Back to School Part II #40: Crossroads (dir by Tamra Davis)

Posted on September 14, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last year, I started a new blog called Lisa Marie’s Song of the Day. It’s nothing big. It’s just a place where, on a daily basis, I share music that I happen to like. Ever since I started the site, certain people have been giving me a hard time over the fact that they have discovered that I am a total Britney Spears fangirl.

Well, I’m not ashamed to admit it. I love Britney Spears. I always have. Even when I was going through my whole “wearing black and writing dark poetry” phase, I still loved Britney. Her songs are great to dance to and they’re even more fun to sing off-key and at the top of your lungs when you’re taking a shower or driving to or from work. Even better is when you have a family member in the car and she has no choice but to listen as you sing Work Bitch in your thickest rural accent.

(Whenever I sing, I unleash my inner country girl.)

Of course, it’s never just been Britney’s music to which I’ve paid attention. I was jealous of her when she dated Justin Timberlake. I was worried for her when she married Kevin Federline. I was scared for her when she went through her period of public instability. When she shaved her head, lost custody of her children, and was placed under the conservatorship of her father and attorney, it angered me to watch as the media treated her pain as entertainment. When she was diagnosed as being bipolar, I related to her because I knew exactly what she was going through. I even still use the #FreeBritney hashtag on twitter.

So, in short, I’m definitely a fan. But I have to admit that I prefer Later Britney, the one who uses bitch as a term of empowerment, to Early Britney, the one who used to lie about being a virgin.

The 2002 film Crossroads is definitely all about Early Britney.

Crossroads was Britney’s feature film debut and it was also pretty much her exit. The film did well at the box office (and I’ll admit that I paid money to see it … well, actually, I got someone else to pay for me to see it but you get the point…) but the critics absolutely hated it and it still regularly appears on lists of the worst films ever made. For the record, I do not think that Crossroads is one of the worst films ever made. Don’t get me wrong. It’s not exactly a good film but it’s definitely something of a guilty pleasure. Whenever I watch it, I go on a nostalgia trip and that’s always a little bit fun.

In Crossroads, Britney plays Lucy. Lucy has just graduated from high school. Lucy is supersmart and, the film is quick to tell us, a super virgin as well. (There’s something rather icky about how much media emphasis was put on Britney’s claimed virginity. Especially since even her biggest fans suspected there was no way she was still a virgin if she was dating Justin Timerblake…) Lucy was her school’s valedictorian and now her father is looking forward to Lucy going to medical school and becoming a doctor. Lucy’s father is played by Dan Aykroyd. Though Aykroyd is playing a Georgia auto mechanic, he makes no attempt to hide his thick Canadian accent. Good for you, Dan!

Anyway, Lucy is preparing to do what her father wants but then she gets an opportunity to drive across the country with two childhood friends and a complete stranger. In high school, Lucy had little to do with snobby Kit (Zoe Saldana) and pregnant Mimi (Taryn Manning) but, when they were all 10 years-old, they were all BFFs. In fact, they were so close that they even buried a time capsule. Digging up the capsule inspires these three frenemies to hop into a car with Ben (Anson Mount) and hit the road!

Ben, it turns out, has just gotten out of prison but he’s hot and he’s musically talented. The girls are a little bit scared because they think Ben might have been in prison for murder but seriously, Ben is way too cute to be a murderer. Plus, when he reads Lucy’s poetry, he sets it to music.

AND SERIOUSLY, HOW CAN YOU NOT LOVE THAT!? I mean, c’mon — every girl who has ever written a poem has, at some point, fantasized about a boy who would put that poem to music and tell her that her words were almost as beautiful as she was.

I mean, there’s a lot of negative things that could be said about Crossroads. I’m not a fan of the way Mimi was portrayed and, towards the end of the film, it almost feels as if the movie is suggesting that she’s being karmically punished for getting pregnant without being married. The film’s emphasis on Lucy’s (and, by implication, Britney’s) chastity feels dangerously reactionary. And, while Britney doesn’t really give a bad performance, she’s still not quite believable as someone who was so busy studying that she didn’t even go to one single party during high school.

But ultimately, this will always be the film where a hot guy took a girl’s poem and spontaneously set it to music.

There’s something to be said for that!

#FreeBritney

Back to School Part II #39: The Glass House (dir by Daniel Sackheim)

Posted on September 14, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Originally, I was planning on using the 2001 thriller The Glass House as one of my guilty pleasure reviews. Because, seriously, this film truly is one of the guiltiest of all guilty pleasures. I mean, there’s so much that you can criticize about the movie but it’s so much fun that I always feel rather bad for doing so. However, after giving it some thought, I decided to use The Glass House as one of my Back to School reviews. Seeing as how I just totally trashed a Leelee Sobieski film called Here On Earth, it only seems fair to now recommend one of her films.

In The Glass House, Leelee plays Ruby Baker, a 16 year-old whose parents are killed in a car accident. Though their uncle (Chris Noth) wants to adopt them, the will states that Ruby and her nine year-old brother (Trevor Morgan) will instead be looked after by their parents’ best friends, Erin (Diane Lane) and Terry (Stellan Skarsgard).

