As some of our regular readers undoubtedly know, I am involved in a few weekly live tweets on twitter. I host #FridayNightFlix every Friday, I co-host #ScarySocial on Saturday, and I am one of the five hosts of #MondayActionMovie! Every week, we get together. We watch a movie. We tweet our way through it.
Tonight, for #ScarySocial, I will be hosting 1984’s NINJA III: THE DOMINATION!
If you want to join us on Saturday night, just hop onto twitter, start the film at 9 pm et, and use the #ScarySocial hashtag! The film is available on Prime and Tubi! I’ll be there co-hosting and I imagine some other members of the TSL Crew will be there as well. It’s a friendly group and welcoming of newcomers so don’t be shy!
4 Shots From 4 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!
Today is the birthday of our greatest living cinematographer, Roger Deakins! It’s time for….
4 Shots From 4 Roger Deakins Films
Barton Fink (1991, dir by the Coen Brothers, cinematography by Roger Deakins)
The Hurricane (1999. dir by Norman Jewison, DP: Roger Deakins)
Skyfall (2012, dir by Sam Mendes, cinematography by Roger Deakins)
Sicario (2015, dir by Denis Villeneuve, cinematography by Roger Deakins)
Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Friday the 13th: The Series, a show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The entire series can be found on YouTube!
This week …. hey, where is everyone?
Episode 3.14 “Repetition”
(Dir by William Fruet, originally aired on February 5th, 1990)
After newspaper columnist Walter Cromwell (David Ferry) accidentally hits and kills a girl with his car, he finds himself consumed with guilt. He also start to hear the girl’s voice in his head, demanding that he bring her back to life. Walter just happens to have a cursed amulet, one that allows the owner to bring someone else back to life as long as he kills someone who is wearing the amulet. Walter’s first victim is his dying mother. But after he kills her, he starts to hear her voice demanding to be brought back to life. So, Walter commits another murder, one after the other, trying to bring back to life every one who he kills.
This was an interesting episode because neither Johnny nor Jack were anywhere to be seen. Instead, it was just Micki and she only appeared at the start and the end of the episode. The entire episode focused on Walter and his descent into madness and, it must be said, that worked just fine. This show’s strength has always been its collection of cursed antiques and this episode allowed us to see how one of them actually works. We saw how the amulet manipulated Walter and how Walter himself became more and more hooked on using the amulet’s power. I’ve always viewed the antiques as being a bit like drugs and their users being addicts and this episode certainly played into that theory.
This was an intense episode, featuring moody visuals and a strong script from David Lynch’s daughter, the future director Jennifer Lynch. After last week’s odd episode, it was nice to see an episode this week that actually got to the heart of what this series was always supposed to be about.
Mike Kovac (Charles Bronson) is working on a pictorial profile of a banker in a small town outside of New York City, when a man named Terry Killeen (Tom Pittman) robs the bank and kills the banker. Killeen sees Kovac’s camera and forces him to come along with them. Killeen wants to be famous so he has Kovac document his one man crime spree as he robs a bank every day for six straight days. Kovac takes pictures at each robbery and sends them to his friend and small town newspaper man, Jenkins (Russell Collins), to publish the stories. Jenkins figures out that Kovac is using the pictures to provide clues to where they are heading, mainly the Lone Pine Lodge. It seems the college girl that Killeen loves, Sara (Mayo Loiseaux) is at the Lodge and Killeen thinks she will reciprocate his feelings now that he’s a famous outlaw. With Killeen planning to kill Kovac once he’s taken a picture with him and Sara, will Jenkins be able to figure out the clues and make it to Lone Pine and save his friend before it’s too late?!
The most unique aspect of “Profile of a Killer” is the performance of Tom Pittman as the bank robber / murderer, Terry Killeen. He’s certainly over the top, but his cackling laugh as he murders, robs, and terrorizes everyone around him is somewhat unsettling. Sadly, Tom Pittman would die on October 31st, 1958, one week after this episode aired, in a car accident. I also liked the performance of Russell Collins as Kovac’s friend and newspaper man, Jenkins. Jenkins’ day job may be as a newspaper editor, but he makes it clear throughout the episode to the local sheriff’s deputy Gilligan (Wayne Heffley) that he’s planning on getting out of the office and saving Kovac by himself if he has to. That’s pretty much exactly what he does. The episode concludes with a rifle wielding Jenkins and Kovac working together to take on Killeen in a night time gunfight. It’s a fun scene, with Kovac’s flashbulbs and Jenkins’ deadeye shooting skills both coming in handy. And of course, there’s the continued excellence of Charles Bronson in the lead as Mike Kovac. In this episode he uses his brain more than his brawn. He didn’t get any real cool lines, and he didn’t get the opportunity to kick any butt. That’s always a missed opportunity with Bronson, but he still dominates the proceedings with his unique charisma and presence.
