Tag Archives: review

October Positivity: The List (dir by Gary Wheeler)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

2007’s The List opens during the dying days of the American Civil War.

A group of wealthy plantation owners form a secret society.  They pool together their fortunes and they each sign onto a list.  Over the years, whenever a member of the Society passes away, their eldest male descendant replaces them on the List and also has access to the fortune that that the Society secretly holds.

In 2007, directionless attorney Renny Jacobsen (Chuck Carrington) is shocked when his father dies and leaves him next to no money.  As Renny tells us over and over again, he really could have used some of his father’s fortune.  However, his father does leave him a key the leads to Renny uncovering a tape that explains everything that he needs to know about the Society.  All Renny has to do is sign his name to the List.

The Society is now run by Desmond Larochette (Malcolm McDowell) and we know that he’s evil because his name is Desmond Larochette and he’s played by Malcolm McDowell.  Larochette seems to be more than happy to allow Renny to join the Society but he’s not quite as happy that another member of the group died and only left behind a female heir, Jo Johnston (Hilarie Burton).  The members of the Society are faced with quite a quandary.  Should they allow a woman to join their society?  And, if not, what should they do now that she know about the Society’s existence?

When Jo goes to the mansion for the Society’s meeting, she spots a portrait of a gray-haired gentleman and asks who he is.  Gus Eicholtz (Pat Hingle) explains that the painting is of John C. Calhoun, who served as Vice President under Andrew Jackson.  “He looks angry,” Jo says and honestly, that was a piece of historical and artistic criticism that was so simple-minded that Jo really should have been disqualified from joining the Society at that very moment.

First off, how are you going to join a Southern secret society if you don’t know how John C. Calhoun is?  Secondly, the portrait in question is actually a pretty famous one.  George Alexander Haley painted it while Calhoun was Secretary of State.  Even if you don’t know who John C. Calhoun is, chances are that you’ve seen the painting.  Finally, there’s the claim that “He looks angry.”  The painting was completed in 1845.  Everyone looked angry in 1840s!  Even the noted bon vivant Henry Clay looked angry in his 1848 State Department portrait.  (And Clay actually had his picture taken for his official portrait.  Imagine how furious he would look if someone had painted him?)

Anyway, Renny joins the society but Jo does not,  But then Renny discovers that it’s not as easy to get his hands on the money as he thought and he spends the entire movie complaining about it.  That’s pretty much it.  There is some suggestion that Desmond might have demonic powers, but it’s not really explored.  Another heir dies mysteriously and it seems like Jo is being targeted as well.  Again, it’s not really clear why.  In the end, Renny puts God before the money but it kind of comes out of nowhere.  It’s a muddled story and, by the end of the film, it’s still a struggle to figure out what it all meant.  At the very least, Malcolm McDowell seemed to be having fun, playing an evil character and speaking in an almost indecipherable accent.

Late Night Retro Television Review: 1st & Ten 2.3 “A Second Chance”

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 Wednesdays, I will be reviewing 1st and Ten, which aired in syndication from 1984 to 1991. The entire series is streaming on Tubi.

Things are getting crazy at training camp!

Episode 2.3 “A Second Chance”

(Dir by Bruce Seth Green, originally aired on September 8th, 1986)

This week’s episode featured the unforgettable sight of O.J. Simpson tackling a knife-wielding Don Swayze and saving the life of Delta Burke.

Swayze was playing Clay Daniels, a tight end who was drafted by Coach Denardo, even though he apparently pulled a knife on a professor in college.  After Clay threatened Johnny Valentine after he felt Valentine wasn’t throwing him the ball enough, Denardo explained that he drafted Clay because Clay can play football.  Okay, Ernie, I guess that justifies having a knife-wielding maniac in the locker room….

After Denardo finally cut Clay from the team, Clay showed up at Diana’s house with a knife.  Fortunately, Diana was able to call Denardo and T.D. Parker for help.  Denardo showed up and promised he would give Clay a second chance.  And then T.D. tackled Clay and grabbed that knife like a pro!

Meanwhile, Yinessa returned to training camp but he was not happy that his friend and roommate, wide receiver Jamie Waldren (Jeff Kaake), had a drug problem.  This episode ended with Yinessa getting into a fight with someone who broke into their room in search of Waldren’s cocaine.  An angry Yinessa flushed all of Waldren’s cocaine.  Considering that this episode also featured Diana being named Chairperson of the League’s Anti-Drug Committee, I’m sure this won’t lead to any sort of awkwardness with the team.

