Film Review: Replicas (dir by Jeffrey Nachmanoff)

Posted on September 20, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Don’t even ask me to explain what’s going on in Replicas, a sci-fi film that was released way back in January to terrible reviews and non-existent box office.

Admittedly, this film has a plot and you can kind of follow it if you force yourself to. And really, it’s not that unusual of a plot. It’s another one of those things where a scientist is shocked to discover that his top secret research is actually being funded by the military and everyone in the audience is supposed to be like, “OH MY GOD! NO! NOT THE MILITARY!” As you can probably guess from the title, the film is also about clones. Have you ever noticed that bad sci-fi films always seem to involve cloning?

It’s not so much that the plot can’t be followed as that the film’s storyline just feels oddly underdeveloped. Watching Replicas, you get the feeling that the filmmakers got bored with the plot and just decided to go ahead and make the movie, without thinking everything through. As a result, the film touches on all of the ethical and philosophical issues that come along with cloning people but that’s all it does. Instead of actually exploring any of those issues or trying to come up with an original spin on the story, Replicas just mechanically moves from one scene to another.

Keanu Reeves plays William Foster, a scientist who, along with his longtime friend and partner, Ed Whittle (Thomas Middleditch of Silicon Valley fame), has figured out a way to transfer a dead person’s mind into a robot’s body, hence bringing the person kind of back to life. A big evil corporation has set up a lab in Puerto Rico for Foster and Whittle to do their research. The problem is that every time that they put a dead soldier’s mind into an android body, the dead soldier gets pissed off and destroys the body. Evil Mr. Jones (John Ortiz) demands that they figure out a way to keep the dead soldier from getting mad. Somehow, it doesn’t occur to Foster or Whittle that Jones wants them to put the soldier’s mind in the android’s body so that the android can then be used as a weapon of war.

(Also, if you want to use androids as soldiers, why not just do some sort of remote control thing like they do with drones? Seriously, I don’t think Jones has thought his evil scheme through. The less complicated the better.)

Anyway, Foster and his wife, Mona (Alice Eve), and his three children decides to spend the weekend camping and things don’t go well. In fact, they go so badly that Foster ends up crashing the SUV and his entire family ends up dead. Not to worry though! Foster’s a scientist and he knows how to create clones. So, he’ll just clone his family. Of course, to do that, he’ll have to pretend that they’re all still alive and, because he only has room for three clones, he’ll have to pretend like his fourth child never existed.

Does Foster succeed? Well, the movie is called Replicas. What’s weird is that it’s obvious that Foster’s going to succeed but the movie still spends an entire hour with Foster and Whittle trying to figure out how to bring the clones to life. I understand the movie wanted to at least pretend like there was a chance that Foster might not be able to do it but, again, the movie is called Replicas.

Anyway, Foster does eventually resurrect his family but then he discovers that Jones is actually a bad guy and soon, Foster and the Replicas are fleeing for their lives. It really doesn’t add up too much because the film doesn’t bother to really explore any of the issues that it brings up. Potentially big moments — like Foster deleting his youngest daughter’s existence — happen but are never really explored. You keep waiting for some sort of twist — like the clones turning on their creator or Foster discovering that he’s a clone himself — and it never happens. Instead, the film turns into a rather standard if not very exciting sci-fi action film.

To give credit where credit is due, Keanu Reeves does appear to be taking the film seriously and he has a few scenes that suggest that the film would have been improved if it had played up the idea of Foster being a mad scientist. The rest of the cast seems to be either bored or miscast but Reeves does try to bring some heart to the film. Otherwise, Replicas is pretty forgettable.

LifetimeFilm Review: The Sweetheart (a.k.a. Dating A Sociopath) (dir by Max McGuire)

Posted on September 18, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Is this Canadian film from 2018 called The Sweetheart or Dating a Sociopath?

It depends on where you first saw it.

When it was on Netflix, it was called The Sweetheart. However, when the film recently aired on Lifetime, the title had been changed to Dating A Sociopath. We all know how much Lifetime loves to change titles and, in this case, I think they made the right move. Dating A Sociopath just has a certain punch to it that The Sweetheart lacks. The Sweetheart makes it sound like this is a film about one of those old women who always has 60 year-old candy sitting in a glass jar. Whereas Dating A Sociopath tells you pretty much everything that you need to know about the film.

