Tag Archives: review

Book Review: Born to Kill by John D. Revere

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Published in 1984, Born to Kill is the third volume in the Justin Perry saga.

This time, the CIA’s most sex-obsessed assassin is on assignment in Jamaica.  There have been a series of mysterious chicken attacks in both Jamaica and Florida and Justin’s boss, the Old Man, is sure that it is somehow connected to the upcoming launching of a space shuttle in Cape Canaveral.  However, it’s not only chickens that have been making trouble.  Someone has been beheading government officials across Europe.  Justin’s assignment is to solve the mystery behind the chicken attacks and make sure that SADIF doesn’t interfere with the shuttle launch.  The Old Man has decide that he doesn’t want any SADIF operatives taken alive so, naturally, Justin Perry is the man to send.

Of course, Justin is more concerned with his latest girlfriend but she’s apparently blown up while driving to the airport.  Now, Justin not only has to solve the mystery of the killer chickens but he also has to get vengeance for his latest murdered lover.  But, before he does that, he has to spend a few days at the local brothel with another CIA agent because he’s Justin Perry.

Anyway, Born to Kill moves along at a decent enough pace, up until we get a flashback to the time that an 8 year-old Justin Perry had sex with a chicken and was then traumatized when his grandparents possibly served him the same chicken for dinner and then …. wait, what?  Justin Perry did what?  Yes, you read that correctly.  The action in the book stops so that Justin Perry can remember the time that he had sex with a chicken.  First off, ew.  Secondly, does this guy even have any good childhood memories?  Third, why is this even in the book?  It certainly doesn’t make Justin Perry into a sympathetic character.  Later on, when Perry was attacked by several mutant chickens, I was rooting for the chickens.

When I read the first two books, I assumed that they were meant to be a satiric and that Justin Perry was meant to be a parody of the heroes who appeared in other pulp paperbacks.  But I have to say that the book treats the chicken incident very seriously and, just as Perry spent Vatican Kill debating the existence of God, he spends a good deal of this book thinking about the decline of morality in society.  (He blames the sexual magnetism of John F. Kennedy.)  What I’m saying is that I’m getting the feeling that the author may have meant these books to be taken seriously.  If so, agck!

Anyway, to be honest with you, the whole chicken thing was really gross and I nearly stopped reading at that point.  Because I’m a completist, I did continue with the book but I have to admit that it was more skimming than in-depth reading as I was kind of worried to find out what other barnyard animals Justin Perry may have had sexual relations with.  And really, I think that might be the best way to read these books.  Skim over it all as quickly as possible and don’t make the mistake of thinking about what any of it means.  Justin Perry saves the day and kills a lot of people and, at one point, watches as a woman he’s just had sex with gets eaten by a shark.  He’s fascinated by the fact that the shark is eating a bit of him along with her.  The main theme of the series seems to be that Justin Perry really needed to get help.  Let’s just put it like that.

Film Review: Fortress: Sniper’s Eye (dir by Josh Sternfeld)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Fortress: Sniper’s Eye is a sequel to the 2021 film, Fortress.

If you haven’t seen Fortress, the plot goes something like this.  A group of mercenaries take over a resort that is populated by retired spies.  Robert Michaels (Bruce Willis) and his son, Paul (Jesse Metcalfe), have to set aside their difference and work together to defeat Frederick Balzary (Chad Michael Murray).

Meanwhile, the plot of Fortress: Sniper’s Eye goes something like this.  A group of mercenaries take over a now-closed resort that was once populated by retired spies.  Robert Michaels (Bruce Willis) and his son, Paul (Jesse Metcalfe), have to continue to set aside their difference and work together to defeat Frederick Balzary (Chad Michael Murray).

Now, to the film’s credit, Sniper’s Eye does admit that it’s largely recycling the plot of the first film.  When Balzary and his henchmen show up for a second time, Paul exclaims, “Didn’t any of you die!?”  It’s a funny line and one that shows that Sniper’s Eye is aware that it’s all a bit ludicrous.  Whatever other faults the film may have, you can’t complain that it’s not self-aware.

