In celebration of the August 6th birthday of the beautiful and talented Michelle Yeoh, I thought I would share this specific fight scene between Yeoh and Zhang Ziyi in CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON (2000). It’s incredible, featuring a variety of swords and other assorted weapons. It’s one of the true highlights of the film, and I’m always glad to have any excuse to watch it! The arrival of my favorite living actor (Chow Yun-Fat) at the end of the scene is just the icing on a delicious cake of action! Enjoy, my friends!
Sabotage (2014, directed by David Ayer)
Atlanta Homicide detective Caroline Brentwood (Olivia Williams) and her partner, Darius Jackson (Harold Perrineau), are the primaries on the murder of a former DEA agent. Their investigation leads them to an elite special operations team led by “Breacher” Wharton (Arnold Schwarzenegger). Wharton and his crew were previously suspended for six months while the FBI investigates their last raid and why there was a $10 million dollar discrepancy between the amount of money the team reporter and the amount of money the FBI was expecting to be recovered. Someone is murdering the members of Breacher’s team one-by-one. Breacher and Brentwood investigate the murder and what happened to the money but they both discover that they can’t trust anyone.
Sabotage has got a cast that is full of talent and familiar faces, including Sam Worthington, Mireille Enos, Terrence Howard, Joe Manganiello, Martin Donavon, and Josh Holloway. It also has one truly great action scene, a violent chase down a busy Atlanta street that comes to sudden and very bloody conclusion. The film’s final scene takes Sabotage into western territory, with Schwarzenegger dominating the screen like a larger-than-life Sergio Leone hero. It’s just too bad that the rest of the movie isn’t as a good as its final shot or that one chase scene. Unfortunately, most of the film feels repetitive and half-baked, with way too much time being wasted on supporting characters who tend to blend together.
Arnold Schwarzenegger gives one of his better performances. When he made Sabotage, he was no longer a governor and he was also no longer an automatic box office draw and there’s a tired weariness to his performance. Unfortunately, the rest of the cast is either miscast (Olivia Williams) or stuck playing one-dimensional characters (everyone else). There’s enough good action sequences to keep Sabotage watchable and Schwarzenegger shows that he can actually be a very good actor but it’s also easy to see why this film didn’t reignite his his career.
Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 6.11 “The Tomorrow Lady/Father, Dear Father/Still Life”
Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986! The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!
This week, a man tells a terrible lie, Greer Garson can see the future, and Isaac is losing his hearing! Come aboard, we’re expecting you….
Episode 6.11 “The Tomorrow Lady/Father, Dear Father/Still Life”
(Dir by Richard A. Wells, originally aired on December 4th, 1992)
This episode of The Love Boat features one of the worst stories ever. Ken Miller (Lawrence Pressman) wants to date Sarah Curtis (Kim Darby). However, Sarah is on the cruise as a member of the Single Parents Group and, when Sarah first sees Ken, she assumes that Ken is a single father because he’s standing with Libby McDonald (played by the one-named Louanne), who is the daughter of Ken’s friend, Tom (Jim Stafford). So, Ken just decides to lie about being a father.
Eventually, Sarah finds out. When she notices that Libby is spending all of her time with Tom, the gig is up. Sarah, however, FORGIVES Ken and accepts his marriage proposal! (“Looks like I won’t be a member of Single Parents anymore….”) Lady, he lied to you about having a daughter! He recruited a little girl to pretend to be his daughter! THIS IS NOT THE WAY TO START A MARRIAGE!
The other two stories were better. One featured Greer Garson (in her final screen performance before retiring) as a woman who was a self-described “good guesser.” She met a struggling businessman (Howard Duff) who wanted to use her power to play the stock market but eventually, he fell in love with her for her and not her powers. Howard Duff’s character was not particularly likable but Greer Garson seemed to be having fun.
The other story featured Isaac struggling with a double ear infection and fearing that he would permanently lose his hearing. He didn’t, which is good considering that he’s the ship’s head bartender and he’s the guy who everyone comes to with their problems. (It always amuses me how a passenger will just automatically start talking to Isaac as if they’re best friends when they’ve only been on the boat for a couple of hours.) What made this story work, though, was the performance of Ted Lange. He was so believably scared of losing his hearing that you just wanted someone to hug him and reassure him that it would all be okay. When his hearing finally came back, I breathed a sigh of relief. Obviously, playing Isaac was probably not the most challenging roll of Ted Lange’s career. I mean, the man has played Othello! Still, Lange gave a really good and honest performance in this episode. He didn’t use the fact that he was acting on The Love Boat as an excuse to just coast.
