I’ll sing the praises of the movie SLING BLADE to any person who will listen. I love the movie, mainly because of Billy Bob Thornton’s outstanding performance as Karl Childers, a character that he created from scratch. I also love the movie because it was filmed in Saline County, Arkansas, the county I live in. I love to eat at Garry’s Diner, if nothing else because Billy Bob and John Ritter did in the movie. They make great burgers and shakes!
One of the best things about SLING BLADE is Dwight Yoakam’s performance as Doyle Hargraves, one of the most disgusting characters you’ll ever see on screen. Dwight Yoakam slays the role, and you can’t help but hate him. On a side note, I have been told that Dwight’s not one of the nicest guys around, but that’s neither here nor there. A lot of people have said they didn’t like Charles Bronson, but I don’t care because I love him and that’s all that matters. I love Dwight Yoakam too. I love his song “Fast as you,” and I love his performance in SLING BLADE!
In celebration of Dwight’s 69th birthday, I present a scene from SLING BLADE where Dwight plays the epitome of domestic, blue collar evil! (I would say enjoy, but if you’re not somewhat repulsed, you may need help! 😉)
I love watching movies that are filmed in my home state of Arkansas. We’ve had our share of big stars show up in the Natural State. Burt Reynolds, Billy Bob Thornton, Bill Paxton, Robert De Niro, Dennis Quaid, Matthew McConaughey, Tom Cruise and Andy Griffith have all filmed really good movies here. Martin Scorsese directed one of his very first movies in southern Arkansas. It’s going to be fun revisiting some of my favorite Arkansas movies and sharing them with you!
I live out in the country in Saline County, Arkansas. Back in 1996, Billy Bob Thornton wrote, directed and starred in a little film made right here called SLING BLADE (1996). It’s one of my favorite movies. Here’s a picture of our son and daughter sitting at the same table at Garry’s Drive-In Diner where Billy Bob Thornton and John Ritter sat in the movie.
Thornton stars as Karl Childers, a developmentally disabled man who was abused as a child by his parents and the other children in the community. At the age of 12, he murdered his mom and her teenage lover Jessie Dixon with a sling blade. After 30 years in the mental hospital, the state decides he’s no longer dangerous, so they give him his stack of books and send him on his way. Karl has no clue of how to get on with his life, but the administrator of the hospital (James Hampton) helps him get a job as a small engine mechanic in his hometown. Hanging out at the laundromat one day, Karl meets a boy named Frank (Lucas Black) and helps him carry his bags of clothes back to his house. The two become friends and start hanging out a lot together. Frank introduces Karl to his mom, Linda (Natalie Canerday), and her gay best friend and boss, Vaughan (John Ritter). Karl also meets Linda’s abusive and alcoholic boyfriend, Doyle (Dwight Yoakam). Karl grows to love Frank and Linda. When he witnesses a drunk Doyle’s abusive and threatening behavior towards Frank and Linda one night, Karl starts thinking that Doyle may really hurt his friends someday. He decides he’s going to make sure that can never happen.
First and foremost, I love SLING BLADE because of Billy Bob Thornton’s performance as Karl Childers. He had been developing the character of Karl for many years before the movie was made. He loved pulling “Karl” out when he was just hanging out and goofing around with his friends. He based his character on bits and pieces of so many different people in his life. As a native Arkansan, many of the words he says and the way he says them reminds me of different people I’ve known over the years. His opening monologue where he describes the murders of his mother and the young Jessie Dixon is a masterpiece in and of itself. Thornton created a truly unique character, and that’s extremely rare these days. It’s a performance for the ages and continues to inspire terrible imitations to this day!