Unfortunately, when Balzary and his people invade for the second time, Paul is hosting a gathering with his fiancée and his future mother-in-law.  They’re all taken hostage.  Because Robert was wounded while rescuing Balzary’s wife from some killer Russians, he spends most of the the movie providing encouragement from a hospital bed.  Fortunately, towards the end of the movie, he is able to get out of bed and help out his son.  Paul is obviously happy to see his father and the viewers are happy to see Bruce Willis actually doing some action stuff.

Needless to say, Willis is going to be the main attraction for most viewers.  (I imagine a few One Tree Hill fans will be watching for Chad Michael Murray.)  Sniper’s Eye was one of the film that Willis completed before announcing his retirement from acting.  Knowing what we now know about Willis’s health and the conditions under which he made his final films, watching something like Fortress: Sniper’s Eye can feel awkward.  I cringed when I saw Willis in the hospital bed, looking tired and talking about how he was getting too old to play the hero.  At that moment, it felt as if the character and the actor became the same and it was a bit difficult to watch.

That said, Bruce Willis gives a convincing performance in Fortress: Sniper’s Eye.  He may not have the same charismatic swagger that he had when he was healthy but Willis does still look credible sneaking down a hallway while carrying a gun.  Even though the action scenes all use a rather obvious stunt double, Willis is still convincing in his role.

As for the rest of the film, the pacing is abysmal and the performances are uneven, with Jesse Metcalde making a bland hero and Chad Michael Murray going overboard as the main villain.  This is another film with a jumbled timeline so I feel sorry for anyone who is looking away from the screen whenever the “Two weeks later” title card flashes by.  On the plus side, the resort scenery was nice to look at and Natali Yura gave a convincing performance as Balzary’s wife.  As far as Bruce Willis’s later films are concerned, Fortress: Sniper’s Eye is superior to American Siege but comes in far below both Gasoline Alley and A Day To Die.

Book Review: “My Ox is Broken!” Roadblocks, Detours, Fast Forwards and Other Great Moments from Tv’s ‘the Amazing Race’ by Adam-Troy Castro

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

I will be the first to admit that I probably watch too much reality television.

Of course, I will also defend myself by saying that I don’t watch as much as I used to.  I limit myself now.  The Bachelor, the Bachelorette, and Bachelor In Paradise are the only dating shows that I still watch and I have to admit that I find them less and less interesting with each passing season.  (Some of that, to be honest, is because I cringe whenever I see people talking about the “Bachelor Nation.”  Just because I watch the same show as you doesn’t mean that I want to come over to your house and watch you get drunk on box wine.)  I still watch Survivor but I have yet to watch any episodes of the Hulu Kardashian show.  The only reason that I recently watched Selling Sunset was because I was checking out the shows that had been submitted to the Emmys.  I haven’t really been emotionally involved with Big Brother for a while now, though I do still write about it because I love my readers.

That said, I still absolutely love The Amazing Race and I make no apologies for that.

The premise behind The Amazing Race has always been a simple one.  Teams of two are sent on a race around the world.  During each leg of the race, they have to complete tasks before they can continue on their journey.  At the end of each leg is a pit stop.  Finish first and you’ll get a prize.  Finish last and you’ll probably be eliminated from the race.  Each season has featured little tweaks to the formula but the basics have always remained the same, which is one reason why The Amazing Race‘s fans have remained loyal to it for over 22 years.

What is the appeal of The Amazing Race?  It’s more than just seeing who wins and who loses.  It’s seeing how the teams, who always start out very confident, handle being outside of their comfort zone.  I’ve lost track of how many athletic, cocky teams were eliminated from the race because they failed to properly communicate with their taxi driver.  How many teams have gone from being in first place to being dead last just because their flight was delayed?  The most recent season of the Amazing Race was actually put on hold due to COVID quarantines.  Filming stopped in 2020 and then resumed over a year later, with the remaining teams returning to their last pit stop.  The Amazing Race is unpredictable and it takes exactly the right mix of athleticism, intelligence, confidence, and luck to survive it.  The Amazing Race is about skill and communicating and seeing the world and I absolutely love it.  A good deal of the Race’s popularity is also due to host Phil Keoghan, who actually seems to be sincerely invested in the racers and their journey.  That’s quiet a contrast to most reality competition hosts.  Just as snarky Jeff Probst was the perfect host for Survivor (or, at least, he was before he decided to get all weepy and sincere these past few seasons), Phil Keoghan is the perfect host for The Amazing Race.

