Tag Archives: Michael J. Reynolds

Insomina File #77: Rolling Vengeance (dir by Stephen Hilliard Stern)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

What’s an Insomnia File? You know how some times you just can’t get any sleep and, at about three in the morning, you’ll find yourself watching whatever you can find on cable or streaming? This feature is all about those insomnia-inspired discoveries!

If you’re having trouble getting to sleep tonight, you can always go over to YouTube and watch 1987’s Rolling Vengeance.

Rolling Vengeance supposedly takes place in Ohio but one look at the perpetually wet weather and the misty country side leaves little doubt that this film was shot in Canada.  Joey Russo (Don Michael Paul) is a trucker who seeks revenge after the antics of Tiny (Ned Beatty) and his redneck sons lead to death of first his mother (Susan Hogan) and sisters and then his father (Lawrence Dane).  Joey’s way of getting revenge is to go down to the junkyard, collect a bunch of parts, and build his own monster truck.  Soon, Joey is tracking down Tiny’s men.  Somehow, Joey is able to sneak up on people while driving a gigantic truck.  Also, for some reason, it never occurs to anyone that the best way to escape from the path of a big, lumbering vehicle is to do anything other than run in a straight line.

It’s a bit of a stupid movie and there’s a gratiotious rape scene that is hard to sit through and which leaves a sour taste that runs throughout the final 20 minutes of the film.  Don Michael Paul makes for a blank-faced hero.  On the plus side, the truck destroys a lot of poorly constructed buildings.  Fan of vehicular mayhem will find a lot to enjoy here.  Fans of great character actors going totally overboard in genre films will enjoy watching Ned Beatty as he wears a leather jacket and talks like the leader of the Canadian Hell’s Angels.

As I watched the film, it occurred to me that, if it had been made in the 70s, it would have starred William Shatner as the good trucker and Leslie Nielsen would have played the Ned Beatty role.  Lawrence Dane would have still played the father.

Previous Insomnia Files:

  1. Story of Mankind
  2. Stag
  3. Love Is A Gun
  4. Nina Takes A Lover
  5. Black Ice
  6. Frogs For Snakes
  7. Fair Game
  8. From The Hip
  9. Born Killers
  10. Eye For An Eye
  11. Summer Catch
  12. Beyond the Law
  13. Spring Broke
  14. Promise
  15. George Wallace
  16. Kill The Messenger
  17. The Suburbans
  18. Only The Strong
  19. Great Expectations
  20. Casual Sex?
  21. Truth
  22. Insomina
  23. Death Do Us Part
  24. A Star is Born
  25. The Winning Season
  26. Rabbit Run
  27. Remember My Name
  28. The Arrangement
  29. Day of the Animals
  30. Still of The Night
  31. Arsenal
  32. Smooth Talk
  33. The Comedian
  34. The Minus Man
  35. Donnie Brasco
  36. Punchline
  37. Evita
  38. Six: The Mark Unleashed
  39. Disclosure
  40. The Spanish Prisoner
  41. Elektra
  42. Revenge
  43. Legend
  44. Cat Run
  45. The Pyramid
  46. Enter the Ninja
  47. Downhill
  48. Malice
  49. Mystery Date
  50. Zola
  51. Ira & Abby
  52. The Next Karate Kid
  53. A Nightmare on Drug Street
  54. Jud
  55. FTA
  56. Exterminators of the Year 3000
  57. Boris Karloff: The Man Behind The Monster
  58. The Haunting of Helen Walker
  59. True Spirit
  60. Project Kill
  61. Replica
  62. Rollergator
  63. Hillbillys In A Haunted House
  64. Once Upon A Midnight Scary
  65. Girl Lost
  66. Ghosts Can’t Do It
  67. Heist
  68. Mind, Body & Soul
  69. Candy
  70. Shortcut to Happiness
  71. Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders
  72. Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders II
  73. Don’t Kill It
  74. Listen To Me
  75. 300 Miles For Stephanie
  76. Hackers

So, I Watched The Descent Part 2 (2009, Dir. by Jon Harris)

Posted on by Dazzling Erin

The Descent Part 2: Back to the Cave!

That’s what I would have called it.

