Artist Profile: John A. Coughlin (1885 — 1943)

Posted on August 10, 2022 by Dazzling Erin

March 1936

John A. Coughlin was born in Chicago in 1885 and was educated at Notre Dame and the Art Institute of Chicago. Like many of the artists of the pulp era, he got his start in advertising. He first started painting covers in 1913 and, for the next thirty years, he was a busy illustrator. Among his credits: The Popular and Detective Story, Argosy, Complete Stories, Detective Fiction Weekly, Detective Tales, Real Western, Short Stories, Top-Notch, and Wild West Weekly. He was only 58 when he died in 1943 but he left behind a long legacy of pulp art.

Here is a sampling of Coughlin’s work.

September, 1924

September, 1926

May, 1929

April, 1931

May, 1931

September, 1931

October, 1932

August, 1933

October, 1933

August, 1934

February, 1936

October, 1937

August, 1938

Film Review: Running Red (dir by Jerry P. Jacobs)

Posted on August 10, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I have to admit that I feel a little bit cheated by the 1999 film, Running Red.

I figured that, with a name like Running Red, the film would be about a redhead who did a lot of running. Since I am a redhead that does a lot of running, I figured that I would be able to relate to this film. Unfortunately, while it’s true that the film does feature a redhead, she doesn’t get to do much running. In fact, she doesn’t really get to do much of anything. Katherine (Angie Everhart) is mostly just there to support her husband, except for those moments that she thinks he’s cheating on him because he’s lied to her about being a former mercenary.

Her husband, who is played by Jeff Speakman, goes by the name of Greg. He’s got a beard and he sells real estate and he has to go on a lot of business trips. However, before he grew the beard, Greg’s name was Grigori and he was apparently a Russian even though, even in the flashbacks that open the film, he never had a Russian accent. Grigori was a part of some sort of weird Russian military unit but he grew disgusted with the ruthlessness of the unit’s leader, Alexi (Stanley Kamel). After one particularly brutal mission, Grigori dropped his submachine gun to the ground. In the movie, this is shown to us in slow motion so we know what that this isn’t just a standard shot of a soldier carelessly dropping a loaded weapon. No, this shot is significant. This is the …. SLO MO OF DISILLUSIONMENT!

Anyway, a few years pass and Grigori is now Greg and he’s married to Katherine and they have a daughter. When two meth addicts steal Greg’s SUV (with his daughter in the backseat), Greg promptly steals an ambulance and chases them down. Using his Russian combat training, Greg beats up the two men. He thinks that no one has seen him but it just so happens that some old busy body was outside with a video camera. Greg makes the news!

Unfortunately, the news report is seen by Alexi. Alexi tracks Greg down and demands that Greg help him out with a few more missions. Wishing to protect his family, Greg agrees. He winds up not only lying to his wife about why he suddenly has to go to Detroit but he also misses her high school reunion! (She even had her old cheerleading outfit cleaned for the special occasion.) Greg really should know better than to lie to a redhead. He also should have known better than to think Alexi was ever going to leave him alone. Greg soon discovers that Alexi isn’t going to be satisfied with just a few missions. In fact, Alexi wants Greg to assassinate a city councilman who either supports or opposed the construction of a stadium. To be honest, I kind of had a hard time keeping straight how everyone felt about the stadium.

It may seem as if the filmmakers weren’t that concerned with coming up with a coherent plot and that’s because they weren’t. The entire film has a make-it-up-as-you-along feel to it. That makes the plot impossible to follow but it also leads to a few moments that are so over-the-top and weird that you can’t help but kind of love then. At one point, Jeff Speakman steals a bus and uses it for a high-speed chase. A little later, he ends up getting into multiple fights on a luxury yacht. I’m not sure who he was fighting or why they were fighting but it really didn’t matter. All that matters is that most of the fights were well-choreographed and the action was quick-paced and didn’t have too many slow spots. Jeff Speakman was a professional martial artist. Judging by this film, he couldn’t act worth a damn but he could throw a convincing punch and he looked good hitting people. It’s best not to demand too much from a film like this. After all, Running Red never said it was going to be anything other than a silly action movie.

