Category Archives: Film

In The Custody of Strangers (1982, directed by Robert Greenwald)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

In this television film, Emilio Estevez plays the world’s worst son but his behavior makes sense because he also has the world’s worst father (played by Estevez’s real-life father, Martin Sheen).

When teenager Danny Caldwell (Estevez) gets arrested for crashing into a police car while driving drunk, his mother, Sandy (Jane Alexander), wants to bail him out and bring him home.  However, Frank Caldwell (Sheen) is an old-fashioned disciplinarian and he decides that his son needs to spend a night in jail in order to teach him a lesson.  Even though, as a juvenile, Danny is given a private cell, he still snaps when the older inmate in the cell next door starts coming onto him.  After smashing the man’s head against the cell bars, Danny picks up a battery charge and is sucked into the system.

While Frank and Sandy struggle to get Danny released from jail, Danny falls deeper and deeper into despair and anger.  It’s an overcrowded, busy jail and Danny is often left in isolation for both his safety and the safety of the other prisoners.  Even though the warden (Kenneth McMillan) is sympathetic to Danny and can tell that he’s not really a hardened criminal, there’s only so much that he can do for him.  Meanwhile, on the outside world, Frank stubbornly refuses to admit that he made a mistake by leaving Danny in jail overnight.  When a job opportunity presents itself in another state, the unemployed Frank misses some of Danny’s hearings so that he can interview for it, leaving Danny feeling abandoned all over again.

For obvious reasons, the casting of Martin Sheen and Emilio Estevez as father and son works very well in this film.  Not only is there the obvious family resemblance but both Sheen and Estevez project the same attitude of anger and resentment towards the world.  If Danny has a chip on his shoulder, it’s because he inherited from his father.  In The Custody of Strangers does a good job of showing how being imprisoned can often turn someone who made a mistake into a hardened criminal but, even though it’s mostly critical of the criminal justice system, it doesn’t let Frank off the hook either.  Frank may say that he was just trying to discipline his son but the film makes clear that what he actually wanted was for jail to do his job as a parent.  The results are disastrous and the film ends on a note of ambiguity.  After what Danny has been through, it’s clear that he’ll never be the same person again.

Sheen, Alexander, and Estevez all give good performances in In The Custody of Strangers.  The only ray of hope that the film offers is the kindly warden and he’s also the film’s biggest flaw because it’s hard to believe that, with everything else going on in the jail, he would have had time to take such a benevolent interest in just one inmate.  In real life, Danny Caldwell would have been even more lost than in this movie.

Film Review: When The Wind Blows (dir by Jimmy Murakami)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Over the past few years, I’ve seen some extremely depressing animated films.

I cried during the first fifteen minutes of Up.  I cried during the final ten minutes of Toy Stories 3 and 4.  Actually, now that I think about it, I think I’ve sobbed through every single PIXAR film, with the exception of the movies about the talking cars and the one about the good dinosaur.  My point is that I’m not one of those people who automatically assumes that, just because a film is animated, it’s necessarily going to make me laugh.  I fully understand that not all animated films are for children and that a cartoon can be just as serious and dark as a live action movie.

That said, I don’t think anything could have prepared for the 1986 film, When The Wind Blows.  To say that When The Wind Blows is bleak would be an understatement.  Is When The Wind Blows a depressing film?  Yes, you could say that.  It’s a film about an elderly couple facing the end of the world with optimism and a never-ending faith that things will turn out okay.  This is the most trusting couple in the world and, in the end, they end up crawling into their own separate potato sacks, where they struggle to recite the Lord’s Prayer as they both die a slow and painful death.  It’s not just that When The Wind Blows is depressing.  It’s also that it’s a film that takes place in a world bereft of hope.  It’s a film that has a message but, at the same time, it also seems to be convinced that it’s a message to which no one will bother to listen.

Jim and Hilda Bloggs (voiced by John Mills and Dame Peggy Ashcroft) are a loving couple who own a rather nice cottage in rural England.  They’re very content in their life and more than a bit complacent.  They have faith that both the milk and the paper will be delivered every morning.  Hilda has a nice garden going.  Jim regularly takes the bus down to the library, where he reads the newspapers and picks up pamphlets about what to do in case of a nuclear attack.  When the news comes over the radio that Britain will probably be attacked in 3 days, Jim industrially sets out to make a shelter for himself and Hilda.

It’s not much of a shelter.  In fact, it’s really just two doors leaning against a wall.  However, Jim and Hilda are simply following the instructions that they found in a government-printed pamphlet and both of them have a good deal of faith in the “power that be.”  As they wait for the war to break out, they remember just how much they enjoyed World War II.  Everyone was in it together during World War II!  And Jim has faith that everyone will continue to be in it together during this latest war.

