Author Archives: Jedadiah Leland

Cinemax Memories: Raw Nerve (1991, directed by David A. Prior)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Raw Nerve opens with a serial killer haunting Mobile, Alabama, using a pump action shotgun to shoot women in the face while they’re wearing red high heels.  Race car driver Jimmy Clayton (Ted Prior, brother of this film’s director) has been having visions of the murders so he goes to the police and offers to help them out.  Unfortunately for Jimmy, neither Detective Ellis (Jan-Michael Vincent!) nor Captain Gavin (Glenn Ford!!) believe in psychic phenomena so they toss Jimmy’s ass in jail.  While Ellis’s ex-wife, Gloria (Sandahl Bergman!!!), tries to prove that Jimmy’s innocent, Jimmy’s mechanic (Randall “Tex” Cobb!!!!), takes an unhealthy interest in Jimmy’s teenage sister, Gina (TRACI LORDS!!!!!).

As you can tell from reading the paragraph above, the main thing that this film has going for it is a cast full of recognizable B-actors.  Though none of them are really at their best, Raw Nerve is still your only chance to see Glenn Ford, Jan-Michael Vincent, and Sandahl Bergman all sharing scenes together.  Unfortunately, despite all of the famous names in the cast, Ted Prior got the most screen time and he really didn’t have the screen presence to pull off either the role or the film’s loony final twist.

The best thing about Raw Nerve is that it features both Randall “Tex” Cobb and Traci Lords.  Lords was a legitimately good actress, even if her past as a pornographic actress made it impossible for her to get the type of roles that she really deserved.  Lords doesn’t get to do much in Raw Nerve but she does her best to make Gina into a real character instead of just a generic victim.  Meanwhile, Randall “Tex” Cobb is a marvel as a biker who is never seen without a beer in his hand.  When Cobb eventually leaves the movie, you miss him.

Raw Nerve was one of the many low-budget thrillers that came out in the 90s.  Like many of these films, Raw Nerve was directed by David A. Prior and released by Action International Pictures, which shared both an acronym and a sensibility with American International Pictures.  Though films like Raw Nerve may not have been great art, they were entertaining if you came across one of them on Cinemax.  Where else were you going to see Tex Cobb and Jan-Michael Vincent battle it out at two in the morning?

Video Game Review: Wolfman (1988, CRL Group)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

In Wolfman, you are David.  You wake up one morning in your tiny bedroom and you realize that something bad has happened.

A few commands later and you discover that you are covered in blood.

You are a werewolf!  You’ve already killed and you know that it’s going to happen again unless you find a cure for your condition.  For the rest of this challenging text adventure, it is up to you to figure out how to get out of town and find the cure.  Along the way, you will have to find ways to fight off your urges to kill.

Assuming that you get David out of the village, the game will switch gears and you’ll play from the viewpoint of Nadia, a young woman who falls in love with David and who, for David to continue on his journey and ultimately be cured of his condition, has to spend the night with David without becoming his latest victim.

If you pull that off, the game then switches back to being told from David’s point of view as he attempts to solve the final few puzzles that will lead him to the cure.

Wolfman is one of the many horror-themed text adventures that were written by Rod Pike in the 1980s.  Though the majority of the game is text, there are some graphics, mostly still shots of the werewolf’s victims.  In 1988, the graphics were considered shocking enough to get it an 18 certificate from the British Board of Film Censors.

The first challenge of playing a game like Wolfman today is getting into the right mindset to play a 1980s text adventure.  The game’s vocabulary and list of commands is impressive for 1988 but still extremely limited when compared to what we are used to today.  I spent several turns trapped in my bedroom and growing increasingly frustrated until I finally realized that the game considered “look” and “examine” to be two very different commands.

Once you get passed that, though, it’s an engrossing, well-written, and challenging game, one that puts you right into the mind of both a werewolf and one of his potential victims.  It’s available at the Internet Archive.  And, if you’re like me and you usually have to cheat to solve the puzzles in games like this, a walk-through is available here.

Music Video of the Day: Now You’re Gone by Whitesnake (1990, directed by Wayne Isham)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

“I remember shooting the video with Wayne Isham in front of a sold out crowd at the Spectrum in Philadelphia, unfortunately it received minimal airplay as MTV was changing its format… still, I think it’s one of the best videos we’ve done…”

–– David Coverdale on Now You’re Gone

Whitesnake was one of the top bands of the 80s but, by the time they released this video, their popularity was in decline as both rap and grunge eclipsed hair metal.  Now You’re Gone is one of Whitesnake’s best songs but, when it was first released, it barely charted in the United States.  Shortly after this video, Whitesnake broke up.  After a 1994 reunion, the band officially reformed in 2002.  Here I Go Again is now used in motorcycle insurance commercials, proving the circle of life.