“Profile of a Killer” doesn’t give Bronson any true badass moments, but it does create some memorable characters for his Mike Kovac to interact with, and I enjoyed that very much!
HostageForADay is the only film that the much-missed John Candy ever directed. (It premiered on Canadian television, a few months after his death.) It’s also one of the only films to feature George Wendt in a leading role, as opposed to being a supporting player. The film is full of funny people like Don Lake and Robin Duke. John Vernon plays Candy’s father-in-law. A lot of talent went into this movie. It’s too bad that it’s not very good.
Wendt does give a good performance in the lead role. He plays Warren Kooey, who is depressed on his 41st birthday. His wife (Robin Duke) has drained their bank account to remodel their house and apparently shag their interior decorator, Hondo (Currie Graham). No one respects him at work. Warren’s reflection in the mirror tells Warren that he needs to do something with his life. Warren decides to fake a hostage situation so that he can collect the ransom. The problem is that the SWAT team has recently had their budget cut and can’t afford to pay the amount that Warren comes up with. Then some real kidnappers (led by John Candy, making a very brief appearance) hold him hostage for real. While this goes on, Wendt continues to talk to his reflection in the mirror and there are a few sweet but out-of-place scenes featuring him reuniting with his childhood sweetheart, Diane St. Clair (Christopher Templeton).
As a director, Candy never seems to be sure what type of film he’s trying to make. The comedy is broad but Candy also tries to sneak in some sentimental moments and the end results just doesn’t mix well. He gets some good performances for his cast but the film itself never really comes together. This was George Wendt’s only starring role and he does a good enough job that I regret he didn’t get bigger roles once Cheers went off the air because, judging by this film, he could have handled them I just wish this movie was better.
Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing St. Elsewhere, a medical show which ran on NBC from 1982 to 1988. The show can be found on Hulu and, for purchase, on Prime!
This week, we start season 2!
Episode 2.1 “Ties That Bind”
(Dir by Bruce Paltrow, originally aired on October 26th, 1983)
The second season is here and there are changes to be found in the opening credits.
David Birney and G.W. Bailey are no longer listed in the opening credits. I’m not sorry to see Birney go as Dr. Samuels was never that interesting of a character. I will miss Bailey’s performance as Dr. Beale.
Norman Lloyd is now listed in the credits, appearing right after Ed Flanders. Ellen Bry, Kim Miyori, and Eric Laneuville are also now listed in the opening credits. That’s good. Last season, Shirley Daniels (played by Ellen Bry) was one of the most important characters on the show and it always seemed strange that she was left out of the opening. Mark Harmon, sporting a mustache, appears in the credits, though he didn’t appear in this episode. The final addition to the opening credits is Nancy Stafford, who does appear in this episode.
Stafford plays Joan Halloran, the new city budget advisor who has been assigned to cut St. Eligius’s budget. She tells Westphall and Auschlander that St. Eligius is not popular downtown. “They call you St. Elsewhere,” she says. Joan wants to do away with the animal research lab, which is a part of the hospital that has never been mentioned before. (And with good reason. Boo, animal research, boo!) Westphall finally agrees, on the condition that the city fund Dr. Craig’s attempt to perform a heart transplant on teacher Eve Leighton (Marian Mercer).
Wisely, Dr. Craig gets a lot of screentime in this episode. If the first season seemed to often be unsure of just how abrasive the show should allow Craig to be, the second season premiere would seem to suggest that the show’s writers realized that the more abrasive Craig is, the better. Of course, Dr. Craig has good reason to be in a bad mood. As he confesses to Nurse Rosenthal, he caught his son doing drugs. Craig explains he kicked him out of the house and now, he wants nothing to do with him.
Speaking of drugs, orderly Luther (played by Eric Laneuville) finally manages to capture the thief who has been stealing all the drugs from the hospital. Dr. White is no longer under suspicion! Yay, I guess. I don’t know. Dr. White wasn’t in much of this episode but he still cames across as being a jerk. I have to admit that I groaned a little when I saw he was still on the show. A part of me is hoping he’ll get a redemption arc this season but, from his behavior during rounds, he still seems to be a jackass.
