Monthly Archives: September 2017

A Movie A Day #241: Distant Justice (1992, directed by Tôru Murakawa)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Inspector Rio (Bunta Sugawara) is visiting Boston for the first time.  When his wife accidentally photographs a drug deal in process, his family his attacked.  Rio’s wife is killed.  His daughter is kidnapped. When Rio goes to the local police, he gets no help.  It does not matter that Chief Bradfield (George Kenendy!) is an old friend of his.  Bradfield is on the verge of retirement and he knows that almost every cop in his precinct is corrupt.  The drug syndicate is so powerful that even the local politicians (represented by David Carradine in the role of Joe Foley) are in their back pocket.  Rio is told to go back to Japan but instead, Rio wages war on the Boston syndicate himself.  With the help of one of Boston’s only honest cops (Eric Lutes) and Bradfield, Rio sets out to rescue his daughter and get justice!  Distant justice!

Distant Justice is a typical low-budget 90s action film.  Bystanders get shot, bad guys get blown up, and there’s a shot of someone screaming as he plunges to his death.  The problem with Distant Justice is that it totally wastes David Carradine in a nothing role as a crooked politician.  If Carradine is in a movie about a cop seeking vengeance on a drug lord, Carradine either has to play the cop or he has to be play the drug lord.  If he is cast in any role other than that, the movie has to be considered a failure.  George Kennedy is his usual likable self (Kennedy built one of the longest careers in the movie on pure likability) but even that cannot make up for not taking advantage of having David Carradine as a member of the cast.  Distant Justice is a missed opportunity.

Little Tin God: SHIELD FOR MURDER (United Artists 1954)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

Edmond O’Brien  is big, burly, and brutal in 1954’s SHIELD FOR MURDER, a grim film noir about a killer cop trapped in that ol’ inevitable downward spiral. It’s a good (though not great) crime drama that gave the actor a seat in the director’s chair, sharing credit with another first timer, Howard W. Koch. The film, coming at the end of the first noir cycle, strives for realism, but almost blows it in the very first scene when the shadow of a boom mike appears on an alley fence! Chalk it up to first-timer’s jitters, and a budget that probably couldn’t afford retakes.

O’Brien, noted for such noir thrillers as THE KILLERS , WHITE HEAT, and DOA, stars as crooked cop Barney Nolan, who murders a bookie in that alley I just mentioned and rips him off for 25 grand. Apartently, this isn’t the first time Nolan’s killed, with the…

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Music Video of the Day: Amber by 311 (2002, dir. The Malloys)

Posted on by Valerie Troutman

i like blood recently told me to put on Amber by 311 because it would make me vomit. How could I not take that challenge?

I didn’t vomit. It is a song I can honestly say that I forgot existed. I’m not sure what memories this conjures up. I wanna say, sitting in a car in a parking lot outside of Togo’s. That’s all I’ve got.

The video, I’m almost 100% certain, I didn’t see it until I sat down to write this post.

What can I say about it?
You can say it’s not very good and you’ll forget it the instant it’s over.
We’re doing a question and answer post again?
Yes.
Fine.

Q: Why doesn’t the camera just go through the beads at the start?
A: Because the video is obsessed with fade transitions. It probably saved them money as well.

Q: Why is he lifting his hand in the air? He does it several times during the video.
A: It’s because melismas were popular at the time. There were a lot of artists who moved their hands around like that.

Q: Why is his face out of focus?
A: They probably screwed up.

Q: Did you notice the 311 St. sign?
A: In between the annoying jump cuts? Yes, I did.

Q: I guess that’s a street known for streaking, right?
A: Congratulations. You looked up that 311 is the police code for indecent exposure. Anything else?

Q: Umm…he has a hole in his T-Shirt.
A: He sure does. Also, we should be listening to Bad Brains instead of this.

Q: Aren’t you going to show some screenshots of stuff that happens outside that room?
A: Nothing happens out there.

Q: Very true, but there is one person people might recognize.
A: Fine. If you look at the scenes where lead-singer Nick Hexum is in the water, then you’ll notice that the woman he is with is Nicole Scherzinger. She was his fiancee at the time, a member of Eden’s Crush, and would go on to do things such as The Pussycat Dolls. The song is about her.

Q: I think that’s it. That is unless you want to make a joke about the campfire bit by trying to tie it to Cabin Fever (2002) and Doctor Dog.
A: I’ll pass. The rest of the video, campfire included, is just a group of people doing things at the beach. It’s as calming as watching other people have fun at the beach. That is to say, it’s really boring.

Q: Wait a second. I forgot to ask who made this thing?
A: The Malloys directed it. They are actually Emmett Malloy and Brendan Malloy who have somewhere between 40-50 music video credits to their names. The video’s first assistant director was John Downer. He has worked as such on around 83 music videos. They’ve all done other work.

