Tag Archives: review

The Eric Roberts Collection: Bed & Breakfast (dir by Marcio Garcia)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

 

2010’s Bed & Breakfast is one of those Hallmark-y films that takes place at a B&B in a quaint little town.

Having recently been left by his actress wife, Jake (Dean Cain) is trying to open up a bed and breakfast, using a house that was left to him by a former employer.  Helping Jake out is his brother, Peter (Jake Engvall), a member of law enforcement who not only enjoys drinking beer but also enjoys talking about beer as well.  Juliana Paes plays Ana, the niece of the original owner of the house.  Ana is from Brazil and she wants to sell the house because her brother is in debt to some local mobsters.  But then Ana meets the handsome and single Jake and …. well, you already know what’s going to happen.  This is one of those films where the familiarity is the point.  You watch it because you know that Jake and Ana are going to fall in love and you know exactly how long it’s going to take for that to happen.  Dean Cain is rugged.  Juliana Paes is pretty.  The town is lovely.  It’s a sweet little film that you’ll forget about a few minutes after it ends.

Of course, these films always require a cameo or two.  John Savage and Julia Duffy show up as a couple who stay at the B&B and who share a dance at the end of the film.  Ted Lange is the judge who settles the issue of who actually owns the house.  Eric Roberts shows up as a reviewer who stays at the B&B and decides that it’s a wonderful place that more than deserves a good review.  Yay!  I will say that it’s always interesting to see Roberts playing someone who is just a nice, polite guy.  He doesn’t get to do it all that often.  Eric Roberts doesn’t have much screentime in this film but he gets to be pleasant the entire time.  It’s a nice change of pace.

Previous Eric Roberts Films That We Have Reviewed:

  1. Star 80 (1983)
  2. Runaway Train (1985)
  3. Blood Red (1989)
  4. The Ambulance (1990)
  5. The Lost Capone (1990)
  6. Love, Cheat, & Steal (1993)
  7. Voyage (1993)
  8. Love Is A Gun (1994)
  9. Sensation (1994)
  10. Dark Angel (1996)
  11. Doctor Who (1996)
  12. Most Wanted (1997)
  13. Mercy Streets (2000)
  14. Wolves of Wall Street (2002)
  15. Mr. Brightside (2004)
  16. Six: The Mark Unleased (2004)
  17. Hey You (2006)
  18. Amazing Racer (2009)
  19. In The Blink of an Eye (2009)
  20. Enemies Among Us (2010)
  21. The Expendables (2010) 
  22. Sharktopus (2010)
  23. Beyond The Trophy (2012)
  24. The Dead Want Women (2012)
  25. Deadline (2012)
  26. The Mark (2012)
  27. Miss Atomic Bomb (2012)
  28. Bonnie And Clyde: Justified (2013)
  29. Lovelace (2013)
  30. The Mark: Redemption (2013)
  31. Self-Storage (2013)
  32. A Talking Cat!?! (2013)
  33. This Is Our Time (2013)
  34. Inherent Vice (2014)
  35. Road to the Open (2014)
  36. Rumors of War (2014)
  37. Amityville Death House (2015)
  38. A Fatal Obsession (2015)
  39. Stalked By My Doctor (2015)
  40. Enemy Within (2016)
  41. Joker’s Poltergeist (2016)
  42. Prayer Never Fails (2016)
  43. Stalked By My Doctor: The Return (2016)
  44. The Wrong Roommate (2016)
  45. Dark Image (2017)
  46. Black Wake (2018)
  47. Frank and Ava (2018)
  48. Stalked By My Doctor: Patient’s Revenge (2018)
  49. Clinton Island (2019)
  50. Monster Island (2019)
  51. The Reliant (2019)
  52. The Savant (2019)
  53. Seven Deadly Sins (2019)
  54. Stalked By My Doctor: A Sleepwalker’s Nightmare (2019)
  55. The Wrong Mommy (2019)
  56. Exodus of a Prodigal Son (2020)
  57. Free Lunch Express (2020)
  58. Her Deadly Groom (2020)
  59. Top Gunner (2020)
  60. Deadly Nightshade (2021)
  61. The Elevator (2021)
  62. Just What The Doctor Ordered (2021)
  63. Killer Advice (2021)
  64. The Poltergeist Diaries (2021)
  65. The Rebels of PT-218 (2021)
  66. A Town Called Parable (2021)
  67. Bleach (2022)
  68. My Dinner With Eric (2022)
  69. Aftermath (2024)
  70. Devil’s Knight (2024)
  71. The Wrong Life Coach (2024)
  72. When It Rains In L.A. (2025)

Retro Television Review: Homicide: Life On The Street 3.7 “Happy To Be Here”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Sundays, I will be reviewing Homicide: Life On The Street, which aired from 1993 to 1999, on NBC!  It  can be viewed on Peacock.