The remainder of the cast in SLING BLADE is so good and natural. Lucas Black is phenomenal as Frank. Billy Bob Thornton has been asked how he got such a great performance from the then 12-year-old boy from Alabama. He says he didn’t get that performance; that’s just the kind of actor Lucas Black is. The relationship between Karl and Frank is the key to the film working, and Black is perfect. Natalie Canerday is excellent as Frank’s mom, Linda. She’s from Russellville, Arkansas, so her accent is authentic, and she just blends perfectly into the film. John Ritter provides a very solid supporting performance as Linda’s gay friend who cares deeply for her and Frank. Thornton was part of the cast of Ritter’s early 90’s sitcom with Markie Post called HEARTS AFIRE. He actually wrote this screenplay while working on the show. The two were great friends off camera and Ritter actually worried that he wouldn’t be able to give a serious performance opposite Thornton’s portrayal of Karl. And then there’s country music superstar Dwight Yoakam as the abusive bully Doyle Hargraves. He’s simply great in the film. He doesn’t just portray Doyle as a monster either. There are many people in this world like Doyle Hargraves, and Yoakam is able to capture that. Director Jim Jarmusch has a memorable cameo in the film. He sells Karl his “french fried potaters.” And the great Robert Duvall even makes a short appearance in the film as Karl’s dad. Duvall was over in the Memphis area filming his own movie A FAMILY THING, which was written by Thornton. He just made the 2 hour drive over for the day and filmed his scene.
Every scene filmed in SLING BLADE is filmed here in Benton and Saline County. The opening and closing scenes between Thornton and actor J.T. Walsh at the “nervous hospital” were filmed at the old Benton Services Center, which is now a psychiatric nursing home just outside of Benton. I’ve driven by the location of the home where Linda and Frank lived. I drive by the laundromat where Karl meets Frank every time I go eat at Garry’s Sling Blade Drive-in. I’ve driven out to the bridge over the Saline River that is prominently featured in the film (see picture below). Heck, I even went to college at the University of Central Arkansas with one of the young ladies who interview Karl at the beginning of the film. I love this movie, and I’m so proud that it was filmed in my backyard.
SLING BLADE is an incredible film with a truly unique character at its center. The film is at times funny, heartbreaking, violent, slow, awkward, dramatic, and thrilling. It’s a resounding success for Billy Bob Thornton as a director, actor, and writer, even winning him an Oscar for his screenplay. I give this film my highest recommendation.
I’ve included the trailer for SLING BLADE below:
Past reviews in the #ArkansasMovies series include:
Last night, as a part of our attempt to make some space on the DVR so that I can record every upcoming episode of The Bachelorette and she can record the World Series, Erin and I watched the 2011 film, Seven Days In Utopia.
Seven Days In Utopia is a Texas-set (and Texas-filmed) movie about a young pro golfer named Luke Chisholm (played by Lucas Black) who has a very public meltdown while in the middle of a tournament. Feeling that his career is pretty much over, Luke jumps in his car and goes speeding around Southwest Texas. Because he’s not pay attention to the road (which, I’ll be honest, occasionally happens when you’re driving through rural Texas.), he almost doesn’t notice the cow standing in front of his car. Fortunately, Luke swerves and avoids the cow. Unfortunately, he crashes through a fence.
The fence belongs to Johnny Crawford (Robert Duvall), a friendly rancher who — coincidence of coincidences — also happens to be a former pro golfer! With Luke’s car temporarily out-of-commission, he’s stuck in Utopia for at least seven days. Johnny offers to spend those days teaching Luke everything that he needs to know about golf and about life. Luke agrees, because what else are you going to do when you’re stranded in Uvalde County?
Seven Days In Utopia is one of the few films in my lifetime to have been released with G rating and it pretty much earns that G-rating by being the most inoffensive film ever made. Seven Days in Utopia is almost aggressive in its pleasantness. Johnny is very nice. Luke is very nice. Just about everyone that Luke plays against is pretty nice. Everyone in town is pretty nice, even if they do give Luke a hard time about being a “city boy.” Deborah Ann Woll plays the nice waitress at the local diner, with whom Luke has a very pleasant romance. Woll and Black make for a cute couple and they have a nice chemistry. They’re all very pleasant.