The sociopath of the title is Brian (John Cor), who is a personal trainer who apparently has a nice side gig going where he seduces wealthy women, spends all of their money, and murders them. John Cor does a pretty good job of playing Brian, turning up the charm even while he’s doing some of the worst things imaginable. As played by Cor, you can understand just how exactly Brian has managed to be such a successful con artist. There’s also a great scene in which a jewelry store employee attempts to blackmail Brian and Brian responds not with the expected violence but instead by precisely explaining everything that he will do to the employee if he doesn’t keep quiet. In this scene, Brian is both charismatic and dangerous and scary as Hell.

Brian’s latest target is Samantha (Jessalyn Gilsig), who is currently separated from her well-meaning but alcoholic husband. Samantha thinks that Brian is the best but her oldest daughter, Jane (Hannah Vandenbygaart), is immediately suspicious of him Of course, Jane has problems of her own to deal with. Thanks to her father’s lack of sobriety and basic driving skills, Jane has a broken leg and is forced to spend most of the movie hopping around on either crutches or using a cane. Making things even worse for Jane is the fact that Brian keeps messing with her medication, the better to keep Jane in constant pain and to also fool everyone into thinking that she’s become a pill-popping drug addict.

And I have to say that, as someone who has broken her ankle on multiple occasions and who knows just how Hellish the healing process can be without painkillers, nothing made me dislike Brian more than those scenes where he would sneak into Jane’s room and switch out her medication while she was sleeping. I mean, if I didn’t already know it from the title, those scenes would be all the proof that I needed to know that Brian was a sociopath. At the same time, those scenes also firmly put me on Jane’s side. By the time Jane finally stood up for herself and started her own investigation into Brian’s past, I was ready to jump and cheer.

Dating A Sociopath is a pretty entertaining Lifetime film, even if it wasn’t originally made for Lifetime. John Cor and Hannah Vandenbygaart are both well-cast in the two most important roles and if nothing else, the film will encourage anyone to think twice before dating a sociopath. Even a charming one.

Cleaning Out the DVR #24: Crime Does Not Pay!

Posted on September 17, 2019 by gary loggins

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We’re way overdue for a Cleaning Out the DVR post – haven’t done one since back in April! – so let’s jump right in with 4 capsule reviews of 4 classic crime films:

SINNERS’ HOLIDAY (Warner Brothers 1930; D: John Adolfi) – Early talkie interesting as the screen debut of James Cagney , mixed up in “the booze racket”, who shoots bootlegger Warren Hymer, and who’s penny arcade owner maw Lucille LaVerne covers up by pinning the murder on daughter Evalyn Knapp’s ex-con boyfriend Grant Withers. Some pretty racy Pre-Code elements include Joan Blondell as Cagney’s “gutter floozie” main squeeze. Film’s 60 minute running time makes it speed by, aided by some fluid for the era camerawork. Fun Fact: Cagney and Blondell appeared in the original Broadway play “Penny Arcade”; when superstar entertainer Al Jolson bought the rights, he insisted Jimmy and Joan be cast in the film version, and…

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Lifetime Film Review: Undercover Cheerleader (dir by Danny J. Boyle)

Posted on September 16, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Autumn (Kayla Wallace) has just transferred to a new high school and she has a decision to make. At her old school, Autumn was the star of the dance team but it turns out that this new school doesn’t have a dance program. Instead, it appears that Autumn is going to have to settle for either becoming a cheerleader or working on the school paper.

It’s a difficult decision and it was one to which I could automatically relate. When I was in high school, I was constantly told that I should follow in my sister’s footsteps and try out for cheerleader. I was also told that, with my big vocabulary and love of gratuitous sarcasm, I would be a natural for the school paper. Myself, I didn’t want to be a cheerleader because I wanted to establish my own identity as opposed to just following in my sister’s footsteps. At the same time, I didn’t want to join the paper because, as much as I love to write, I hate being edited. I ultimately decided to do neither. However, Autumn apparently has a bit more initiative than I did at that age because she decides to do both!