The video for Now You’re Gone was filmed in Philadelphia, before and during an afternoon show.  It’s one of Whitesnake’s best videos, though the presence of Tawny Kitaen is missed.

Enjoy!

Music Video of the Day: Tragic Comic by Extreme (1993, directed by Paris Barclay)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Tragic Comic was a third third and final single to be released off of Extreme’s third album, III Sides to Every Story.  This was Extreme’s last single to crack the UK Top 40, reaching #15.

The video for Tragic Comic features Extreme’s lead singer, Gary Cherone, trying to have the perfect date with his neighbor and failing in almost every way.  Even when things look like they’re finally going right, she ends up falling down an elevator shaft.  Unfortunately, I have not been able to find the name of the actress who played Cherone’s neighbor in this video.

As for Gary Cherone, he is probably best known for being Van Halen’s third lead singer.  Cherone joined the band in 1996, replacing Sammy Hagar.  He stuck with Van Halen for three years, recording one album with the band.  Though Van Halen III was a success by most standards, it still didn’t sell as much as previous Van Halen albums and Cherone and the band amicably parted ways in 1999.  If nothing else, Cherone is probably the only person to ever leave Van Halen on relatively good terms.

This video was directed by Paris Barclay.  Today, Barclay is best-known as an Emmy-winning television director.  Among the shows that he’s worked on:  NYPD Blue, ER, The West Wing, CSI, Lost, The Shield, House, Law & Order, Monk, Numb3rs, City of Angels, Cold Case, Sons of Anarchy, The Bastard Executioner, The Mentalist, Weeds, NCIS: Los Angeles, In Treatment, Glee, Smash and The Good Wife, Extant, and Manhattan, Empire, and Scandal.  Barclay also served two terms as the president of the DGA.

Enjoy!

 

Music Video Of The Day: Feeling That Way by Journey (1978, directed by ????)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Like many Journey songs, Feeling That Way went through several different versions before it became the song that was eventually released.

It started out as an instrumental called Velvet Curtain that stayed on the shelf because the band wasn’t satisfied with the results.  Eventually, while the band was recording their third album, keyboardist Greg Rolie pulled it off of the shelf, wrote some lyrics, and renamed the song Please Let Me Stay.  In that form, the song nearly appeared on the Next album but, because the band was again not fully satisfied with the end result, it eventually went back on the shelf.  It would remain there until Steve Perry joined the band.  Perry rewrote the lyrics, added a new chorus, and the song — now called Feeling That Way — finally appeared on Journey’s fourth album, Infinity.

Like most early music videos, the video for Feeling That Way is a performance clip, featuring the band doing what they did best.

Enjoy!

Music Video of the Day: Wheel In The Sky by Journey (1978, directed by ????)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Wheel in the Sky started out as a poem, written by Diane Valory, the wife of Journey bassist Ross Valory.  The poem was re-written by the band’s second lead singer, Robert Fleischman, and guitarist Neal Schon worked out the melody while the band was driving from show to show.

Though Fleischman may have written the lyrics, he had left the band by the time the song was recorded for the Infinity album.  Fleischman’s replacement was Steve Perry, who would go on to become Journey’s best-known (though not final) lead singer.  Wheel in the Sky would be the first Journey single to be released after Perry joined the band and it was also the first first single to chart, reaching #57 in the United States.  It remains one of their most popular songs and it’s also one of the few songs to have been performed by every iteration of Journey.

As was Journey’s style, the video for Wheel In The Sky is a performance clip.  As Steve Perry put it when discussing their later video for Separate Ways, the members of Journey were proud to be musicians and not actors.

Enjoy!

 

Music Video of the Day: Lights by Journey (1978, directed by ????)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Though this classic Journey song eventually became a tribute to the band’s hometown of San Francisco, it didn’t start out that way.

As Steve Perry explained in an interview, “I had the song written in Los Angeles almost completely except for the bridge and it was written about Los Angeles. It was ‘when the lights go down in the city and the sun shines on LA.’ I didn’t like the way it sounded at the time. And so I just had it sitting back in the corner. Then life changed my plans once again, and I was now facing joining Journey. I love San Francisco, the bay and the whole thing. ‘The bay’ fit so nice, ‘When the lights go down in the city and the sun shines on the bay.’ It was one of those early morning going across the bridge things when the sun was coming up and the lights were going down. It was perfect.”

Lights was the third single released off of their Infinity album, which was the first album to feature Steve Perry as lead singer.  Though Lights would only reach #68 on the charts, it’s popularity increased over time, to the point that it became one of Journey’s signature songs.