My Ox is Broken! is a perfect companion to The Amazing Race.  Admittedly, the book was published in 2006 and, as a result, it only covers the first 9 seasons of the Race.  But those were some truly great seasons and reading the book today is a wonderful way to relive the excitement of Rob and Amber going from dominating Survivor to nearly winning The Amazing Race, Colin and Christie narrowly losing the fifth season, and the dysfunctional couples who made up the sixth season.  Author Adam-Troy Castro takes a look at everything that made those first 9 seasons so much fun and he’s also honest about the show’s occasional missteps.  Full of recaps, interviews, and lists (you know how much I love lists!), this book is an essential for anyone who loves the Race.

Film Review: Minamata (dir by Andrew Levitas)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

In Minamata, Johnny Depp plays Eugene Smith, a real-life photographer who found fame taking pictures for Life Magazine.  Taking place in 1971, the film opens with Smith famous but burned out.  He spends most of his time in his run-down apartment or walking the streets of New York.  His camera is always with him, a tool of both his art and a symbol of his detachment.  Smith can capture the world in a photograph but he’s still not sure that he wants to be a part of it.  Smith is outspoken, eccentric, and ultimately a bit of an idealist who hides behind a cloak of cynicism.

When Smith is asked to come to the Japanese city of Minamata so that he can photograph the effects of Mercury poisoning on the citizens, he agrees to do so.  Armed with only his camera and aided only by his translator, Aileen (Minami), Smith discovers a community that has been ravaged by environmental pollution.  Smith tries to bring the story of Minamata to the world, despite the efforts of one of Japan’s largest corporations to silence him.

As far as films go, Minamata isn’t bad.  It feels a lot like a throwback to the old social problem films of the late 70s and the early 80s.  Watching the film, it was easy to draw comparisons to similar films like The China Syndrome, Silkwood, A Civil Action, Erin Brockovich, and even Promised Land.  Like the characters at the heart of those films, Eugene Smith is an unlikely crusader but when he sees a heartless corporation destroying lives, he feels that he has no choice but to act.  The film’s narrative momentum occasionally sputters and there are a few too many scenes of Smith haranguing his editor but the film’s heart is in the right place.  Johnny Depp gives a surprisingly sincere performance as Eugene Smith, playing him as someone who is a bit of a natural screw-up but who still wants to make the world a better place.  The film’s best scenes are the ones in which Smith tries to convince the camera-shy villagers to allow him to document what’s happening to them.  Minamata is at its best when it just allows Depp (as Smith) to interact with other people.

Of course, by this point, Minamata is probably best known for the drama that went on behind-the-scenes.  Minamata was filmed in 2019 and made its debut at the Berlin International Film Festival in February of 2020.  Distribution rights were eventually purchased by MGM and it was originally slated to be released in 2021.  However, after Amber Heard accused Depp of domestic abuse, MGM took the film off of its schedule.  Due to the bad publicity surrounding Depp, it appeared that the film would be buried.  Depp’s fans reacted by voting for Minamata to win the Oscars Fan Favorite contest.  Though Minamata ultimately came in third place, that’s a good showing for a film that hardly anyone had seen and which hadn’t even been distributed in the United States.  The victory of the Snyder Cut may have gotten all the attention but Minamata‘s strong showing served to remind Hollywood that, despite the accusations, Johnny Depp still had a strong fanbase.

It’s tempting to say that Minamata got its release due to the outcome of the Depp/Heard libel trial.  It was actually released on Hulu while the trial was still going on.  Though Minamata is probably destined to be mostly remembered as a footnote in Oscar history, it is a film that shows that Johnny Depp can still give a good performance when he has the right material.

Book Review: Vatican Kill by John D. Revere

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Justin Perry, the assassin, is back!

And he’s just as screwed up as usual.

