Category Archives: Film Review

Film Review: Robocop 3 (dir by Fred Dekker)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

“Oh wow, Robocop can fly!”

An odd film, Robocop 3. Released in 1993, this was the third and final film in the original Robocop franchise. While the action is still set in Detroit and Robocop is back (albeit now played by Robert John Burke) and Nancy Allen shows up long enough to get killed off, Robocop 3 feels strangely separate from the previous two Robocop films. If the first two Robocop films were dark, satirical, and over-the-top in their violence, the third film is a family friendly adventure film that reimagines Robocop as being some sort of fair housing activist.

And, on top of all that, Robocop can fly now. Admittedly, that’s because Robocop gets fitted for a jetpack that he didn’t have in the previous films but he still looks incredibly ludicrous flying through the streets of Detroit. Since the Robocop armor has always looked very bulky and very heavy, it’s hard to believe that he could fly as quickly and as smoothly as he does in this film.

There’s a new set of villains too. Rip Torn has replaced Dan O’Herilhy as the CEO. And listen, I like Rip Torn. He will always be a hero to me because he bit Norman Mailer’s ear off. But Torn is far too obviously evil in the role of the CEO. O’Herlihy smartly played the Old Man as being avuncular and amoral. You could look at him and understand how he rose to his position of prominence. Torn’s performance is a bit more cartoonish but then again, Robocop 3 is the most cartoonish of the series.

The CEO wants to tear down Old Detroit so the residents of Old Detroit are fighting back. Leading the CEO’s forces — called the Rehabbers — is Paul McDagget (John Castle), who is a complete and total madman but who, at the same time, is never quite as memorable as Kurtwood Smith or Tom Noonan. He’s really just another generic militaristic bad guy. Normally, you would expect Robocop to be on the side of the company and the police but he’s been reprogrammed by an 8 year-old hacker named Nikko (Remy Ryan). Robocop is now working with the rebels. One of the rebels is played by Stephen Root, proving once again that you never know where Stephen Root might pop up.

Robocop 3 has none of the satiric bite of the first two movies. Instead of being a symbol of authoritarianism gone beserk, Robocop becomes a generic do-gooder. The violence is toned down and, with the addition of a kid sidekick, it’s obvious that this Robocop was meant to be a safer version of the character. Unfortunately, a safe Robocop equals a boring Robocop. You watch this movie and you wonder what happened to the Robocop who shot Ronny Cox out of a window.

“My friend’s call me Murphy,” he says towards the end of the film, “You can call me Robocop.” That seemed to indicate that Robocop had quite a future ahead of him of doing the right thing and standing up to big evil corporations but Robocop 3 was such a bomb at the box office that Robocop’s further adventures would only be seen on TV. The franchise was rebooted back in 2014, in a film that my friend Mark called “Rubber Cop.” After Rubber Cop fell flat, it was announced that Robocop would be rebooted for a second time, this time with a movie that would serve as a direct sequel to the first Robocop and which would ignore the sequels and the first reboot. Personally, I think it might be time to let Robocop retire. He had a good run.

Film Review: Robocop 2 (dir by Irvin Kershner)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Robocop 2, the 1990 sequel to Robocop, finds Detroit on the verge of getting nuked.

No, not nuked like that! Instead, there’s a new designer drug called Nuke and it’s tearing the city apart. Of course, Detroit has problems that go beyond just the new drug. The city is almost bankrupt. OCP, under the leadership of The Old Man (Dan O’Herlihy), is still running things behind the scenes. There’s still all sorts of petty crime to deal with. To be honest, it seems like the city has gotten even more out-of-control now that Clarence Boddiker is no longer around to oversee things.

Fortunately, Robocop (Peter Weller) is still patrolling the streets! But, for how long? There are lawyers who claim that Robocop is a huge potential liability and when you consider some of the stuff that went on during the first film, it’s hard not to see their point. His ex-wife is also suing the police department, claiming that Robocop has been harassing her. Despite being a robocop, our hero is still Murphy and he’s still haunted by memories of the family he once had. Or, at least, he is for the first few minutes of the film. That storyline kind of gets abandoned, along with a lot of other storylines.

While OCP is trying to develop a second robocop, one that can be mass produced and used to replace the human police force (the majority of whom have gone out on strike), a cult leader named Cain (Tom Noonan) is attempting to take over the city’s Nuke trade. Working with Cain is the usual gang of flamboyant malcontents. His second-in-command is a sociopathic child named Hob (Gabriel Damon). Hob may be a kid but he’ll kill anyone and he’ll enjoy himself while he’s doing it.

