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 is all about letting the visuals do the talking.
Happy birthday, David Lynch!
4 Shots From 4 Films
The Elephant Man (1980, directed by David Lynch)
Blue Velvet (1986, directed by David Lynch)
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (1992, directed by David Lynch)
Mulholland Drive (2000, directed by David Lynch)
During his professional boxing career, Chuck Wepner had more than a few nicknames. Some people called him “The Bayonne Brawler,” because he was from Bayonne, New Jersey and he was a street fighter. After a 1970 loss to Sonny Liston, Wepner became known as “The Bayonne Bleeder” because of the amount of blood that he shed in the ring. However, after 1976, most people knew Chuck Wepner as “the real Rocky.”
In 1975, the largely unknown and little-regarded Chuck Wepner was given the opportunity to challenge Muhammad Ali for the world’s Heavyweight title. For the fight, Ali was paid $1.5 million while Wepner received only $10,000. For Ali, it was supposed to be an easy title defense. For Wepner, it was not only his biggest payday but also his chance to prove that he belonged in the ring with the champ.
During the fight, Wepner shocked everyone by holding his own. In the ninth round, Wepner knocked Ali down and it briefly looked as if the Bayonne Bleeder was about to become the world’s Heavyweight champion. Returning to his corner, Wepner told his manager, “Start the car. We’re going to the bank. We are millionaires!”
His manager replied, “You better turn around. He’s getting back up and he looks pissed off.”
When Ali got back on his feet, he came at Wepner with everything he had. Despite getting decisively outboxed and getting his nose broken during the final rounds, Wepner still went 15 rounds with Ali before the referee stopped the fight and declared Ali to be the winner by technical knockout.
Sitting in a bar and watching the Ali/Wepner fight was a struggling actor named Sylvester Stallone. A few days after the fight, Stallone wrote the first draft of his screenplay for Rocky and the rest is history. However, when Wepner would later try to get paid for inspiring one of the biggest box office hits of all time, Stallone claimed that Wepner had not provided any inspiration at all. Eventually, Wepner took Stallone to court and the case was settled for an undisclosed account.
ESPN Film’s The Real Rocky is an hour-long documentary about Chuck Wepner and his life both before and after Rocky. Featuring extensive interviews with Wepner himself and a group of veteran boxing journalists, The Real Rocky attempts to answer the two questions that haunt Wepner’s career: Was Chuck Wepner the real Rocky and did Wepner really knock down Muhammad Ali?
After the fight, Muhammad Ali claimed that Wepner did not knock him down but instead that Wepner had tripped him. In the documentary, Wepner continues to insist that he did knock Ali down and even says that, if asked, Ali will back him up. However, the documentary features a close-up of a photo that appears to show Wepner throwing a punch while standing on Ali’s foot, which would mean that Ali was right and Wepner did trip him. The Bayonne Bleeder knocking down Muhammad Ali is a great story but it probably did not happen.
As for whether or not Wepner was the real Rocky, the documentary leaves little doubt that he was. Along with the obvious parallels between Wepner vs. Ali and Balboa vs. Creed, the documentary reveals that Wepner later fought an exhibition match with wrestler Andre the Giant, a match that was later recreated in Rocky III. Even after the first movie, Stallone was still borrowing from Wepner’s life.
After his retirement from the ring, Wepner struggled with drug addiction and briefly did some time in prison. In the documentary’s most bittersweet moment, Wepner talks about being locked up in East Jersey State Prison, just to discover that Stallone was also at the prison, shooting a movie where he played a prisoner. After being released, Wepner went back to his job as a liquor salesman, a job that he still holds today.
The Real Rocky is an engrossing documentary that allows Wepner to tell his story in his own words. With Stallone on the verge of winning an Oscar for his latest (and probaly) last performance as Rocky Balboa, now is a great time to watch this documentary and spare a few thoughts for the real Rocky, Chuck Wepner.
Last week, when the world first learned of the death of the actor Alan Rickman, it was shocking to realize just how many great roles he had played. He made his feature film debut as Hans Gruber in Die Hard. He played Colonel Brandon in Sense and Sensibility, Severus Snape in the Harry Potter movies, the Sheriff of Nottingham in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Hilly Kristal in CGBG and Marvin the Paranoid Android in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. He even played Leonard Nimoy Alexander Dane in Galaxy Quest. But the first time I ever saw Alan Rickman, he was playing Ed the Painter in The January Man.
