I know next to nothing about the 1983 film Uncommon Valor, beyond what I read on Wikipedia and the imdb. (It’s an action film. Shit gets blown up.) But, a few days ago, I came across the end credits on Movies TV and I quickly fell in love with the little dance that ends the film.
The dancer, by the way, is a gentleman named Randall “Tex” Cobb, who was apparently a former boxer and who played the Warthog from Hell in Raising Arizona.
Hi there! Well, I’m on vacation for the next two weeks so this latest edition of Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse Trailers deals with the crazy things that can happen as a result of being on the road!
Enjoy!
1) Road Games (1981)
2) Survival Run (1979)
3) Duel (1971)
4) The Hitcher (1986)
5) Convoy (1978)
6) The Hills Have Eyes (1977)
What do you think, Road Rage Kitty?
Today’s dance scene that I love comes from the surrealistic 1968 musical, Head. It features Davy Jones dancing with the wonderful Toni Basil.
Enjoy and try not to cry because it’s a seriously sad song.
Last night, I watched the latest Lifetime original film, Murder in Mexico!
Why Was I Watching It?
I may be on vacation but that doesn’t mean that I’m not going to watch and live tweet the latest Lifetime film!
What Was It About?
This was one of those based-on-a-true-crime-story Lifetime productions! Bruce Beresford-Redman (Colin Egglesfield) is a successful reality TV producer who has trouble being loyal to his wife (Leonor Varela). When they take a vacation in Cancun, Bruce’s wife is murdered and Bruce quickly becomes the number one suspect.
What Worked?
Colin Egglesfield and Leonor Varela were both well-cast. Also, the scene where Bruce crosses the Mexico-US border reminded me of the border scenes from No Country For Old Men.
What Did Not Work?
Just speaking as somebody who enjoys live tweeting Lifetime films, it’s always hard to know how to deal with these “true crime” movies. The whole point of live tweeting is to be snarky and that can be difficult when you’re talking about real murderers, real victims, and real children who will now grow up without their mom and knowing their dad is in prison. For that reason, Murder in Mexico was not as fun to live tweet as A Deadly Adoption or The Unauthorized Full House Story.
Beyond that, it was hard not to feel that Bruce Beresford-Redman and his crimes were not worthy of the attention that this movie gave to him. The film attempted to make him interesting by playing up his past as a reality tv producer and trying to maintain some ambiguity as to whether or not Bruce was actually guilty but, ultimately, Bruce just came across as your standard cheating asshole. In the end, both his guilt and his motives were too obvious to be intriguing.
“OH MY GOD! Just. Like. Me!” Moments
In 2008, I went to Cancun for Spring Break and it was a blast! Seriously, I had a great time and did a lot of things that I probably shouldn’t post in public. However, none of those things involved murder and I suppose that’s a good thing.
Lessons Learned
Once a cheater, always a cheater.
If I wasn’t already scared of heights, I definitely would be after seeing Everest.
Based on a true story, Everest tells the story of two expeditions attempting to climb to the top of Mt. Everest. One expedition is led by a New Zealander named Rob Hall (Jason Clarke), an experienced climber who, we’re told, pretty much invented the entire industry of taking commercial expeditions up to the top of Mt. Everest. Criticized by some for being a “hand holder” who gets too emotionally involved with his clients and, as a result, cheapens the Everest “experience” by helping weaker clients make it to the top of the summit, Rob is married to a fellow climber, Jan Arnold (Keira Knightley). While Rob tries to lead his clients to the highest place on Earth, the pregnant Jan stays home and waits for his return.
The other expedition is led by Scott Fischer (Jake Gyllenhaal). Scott and Rob are friendly rivals, with Scott taking a much more hands off approach to his clients. (It’s not a coincidence that Rob’s company is called Adventure Consultants while Scott works for Mountain Madness.)
Everest details what happens when the two expeditions are both caught in a sudden blizzard and find themselves trapped at the top of Everest. The rest of the film is about the attempts of a stranded few to make it back to civilization. A few make it, though not without suffering a good deal of pain and, in one particularly case, sacrificing a few body parts as a result. Tragically, several others fall victim to the whims of nature, some dying of hypothermia while others, hallucinating from the lack of oxygen, literally walk off the side of the mountain.
