Police Academy (1984, directed by Hugh Wilson)

Posted on April 25, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

God help us, it has come to this. After a month and a half being locked down, Lisa and I watched the first two Police Academy movies last night.

The first Police Academy takes place in an unnamed city that appears to be in California. Due to a shortage of officers, the mayor has announced that the police academy will now accept anyone who wants to apply, regardless of their physical or mental condition. Naturally, this leads to a collection of misfits applying. Martinet Lt. Harris (G.W. Bailey) is determined to force all of them to drop out of the academy and he has a point because I wouldn’t trust Michael Winslow’s human sound effects guy to investigate any crimes that were committed in my neighborhood. What’s he going to do? Make silly noises while I’m trying to figure out who stole my car?

The leader of the recruits is Carey Mahoney (Steve Guttenberg). Mahoney is being forced to attend the academy because otherwise, he’ll have to go to jail for disturbing the peace. Police Academy is a film that asks you to believe that a character played by Steve Guttenberg has not only frequently been in trouble with the law but would also make a good cop. Guttenberg doesn’t really do a bad job as Mahoney. He’s a likable actor, even if his filmography has more duds than hits. But he’s still miscast in a role that demands someone like Bill Murray, who could be both tough and funny.

The other recruits include Bubba Smith as Hightower and David Graf as the insane gun nut, Tackleberry. Kim Cattrall is the rich girl who wants to be a cop and who falls in love with Mahoney. George Gaynes is Commandant Lassard, who is out-of-it but not as out-of-it as he would be in the sequels.

You have to wonder how many parents, in the late 80s and early 90s, allowed their children to rent the R-rated Police Academy from the local video store without realizing the the first Police Academy is considerably more raunchy than the later sequels. How did mom and dad react when they walked into the room and discovered their children watching Georgina Spelvin giving George Gaynes a blow job from underneath a podium? Or how about the scene where recruit George Martin (Andrew Rubin) is spied having a threesome in the girl’s dorm? The first Police Academy film is definitely made from the same mold as Animal House, Caddyshack, and Stripes. It’s just not as funny as any of those films.

However, it is funnier than every Police Academy film that followed it. There’s enough solid laughs to make the first Police Academy fun in a stupid way. For instance, just about every scene involving accident-prone Cadet Fackler (Bruce Mahler) was funny. Bubba Smith gets a lot of laughs just by being Bubba Smith in a stupid movie. It’s also hard not to love it when Cadet Hooks (Marion Ramsey) yelled, “Don’t move, Dirtbag!” Hell, I even laughed at the sound effects guy once or twice.

All of the Police Academy films are now on Netflix. Tomorrow, we’ll take a look at Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment.

Film Review: Unforgettable (dir by John Dahl)

Posted on June 24, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

You have to give the makers of the 1996 film, Unforgettable, some credit. It takes a certain amount of courage to give your movie a title like Unforgettable. You’re practically asking some snarky critic to comment on the fact that she can’t remember your movie.

Well, I’ll resist the temptation because I can remember enough about this movie to review it. I saw it a few days ago on This TV and, at first, I was excited because it was a Ray Liotta movie. Ray Liotta is an entertaining and likable actor who, nowadays, only seems to get cast in small, tough guy roles. Nowadays, a typical Liotta role seems to be something like the character he played in Killing Me Softly. He showed up. He was tough. He got killed for no good reason. So, whenever you come across a film in which Liotta gets to do something more than just get shot, you kind of have an obligation to watch.

In Unforgettable, Liotta plays Dr. David Krane, who is haunted by the unsolved murder of his wife. Fortunately (or perhaps, unfortunately), Dr. Martha Briggs (Linda Fiorentino) has developed a formula that can be used to transfer memories from one person to another. All you have to do is extract some spinal fluid! Or something like that. It doesn’t make any sense to me and I have to admit that I kinda suspect that the science might not actually check out.

Anyway, Dr. Krane is all like, “I want to inject myself with my dead wife’s spinal fluid so I can experience her final moments!”

And Dr. Briggs is all like, “But this could kill you because there’s all these vaguely defined side effects!”