That said, I’m a bit disappointed that Katherine didn’t get to do more because, as played by Angie Everhart, she had the potential to be an interesting character and, like me, she was lucky enough to be one of the 2% of the population that has naturally red hair. That said, Running Red is both frequently dumb and often entertaining. It delivers what the majority of viewers will be watching it for (i.e., mindless action) and there’s something to be said for a film that is at peace with what it is.

On a personal note (and yes, I’m aware that it’s kind of silly for me to say that when all of my reviews are, more or less, personal notes), I watched Running Red on YouTube as a part of this week’s #MondayActionMovie live tweet. The version that I saw featured French opening credits and the first few minutes of dialogue were also in French before abruptly switching over to English. I have to admit that I was a little disappointed when everyone suddenly started speaking English. I was looking forward to tweeting along in French! Oh well!

Scenes I Love: Billy Jack Defends Children And Other Living Things

Posted on August 10, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today would have been the 91st birthday of Tom Laughlin, the independent film pioneer who gave the world Billy Jack.

In honor of the day of his birth, here’s a scene that I love from Billy Jack. The townspeople think that they can get away with humiliating the students from the Freedom School. Well, Billy Jack’s got something to say about that and, as always, it starts with him taking off his shoes.

Artwork of the Day: Mistress of Wynds (by George Ziel)

Posted on August 10, 2022 by Dazzling Erin

by George Ziel

Feel the romance!

Music Video of the Day: The Wicker Man by Iron Maiden (2012, directed by ????)

Posted on August 10, 2022 by Jedadiah Leland

In the year 2000, Iron Maiden proved that they still had it with a song based on the movie The Wicker Man. The song became one of their late career hits, earning the band another Grammy nomination. This was the first song that the band rehearsed after the return of Bruce Dickinson and Adrian Smith. Dickinson later said the song was an attempt to capture the feeling of being on stage and watching the audience chant along to what you’re singing.

This video features the band performing the song live in 2012, in Santiago, Chile. An earlier video, which was released at the same time as the song and which was directed by Dean Karr, featured the band performing the song on a stage while a fire raged behind them.

Enjoy!

In The Line of Duty: Manhunt in the Dakotas (1991, directed by Dick Lowry)

Posted on August 9, 2022 by Jedadiah Leland

On February 13th, 1983, a group of U.S. Marshals attempted to arrest a man named Gordon Kahl in North Dakota. Kahl was an outspoken tax resistor. He had already served time in Leavenworth for refusing to pay his taxes. When he was released, he continued to refuse to pay and, in violation of his parole, started to attend meetings of the Posse Comitatus, an organization that refused to recognize the authority of any government above the county level. Because Kahl was so prominent in anti-government circles, the plan was to make an example out of him by arresting him as he left a Posse Comitatus meeting. Instead, Kahl, his son, and an associate opened fire on the U.S. Marshals, killing two of them. Kahl escaped and, for several months, was the subject of an FBI manhunt.

To make clear, Gordon Kahl was not a good man. Gordon Kahl was a white supremacist and an anti-Semitic conspiracy theorist who was a follower of the Christian Identity movement. While Kahl’s supporters claimed that Kahl originally fired on the marshals in self-defense, eyewitnesses testified that Kahl personally executed one marshal after he had already been wounded and was no longer a threat. Gordon Kahl was no hero but, at a time when many farmers were struggling financially and felt helpless as they watched the banks and the government seize their land, many locals did sympathize with him. The government’s attempt to publicly arrest Kahl and make an example out of him was seen as a classic example of government overreach. The government was so eager to catch Kahl and Kahl was initially so successful in eluding them that Gordon Kahl became a folk hero. When Kahl was discovered hiding out in an Arkansas farmhouse, it led to Kahl killing another deputy and the the government firing over a thousand rounds into the house before eventually setting it on fire. In their effort to capture Gordon Kahl, the government behaved just as destructively as Kahl always said they would.