Now, here’s the thing. This is going to blow your mind. Guess where Erin and Terry live? They live in a big mansion in Malibu and the entire house is made out of … GLASS! We have a title, right!? But wait, there’s more! Guess what Terry and Erin’s last name is? That’s right — GLASS! So, the house is not only literally a glass house but it’s also the Glass house as well! And beyond that, there’s that old saying that people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones and … well, that really doesn’t apply to this film.

Anyway, I’m making such a big deal about the title because it pretty much tells you everything that you need to know about The Glass House. There is not a single subtle moment to be found in this entire film. And really, this is not a film that requires or rewards subtlety. We know that Terry Glass is up to no good from the minute we meet him, largely because he’s played by Stellan Skarsgard and when was the last time Stellan Skarsgard played a trustworthy character? Skarsgard pretty much gives the same performance here that he’s given in almost every thriller that he’s ever appeared in (including David Fincher’s rehash of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo — which I’m still ticked off about, by the way) but it works wonderfully because there’s not a hint of pretension to The Glass House. It just wants to entertain and it does just that. There’s little that can match the entertainment value of watching Stellan Skarsgard go totally over the top.

Sure, the film has all sorts of flaws. Ruby’s intelligence changes from scene to scene, depending on what the film’s story needs her to do. (For that matter, the same thing can be said about every character in the film.) But the film’s a lot of fun and Leelee Sobieski gives one of the best and most sympathetic performances of her career. Ruby may be an inconsistent character but she’s so well-played that you like her anyway. In a film that often threatens to go just a little bit too crazy, Leelee gives a performance of both believable grief and believable inner strength. She keeps the film grounded just enough that you’ll continue to watch even when the narrative hits a rough patch. As well, Bruce Dern is hilariously sleazy as a possibly duplicitous attorney. The only thing more entertaining than watching Stellan Skarsgard go over the top is watching Bruce Dern do the same thing in the same film.

The Glass House is one of those films that seems to show up on cable constantly. And, 9 times out of 10, I’ll at least watch at least a little bit of it. It’s just a fun movie.

Back to School Part II #38: Here On Earth (dir by Mark Piznarski)

Posted on September 14, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Here on Earth is a wannabe melodrama from 2000. When I first started watching it on Netflix, I was convinced that I had never seen it before. Sure, the name sounded familiar but I figured that was just because Here On Earth is such a generic name that it could have been used for any number of different films. In fact, even as I sit here typing this, there’s a part of me that keeps wanting to call the film either Back On Earth or Heaven On Earth.

But then as I watched the film, I realized to my horror that I had seen Here On Earth before. I watched it on cable back when I was in high school and, as much as I may not want to admit it, I think I actually cried at the end of it.

I didn’t cry this time, though. In fact, I laughed. Here on Earth is such a stereotypically melodramatic romance that it actually feels like a parody. It didn’t help that the film starred Chris Klein, who goes through almost the entire film with this sort of steely look in his eyes. No matter what emotion he’s supposed to be showing, Chris Klein’s impassive face remains frozen. In fact, it’s tempting to wonder if his character was supposed to be a robot sent from the future. Maybe Here On Earth was originally meant to be a Terminator film.

Here On Earth takes place in one of those little towns in Massachusetts where all of the poor townies resent the rich kids who go to a nearby boarding school. (Judging from the movies I’ve seen, it appears that every small town in Massachusetts is also home to an exclusive boarding school. A part of me suspects that this might not actually be the case. Fortunately, several TSL writers are from Massachusetts so, the next time I get a chance, I’ll just ask Gary, Leon, or Pantsu if any of them grew up near a boarding school.)

Chris Klein plays Kelly Morse. He’s a student at that boarding school. He’s rich. He’s snobby. But he’s also really, really smart. In fact, he was originally meant to be the school’s valedictorian until he got in some legal trouble. See, Kelly was having a street race with a townie named Jasper Arnold (Josh Hartnett). The street race led to the local gas station blowing up. I have to admit that I started laughing as soon as that gas station went up in flames because … well, let’s just say that I imagine it’s a lot more difficult to blow up a gas station than this film makes it look. Judging from this film, the gas station down the street from the office should be blowing up right now.

Anyway, that exploding gas station also causes a local restaurant to burn down. Both Jasper and Kelly are sentenced to help rebuild Mable’s Table. (That’s right, the name of the restaurant was Mable’s Table. It’s a good thing that Mable rhymes with table. If the place had been started by someone named Gretchen, I guess they’d call it Gretchen’s Kitchen.) The judge literally says, “They’ll be building a restaurant but building character too!”

Okay, your honor, thanks for spelling that shit out for us! Yay abuse of the justice system!

Anyway, Jasper has a girlfriend. Her name is Sam Cavanaugh (Leelee Sobieski) and her father (Bruce Greenwood) is the town sheriff. And guess what? HER FAMILY ALSO OWNED MABLE’S TABLE! This may seem like a lot of coincidences but these things happen when there’s only a dozen or so people living in a town.

Sam’s mother always tells her, “As long as we’re all alive, it’s nothing worse than a bad day.” Because they’re poor but honest and that’s how poor but honest people talk, don’t you know? Her father also tells her, every morning: “Good to be your father.” “Good to be your daughter,” Sam replies.

BECAUSE THEY’RE POOR!