As The January Man begins, the new year is barely a day old and already Manhattan is in a panic. Over the past 11 months, a serial killer has terrorized the city, killing one woman per month. His latest victim, Allison Hawkins (Faye Grant) was murdered on New Year’s Eve. Now, it’s January and everyone in New York City is waiting for the killer to strike again.
Mayor Flynn (Rod Steiger, bellowing his lines as only an Oscar-winning “great” actor can) is upset because Allison was a friend of his daughter, Bernadette (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio). Flynn orders the police commissioner, Frank Starkey (Harvey Keitel), to put his brother on the case. Nick Starky (Kevin Kline) was the best detective in New York but Frank framed him on corruption charges. Now, Nick is working as a fireman and does not want to return to police work. However, Nick tells Frank that he will investigate the murders on one condition: Nick wants to make dinner for Frank’s wife (and Nick’s former lover), Christine (Susan Sarandon).
After cooking an octopus for Christine, Nick works the case. His unorthodox methods get on the nerves of Capt. Alcoa (Danny Aiello, bellowing almost as much as Rod Steiger) but also wins him the heart of Bernadette. Helping him investigate the case (and repainting his office) is his neighbor, Ed (Alan Rickman). Ed is not only a painter but he’s also a computer expert who figures out exactly where the killer is going to strike next.
The January Man was Alan Rickman’s second film and followed his debut in Die Hard. Other than sharing a similarly sarcastic sense of humor, Ed the Painter is the exact opposite of Hans Gruber. Gruber was a murderer who would do anything for money. Ed is an artist who wants only to paint and hang out with Nick Starkey.
When I first saw The January Man, I was seven years old and I was on an airplane flying to London. I was too young to really understand what was happening in the movie but I knew that Ed was my favorite character because he was the one who got all the funny lines and he spoke with a British accent. When he told one of his models “Don’t molest anything,” I thought it was hilarious even though I did not really understand what he was talking about. (Years later, I would watch The January Man on HBO and I would discover that Ed made his living painting nudes and that Bernadette and Nick were having sex, all information that was edited out of the airplane version.)
After I heard that Rickman had died, I rewatched The January Man for the first time in years. I discovered that The January Man is a terrible movie that tries to unsuccessfully to mix slapstick comedy with brutal serial killer action but Alan Rickman still gives a really good performance, the best in the film. (A close second would be Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, whose smile lights up every scene in which she appears. She married the movie’s director so at least she got something good out of appearing in The January Man.) That Alan Rickman is one of the film’s few bright spots is a testament to his talent as an actor. Alan Rickman was such a great actor that he even made The January Man watchable.
RIP, Alan Rickman.
4 Shots From 4 Films
Die Hard (1988, directed by John McTiernan)
Closet Land (1991, directed by Radha Bharadwaj)
Galaxy Quest (1999, directed by Dean Parisot)
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azbakan (2004, directed by Alfonso Cuaron)
Rest in peace, the great Alan Rickman.
Last night, when I heard that David Bowie had died, I immediately flashed back to the summer of 2003. I spent that summer hanging out with my friend Jay. I was an aspiring writer and he was the musician who got all the girls. Jay was also a David Bowie fanatic whose cover of The Man Who Sold The World was at least as good as Nirvana’s. When I think about that summer, I remember the all-night bull sessions, smoking in Jay’s backyard, watching reruns of Hawaii 5-0 and agreeing that McGarrett was one cool dude, and the weekly poker games where I always seemed to lose. But mostly, I remember David Bowie providing the greatest soundtrack anyone could want.
Over his 50 year career, David Bowie reinvented himself many times. When he released his first single in 1964, he did so under his real name. He was 17 years old when Davie Jones and the Queen Bees released Liza Jane.
By the time he released Space Oddity in 1969, Davie Jones had become David Bowie. Space Oddity would introduce the world to Major Tom, a character to whom Bowie would return in the future.
1970’s The Man Who Sold The World is often erroneously believed to be a retelling of Robert Heinlein’s novella, The Man Who Sold The Moon. In 1997, Bowie himself said that the song was about being young and feeling incomplete.
Life on Mars? was once described by BBC Radio 2 as being “a cross between a Broadway musical and a Salvador Dali painting.”
1975’s Golden Years, with its chorus of “run for the shadows,” is one of my personal favorites.
In 1977, David Bowie appeared on the final Bing Crosby Christmas Special. He and Bing performed Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy. At the time, Bing was quoted as saying about Bowie: “clean-cut kid and a real fine asset to the show. He sings well, has a great voice and reads lines well.”
In 1980, Major Tom returned in Ashes to Ashes.