That’s right. Autumn is going to try out for the squad and then she’s going to write anonymous articles about her experience for the newspaper! She’s going to be an …. UNDERCOVER CHEERLEADER!

Autumn makes the squad and, not surprisingly, she discovers that there’s a lot to write about. For instance, it turns out that that high school’s cheerleading coach is kind of a fascist who forces the cheerleaders to eat laxatives and who takes an immediate and irrational dislike to the only black girl on the squad. The coach is also obsessed with controlling every aspect of her cheerleaders’s lives and it’s obvious that she’s less concerned with their well-being than she is with winning another championship. She even forces one cheerleader to seriously injure herself for no apparent reason.

When Autumn’s first article comes out, the entire school is like, “Ewwwww! Laxatives!?” Everyone on the squad is trying to figure out who wrote the article. Why they didn’t automatically suspect Autumn, who they already know is friends with the paper’s editor, I’m not sure. While the article does get the coach in trouble, it also leads to a cheerleader power struggle and ultimately a murder. This is a Lifetime movie, after all.

A lot happens in Undercover Cheerleader. In fact, you could probably argue that too much happens in the movie. It takes forever to get to that murder, which is unusual for a Lifetime film. But no matter! Undercover Cheerleader is a well-acted film and one that even has a few unexpected moments of wit. Autumn is an interesting character because, even as she writing articles about how much it sucks to be a cheerleader, she’s also discovering that she likes the other members of the squad. Kayla Wallace does a great job of capturing Autumn’s conflicted emotions about her assignment and she’s well-matched by Maddie Phillips and Ryan Grantham, who play two cynical student journalists.

If you’re a fan of Lifetime films, you should enjoy Undercover Cheerleader.

Drive-In Saturday Night #5: MALIBU BEACH (Crown-International 1978) & VAN NUYS BOULEVARD (Crown-International 1979)

Posted on September 14, 2019 by gary loggins

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The kids are back in school, the days are getting shorter, and the nights are getting cooler. Yes, my friends, summer’s almost over, but before it ends, let’s take one more trip to the drive-in and enjoy a pair of Crown-International Exploitation classics. Crown was responsible for a slew of “teen sex” drive-in flicks in the 70’s and early 80’s. You know the type: the “teens” are all over 21, and the “sex” consists mainly of topless babes and some heavy necking!

Our first feature, 1978’s MALIBU BEACH, is the quintessential Crown-International “teen sex” romp. School’s out, and all the hardbodied California kids head to said beach for some frolicking in the sand and surf. Pretty Dina gets a summer job as a lifeguard, and meets handsome football hunk Bobby. A leather jacket wearing musclehead named Dugan tries to get between them, but we all know he’s got no shot!…

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Hellhound On My Trail: Walter Hill’s CROSSROADS (Columbia 1986)

Posted on September 10, 2019 by gary loggins

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‘Well the blues had a baby/and they named it rock and roll” –

Muddy Waters

Hi, my name’s Gary, and I’m a bluesoholic! Whether it’s Deep South Delta or Electric Chicago, distilled in Great Britain or Sunny California, the blues has always been the foundation upon which rock’n’roll was built. Yet there aren’t a lot of films out there depicting this totally original American art form. One I viewed recently was 1986’s CROSSROADS, directed by another American original whose work I enjoy, Walter Hill.

Hill was responsible for cult classics filled with violence and laced with humor, like HARD TIMES (with Charles Bronson as a 1930’s bare knuckles brawler), the highly stylized THE WARRIORS , the gritty Western THE LONG RIDERS, and SOUTHERN COMFORT (a kind of MOST DANGEROUS GAME On The Bayou). He scored box office gold with the 1982 action-comedy 48 HRS, making a movie star out of…

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Lifetime Film Review: My Evil Stepdad (dir by Stacia Crawford)

Posted on September 10, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

AGCK!