Everest is one of those films where men die tragically but we’re supposed to find some sort of comfort from the fact that they died doing what they loved. To be honest, I usually have a hard time buying into these type of narratives. For instance, I love shopping but I wouldn’t expect anyone to be happy for me if I died while looking for a new purse. (In fact, that’d probably upset me if not for the fact that I’d be too dead to know about it.) At the same time, guys seems to love movies like this and I think, in the future, Everest will probably be remembered for being the epitome of a guy movie.
And that’s not meant to be a criticism on my part! Everest does what it does with a lot of skill and confidence. It’s an exciting film that, once the disaster hits, will leave you breathless. And yes, at the end of the film, I did shed a tear or two. Narratively, there’s really not a surprising moment to be found in the entire film. I went into Everest not even knowing it was a true story and I was still able to guess who would survive and who would not. But Everest‘s amazing visuals make up for the predictable narrative. The term “visually stunning” is probably overused (especially by me!) but Everest is truly a visually stunning film. For someone like me — who has asthma, a huge fear of heights, and who lives in North Texas (where, regardless of what you may see in the movies, the land is remarkably flat) — Everest is probably as close as I’ll ever get to climbing a mountain.
I should also mention that it never ceases to amaze me that Josh Brolin was born in Santa Monica, California because, on the basis of this film and No Country For Old Men, he is one of the most convincing Texans to appear in the movies. In this film, he plays Beck Weathers, a Dallas doctor who is a member of Rob’s expedition team. Usually, of course, if a Texan (especially one who is specifically identified as being a Republican, as Beck is at the beginning of a film) shows up in a movie, you know he’s going to end up being the villain. Fortunately, Everest was based on a true story and, as a result, Beck turned out to be one of the most compelling characters in the film. (If you know the story behind the film, you already knew that. However, I went into Everest blind.) Josh Brolin brings a lot of strength to his role and to the film overall.
Everest may predictable but it’s still an exciting film. Make sure that you have someone beside you to whom you can hold on and that you see it in 3D!
The Loft‘s journey to Neftlix was a long one.
A remake of a Belgian film, The Loft was originally filmed in 2011 and was meant to come out in that year. It was due to be released by Joel Silver’s Dark Castle Entertainment and Warner Bros. However, when Silver had a falling out with Warner Bros and moved his operations over to Universal, he took The Loft with him. And it turned out that Universal was in no hurry to distribute The Loft. After sitting on the film for three years, Universal announced that they would release it in August of 2014 but, at the last minute, they changed their mind and instead released the horror film As Above, So Below in the spot that was originally set aside for The Loft. Dark Castle then dropped the film, leaving The Loft in limbo until Open Road Pictures picked up the distribution rights and gave it a limited release in January of 2015. The critics hated it, audiences were indifferent, and The Loft quickly vanished from theaters. It’s now available on Netflix.
And, having watched the film, I can understand why the studios weren’t exactly enthused about it. It’s not the type of film that works on the big screen. The characters are too unlikable. The plot is an unstable combination of silliness and melodrama. The big twists are more likely to inspire groans than cheers. It’s just not the type of film that you want to spend too much money on.
And yet, it’s the perfect film for Netflix. What may seem over-the-top and annoying when viewed in a public theater becomes a lot more entertaining when viewed in the privacy on your own home. The Loft is a film that works best if you don’t spend too much time thinking about how little sense it all makes. It’s the perfect film to watch while you’re doing something else.
And if that sounds like faint praise, it’s not. I thoroughly enjoyed The Loft without once mistaking it for being a “good” film. Instead, it’s an over-the-top melodrama, with all that entails. It’s ludicrous, it’s silly, and — when taken on its own terms — it’s also a lot of fun.