Seven Days In Utopia is one of those films that you end up watching when you need something to watch with an older relative who doesn’t understand why “all the movies nowadays have to use all that language!” It’s an old-fashioned movie. That, in itself, is hardly a problem for me. I like old movies and, despite my love of horror as a genre, I can also appreciate movies that are not meant to traumatize the audience. For that matter, I like Lucas Black and I like Deborah Ann Woll. As for Robert Duvall — I mean, My God, he’s one of the last of the great character actors. He’s Boo Radley and Tom Hagen, for God’s sake! Of course, I love Robert Duvall and Duvall really is probably the only actor who could make an idealized character like Johnny Crawford into a real human being. That said, Seven Days In Utopia is also a rather slow film. The pacing will make you feel all seven of those days and the lessons that Johnny teaches to Lucas aren’t particularly profound once you look beyond the fact that they’re being taught by legitimate great actor Robert Duvall. It’s an nice film and the scenery is pretty but, while watching it, it’s hard not to miss the anarchistic spirit of golfers like Shooter McGavin and Happy Gilmore.
When it comes to the Fast and Furious franchise, Tokyo Drift is my favorite, followed closely by Fast Five. I thought the franchise should have ended at 7 with the death of Paul Walker, but the show went on with The Fate of the Furious. They managed to close off all of the loops between the earlier movies, After a bit of a spat between Vin Diesel and Dwayne Johnson, Johnson branched off with his character Luke Hobbs and Jason Statham’s Deckard Shaw on their own film, Hobbs & Shaw.
Not to be left behind, we now have the ninth entry in the franchise. F9 reunites director Justin Lin with Vin Diesel, Jordana Brewster, Tyrese Gibson, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, Michelle Rodriguez, and Nathalie Emmanuel. John Cena (Bumblebee) plays the villain this time around, as a thief with personal ties to Dominic Toretto. With this trailer, we see a few very familiar faces, including Tokyo Drift’s Lucas Black and Sung Kang. How Kang’s character Han is still alive, I don’t know, but we’ll find out this May when the film releases.
Regardless of what you may think about the rest of Furious 7, the final ten minutes will make you cry. They made me cry and, before I saw Furious 7, I wasn’t even really a fan of the franchise. It’s not a spoiler to tell you that Furious 7 ends with a tribute to both the character Brian O’Connor and the actor who played him, Paul Walker. While Dominic Toretto (played, of course, by Vin Diesel) says goodbye to Brian, we see a montage of clips of Brian throughout the previous Fast and Furious Films and it’s so poignant to see how Paul Walker transformed over the course of the series, going from being a somewhat bland teen heart throb to becoming a genuinely charismatic leading man. Watching the montage, you can see that Paul Walker was still growing as an actor and you’re reminded of just what a shock it was when we first heard the news of his death in 2013.
And, of course, we’re very aware that, as Dominic is saying goodbye to Brian and we’re saying goodbye to the actor who played him, Vin Diesel is saying goodbye to his friend. That Diesel and Walker were friends on-screen and off is no secret. In fact, that friendship has always been one of the big appeals of the Fast and Furious franchise. The films are about a group of people (mostly men) who care about each other and who aren’t ashamed to admit it. When Dominic delivers the film’s final monologue, it’s really all about Vin saying goodbye to Paul. By the time the words “For Paul” appeared on the screen, there was not a dry eye in the theater.
The death of Paul Walker adds an undeniable poignancy to Furious 7 and it’s sometimes hard to separate the real-life tragedy from what we’re watching on screen. But here’s the thing — Furious 7 works as both a heartfelt tribute to Paul Walker and as a wonderfully over-the-top and fun action movie. Furious 7 is a burst of pure adrenaline and style that epitomizes everything that you could possibly want out of an action movie.