Much like last week’s episode, this episode was so melodramatic and over-the-top that I couldn’t help but enjoy it.  Drugs, training camp, and knives!  Will the Bulls make it to the Championship Game a second year in a row?  It’s not looking good but, considering that they have O.J. Simpson’s razor-sharp instincts at their disposal, I wouldn’t count them out yet!

Horror On TV: Dead of Night (dir by Dan Curtis)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

For today’s horror on television, we’re very happy to present to you, Dead of Night!

From 1977, this television film is a horror anthology, made up of three stories directed by Dan Curtis and written by Richard Matheson.  In the first story, a youngish Ed Begley, Jr. travels through time.  In the 2nd story, Patrick Macnee plays a man whose wife is apparently being menaced by a vampire.  And in the third story, Joan Hackett plays a mother who brings her dead son back to life, just to discover that sometimes it’s best to just let sleeping corpses lies.

The entire anthology is good, though the third story is clearly the best and the most frightening.  Not only is it scary but it’s got a great twist ending.

Enjoy!

Brad reviews BONE DADDY (1998), starring Rutger Hauer!

Posted on by Bradley Crain

I became obsessed with the actor Rutger Hauer in the summer of 1990. I was about to go into my senior year of high school, and I was attending the Arkansas Governor’s School. I had seen Hauer before in films like THE HITCHER and WANTED: DEAD OR ALIVE, but as part of our curriculum, we all watched BLADE RUNNER and then broke up into smaller groups to analyze the film. Blown away by the film, Hauer’s powerful performance, and the opportunity to engage in a serious conversation about a movie with my peers, it was a rewarding experience, and I soon found myself seeking out every Hauer film I could find. I followed the charismatic Dutch actor’s career closely from that point forward, all the way up to his death in July of 2019. I was actually sitting on a beach in Florida when I read that he had passed away. Based on my extreme interest in every project that Hauer was associated with, I specifically remember when BONE DADDY premiered on HBO in 1998. I didn’t have HBO so I had to wait for a few months to catch it when it arrived on home video.

In BONE DADDY (1998), Rutger Hauer stars as Dr. Bill Palmer, a retired Chicago medical examiner turned bestselling author. Years earlier, Palmer investigated a series of brutal unsolved murders committed by a serial killer known as “Bone Daddy.” Retiring in frustration from not being able to solve the murders, Palmer pens the novel, “Bone Daddy,” a fictionalized account of the crimes where, unlike real life, the killer is caught and brought to justice. The book’s runaway success catapults Palmer to fame, but it also seems to pull the notorious Bone Daddy out of retirement. When his literary agent, the cocky, Rocky Carlson, is kidnapped and subjected to the killer’s signature torture, the surgical removal of bones from a living body, Palmer finds himself back on the case and teamed up with the no-nonsense police detective Sharon Wells (Barbara Williams). As the bones and the suspects pile up, Palmer is determined to make sure the killer is found and brought to justice this time around!

BONE DADDY is a pretty darn good entertainment option if you’re in the mood for an undemanding serial killer flick that’s in and out of your life in 90 minutes. It’s certainly not in the same league as SE7EN, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be enjoyed for what it is. The premise is pretty twisted, and the scenes where the killer is preparing to remove the bones of fully coherent victims is horrifying to say the least! There isn’t a lot of gore, but what’s there is pretty gross. This is B-movie territory and the lack of Hollywood gloss works in its favor. The film’s plot also has quite a bit of family drama between Dr. Palmer and his adult son Peter (Joseph Kell), who’s following in his dad’s professional footsteps in the medical field. It seems Dr. Palmer wasn’t the greatest dad and the current state of their relationship figures strongly throughout various portions of the film. This element of the story is actually handled quite well and adds some interesting tension as we move towards the end.

