Today, the Shattered Lens wishes a happy birthday to Amy Steel, the actress who played Ginny, the strongest and most resourceful of all of the final girls to appear in the Friday the 13th franchise. Whenever I watch any of the Friday the 13th films, I always like to think that I would be Part 2’s Ginny, though I know, deep down, I would actually probably more likely be Part One’s Marci, getting stuck outside the rain in my underwear and somehow not hearing someone stepping up behind me with an axe.
Today’s scene that I love comes from Friday the 13th Part II. In this scene, Ginny proves herself to be the only camp counselor in history to be smart enough to confuse a backwoods vagrant who wears a flour bag over his head. This scene is one of the reasons why Ginny is one of the franchise’s most popular characters.
4 Or More Shots From 4 Or More Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films lets the visuals do the talking!
Today, TSL wishes a happy birthday to director Joseph Kosinski! It’s time for….
4 Shots From 4 Joseph Kosinski Films
Tron: Legacy (2010, dir by Joseph Kosinski, DP: Claudio Miranda)
Oblivion (2013, dir by Joseph Kosinski, DP: Claudio Miranda)
Only The Brave (2017, dir by Joseph Kosinski, DP: Claudio Miranda)
Top Gun: Maverick (2022, dir by Joseph Kosinski, DP: Claudio Miranda)
Someone is assassinating commie journalists in Europe and making it appear as if the CIA is responsible. O’Malley (Tim Blake Nelson) of the CIA suspects that the assassin is Michael Radek (Clifton Collins, Jr.), a former intelligence asset who faked his own death but who has now returned and is seeking vengeance on the Agency for the death of his wife and daughter. O’Malley decides that Radek’s friend and former CIA handler, Steve Vail (Aaron Eckhart), is the only man who can track Radek down.
The problem is that Vail is as disillusioned with intelligence work as Radek. Vail walked away from the Agency years ago and now spends his time listening to jazz and working as a bricklayer. Vail explains that, when working with bricks, everything is predictable and everything fits together perfectly. It’s the opposite of the chaotic world of spies and assassinations. O’Malley think that Vail is full of crap and I would be tempted to agree if not for the fact that Aaron Eckhart is one of the few actors who can make you believe anything that he says.
At first, Vail refuses to help but then Radek sends a group of assassins to kill him. That changes Vail’s mind. Along with an inexperienced supervisor named Kate (Nina Dobrev), Vail heads to Greece to not only track down Radek but also discover the identity of a mole in the CIA.
The Bricklayer was advertised as being a return-to-form of sorts for director Renny Harlin. In many ways, it’s a typical Harlin film. For the most part, it looks good. Some of the action scenes are exciting. A car flips over and explodes. At the same time, it never quite reaches the heights of Harlin’s heyday. This film has neither the grandeur of Die Hard 2, the romantic sparks of The Long Kiss Goodnight, or the energy of Deep Blue Sea. The film’s low-budget is definitely a factor in that. There are scenes in the film that look about as cheap as some of the movies that Bruce Willis was making before he announced his retirement.
That said, The Bricklayer does what it does with efficiency and Renny Harlin still knows how to keep the action moving. Though the story is a bit too familiar to really be intriguing, Aaron Eckhart makes for a surprisingly believable secret agent. One thing I especially liked about Eckhart’s performance is that he didn’t go for the “grim” stereotype of the former intelligence agent. As played by Aaron Eckhart, Steve Vail may have had his regrets but he wasn’t some sort of emotionless zombie. He enjoyed jazz. He enjoyed the work that he did as a bricklayer. Though the rules of the genre demand that he and Nina Dobrev start the film as mild adversaries, they quickly developed a likable chemistry.
The Bricklayer is the epitome of an okay, middle of the road movie. It’s neither good nor bad enough to be especially memorable but it’s entertaining enough if you’ve got 100 minutes to kill.
Writer George Plimpton (Alan Alda) is a Park Avenue sophisticate who practices “participatory” journalism. He has already written about pitching in an exhibition all-star game and getting knocked out by Sugar Ray Robinson. He is having trouble coming up with his next stunt until he goes to Central Park and plays a touch football game with his girlfriend Kate (Lauren Hutton) and his editor, Oscar (David Doyle). Oscar sees George throwing the ball and decides that George should write about going to a professional football team’s training camp as a player.