Speaking of jackasses, when Jerry Singleton (Alan Arkin) discovers that his wife, Fran (Piper Laurie), has had a stroke, he responds by crashing his car into the ER and then refusing to leave the doctors along while they try to save his wife’s life. Jerry is convincing that he knows everything and he’s very demanding. Naturally, Fran’s doctor is Jack Morrison because Morrison always gets the really depressing cases. Fran does wake up from her coma but she neither speaks no seems to hear anything anyone says to her. I can’t imagine this is going to end well, mostly because she’s Morrison’s patient and things never seem to go well when Morrison is involved. (What’s really sad is that Morrison, unlike Peter White, is a good doctor! He just has rotten luck.)
Shirley Daniels finds out that Fiscus is cheating on her with Kathy Martin, who spends most of this episode promoting cryogenics. Shirley responds by dumping Fiscus and telling him that he’s a pig. Fiscus tells Kathy that they no longer have to sneak around, just for Kathy to say that the sneaking around was the whole point. She promptly dumps Ficus.
Finally, Dr. Ehrlich meets a woman, Bobbi (Jean Bruce Scott) at the laundromat. They go back to her apartment. She strips down to her underwear. She has Ehrlich tie her to the bed. Ehrlich realizes that he has to get something from his car so he runs outside and …. gets locked out. And then he nearly gets arrested while trying to use his credit card to open the building’s door. However, the next day, Bobbi shows up at the hospital for her “encounter group,” and the two of them are reunited. Again, I have a feeling this is not going to end well, just because it involves Dr. Ehrlich.
Hey, this episode was pretty good! It moved quickly, it reintroduced us to the cast, and all of the stories were actually fairly interesting. It’s obvious that show’s producers paid attention with what didn’t work during season one and they made an effort to improve things with season two. Compared to the majority of this first season’s episodes, the pace was quicker, the humor was sharper, and just about everyone got a moment or two to shine. I’m looking forward to next week!
4 Shots From 4 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!
Actor Lau Ching-Wan won his 4th Hong Kong Film Award for Best Actor last month for the film PAPA. Today’s “4 Shots From 4 Films” celebrate Lau, one of the world’s great actors, and those four films that featured his incredible performances.
61* is about two baseball player and two friends who couldn’t seem to be more different.
Roger Maris (Barry Pepper) is an introverted family man who doesn’t like it when reporters show up at his house in search of a story or a quote. He’s a good ball player, one of the best, but he doesn’t want to be a celebrity. Mickey Mantle (Thomas Jane) is a larger-than-life personality, a beloved figure on the field and in the dugout. Mickey loves being famous and the fans love him. Both Maris and Mantle are members of the New York Yankees. Because Mantle is struggling with his drinking, he becomes Maris’s roommate when they’re on the road. In 1961, the two friends both go after Babe Ruth’s record of 60 home runs in a season. The press presents their season as a battle, a race to see who will be the first to hit the sixty-first home run of the season. Mantle and Maris, though, are just swinging the bat and making plays.
I really enjoyed 61*, which is a baseball film made by and for people who love baseball. I liked the contrast between the quiet Maris and the charismatic Mantle. Even though Maris is a hard worker and a good ballplayer, Mantle is the fan favorite and the one that people actually want to break the record. I appreciated that Maris and Mantle remained friends even when the press tried to turn them into rivals. That’s what teamwork is all about. Barry Pepper and Thomas Jane were great as Maris and Mantle and the movie showed how each man dealt with the stress of possibly breaking Babe Ruth’s record.
(Why is there an asterisk in the title? Babe Ruth set his record in a season that only had 154 games. The 1961 baseball season was 8 games longer. The asterisk was added as a reminder that Maris and Mantle had 8 more games than Ruth did to try to break the record. Baseball fans understand how important accurate statistics are to a player’s career and a team’s season.)
61* celebrates the way baseball used to be, a game played by athletes who had to depend on skill and teamwork instead of performance enhancing drugs. The movie opens with Maris’s family watching as Mark McGuire closes in on breaking the record. McGuire would only briefly hold the record. He would lose it, for 48 minutes, to Sammy Sosa and then, three years after winning it back, he would lose it a second time to Barry Bonds. Of course, Roger Maris won the record without using steroids so, as far as I’m concerned, it still belongs to him.
If you’re a baseball fan, 61* is a film that you have to see.
Through the Shattered Lens 