As you can tell from looking at the picture above, the stepdad in My Evil Stepdad is even more evil and pervy and shady than the usual Lifetime evil stepdad. Lifetime, of course, has a long and proud tradition of airing films about dangerous stepparents. They all usually seem to follow the same basic plot. A widow (and it’s almost always a widow as opposed to someone who has just gone through a divorce) meets a seemingly charming man who quickly marries her. Her daughter is suspicious of her new stepfather. Around the halfway mark, the stepfather commits a murder, just in case we were still entertaining any doubts about whether or not he’s a really bad guy. Eventually, the daughter does a Google search and discovers that her new stepfather has either changed his name or is lying about some other important detail from his past. Eventually, the stepfather is either killed or taken off to prison, the widow realizes that there’s nothing wrong with being single, and the daughter is proven correct. The most important thing, of course, is that everything returns to normal at the end of the film.

In My Evil Stepdad, the widow is Tracy (played by Jennifer Lafluer). Tracy has still not fully gotten over the death of her husband and, while she’s open to dating again, she has a strong aversion to Tinder and almost anything else that came into existence after 2011. Her daughter is Ashley (Addy Stafford), who has inherited her father’s love of photography and who is looking forward to attending college in the fall. And then, finally, the evil stepdad of the title is Jared (Chris Johnson), who seems to be nice and trustworthy and whose claim that he’s started a wind chime business is kind of charming as long as you don’t think about it too much.

When Jared comes across an online dating profile that Ashley set up for Tracy, he quickly manages to make his way into Tracy’s life. Of course, he gets a little bit of help from Ashley who, unfortunately, doesn’t realize that he’s totally evil until after he’s already married Tracy. It’s after the wedding that Jared starts to push Ashley out of her mother’s life. Not only does he pressure her to take out a student loan to help pay for college but he also takes over her photography studio, changing the locks and turning it into his mancave. Even worse, he tells Ashley that if she needs any money, she’ll have to ask him for it. He even says that he will be her “sugar daddy.” Like seriously, ewwww!

While all of this is going on, Tracy continues to defend Jared even as everyone else in her life tells her that he’s kind of a jerk. Of course, every since the wedding, Tracy has been feeling ill. Hmmmm …. could Jared possible have something to do with that?

In many ways, My Evil Stepdad is a standard evil stepparent film but it manages to go through all of the expected paces with a certain panache. Director Stacia Crawford keeps the action moving at a nice pace and Abby Stafford and Jennifer Lafluer are believable as daughter-and-mother. Chris Johnson is wonderfully sleazy in the role of Jared and the film also features a good comedic turn from Belmont Cameli in the role of Ashley’s best friend. If you like Lifetime films, you’ll enjoy My Evil Stepdad.

Lifetime Film Review: The Wrong Cheerleader (dir by David DeCoteau)

Posted on September 9, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

“You messed with the wrong cheerleader!” Vivica A. Fox announced towards the end of Lifetime’s The Wrong Cheerleader.

“Hell yeah, he did!” I shouted back at the television.

Now, one reason why I yelled that response is because Vivica A. Fox is a totally badass. She has appeared in almost every installment of Lifetime’s “Wrong” franchise and she always plays a no-nonsense authority figure that no one in their right mind would want to mess with. When Vivica A. Fox gives you advice, you better listen. And when she gets mad at you, you better run because she does not mess around!

The other reason I cheered was because she was telling off one of the most unsympathetic and evil abusers to ever appear in a Lifetime film. After spending two hours watching this guy gaslight and threaten his girlfriend, I was ready for Vivica to show up and verbally kick his ass and she did not disappoint.

Fox plays Coach Flynn in The Wrong Cheerleader. She’s the cheerleading coach at the local high school and it’s a job that she takes very seriously. As she explains to a new recruit, being a part of the squad means that you’re a part of a family. When a prospective cheerleader says that she understands what Flynn means, the Coach tells her that she won’t be capable of understanding until she actually experiences it for herself. And I’m just going to say that I probably would have been scared to death of Coach Flynn in high school because she would have taken one look at me and probably told me to drop the attitude, stop showing so much skin, and behave like a responsible young lady. And I probably would have done it too because, seriously, you don’t want Coach Flynn mad at you.