Robocop 2 is a bit of a mess. It apparently was rushed into production after the surprise success of the first film and filming started before there was even a completed script. As a result, there are a lot of storylines and themes that are brought up and then seem to mysteriously disappear. The film duplicates Paul Verhoeven’s satirical approach to the first film’s ultra-violence but, unfortunately, it does so in the most superficial way possible. Once again, we get the cheerful and vapid news reports about impending doom and once again, the violence is completely and totally over-the-top. But none of it carries any of the bite that was present in the first film. The first film worked because director Verhoeven actually was trying to make a larger point with all of the violence and the hints of growing fascism. He was attempting to challenge the audience and to get them wonder why they found all of the terrible thing happening in Robocop to be so entertaining. The sequel was directed by Hollywood veteran Irvin Kershner who was a good, workmanlike director but who also didn’t possess Verhoeven’s subversive sensibility. Far too often, Robocop 2 just feels like it’s going through the motions.

That’s not say that Robocop 2 isn’t occasionally an effective film. Dan O’Herlihy is wonderfully amoral as the Old Man and Tom Noonan is a worthwhile villain. Though Peter Weller has said that he wasn’t happy with how the overall film turned out, he still make for a sympathetic hero and he still manages to capture Robocop’s anguish without letting us forget that the character is still essentially a machine. I’m not really a big fan of films that use evil children for cheap shocks but Gabriel Damon is frequently chilling as Hob. Detroit is such a terrible place in the Robocop films that it’s not really a surprise when an evil child pops up and start shooting people. When compared to the first film, Robocop 2 may be a disappointment but it’s hardly a disaster.

Robocop 3 on the other hand….

Film Review: Robocop (dir by Paul Verhoeven)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last week, I watched the original Robocop (along with Robocop 2 and Robocop 3) and I have to say that the first film holds up far better than I was expecting. Made and released way back in 1987, Robocop may be one of the most prophetic films ever made.

Consider the plot:

America is torn apart by crime and a growing gap between the rich and the poor. That was probably true in 1987 and it’s certainly true in 2021.

Throughout the film, we see news reports about what’s happening in the world. The news is always grim but the reporters are always cheerful and the main message is that, no matter what’s happening, the government is not to blame and anyone who questions the wisdom of the establishment is a fool. If that’s not a perfect description of cable news and our current state-run media, I don’t know what is.

The populace is often too busy watching stupid game shows to really pay attention to what’s happening all around them. I’m writing these words on a Wednesday, which means that Game of Talents will be on Fox tonight, immediately after The Masked Singer.

Detroit, a once proud center of industry, has now turned into a dystopian Hellhole where no one feels that they’re safe. Now, I don’t live in Detroit so I don’t know how true that is but I do know that most of the recent news that I’ve heard about the city has not exactly been positive. Also, this seems like a good time to point out that, even though the film is set in Detroit, it was shot in Dallas. Though the Dallas skyline has undoubtedly changed a bit since 1987, I still recognized several buildings while watching Robocop. Seeing Reunion Tower in the background of a movie that’s supposed to be set in Detroit was interesting, though perhaps not as interesting as seeing our City Hall transformed into the headquarters of Detroit’s beleaguered police force.

OCP, a multi-national conglomerate that’s run by the amoral but occasionally charming Old Man (played by the brilliant Dan O’Herlihy), has a contract with city of Detroit to run their police department. This certainly doesn’t seem far-fetched in 2021. Considering that we now have prisons that are run by private companies and that the government has shown a willingness to work with private mercenaries overseas, it’s not a stretch to imagine a city — especially one on the verge of bankruptcy — handing over the police department to a private company.

Two OCP executives — Dick Jones (Ronny Cox) and Bob Morton (Miguel Ferrer) — are competing to see who can be the first to create and develop a peace-keeping robot, a machine that will replace the need to employ (and pay) human police officers. Dick Jones goes with an actual robot, which malfunctions during a boardroom demonstration and guns down another executive. (The scene where the poor exec is targeted is both terrifying and darkly humorous at the same time. Particularly disturbing is how everyone in the boardroom keeps shoving him back towards the robot in order to ensure that they won’t accidentally be in the line of fire.) Bob Morton, however, takes a mortally wounded cop named Murphy (Peter Weller) and turns him into Robocop!