George, who fantasizes about throwing the game-winning touchdown, is enthusiastic. Most of the teams that George approaches are less enthusiastic but finally, the Detroit Lions agree to sign him as a quarterback. Once the other players realize that George is a writer and not a professional athlete, there’s a lot of resentment. As Guard John Gordy (playing himself) puts it, he could easily get injured while protecting an inexperienced quarterback like George. George can always go back to Park Avenue but, for the rest of the players, the game is their life and they don’t like the idea of some outsider coming in and treating it all like a joke. At first, only the fearsome defender Alex Karras (also playing himself) is willing to support George but eventually, George’s refusal to give up wins over the rest of the team. They even let him score a touchdown during practice.
When the preseason begins, George waits for his opportunity to take the field. How many yards can he lose in three plays?
Paper Lion is based on a true story. In 1963, George Plimpton did attending training camp and play a scrimmage for the Lions and he later wrote a book about the experience. The movie changes the time period from ’63 to ’67 so that all of the then-members of the Lions could play themselves. (Though Karras was a friend of Plimpton’s, he was actually suspended during the 1963 season and, unlike in the movie, never joined Plimpton on the practice field.) The film plays Plimpton’s football career largely for laughs, celebrating every guy’s fantasy of being a sports star while also showing why it’s probably best to leave the actual game to the professionals. Alan Alda doesn’t imitate Plimpton’s famous Mid-Atlantic accent but he does capture the excitement of a man getting to live out his fantasy.
Paper Lion was made with the full cooperation of the NFL and a good deal of the film’s final third is made up footage that was shot for an actual game. Seen today, it’s interesting to see how positively Paper Lion portrays both the game and its players and to contrast it with how the game is usually portrayed today. There’s no talk of steroids or fears of multiple concussions. All of the players are clean-cut, friendly, witty, and helpful. Even the training camp hazing is all done is good fun. Paper Lion introduces us to the nicest people in the world and they’re all football players!
Rikers Island is one of those places that we all know about, even those of us who have never been there.
Rikers Island is an island that sits in the East River in the Bronx. It is also home to New York City’s largest and most notorious jail. It’s a jail that has a reputation for violence and corruption. Over 100,000 people are admitted into Rikers per year and, on most days, the complex has a population of 10,000 prisoners. (For comparison, my mom was born in a town that currently has a population of 1,200.) Rikers Island is notorious for the number of prisoners who have died while in the jail. It is estimated that 85% of the inmates are pre-trial defendants, people who have yet to be convicted of anything but who either didn’t get or couldn’t afford bail. The other 15% are serving short sentences. Rikers Island is a county jail that has a reputation for being as bad as any state prison. You don’t have to be from New York City to know about Rikers Island. The jail has become so notorious that Rikers Island has developed an international reputation and is often held up as a symbol of everything that’s wrong with the way that incarceration is handled.
Lock-Up: The Prisoners of Rikers Island was filmed for and aired on HBO in 1994. The documentary is now 30 years old and the population of the jail has grown considerably since it first aired. That’s a frightening thought because the jail that is seen in the documentary was already overcrowded, dirty, and dangerous. The documentary features interviews with both guard and prisoners. We follow the guards as they search cells and confiscate weapons and drugs. We meet a prisoner who has AIDS and who is hoping to be transferred to a drug rehab. (He explains that he was born addicted and he’ll probably die addicted if he’s left in Rikers.) We meet several of the pregnant women who are incarcerated in the jail and listen as they wonder what would happen if they went into labor when there’s not a guard around. We watch as the guards uneasily deal with the prisoners who have asked to be incarcerated in the jail’s “gay wing.” We meet several inmates who are obviously dealing with untreated mental illness. A lawyer tries to talk to his client and gets in a shouting match with another prisoner. We meet a notorious criminal named Eddie White, who explains that a life sentence means that he no longer has to follow the rules. We meet a lot of people in this documentary and what they all agree on is that being locked up is Hell.