Coach Flynn is concerned about her newest cheerleader, Becky (Cristine Prosperi). Becky is dating Rob (David Meza) and, from the minute he first shows up at school, it’ obvious that Rob has issues. Along with having a violent temper, Rob is a relentless manipulator, the type of guy who tells Becky that everything he does wrong is because of how much he loves her. When he gets into a fight, he tells Becky that it was because he was defending her and that it’s actually her fault because she was wearing her cheerleading uniform. If Becky so much as looks in the direction of another guy, Rob loses his temper. Rob, of course, has a hundred excuses for his behavior, most of them having to do with his dysfunctional family life. Everyone can see through Rob. Everyone, it seems, but Becky.

If you’re looking for an expose into the sordid world of high school cheerleading, you’ll probably be disappointed with The Wrong Cheerleader. To be honest, Coach Flynn could have been a soccer coach and Becky a goalie without changing the film’s plot. (Though “You messed with the wrong goalie!,” doesn’t have as much of a ring to it as “You messed with the wrong cheerleader!”) But no matter. The film does a pretty good job of revealing the techniques that an abuser will use to maintain control over the woman that he’s abusing. Anyone who has ever been in a toxic relationship will recognize exactly what Rob is doing. The film also makes the very important point that if you do witness abuse, you need to say something. Just shrugging away the problem or hoping that things will somehow get better is not a solution.

For those of us who remember her as the always quirky Imogen on Degrassi, it’s interesting to see Cristine Prosperi playing a far more conventional character in this film but she does a good job in the role and she still looks young enough to pass for a high school student. (The same could not be said of some of her classmates.) David Meza does a good job playing up his character’s manipulative nature and, of course, Vivica A. Fox is a total badass as Coach Flynn.

The Wrong Cheerleader isn’t quite as over-the-top as most Lifetime cheerleading films but it has a good and heartfelt message and that’s definitely worth something.

Lifetime Film Review: Identity Theft Of A Cheerleader (dir by Christie Will Wolf)

Posted on September 8, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Poor Vicky Patterson!

All she wants is …. well, actually she wants a lot but none of it is really too much to ask. Vicky (pictured above and played by Maiara Walsh) wants to grow up to lead a successful life, like the life led by her wealthy and demanding mother (Gail O’Grady). She wants to be one of the popular girls at school. She wants to date a star athlete and she wants to be the girl who throws the legendary party that all of her classmates will be talking about for years after they graduate. She wants to be the captain of her high school’s cheerleading squad. Not the co-captain or anything like that. No, she wants to be the captain.

The only problem is that Vicky is 31 years old and she dropped out of high school a long time ago. In fact, she dropped out after it became obvious that she would never make the squad, the popular girls would never accept her, and she’d never be able to make her mother happy. So, now, Vicky is working in a dead-end job at an outlet store and supporting her good-for-nothing boyfriend, Darren (Matty Finochio). When Vicky talks about going back to night school and maybe even trying to earn a degree, her mother informs her that she’s too old to have any hope of successfully breaking into any worthwhile industry. In short, Vicky’s life is pretty much over.

However, Caitlyn’s life has just begun! Caitlyn is what Vicky starts calling herself after she steals the identity of one of her co-workers. As Caitlyn, Vicky enrolls herself at the local high school. She tells all of her new classmates that she’s 18 years old and that she and her mom have just moved to town. As Caitlyn, Vicky finally makes the cheerleading squad and gets to experience the life about which she’s spent the past decade dreaming. Suddenly, she’s hanging out with the popular crowd. She’s got an athletic boyfriend. She’s got a future to which she can actually look forward!

Of course, there are some problems. No solution is ever perfect. For one thing, Darren wants to know why his girlfriend is suddenly dressing like a teenager and spending so much time out of the apartment. For another thing, another girl is named captain of the squad so Vicky has to arrange for her to break her ankle. (Vegetable oil has so many uses.) There’s also the fact that one of her fellow cheerleaders, Heather (Karis Cameron), is suspicious that Vicky may not be who she claims to be. This is a Lifetime film, so you can probably guess that this is going to lead to murder and attempted murder. But seriously, what else could Vicky do? Go back to working at Big Lots?