This week, Bayliss loses it!

Episode 3.7 “Happy To Be Here”

(Dir by Lee Bonner, originally aired on November 18th, 1994)

This week’s episode was depressing even by Homicide standards.

Felton’s wife is still missing.  Felton confronts both Kay and Megan, convinced that they know something about it.  Does it ever occur to Felton that maybe, just maybe, he wouldn’t have so much trouble in his marriage if he wasn’t always stumbling around like hulking dunk, sweating through his shirt and smoking up a storm?  Be the change, Felton.  Be the change.

Sam Thorne, the journalist played by Joe Morton, is assassinated by a Colombian cartel.  It turns out that his assassin was a teenager who agreed to do it in return for a new bike.  Giardello is shaken by the death of his friend and there’s a wonderfully acted scene in which Giardello visits Sam’s daughter (Maggie Rush).  This storyline served to remind the viewer that Yaphet Kotto, even if he spends most of the show in his office, really is the glue that holds this show together.  He’s the heart and the moral soul of Homicide.

Meanwhile, Bayliss has gone from being the clean-cut rookie to being someone who appears to be on the verge of having a complete and total breakdown.  He’s still seeing Emma Zoole and Lewis is still angry with him about it.  Emma likes to make love in a coffin.  Bayliss can accept that.  Emma wants Bayliss to hit her and that pushes Bayliss over the edge.  When he stops by a convenience store to pick up a six-pack of beer, he discovers that he’s a few pennies short.  The clerk says it doesn’t matter.  He can’t sell Bayliss the beer.  Bayliss responds by drawing his gun and robbing the place!  When the police arrive, Bayliss is sitting in his car and drinking a beer.

So, I guess Bayliss is going to prison now, right?  No, not in Baltimore.  Instead, Bayliss shows off his badge.  When that doesn’t work, he calls Pembleton.  Pembleton comes down to the store and gets the clerk to drop the charges in exchange for Bayliss serving as an unpaid security guard.  At the end of the episode, Bayliss is sitting in front of that store and hopefully thinking about how close he came to being sent to prison.

This was a good episode, one that looked at the pressure that goes along with being exposed to the worst that humanity has to offer.  Bayliss holding that store was a scene that probably should not have worked but it did, due to the performance of Kyle Secor.  In a manner of minutes, Secor took Bayliss from being tired but friendly to being so angry that I was worried he was actually going to shoot the clerk.  Not only did we see Bayliss’s dark side but we also saw Pembleton’s good side as he went out of his way to keep his partner from going to prison.

How much darker can things get in Baltimore?  We’ll find out next week!

Song of the Day: Rumble by Link Wray

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today’s song of the day is the only instrumental tune to be banned from being played on the radio.  Back in 1958, when Link Wray first released this song, it was felt that the title and the sound would promote juvenile delinquency and that the song had to be banned for the mental well-being of the nation’s youth.  The radio stations must have made the right decision because we all know how peaceful the 60s turned out to be.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Check it Out! 3.12 “Howard Hemingway”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Saturdays, I will be reviewing the Canadian sitcom, Check it Out, which ran in syndication from 1985 to 1988.  The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi and Peacock!

This week’s episode makes even less sense than usual.

Episode 3.12 “Howard Hemingway”

(Dir by Alan Erlich, originally aired on November 22nd, 1987)

Weird episode.

Howard Bannister notices how many of the store’s customers are also buying trashy romance paperbacks.  He also notices how much Marlene and Edna enjoy reading them.  Howard decides that he should write a book of his own and become a millionaire!

(Heh heh …. go tell any working writer about the idea of becoming a millionaire off of one book and see how they react.)