But Dr. Krane does it anyway and he discovers that his wife was murdered by a lowlife criminal named Eddie Dutton (Kim Coates)! So, Dr. Krane chases Eddie all ocer the city and it’s interesting to see that a doctor can apparently keep up with a career criminal. I mean, you would think that Eddie’s experience with being chased and Krane’s inexperience with chasing would give Eddie an advantage. Anyway, regardless, it doesn’t matter because Eddie is eventually gunned down by the police and Dr. Krane is fired from his job.

Hmmm … well, that was quick. I guess the movie’s over…

No, not quite! It turns out that someone hired Eddie to kill Dr. Krane’s wife! And it turns out that person was a cop! But which cop!? Well, there’s only two cops in the film who actually have any lines so it has to be one of them. And one of the cops is so unlikable that it’s obvious from the start that he’s a red herring. So, I guess that means the actual murderer is the one that you’ll suspect from the first moment he shows up.

(For the record, the two cops are played by Christopher McDonald and Peter Coyote. I won’t reveal which one is unlikable and which one is a murderer but seriously, you’ve already guessed, haven’t you?)

Anyway, it’s all pretty stupid and a waste of everyone involved. Ray Liotta is likable and sympathetic but the film gets bogged down with trying to convince us that crimes can be solved through spinal fluid. It’s a dumb premise that the movie takes way too seriously and it never quite works.

Still, I hope that someone will give Ray Liotta another good role at some point in the future. He deserves better than supporting roles and Chantix commercials.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtswyFJfDQU

Film Review: Ice Princess (dir by Tim Fywell)

Posted on February 10, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In the 2005 Disney film, Ice Princess, Michelle Trachtenberg plays Casey Carlyle.

Casey is a brilliant high school student with a potentially wonderful future. At least that’s what her mother, Joan (Joan Cusack), has decided. As far as Joan is concerned, Casey’s destiny is to go to Harvard, become an award-winning physicist, and serve as an inspiration for young women everywhere. When Joan looks out of her kitchen window and sees that Casey is skating on a nearby frozen pond, she doesn’t praise her daughter’s athleticism. Instead, Joan taps on the window and holds up a text book. It’s time to study!

If Casey’s going to go to Harvard, she’s going to need to win a scholarship. And Harvard doesn’t just give out scholarships to anyone! I mean, I sent them a note asking for money a few years ago and I still haven’t heard back from them. So, Casey decides to prove that she’s Harvard-worthy by filming a bunch of ice skaters and showing how she can use physics to make their routines even more impressive. Or something like that…

(Look, I’ll just be honest. Science was always my worst subject in school. Quite frankly, I don’t have the attention span necessary for it and I kind of like the idea of not knowing how the universe works. I love the mystery of it all. I realize that Neil deGrasse Tyson would probably be disappointed in me but, honestly, I know more about movies than he ever will. So, I figure it all evens out.)

For her experiment, Casey tries to watch and film some other skaters, just to discover that the parents of ice skaters are insane. Not only are they convinced that Casey is some sort of spy who has been sent by a rival skater but they also put their children under a tremendous amount of pressure. They expect their kids to be champions and, even more importantly, to land the type of endorsement deals that go with being champions. Casey, on the other hand, just wants to skate.

When Tina Harwood (Kim Cattrall), a former Olympic skater, agrees to teach Casey how to skate, she is shocked to discover that Casey is a natural on the ice. Casey not only befriends Tina’s daughter, Gen (Hayden Panettiere), but she is also soon competing in regional competitions. However, Casey’s mother still doesn’t know what Casey is actually doing and Tina soon becomes paranoid that Casey will outshine Gen.

So, what happens?

Does Joan discover that Casey is more into skating than science?

Does Casey win her scholarship to Harvard or does she give it up so she can pursue her dreams?

Does Tina try to sabotage Casey?

Does Gen encourage Casey to follow her dreams?

And, most importantly, does Casey win the heart of the guy driving the Zamboni?