Q: Gonna end this with your stupid catchphrase?
A: No. I’ll just end it with their drummer apparently having discovering the language from Arrival (2016) seeing as I only enjoyed that film a little more than this video.

A Movie A Day #240: The Funny Farm (1983, directed by Ron Clark)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Mark Champlin (Miles Chapin) is a fresh-faced, aspiring comedian from Cleveland who drives across the country, listening to tapes of Steve Martin.  He arrives in Los Angeles, hoping to become a star.  Despite being too naive and trusting, Mark starts to find success in the cut-throat entertainment industry.  Soon, he is performing at the Funny Farm, a comedy club owned by Gail Corbin (Eileen Brennan, giving the exact same performance that Melissa Leo gave in Showtime’s I’m Dying Up Here).  Mark befriends the other comedians, finds love, and hopes for his big break.

There have been several movies and television shows about the drama that goes on behind the scenes in the world of comedy.  It’s rare that they ever turn out well.  For every successful movie about the struggle to make a living by telling jokes, there are a hundred movies like Punchline or this one.  Whereas Punchline tried to pass Sally Field off as an up-and-coming stand-up comic, The Funny Farm was full of actual comedians.  Almost everyone in the film is playing a thinly disguised versions of themselves and snippets of their acts are used throughout the movie.  (Probably the best known member of the cast is Howie Mandel.)  Unfortunately, none of their acts seem to be very funny.  Miles Chapin comes across like every forgettable comic who ever bombed on The Tonight Show.

Eileen Brennan does a good job as the club owner, even if she is underused.  There is also a good scene where the younger comedians meet a legendary, older comic who turns out to be a racist asshole.  During this scene, The Funny Farm actually has something to say about the way comedy progressed and changed over time.  Otherwise, The Funny Farm is forgettable.

Music Video of the Day: The Lion Sleeps Tonight by Tight Fit (1982, dir. ???)

Posted on by Valerie Troutman

Ummm…let’s just go through this thing.

The video starts off and we see two people playing drums. They pretty much sum up Tight Fit prior to this success of this song: studio musicians.

When this song took off, Steve Grant, Denise Gyngell, and Julie Harris were put out there as a front for a group that existed in name only to promote the song. Much like Bucks Fizz was manufactured to get a song on Eurovision before ending up as a thing, Tight Fit started out as a name in front of session singers. Then they had some actors/singers put out in public before Grant, Gyngell, and Harris became the standard lineup. They were originally there to be pretty faces to sell the song, but when it was found that they could actually sing and people liked them, they kept them around, and an actual group was born. They went through several changes, and over the years we appear to have them back together with Grant, Gyngell and Harris owning the rights to the songs, group name, and presumedly this very video. I’m just going to assume that the people in this video are Grant, Gyngell, and Harris. I have no reason to believe otherwise.

Now we cut to Steve who is decked out like Tarzan Boy.

Am I the only one who looks at this guy and thinks of Peter Williams’ Apophis from Stargate SG-1?

It’s probably just the makeup.

Now we meet the gorilla. At least I’m pretty sure that’s supposed to be a gorilla.

I’m not sure whether that’s Denise or Julie, but she seems intrigued at the sight of the gorilla. Yes. And no, I didn’t know this song had anything to do with that till I watched this video. I’m still not sure it was supposed to have anything to do with that.

Anyways, she looks through her binoculars and sees the Anaconda 2 monkey.

She also sees Steve reminding us that he wasn’t just a singer and dancer, but also a model.

After a few more shots, we finally see the lion.

I know it would have been too dangerous, but I just watched Prince Charming by Adam & The Ants where they seemed to have gotten a real panther. This is a little disappointing.

The flamingo on the other hand, didn’t need to be real. That’s okay with me.

Now it gets weird. Why are Denise and Julie moving the grass with machetes in time to the song? I wouldn’t ask if this music video didn’t go the direction it does.

Denise and Julie get ready to try and trap the lion, but…

with a swinging Steve…

and a little magic, the net gets thrown on them.

No one touches Steve’s lion, but him.

Before long, it’s a party. Where they got the couch? Who cares.

It’s a party where somebody is gonna get laid, as the gorilla shows up to take either Denise or Julie away.

I love the look this guy gets on his face. For this video, with the looks Steve gets on his face, it’s perfect! He’s not gonna waste his closeup.

She’s way too happy to be going off somewhere with a gorilla.

And Steve is looking really happy sucking on that straw.

Then the guy down-front seems to think the video is over before it is, and the lady who went with the gorilla is seen crossing in the background towards the right.

I feel enlightened now that I have seen this video. I’m sure that original writer, Solomon Linda, and George David Weiss, the one who adapted the original tune into The Lion Sleeps Tonight, fully intended the song to be about getting up close and personal with a lion, going off to party with a gorilla, lying on a jungle couch, and drinking from a crazy straw.