The hunt for Gordon Kahl served as the basis for the third of NBC’s In The Line of Duty films, Manhunt in the Dakotas. Rod Steiger played Gordon Kahl. Michael Gross, fresh off of playing a tax resistor in Tremors, played the FBI agent who headed up the manhunt. Dick Lowry, director of the previous two installments of In The Line of Duty, returned to direct.

Manhunt in the Dakotas is a fair and even-handed look at the search for Gordon Kahl. The film doesn’t shy away from Kahl’s racism and his paranoia but, at the same time, it also shows why many people instinctively distrust anyone who says that he’s from the government. The film shows why so many supported Kahl without supporting Kahl itself. Gross’s FBI agent may start out as rigid and by-the-book but he quickly learns that’s not the best way to get people to answer his questions. Having come to understand why the people of the Dakotas don’t trust the government, he can only helplessly watch as the government does everything in its power to make Kahl’s paranoid claims seem plausible. The FBI agent is determined to bring Gordon Kahl in alive but Kahl would rather be a martyr and it seems that the rest of law enforcement is all too happy to help Kahl achieve that. Other than a few scenes were he indulges in his tendency to overact, Steiger gives a convincing performance as Kahl and he is well-matched by Michael Gross as the agent who comes to realize that there’s more to enforcing the law than giving orders and threatening to send people to prison.

Manhunt in the Dakotas would be followed by In The Line of Duty: Mob Justice, which I will review tomorrow.

Book Review: Born to Kill by John D. Revere

Posted on August 9, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Published in 1984, Born to Kill is the third volume in the Justin Perry saga.

This time, the CIA’s most sex-obsessed assassin is on assignment in Jamaica. There have been a series of mysterious chicken attacks in both Jamaica and Florida and Justin’s boss, the Old Man, is sure that it is somehow connected to the upcoming launching of a space shuttle in Cape Canaveral. However, it’s not only chickens that have been making trouble. Someone has been beheading government officials across Europe. Justin’s assignment is to solve the mystery behind the chicken attacks and make sure that SADIF doesn’t interfere with the shuttle launch. The Old Man has decide that he doesn’t want any SADIF operatives taken alive so, naturally, Justin Perry is the man to send.

Of course, Justin is more concerned with his latest girlfriend but she’s apparently blown up while driving to the airport. Now, Justin not only has to solve the mystery of the killer chickens but he also has to get vengeance for his latest murdered lover. But, before he does that, he has to spend a few days at the local brothel with another CIA agent because he’s Justin Perry.

Anyway, Born to Kill moves along at a decent enough pace, up until we get a flashback to the time that an 8 year-old Justin Perry had sex with a chicken and was then traumatized when his grandparents possibly served him the same chicken for dinner and then …. wait, what? Justin Perry did what? Yes, you read that correctly. The action in the book stops so that Justin Perry can remember the time that he had sex with a chicken. First off, ew. Secondly, does this guy even have any good childhood memories? Third, why is this even in the book? It certainly doesn’t make Justin Perry into a sympathetic character. Later on, when Perry was attacked by several mutant chickens, I was rooting for the chickens.

When I read the first two books, I assumed that they were meant to be a satiric and that Justin Perry was meant to be a parody of the heroes who appeared in other pulp paperbacks. But I have to say that the book treats the chicken incident very seriously and, just as Perry spent Vatican Kill debating the existence of God, he spends a good deal of this book thinking about the decline of morality in society. (He blames the sexual magnetism of John F. Kennedy.) What I’m saying is that I’m getting the feeling that the author may have meant these books to be taken seriously. If so, agck!