You probably already know the answer to all these questions. I mean, this is a Disney movie. It was rated G and, after a somewhat unsuccessful run at the box office, it found a second life on the Family Channel. Ice Princess is not exactly a revolutionary film. It doesn’t set out to rewrite the rules of sports film genre. Instead, it’s content to be a likable crowd-pleaser. Michelle Trachtenberg and Hayden Panettiere were both perfectly cast as the unlikely friends and their relationships with their respective mothers feel authentic and true. More importantly, the film features enough real-life ice skaters to lend verisimilitude to the competition scenes.

Right now, like all good people, I am insanely enthusiastic about the Winter Olympics. (For the record, I’m hoping that Team Ireland and Team Italy takes everything.) That’s one reason why I watched Ice Princess. While no one in the movie actually goes to the Olympics, it’s still a figure skating movie and I imagine that, if there had been a sequel, Casey would have been skating at the Winter Games.

Ice Princess is an entertaining and thoroughly light-weight film. There aren’t any surprises but you don’t really watch a movie like this to be surprised. In an uncertain world, there’s a definite comfort to be found in movies that are content to simply be likable and entertaining.

My advice is to watch Ice Princess as a double feature with I, Tonya.

(This trailer is Italian but you’ll get the general idea…)

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

Shattered Politics #87: The Ghost Writer (dir by Roman Polanski)

Posted on February 10, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In the 2010 film The Ghost Writer, Ewan McGregor plays a character known as the Ghost. We never actually learn the name of his character and that’s perhaps appropriate. The Ghost has made his living by being anonymous. He’s a ghost writer. He’s the guy who is hired to help inarticulate and occasionally illiterate celebrities write best-selling biographies.

The Ghost has been given a new assignment. He is to ghost write the memoirs of former British Prime Minister Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan). Despite the fact that Adam is one of the most famous men in the world, the Ghost is not initially enthusiastic about working with him.

First off, there’s the fact that Adam and his wife, Ruth (Olivia Williams), are currently hiding out in America because America is one of the few countries that will not extradite him to be prosecuted for war crimes at the International Criminal Court. It seems that Adam (much like Tony Blair) is a controversial figure because of some of the actions he may have authorized as a part of the war on terror. Not only does the Ghost have political objections to working with Adam but he has to leave his London home and go to Massachusetts in order to do so.

Secondly, there’s the fact that, once the Ghost arrives in America, he discovers that — for such a controversial figure — Adam is actually rather boring and seems to have very little knowledge about anything that he did while he was prime minister. Instead, he seems to be more interested in spending time with his mistress (Kim Cattrall, giving the film’s one bad performance). Ruth seems to be the political (and smart) one in the marriage.

And finally, there’s the fact that the Ghost is actually the second writer to have worked with Adam. The previous writer mysteriously drowned. While that death was ruled to be an accident, the Ghost comes to suspect that it was murder and that the motive is hidden in the first writer’s manuscript…

The Ghost Writer is a favorite of mine, a smart and witty political thriller that features great performances from Ewan McGregor, Olivia Williams, and Pierce Brosnan. Brosnan especially seems to be having a lot of fun sending up his dashing, James Bond image. Roman Polanski directs at a fast pace and maintains a perfect atmosphere of growing paranoia throughout the entire film. In the end, The Ghost Writer proudly continues the tradition of such superior paranoia films as The Conversation, Three Days of the Condor, and the Parallax View.

Incidentally, I have a theory that Adam Lang was also the unseen Prime Minister who was featured in Into the Loop. Watching The Ghost Writer, it’s hard not to feel that Adam really feel apart without Malcolm around to help him out.

Shattered Politics #37: Rosebud (dir by Otto Preminger)

Posted on January 25, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Before I review the 1975 film Rosebud, allow me to tell you about how I first discovered the existence of this particular film.

The greatest used bookstore in the world is located in Denton, Texas. It’s called Recycled Books and it is three stories of pure literary goodness! (Plus, there are apartments on the top floor where I attended some pretty interesting parties but that’s another story….) When I was attending the University of North Texas, I used to stop by Recycled Books nearly every day. One day, I happened to be searching the Film and TV section when I came across a beat-up paperback called Soon To Be A Major Motion Picture.