The film is about five friends and the loft to which they all have a key. All five of the friends are married and all five of them have secrets. Vincent (Karl Urban) is the unofficial leader of this group of friends, an architect who is also a compulsive cheater. Luke (Wentworth Miller) is a nervous guy who appears to worship Vincent. Marty (Eric Stonestreet) is an alcoholic who always manages to say the wrong thing. Chris (James Marsden) is a psychiatrist who often seems to feel that he’s morally superior to his other friends. And Phillip (Mattias Schoenarts) is Chris’s half-brother, a mentally unstable and violent guy who snorts cocaine and may have incestuous feelings towards his younger sister.
The five men use the loft to cheat on their wives. The men are all confident that only they know about the existence of the loft and that they are the only ones who have a key. So, naturally enough, they are all a little shocked when a woman turns up dead in the loft. As the men gather in the loft, they debate who killed her and we get numerous flashbacks to how this all came to be.
Of course, it all leads to many secrets being revealed. This is one of those films that simply cannot stop with one plot twist. Instead, every twist leads to another twist until eventually, it becomes nearly impossible to keep up with who knows what. In fact, the film features so many twists that it all quickly gets a bit silly. But, at the same time, it’s also undeniably entertaining. Strangely enough, the fact that it doesn’t make much sense only add to the film’s melodramatic charm.
As for the five men — well, none of them are particularly likable but at least they’re all interesting to watch. Wentworth Miller is properly strange, Matthias Schoenarts is properly sleazy, and Eric Stonestreet is properly pathetic. James Marsden often seems wasted in mainstream films (like Straw Dogs and The Butler) but he’s actually very charming when he appears in B-movies like this one and Walk of Shame. And finally, you’ve got Karl Urban, doing great work and turning Vincent into the epitome of every middle-aged guy who has ever tried to flirt with me while I was waiting at a red light.
The Loft may not have got much respect when it was released into theaters but it’s entertaining enough for Netflix.
Hi, everyone! Well, as you read this, I am currently on vacation! That’s right — I put off my vacation for the entire summer because I had a job writing about Big Brother for the Big Brother Blog. Now that the show is over, I am officially on vacation for the next two weeks!
But don’t worry! Just because I’m going to be busy exploring this wonderful world of ours for the next two weeks, that doesn’t mean that I haven’t already written and scheduled several posts to keep everyone amused over the next couple of days!
Starting on October 1st, it’ll be our annual horror month here on the Shattered Lens. But, until that day, allow me to share a few dance scenes that I love and I hope that you’ll love them too!
Let’s get things started with one of my all-time favorites, Gene Kelly ad Cyd Charisse dancing in the Broadway Melody scene from 1952’s Singing in the Rain!
Here’s the trailer for Truth, a film about Dan Rather, Mary Mapes, and a bunch of forged documents. Judging from the trailer, it looks super tedious but I’m sure it’ll get an A from the reviewer at the A.V. Club. This looks like the type of boring political film that I would normally pay money to avoid seeing but since it’s being talked up as a potential Oscar nominee, I guess I’ll have to see it and a lot of other movies that I don’t really care that much about.
For the record, I will totally change my opinion if, at some point during Truth, Dan Rather is heard to say, “Hail Hydra.”
Who doesn’t love a good folk tale?
Every section of this country has their own separate folk tales, their own stories about mysterious monsters and unsolved mysteries. New Jersey has the Jersey Devil. Bigfoot is rumored to live near Seattle. If you stop by Fouke, Arkansas, be sure to ask about the Boggy Creek Monster and, if you’re ever in Colorado, be sure to keep an eye out for the jackalopes. They say that Chupacabras live in South Texas and there’s a goatman who lives near Ft. Worth. I was born in the southwest and I grew up hearing stories and having nightmares about La Llorona, the weeping woman who cried for the children she had drowned.
I have to admit that, even with my love of folk tales and urban legends, I wasn’t really familiar with the legend of Tailypo. Or, at least, I wasn’t until I saw Tailypo, the latest short film from Cameron McCasland, the director of The Lashman.