In the long and proud history of Lifetime cheerleading films, Identity Theft Of A Cheerleader is perhaps the best yet. I don’t say this lightly because there’s been some great Lifetime cheerleading films. But what sets Identity Theft Of A Cheerleader apart from all the others is the wonderfully unhinged — yet, at times, oddly sympathetic — performance of Maiara Walsh. As played by Walsh, Vicky is both dangerous and relatable. I don’t think there’s anyone alive who hasn’t, at some point, wished for a chance to relive a year from their past and make some different choices, if just for the opportunity to see what would happen. Identity Theft Of A Cheerleader embraces the melodrama as all good Lifetime film should but, at the same time, it also taps into a very real human emotion. Who hasn’t asked “What if?”

Despite the rather unwieldy title, Identity Theft Of A Cheerleader is an entertaining and undeniably enjoyable Lifetime film. Director Christie Will Wolf and screenwriter Barbara Kymlicka craft a fun melodrama that’s rooted just enough in reality to stick with you even after the final cheer.

Film Review: Shadowplay (dir by Tony Pietra Arjuna)

Posted on September 5, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

When he was just a child, Anton Shaw disappeared, the victim of an apparent kidnapping. He was missing for days until he was found with little memory of where he had been or who had abducted him. He’s haunted by dreams of his mother being taken away from him, her farewell cry of “Adieu,” ringing in his mind.

As an adult, Anton (played by Tony Eusoff) is a private investigator, working in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia. He’s not a particularly successful detective. In fact, as the film begins, it seems like he spends more time reading old paperback novels about other detectives than doing any investigating of his own. Even as an adult, he’s haunted by dreams and random flashes of memories, all linking back to the trauma that he suffered as a child.

When Anton is hired to investigate the disappearance of a college student named Lumya (Jurias Hartman), he soon finds himself plunging into the underworld of Kuala Lampur. Everyone from Lumya’s dance instructor to her art teacher seems to have something to hide and, for once, Anton’s problem is not having enough options but instead having too many. Everyone seems as if they may have had something to do with Lumya’s disappearance and the more that Anton digs, the more he finds himself obsessing on his own disappearance. Could these two mysteries somehow be linked?

While Anton investigates, he also reads a book. The book, with is credited to no author and no publisher, appears to be a choose your own adventure-type book from the 1980s and the choices that it asks the reader to make are unmistakably similar to the choices that Anton will have to make to solve not only Lumya’s mystery but his own as well. Does the book hold the answers to Anton’s questions or is both his disappearance and Lumya’s destined to just be another unsolved mystery in a world that’s full of them?

Shadowplay is a wonderfully surreal mystery from director Tony Pietra Arjuna. Tempting as it may be to call Shadowplay a film noir, perhaps a better label would be neon noir. The city of Kula Lampur is definitely one of the stars of the film with, Arjuna capturing the urban landscape with its mix of beauty and danger. The neon of the city glows in each scene, adding a progressively more and more menacing tint to each chapter of Anton’s story. When Anton’s investigation leads him to a bar, Ich bin ein Berliner glows, in purple lettering, from a wall, a reminder that all things will ultimately be commercialized. Towards the end of the film, when Anton meets some very bad people, the neon gives off a red glow that warns us of the blood that will soon be spilled. Throughout it all, the synthpop score (provided by Stellar Dreams) pulses in the background, adding to the film’s dream-like feel.

Shadowplay is a film that keeps you off-balance. It’s a film that keeps you wondering what’s real and what is just a fragment of memory or a figment of imagination. It’s a film that welcomes a second viewing, just so you can pick up on the clues that you might have missed the first time around. In the lead role, Tony Eusoff makes Anton into a sympathetic character and, even as the film grows progressively more surreal, the sincerity of his performance keeps you watching. You want to know what’s going on in his mind. You want to know the answers to his questions and the solutions to his mysteries.

Playing out like a filmed dream, Shadowplay is an existential journey worth taking. It’s played in some theaters and is currently available on VOD. I watched it on Vimeo.