It’s hardly a balanced documentary. The filmmakers are clearly on the side of the inmates but that’s okay. Considering that the inmates have essentially no control over their own lives while they’re in Rikers, it can be argued that they deserve to have someone on their side. Most of the inmates talk about their regrets but, as the documentary ruefully observes, most of them will eventually end up returning to Rikers even after they’re released. One woman cries when she learns her baby might be ill but, when we see her during her second stint at Rikers, she blithely comments that her baby was taken away by “the city.” As with so many inmates, she explains that she was set free with no training as to how to remain free. As an addict, she has discovered the system is more interesting in punishing her addiction than treating it.
The biggest problem with the criminal justice system is that it rarely rehabilitates but instead creates a situation where no one can get or take advantage of a second chance. 30 years after it was released, Lock-Up reminds us that this is hardly a new problem.
We’re nearly halfway through the year and so far, we have two films that seem like they might still be in the Oscar conversation at the end of the year, Dune 2 and Civil War. With the Cannes Film Festival coming up this month, we should soon have some more contenders to consider.
My predictions below are a bit heavy on sequels. In fact, if the predictions below came true, it would a record year for sequels at the Oscars. Of course, it’s early and it’s totally probable that the majority of the films listed below will not be nominated. Right now, it’s pretty much a guessing game. The production delays caused by last year’s strikes have opened the door for a lot of sequels to receive consideration that they might not receive in other years.
Today, the Shattered Lens wishes a happy 59th birthday to actor and musician Ari Lehman! Lehman made his debut in 1978’s Manny Orphans and so impressed director Sean S. Cunningham that Cunningham offered him a role in his next film. When Cunningham offered Lehman the role, he asked only one question. “Can you swim?”
At the age of 14, Ari appeared in Friday the 13th. He didn’t get much screen time but his performance and appearance as the young Jason Voorhees created a moment of fright that lives on today.
4 Or More Shots From 4 Or More Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films lets the visuals do the talking!
Today, TSL wishes a happy birthday to Danish director Lone Scherfig! It’s time for….
4 Shots From 4 Lone Scherfig Films
An Education (2009, dir by Lone Scherfig, DP: John de Borman)
One Day (2011, dir by Lone Scherfig, DP: Benoît Delhomme)
The Riot Club (2014, dir by Lone Scherfig, DP: Sebastian Blenkov)
Their Finest (2016, dir by Lone Scherfig, DP: Sebastian Blenkov)
In 1972, a New York Congressperson named Shirley Chisholm made history when, in January of that year, she announced that she would be a candidate for the Democrat presidential nomination. Chisholm, who had already made history when she became the first Black woman to be elected to Congress, was also the first Black woman to run for a major party’s presidential nomination.
(For the record, U.S. Senator Margaret Chase Smith of Maine and the Rev. Channing Phillips were, respectively, the first woman and the first Black to run for a major party’s presidential nomination. Smith lost the Republican nomination to Barry Goldwater in 1964. In 1968, Phillips was the first Black to have his name officially put into nomination at a major party political convention.)
Of course, Chisholm did not win in 1972. She was one of many liberal candidates who declared that they were running as an alternative to the presumed front runner, U.S. Sen. Edmund Muskie. When Muskie’s campaign stalled in New Hampshire, it was George McGovern (and not Shirley Chisolm, John Lindsay, Eugene McCarthy, or Fred Harris) who benefitted. For the most part, the media viewed Chisholm as being a protest candidate, one who had a small but loyal activist base but which couldn’t compete with candidates like McGovern and Hubert Humphrey. Still, Chisholm went into the convention with a handful of delegates and, with McGovern not having enough pledged delegates to win outright, it was expected that Shirley Chisholm would at least be able to get some concessions from him in return for her support.
Political conventions being what they are, things didn’t work out that way. Due to several backroom deals, George McGovern was able to secure the nomination during the first round of voting. McGovern went on to suffer a landslide defeat and for years, his general election campaign would be held up as an example of how not to run for President. Chisholm returned to the U.S. Congress, where she served for another ten years.
Featuring Regina King in the title role, Shirley is a dramatization of that primary campaign. In many ways, it’s a typical Netflix docudrama. It’s well-made and it’s tasteful and occasionally, it’s a little bit boring. Political junkies will enjoy it, particularly if they’ve studied the 1972 presidential election. My inner history nerd was thrilled as largely forgotten historical figures were casually mentioned in the dialogue. Who would have guessed that a film released in 2024 would have featured characters talking about the presidential campaigns of Sam Yorty, John Lindsay, and Walter Fauntroy? Sadly, no mention is made of Patsy Mink. While Shirley Chisholm was making history as the first Black woman to run for president, U.S. Rep. Patsy T. Mink of Hawaii was doing the same as the first Asian-American woman to run.