This book, which was written by Theodore Gershuny, told the story of how the previously acclaimed director Otto Preminger attempted to make a film about terrorism. Starting with the attempts of Preminger’s son, Erik Lee Preminger, to come up with a workable script and then going on to detail how Peter O’Toole came to replace Robert Mitchum as the star of the film and ending with the film’s disastrous release, Soon To Be A Major Motion Picture proved to be a fascinating read.

After finishing the book, I simply had to see Rosebud for myself. Unfortunately, at that time, Rosebud had not yet been released on Blu-ray or DVD. So, I actually ended up ordering an old VHS copy of it. The tape that I got was not in the best condition but it played well enough and I can now say that, unlike the majority of people in the world, I’ve actually seen Rosebud!

Which is not to say that Rosebud is any good. It’s not the disaster that I had been led to expect. In fact, it probably would have been more fun if it had been a disaster, as opposed to being just a forgettable film from a director who was probably capable of better. Preminger started his career in the 30s and was considered, at one point, to be quite innovative. He directed Laura and Anatomy of a Murder, two great films. Unfortunately, there’s really nothing innovative about his direction of Rosebud. In Gershuny’s book, Preminger comes across like an intelligent and thoughtful man who was too set in his ways to realize that what was shocking in 1959 was no longer that big of a deal in 1975. (And, needless to say, it’s even less of a big deal in 2015.)

As for what Rosebud‘s about, it’s about a man named Sloat (Richard Attenborough), a former journalist who now lives in a cave in Israel and dreams of establishing a worldwide terrorist network. Under Sloat’s direction, terrorists storm a yacht named the Rosebud and take the girls on board hostage. The girls are wealthy and privileged. Their fathers are judges, senators, and businessmen. CIA agent Larry Martin (Peter O’Toole) is tasked with tracking down and rescuing the girls. If it sounds like an action film — well, it’s not. This is not a prequel to Taken. Instead, it’s a very talky film that has a few isolated good moments and performances but otherwise, is fairly forgettable.

That said, the film does have an interesting cast. Peter O’Toole seems bored by his role (and who can blame him?) but Attenborough briefly livens things up in the role of Sloat. As for the girls being held hostage, they’re not given much to do. One of them is played by a young Isabelle Huppert. Long before she would play Samantha on Sex and the City, Kim Cattrall plays a hostage here. The English hostage is played by Lalla Ward, who is now married to Richard Dawkins.

And then there’s the girl’s parents, who are played by an odd assortment of character actors. Raf Vallone, an Italian, plays a Greek. (His daughter, meanwhile, is played by the French Isabelle Huppert.) Peter Lawford, looking somewhat dazed, shows up as Lalla Ward’s father. (One of the sadder scenes in Gershuny’s book deals with Lawford’s attempts to remember his lines.) And than, in the role of Cattrall’s father, we have a very distinguished looking man named John Lindsay.

John Lindsay was the former mayor of New York City, a man who ran for President in 1972 and, three years later, attempted to launch a new career as an actor. Rosebud was his both his first and final film. (Rumor has it that Martin Scorsese attempted to convince Lindsay to play Senator Palatine in Taxi Driver but Lindsay turned the role down.) Lindsay is not particularly memorable in Rosebud. It’s not so much that Lindsay gives a bad performance as much as it’s just the fact that he has a very bland screen presence. That blandness probably served him well as a politician but, as an actor — well, let’s just say that John Lindsay was apparently no Fred Thompson.

And so that’s Rosebud. It’s a film that, much like Maidstone, you can only appreciate if you know what went on behind the scenes. I can’t really recommend Rosebud but, if you ever come across a battered old copy of Soon To Be A Major Motion Picture in a used bookstore, be sure to buy it!

Seriously, you will not be sorry.

Poll: Which Movie Should Lisa Marie Watch on March 20th?

Posted on March 13, 2012 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Anyone who knows me knows that sometimes I just can’t help but love being dominated.