Sarah (Shauna Macdonald) goes back to the caves that she barely escaped from during the first Descent to help the police look for the remains of her friends.  Sarah is suspected of killing all of them so I don’t think the police would have gone into a narrow cave with her.  Sarah was also traumatized by what happened in the cave so I don’t think she would voluntarily go back down there either.  As soon as they enter the cave, they get attacked by the crawlers.  What did they think would happen?

I loved the first Descent because it was a horror film that featured interesting and multi-layered women who weren’t just put on screen to be whimpering victims.  When I watched The Descent, I was just as invested in the personal drama as I was the horror in the caves.  I also liked that the first Descent left it open to interpretation about what actually happened in the cave.  The sequel didn’t really do that and it also didn’t add anything to the story.  Juno (Natalie Mendoza) returns but I’m not sure how considering what happened during the first movie.

The Descent Part 2 also shows a lot more of the crawlers than the first film did.  They’re much more visible and much more busy but they aren’t as scary once you can actually see them.  Plus revealing the crawlers as much as this movie does also ruins the ambiguity that I loved about the first Descent.

The Descent Part 2: More Splatter, Less Heart.

I should get a job writing tag lines.

 

Retro Television Reviews: T. and T. 1.17 “The Game” and 1.18 “A Victim of Fashion”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing T. and T., a Canadian show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990.  The show can be found on Tubi!

This week, Mr. T plays the game!

Episode 1.17 “The Game”

(Dir by Robert Malenfant, originally aired on May 2nd, 1988)

“In this episode,” Mr. T explains, “Amy and I disagree on tactics as I try to bring an end to a very dangerous game.”

Pam Richards (Cynthia Preston) and her boyfriend Nash Weaver (David Orth) are two spoiled rich kids, playing a dangerous game.  Nash steals some expensive dishes and silverwear from the home of his father (who is judge, no less) and, with Pam’s help, puts it in the locker of one of their shy classmates, Greg Walker (Victor Erdos).  Nash then calls the police, gives them an anonymous tip, and Greg is arrested.  Greg is only 14 but it appears that he’s going to be tried as an adult!  Canada is going to make an example out of him!

Fortunately, Greg’s attorney is Amy Taler and that means that T.S. Turner is on the case!  It doesn’t take T.S. long to figure out what happened.

“The way I see it,” he tells Amy, “the girl played decoy so they could plant stuff in Greg’s locker!  These are the type of games these kids are into.  I’m going to see if I can play too.”

T.S. stakes out Pam’s house.  Nash orders a pizza for him.  “I don’t eat while on duty,” T.S. growls.

That night, Nash and Pamela leave Nash’s house and break into a neighbor’s house.  T.S. follows them, just to discover that they’ve already left the house.  In the kitchen, T.S. finds a balloon that looks like an eyeball.  The balloon pops, revealing a note that reads, “We’re watching you too.”  Suddenly, the cops show up and arrest T.S!

Waiting outside the house, Nash tells T.S. to “give my regards to the boys in blue.”

“Give it to them yourself,” T.S. replies.

Nash and Pam claim that they were just going in the house to water the plants and T.S. is not charged with breaking and entering.  Detective Jones assures T.S. that he doesn’t like Nash much either, saying that the kid has been in trouble before but he’s never been charged.

“Why?” T.S. snarls, “Because his father’s a judge?”

T.S. returns to staking out Nash’s house.  (He’s eventually joined by Greg, who simply cannot believe that Pam would frame him.)  “These kids are not playing kid games!” T.S. says.  Eventually, Nash and Pam drive off to small warehouse.  When T.S. follows them, Nash pulls a gun on them.

“You want to go to prison?” T.S. demands, “You know what prison’s like?  Being locked up in the small cell, 24 hours!  After you shoot me, who is next?  Is it Pam?  How about your father …. BECAUSE HE’S A JUDGE!”

(T.S. is really hung up on that.)

Nash points the gun at his own head.

“It’s not worth it, brother!” T.S. shouts.

A sobbing Nash surrenders himself.

Later, T.S. tells Amy, “Nash was just a little frightened kid, reaching out for love and attention.”

Here’s the thing — this all happened over the course of 30 minutes running time.  As a result, Nash’s surrender seemed to come out of nowhere.  This is an episode that would have benefitted from a full hour.  As it is, this episode ends on a jarringly abrupt note and therefore, Nash’s surrender is neither as effective nor satisfying as it should have been.