Rather than grow stagnant as an artist, David Bowie was always reinventing himself. In 1997, he proved he was still a force to be reckoned with when he released I’m Afraid of Americans.
In November, David Bowie released Blackstar. In the song’s video, Major Tom made his final appearance.
Lazarus was the last single that David Bowie released during his lifetime. The video was released three days before he died and feels like it was his way of saying goodbye.
Rest in peace, good sir. And thank you for the music and the memories.
Here’s a life lesson from the original 1953 version of War of the Worlds.
Not everyone knows what a white flag means.
Here’s wishing you and your family a Happy Festivus!
Whether gathered around the Festivus Pole or competing in feats of strength or listening to the airing of grievances, never forget the true meaning of a Festivus for the rest of us!
Life on the planet Mongo is not easy. Aided by Darth Vader wannabe Klytus (Peter Wyngarde) and the sadistic General Kala (Mariangela Melato), the evil Emperor Ming (Max Von Sydow) rules with an iron fist. All of the citizens are heavily taxed and kept in a state of perpetual war in order to keep them from joining together and rebelling. Those who attempt to defy Ming are executed.
There are many different races living on both Mongo and its moons. The Arborians, also known as the tree people, live in a jungle and are ruled by Prince Barin (Timothy Dalton). Until Ming overthrew his father, Barin was the rightful heir to the throne of Mongo. Barin is also one of the many lovers of Aura (Ornella Muti), Ming’s rebellious daughter.
Barin distrusts the Hawkmen, a group of winged barbarians. Led by the boisterous Prince Vultan (the one and only Brian Blessed), the Hawkmen live in a palace that floats above Mongo. Both Vultan and Barin share a desire to overthrow Ming but neither one of them can set aside their own dislike and distrust of each other.
Ming grows bored easily but Klytus has found him a new play thing, an obscure planet in the S-K system. “The inhabitants,” Klytus says, “refer to it as the planet Earth.”
It all leads to this:
You may have been too busy listening to Queen’s theme song to notice (and I don’t blame you if you were) but I have always found it strange that, even though Ming had never heard of Earth before Klytus brought it to his attention, he still had a button labeled “Earthquake.” Whenever I watch Flash Gordon, I wonder if I am the only one who has noticed this.
With Ming plaguing Earth with tornadoes, hurriances, and “hot hail,” it is up to three Earthlings to travel to Mongo and defeat him. Dr. Zarkov (Topol) is an eccentric scientist who was forced out of NASA because of his belief in Mongo. Dale Arden (Melody Anderson) is a reporter. And, finally, Flash Gordon (Sam J. Jones) is a professional athlete. Because this movie is a fantasy, Flash Gordon is a superstar quarterback for the New York Jets.
The character of Flash Gordon was first introduced in a 1934 comic strip and was played by Buster Crabbe in several classic serials. Among Flash’s many young fans was a future filmmaker named George Lucas, who would later cite Flash’s adventures as being a major inspiration for the Star Wars saga. After the unprecedented success of Star Wars: A New Hope, it only made sense that someone would try to make a Flash Gordon film.
That someone was producer Dino De Laurentiis. (Before writing the script for Star Wars, Lucas attempted to buy the rights for Flash Gordon from De Laurentiis.) To write the script that would bring Flash into the 80s, De Laurentiis hired Lorenzo Semple, Jr. Semple was best known for helping to create the 1960s version of Batman and he brought a similarly campy perspective to the character and story of Flash Gordon. As a result, the film ended up with scenes like this one, where Flash interrupts one of Ming’s ceremonies with an impromptu football scrimmage:
It also led to Brian Blessed’s entire performance as Prince Vultan, which is especially famous for the way that Blessed delivered one line:
(That also makes for a great ringtone.)
Sam J. Jones and Melody Anderson often seem to be stranded by Semple’s script but Max Von Sydow, Topol, Brian Blessed, Peter Wyngarde, and Ornella Muti all get into the swing of things. Seen today, Flash Gordon is entertaining but too intentionally campy for its own good. On the positive side, the images still pop off the screen and the soundtrack sounds as great as ever. When you listen to Queen’s theme song, you have no doubt that “he’ll save every one of us.”
As Flash Gordon himself put it after he saved the universe: “YEAAAAH!”
I think I was twelve when I first saw Heavy Metal. It came on HBO one night and I loved it. So did all of my friends. Can you blame us? It had everything that a twelve year-old boy (especially a 12 year-old boy who was more than a little on the nerdy side) could want out of a movie: boobs, loud music, and sci-fi violence. It was a tour of our secret fantasies. The fact that it was animated made it all the better. Animated films were not supposed to feature stuff like this. When my friends and I watched Heavy Metal, we felt like we were getting away with something.