Sadly, Linda died in 1962 without having really gotten much from this song. The version most people are probably familiar with is the one done by The Tokens in 1961. It was later used in The Lion King, which is where things get messy. It appears after a fight that included Pete Seeger, Rolling Stone, a movie, and a lawsuit, his family now receives royalties for its use in the past and from its worldwide use from 2006 onward. A bit of a happy ending after such a long fight that at least included the song living on and became a classic even if Linda was not around to see it become as famous as it is today.

It’s nice to come across one of these songs that didn’t have somebody show up recently to claim that it was violating their copyright on something people not only thought was in the public domain, but had become an unofficial anthem for an entire country–Down Under by Men At Work. Here, these are the descendants of the person who made this song possible.

Enjoy!

A Movie A Day #239: Act of Vengeance (1986, directed by John Mackenzie)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Act of Vengeance is an uncompromising look at union corruption and how it hurts the workers while benefitting the bosses.

The year is 1969 and the United Mine Workers of America is one of the biggest and most powerful labor unions in the country.  The UMWA was founded to protect the rights of miners but the current union president, Tony Boyle (Wilford Brimley), is more concerned with enriching himself and consolidating his own power.  Despised by the workers that he represents, Boyle has managed to stay in power through fixed elections and his own fearsome reputation.  When 80 West Virginia miners are killed in an accident, Boyle defends the owners.  That is the last straw for Jock Yablonski (Charlies Bronson), a lifelong miner and proud union man.  Yablonski runs against Boyle for the UMWA presidency and, when the election is stolen from him, Yablonski challenges the results.

Boyle’s solution?  Working through one of his supporters (played by Hoyt Axton), Boyle hires three assassins (Robert Schenkkan, Maury Chaykin, and a young Keanu Reeves) and orders them to kill not only Yablonski but his entire family too.

With a name like Act of Vengeance and a star like Charles Bronson, it would be understandable to assume that this is another Cannon action film where Bronson gets vengeance by blowing away the bad guys.  That’s not the case, though.  Made for HBO, Act of Vengeance is based on a true story of union corruption and murder.  There is violence but very little of it comes from Bronson.  Instead, this is a well-made docudrama about what happens when workers are betrayed by the very people who are supposed to be looking out for them.

Bronson grew up working in the mines and he never forgot the poverty of his youth.  He knew men like the men depicted in this movie and Bronson gives one of his most naturalistic performances as Yablonski.  Brimley is at his gruffest as Boyle and the performances of the actors playing the three hapless but deadly assassins also feel authentic.  Ellen Burstyn and Ellen Barkin are also well-cast as, respectively, Yablonski’s wife and the wife of the main assassin.

Pre Code Confidential #14: THE HALF-NAKED TRUTH (RKO 1932)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

Director Gregory LaCava is remembered today mainly for a pair of bona fide classics: MY MAN GODFREY and STAGE DOOR. LaCava, who started his career in early silent animation, was also responsible for THE HALF-NAKED TRUTH, a Pre-Code screwball comedy begging to be rediscovered. It’s a crazy, innovative, pedal-to-the-metal farce headlined by fast-talking Lee Tracy and “Mexican Spitfire” Lupe Velez as a pair of carny con artists who work their way up to The Great White Way in grand comic style.

Tracy does his rapid-fire spieling schtick as a carnival barker promoting hot-tempered tamale Lupe, a hootchie dancer who spends most of the movie wearing next to nothing. Together with pal Eugene Pallette , they leave the carny life behind (with the law on their tails!) and head for Broadway, where Lee promises Lupe he’ll make her a star. The trio pawn Lupe off as Turkish Princess Exotica (with Tracy pawning off an unwitting…

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This Week’s “Peaks” Addendum : Some Quick Additional Thoughts On The Finale

Posted on by Ryan C. (fourcolorapocalypse)

Ryan C. (fourcolorapocalypse)'s avatarTrash Film Guru

Yeah, it’s a holiday, but you’d never know it if you follow any number of Twin Peaks-related fan sites, or even any “entertainment” sites in general. The long-dormant wheels within any number of Lynch-nerd minds are spinning and churning, ganglionic gears grinding in a way not seen since Mulholland Drive first hit theaters. We want to know what we just watched, and since David Lynch isn’t exactly telling us, we’re doing the work for ourselves. In other words, the fun is just beginning.

So — that finale. Yup, it was a doozy. And many a wiser and more astute critic than I appears to have met their match when it comes to trying to decode what Lynch and Mark Frost were “getting at” not just with it, but with the entirety of Twin Peaks 2017/Twin Peaks : The Return/Twin Peaks season three. Hell, they’re even second-guessing…

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