Jason Statham plays Deckard Shaw, a former government assassin who has a personal vendetta against Dom, Brian, and practically everyone else who has ever been a Fast and Furious movie. Statham isn’t in a lot of scenes but whenever he shows up, he kicks ass and watching Furious 7 was probably the first time that I’ve ever truly understood Statham’s appeal. How impressive is Jason Statham in this film? He puts Dwayne Johnson in the hospital, that’s how impressive he is. And what’s amazing is that after watching their fight scene, you totally believe that Jason Statham could put Dwayne Johnson in the hospital.
Another government agent, Mr. Nobody (Kurt Russell, having a great time), offers to help Dom take out Deckard but first, Dom and his crew have to do a favor for Mr. Nobody. They have to rescue a hacker (Nathalie Emmanuel) from an African warlord (Djimon Honsou) who is obviously based on Joseph Kony. That hacker knows about the location of a device that will allow the government to track down Deckard but the device has already been sold to a billionaire who lives in Abu Dhabi….
Ultimately, the exact specifics and logic of it all doesn’t matter. What does matter is that Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Chris Bridges, Tyrese Gibson, Michelle Rodriguez, and Dwayne Johnson are all back and they’re all a lot of fun to watch. What matters is that the cars look good and the stunt work is just as amazing as you were hoping. What matters is that the film features things that you never thought you’d see — like cars parachuting down to a mountain road and jumping from skyscraper to skyscraper.
This is an exciting film. It’s a fun film. It’s an entertaining film. It’s a stylish film. And, ultimately, it’s a film that will make you cry.
We saw the Super Bowl trailer of Furious 7 (formerly known as Fast & Furious 7). Well, here’s the extended version of it with more Jason Statham mayhem added to the mix. We also get The Rock get beatdown by Statham. Then again we’re all pretty much aware that Statham probably is the only person can put a beatdown on the Rock.
It looks like the summer blockbuster season starting out earlier and earlier with each passing year. Furious 7 is set for an April 3, 2015 release date.
To much fanfare we finally have the teaser trailer to the latest adventures of Dominic Toretto and his band of misfit drivers.
Now officially titled as Furious 7, the latest film in the franchise goes further away from it’s street racing roots and into the spy thriller and superhero genres it drifted into with Fast Five. Even the title alone sounds like a superhero team straight out of Marvel Comics. It’s almost as if I expect to see Iron Fist, Luke Cage, Daredevil and Elektra plus three other furious heroes fighting the good fight.
The teaser pretty much teases the sort of over-the-top, physics-defying action scenes we’ve come to expect from this franchise. It’s almost as if with each new film they up the ante as to how much universal laws Dom and his crew will break in order to entertain it’s massive fan audience.
Furious 7 is set to ride and die this April 3, 2015.
It’s funny. Despite being a Texas girl, I know very little about football and, whenever I have found myself watching a game, I’ve usually end up getting bored out of my mind. I’m not a huge fan of sports films, either. It’s just not my thing. And yet, as a result of doing this series of reviews, I’ve watched more football films over the past month than I had probably seen in my entire life previously. Some of the films that I’ve reviewed specifically were football films — The Pom Pom Girls, All The Right Moves, and Varsity Blues, for example. However, even the film that weren’t specifically about the sport often featured scenes set on the football field. Just think of Forest Whitaker in Fast Times At Ridgemont Highor the socially conflicted jocks from Dazed and Confused.
For a lot of films, football and high school seem to go together. And one of the most acclaimed high school football films is 2004’s Friday Night Lights. Now, I have to admit that Friday Night Lights is not one of my favorite films. It’s a football film, I’m not into football, and therefore, Friday Night Lights is a film that I respect more as a well-made film than like as a source of entertainment. Perhaps the best thing that I can say about Friday Night Lights is that I understand why so many people who do love football also happen to love this film.
And I do have to say that I appreciate that Friday Night Lights is also a film about Texas that actually manages to realistically portray my home state without resorting to the predictable clichés that dominated Varsity Blues.