Howard struggles.  He sits in his office and tries to write a book about a safari.  Because this episode aired in the 80s, he uses a typewriter.  Because I’ve worked as an administrative assistant, I immediately noticed that Howard was a terrible typist.  Soon, the floor of his office is covered in crumpled papers.  He just can’t find the right hook for his story.  Edna points out that he’s never been on safari.  All Howard knows about is running a grocery store.

And so Passion Aisle is born!

Howard writes a book based on Cobb’s and the people that he works with.  Since he only appears to work with five other people, I’m a little bit surprised that the book appeared to be as long as it was.  Somehow, Howard is able to talk a publisher into publishing his book.  Howard doesn’t even have an agent so I’m curious how he pulled that off but anyway….

No one wants to buy the book!  Howard finally ends up giving copies away at the store.  Some of the customers read it and immediately figure out that the trampy cashier “Arlene” is based on Marlene.  The employees at Cobb’s decide that, since the book is based on them, they deserve some of the money that Howard is making off of it.  Howard agrees even though there’s absolutely no reason for Howard to have done so.  Howard wrote the thing.  The employees really didn’t do anything.  Still, they get a 50/50 split….

Seriously, I don’t want to overanalyze this but it really bothers me that Howard finally managed to accomplish something on his own and his employees, rather than accepting that, immediately demanded that they be rewarded for his hard work.  Just because you inspired someone to write a book or paint of picture or do anything else doesn’t mean that your entitled to financial compensation.  Not even Canada has gone that communist yet.  Howard should have stood his ground.

But, he didn’t.  Everyone got a little bit of money and I assume that Howard is never going to write another book.  That’s kind of sad.  Howard’s been looking for an escape from Cobb’s since the show began.  He finally got one and was immediately punished for his initiative.  Poor Howard!

Love On The Shattered Lens: At First Sight (dir by Irwin Winkler)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

1999’s At First Sight tells the story of Amy (Mira Sorvino) and her boyfriend, Virgil (Val Kilmer).

Virgil seems to be just about perfect.  He’s intelligent.  He’s sensitive.  He knows just what to say when Amy’s crying.  He’s a masseuse and who doesn’t want to come home to a nice massage?  He loves hockey.  He’s a great guy to go for a walk with and he’s someone who always has his own individual way of interpreting the world.  However, Virgil is blind.  He’s been blind since he was three years old.  When Amy comes across an article about a doctor named Charles Aaron (Bruce Davison), who has developed an operation that could restore Virgil’s sight, Amy pushes Virgil to get operation.  In fact, Amy pushes him maybe just a bit too much.  Virgil regains his sight but struggles to adjust to being able to see the world around him.

For instance, he has no idea how to read Amy’s facial expressions.  He struggles with his depth perception and, at one point, even walks into a glass door.  He’s seeing the world for the first time and a lot of the things that amaze him are things that Amy takes for granted.  Virgil getting back his sight totally changes the dynamic of his relationship with Amy and soon, despite their best efforts, the two of them find themselves drifting apart.  Amy is even tempted by her ex (Steven Weber).  Meanwhile, Dr. Aaron suggests that Virgil talk to a therapist who can help him adjust to his new life.  Seize every experience, Phil Webster (Nathan Lane) suggests.  Really?  That’s the great advice?  I could have come up with that!

However, Virgil has a secret that he has been keeping from Amy.  There were no guarantees when it came to the operation and now, Virgil’s sight is starting to grow dim.  He’s just gained the ability to see the world but now, he’s about to lose it again.  Will he make it to one final hockey game before he loses his eyesight?  Will he finally discover what “fluffy” thing he was looking at before he went blind at the age of three?  And will Amy ever realize that it was kind of wrong for her to push him into getting an experimental operation that he didn’t even want?

At First Sight has its flaws, as you may have guessed.  The plot is often predictable.  The message of “seizing the day” and “enjoying every moment” has been delivered by countless other films.  (The movie seems to think we won’t notice the message is a cliche as long as it’s delivered by Nathan Lane.)  As directed by Irwin Winkler (who was better-known as a producer than as a director), the film moves at a slow pace and the two-hour plus running time feels excessive.  But it almost doesn’t matter when you’ve got stars as attractive and charismatic as Val Kilmer and Mira Sorvino.  Whatever other flaws the film may have, it doesn’t lack chemistry between the two leads and I actually found myself very much caring about these characters and their relationship.  When it comes to romance, good chemistry can make up for a lot!