Robocop turns out to be a huge success and is very popular with the media. (Anyone who doubts this would really happen has obviously never watched news coverage of a drone attack.) As you can guess, Dick is not particularly happy about getting shown up by Morton and his robocop. Dick also happens to be secretly in league with Clarence Boddicker (Kurtwood Smith), the crimelord who blew Murphy apart in the first place.

(A gangster and a businessman working together!? I doubt that was shocking even in 1987.)

Robocop claims that he’s just a machine, without a past or emotions, but he’s still haunted by random flashes of his life as Murphy. Working with Lewis (Nancy Allen), Murphy’s former partner, Robocop tracks down Boddicker and his gang. A lot of people die in outrageously violent ways. (The scene where Boddicker and his gang use a shotgun to torture Murphy is still shocking, even after all these years.) The violence is so over-the-top that it soon becomes obvious that director Paul Verhoeven is deliberately trying to get those of us watching to ask ourselves why we find films like this to be so entertaining. On the one hand, Robocop is an exciting action film with a sense of humor. On the other hand, it’s the type of subversive satire of pop and trash culture to which Verhoeven would return with Basic Instinct, Starship Troopers, and Showgirls. This is the type of film that asks the audience, “What are you doing here?”

34 years after it was first made, Robocop remains a triumph. Peter Weller’s performance holds up well, as he does a great job of capturing Robocop’s anguish while, at the same time, never forgetting that the character is ultimately a machine, one that’s trapped in a sort of permanent limbo. I also really liked the performance of Miguel Ferrer, who takes a character who should be unlikable and instead makes him into a surprisingly sympathetic figure.

Of course, a film like this lives and dies on the strength of its villains and both Ronny Cox and Kurtwood Smith are ideally cast as Dick Jones and Clarence Boddicker. Kurtwood Smith especially took me by surprise by how believably evil and frightening he was. As a I watched the film, I realized that it was his glasses that made him so intimidating. Wearing his glasses, he looked like some sort of rogue poet, a sociopathic intellectual who had chosen to use his talents to specifically make the world into a terrible place. Boddicker’s crew was full of familiar actors like Paul McCrane, Ray Wise, and, as the always laughing Joe Cox, Jesse Goins. Interestingly enough, all of the bad guys seemed to genuinely be friends. Even though they were all willing to betray each other (“Can you fly Bobby?”), they also seemed to really enjoy each other’s company. That somehow made them even more disturbing than a group of bad guys who were only in it for the money. The villains in Robocop really do seem to savor the chance to show off just how evil they can be.

(Incidentally, for all of the Twin Peaks fans out there, this film features three members of the show’s ensemble: Miguel Ferrer, Ray Wise, and Dan O’Herlihy.)

Robocop holds up well as entertainment, prophecy, and satire. Though not much was expected from it when it was first released, it became a surprise hit at the box office. Needless to say, this led to a sequel. I’ll deal with that film in about an hour.

Lifetime Film Review: Girl In The Basement (dir by Elisabeth Rohm)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

When Sara (Stefanie Scott) disappears shortly before her 18th birthday, her mother (Joely Fisher) and her older sister (Emily Topper) are naturally concerned. Significantly less concerned is her creepy father, Don (Judd Nelson). Don says that Sara has always been irresponsible and has always placed her own wants and desires above what’s best for her family. Don goes on to say that Sara had long been threatening to go on a road trip and that her plan was to see all 50 states before returning home.

The years pass and Sara never returns home. Don says that it’s obvious that Sara has decided never to return and that it’s best not to even worry about her. When Sara’s mother suggests maybe hiring a private detective, Don angrily says that he doesn’t want to hear another word about it. Sara has made her decision and he doesn’t want to talk about it anymore.

And the years continue to pass.

Of course, Don knows exactly where Sara is. He knows that, years ago, he tricked her into the going into the basement and that he then locked her in a secret room. Everyday, he takes her some food. He rewards her if he feels that she’s being good. He punishes her if he feels that she’s still being rebellious. As the years pass, Sara has several children, all fathered by Don. They live in the basement with Sara.