At the end of the day, the best thing about BONE DADDY is the presence of Rutger Hauer in the lead. He brings gravitas to the role of Dr. Palmer, a man who has had his share of successes and failures in the world. It’s his failures that continue to haunt him throughout this story and seems to put everyone around him in danger. Hauer, known for his ability to go over the top at times, plays the role completely straight with the quiet intensity and determination of a man trying to make up for past wrongs. It’s another solid performance in the career of the then-53 year old actor. I also want to give a special shout out to his nice, bushy mustache. I enjoyed it very much! The other primary performance of the film comes from Canadian actress Barbara Williams as the lead cop. In contrast to how much I enjoy Hauer, I’m just not much of a fan of Williams. She seems to be in a perpetual state of being offended in every role I’ve seen her in. She played Charles Bronson’s daughter in the FAMILY OF COPS series and her character was always on the ready to jump down someone’s throat for just about anything they said. It’s kind of the same here. I should probably try to look for some more of her work just to see if she ever smiles. 

Overall, I think BONE DADDY is worth a watch, especially for fans of Rutger Hauer or movies about serial killers. The plot is predictable, and so is the identity of the killer if you’re paying attention, but you could definitely do a lot worse! 

Bonus Horror On The Lens: I Was A Teenage Frankenstein (dir by Herbert L. Strock)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

From 1957, it’s I Was A Teenage Frankenstein!

This film was produced as a direct result of the box office success of I Was A Teenage Werewolf.  Just as in Teenage Werewolf, Whit Bissell plays a mad scientist who makes the mistake of trying to play God.  (He also makes the mistake of keeping an alligator in his lab but that’s another story.)  The end result …. Teenage Frankenstein!

The makeup on the Teenage Frankenstein is probably the best thing about this film.  If nothing else, this film features a monster who actually looks like he was stitched together in a lab.

Enjoy and please be sure to read my full review!

Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 6.24 “So Help Me Hannah/The Maid Cleans Up/CPR IOU”

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 Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986!  The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

Love …. exciting and new!

Episode 6.24 “So Help Me Hannah/The Maid Cleans Up/C.P.R, I.O.U.”

(Dir by Kim Friedman, originally aired on March 12th, 1983)

This episode features Gopher bringing a CPR dummy on board.  No one is that interested in learning how to perform CPR, at least not until one of the passengers, Dwaine Fenley (Steven Keats), has a heart attack.  Fortunately, because of his CPR training, Gopher is able to save Dwaine’s life.  Not only does this lead to Dwaine forging a stronger relationship with his father (Milton Berle) but it also leads to Gopher getting promoted to Head Purser.

(Erin doesn’t like to brag so I’ll brag for her and say that she is not only CPR-certified but she also saved someone’s life a few years ago.  CRP is a good thing to learn!)

While Gopher is trying to get everyone to learn CPR, there are other things happening on the boat and, to be honest, they’re all kind of annoying.  For instance, Hannah (Mary Martin) boards the boat and she’s immediately giving everyone advice and singing Cole Porter tunes.  I kind of knew that this story was going to be annoying from the minute Hannah first boarded the ship and the camera zoomed in for a close-up, which was usually a sign that a guest star was going to spend the entire cruise overacting.  That’s the case here, with Mary Martin delivering every line and playing every emotion as if she’s on Broadway as opposed to a television soundstage.  Hannah meets an ex-boyfriend named Jarvis (Max Showalter) and they sing It’s De-Lovely while standing against the ship’s railing and, for me, it was De-Cringey.  Maybe if I was of Mary Martin’s generation, it would have been less cringey.  But I have to admit that I listen to most of those old songs and I think to myself, “De-lovely is not a word.”  Hannah encourages Jarvis to allow his son (Timothy Patrick Murphy) to play piano instead of becoming a real estate agent.

Finally, a maid (Judy Landers) boards the boat because she knows that her employer (Caren Kaye) is cheating on her boyfriend (Ben Murphy).  It’s actually a bit of a complex storyline, at least by the typical standards of The Love Boat.  Personally, I like Judy Landers and Ben Murphy was appropriately rugged and handsome.  Unfortunately, Landers and Murphy didn’t have much chemistry.

A mixed review for this episode, I’d say.  I appreciated the CPR subplot because that was The Love Boat at its most well-intentioned.  The whole thing with Mary Martin singing old songs was cringe city.  And the maid subplot was just kind of boring.  This was not a great cruise but it wasn’t a terrible one either.  At least, after six seasons, Gopher finally got his promotion.

 

 

Horror Song of the Day: Buio Omega by Goblin

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today’s horror song of the day comes from the 1979 film, Beyond The Darkness.

This film’s soundtrack, courtesy of Goblin, was so acclaimed that it later turned up in several other Italian horror film, usually without anyone bothering to clear it with Goblin ahead of time.