Like almost every Journey video, the video for Lights is a simple performance clip, though some very 70s special effects are included as almost an afterthought.  This would be Journey’s style until they tried something different with the infamous video for Separate Ways.

Enjoy!

Music Video of the Day: My Best Friend’s Girl by The Cars (1978, directed by ????)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

On Sunday night, it was announced that Ric Ocasek, the co-lead singer and songwriter of the Cars, had died at the age of 75.  First Daniel Johnston.  Then Eddie Money.  And now Ric Ocasek.  We’ve lost some of the truly great ones this past week.

My Best Friend’s Girl is one of the many songs that Ocasek wrote and recorded as the lead singer of The Cars.  Sung from the point of view of a man whose girl has left him for his best friend, it was one of the Cars’s biggest hits and it continues to endure as one of the signature songs of the 70s and 80s.

Ric Ocasek, R.I.P.

Music Video of the Day: I Wanna Go Back by Eddie Money (1986, directed by Nick Morris)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Eddie Money, who was one of the major voices of the 80s, died on Friday.  He had been in poor health for a while and had recently been diagnosed with stage 4 esophageal cancer.  He was 70 years old and he will be missed.  He leaves behind a legacy of music that epitomized a decade.

I Wanna Go Back was not originally recorded by Eddie Money.  The song was first performed by a band called Billy Satellite.  Their version was released in 1984 and was their first song to place on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.  Eddie Money’s cover version, which featured backing vocals by Marilyn Martin, came out in 1986 and was included on his Can’t Hold Back album.  Both the song and the video were released as a follow-up to Money’s monster hit, Take Me Home Tonight.

The song is about a man thinking about the past and wishing that he could go back to the way that things were.  The video features Eddie revisiting his old high school.  (I don’t know if that’s actually Eddie’s high school in the video or not.)  The scenes of Eddie wistfully remembering the past are interspersed with scenes of Eddie and his band playing for an enthusiastic audience so maybe the present wasn’t as bad as the song suggests.

Enjoy!

 

Bruce Lee vs. The Star Whackers: Game of Death (1978, directed by Robert Clouse)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Billy Lo (played by archival footage of Bruce Lee and two stand-ins) is the world’s biggest film star and the Syndicate (represented by Dean Jagger and Hugh O’Brian) want a piece of the action.  When Billy refuses to allow the Syndicate to take control of his career, the Syndicate responds by threatening both Billy and his girlfriend (Colleen Camp).  After a Syndicate hitman sneaks onto the set of Billy’s latest film and shoots him in the face, Billy allows the world to believe that he’s dead.  Using a variety of disguises, Billy seeks revenge on the Syndicate and all of its assassins, including the 7 foot tall Hakim (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar).

Lee’s original plan for the Game of Death was that it would feature him as a retired martial artist who, in order to save the lives of his family, had to make his way up a five-level pagoda, defeating a different guardian on each floor.  Each guardian would represent a different fighting style and the journey up the pagoda would allow Lee to discuss his beliefs regarding the principles of martial arts.  Serving as both director and star, Lee did during the making of the film, of cerebral edema though some said Lee was either murdered or that he had faked his own death.

Released seven years after his death, the final version Game of Death has little in common with Lee’s original vision.  Only about 11 minutes of footage from the original film was used in the revised version and most of Lee’s philosophical concerns were abandoned for a plot that, today, feels like it could have been lifted from Randy Quaid’s twitter timeline.  (Also, when watching the film today, it’s also impossible to watch the Syndicate’s assassins disguise Billy Lo’s shooting as an on-set accident without being reminded of what would happen to Brandon Lee on the set of The Crow.)  Game of Death opens with footage lifted from Lee’s battle with Chuck Norris at the end of Way of the Dragon and the other fight scenes are full of close-ups of Lee that were obviously lifted from other films.  There’s even a scene in Billy’s dressing room where a cardboard cut-out of Lee’s face has obviously been taped onto a mirror.  After Billy fakes his own death, footage of Bruce Lee’s actual funeral is shown, including a shot of Lee in his coffin.

If you can overlook the ethical issues of making a Bruce Lee film without the actual participation of Bruce Lee, Game of Death is actually a pretty entertaining movie.  Director Robert Clouse had previously directed Enter the Dragon and obviously knew how to direct a fight scene while even stock footage of Bruce Lee has more charisma than the average action star.  Best of all, Bruce Lee battles Kareem Adbul-Jabbar, in an epic scene that Lee himself directed for the original version of Game of Death.  When the 7’2 Kareem Abdul Jabber plants his foot in the middle of Bruce Lee’s chest, Game of Death achieves pop cultural immortality.

Thorny ethical concerns aside, Game of Death proves that Bruce Lee will live forever.