Based on stories from the adults-only Heavy Metal Magazine, Heavy Metal was divided into 8 separate segments:
Soft Landing (directed by Jimmy T. Murakami and John Bruno, written by Dan O’Bannon)
Heavy Metal opens brilliantly with a Corvette being released from a space shuttle and then flying down to Earth, surviving reentry without a scratch. Who, after watching this, has not wanted a Space Corvette of his very own?
Grimaldi (directed by Harold Whitaker)
On Earth, a terrified young girl listens a glowing green meteorite called the Loc-Nar tells her that it is the source of all evil in the universe. This sets up the rest of the film, which is made up of stories that the Loc-Nar tells about its influence. The Loc-Nar is the film’s MacGuffin and, seen today, one of Heavy Metal’s biggest problems is that it has to find a way to force the Loc-Nar into every story, even if it meant sacrificing any sort of consistency about what the Loc-Nar was capable of doing. Even when I was twelve, I realized that the Loc-Nar was not really that important.
Harry Canyon (directed by Pino Van Lamsweerde, written by Daniel Goldberg)
In this neo-noir tale, futuristic cabby Harry Canyon (voiced by Richard Romanus) is enlisted to help an unnamed girl (voiced by Susan Roman) to find the Loc-Nar. Slow and predictable, Harry Canyon does feature the voice of John Candy as a police sergeant who attempts to charge Harry for police work.
Den (directed by Jack Stokes, written by Richard Corben)
Nerdy teenager David (voiced by John Candy) finds a piece of the Loc-Nar and is transported to the world of Neverwhere, where he is transformed into Den, a muscular, bald warrior. As Den, David gets to live out the fantasies of Heavy Metal‘s target audience. On his new planet, Den rescues an Earth woman from being sacrificed, overthrows an evil queen and a sorcerer, and gets laid. A lot. Den is the best segment in Heavy Metal, largely because of the endearing contrast between the action onscreen and John Candy’s enthusiastic narration.
Captain Sternn (directed by Paul Sebella and Julian Harris, written by Bernie Wrightson)
On a space station orbiting the Earth, Captain Lincoln F. Sternn is on trail for a countless number of offenses. Though guilty, Captain Sternn expects to be acquitted because he has bribed the prosecution’s star witness, Hanover Fiste. However, Hanover is holding the Loc-Nar in his hand and it causes him to tell the truth about Captain Sternn and eventually turn into a bloodthirsty giant. Captain Sternn saves the day by tricking Hanover into getting sucked out of an air lock.
Captain Sternn was a reoccurring character in Heavy Metal Magazine and his segment is one of the best. Eugene Levy voices Captain Sternn while Joe Flaherty voices his lawyer and Dean Wormer himself, John Vernon, is the prosecutor. Even National Lampoon co-founder Douglas Kenney provided a voice.
B-17 (directed by Barrie Nelson, written by Dan O’Bannon)
After the Loc-Nar enters Earth’s atmosphere, it crashes into a bullet-riddled World War II bomber, causing the dead crewmen within to reanimate as zombies. Scored to Don Felder’s Heavy Metal (Takin’ a Ride), B-17 is one of the shorter segments and its dark and moody animation holds up extremely well.
So Beautiful and So Dangerous (directed by John Halas, written by Angus McKie)
Nubile Pentagon secretary Gloria is beamed aboard a spaceship that looks like a giant smiley face. While she has sex with the ship’s robot captain, the two crew members (voiced by Harold Ramis and Eugene Levy) pour out a long line of cocaine and shout “Nosedive!” before snorting up every flake. So Beautiful and So Dangerous is so juvenile and so ridiculous that it is actually all kinds of awesome.
Taarna
In the film’s final and most famous segment, Taarna, the blond warrior was featured on Heavy Metal‘s poster, rides a pterodactyl across a volcanic planet, killing barbarians, and finally confronting the Loc-Nar. She sacrifices herself to defeat the Loc-Nar but no worries! We return to Earth where, for some reason, the Loc-Nar explodes and the girl from the beginning of the film is revealed to be Taarna reborn. She even gets to fly away on her pterodactyl. Taarna was really great when I was twelve but today, it is impossible to watch it without flashing back to the Major Boobage episode of South Park.
Much like Taarna, Heavy Metal seems pretty silly when I watch it today. But when I was twelve, it was the greatest thing ever.
The year 2005 was a dark time to be a fan of Star Wars.