It was hard not to feel a bit sad while watching the film’s stars act opposite each other.  After the film was released, Mira Sorvino was blacklisted by Harvey Weinstein and her career has yet to really recover.  With his health struggles and his own reputation for being eccentric, Val Kilmer struggled to get good roles during the latter half of his career.  It was nice, though, to see them in At First Sight, looking young and happy and hopeful.  That’s one wonderful thing about the movies.  They save the moment.

Gamera Review: Gamera vs Barugon (dir by Shigeo Tanaka)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

1966’s Gamera vs Barugon opens six months after the end of Gamera, The Giant Monster.

Everyone’s favorite atomic turtle has been exiled into space, sent on a rocket to a distant planet and ordered to never attack Japan again.  However, when a meteorite collides with the rocket, Gamera is set free.  He promptly returns to Earth and attacks Japan again.  Seriously, Japan really can’t catch a break!  While it’s true that Gamera and Godzilla don’t exist in the same cinematic universe, it’s still hard not to wonder why Japan is the only country that ever seems to get attacked by the giant monsters.

(The obvious answer, of course, is that both Gamera and Godzilla, with their fiery breath and their relentless need to destroy everything in their path, are metaphors for the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  Blame Truman.)

However, Gamera is not Japan’s only problem.  They’re also having to deal with Barugon, a monster who hatches out of an opal that a group of bumbling adventurers have recently retrieved from New Guinea.  Barugon is a lizard, one that grows from being tiny to gigantic in just a manner of days.  Barugon creates rainbows that not only serve as a shield for him but which also destroy just about anything that they touch.  Gamera, though perhaps not intentionally, becomes the champion of the same humans that previously tired to exile him into space.

There’s an interesting subtext to Gamera vs Barugon.  The opal was originally discovered by a soldier during World War II.  He hid the opal in New Guinea, not realizing that it was actually an egg.  Years later, he’s the one who hires the men who retrieve the opal.  In its way, the opal is a symbol of the past, of what Japan was before the American occupation and what Japan could have been if it had been victorious in the war.  Of course, bringing the opal to Japan and allowing it to open leads to the deaths of hundreds of innocent people and it nearly destroys the country.  If the opal had remained where it had been abandoned and if the old soldier had been willing to move on from the past, Barugon would never have been born.  Then again, if Barugon hadn’t been born then Gamera wouldn’t have had a chance to redeem himself in the eyes of the public.  For every bad thing (like Barugon) that happens, there’s also a good thing to consider.  Then again, maybe I’m reading too much into it.

Quickly paced and featuring enough giant monster action to hold the interest of even the most jaded of viewers, Gamera vs Barugon is a lot of fun.  With its colorful visuals, cute but angry monsters, and random rainbows, it’s definitely a work of pop art.  Seriously, how can you not love a giant turtle that spins around and shoots fire?  And how can you not love a lizard like Barugon, with his rainbow destruction and his cheerful facial expressions?  One thing I enjoy about the Gamera films is that Gamera always seems to be doing his best.  He’s determined to win!  Sometimes, Godzilla can seem like he’s just phoning it in.  But Gamera always gives 110%!  Yay, Gamera!

Previous Gamera Reviews:

  1. Gamera, The Giant Monster (1965)
  2. Gamera vs. Jiger (1970)

AMV Of The Day: Don’t Stop Believing (Various)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

An AMV set to Journey?  How can I not share it?

Song: Don’t Stop Believing by Journey

Anime: -Dance in the Vampire Bund, -Spice and Wolf ,-Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, -Durarara, -Toradora, -Attack on Titan, -Soul Eater ,-A Certain Scientific Railgun S, -Vampire Knight, -Higurashi When They Cry, -Deadman Wonderland, -Bleach, -Death Note, -Shuffle, -Maid Sama, -Free!, -B Gata H Kei, -Black Butler, -Nana, -Rosario Vampire -,demon king daimao, -yoko you’re my star

Creator: Katherine Dickinson (KatiePandas)

Past AMVs of the Day

Retro Television Review: Welcome Back, Kotter 4.22 “I’m Okay, But You’re Not”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Saturdays, I will be reviewing Welcome Back Kotter, which ran on ABC  from 1975 to 1979.  The entire show can be purchased on Prime.

We’re nearly done.