But honest…

In fact, they’re so poor but honest that they help Kelly come out of his snobby shell. Soon, he’s opening up to Sam. He’s telling her his secrets. He’s revealing his inner self and probably asking her, “What is this thing you humans call pleasure?” (Because he’s a robot from the future!) Suddenly, they’re in a love…

But guess what? Sam only has a few months to live…

Or I should say that she only has a few months to live here on Earth. She’s at peace with the idea because she’s a saint and she has a pretty a good idea that heaven is going to kick serious ass! Can she make Kelly into a better man before she dies?

Watch and find out! Or don’t. This is one of those extremely silly and misjudged melodramas that doesn’t really work. The adult roles are played by dependable character actors like Bruce Greenwood, Michael Rooker, and Annette O’Toole but Chris Klein and Josh Hartnett go through the entire film looking like they’d rather be anywhere but here on Earth. Leelee Sobieski gives the film’s best performance, bringing as much credibility as she can to an idealized role. (She’s beautiful, she’s sassy, she’s saintly, and she’s dying!) It’s a shame that she has since retired from acting but maybe she didn’t want to spend her entire career making movies like Here on Earth.

Anyway, Here on Earth made me laugh for all the wrong reasons. Maybe it will do the same for you!

Back to School Part II #37: Can’t Hardly Wait (dir by Deborah Kaplan and Harry Elfont)

Posted on September 14, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Oddly enough, the late 90s and early 2000s saw a lot of movies about teenagers that all had strangely generic names. She’s All That, Down To You, Drive Me Crazy, Head Over Heels, Get Over It, Bring It On … the list is endless.

And then you have the 1998 graduation party-themed Can’t Hardly Wait. Can’t Hardly Wait has such a generic name that, when you first hear it, you could be forgiven for naturally assuming that it stars Freddie Prinze, Jr. Of course, if you’ve actually seen the film, you know that it features almost everyone but Freddie Prinze, Jr. This is one of those films where even the smallest roles are played by a recognizable face. In fact, there’s so many familiar actors in this film that a good deal of them go uncredited. Jenna Elfman, Breckin Meyer, Melissa Joan Hart, Jerry O’Connell, and Amber Benson may not show up in the credits but they’re all in the film. In fact, you could argue that Melissa John Hart, playing an impossibly excited girl who is obsessed with getting everyone to sign her yearbook, and Breckin Meyer, playing an overly sensitive lead singer, provide the film with some of its comedic highlights.

(That said, perhaps the most credible cameo comes from Jerry O’Connell. He plays a former high school jock who ruefully talks about how he can’t get laid in high school. He’s so convincingly sleazy and full of self-pity that you find yourself wondering if maybe O’Connell was just playing himself. Maybe he just stumbled drunkenly onto the set one day and started talking to anyone who would listen…)

Can’t Hardly Wait takes place at one huge high school graduation party, which is actually a pretty smart idea. The best part of every teen movie is the party scene so why not make just make the entire movie about the party? Almost every member of the graduating class is at this party and we get to see all of the usual types. There’s the stoners, the jocks, the nerds, and the sarcastic kids who go to parties specifically so they can tell everyone how much they hate going to parties. Eric Balfour shows up as a hippie. Jason Segel eats a watermelon in the corner. Sara Rue’s in the kitchen, complaining about how everyone’s a sheep. Jamie Pressly drinks and assures her best friend that she’s at least as pretty as Gwynneth Paltrow. (“And you’ve got way bigger boobs!” she adds, encouragingly.) Outside, Selma Blair frowns as someone hits on her with bad line.

Of course, Mike Dexter (Peter Facinelli) and Amanda Beckett (Jennifer Love Hewitt) are the main topic of conversation at the party. For four years, Mike and Amanda were the school’s power couple but Mike decides to dump Amanda right before they graduate. Mike feels that he’s going to have a great time in college and he doesn’t need any old high school commitments holding him down. His best friends all agree to dump their girlfriends too. Mike spends the party watching, in horror, as all of his friends go back on their promise. Amanda, meanwhile, wanders around and wonders who she is now that she’s no longer Mike Dexter’s girlfriend.

Preston Meyers (Ethan Embry) struggles to work up the courage to tell Amanda that he’s had a crush on her ever since the first day he saw her. Meanwhile, Preston’s best friend — the reliably sarcastic Denise (Lauren Ambrose) — finds herself locked in an upstairs bathroom with Kenny “Special K” Fisher (Seth Green). (Needless to say, Kenny is the only person who actually calls himself “Special K.”) Kenny is obsessed with losing his virginity. Denise, meanwhile, won’t stop talking about the sweet and dorky Kenny that she knew way back in elementary school.

And then there’s William Lichtner (Charlie Korsmo). He’s spent his entire life being tormented by Mike and he specifically goes to the party looking for revenge. However, he has a few beers and quickly becomes the most popular senior at the party. He even gets a chance to bond with Mike…

Can’t Hardly Wait is a favorite of mine. It’s one of those films that doesn’t add up too much but it’s so so damn likable that it doesn’t matter. It’s full of smart and funny scenes and all the actors are incredibly likable. If you’re not rooting for Preston and Amanda by the end of the movie then you have no heart. In fact, Can’t Hardly Wait is a lot like Empire Records. They may not be much depth to it but it’s so sincere and earnest that you can forgive it.

You can even forgive the generic name.

Back to School Part II #36: Dead Man On Campus (dir by Alan Cohn)

Posted on September 13, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Oh my God, it’s Zack Morris smoking pot and getting laid!

That, in a sentence, is the main appeal of the 1998 comedy Dead Man On Campus. This is the film that features Mark-Paul Gosselaar playing a character who does everything that most Saved By The Bell fans have always assumed that Zack Morris was doing whenever he wasn’t on-screen, fooling Belding, tormenting Screech, and gazing at Kelly.

(By the way, if you’re interested in the further college adventures of Zack Morris, check out Primetime Preppie, where Derek Morris and I are reviewing every single episode of Saved By The Bell: The College Years!)

In Dead Man On Campus, Gosselaar plays Cooper Frederickson. Cooper is a college student. He spends most of his time partying and consistently fails his classes but since he’s going to a college that apparently doesn’t believe in academic suspension, it doesn’t matter. Cooper’s father continues to pay for him to go to school. To be honest, Cooper is kind of a jerk but he’s also really hot. He wears glasses and there’s just something about a bad boy with bad eyesight.

(Seriously…)

Anyway, Cooper has two roommates. Kyle (Jason Segel) is … well, he’s Jason Segel, giving another one of the somewhat odd performances that typified his film career before he co-starred with The Muppets and played David Foster Wallace. His other roommate is Josh (Tom Everett Scott). Josh starts out as a responsible and hard-working student but then he falls under Cooper’s bad influence. He also gets a girlfriend (Poppy Montgomery) and ends up having so much fun that he blows off all of his classes.

Suddenly, Josh realizes that he’s about to lose his scholarship. At the same time, Cooper’s father comes to visit and announces that he will no longer be paying for his son’s lifestyle. If Cooper flunks out of school, he’s going to end up cleaning toilets for his father’s janitorial service.

Oh no! Zack Morris cleaning a toilet!? How the mighty have fallen! I guess they’re screwed, right!?

Nope! It turns out that there’s a clause in the university charter. If a student’s roommate commits suicide during the school year, that student gets perfect grades for the semester! (I was told the same thing during my first semester at the University of North Texas.) Unfortunately, Kyle has recently moved out of the dorm and neither Cooper nor Josh are willing to die for the other.

So, they decide to get a new roommate. After breaking into the school’s student files, they identify the three students who are most likely to commit suicide. One is an aspiring singer who Cooper and Josh come to suspect might be faking his depression as a way to hit on girls. (Okay, that’s kind of clever because I know that I’ve gone out with people who I thought were dark and profound, just to discover that they were actually rather boring and bourgeois.) Another is a nerdy computer guy who has paranoid delusions about Bill Gates.

And then there’s Cliff. Cliff is actually the first potential roommate that they investigate but he also makes the biggest impression. In fact, he makes such a big impression that he ends up overshadowing everyone else in the film. Cliff is played by Lochlyn Munro, who has subsequently become one of the patron saints of the Lifetime network. (Seriously, it seems like Munro shows up on Lifetime on a daily basis.) Ripping through the film like a cyclone, Munro is definitely the highlight of Dead Man On Campus. It turns out that Cliff isn’t so much suicidal as he’s just absolutely insane and Munro goes so wonderfully over the top in the film that he briefly brings some much-needed life to this comedy about death.

Anyway, Dead Man On Campus is a pretty forgettable movie and it’s never as clever as it thinks that it is. But it does feature Mark-Paul Gosselaar taking hits off a bong and that’ll definitely make it worth seeing for some viewers.

Back to School Part II #35: One Eight Seven (dir by Kevin Reynolds)

Posted on September 13, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I’m writing this review from memory so you’re going to have to bear with me. 187 is one of those films that seems to show up on late night cable constantly, which is how I saw it. I probably should rewatch it for this review but … no. I don’t want to have to sit through it again.

See, here’s the thing with 187. It’s a film where Samuel L. Jackson plays a high school science teacher and, just by definition, that should make it the greatest film ever and yet it isn’t.

Originally, Jackson’s working in New York but then he ends up failing one of his students (played by Method Man). Method Man ends up giving Jackson a textbook on which he has written 187 on every single page. Jackson immediately realizes that 187 is the name of the movie that he’s in. “Always good to meet a fan,” he thinks but then suddenly, it dawns on him that 187 is also police code for homicide! Jackson asks the school administration for help. They ignore him (probably because everyone knows that Samuel L. Jackson is too much of a badass to be scared by some numbers in a textbook) and he ends up getting stabbed several times in the back.

Agck!

We jump forward 15 months. Jackson has recovered from nearly being killed and he’s still determined to teach. He wants to make a difference! But he’s decided that New York kids are too homicidal so he transfers to a school in Los Angeles. Surprise! It turns out that students in Los Angeles are just as dangerous as the ones in New York. During his first day as a substitute teacher, Jackson is writing his name on a chalk board. Someone throws a crumpled ball of paper at him. Jackson flinches as it hits his back.

FLASHBACK TIME!

Now, here’s the thing: the idea of Samuel L. Jackson teaching in an inner city high school and taking on a bunch of gang members sounds totally kickass. And you spend this entire two-hour movie waiting for Samuel L. Jackson to have one of those wonderful Samuel L. Jackson moments when he fixes someone with that powerful glare and suddenly speaks in the voice of angry and vengeful God. You keep waiting but, with the exception of a few moments, it never seems to happen.

I mean, don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t expecting Jackson to say, “I’m sick of these motherfucking gangstas in this motherfucking classroom!” It would have been great if he had said that but, after a few minutes of watching the movie, I realized that he probably wouldn’t. 187 is obviously meant to be a serious movie about America’s educational crisis. Watching it, you get the feeling that 187‘s director, Kevin “I know Kevin Costner” Reynolds, woke up every morning and said, “I am making the most important film ever today!”

But whatever good intentions that the filmmakers may have had, it’s no excuse for totally wasting Samuel L. Jackson. When you’ve got a powerful actor like Samuel L. Jackson, why do you waste him in such a thinly written role? When you finally do allow him to do something big and Samuel L. Jackson-like, why do you waste so much dramatic potential by having him do almost all of it off-screen? Jackson finally does get a great Samuel L. Jackson moment towards the end of the film but that’s just because there’s a big plot twist that doesn’t make any sense. The end of 187 reminds the viewer that an ironic ending has to be earned. It just can’t be slapped onto the film.

I mean, I don’t want to toss out any spoilers because, for all I know, 187 is going to be on Cinemax tonight. If you’re up at 3 in the morning, you might end up watching it and God knows, I don’t want to be accused of giving away the ending. But let me ask you this — if you’ve finally captured someone who you’ve spent an entire two-hour film trying to kill, would you then suddenly decide to play a game of Russian roulette?

Anyway, 187 should be avoided because it totally wastes Samuel L. Jackson and that’s kind of unforgivable.

Back to School Part II #34: The Ice Storm (dir by Ang Lee)

Posted on September 13, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1997 film The Ice Storm is kind of a schizophrenic film, which makes sense since it’s set in 1973 and, just from what I’ve seen in the movies, it appears that the early 70s were kind of a schizophrenic time.

It’s a film that deals with two sets of people who all live in an upper class Connecticut community. One part of the film deals with parents who are freaking out about suddenly being adults. The other part of the film deals with the children, most of whom seem destined to make the same mistakes as their parents. It’s a film that is occasionally bracingly realistic and relatable, one that reminds us that being directionless in the 70s isn’t necessarily that different from being directionless in 2016. At other times, the film feels a bit too studied for its own good. This is one of those films that features a Tobey Maguire voice-over and, as good an actor as Maguire has always been, he’s always at his worse when reciting a pseudo-profound voice over. And then there are other times when the film feels a bit too cartoonish for its own good. Elijah Wood’s a stoner. Sigourney Weaver walks around with a bullwhip. David Krumholtz shows up as a character named Francis Davenport.

Fortunately, the film is directed by Ang Lee and Ang Lee is probably one of the few filmmakers who can overcome tonal inconsistency. Lee is so good with actors and is such a good storyteller that even his lesser films are usually worth watching. The Ice Storm would just be another silly sin-in-the-suburbs film if it had been made by any director other than Ang Lee.

The main adult in the film is Ben Hood (Kevin Kline). Ben is married to Elena (Joan Allen) but he’s having an affair with his neighbor, Janey (Sigourney Weaver). Elena may be upset when she finds out about the affair but she’s still willing to accompany her husband to a key party. A key party was a 70s ritual in which husbands would throw their car keys into a big punch bowl and then the wives would randomly pick a key and have sex with the owner. Basically, anytime a TV show or a movie takes place in the suburbs during the 70s, there has to be at least one key party.

And The Ice Storm‘s key party is kind of fun to watch. Kevin Kline and Joan Allen both give really good performances and Ben is such a loser that it’s fun to watch him freak out when Janey gets a key other than this own. Elena, meanwhile, ends up going off with Janey’s husband (Jamey Sheridan, pretty much looking the same in this 1997 film as he did in Spotlight and Sully) and they share a really good scene together, one that reveals that none of the film’s adults are really as mature or liberated as they claim to be.

While the adults attempt to play, their children attempt to find some sort of meaning to their empty existence. Ben and Elena’s daughter, Wendy (Christina Ricci), wears a Richard Nixon mask and enjoys sexually teasing her classmates, especially Janey’s youngest son, Sandy (Adam Hann-Byrd). Ben and Elena’s oldest son, Paul (Tobey Maguire) is in New York, hoping to lose his virginity to Libbits (Katie Holmes) despite the fact that Libbets is far more interested in his boarding school roommate, Francis Davenport (David Krumholtz). Paul also compares his family to the Fantastic Four so, assuming Paul survived both the 70s and 80s, he’s probably still living in Connecticut and telling everyone who disappointed he was with last year’s film.

And, of course, there’s Mickey (Elijah Wood). Mickey is Janey’s oldest son and he’s permanently spaced out. When the ice storm of the title occurs, Mickey is the one who decides to wander around outside and appreciate the beauty of nature’s remorseless wrath.

Needless to say, the ice storm is also a really obvious metaphor for the way all of these very unhappy (but very prosperous) characters tend to view and treat each other. Despite all the attempts to pretend otherwise, everyone has a frozen soul. Nobody’s capable of maintaining any sort of real emotional connection. Of course, someone dies and everyone’s forced to take a look at the sad reality of their lives and the film ends with a sudden and spontaneous display of actual human emotion. It’s one of those ideas that probably works better as a literary conceit than a cinematic one.

That said, The Ice Storm is flawed but very watchable. I enjoyed it, even if it did occasionally seem to be trying way too hard. It’s well-acted and, if nothing else, I enjoyed getting to see all of the amazingly tacky clothes and the interiors of all those big houses. These people love their wide lapels and their shag carpeting. The Ice Storm is not Ang Lee’s best but it’s still good enough.

Back to School Part II #33: No One Would Tell (dir by Noel Nosseck)

Posted on September 12, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Do you remember when Chris Brown performed The Man In The Mirror at the 2010 BET Awards? It was during a tribute to Michael Jackson and Brown broke down crying while singing the song. Afterwards, he accepted an award and he said, “I let you all down before, but I won’t do it again. I promise you.”

This, of course, was about a year after Brown had pled guilty to physically abusing Rihanna. I remember being on twitter during Brown’s performance and seeing literally thousands of tweets from people talking about how brave Chris Brown was and how amazing his performance had been. Chris Brown was looking at the man in the mirror and asking him to change his ways. Chris Brown was promising not to let anyone else down by nearly killing any future girlfriends. A lot of people on twitter claimed this was amazing. I thought it was disgusting and I tweeted out my opinion. I really didn’t give a fuck if Chris Brown was asking the man in the mirror to change his ways. The man in the mirror was (and is) an abusive asshole. The man in the mirror beats women. The man in the mirror is not capable of changing his ways. “FUCK THE MAN IN THE MIRROR!” I tweeted.

And, oh my God, the reaction my little twitter rant inspired. What was especially disturbing was that the majority of people who tweeted me in Brown’s defense were other women. Yes, they all agreed, Chris Brown had beat Rihanna but he admitted what he had done, he was asking the man in the mirror to change his ways, and hey, Rihanna probably deserved it.

My favorite excuse — and this was used by quite a few of Brown’s defenders — was this: “Only God can judge Chris Brown.” Well, you know what? I asked God and he says Chris Brown’s an abusive asshole.

I’m tempted to say that it amazes me that Chris Brown still has fans but actually, it doesn’t. Sadly, when it comes to a celebrity, people are willing to make excuses for almost anything. If you ask most people, they’ll say that they’re against domestic abuse and they think abusers should suffer the worst punishment imaginable. But when the abuser is someone who they know (or, in the case of a celebrity like Chris Brown, someone who they feel they know), the excuses start. The equivocations are heard. The blame is assigned to everyone but the abuser. We start hearing bullshit about how people make mistakes and only God can judge.

In short, people are willing to talk but when it matters, they rarely act.

That’s also the theme of a powerful and sad movie called No One Would Tell. No One Would Tell was originally made for television in 1996 and it still shows up fairly regularly on Lifetime. Though the names and certain details have been changed, it’s based on a true story. In fact, the film feels like it’s based on several true stories. The plot of No One Would Tell is one that has occurred and continues to occur on far too regular of a basis.

Stacy Collins (played by Candace Cameron, before she added the Bure to her name) is a 16 year-old high school student. She’s quiet, shy, and insecure. When she first starts to date a popular jock named Bobby Tennison (Fred Savage), it seems like a dream come true. But soon, Bobby starts to show another side. He’s controlling and possessive. He grabs her wrist hard enough to leave bruises. He shoves her into a wall when they have an argument. When she wears a skirt that he thinks is too short, he grabs her in the school hallway and demands that she change immediately. When she isn’t home to answer his calls, he assumes that she most be cheating on him. And, when she finally breaks up with him, he kills her.

What’s infuriating is that, throughout the film, Bobby’s abuse is witnessed by all of his and Stacy’s friends. Everyone sees him push her. Everyone sees the bruises. Everyone knows that Bobby is unstable and that Stacy is afraid of him. And yet, nobody says a word. Nobody does a thing. Instead, they just make excuses for Bobby’s behavior. Some of them even blame Stacy. No one is willing to get involved and it eventually costs Stacy her life.

For a TV movie from the mid-90s, No One Would Tell holds up surprisingly well. Admittedly, Fred Savage overacts in the role of Bobby (and maybe it would have been better if the role had been played by Eric Balfour, who appears as Bobby’s best friend) but Candace Cameron does a perfect job as the tragic Stacy, capturing both her insecurity and her vulnerability. Some of the film’s best moments are the ones shares by Cameron and Michelle Phillips. In those scenes, we see how Stacy learned how to make excuses for Bobby’s behavior from watching the way that her mother made excuses for the men who similarly abused her. No One Would Tell is a powerful film, one that offers an unflinching look at abuse and one that dares to demand that its audience take a stand.

No One Would Tell is a film that should be watched by anyone who thinks that the man in the mirror can change his ways.

Back to School Part II #32: Kids (dir by Larry Clark)

Posted on September 11, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The first time that I ever saw Kids, the 1995 directorial debut of Larry Clark, my initial response was to wonder what the Hell everyone was talking about.

Seriously, I couldn’t understand a word that anyone was saying. The two main characters — 15 year-old Telly (Leo Fitzpatrick) and his friend Casper (Justin Pierce) — talked almost constantly. In fact, Telly even narrated the film. But both of them had such thick Northern accents and both of them were so inarticulate that I spent 75% of the movie trying to understand what they were going on about. (Add to that, Casper is pretty much either drunk or stoned through the entire film.) Don’t get me wrong. I understood enough to know what was going on in the movie. I knew that Telly was obsessed with having sex with virgins and that he didn’t know that he was HIV positive. I knew that Casper considered himself to be the “dopest ghost in town,” and that he ended the film by coming out of his daze long enough to look straight at the camera and ask, “What the fuck happened?” But a lot of the dialogue in-between got lost as a result of Telly growling and Casper slurring.

So, when I rewatched Kids for this review, I turned on the close captioning so that I could read what it was that Telly and Casper were actually saying to each other while they were walking around New York City. After a few minutes, I started to really wish that I had just remained ignorant. Seriously, you may hate Telly but you’ll hate even more once you understand everything that he actually says during the opening scenes of the film. Telly is literally one of the most disgusting pervs to ever be at the center of a motion picture. “Virgins,” he announces at the start of the film, “I love them!” He also infects them and what’s truly disturbing is that you get the feeling that, even if he knew he was HIV positive, Telly wouldn’t change his behavior at all.

Reportedly, Leo Fitzpatrick got death threats after starring in Kids. Because he was making his film debut in Kids and because the film’s cast was reportedly made up of actual street kids, many viewers assumed that Fitzpatrick was playing himself. Fitzpatrick is one of the few members of the cast to have actually maintained an acting career after Kids and, by most accounts, he’s not Telly. That said, Telly is such a demonic character and Fitzpatrick does such a good job playing him that, admittedly, it is strange to see him subsequently play characters who are far different from Telly. (His performance as faux hitman in Clark’s Bully is one of the highlights of that film.)

Justin Pierce also continued to act after Kids, though his efforts to maintain a career were reportedly hampered by his own personal demons. Sadly, Pierce committed suicide in 2000, hanging himself in Las Vegas. As raw as it may be, Pierce probably gives the best performance in Kids. I’m sure that some would be tempted to say that Pierce was just playing himself but there’s also a sly humor to his performance that isn’t necessarily present in the script. Casper is a despicable character who not only possibly beats a man to death but who also rapes one of his so-called friends when she’s passed out on a coach. At times, Casper seems to almost be brain-dead. (We’re told that he’s been sniffing glue since the 4th grade.) But then there’s a few scenes where we get hints of who Casper could have been if he hadn’t fried his brain.

(For instance, it’s interesting to note that, alone among the male characters, Casper is the only one who occasionally behaves in a generous manner. He may steal a piece of fruit but he then gives it to a young girl waiting outside of a dilapidated building. In the famous scene in which a legless man asks for money while singing, “I have no legs/I have no legs,” Casper gives him money while Telly rolls his eyes. Casper may be awful but, unlike Telly, he’s not a total sociopath.)

(It’s also interesting to note that, while we meet Telly’s mom and hear from her that Telly has a strained relationship with his dad, we never meet or hear about Casper’s family. While Kids may be critical of Telly and Casper and their friends, it’s true scorn is reserved for the frequently unseen adults who all either seem to either be in denial or just incredibly callous as far as their children are concerned.)

And then there’s Chloe Sevigny and Rosario Dawson, both making their film debut in Kids. They play friends who, at the start of the movie, both go to a clinic to get the results of their HIV tests. The promiscuous Ruby (Dawson) is negative. Jennie (Sevigny), however, is positive. Since she’s only had sex with one person, she knows that she caught it from Telly. What little plot that Kids has deals with Jennie’s efforts to track down Telly before he has sex with another virgin. From the minute that Jennie starts searching for Telly, you know that it’s a pointless mission. Even if Jennie did manage to track down Telly, it’s doubtful he would listen to her.

Kids was the directorial debut of Larry Clark. It was also the screenwriting debut of Harmony Korine and reportedly, it was considered to be very shocking and controversial when it was first released. I have to admit that, even speaking as someone who grew up far away from the streets of New York on which Kids was cast and filmed, I’ve never been that shocked by Kids. Don’t get me wrong — it’s a raw and powerful film and the scene where Sevigny sits in a cab and repeats to herself that she’s not going to die brought tears to my eyes. But, no — the idea of kids and teenagers having sex, doing drugs, and getting violent is no longer shocking (if it ever was).

It’s just another day.

Back to School Part II #31: Empire Records (dir by Allan Moyle)

Posted on September 10, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1995 film, Empire Records takes place in a fictional record store. The store is located in a state called Delaware, which I’m pretty sure is fictional as well. (Have you ever actually met anyone from Delaware? And don’t say Joe Biden because we all know he’s just a hologram…) Empire Records is a beloved institution, an independent record shop that’s as well-known for its lively employees as its amazing selection of music!

However, things are not perfect in the world of Empire Records. The store is owned by a heartless businessman named Mitchell (Ben Bode). Mitchell hates Empire Records and usually just lets the store manager, former drummer and Scott Stapp-lookalike Joe (Anthony LaPaglia), run the place. However, Mitchell has decided to sell Empire Records to the soulless and corporate Music Town franchise. Oh my God! If Empire Records becomes a Music Town, the employees will have to wear orange aprons! They won’t be allowed to wear anything too revealing or have any visible piercings! And nobody will be allowed to dance in the aisles!

Over the course of just one day, can the staff of Empire Records find a way to save their store!?

It would be easier if not for the fact that a hundred other things happen over the course of that same day. A shoplifter (Brendan Sexton III, who co-starred in the very different Welcome to the Dollhouse the same year that he appeared here) keeps trying to steal stuff and, at one point, he even shows up at the store with a gun! Is it possible that he just wants to join the Empire Records family and is just hoping that he’ll be offered a job?

And then there’s Rex Manning! That’s right — it’s Rex Manning Day! Who is Rex Manning? Well, he used to star on a show called The Family Way and his nickname is Sexy Rexy. He has truly memorable hair. Middle-aged people love him but most young people think that he’s a joke. Rex is going to signing copies of his latest album at Empire Records and you better believe that he’s brought blue cheese salad dressing with him. There’s a reason they call him Sexy Rexy and it’s not just that Rex Harrison is no longer around to object. Rex is played by Maxwell Caulfield. Caulfield steals every scene that he appears in and it’s hard not to feel that he’s playing a version of who he could have become if Grease 2 hadn’t bombed at the box office.

And, of course, all the members of Empire Records staff have their own personal problems to deal with. Fortunately, since this is a breezy and comedic movie, nobody has problem that can’t be solved within ten to fifteen minutes.

For instance, Debra (Robin Tunney) is suicidal and shows up for work with a big bandage on her wrist. After clocking in, she promptly shaves her head. Debra is depressed and troubled but guess what? All she needs is for her friends to hold a mock funeral in the break room. (And who is taking care of the customers while everyone else is eulogizing Debra? Probably Andre but we’ll talk more about him in a moment…)

Berko (Coyote Shivers) appears to be Debra’s boyfriend but he doesn’t seem to be that good of a boyfriend. Berko’s a musician and he wants to make it big. Solution to his problem: an impromptu concert on the roof of Empire Records! And you know what? Coyote Shivers was not the world’s best actor but the song he performs, Sugar High, will stay in your head long after you hear it.

Eddie (James ‘Kimo’ Williams) has no problems, probably because he also works at a pizza place and he makes the best brownies in the world. Except, they’re not ordinary brownies … hint hint hint….

Mark (Ethan Embry) only has one problem: his character, as written, is pretty much interchangeable with Eddie’s. But, fortunately, Embry gives such a totally weird performance that you never forget who he is.

Lucas (Rory Cochrane) tried to help Joe out by taking the previous night’s cash receipts to Atlantic City. Lucas, however, is not a very good gambler and ends up losing all of the money at the result of one roll of the dice. Lucas’s problem is that Joe is going to kill him. The solution is to spend almost the entire movie sitting on the break room couch and making snarky comments.

Gina’s problem is that everyone thinks that she’s a slut, mostly because that’s how the character is written. Fortunately, Gina is played by Renee Zellweger and she brings a lot of depth to an otherwise underwritten role. One of the film’s best moments is when Gina and Berko perform together because Zellweger really throws herself into the song. Watching that scene always makes me want to sing along with them. It’s funny that Zellweger has even a stronger Texas accent than I do and yet, she can really sing while I mostly certainly cannot.

Then there’s Andre! Andre’s problem is that he ends up getting cut out of the film. However, he’s still listed in the credits, which is how we know that he was played by Tobey Maguire.

A.J. (Johnny Whitworth) is an artist. How can you not love a struggling artist? His problem is that he’s in love with Corey (Liv Tyler) but Corey is obsessed with losing her virginity to Rex Manning.

Actually, that’s not the only problem that Corey has. Corey, who is in high school but has recently been accepted to Harvard, is a driven overachiever. Occasionally, we see her popping a pill. Oh my God, is she using speed!? Of course. she is. How else is she going to be able to both study late and maintain her figure? If I don’t seem too concerned about Corey’s pills, it’s because I pretty much take the same thing to keep my ADD under control. They’ve worked wonders for me!

But not so much for Corey. In fact, they cause Corey to kinda freak out and attack a cut-out of Rex Manning. Fortunately, the solution to her drug problem is pretty simple. She just has to splash some water on her face.

As for her virginity problem, well … it is Rex Manning Day! Judging from this film and Stealing Beauty, it would appear that film goers in the mid-90s were obsessed with Liv Tyler losing her virginity.

Anyway, there are like a hundred overly critical things that I could say about Empire Records. I’ve seen this film a number of time and there are certain scenes that always make cringe — like Debra’s funeral or when Joe starts banging away on his drum set. A lot of the dialogue is overwritten and the whole things occasionally seems to be trying too hard.

And yet, I can’t dislike Empire Records. In fact, I actually really like it a lot. It’s just such an earnest and sincere movie that you can’t help but enjoy it. Meanwhile, the cast has so much energy and chemistry that they’re just fun to watch. This is one of those films where it’s best just to shut off your mind, say “Damn the man!,” and enjoy what you’re watching for what it is.

Add to that, I love that ending. Everyone dancing on top of the store? Perfect.