It’s a disturbing story, made all the more disturbing by the fact that it’s based on actual events. For 24 years, Elizabeth Fritzl was trapped, by her father, in a basement. Girl In The Basement is Lifetime’s take on the story. It was directed by Elisabeth Rohm, who has starred in several Lifetime films herself. Girl In The Basement is relentlessly grim, as it should be. It’s not particularly a fun film to watch but it’s impossible not to be inspired by the fact that the Sara, the film’s stand-in for Elizabeth Fritzl, managed to survive, no matter how terrible the situation became. She never gave up. Rohm does a good job of capturing the oppressive claustrophobia of Sara’s existence and Joely Fisher, Emily Tapper, and Stefanie Scott all did good job of showing how the victims of abuse often make excuses for their abusers. Even before he locks Sara in the basement, everyone in the family knows that Don is a monster but they’ve all come to accept it. They’ve all come to feel as if “That’s just Don.” Like most abusers, Don knows how to manipulate and how to gaslight his victims into accepting almost anything.

Judd Nelson does a good job in the role of Don. Unfortunately, we’re so used to seeing Judd Nelson play creeps that it was impossible to be surprised when he turned out to be one in this movie. The casting was a bit too on-the-nose and, whenever Nelson was onscreen, I found myself thinking about all over the other films that I’ve seen that featured Judd Nelson as a villain. That said, Nelson brought enough authenticity to Don’s sudden mood swings that he was convincingly menacing. It’s not just that Don locks his daughter in the basement and abuses her for 24 years while insisting that the family should just forget that she ever existed. It’s that he’s so damn proud of himself after he does it.

Girl in the Basement is well-done Lifetime true crime film, albeit not a particularly pleasant one to watch.

Lifetime Film Review: Killer Advice (dir by Jared Cohn)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Beth (Kate Watson) is not having an easy time dealing with her seemingly perfect life.

She’s worried about whether or not her teenage daughter, Jess (Gigi Gustin), is going to be able to get into a good college. She’s worried about whether or not her husband, Nick (Steve Richard Harris), is going to be able to hold onto his job. She’s also overworked at her own job. That’s a lot of stress to deal with. Of course, what’s really causing Beth the most trouble is the fact that she was recently the victim of a terrifying attack. In an underground parking garage, a man in a mask tried to attack her and chased her all the way to her car. Beth is having trouble recovering from the trauma. Eventually, she ends up seeing a highly praised therapist named Marsha (Meredith Thomas).

At first, Marsha seems like the perfect therapist. She listens to what Beth has to say. She gives good advice. She seems to genuinely care about Beth’s well-being. Then, one night, Nick announces that his firm has a rich new client and that this new client specifically asked to work with him. He goes on to explain that the client is coming to dinner and that it’s very important that everything go perfectly because, otherwise, the client might go to another firm. Beth works all day, preparing the perfect meal. When the client shows up, it turns out to be …. MARSHA!

Marsha claims to be shocked to discover that Nick and Beth are married. Why, Marsha just had no idea! What a coincidence! Later, Marsha hears Beth’s best friend, Simone (Gina Hiraizumi), saying that Marsha should be reported for violating her professional ethics by hiring a patient’s husband. Marsha, needless to say, isn’t happy to hear that and promptly looks for a rock that she can use to bash in Simone’s head….

That’s right! This is one of those type of films! Airing on Lifetime, Killer Advice is another film in which a woman with a perfect family finds herself being stalked by someone who is obsessed with her. This a frequent Lifetime genre and it’s one that centers around a fear that we all have, that fear that our new best friend might actually be a knife-wielding psycho. If you’re not paranoid after watching a Lifetime film, then you’re just not paying attention.

With it’s plot of a dangerous therapist, it’s tempting to compare this film to the Stalked By My Doctor films. Making that comparison even more tempting is the fact that Eric Roberts (the doctor of the Stalked By My Doctor franchise) has a small but key role as Nick’s boss. (It’s always fun to see Eric Roberts and, personally, I like the fact that he’s reinvented himself as a Lifetime mainstay.) However, the Stalked By My Doctor films tend be almost parodies of the classic Lifetime formula. Much like A Deadly Adoption, the Stalked By My Doctor franchise comments on the Lifetime style while also celebrating it. Killer Advice is a bit less meta, content to be a straight-forward story about an unlikely but dangerous stalker.

Kate Watson, Meredith Thomas, and Gigi Gustin all give good performances. Thomas stalks with style, which is really the most important thing when it comes to a film like this. The 2nd most important thing, of course, is the house where it all takes place and Killer Advice features a beautiful one. Living in a house that nice might make being stalked by a therapist almost worth it!