The first two parts of the highly anticipated prequel trilogy had been released and had left fans feeling as if millions of voices had cried out in terror and suddenly been silenced. No sooner had fans started to recover from the trauma of The Phantom Menace then Attack of the Clones was unleashed and they were stunned to learn that a movie could be even more pointless than The Phantom Menace.
The summer of 2005 promised the release of Star Wars Episode III: The Revenge of the Sith. Fans were excited because they knew that Anakin Skywalker would finally be transformed into Darth Vader but they also knew that he would still be played by Hayden Christensen. Many of us who went to see the movie on its opening weekend did so with low expectations and mixed feelings.
“WAR!” the opening title crawl of Revenge of the Sith declared, as if it was trying to reassure those of us in the audience that it would not be another boring Star Wars prequel. There was nothing in the crawl about taxation or trade routes. Instead, it was all about how the Galactic Republic was at war with separatists and how Chancellor Palpatine was being held prisoner by General Grievous. After an exciting battle on Grievous’s flagship, Anakin not only rescued Palpatine but also decapitated Christopher Lee’s Count Dooku, despite the fact that Dooku had surrendered and was unarmed. That’s when those of us watching knew that Revenge of the Sith was not going to be like the other two prequels. Revenge of the Sith was going to be darker and edgier and not just for kids. A headless Count Dooku action figure would not be sold at your local toy store.
Looking back, it is easy to forget how relieved many of us were that Revenge of the Sith was not terrible. After the bitter disappointment of the first two prequels, we were happy that Jar Jar Binks only appeared during one shot towards the end of the film and he did not speak. We were happy that Ewan McGregor and Natalie Portman both finally got to give performances that justified casting actors of their caliber as Obi-Wan and Amidala. We were happy that, since Anakin and Amidala were secretly married between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, we did not have to sit through any more scenes of them falling in love. Many of us had found Hayden Christensen’s performance to be petulant in Attack of the Clones and, intentionally or not, Revenge of the Sith seemed to validate our suspicions by having both Yoda and Mace Windu say the same thing about Anakin. After the embarrassment of Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones, this was a prequel that we felt we could get behind.
And we were really happy with the climatic battle between Obi-Wan and Anakin. After Anakin had gone over to the dark side, he and Obi-Wan dueled on a volcanic planet. “You were supposed to be the chosen one!” Obi-Wan shouted after chopping off Anakin’s legs. After being left to die by Obi-Wan, Anakin was rescued by Emperor Palpatine. It was only after being encased in that famous black armor that Palpatine told the new Darth Vader that Amidala had died. Darth Vader’s “Nooooooooo!” would go down in history.
At the end of the film, Jimmy Smits was seen giving an infant Luke to Owen and Beru Lars and Darth Vader and the Emperor were seen standing on the bridge of an imperial ship and looking out at the skeleton of the Death Star. For the first time since the prequels were first released, some of us applauded at the end of a Star Wars film.
When, ten years later, I rewatched Revenge of the Sith for the first time in a long while, my immediate impression was that it was nowhere close to being as good as I remembered. Without a doubt, it was still the best of the prequels but how much was that really saying? Of all the prequels, it came the closest to capturing the sense of awe and excitement that made the original trilogy (even Return of the Jedi) so entertaining but, at the same time, it still had many of the same flaws that afflicted Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. Hayden Christensen was as stiff and inexpressive as ever, as was George Lucas’s dialogue. (When Obi-Wan tells Anakin that Palpatine is evil, Anakin actually replies, “From my point of view, the Jedis are evil!” He shouts this in the middle of a light saber duel.) Even the movie’s most shocking moment, when Anakin murdered a group of children, was no longer effective because everyone in the movie insisted on calling the children “younglings.”
Throughout the entire prequel ordeal, George Lucas would insist that it was necessary to see all three of the prequels to really understand the story he was trying to tell and how it fit in with the original trilogy. However, of all the prequels, Revenge of the Sith is the only one that feels as if it adds anything to what we had already learned from watching the original trilogy. Nor is there anything to be gained from having seen the first two prequels before watching Revenge of the Sith for the first time. The main accomplishment of Revenge of the Sith was to prove that The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones were entirely unnecessary. (Revenge of the Sith actually works better if you have never seen Phantom Menace because there is no way that the Anakin played by Jake Lloyd could have grown up to be the Anakin played by Hayden Christensen.)
Why, when we originally watched Revenge of the Sith, did so many of us think that it was so much better than it actually was?
In the year 2005, we were just happy to have a Star Wars film that did not totally suck.
Through the Shattered Lens 