The bomb eventually drops.  The animation, which previously had the feel of an old school Christmas special, becomes dark and ominous as the world around Jim and Hilda’s house erupts into flames.  Jim and Hilda hide in their little shelter.  Though the pamphlets say that they shouldn’t leave the shelter for at least two weeks, Jim and Hilda leave within a few hours.  They walk around outside and look at the charred remains of the garden.  Hilda wonders what fallout looks like.  Jim isn’t sure.

And, at this point, we know they’re both as good as dead.  (Interestingly enough, it does appear that they survived longer than their neighbors, who perhaps did not hide behind a door.)  The rest of the film is essentially watching Jim and Hilda waste away while remaining convinced that someone from the government is going to come and save them.  You find yourself wondering if the two of them are really as naive as they seem or if they’re both in a shared denial about what’s happened.  It’s probably a combination of the two.

It’s an undeniably effective film.  It not only works as an anti-war film but also as an anti-government film.  Both the Left and the Right will find things to appreciate in the film’s story.  But my God is it ever a depressing movie.  It’s a well-made film that I’ll probably never voluntarily watch again.

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Here’s A First Look (For Those Of Us in the U.S.) At The Personal History of David Copperfield!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

The Personal History of David Copperfield has finally made it over here to the U.S.  It opened in the UK back in January and its release here in the States has been continually delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic.  Originally, it was supposed to open in May.  Then it got moved back to August 14th and then it was moved back another two weeks to August 28th.

Personally, I’m really looking forward to seeing the film.  Apparently, there was some controversy over the casting of the lead role but I personally think that casting the terrifically talented Dev Patel as David Copperfield is a way to bring some new life to an old story.  The film was directed by Armando Iannucci, who, along with creating Thick of It and Veep, also directed The Death of Stalin, one of the best films of the past ten years.

This featurette about the film was released today and here it is:

Here’s The Trailer For Robin’s Wish

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

When I first heard that there was a documentary coming out about the final days of Robin Williams, I feared for the worst.  I worried that it would be one of those exploitative programs that featured reenactments and tabloid reporters sharing every sordid rumor that they had ever heard about the man.

However, the trailer for Robin’s Wish seems to indicate that the film is actually meant to be both a tribute to Williams and an educational tool about Lewy body dementia, the disease that is believed to have led to him ending his life.  Let’s hope that it is.

Robin’s Wish will be released on September 1st.

Here’s The Trailer For On The Rocks!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

On the Rocks is the latest film from Sofia Coppola.  Featuring Bill Murray, Rashida Jones, and Marlon Wayans, it’s a film about a daughter who teams up with her impulsive father to discover whether or not her husband is cheating on her.

In other words, it’s a Sofia Coppola film.

And I can’t wait to see it!

On The Rocks will be released at some point in October.  Here’s the trailer:

Here’s The Trailer For Death On The Nile!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Kenneth Branagh is back with another Agatha Christie adaptation and, again, he’s brought along an all-star cast.  I will definitely see Death on the Nile because seriously, how can you go wrong with a murder mystery featuring Gal Gabot, Armie Hammer, and Russell Brand?  It should be fun if nothing else.

The movie comes out on October 23rd and here’s the trailer:

Hanging By A Thread (1979, directed by Georg Fenady)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

A group of old friend who call themselves the Uptowners’ Club (yes, really) want to go on a picnic on top of a remote mountain.  The only problem is that they have to ride a cable car up to the mountain and there are reports of potentially bad weather.  It’s not safe to ride in a cable car during a thunderstorm.  Drunken ne’er-do-well Alan (Bert Convy) doesn’t care and, since his family owns both the mountain and the tramway, his demands that he and his friends be allowed to ride the cable car are met.  One lightning strike later and the members of the Uptowners’ Club are stranded in a cable car that is perilously suspended, by only a frayed wire, over treacherous mountain valley.

With no place to go, there’s not much left for the members of the Uptowners’ Club to do but bicker amongst themselves and have lengthy flashbacks that reveal every detail of their own sordid history.  Paul (Sam Groom) is angry with Alan because Alan is now engaged to his ex-wife (Donna Mills).  Sue Grainger (Patty Duke) is angry with everyone else because they don’t want to admit how their old friend Bobby Graham (Doug Llewellyn) actually died.  The other members of the Uptowners’ Club are angry because there’s not much for them to do other than watch Duke and Convy chew on the scenery.  Because of the supposedly fierce winds, someone is going to have to climb out on top of the cable car and repair it themselves.  Will it be Paul or will it be cowardly drunk Alan?  On top of everything else, Paul is set to enter the witness protection program and has got hitmen who want to kill him.