Anyway, to be honest with you, the whole chicken thing was really gross and I nearly stopped reading at that point. Because I’m a completist, I did continue with the book but I have to admit that it was more skimming than in-depth reading as I was kind of worried to find out what other barnyard animals Justin Perry may have had sexual relations with. And really, I think that might be the best way to read these books. Skim over it all as quickly as possible and don’t make the mistake of thinking about what any of it means. Justin Perry saves the day and kills a lot of people and, at one point, watches as a woman he’s just had sex with gets eaten by a shark. He’s fascinated by the fact that the shark is eating a bit of him along with her. The main theme of the series seems to be that Justin Perry really needed to get help. Let’s just put it like that.

Film Review: Fortress: Sniper’s Eye (dir by Josh Sternfeld)

Posted on August 9, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Fortress: Sniper’s Eye is a sequel to the 2021 film, Fortress.

If you haven’t seen Fortress, the plot goes something like this. A group of mercenaries take over a resort that is populated by retired spies. Robert Michaels (Bruce Willis) and his son, Paul (Jesse Metcalfe), have to set aside their difference and work together to defeat Frederick Balzary (Chad Michael Murray).

Meanwhile, the plot of Fortress: Sniper’s Eye goes something like this. A group of mercenaries take over a now-closed resort that was once populated by retired spies. Robert Michaels (Bruce Willis) and his son, Paul (Jesse Metcalfe), have to continue to set aside their difference and work together to defeat Frederick Balzary (Chad Michael Murray).

Now, to the film’s credit, Sniper’s Eye does admit that it’s largely recycling the plot of the first film. When Balzary and his henchmen show up for a second time, Paul exclaims, “Didn’t any of you die!?” It’s a funny line and one that shows that Sniper’s Eye is aware that it’s all a bit ludicrous. Whatever other faults the film may have, you can’t complain that it’s not self-aware.

Unfortunately, when Balzary and his people invade for the second time, Paul is hosting a gathering with his fiancée and his future mother-in-law. They’re all taken hostage. Because Robert was wounded while rescuing Balzary’s wife from some killer Russians, he spends most of the the movie providing encouragement from a hospital bed. Fortunately, towards the end of the movie, he is able to get out of bed and help out his son. Paul is obviously happy to see his father and the viewers are happy to see Bruce Willis actually doing some action stuff.

Needless to say, Willis is going to be the main attraction for most viewers. (I imagine a few One Tree Hill fans will be watching for Chad Michael Murray.) Sniper’s Eye was one of the film that Willis completed before announcing his retirement from acting. Knowing what we now know about Willis’s health and the conditions under which he made his final films, watching something like Fortress: Sniper’s Eye can feel awkward. I cringed when I saw Willis in the hospital bed, looking tired and talking about how he was getting too old to play the hero. At that moment, it felt as if the character and the actor became the same and it was a bit difficult to watch.

That said, Bruce Willis gives a convincing performance in Fortress: Sniper’s Eye. He may not have the same charismatic swagger that he had when he was healthy but Willis does still look credible sneaking down a hallway while carrying a gun. Even though the action scenes all use a rather obvious stunt double, Willis is still convincing in his role.

As for the rest of the film, the pacing is abysmal and the performances are uneven, with Jesse Metcalde making a bland hero and Chad Michael Murray going overboard as the main villain. This is another film with a jumbled timeline so I feel sorry for anyone who is looking away from the screen whenever the “Two weeks later” title card flashes by. On the plus side, the resort scenery was nice to look at and Natali Yura gave a convincing performance as Balzary’s wife. As far as Bruce Willis’s later films are concerned, Fortress: Sniper’s Eye is superior to American Siege but comes in far below both Gasoline Alley and A Day To Die.

4 Shots From 4 Films: Special Robert Aldrich Edition

Posted on August 9, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

4 Or More Shots From 4 Or More Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films lets the visuals do the talking!

On this date, 104 years ago, Robert Aldrich was born in Cranston, Rhode Island. The first cousin of New York Governor and Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, Robert Aldrich eschewed business and politics to pursue a career in film. Though his wonderfully melodramatic films were often undervalued when first released, Aldrich is now seen as one of the most influential filmmakers of all time. Tarantino loves him.

In honor of Aldrich’s career and legacy, here are….

4 Shots From 4 Robert Aldrich Films