A Movie A Day #195: Best Revenge (1984, directed by John Trent)

Posted on July 22, 2017 by Jedadiah Leland

Damn … John Heard died.

I know that almost everyone knows John Heard as either the father from Home Alone or as the detective on The Sopranos or maybe even the executive in Big. Over the course of his long career, John Heard played a lot of neglectful fathers, greedy businessmen, and corrupt politicians. Heard was good in all of those roles but he was capable of so much more. Though he did not get many chances to do so, he could play heroes just as well as villains.

One of his best performances is also one of his least seen. In Best Revenge, he plays Charlie. Charlie is a laid back drug dealer, someone who would probably hate and be hated by most of the authority figures that Heard was best known for playing. Charlie is the ultimate mellow dude, without a care in the world. All he wants to do is play his harmonica and spend time with his girlfriend (Alberta Watson). However, an old friend (Stephen McHattie) wants Charlie to help smuggle 500 keys of hash from Tangiers to America. Charlie wants nothing to do with it but then he finds out that the Mafia will kill his friend unless the drugs make it across the ocean. Charlie and his friend Bo (Levon Helm of The Band) fly over to Morocco but are betrayed. Charlie ends up in a prison cell, from which he has to escape so that he can rescue Bo, smuggle the drugs, and get revenge on those who betrayed him.

Because of the prison aspect and the fact that Charlie wears a fedora, Best Revenge was sold as being a combination of Midnight Express and Raiders of the Lost Ark but actually it is a character study disguised as an action film. Despite the title, Best Revenge is more interested in the real-life logistics and hassles of being an international drug dealer than in any sort of revenge. Though it is a role far different from the ones he may be best known for, John Heard was perfectly cast as a small-time drug dealer who suddenly finds himself in over his head. Heard gives such a good and sympathetic performance that this film, along with his work in Cutter’s Way and Chilly Scenes of Winter, shows what a mistake was made when Heard became typecast as the bad guy.

Best Revenge was filmed in 1980 but not released until four years later. Along with appreciating Heard’s performance, keep an eye out for Michael Ironside in an early, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it role.

A Movie A Day #81: The Great White Hype (1996, directed by Reginald Hudlin)

Posted on March 29, 2017 by Jedadiah Leland

The Rev. Fred Sultan (Samuel L. Jackson) has a problem. He is the richest and the best known fight promoter in America but the current (and undefeated) heavyweight champion is just too good. No one is paying to watch James “The Grim Reaper” Roper (Damon Wayans) fight because Roper always wins. Sultan has a plan, though. Before Roper turned professional, he lost a fight to Terry Conklin (Peter Berg). Conklin has long since retired from boxing and is now a heavy metal, progressive musician. Sultan convinces Conklin to come out of retirement and face Roper in a rematch. Since Conklin is white and Roper is black, Sultan stands to make a killing as white boxing fans get swept up in all the hype about Conklin being the latest “great white hope.”

In the days leading up to the fight, crusading journalist Mitchell Kane (Jeff Goldblum) attempts to expose the crooked Sultan before getting seduced into his inner circle. Meanwhile, boxer Marvin Shabazz (Michael Jace) and his manager, Hassan El Rukk’n (Jamie Foxx), unsuccessfully pursue a match with Roper. Conklin gets back into shape while Roper eats ice cream and watches Dolemite.

In its attempt to satirize boxing, The Great White Hype runs into a huge problem. The fight game is already so shady that it is beyond satire. This was especially true in the 90s, when the The Great White Hype was first released. (Even more than the famous Larry Holmes/Gerry Cooney title fight, The Great White Hype’s obvious inspiration was the heavily promoted, two-minute fight between Mike Tyson and Peter McNeeley.) The Great White Hype is a very busy film but nothing in it can match Oliver McCall’s mental breakdown in the middle of his fight with Lennox Lewis, Andrew Golota twice fighting Riddick Bowe and twice getting disqualified for low blows, or Mike Tyson biting off Evander Holyfield’s ear.

The Great White Hype has an only in the 90s supporting cast, featuring everyone from Jon Lovitz to Cheech Marin to, for some reason, Corbin Bernsen. Damon Wayans is the least convincing heavyweight champion since Tommy Morrison essentially played himself in Rocky V. The Rev. Sultan was meant to be a take on Don King and Samuel L. Jackson was a good pick for the role but the real Don King is so openly corrupt and flamboyant that he’s almost immune to parody.

When it comes to trying to take down Don King, I think Duke puts it best.

Film Review: The Red Dress (dir by Leif Bristow)

Posted on February 22, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

As I was watching The Red Dress, I found myself thinking that it had to be one of the most deliberately paced Lifetime film that I had ever seen. It moved slowly, taking its time to tell its story and, as far as I could tell, attempting to build up a certain atmosphere of existential doom. (In many ways, it reminded me of the trailer for Angelina Jolie’s By The Sea.) It really wasn’t paced right for TV but that’s probably because it really wasn’t made for TV.

From the occasionally blanked out lines of dialogue to a blurred hint of sideboob, it was obvious that The Red Dress was a theatrical film that somehow ended up making its American premiere on the Lifetime Movie Network. What would have worked just fine when watched in one uninterrupted 90 minute viewing worked less well when stretched out to two hours and frequently interrupted by commercials for Liberty Mutual Insurance. The film, itself, frequently plays with time and makes heavy use of flashbacks. It’s not necessarily a complicated story but it’s still one that requires a bit of concentration. It’s not always easy to concentrate when you have to deal with a commercial about an insane person who named her car Brad.

As for the story that the movie tells, Patricia (Rachel Skarsten) and Rainer (Callum Blue) are young, rich, married, and maybe in love. Of course, Patricia did have an affair with Rainer’s business partner, James (Sean Maguire). And, after Patricia announced that she was pregnant, Rainer did start to feel like “an appendage.” As for the baby, it died in a mysterious fire that may or may not have been arson.

With Patricia in a deep depression, Rainer suggests that they move to a beachfront house in Malta. It’s here that Rainer can spend all of his time floating in the pool and Patricia can deal with the constant nightmares that make it impossible for her to sleep. At times, being in Malta seems to bring the spark back to their marriage. But then there are other times when Patricia suspects that Rainer is keeping a secret from her.

And then there’s the mysterious girl who Patricia keeps seeing. The girl seems to always be heading towards a castle that lies in the distance, lit up with a crimson glow that makes it seem like it belongs in a Jean Rollin film or maybe Inception‘s Limbo. Patricia suspects that the girl may have been kidnapped by the mysterious local hunter, Angelo (John Rhys-Davies). Rainer, however, seems to believe that the solution to everything is for Patricia to take more pills.

The Red Dress doesn’t really work as a film, largely because Rainer and Patricia are such unlikable characters that you really don’t care what happens to them. Far too often, they put the idle into idle rich. As well, the film’s final twist is not as much of a surprise as the film seems to think it is. You’ll see it coming. That said, I did like the look of a film. Malta is a great location and the film takes advantage of that fact.

As for the film’s title, it refers to a dress that Patricia wears in a few of the flashbacks. And you know what? It is a really nice dress.