Taking place in Odessa, Texas, Friday Night Lights follows the 1988 season of the Permian Panthers. As opposed to most sports films, Friday Night Lights does not focus on a team of lovable underdogs. Instead, the Panthers are already known for being a championship team. As the season begins, Coach Gary Gaines (Billy Bob Thornton) is under tremendous pressure to continue that winning tradition. However, when the team’s star player is injured during the first game of the season, the Panthers suddenly find their pre-ordained winning season in doubt. Gaines finds himself being alternatively celebrated and demonized depending on how the previous night’s game has gone and his players find themselves under tremendous pressure from everyone in town. The film features a great performance from Billy Bob Thornton and a really good one from Derek Luke, playing a player who abruptly goes from being a future superstar to a present could-have-been. In fact, the entire film is well-acted with even country singer Tim McGraw giving a surprisingly multi-faceted performance as a former player-turned-drunk.
In short, Friday Night Lights is a lot like Varsity Blues, except that it doesn’t suck.
(Incidentally, Friday Night Lights did inspire a TV series. I never watched it.)
Scott Stewart’s film about the Biblical Apocalypse was one film that I was very hyped to see in the first weeks of 2010. I had heard some very good buzz about it when a red band sizzle reel was shown in at 2009 San Diego Comic-Con. This was Stewart’s first major work (he had made a smaller film in 2000 called What We Talk About When We Talk About Love) and with his background in the special effects industry I thought that this film of his would at least be a feast for the eyes. I knew going in what to expect from something about God, Angels, the Apocalypse and uneding amounts of guns and ammo. So, it was with a profound disappointment when I finally saw Legion and, despite my low expectations, was roundly disappointed with everything about it.
Legion is about God deciding that he’s had enough of humanity’s bullshit and shenanigans (a term I would put on this film) and turned his angelic hosts loose upon the world to start things new. This was God’s version of shaking the Etch-a-Sketch that is the world. He has his two favorite Archangels in Michael and Gabriel leading the vanguard of this Apocalypse with Michael tasked with making sure a baby doesn’t get born before the divine enema has been completed. Well, Michael being the introspective sone decides that he still has faith in humanity and refuses to do God’s bidding. We see Michael go through removing his wings (which also unlocks the very BDSM God collar all the angels wear) then find a huge cache of weapons inside a toy company warehouse. Seems removing the wings makes him human and minus all the cool angelic powers. He says something about the Apocalypse having started then makes off towards Bethle…I mean the diner out in the Nevada desert to protect the prophesized baby who will save humanity.
Yeah, the premise for Legion sounds awesome on paper. Militant angels led by badass Archangels like Gabriel about to go “Terminator” on mankind. The story itself was like a mish-mash of some of the best cult fantasy/horror of the past. There’s some of the cool Christopher Walken film Prophecy in the plot and, of course, one cannot but see some parallels with Cameron’s Terminator. Plus, we have a humanized Archangel Michael with guns and guns and guns to battle his former brethren with his coterie of human sidekicks to help out. The trailer for this was very cool and full of action. A trailer which pretty much had all the cool parts in this film. One can watch the trailer and actually enjoy Legion more than when they watch the film itself.
For a filmmaker with a special effects background the film looked pretty lifeless with action sequences that lacked any sort of memorable action. The dialogue wasn’t awful, but everyone’s performance made it sound worse than it really was. Even Bettany in the lead role of Michael looked tired and bored with his role (a sign the film was going downhill and downhill fast). The possessed humans who made up the bulk of the opposing force against the good guys were uninteresting with the exception of Doug Jones’ “Ice Cream Man” character shown in the trailer. A scene the trailer pretty much showed almost in its entirety. That character was on the screen for less than two minutes then gone.
I actually think that people should just watch the trailer for Legion then pop into their dvd player Prophecy and Terminator. Doing that will pretty much give them the whole story of Legion and have a kick-ass time doing so. This was a film that looked good to great on paper, but once they actually started writing the script and started filming went down the septic tank. It’s films like these that makes one shout “shenanigans” at all those involved in its making. I think Kyle Broflowski would agree with me.
Through the Shattered Lens 