Episode 4.22 “I’m Okay, But You’re Not”

(Dir by Norman Abbott, originally aired on June 1st, 1979)

The next-to-last episode of Welcome Back, Kotter centers on Beau, the Southern transfer who was introduced as a replacement for Barbarino.  This is only the second episode to focus on Beau and it aired right as the show was about to end.  Judging from some of the comments made in the episode and the fact that no mentions that Horshack is now married, I’m going to guess that this episode was probably originally meant to air earlier in the season.

Anyway, the Sweathogs read their student evaluations when Julie, for some reason, leaves Arnold in charge of the office while she goes to another classroom to get a skirt that’s been hemmed for her by the Home Economics teacher.  Why Julie couldn’t have just gotten the skirt after the students had left for the day isn’t really clear.  The Sweathogs are not happy to discover that Woodman hates all of them except for Beau.  Beau, looking to prove that he’s not Woodman’s favorite, steals Woodman’s pants (Woodman is asleep at his desk) and runs them up a flagpole.  He also rings the fire alarm.  Woodman is forced to put on Julie’s skirt before leaving his office.

(What about Gabe?  Gabe is nowhere to be seen.  Gabe became assistant principal and then stopped hanging out at the school.)

Beau confesses that he was behind the prank.  Woodman says that it’s honorable for Beau to take the blame but he knows that Epstein, Washington, and Horshack are to blame.  Woodman gives the three “bad” Sweathogs detention.  There’s something inherently weird about watching three actors in their 30s complain about getting detention.  So, Beau again says that he was solely responsible and then insults Woodman until Woodman snaps, gives Beau three weeks detention, and promises that he’ll be keeping on eye on everything Beau does.

Good luck with that, Woodman.  The show’s nearly over!

Poor Stephen Shortridge.  He wasn’t a bad actor but the character of Beau was never that clearly defined and, even worse, Shortridge was brought in to replace Travolta’s Barbarino.  The show never figured out what to do with Beau and he ended up as something of a footnote in the show’s history.

This episode was just dumb.  It’s the type of episode that the show did well when it first started, back when the Sweathogs were still plausible as being high school students and when Travolta and Gabe Kaplan were still willing to appear on the show.  But, by the time the fourth season rolled around, the cast was too old to be playing high school pranks and neither Barbarino nor Gabe were around anymore.

Next week, the show finally ends!

Documentary Review: Matthew Perry: A Hollywood Tragedy (dir by Robert Palumbo)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

It’s rare that I ever feel like I should apologize for having watched a documentary but that was the feeling I had after watching Matthew Perry: A Hollywood Tragedy.

This documentary examined the career and death of actor Matthew Perry, with most of the emphasis being put on Perry’s struggle with addiction.  Excerpts were read from his book.  Lots of clips were shared from Friends.  People in the industry talked about what a charming actor Perry was and they also talked about how hard it is to free oneself from addiction.  This is especially true when you’re rich enough to have a bunch of people around you who will literally respond to your every whim and not take a second to ask, “Are you sure?”  One of the worst things about celebrity culture is that we tend to root for the worst until it actually happens.  When an actor is publicly struggling with addiction or their mental health, it’s treated as entertainment  It’s only after that actor dies that we talk about how tragic it was and people hop on social media to talk about how addiction is a disease and no one should be shamed for their struggle.

And that brings me to documentaries like this one.  There’s something really hypocritical about these documentaries that take a real life tragedy and turn it into entertainment while pretending to be a tribute or a serious examination of the addiction crisis in America.  For instance, this documentary tells you absolutely nothing that you didn’t already know about Matthew Perry and his tragic death and it really doesn’t do a good job of paying tribute to him as an actor either.  Those clips from Friends are the same clips that you’ve seen on every other special about the life of Matthew Perry.  There’s really no reason for this documentary to exist, other than to appeal to the desire of viewers to learn something sordid about a well-known figure.  It’s a documentary that exploits Perry’s death while claiming to mourn it.

And I’m not saying anything that you haven’t already heard or which hasn’t been said by hundred other people.  Nearly every review that I’ve read of this documentary says basically the same thing that I just said.  It’s exploitive and doesn’t have much to add to our overall understanding of how someone with so much talent and so many fans could also be so self-destructive.  And yet, while we all criticize documentaries like this, many of us still watch them.  I still watch them.  I watched this one.  I learned absolutely nothing new and I felt fairly guilty afterwards.  Matthew Perry’s death was a tragedy and a cautionary tale and, at the same time, it should take nothing away from the happiness that he brought his fans.  He deserved better than this.  For that matter, he deserved better than all of the speculative stories that came out after his appearance on the Friends Reunion Special.