Cleaning Out The DVR: Tony Rome (dir by Gordon Douglas)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1967 film, Tony Rome, is about a detective named …. can you guess it?

That’s right! Tony Rome!

Tony works out of Miami and, because he’s played by Frank Sinatra, you can be sure that he’s a tough guy who knows how to throw a punch but who, at the same time, also knows how to have a good time. He’s got a bottle of liquor in the glove compartment. He’s got his own boat. He’s got a snappy quip for every occasion and a properly cynical sense of humor but at the same time, he also cares about doing the right thing. He says what’s on his mind and if that hurts your feelings, tough. Again, none of this should be a surprise, considering that he’s played by Frank Sinatra and Sinatra could play these type of sentimental tough guys in his sleep.

That’s not to say that Sinatra sleepwalks through the role, of course. Far from it. As played by Sinatra, Tony comes across as an authentic tough guy, as someone who has seen it all and who, as a result, understands that importance of stopping to have a drink and appreciate the world around him. Tony Rome might be a Rat Pack-style private investigator but that doesn’t mean he can’t solve the case and, even while Tony’s having a good time, Sinatra never lets you forget that he takes his job very seriously.

As for the film, it’s a story that beings when Tony is hired to drive a passed out rich girl back to her home. This leads to him investigating a jewelry theft and eventually discovering an extortion plot. Sue Lyon plays the rich girl. Gena Rowlands plays her stepmother while Simon Oakland (the psychologist at the end of Psycho) plays her father. Richard Conte, who played bad gangster Barzini in The Godfather, plays Tony Rome’s best friend on the police force. (Every good private eye has a best friend on the police force.) Jill St. John plays Ann Archer, who helps Tony out with his investigation. Ann is recently divorced. Will Tony claim her heart or will she go back to her husband? It wouldn’t be a Sinatra film without a little heartbreak. (To a large extent, St. John’s performance here feels like a slightly more serious version of the performance she would later give as Tiffany Case in Diamonds are Forever, which is perhaps as close as we’ll ever get to a Rat Pack-style James Bond film.)

The story itself is surprisingly easy to follow. This is not one of those detective stories that will leave you shocked over who turns out to be the bad guy. For a film that often takes something of a light-hearted approach to Tony’s efforts to solve the mystery, it’s also a rather violent film. More than a few people get killed. Tony gets kicked in the ribs at one point and the sound of the 50-something Sinatra groaning in pain is disconcerting. Of course, Tony recovers quickly and immediately gets his revenge. When you watch the scene, you think to yourself that anyone who would try to beat up Frank Sinatra has to be a fool. That’s largely because Tony is Sinatra and Sinatra is Tony.

It’s an entertaining film, one that works well as a time capsule of what it was like to cool and swinging and middle-aged in 1967. Tony Rome is smart enough to focus more on Sinatra’s charisma than on trying to impress the viewers with its own cleverness. If I ever have to hire a private detective, I hope he’s like Tony Rome. I hope he gets the job done. I hope he has a good time while doing it. And I hope he comes with his own Nancy Sinatra-sung theme song. That’s not too much to ask, is it?

Cleaning Out The DVR: The 300 Spartans (dir by Rudolph Mate)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

King Xerxes (David Farrar), the ruler of Persia, is leading his armies across the ancient world, conquering every nation that he comes to. Xerxes is quick to proclaim that his vision is to have “one world ruled by one master” but really, he’s mostly just trying to prove that he’s as fearsome a conqueror as his father was. Like most authoritarians, he’s really just dealing with his own psychological issues.

When Xerxes sets his eyes on Greece, he assumes that he’ll easily be able to conquer the country. Greece, after all, is divided into several city states and everyone knows that the cities are rarely willing to work together. However, 300 Spartan warriors — led by King Leonidis (Richard Egan) — are willing to stand their ground and hold off Xerxes’s forces for as long as possible. Despite the fact that they’re outnumbered and have no way of knowing if reinforcements will ever arrive, the 300 Spartans are willing to do whatever it takes to protect their freedom. They know that they probably won’t survive the battle but none of them are going to surrender. Better to die than be enslaved.