It’s an uneven film, one that takes it time getting started. Filmmaker John Ridley is a better writer than director. Some of the scenes, like the ones of Chisholm mentoring a young Barbara Lee (Christina Jackson), felt a bit too much on the nose. (That said, Barbara Lee did start her career as a volunteer with the Chisholm campaign and, while in Congress, she regularly cited Chisholm as an inspiration.) But then there were other scenes that worked wonderfully, like Chisholm visiting segregationist George Wallace (W. Earl Brown) after Wallace had been shot. The film is at its best when it reaches the Democrat Convention and Chisholm goes from being elated to disappointed as one of her strongest allies goes from supporting her to announcing that it’s time for all the black delegates to line up behind McGovern. Regina King’s performance, especially towards the end of the film, captures both Shirley Chisholm’s strength and her vulnerability. It’s not always easy being a trailblazer.
Finally, if you want to learn more about Shirley Chisholm’s 1972 presidential campaign, I suggest the 2005 documentary, Shirley Chisholm ’72: Unbought and Unbossed.
Wally Sparks (Rodney Dangerfield) is a talk show host with a program that is so raunchy that even Jerry Springer says, “At least this isn’t The Wally Sparks Show!”
Despite being a huge hit amongst teens and college students, the show is on the verge of being canceled by the head of the network, Mr. Spencer (Burt Reynolds, wearing a fearsome toupee). He is tired of Wally’s antics and he tells Wally and his producer, Sandy Gallo (Debi Mazar), that they have a week to make the show respectable.
Wally doesn’t know what to do. Wally Sparks act respectable? Wally’s a guy who don’t get no respect, no respect at all. Then Sandy finds a letter inviting Wally to attend a party at the home of Georgia Governor Floyd Patterson (David Ogden Stiers), a noted critic of the show. Hoping to get the interview that will save the show, Wally and Sandy head down south.
At the party, Wally acts like Wally and scandalizes all of the politicians and socialites. He also shares a bottle of whiskey with a horse and then rides the horse through the mansion. The party is a disaster but, after Wally claims that he can’t walk because of a spinal injury he suffered when he fell off the horse, the Governor allows him to recuperate in the mansion. Wally causes more chaos while also teaching the Governor’s wife (Cindy Williams) how to play strip poker and eventually exposing a scheme to blackmail the Governor into building a Confederate-themed amusement park.
Rodney Dangerfield playing a talk show host sounds like a great idea and there are a lot of talented people to be found in Meet Wally Sparks. Debi Mazar is an actress who should have appeared in a lot more movies and she and Rodney Dangerfield make a good team. The movie actually gets off to a funny start, with a montage of actual talk show hosts talking about how much they hate Wally Sparks and his show. Gilbert Gottfried has a cameo as a manic guest and Wally repeats some of Rodney Dangerfield’s classic jokes.
Unfortunately, the movie starts to fall apart as soon as Burt Reynolds threatens to cancel the show for being too lowbrow. No network executive has ever threatened to cancel a show that’s bringing in the ratings, regardless of how lowbrow it might be. Things get even worse after Wally goes to Atlanta and ends up staying there. The movie tries to recreate the Snobs vs. the Slobs dynamic of previous Dangerfield films but the Governor comes across as being such a decent man that there’s no joy to be found in watching his life get turned upside down. The movie has a surprisingly large number of subplots, including one about Wally’s son (Michael Weatherly) falling for the Governor’s daughter (Lisa Thornhill), but most of them go nowhere and just distract from the man who should have been the film’s main attraction, Rodney Dangerfield. By the end of the movie, even the usually irrepressible Dangerfield seems to have been neutered.
Rodney Dangerfield was a national treasure but Meet Wally Sparks was not the best showcase for his persona or his style of humor. Fortunately, Caddyshack and Back To The School are available to watch anytime that we need a good laugh and we want to show Rodney Dangerfield a little respect.
Through the Shattered Lens 