Tag Archives: Anna Zielinski

October Positivity: Beckman (dir by Gabriel Sabloff)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

2020’s Beckman is one of the most violent faith-based films I’ve ever seen.

Usually, when a religious film is full of death and violence, it’s apocalypse-themed.  The rapture has happened.  The Anti-Christ is in power.  All bets are off.  Beckman, however, is not an apocalypse-themed film.  Instead, it’s a John Wick rip-off, one in which the Wick-character also happens to be a preacher.

David A.R. White plays Beckman, a former contract killer who stumbled into a church and meets Rev. Philip (Jeff Fahey).  Philip converts Beckman, baptizing him and showing him that even a viscous killer can be redeemed.  (A Vietnam vet, Philip killed eleven people during the war and it still haunts his nightmares.  Incidentally, Jeff Fahey deserves roles in better movies.)  When Philip grows sick and dies, Beckman takes over as the church’s pastor.  When Philip’s runaway niece, Tabitha (Brighton Sharbino), shows up at the church, Beckman adopts her as his daughter.

One year later, all Hell breaks loose.  Gunmen working for rich cult leader Reese (William Baldwin, looking like someone cosplaying Alec for Halloween) storm the church and they kidnap Tabitha.  Beckman snaps.  He goes back to his old ways, leaving a trail of bodies throughout Los Angeles as he searches for Tabitha.  The film becomes a cross of Taken and John Wick with a religious angle tossed in as well.  Beckman kills but he constantly hears a voice in the back of his head telling him that he needs to reject his anger.

Beckman does indeed kill a lot of people and I have to admit that it bothered me a bit, just how casual the film got about killing.  It made the film’s ending, with Beckman suddenly realizing that he doesn’t need to kill everyone, feel rather hollow.  Reese is an Jeff Epstein-like madman who kidnaps teenage girls and makes them a part of his cult.  He associates with human traffickers.  And yet, when Beckman has a chance to kill him, Beckman suddenly realizes that he doesn’t want to lower himself to Reese’s level.  Okay, what about all the people Beckman killed beforehand?  I mean, if you’ve already killed 12 people, you might as well take out the worst of them all.

(It reminded me a bit of how Cecil B. DeMille would always be sure to include plenty of sin in the first half of his films so that audiences could enjoy themselves before the second half became all about chastity and redemption.  The film portrays a countless number of deaths but still wants its message to be Thou Shalt Not Kill.  It feels a bit hypocritical.)

Beckman takes a lot of its cues from John Wick and there are a few effective fight scenes.  The film is also divided into chapters and there’s a lot of time jumps, showing that the filmmakers have, at the very least, seen at least one Tarantino film.  But the film itself lacks the self-aware humor and the shameless style that made the John Wick films memorable.  David A.R. White is not a bad actor but he’s better at light comedy than at killing people.  The film ends with what appears to be the promise of a sequel but I’m not sure how many more people Beckman can kill while still claiming to be a preacher.

October Positivity: Marriage Retreat (dir by David Christiaan)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 2011’s Marriage Retreat, Jeff Fahey and Victoria Jackson play marriage counselors.

Seriously, that’s bring to mind some wonderful images, doesn’t it?  I would pay money for a film where Jeff Fahey plays a Dr. Phil-type psychiatrist who has his own television show where he yells at his guests and tell them that they’re not worth his time.  Fahey would totally knock that role out of the park.  As for Victoria Jackson, her eccentric screen persona would seem to make her the perfect companion for Fahey.  Fahey is known for intensity.  Jackson is known for being in her own private world.  They’re a good combination!

And Fahey and Jackson are the best things about Marriage Retreat.  Admittedly, Victoria Jackson doesn’t really get to do too much but she has a few good scenes with Fahey.  Fahey, for his part, dominates the entire film.  Marriage Retreat may be a lightweight and ultimately rather light-headed comedy but Fahey doesn’t give a lightweight performance.  Fahey delivers all of his lines with that hard-driving intensity of his and, when someone complains about being married, Fahey’s glare tells you all you need to know.  If the film’s message was that being a bad husband results in dealing with the wrath of Fahey, many husbands would immediately shape up.

Unfortunately, the rest of the film doesn’t really live up to the performances of either Fahey and Jackson.  The majority of the film deals with three boring couples who all go on a marriage retreat.  They stay at what appears to be a summer camp and they discuss why their marriages are falling apart.