If the plot of 1962’s The 300 Spartans sounds familiar, that’s probably because it’s based on the same historical events that inspired 300. The 300 Spartans essentially tells the same story and even has many of the same themes as Zack Snyder’s later film. The main difference, of course, is that The 300 Spartans tells it story in a much less stylized manner. Indeed, while 300 tended to kind of take place in a dream-world, one that was designed to highlight the legendary elements of the story, The 300 Spartans very much takes place in the real world, with the actors playing the ancient warrions standing on the same ground that Leonidis and his 300 Spartans once stood upon. It’s a choice that works well, giving The 300 Spartans a far more authentic feel than a lot of the other historical epics that came out in the 50s and 60s.

The 300 Spartans has everything that you might expect from a film like this: dancing, harems, swords, armor, a lot of talk of omens and honor, and of course several speeches about the importance of freedom. That said, even if some elements of the story are predictable, the film is well-acted with Richard Egan giving a strong performance as Leonidis while David Farrar turns Xerxes into a villain who you’ll enjoy rooting against. Anne Wakefield is also well-cast as Artemesia, Xerxes’s consort and his main advisor. Perhaps best of all is Ralph Richardson, playing the general Themistocles with the grim determination of a warrior who has learned better than to depend on omens and prophecy.

At the end of the film, the narrator grandly declares that the actions of the 300 Spartans were more than an example of Greek bravery. They were also, “a stirring example to free people throughout the world of what a few brave men can accomplish once they refuse to submit to tyranny!” Maybe a few years ago, I would have said that the narration went a bit overboard but, after the past few years, I’m now more convinced than ever that a lot of people would be fine living in an authoritarian state as long as their side was the one with all of the authority. At a time like this, any film that celebrates freedom is to be appreciated.

Cleaning Out The DVR: Sodom and Gomorrah (dir by Robert Aldrich)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

I think we all know the story of Sodom and Gomorrah.

As told in the book of Genesis, Sodom and Gomorrah were two of the wickedest cities in what was then the civilized world. God grew so sick of their wickedness that he decided to wipe both of the cities and all of their inhabitants out of existence. However, because Abraham’s son, Lot, was living in Sodom with his family, God sent two angels to Sodom to warn Lot. Lot tried to argue that, if he could find 10 good people in the city, Sodom should be spared. However, then the people of Sodom showed up and demanded to “know” the angels and that pretty much sealed their fate. Lot and his family were told to leave the city and to not look back while it was being destroyed. Unfortunately, Lot’s wife just couldn’t resist the temptation and she ended up turning into a pillar of salt.

The 1962 film, Sodom and Gomorrah, recreates the Biblical story, though it takes a lot of liberties with the established narrative. Stewart Granger plays Lot. Anouk Aimee plays Bera, the decadent queen of Sodom who refuses to believe that the incoming destruction of her city is anything more than a dust storm. Pier Angeli plays Lot’s wife, who is imagined here as formerly being one of Bera’s slaves. Though she loves Lot, she loves her former life more and …. well, we all know the story. And then there’s several characters who were created specifically for the film. The most prominent of these is Astaroth (Stanley Baker), who is Bera’s scheming brother and who later is attracted to one of Lot’s daughters. The film was directed by Robert Aldrich. If you know anything about Aldrich’s filmography (Kiss Me Deadly, Twilight’s Last Gleaming, and Hustle among others), he’s not exactly the first name that comes to mind when you think of a director who you would expect to find directing a Biblical epic. And indeed, when compared to his other films, Aldrich often does seem to just be going through the motions when it comes to telling the film’s story.

Sodom and Gomorrah suffers from a problem that afflicted many Biblical epics. It takes forever to get to the good stuff. We’re all watching because we want to see the cities get destroyed and we want to watch Lot’s wife get transformed into a pillar of salt. However, this film — which has a running time of two and a half hours — takes forever to reach that point. First, we have to spend a lot of time listening to Astaroth plotting against his sister and scheming how to take over the Salt Trade, which is the source of the wealth of both of the cities. Then we spend an endless amount of time with Lot and his family wandering through the desert. There are a few good battle scenes but the film still feels dragged out. It takes forever to get to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and it’s a bit of a let down when it finally does happen. The ground shakes, Dust fills the sky. Buildings start falling on people. Throughout it all, the Sodomites continue to behave wickedly, which leads to a few odd moments. (A man and a woman stop fleeing for a few minutes to make out against a wall. Naturally, the wall is the next thing to collapse.) After all of that build-up, the destruction scenes are maddeningly pedestrian.