That’s why, on occasion, I’ll give you, our beloved readers, the option of telling me which film to watch and review. In the past, you’ve commanded me to watch and review Anatomy of a Murder, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and Logan’s Run.

Well, here’s your chance to, once again, tell me what to do. I’ve randomly selected 12 films from my film collection. Whichever film gets the most votes will be watched and reviewed by me next Tuesday, March 20th.

Here are the films up for consideration:

1) Black Jesus (1968) — This Italian film stars Woody Strode as an African rebel leader who is captured by his country’s right-wing, American-backed dictatorship.

2) Capote (2005) — Philip Seymour Hoffman was an Oscar for best actor for playing writer Truman Capote in this film that details how Capote came to write his true crime classic, In Cold Blood. This film was also nominated for best picture.

3) Chappaqua (1966) — In this underground cult classic, drug addict Conrad Rooks seeks treatment in Switzerland while being haunted by a scornful William S. Burroughs. This film features cameo from Allen Ginsberg, The Fugs, and just about every other cult figure from 1966.

4) Crazy/Beautiful (2001) — Jay Fernandez and Kirsten Dunst have lots and lots of sex. This was like one of my favorite movies to catch on cable back when I was in high school. 🙂

5) An Education (2008) — In my favorite movie from 2008, Carey Mulligan is a schoolgirl in 1960s England who has a secret affair with an older man (played by Peter Sarsgaard), who has plenty of secrets of his own. Co-starring Rosamund Pike, Emma Thompson, Alfred Molina, and Dominic Cooper (who is to die for, seriously).

6) Female Vampire (1973) — In this atmospheric and ennui-filled film from the infamous Jesus Franco, a female vampire spends the whole movie wandering around naked and dealing with the lost souls who want to join the ranks of the undead.

7) Nightmare City (1980) — In this gory and fast-paced film from Umberto Lenzi, an accident at a nuclear plant leads to a bunch of blood-thirsty zombies rampaging through both the city and the countryside. Hugo Stiglitz plays Dean Miller, zombie exterminator! Nightmare City is probably most remembered for introducing the concept of the fast zombie and for serving as an obvious inspiration for Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later.

8) The Other Side of Midnight (1977) — Based on a best-selling novel, The Other Side of Midnight tells the story of a poor French girl who becomes a world-famous actress and who ends up sleeping with apparently every wealthy man in the world. Meanwhile, the man she loves ends up marrying Susan Sarandon. Eventually, it all ends with both a hurricane and a murder. Apparently, this film cost a lot of money to make and it was a notorious box office bomb. It looks kinda fun to me.

9) Peyton Place (1957) — Also based on a best-selling novel, Peyton Place is about love, sex, and scandal in a small town. Lana Turner is a repressed woman with a past who struggles to keep her daughter from making the same mistakes. At the time it was made, it was considered to be quite racy and it was even nominated for best picture. This film is a personal favorite of mine and it’s pretty much set the template for every single film ever shown on Lifetime.

10) Rosebud (1975) — From director Otto Preminger comes this film about what happens when a bunch of rich girls on a yacht are taken hostage by Islamic extremists. The film’s diverse cast includes Peter O’Toole, Richard Attenborough, Cliff Gorman, former New York Mayor John Lindsay, former Kennedy in-law Peter Lawford, Raf Vallone, Adrienne Corri, Lalla Ward, Isabelle Huppert, and Kim Cattrall.

11) Valley of the Dolls (1967) — Oh my God, I love this movie so much! Three aspiring actresses move to the big city and soon become hooked on pills and bad relationship decisions. Every time I watch this movie, I spend hours yelling, “I’m Neely O’Hara, bitch!” at the top of my lungs.

12) Zombie Lake (1981) — From my favorite French director, Jean Rollin, comes this extremely low budget film about a bunch of Nazi zombies who keep coming out of the lake and attacking the nearby village. Some people claim that this is the worst zombie films ever made. I disagree.

Please vote below for as many or as few of these films as you want to. The poll will remain open until March 20th and whichever film gets the most votes will be watched and reviewed by me.

Happy voting!