Episode 1.18 “A Victim of Fashion”

(Dir by Don McCutcheon, originally aired on May 9th, 1988)

“In this episode,” Mr. T tells us, “the world of fashion loses its glamour as threats and murder come into play.”

“I’m not going to hire no tux and go to no bourgeois fashion show and that’s that!” T.S. Turner tells Amy when she informs him that he has no choice but to accompany her to an uptown fashion show.  This leads to a genuinely amusing scene in which Amy leads T.S. onto an elevator, where T.S. is suddenly grabbed by two men who proceed to …. get his measurements so they can rent him a tuxedo.

Fashion designer John Merrick (Richard Monette) has hired Amy and T.S. because he was mailed a slashed up picture of his top model, Anita (Tonya Williams).  Anita doesn’t know that she’s being stalked and Merrick wants T.S. to be her bodyguard without explaining why.  Tonya, for her part, is just happy to be famous enough to require a bodyguard.

“Please,” T.S. tells her, “call me T.S.”

“Okay,” Anita replies, “if you’ll tell me what it stands for.”

“Tree Surgeon.”

Who could the stalker be?  Could it be the long-haired man wandering around with a camera?  Of course it is!  This is only a 30 minute show so it’s not like there’s time to develop a lot of suspects.  However, it turns out that Lonzo (Patrick Brymer) was not really stalking Anita as much as he was demanding that Merrick admit to stealing Lonzo’s designs.  When Merrick tries to murder Lonzo, T.S. is there to save the day!  Yay!

Again, just as with the other episode I looked at this week, this is an episode that would have been considerably more effective with a 60-minute running time.  With only 30 minutes to tell the story, it felt rushed.  There was a lot of comedic potential to the idea letting Mr. T loose in the fashion world but sadly, there was enough time to get to any of it.

Next week — T.S. quips his way through another case!  Evildoers beware!

Shattered Politics #48: The Kidnapping of the President (dir by George Mendeluk)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Kidnapping_of_the_president

Agency was not the only Canadian film to be made about American politics in 1980.  There was also The Kidnapping of the President, a low-budget political thriller that, because it has since slipped into the public domain, can currently be found in a few dozen DVD box sets.  In fact, you may very well own a copy of The Kidnapping of the President without even realizing it!

Don’t worry if you do.  The Kidnapping of the President is a fairly harmless little film.

U.S. President Adam Scott (Hal Holbrook) is visiting Toronto when he gets handcuffed to a South American revolutionary named Roberto Assanti (Miguel Fernandes).  Assanti locks President Scott in an armored car that is wired with explosives and then demands a hundred million in diamonds and two planes.  (Though the film never explicitly states it, I imagine that Assanti was primarily motivated by jealousy over the fact that Che is on a million t-shirts while Assanti remains fairly unknown.)  It’s up to secret service agent Jerry O’Connor (William Shatner) to negotiate with Assanti and rescue the President!  Meanwhile, the ethically compromised Vice President (Van Johnson) is left as acting President in Washington and struggles to keep things calm while his ambitious wife (Ava Gardner) plots for a brighter future.

Overall, the Kidnapping of the President is okay for what it is.  It’s neither exceptionally good nor memorably bad.  It just sort of is.  Hal Holbrook is always well-cast as a President and William Shatner gives a typical Shatner performance, which is either a good or a bad thing depending on how you feel about William Shatner.  And, for that matter, Miguel Fernandes is a properly unlikable villain though he never really seems to have the charisma necessary to make him believable as the dynamic leader that he’s supposed to be.

Probably the most interesting thing about The Kidnapping of the President is that it doesn’t try to pass Montreal off for being a location in the United States.  Instead, the film was not only filmed in but is actually set in Toronto as well.  When Jerry attempts to deal with the local authorities, that means that he ends up talking to a bunch of very polite men in red uniforms.

But what’s strange about this is that the people of Toronto are so excited about the arrival of the President.  You half expect to hear one extra say, “I never thought I’d live long enough to see the day that a leader that I can’t vote for and who has next to nothing to do with my everyday life would come to visit Toronto.”

Don’t get me wrong.  If you follow me on twitter, then you know that I am unashamed to declare my love for all things Canadian.  And obviously, as neighbors, Canada and the United States do have a close relationship.  But would people in Toronto really be that excited to see the President?

If so, I think we really owe the people of Canada an apology for not knowing more about their government.  At the very least, we should definitely invite Stephen Harper over for lunch.