For instance, Mark (David A.R. White) says that he’s not ready to be a father and he’s come up with all sorts of financial excuses to justify not starting a family.  Do you think Jeff Fahey’s going to let him get away with that?  No way!  Plus, Mark’s wife (Andrea Logan White) is already pregnant so Mark better stop whining and step up.

Bobby Castle (Tommy Blaze) was a successful businessman but then he blew all of his money in some unwise investments.  Now, Bobby is addicted to gambling online and his wife (Caroline Choi) is thinking of leaving him.  Bobby is such a degenerate gambler (to quote Joe Pesci in Casino) that he even finds a way to get online at the camp so that he can continue to play poker on the Internet.  The man needs help!

And finally, James Harlow (Matthew Florida) needs to grow up, especially since he’s about to become a father…. wait, a minute, I thought that was Mark’s problem.  Well, no matter.  Grow up, James!

The men are all immature and Jeff Fahey calls them out on it while Victoria Jackson tells the wives that they need to remember that God made them second and their job is to support their husbands …. wait, what?  Oh, wait — this is another faith-based movie about marriage.  The recurring theme in these films is that, no matter how much the husband screws up, it’s still ultimately the fault of the wife for not being understanding and supportive.  Yeah, okay, then.  There’s a difference between being supportive and being a doormat.

Anyway, the problem with this film is that I didn’t really care about the married couples.  But I did enjoy watching Jeff Fahey do his thing.

October Positivity: Jerusalem Countdown (dir by Harold Cronk)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

2011’s Jerusalem Countdown opens with the world on the verge of destruction.  Israel and a nuclear-armed Iran are negotiating in Washington and not everyone wants the two countries to be at peace.

In Chicago, Daniel (Carey Scott) watches the news of the summit and then looks out his window as his unfriendly and glowering neighbor comes and goes from his house.  Daniel worries that his neighbor is up to something.  He could be a member of a terrorist cell!  Daniel’s wife (Jaci Velasquez) tells him to stop worrying about things that he can’t control but that’s easier said than done.

FBI agent Eve (Anna Zielinski) is approached by her father (Stacy Keach), a former intelligence agent who warns her that the end times are approaching.

Another intelligence agent, Shane Daughtery (David A.R. White) is contacted by a burned-out arms dealer (Lee Majors), who informs him that a group of terrorists are planning on setting off a series of bombs and plunging the world into war.  The arms dealer is assassinated by a man who keeps reciting passages from the Book of Revelations.  Meanwhile, CIA bigwig Jack Thompson (a seriously miscast Randy Travis) continually tells Shane that he can’t share too much information with him because it’s all classified….

Jerusalem Countdown is a faith-based film that also tries to be an action film.  In fact, I would say that far more emphasis is put on action than on faith.  Until the final few minutes of the film, there’s really not much focus put on religion, other than Daniel briefly praying when he finds himself trapped in the neighbor’s house and a scene where a librarian scolds Shane and Eve for not knowing about the Ten Commandments.  One major commandments, by the way, is Thou Shalt Not Kill but Shane and Eve manage to kill quite a few people in this film.  Of course, they were all bad people and Shane and Eve are trying to keep the world from being plunged into a world war so I’m willing to cut them some slack.

The cast, as you may have noticed, has a number of familiar faces in it.  It’s largely a nostalgia cast, the type that’s designed to make people over the age of 60 say, “Lee Majors is in this!”  With the exception of Randy Travis, none of the “stars” have a particularly large role.  One gets the feeling that Stacy Keach filmed his scenes in a handful of hours, collected his paycheck, and then got out of there.  It’s amazing to me that Eric Roberts is somehow not in this film.

As for the film itself, it’s competently made and David A.R. White is one of the better actors amongst the Pureflix regulars.  (White has even managed to maintain a semblance of dignity through five God’s Not Dead films.)  That said, the film itself moves a bit slowly and the low-budget keeps the action from being as memorable as it could be.  There’s a cool helicopter crash but otherwise, it’s never as exciting as it obviously wants to be and there’s a lot — and I do mean A LOT — of filler-type scenes of people talking on their phones while driving from one location to another.  The plot itself feels a bit muddled and there’s a lot of loose ends left dangling, as if the film was meant to be a set up for a sequel that never came.