Lot is probably one of the most interesting characters in Genesis, an imperfect man who tried to do the right thing but who often seemed to have terrible luck. Unfortunately, Stewart Granger is a bit of a stiff in the lead role and he’s never convincing as someone who could lead his people through the desert. He doesn’t have the innate authority that Charlton Heston had in The Ten Commandments. Far more successful are the performances of Stanley Baker and Anouk Aimee. Aimee, in particular, seems to being having a blast being bad. Or at least, she is until the walls come tumbling down.

Film Review: Boom! (dir by Joseph Losey)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

“Boom!” says poet Chris Flanders (Richard Burton) in the 1968 film of the same name. Boom, he goes on the explain, is the sound of life being lived. Every minute that we’re reminded that we’re still alive is a “Boom!” It’s the type of thing that 18 year-old artists say to get laid, though the film treats Chris’s comment with an almost supernatural reverence.

Chris has just shown up on an island that’s owned by Flora Goforth (Elizabeth Taylor), who is the richest woman in the world and who is apparently dying of one of those diseases that makes you lie in bed and yell a lot. Flora lives on the island with an entourage that includes a secretary named Miss Black (Joanna Shimkus) and a head of security named Rudi (Michael Dunn). Rudi is a dwarf and he dresses like a Nazi and often does a stiff-armed salute, just in case we missed the fact that he’s supposed to be a fascist. Why exactly Flora, who were supposed to sympathize with, would employ a Nazi, we never really find out. The film seems to think that there’s something extremely daring about casting a person of short statue as the head of Flora’s security though, ultimately, it’s about as profound as uttering “Boom!” every few minutes.

Anyway, Flora is dying but she’s also dictating her autobiography. It turns out that she’s rich because she married a lot of wealthy men, all of whom died and left her all of their money. Flora’s always in a bad mood but things improve a little when Chris mysteriously shows up on the island and starts saying, “Boom!” all the time. Flora and Chris have several conversations about life and the meaning of it all, the majority of which are full of obscure statements and half-baked attempts at being profound. The dialogue is pretentious but it’s also not very memorable, which is a shame. One can survive being pretentious but being forgettable is simply unforgivable.

Eventually, a friend of Flora’s shows up. Famed playwright Noel Coward plays The Witch of Capri, a flamboyant friend to the rich and famous. He loves to gossip and has a bitchy comment for every occasion. One could argue that Coward is merely playing himself, though one imagines that the real-life Coward could have also come up with a few genuinely witty lines. The Witch informs Flora that Chris has a habit of showing up at the bedside of rich women right before they die. Some people think that Chris is a gigolo while others believe Chris to be …. THE ANGEL OF DEATH!

(Dramatic music)

Which is it? Don’t worry, the answer is revealed by the end of the movie. Of course, it takes a while to get to the end. Boom! is two hours long but it feels much longer. Storywise, Boom! feels like it would be ideal as a 30-minute episode of some old anthology show but director Joseph Losey keeps the story moving at a very slow pace and there are so many dramatic pauses and unnecessary zoom shots that the film itself becomes a bit of an endurance test. Just when you think the movie is finally going to get moving, Chris says, “Boom!” or there’s an extreme close-up of Flora’s ring and everything slows down again.

Boom! is one of the many films that Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor made together in the 60s. Unfortunately, both actors are miscast in the lead roles. Flora is described as being old and sickly. Elizabeth Taylor was in her 30s and appeared to be in robust health during the shooting of the film. Chris Flanders is supposed to be in his 20s and a seeker of truth and enlightenment. Burton was in his 40s and looked like he was in his 60s. He spends most of the film looking and sounding as if he’s just come off a weekend bender, which makes him look all the more ludicrous when he hears the ocean and says, “Boom!”

On the plus side, the film is lovely to look at. Flora’s house is big and beautiful. The island scenery is gorgeous. Flora’s costumes are ludicrously ornate but still, they are what you would want to see an international movie star wearing in 1968. As such, the film is always nice to look at. In fact, perhaps the best way to watch Boom! is to turn down the sound so you don’t have to listen to any of the dialogue.

Boom! was based on a Tennessee Williams’s play called The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore. The filmmakers decided to change the name to Boom! and I really can’t blame them for that. This was Elizabeth Taylor’s third film to be based on a Tennessee Williams play. Unfortunately, it matched neither the critical nor the commercial success of Cat On A Hot Tin Roof or Suddenly, Last Summer.