This cruise …. it was kind of forgettable. Still, at least Ted Lange got a chance to shine!
Song of the Day: Andy Warhol from David Bowie
Today’s song of the day comes from David Bowie and it’s about Bowie’s fascination with Andy Warhol. Warhol himself apparently didn’t care for this song but Bowie meant it as a tribute.
This song came out in 1971. 25 years later, Bowie would play Andy Warhol in Basquiat.
Scenes I Love: Robert Mitchum in Out of the Past
The great Robert Mitchum was born, on this date, 107 years ago. Today’s scene that I love comes from one of my favorite Mitchum films, the classic 1947 noir Out of the Past.
In this scene, we are reminded that no one was cooler than Robert Mitchum. And no one threw a better punch.
4 Shots From 4 Films: Special Andy Warhol Edition
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!
On this date, 97 years ago, Andy Warhol was born. Today, we mark this occasion with….
4 Shots From 4 Andy Warhol Films
Empire (1965, dir by Andy Warhol)
Vinyl (1965, dir by Andy Warhol)
Poor Little Rich Girl (1965, dir by Andy Warhol)
Chelsea Girls (1966, dir by Andy Warhol and Paul Morrissey)
Artwork of the Day: Special Detective True Crime Cases (Artist Unknown)
This is from 1948. Unfortunately, the identity of the artist is not known.
Music Video Of The Day: Summer 09 by Vancouver Sleep Clinic (2019, dir by Max Galassi)
Today’s music video of the day is this haunting and rather sad video for Summer ’09, the second single to be released from Vancouver Sleep Clinic’s second album, Onwards to Zion.
The song itself was inspired by the passing of a friend of Tom Bettison’s. (Bettison is the artist behind Vancouver Sleep Clinic.) Bettison’s friend passed away in 2017 and this song was Bettison’s way of dealing with the pain of his loss. It’s not surprising, then, that both the song and the video are both nostalgic and sad, a song of regret that also celebrates the time that these two friends were able to share with one another.
Enjoy!
Late Night Retro Television Review: Pacific Blue 2.14 “One Kiss Goodnight”
Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing Pacific Blue, a cop show that aired from 1996 to 2000 on the USA Network! It’s currently streaming everywhere, though I’m watching it on Tubi.
This week, Cory helps a man who can’t remember how lame this show is.
Episode 2.14 “One Kiss Goodnight”
(Dir by Sara Rose, originally aired on December 15th, 1996)
Alec Cooper (Markus Flanagan) gets amnesia after he falls off the balcony of his hotel room while trying to escape some mysterious men with guns. Cory tries to help Alec figure out who he actually is and she starts to fall in love with him in the process. Alec admits that there seems to be something familiar about Cory.
Well, that means there are only two possibilities.
Cory and Alec are either meant to be together
or
Alec is married to someone who looks just like Cory!
It turns out the latter is true. Alec eventually get his memory back and Cory meets his wife, who indeed looks a lot like her. Cory goes back to being single. Interestingly, Chris spends this entire episode telling Cory that she needs to date more but she doesn’t approve of Cory dating someone who has amnesia. Then again, Chris doesn’t really approve of anyone doing anything.
Meanwhile, TC’s girlfriend makes the decision to leave Santa Monica so that she can attend a graduate program and become a counselor for rape victims. This is the sort of storyline that would have been touching if TC has any personality or if he and his girlfriend had any sort of chemistry. But they don’t.
It probably sound like I hated this episode. Actually, I think it’s one of the better episodes of season 2, if just because the bike riding was kept to a minimum. The bikes would have made this awful. Without all of the bike nonsense, it was merely forgettable. That’s progress!
Trailer for HIGHEST 2 LOWEST (2025), starring Denzel Washington!
Who thinks that a remake of Akira Kurosawa’s HIGH AND LOW, directed by Spike Lee, and starring Denzel Washington, sounds intriguing? I do! The duo’s fifth film will be released on August 15th, 2025.
Check out the trailer for HIGHEST 2 LOWEST:
