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!
100 years ago, on the very day, Russ Meyer was born in San Leandro, California. Meyer would get his start filming newsreels during World War II (many of his newsreel footage were used in the 1970 Oscar winner, Patton). When he returned to the United States, he continued to make films. Meyer was one of the pioneers of the adult film industry, though his films seem rather quaint and innocent when compared to the industry’s later films. Meyer’s strong visual sense and his intentionally over-the-top plots made him a favorite amongst underground critics. In the 70s, he was briefly embraced by mainstream Hollywood but, unhappy with having to deal with studio bosses, Meyer returned to making the type of independent, grindhouse films that made him famous.
Russ Meyer was 82 years old when he died in 2004. He was acclaimed as one of America’s first and greatest independent filmmakers.
Here are 4 Safe-For-Work Shots From 4 Russ Meyer Films.
4 Shots From 4 Films
Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965, dir by Russ Meyer, DP: Walter Schenk)
Motorpsycho (1965, dir by Russ Meyer, DP: Russ Meyer)
Cherry, Harry, & Raquel! (1970, dir by Russ Meyer, DP: Russ Meyer)
Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls (1970, dir by Russ Meyer, DP: Fred J. Koenekamp)
I’m a little late in reporting this but last night, the Producers Guild of America announced their picks for the best of 2021 and they promptly threw the Oscar race into chaos by selecting CODA, instead of the Power of the Dog. Today, there’s a lot of people talking about the possibility of DGA winner Jane Campion taking Best Director while CODA, which also won the SAG Ensemble Award, takes Best Picture.
It could happen. We’ll find out for sure next Sunday!
The Award for Outstanding Producer of a Feature Theatrical Motion Picture
Being The Ricardos
Belfast CODA
Don’t Look Up
Dune
King Richard
Licorice Pizza
The Power Of The Dog
Tick, Tick…Boom!
West Side Story
The Award for Outstanding Producer of Animated Theatrical Motion Pictures Encanto
Luca
The Mitchells vs. The Machines
Raya And The Last Dragon
Sing 2 The Award for Outstanding Producer of Documentary Motion Pictures
Ascension
The First Wave
Flee
In The Same Breath
The Rescue
Simple As Water Summer Of Soul (…Or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised)
Writing With Fire
Just released on Hulu, Deep Water is the funniest film of the year so far.
Ben Affleck stars as Vic Van Allen. (Even his name is funny!) Vic made a fortune by inventing a computer chip that is used to help drones track people down and blow them up. Now, Vic is retired, living in a nice and small town, and publishing a photography/poetry magazine. He enjoys going to parties with his friends, joking about committing murder, and riding the heck out of his bike. Seriously, the shots of Affleck riding that bike are comparable to Will Ferrell playing the flute in Anchorman.
Ana de Armas plays Vic’s wife, Melinda. Everyone, including Vic, knows that Melinda cheats on Vic with almost every man that she meets. Vic accepts Melina’s infidelities on the condition that she not leave him and their daughter, Trixie (Grace Jenkins). Of course, Vic does still get upset. When Melinda’s former lover vanishes, Vic jokes to Melinda’s current lover that he killed the previous lover. Everyone in town gets a good laugh out of that one. Everyone, that is, but for Melinda and local busybody Don Wilson (Tracy Letts).
Both Melinda and Don think that Vic is capable of murder. As far as Don is concerned, Vic is responsible for the death of every single person who has ever been blown by a drone. Meanwhile, Melinda knows that there’s something strange about the way that Vic spends all of his time taking care of the hundreds of snails that he keeps in the basement. Vic, of course, insists that he was just making a joke when he said that he was a murderer. But then Vic actually does murder someone and things get complicated….
From what I understand, Deep Water is supposed to be a serious thriller but I absolutely refuse to believe that it’s not actually meant to be a parody of the genre. It’s director Adrian Lyne’s first film in 20 years. Lyne is best know for directing movies like 9 1/2 Weeks, Fatal Attraction. Indecent Proposal, and Unfaithful and so many of the scenes in Deep Water feel as if they’ve been specifically designed as a way to poke fun at Lyne’s previous films that one can’t help but suspect that at least a few of the film’s laughs are meant to be intentional. This is a film that features Ben Affleck, on a bicycle, chasing a car while the driver rants about how autocorrect is always ruining his text messages. I absolutely refuse to accept that this was truly meant to be taken seriously.
That said, Affleck wanders through the film with a glum expression on his face, one that suggests that he wasn’t let in on the joke ahead of time. Ana de Armas is ultimately defeated by a script that refuses to allow her character to behave with any consistency but she’s still smart enough to play Melinda as being a character who is at least partially aware that she’s in a movie. As for Tracy Letts, I have never seen any reputable actor overact quite as much as Tracy Letts does towards the end of Deep Water. It’s a sight to behold.
Adrian Lyne makes sure that the film looks good but he never manages to strike a consistent tone and the film’s plot is full of holes. Affleck spends a lot of time gazing at snails while Ana de Armas throws a fit when her daughter keeps insisting that Alexa play Old MacDonald. Tracy Letts, at one point, sees Affleck riding his bicycle and starts cursing like Linda Blair in The Exorcist. Deep Water doesn’t really work as a thriller but, as a comedy, it’s a lot of fun.
The scene below is from the 1953 film, Julius Caesar. This Oscar-nominated Shakespearean adaptation had a cast that was full of distinguished actors. James Mason played Brutus. The great John Gielgud played Cassius. Louis Calhern was Caesar while other roles were filled by Deborah Kerr, Greer Garson, Edmond O’Brien, George Macready, John Hoyt, Edmund Purdom. and a host of other distinguished thespians. And yet, the best performance in the film came from an actor who, at the time, no one considered to be a Shakespearean. Marlon Brando brought his method intensity to the role of Mark Antony and the result was a performance that is still electrifying today.
On YouTube, someone referred to this as being “the world’s greatest speech delivered by the world’s greatest actor.” Sounds good to me!
Before I say anything else, I should admit that I fully understand why some of you are going to say that the 1978 science fiction film, Laserblast, is not a spring break film.
First off, it takes place not on the beach but in the desert. There is a scene that takes place at a pool but it’s one of those cheap pools that all of the desert towns have.
Secondly, the film itself doesn’t take place during the spring. It takes place during the summer, when the sun is bright and harsh. The teenagers in the film might not be in school but that’s just because it’s their summer vacation.
I get it.
But, as far as I’m concerned, Laserblast is spiritually a spring break film, even if it isn’t technically one. I mean, just look at the film’s hero, Billy. As played by the very handsome Kim Milford, Billy is a mellow guy with blonde hair, stoned eyes, and the attitude of someone who can say, “Right on!” and make you believe that everything will be right and on. Billy even drives a totally 70s van. Everything about Billy and his girlfriend, Kathy Farley (Rainbeaux Smith), screams Malibu. Even in the desert and in the summer, they are the ideal spring break couple.
Billy, of course, gets in some trouble over the course of the film. He stumbles across a space gun in the desert. Billy doesn’t know what we know, that the space gun was accidentally left there by two adorable claymation aliens who previously visited Earth so that they could kill the gun’s owner. Billy just thinks it’s a cool gun. Soon, Billy is blowing up the town and turning into a green-skinned monster. Billy even blows up a sign that’s advertising Star Wars, which is made doubly interesting by how much Kim Milford resembles Mark Hamill. (The same year that Laserblast came out, Hamill and Milford acted opposite each other in Corvette Summer, with Milford’s mellow confidence providing a nice counter to Hamill’s somewhat hyperactive earnestness.) Much like a drunk spring breaker who ends up vomiting into the ocean, Billy has found something that he enjoys and he’s allowing it to take over his life. The space gun represents every vice and addiction that’s out there to tempt people into risking their lives and their sanity and their totally 70s van. (We don’t see much of the inside of the van but I’m willing to bet that it has shag carpeting and a strobe light.) The spring breakers inThe Real Cancun spent their week drinking themselves into a stupor. Billy, on the other hand, spends a week blowing stuff up and turning into a monster. Of course, that’s the great thing about spring break. How you spend your time is your business.
Laserblast is a low-budget film, one that is often listed as being one of the worst films ever made. Myself, I love the film because I think the aliens are cute and I enjoy Kim Milford’s performance as Billy. Actually, for a film that didn’t cost much to make, Laserblast has a surprisingly impressive cast. Technically, it’s not a shock to see Roddy McDowall in the film, since McDowall apparently accepted every role that he was offered in the 70s. But Roddy’s trademark neurotic eccentricity is still welcome in the small role of Billy’s doctor. The great character actor Dennis Burkley shows up as a fascist deputy. Gianni Russo, who played Carlo Rizzi in The Godfather, plays a government agent who shows up from out of nowhere and who wears a cream-colored suit that makes him look like a wedding DJ. Keenan Wynn, who also apparently accepted any role he was offered in the 70s, plays Rainbeaux Smith’s drunk grandfather. Best of all, Eddie Deezen, who was best known for playing stereotypical nerd characters in films like Grease, shows up as a bully named Froggy! After getting bullied by Eddie Deezen, who wouldn’t pick up the first space gun they found and start blasting rocks?
Laserblast is fun, just like spring break. I like it, just like spring break. So does Arleigh so be sure to check out his review, as well!
Last night, the Directors Guild of America awarded their top prize to Jane Campion and The Power of the Dog. This is definitely good news for the film, as far as the Oscars are concerned. With West Side Story now on HBO and so many people rediscovering how important a director Steven Spielberg really is, it seemed as if the momentum may have been shifting. But, thanks to the DGA and the recent controversy over Sam Elliott’s comments about the film, The Power of the Dog is once again the front runner.
(To be honest, as far as Spielberg is concerned, it wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of Academy voters are currently of the “In just a few month, he’s going to get another chance with The Fabelmans” mindset.)
Here are the film winners from the DGA:
NARRATIVE FEATURE FILM
Paul Thomas Anderson – Licorice Pizza
Kenneth Branagh – Belfast Jane Campion – The Power of the Dog
Steven Spielberg – West Side Story
Denis Villeneuve – Dune
FIRST TIME NARRATIVE FEATURE FILM Maggie Gyllenhaal – The Lost Daughter
Rebecca Hall – Passing
Tatiana Huezo – Prayers For The Stolen
Lin Manuel-Miranda – Tick, Tick…BOOM!
Michael Sarnoski – Pig
Emma Seligman – Shiva Baby
DOCUMENTARY
Jessica Kingdon – Ascension Stanley Nelson – Attica
Raoul Peck – Exterminate All The Brutes
Questlove – Summer of Soul
Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi & Jimmy Chin – The Rescue
In 2021’s Aileen Wuornos: American Boogeywoman, Peyton List stars at Aileen, who prefers to be called Lee. Lee has fled an unpleasant and abusive home in Michigan and she has made her way down to Florida. With no money and no formal education, she’s been forced to make a living as a truck stop prostitute. However, on July 4th, 1976, she happens to stumble across a party on the beach. She befriends Jennifer (Lydia Hearst), who invites Lee to stay at her beach house. Though Lee quickly overstays her welcome, she does meet Jennifer’s widowed father, Lewis Fell (Tobin Bell). Lewis is enchanted by Lee’s crude but enthusiastic personality. Lee is enchanted by Lewis’s money. Soon, they’re married. But when Lewis’s daughter and friends start to dig into Lee’s mysterious past, Lee resorts to murder to protect her secrets.
The idea of making a movie about future serial killer Aileen Wournos hanging out around the Florida beach and marrying the kindly president of a yacht club may sound like an unlikely one but when has that ever stopped anyone? Oddly enough, American Boogeywoman is loosely based on the truth. Before she became the fraggle-toothed serial killer who was immortalized in two Nick Broomfield documentaries and by Charlize Theron in Monster, Aileen Wournos was briefly married to a yacht club president named Lewis Fell. The marriage was even announced in the society pages. Of course, the marriage didn’t last long. Aileen was accused of striking Lewis with his own cane and the two of them ended up getting a divorce. That said, it would appear that the majority of American Boogeywoman was fictionalized. Aileen was never accused of murdering anyone before she started the killing spree that eventually landed her on Florida’s crowded death row. In the film, Aileen also claims to have murdered her own brother after he suddenly turned up in a cheap Florida motel and demanded money. In real life, Aileen’s brother died in Michigan, long after Aileen had cut off contact with her family.
The film opens with Aileen already on death row, talking to a documentarian about her marriage. Occasionally, throughout the film, the documentarian will interrupt Aileen’s story and he’ll point out that what she’s saying doesn’t really make sense. (For instance, he points out that there’s no way that Aileen’s brother could have died in both Florida and Michigan.) For the most part, Aileen shrugs off his comments but the character of the documentarian is an important one. His character serves to comment on the strange nature of fame and crime in America. Aileen Wournos may be an unbalanced killer but she’s also a celebrity. She’s enough of a celebrity, the film tells us, that even after her death, two films will be made about her. One of those films will win an Oscar. The other film will be American Boogeywoman. At its heart, American Boogeywoman is an examination of the morbid streak that secretly runs through American culture. As such, it is slightly more interesting than the typical serial killer exploitation film.
American Boogeywoman was directed by Daniel Farrands, who has recently made a career out of directing somewhat distasteful true crime thrillers. His most famous film, The Haunting of Sharon Tate, is surprisingly effective. His worst film, The Murder of Nicole Brown Simpson, is perhaps one of the most offensive films made over the past decade. Farrands is not a bad director but his choice in material will always be problematic for many viewers. American Boogeywoman is one of his better films, if just because it has enough self-awareness to realize how ludicrous it all is.
The beach is a beautiful and fun place and the perfect location to celebrate a spring or summer break. But beware of getting carried away with your youthful revelries because it can lead to complications that will follow you into the fall. And those complications can be deadly….
BLEH!
Okay, sorry for all the drama. I’m just trying to make myself feel some sort of enthusiasm for reviewing the 2017 Netflix film, You Get Me. You Get Me is technically not a spring break movie but it does take place on the beach and it does feature a moderate amount of drinking, drug-taking, and partying so, it’s close enough. It also features a cast of 20-something actors cast as high school students. Some are more believable than others.
Basically, dumb and dull teenager Tyler (Taylor John Smith) is having the best summer of his life because he has a girlfriend named Ali (Halston Sage), who he is totally in love with. (Ali could probably do better but whatever. Everyone makes mistakes in high school.) Tyler is also frustrated because Ali wants to wait before having sex with him and she also doesn’t understand why Tyler has been so hesitant to introduce her to his dysfunctional family. When Tyler goes to a party and runs into a guy from Ali’s past, he learns that Ali used to be much wilder. Angry that Ali hasn’t been honest with him, big dumb Tyler gets drunk and runs off with Holly (Bella Throne), a girl who he has only known for an hour. They go dancing. Holly offers Tyler a pill. Tyler isn’t sure he’s ready for that. “You swallow, I swallow,” Holly tells him. Tyler and Holly spend a passionate weekend together but, afterwards, Tyler and Ali get back together, with Ali promising that she’ll tell Tyler everything about her past. “No more secrets,” Tyler agrees, despite the fact that he’s now keeping a secret of his own.
Fortunately, Holly was only visiting for the summer and it’s not like Tyler will ever see her again so …. OH MY GOODNESS, LOOK WHO JUST SHOWED UP AT TYLER’S HIGH SCHOOL! Holly now goes to the same school as Tyler and her new best friend is Ali! Tyler asks Holly not to tell Ali anything about their weekend together. Holly, however, has stopped taking her meds (seriously, that’s a plot point) and has decided that if she can’t have Tyler, no one will. Soon, Holly is claiming to be pregnant and serving peanut-laced smoothies to people with food allergies. Have you ever noticed how people in movies like this always have a best friend who suffers from a food allergy?
I’m probably making You Get Me sound more fun than it actually is. It’s actually an extremely bland movie and a surprisingly tame one. At her best, Bella Thorne is less an actress and more an agent of chaos. She gets a few opportunities to be enjoyably evil in You Get Me but the script, for whatever reason, often seems to be more concerned with boring old Tyler. Perhaps if Taylor John Smith and Halston Sage had at least a little bit of romantic chemistry, we would care about what happens to Tyler and Ali but they don’t. Since they don’t really seem to be that into each other, it’s a little bit hard to get upset when Holly comes between them.
The beach, I will say, looked lovely. And I really liked Holly’s house. And, as I mentioned earlier, there were a few moments when Bella Thorne’s demented performance brought some life to the anemic proceedings. But, for the most part, You Get Me is forgettable. It did not get me.
Welcome to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, the setting of the 1989 film, Shag: The Movie!
We know that we’re in South Carolina because everyone is speaking with the type of overbaked Southern accents that you only hear in the movies. And you know it’s the beach because of all the sand, the bathing suits, and the spring breakers. Everyone’s listening to that rock and roll music. Everyone’s dancing. There’s a lot of Confederate flags around, mostly because the movie was made in the 80s and it’s taking place in the South. If the movie were made today, it would probably take place in New Jersey and everyone would be debating whether or not Christopher Columbus was a hero or not.
Though the movie was made in 1989, it takes place in 1963. We know that the movie takes place in 1963 because everyone in the movie keeps mentioning how it’s 1963. One character mentions having sexual fantasies about President Kennedy, which scandalizes all of her friends. Another character won’t stop talking about how much he enjoyed Paul Newman’s performance in The Hustler. (The Hustler came out in 1961, though, so I think the dude needs to get with the times and watch Tom Jones.) Everyone’s dancing the Shag. Of course, since this is a film about how innocent the world was in 1963, there’s no talk of the growing American presence in Vietnam or anything like that. This is the 1963 of the popular imagination, the 1963 that one visualizes after watching a hundred movies about spring break in the early 60s.
Anyway, Shag follows four friends as they have a wild week in Myrtle Beach. They’re recent high school graduates. Melaina (Bridget Fonda) is the wild preacher’s daughter. Louanne (Paige Hannah) is the responsible one, who wears horn-rimmed glasses. Pudge (Annabeth Gish) is the friend who needs better friends or, at the very least, friends who won’t give her a cruel nickname. Carson (Phoebe Cates) is the responsible girl who is about to marry the level-headed Harley (Tyrone Power, Jr.) After telling their parents that their going to Ft. Sumter to learn about the Civil War, they instead head down to Myrtle Beach. Melania enters a beauty contest. Pudge enters a shag contest with Chip (Scott Coffey). Carson finds herself tempted by Chip’s friend, the Yale-bound Buzz (Robert Rusler). And Louanne is tempted by Harley, who eventually comes to Myrtle Beach himself to try to understand why Carson is being so irresponsible.
There aren’t really many surprising moments to be found in Shag. From the minute that we first see Carson trying on her wedding dress, we know that there’s no way she’s still going to be engaged by the time the movie comes to its conclusion. By that same token, we also know that Melaina is not going to be as wild as she tries to present herself as being and that Pudge is going to find her confidence and that Louanne is eventually going to let her hair down, if just for a few minutes. It’s a predictable movie but the cast is likable and there’s a lot of dancing, which is always a plus as far as I’m concerned. Admittedly, Cates and Rusler are a bit bland as the main couple. Instead, Annabeth Gish and Scott Coffey are the cast stand-outs. I also have to say that I really liked the performance of Tyrone Power, Jr. Harley is kind of a thankless role but Power manages to make him at least a little sympathetic. At the very least, Carson doesn’t come across like a fool for considering him as a possible husband.
Shag is a likeable film, even if it’s not exactly groundbreaking. And did I mention that there’s dancing?
This 2003 film tells the story of 16 good-looking and not particularly intelligent college students who go to Cancun for spring break. For 8 days, they all live in the same beach house and they get to know each other. They drink. They flirt. A few of them hook up but perhaps not as many as you would expect. The dorky virgin dude says that he just wants to see “boobies” and then gets drunk off of one shot. Two platonic friends debate whether they should take their relationship to the next level. The women wear bikinis. The men wear speedos. There are bare boobs and behinds galore. Snoop Dogg makes a special guest appearance. One spring breaker get stung by a jelly fish so her new roommate pours a cup of urine on her ankle. Good thing he had already had ten beers that morning! What fun!
If this sounds like a typical spring break film, that’s because it is a typical spring break film but with one big difference. It was produced by the people behind MTV’s The Real World and, as such, the 16 spring breakers are sold as being real people who are spontaneously acting like a bunch of movie characters. In 2003, reality tv was still a relatively exotic concept and this film was an attempt to take the genre’s cheap aesthetic to the cinematic level. Even more importantly, it was an attempt to duplicate the success of Girls Gone Wild, without actually admitting to being inspired by that sleazy enterprise. As such, there’s a lot of nudity but there’s a strange lack of actual sex. There’s a lot of drinking but there’s not much drunkenness. It’s an oddly tame look at spring break, one that promises debauchery but which doesn’t deliver anything that would have kept the film out of theaters or off the cable networks. I got more wild on my spring breaks than anyone in this film and I don’t even drink.
The film’s “stars” are all pretty bland and it’s not a surprise that, with one exception, none of them have appeared in anything other than The Real Cancun. (That one exception is Laura Ramsey, who went on to have a somewhat busy acting career after appearing as herself in this film.) The film manages to make nudity boring. Seen today, The Real Cancun works best as a time capsule, largely because it was filmed at a time when there was no social media and, even more importantly, no phones. Everyone is attracted to the crew and their bulky film cameras because there aren’t any other cameras around to record them and make them famous. Today, anyone can make their own Real Cancun and post it to YouTube. In 2003, if you wanted a shot at that type of fame, you had to audition and be selected to appear in a “documentary.”
Apparently, The Real Cancun was meant to be the first part of a Real World cinematic franchise. The first Jackass film had come out the previous year so MTV was enthusiastic about producing cheap reality movies. However, The Real Cancun was such a huge flop at the box office that it killed those plans. There would be other Jackass films, of course. But the Real World Cinematic Universe imploded as soon as it began. And for that, we should probably be thankful.
Through the Shattered Lens