Boom!

Cleaning Out The DVR: The Comedians (dir by Peter Glenville)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Not to be mistaken for the Taylor Hackford-directed, Robert De Niro-starring disaster from a few years back, The Comedians is a film from 1967 that follows several different people as they attempt to survive day-to-day life in Haiti, back when Haiti was ruled by the dictator, Papa Doc Duvalier.

Richard Burton stars Mr. Brown (Richard Burton), a deeply cynical and world-weary Englishman who owns what passes for a luxury hotel in Haiti.  Though Mr. Brown hopes to be able to sell the hotel and get out of Haiti, he is also having an affair with Martha (Elizabeth Taylor), the German wife of Pineda (Peter Ustinov), the ambassador from Uruguay.  Mr. Brown tries to avoid politics, which it turns out is not easy to do when you’re living under a murderous regime.

Complicating Mr. Brown’s life is Major Jones (Alec Guinness), a retired British army officer who has come to Haiti to do business but who is promptly imprisoned when it’s discovered that he was invited to come to the island by a minister who was subsequently declared to be an enemy of the state.  The fascist Captain Concasseur (Raymond St. Jacques) arrests Major Jones and Mr. Brown takes it upon himself to try to get Jones released.  Unfortunately, Major Jones doesn’t quite understand how serious his situation is and he’s convinced the Haitians that he’s not only a brilliant military leader but that he can also arrange for them to receive a cache of weapons, which he claims he has hidden in a Miami warehouse.

Meanwhile, Mr. and Mrs. Smith (Paul Ford and Lillian Gish) have also arrived on the island, hoping to set up a vegetarian center in Haiti.  (Mr. Smith even once ran for President of the U.S. as the candidate of the Vegetarian Party.)  In many ways, Mr. and Mrs. Smith serve as a stand-in for clueless American activists, obsessing over minor issues while ignoring the larger problems that are right in front of their faces.

From the start, The Comedians establishes Haiti as being a dangerous place, a country where the people live in fear of the brutal police and where the poor struggle to survive day-to-day while their rulers live a life of luxury.  It’s a place where political dissidents regularly disappear, though the police aren’t above murdering people in public as well.  It’s a country where the State rules supreme, controlling the citizens through both fear and a fierce cult of personality.  Rebels like Dr. Magiot (James Earl Jones) only want the country to be free but they know that, as long superpowers like America are supporting the regime, there’s little that the rebels can realistically hope to accomplish.

A major theme running through The Comedians is that the real suffering of the Haitian people is often overshadowed by the strategic concerns of the United States.  Unfortunately, pretty much the same thing happens within the film itself.  While there’s several black actors in supporting roles, the story focuses on the white characters and, as a result, it sometimes feels like the film’s message is less about the people being oppressed and more about how unfortunate it is that people like Brown, Jones, and the Smiths are being inconvenienced by it all.  Like many similarly well-intentioned political films from the late 60s, The Comedians get so bogged down in all of the personal dramas that it loses sight of what’s actually the important part of the story.  The film is often seems more interested in Brown and Martha’s affair than in the conditions that would lead to people like Dr. Magiot risking their lives to bring about change.

For the most part, it’s a well-acted film.  Richard Burton’s natural self-loathing is put to good use and Alec Guinness has a few poignant scenes as a pathological liar who doesn’t realize how much trouble he’s actually in until it’s too late.  (Guinness also has a scene where he wears blackface and pretends to be Burton’s maid.  He does this in order to escape from the secret police and the film doesn’t treat it as being a joke but it’s still rather cringey to watch.)  Elizabeth Taylor is miscast as Martha and her German accent comes and goes but Paul Ford and Lillian Gish do a good job playing clueless Americans.  Perhaps the film’s strongest performance comes from Zakes Mokae, who doesn’t say much as a member of the secret police but who exudes menace every time that he’s on screen.  Still, as well acted at it may be, the film is slowly paced and always seem hesitant about taking any position beyond a general sense that dictatorships are bad.

That said, there’s nothing wrong with reminding people that dictatorships are bad.  That’s especially an important message today.  The past few years have left me convinced that a lot of people secretly yearn for a dictatorship and would be willing to trade their freedoms for a false sense of security.  Though the film may struggle dramatically, it’s still works as a warning about what true authoritarianism actually is.