But I can’t get self-righteous or too quick to condemn.  Because I did watch this.  I was bored, I saw that it was streaming, and I watched it.  And I’ll probably watch the next trashy celebrity documentary that come out.  I won’t feel good about it but I’ll probably do it.  I doubt I’ll be alone.

The TSL Grindhouse: The Wild Angels (dir by Roger Corman)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

“What is it exactly that you want?” a preacher (Frank Maxwell) asks a congregation of leather-clad bikers.

“We want to get loaded!” Heavenly Blues (Peter Fonda) replies, “And we want to have a good time!”

And have a good time, they proceed to have.  Of course, it’s a good time for them.  Everyone else who meets the bikers at the center of 1966’s The Wild Angels are horrified by this collection of rebellious and violent outsiders.  Sure, Heavenly Blues might actually be a soulful guy who mistakenly believes that he can control the gang’s more excessive tendencies.  His girlfriend, Mike (Nancy Sinatra), actually seems rather reserved and conservative when compared to the rest of the gang.  But make no mistake about it, the majority of the members of the gang are into violence for its own sake.  They are bullies who couldn’t make the football team so, instead, they hopped on a motorcycle and formed their own society.  They’re self-styled rebels  but what are they rebelling against?  What have you got?

I know, I know.  That famous line comes from Marlon Brando and it was uttered in The Wild One.  Peter Fonda, to put it lightly, was no Marlon Brando and, as directed by Roger Corman, The Wild Angels doesn’t have the societal concerns that lay at the hear of The Wild One.  As Corman was often the first to admit, his main concern when it came to making movies was to make money.  Corman wasn’t necessarily against message films.  He often stated that, as a director, 1962’s The Intruder was the film in which he took the most pride.  The Intruder took a firm stand against racism and it let everyone know where Corman stood on when it came to the Civil Rights Movement.  It was also one of his few films to lose money.  The Wild Angels celebrates rebellion but one gets the feeling that celebration is motivated by the fact that younger filmgoers would be happy to pay to see a movie about a bunch of “youngish” people telling the old folks to shut up and get out of the way.  The Wild Angels themselves don’t seem to be motivated by any sort of grand ideology.  Heavenly Blues preaches about getting loaded and having a good time and celebrating freedom but he also allows the members of the gang to drape a Nazi flag over a casket.  What does Heavenly Blues actually believe in?

Heavenly Blues believes in loyalty to his friends.  For all the fights and the orgies and the scenes of motorcycles roaring down country roads, this is ultimately just a film about a guy who wants to give his best friend a decent burial.  The Loser (Bruce Dern) dies about halfway through the film and one gets the feeling that he probably would have lived if the gang hadn’t kidnapped him from the hospital.  Heavenly Blues wants to give The Loser the type of wild funeral that Blues thinks he would have wanted though I think The Loser probably would have been happier not have been killed by the actions of his idiot friends.  Diane Ladd, who was married to Bruce Dern at the time and who has said Laura Dern was conceived during the filming of The Wild Angels, is heart-breaking as The Loser’s girlfriend, Gaysh.  Gaysh wants to mourn her boyfriend while the rest of the gang is more concerned with figuring out who her next boyfriend is going to be.

Does Heavenly Blues ever realize that he’s traveling with a bunch of animals?  He does but one gets the feeling that he’s accepted his fate.  There’s no going back.  The past can’t change and the future cannot be controlled so Heavenly Blues is content to live in the present.  All he can do is try to give his friend a decent burial while the sirens of cops shriek in the distance.

The Wild Angels was a controversial film when it was first released.  It also made a lot of money and led to a whole cycle of outlaw biker films, culminating with Easy Rider.  Seen today, it’s a portrait of a society coming apart, with the establishment and the bikers not even willing to stop fighting long enough to allow for a simple burial.  It’s definitely a time capsule film, one of those productions that epitomizes an era.  There’s not much going on underneath the surface and most of the film’s bikers really are awful people but there is something touching about Blues giving it all up just to try to give his friend a decent burial.