October True Crime: My Father’s Shadow: The Sam Sheppard Story (dir by Peter Levin)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

On July 3rd, 1954, Marilyn Sheppard was murdered in her bedroom.

The wife of a prominent neurosurgeon, Marilyn Sheppard was bludgeoned to death in her own bedroom.  Her husband, Sam Sheppard, claimed that he had fallen asleep on a downstairs couch and was woken up by the sound of his wife screaming.  Sheppard said that, when he ran upstairs to the bedroom, he saw a bushy-haired man in the shadows.  The man hit Sheppard, knocking him out.  When Sheppard came to, he saw the man fleeing the house and chased after him.  The two fought outside and again, Sheppard was knocked out.

The police did not believe Sam Sheppard’s story and, after days of headlines that flat out accused him of being the murderer, he was arrested and charged with murdering his pregnant wife.  The press had a field day with the story and the trial was frequently described as being a circus.  Sheppard’s case was damaged by the revelation that he had cheated on his wife multiple times.  Contemporary accounts of the trial portrayed Sheppard as being cocky and arrogant.  As the jury was not sequestered, they saw every tabloid headline about Sheppard.  After deliberating for four days, the jury found Dr. Sam Sheppard guilty of murdering his wife.  He was sentenced to prison.

Sheppard would stay in prison until 1966.  During that time, his mother committed suicide, his father died of an ulcer, and his former father-in-law also chose to end his own life.  Sheppard’s original attorney died in 1961 and his appeals were taken over by a young lawyer named F. Lee Bailey.  In 1966, Bailey argued before the U.S. Supreme Court that Sheppard was denied due process due to the jury not being sequestered.  The Supreme Court agreed and granted Sheppard a new trial.  This time, with the flamboyant Bailey defending him, Sheppard did not testify and the defense focused on the lack of any real evidence that would suggest Sheppard had lied about the Bushy-haired Man.  Sheppard was acquitted.

Today, if Sam Sheppard is remembered, it’s for inspiring The Fugitive, a show about a doctor wrongly accused of murder.  (The show aired while Sheppard was still in prison.)  The majority of online posts and articles that I’ve read about Sam Sheppard have always focused on the retrial and usually end with Sheppard leaving prison.  It’s rare that Sheppard’s life after prison is discussed,  That’s probably because it’s a very sad story.

Sheppard may have been acquitted but he had also just spent 12 years in prison and he came out a changed man.  Sheppard tried to return to practicing medicine but his surgical skills had deteriorated to the extent that two of his patient died after he nicked an artery.  Facing multiple wrong death suits, he resigned from the only hospital that had been willing to give him a job.  He became a professional wrestler and was known as “Killer” Sam Sheppard at some of his matches.  He was also an alcoholic.  Less than four years after getting out of prison, he was dead at the age of 46.

1998’s My Father’s Shadow: The Sam Sheppard Story features Peter Strauss as Dr. Sheppard and Henry Czerny as his namesake son.  The film alternates between flashbacks to Dr. Sheppard’s life and scenes set in the 90s that focus on his son’s attempts to definitively clear his father’s name.  The film suggests that the murder was actually committed by Richard Eberling (John Colicos), who worked as a handyman and a window washer at the Sheppard home and who, when he was arrested for burglary several years after the murder, was discovered to have some of Marilyn Sheppard’s jewelry in his possession.  In the 80s, Eberling was convicted of murdering another one of his clients.  Eberling himself died in prison, the same year that this movie aired.

It’s a big story and My Father’s Shadow tries to do a lot in just 90 minutes.  Sometimes, it tries to do too much.  The flashbacks are occasionally a bit difficult to keep track of.  Sam Sheppard’s son goes from being a military school brat to a long-haired hippy so suddenly that, from a narrative point of view, it’s a bit distracting.  Overall, though, this is an effective look at an interesting story and it features two excellent performances from Strauss and Czerny.  It may not be the definitive telling of Sam Sheppard’s story but it’s a good place to start.

Horror On The Lens: Little Shop of Horrors (dir by Roger Corman)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Whenever it’s time to share this film for Horrorthon, I have a little story that I like to tell:

Enter singing.

Little Shop.…Little Shop of Horrors.…Little Shop.…Little Shop of Terrors….