Taking place in Appalachia, Tailypo opens with Levon (David Chattam) and his dog Jasper (played by Ranger) out hunting. When Levon hears something rustling in the nearby bushes, he opens fire. Though the creature runs off, it leaves something behind. Specifically, it leaves behind its tail, which Levon proceeds to pick up and take home with him. Later that night, as Levon relaxes at his isolated cabin, he starts to hear a voice hissing in the darkness. The creature is back and it wants its tail…
Tailypo is an effective 14 minutes exercise in claustrophobic horror, one that pays homage to the type of scary stories that people used to tell while sitting around in the dark or in front of campire. Even the sound of the creature hissing brought to mind a particularly creative storyteller using every technique at her disposal to lure her listeners into the world of her story. As such, it’s a scary film but it’s also a really fun film, with David Chattam bringing a sly humor to his role. If you’ve ever spent any time in the country, you’ve met someone like Levon and Chattam is authentic and likable.
McCasland makes good use of the film’s Appalachian setting, emphasizing the isolation of both Levon and the creature from the outside world. Both of them live a life outside of “normal” society and, when their paths cross, it’s a reminder that there are still mysteries lurking in the shadows. Interestingly enough, while Levon was hunting and also when I got my first glimpse of his cabin home, I found myself thinking about Winter’s Bone. Both films take place in a part of America that many would consider to be “the backwoods” and both of them use that setting to remind complacent viewers that, virtually next door, there’s an entire world that most know little about.
Tailypo is the first in a series of short films that McCasland is planning to put together for an anthology film that I hope I will someday get a chance to review. Along with playing at various film festivals, Tailypo can currently be viewed for free at both redheadedrevolution.com and on youtube.
So, go watch it!
Last night, after I watched UnGodly Acts, I watched The Bride He Bought Online.
Why Was I Watching It?
The Bride He Bought Online actually premiered a few months ago but, for some reason, I missed it. Even though all of my friends told me that I had not missed much, I took a solemn vow last December to watch every Lifetime film released this year. So, when I saw that The Bride He Bought Online would be airing again last night, I made sure to watch it.
What Was It About?
This is the story of three teenage girls who have a blog where the specialize in doing mean things to their friends and occasionally to complete strangers. Kaley (Annalisa Cochrane) dreams of making the blog so successful that she’ll be able to sell it for so much money that she won’t have to bother going to college after high school. Mandy (Lauren Gaw) is a former unpopular girl who is now awkwardly trying to decide if she really wants to be a mean girl. And Avery (Anne Winters) is the responsible one who worries that Kaley is going to go far.
And Avery has ever right to be worried because Kaley does go too far. Pretending to be a mail order bride, Kaley starts an online relationship with a dorky guy named John (Travis Hammer). Convinced that he’s finally found a woman who will love him, John sends her money and even takes guitar lessons so that he can serenade his bride to be. When he spends hours waiting at an airport for his nonexistent bride to show up, Kaley and Mandy record him and then upload the video to the blog.
Up until this point, you’ve been feeling pretty sorry for John. But it turns out that John is actually a pretty dangerous and unstable guy. Once he figures out what has happened, he kidnaps the three girls and makes plans to sell them to a group of human traffickers.
What Worked?
A lot of people have told me that they didn’t like The Bride He Bought Online but I thought it was actually a very well-done and well-acted film. It’s a great example of one of my favorite Lifetime movie genres — the Everything Bad That Can Happen Will Happen genre. Yes, it’s melodramatic and it’s a bit extreme but then again, that’s kind of what we want from Lifetime.
Plus, I’ve had friends just like Kaley, Mandy, and Avery. Their friendship felt very real to me. Also way too plausible was the character of John. As played by Travis Hammer, he was both pathetic and scary at the same time.
What Did Not Work?
Lifetime movies are always so phobic of the internet. Anytime someone says that they have a blog, you know that something bad is going to happen as a result.
“Oh my God! Just like me!” Moments
I’m happy to say that, even at my brattiest, I was never as bad as Kaley. However, I did know quite a few girls like Kaley and I often found myself wondering just why exactly I was friends with them. So, in the end, I related to Avery.
Lessons Learned
Be nice or you’ll get sold to the Russian mafia.