This made-for-TV disaster movie was produced by Irwin Allen.  Are you surprised?  It’s also three hours long and amazingly, Leslie Nielsen is not in it.  It’s hard to understand how anyone could have produced a cable car disaster film and not given a role to Leslie Nielsen.  Cameron Mitchell’s in the film but he’s not actually in the cable car so it’s a missed opportunity.  Any film that features Patty Duke detailing how her friends got so drunk that they ended up killing the future host of The People’s Court is going to at least have some curiosity value but, for the most part, Hanging By A Thread gets bogged down by its own excessive runtime and lack of convincing effects.  Hanging By A Thread came out at the tail end of the 70s disaster boom and it shows why the boom didn’t continue into the 80s.

Film Review: The Divide (dir by Xavier Gens)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

It seems like whenever there’s any sort of disaster, people are advised to seek shelter.  Often, if the disaster is national news, people are told to take shelter in their basement, as if everyone in the world has a basement.  This is a bit of a pet peeve of mine because I live in North Texas, where the land is completely flat and no one has a basement, a cellar, or any other sort of underground shelter.  (We also don’t have mud rooms and, in fact, I’m not even sure what a mud room is.)

That said, there’s a part of me that’s glad that it would be impossible for me to take shelter because, from what I’ve seen in the movies, it appears that spending months in a shelter can actually be worse than dying in a disaster.

Take the 2011 film, The Divide, for instance.

The Divide opens with several people watching while a mushroom cloud blooms over New York City.  Eight of those people all end up taking shelter in the same basement.  While that means that they don’t get incinerated by the nuclear blast, it also means that they now have to figure out how to live together.  That’s not going to be easy because it doesn’t take long to realize that none of these people should be anywhere near each other.

For instance, there’s Mickey (Michael Biehn).  Mickey’s the one who built the shelter.  He says that he specifically built it so that, in case of a nuclear war or a terrorist attack, he could safely sit underground and laugh at everyone dying above him.  That’s not a nice sentiment but Mickey is played by Michael Biehn so he’s still one of the more likable characters in the film.

There’s Josh (Milo Ventimiglia) and his brother Adrien (Ashton Holmes) and their friend Bobby (Michael Eklund), three idiots who are clearly destined to end up going crazy before the ordeal is over.

There’s Eva (Lauren German) and her boyfriend, Sam (Ivan Gonzalez), who are both obviously destined to be the voices of reason to which no one is going to listen.

And then there’s Marilyn (Rosanna Arquette) and her daughter (Abby Thickson), who are there because it’s not a shelter-movie without a child being put in jeopardy.

Lastly, there’s Devlin (Courtney B. Vance), who is there to be the older authority figure who ultimately fails to exercise much authority.

After an effectively chilling scene where the basement is briefly invaded by some mysterious men in Hazmat suits, The Divide settles down to be a fairly predictable and, to be honest, rather unpleasant examination of a group people going crazy from the stress of being trapped together.  It may seem odd to complain that a film about the aftermath of a nuclear apocalypse was unpleasant and I guess it is.  But The Divide runs a little over two hours and it’s so relentlessly bleak and everyone is ultimately so nasty that it becomes a bit of a chore to sit through.  By the time the torture scenes begin, The Divide has slipped into Hostel territory and it’s hard not to feel that the film is being grotesque simply for the sake of being grotesque.

That said, the film does have its strength.  The shelter is an effectively claustrophobic location and Michael Biehn does what he can with the role of Mickey.  When some of the characters end up getting radiation sickness, it creates some effectively scary visuals.  I mean, if you ever thought it would be cool to poison yourself with radiation, this film will change your mind.  That’s a good thing, I suppose.

The Divide is a very long movie about some very unpleasant people in an even more unpleasant situation.  It’s well-made but not particularly entertaining to watch.  In the end, it’s easy to feel that everyone would have been better off just staying above ground and getting it over with.

Here’s The Trailer For The Death Of Me!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

“How am I still alive!?”

That’s always a good question.  The usual answer is that your either in Purgatory or you’re having a dream or someone is trying to drive you crazy by making you think that you died and then came back to life.

I don’t know if any of that is true about the upcoming film, Death of Me, but I do like the trailer.

And here it is:

Death of Me is scheduled to be released on October 2nd.