When I was 19 years old, I was in a community theater production of the musical Little Shop of Horrors.  Though I think I would have made the perfect Audrey, everybody always snickered whenever I sang so I ended up as a part of “the ensemble.”  Being in the ensemble basically meant that I spent a lot of time dancing and showing off lots of cleavage.  And you know what?  The girl who did play Audrey was screechy, off-key, and annoying and after every show, all the old people in the audience always came back stage and ignored her and went straight over to me.  So there.

Anyway, during rehearsals, our director thought it would be so funny if we all watched the original film.  Now, I’m sorry to say, much like just about everyone else in the cast, this was my first exposure to the original and I even had to be told that the masochistic dentist patient was being played by Jack Nicholson.  However, I’m also very proud to say that — out of that entire cast — I’m the only one who understood that the zero-budget film I was watching was actually better than the big spectacle we were attempting to perform on stage.  Certainly, I understood the film better than that screechy little thing that was playing Audrey.

The first Little Shop of Horrors certainly isn’t scary and there’s nobody singing about somewhere that’s green (I always tear up when I hear that song, by the way).  However, it is a very, very funny film with the just the right amount of a dark streak to make it perfect Halloween viewing.

So, if you have 72 minutes to kill, check out the original and the best Little Shop of Horrors….

 

October Positivity: Revelation Road 3: The Black Rider (dir by Gabriel Sabloff)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Eric Roberts is not in Revelation Road 3.

I was hoping that he might be, even though his name didn’t appear in the credits.  Quite a few cast members from the first two films return for the third film.  David A.R. White is back as Josh McManus, the former super soldier who now drives his souped-car through the wastelands of America.  Bruce Marchiano is back, credited as the Stranger though we all  know he’s actually Jesus.  (Since Marchiano  appeared in all three films, I can only assume the Revelation Road films all take place in the same cinematic universe as The Encounter films and Sarah’s Choice.)  Brian Bosworth shows up briefly.

But there is no Eric Roberts.  Not even Eliza Roberts appears in this film!  It’s a shame and they are both missed.

However, Kevin Sorbo does show up.

Kevin Sorbo plays Honcho, a bandit leader who lives in the wastelands and who is worshipped by those who follow him.  Honcho occasionally speaks with an Australian accent.  Occasionally, the accent slips or disappears all together.  At first, I thought this was a case of bad editing, bad dubbing, or maybe Sorbo not really being that into the character.  However, there’s actually a rather clever moment in which Honcho tells Josh that he’s not actually from Australia.  He just speaks with the accent because it impresses his followers.  Without the accent, he’s just some guy who used to work at a gas station.  With the accent, he’s a warlord.

It’s a moment that made me laugh, largely because it’s true.  People love and fear accents.  If you’ve got a posh British accent, most Americans will assume that you’re planning a heist of some sort and that Sylvester Stallone or Harrison Ford is somewhere nearby, trying to stop you.  If you’ve got an Australian accent, the assumption amongst Americans is that you can survive harsh conditions, handle your alcohol, and jump out of a plane without a second thought.

However, Sorbo’s fake Australian accent also pays a sort of homage to the Mad Max films.  The Revelation Road trilogy was obviously envisioned as being a faith-based version of the Mad Max films, with David A.R. White cheerfully stepping into the somber shoes of Mel Gibson and Tom Hardy.  Using Mad Max as a model for a faith-based apocalypse film actually isn’t that bad of an idea.  Indeed, Gibson’s style of beatific madness opens up the original Mad Max trilogy to a similar interpretation.  Unfortunately, Revelation Road 3 is at time a bit too faithful to the Mad Max films, to the extent that it struggles to establish an identity outside of the films that inspired it.  That’s one reason why Kevin Sorbo’s character stands out.  He’s a character who genuinely surprises us.

As for the plot of Revelation Road 3, it finds Josh being sent on a mission to find The Shepherd (Robert Gossett), a mysterious figure who is gathering together a religious flock in the desert despite the fact that the new world government has outlawed things like religion and individual freedom.  While Josh’s wounded companion waits in a town ruled over by Mayor Drake (James Denton), Josh searches the desert and occasionally sees a mysterious rider on a horse.  The film mixes action and theology and the results are definitely mixed, with a few well-done chase scenes mixed with a lot of scenes of people talking.  That said, at its best, The Black Rider achieves a sort of desolate grandeur.