Continuing the theme of the first Justin Perry novel, 1983’s Vatican Kill finds the CIA still battling the evil plans of SADIF.  A Nazi sympathizer named Carl Werner is working as a gardener at the Vatican and masterminding SADIF’s European operations.  Justin Perry’s boss, the enigmatic Old Man, not only wants Werner to die, he wants it to be such a cruel and sadistic death that it will send a message to all of America’s enemies.  Among Werner’s many crimes is developing a nuclear warhead that SADIF is planning to fire at Venus in an attempt to wow the world.  Unfortunately, as a scientist helpfully explains at the start of the book, blowing up Venus will also destroy the universe so the stakes are pretty high!

The reader might assume that, with the future of the universe at stake, Justin Perry might actually focus on his job for once.  The reader would be wrong.  The world’s greatest assassin is just as easily distracted in this book as he was in the second.  When I reviewed the first book, I mentioned my theory that the series was meant to be a satiric.  Justin Perry was just too weird and sex-obsessed to be viewed as anything other than a parody of the traditional, hypermasculine pulp hero.  There are definitely elements of satire in Vatican Kill but, oddly enough, there are also several passages in which Perry sincerely contemplates why he cannot accept the idea of a benevolent God, passages that suggest that the author was trying to make some sort of larger point about the mysteries of existence.  Of course, there are also several overheated flashbacks to a childhood trip to India, during which Perry both lost his virginity and he witnessed a train crash rather than run over a cow.  Just as in the first book, it turns out that everything that happened in his past is connected to what’s happening in the present….

It’s a weird book.  To be honest, I haven’t even begun to scratch the surface of some of the weird things that happen in Vatican Kill.  Justin Perry is as obsessed with sex and violence as ever while the villains of SADIF continue to come up with with elaborate tortures.  (This book didn’t do much to help me with my fear of dogs.)  I haven’t even gotten into Werner’s demand that Justin Perry assassinate the King and Queen of Spain for …. reasons, I guess.  Just as with the first book, describing the plot of Vatican Kill probably makes it sound more interesting than it actually is.  As over the top as all of the action and the scheming is, the prose describing it is fairly mundane and the author continually gets lost in Perry’s ruminations about God and the past.  I have to admit that I read the book very quickly, first because it was called Vatican Kill and I can only imagine what my Spanish and Italian grandmothers would have thought about that and secondly, because Justin Perry was such a creepy character that I really didn’t want to spend too much time with him.  The book ended on a note so grotesque that I washed my hands afterwards.  Seriously, Justin Perry was one messed up dude!

Film Review: Gold (dir by Anthony Hayes)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

If you’ve ever wanted to see Zac Efron covered in flies, Gold is the film for you!

Actually, I’m being perhaps a bit more snarky than I should be.  Gold is actually a pretty good movie and Zac Efron deserves a lot of credit for trying something different.  That said, when all is said and done, I think the thing that most people will remember about this movie will be the flies.  Efron plays a character who spends several days stranded in the desert.  As we all know from watching any of the films that Clint Eastwood made with Sergio Leone, the desert is full of flies and there’s nothing they like more than to land on the blisters on someone’s sun-baked face.  So, it makes sense that Efron spends the majority of the film dealing with flies.  Of course, he also has to deal with feral desert dogs, a mysterious stranger who may or may not exist, and a freak dust storm.

Gold takes place in the near future.  Gold was filmed in Australia and, in many ways, it seems to take place in the same cinematic universe as the first Mad Max.  It’s the early days of a dystopia, when there’s still enough comforts around for people to pretend that things can still be normal.  People still watch television.  They still drive cars.  They still use telephones.  There’s still some sort of government that is supposedly in charge of things.  Society still exists but all around are clues that it is in the process of collapsing.  Things are on the verge of changing and they won’t be for the better.

Zac Efron plays Virgil, a man who wants to go to some place known as the Compound.  Keith (played by Anthony Hayes) has been hired to drive Virgil through the desert.  From the start, Keith and Virgil don’t get along.  Keith gets angry at Virgil for wasting water.  He gets even angrier when Virgil turns up the air conditioning in Keith’s truck and causes the motor to overheat.  However, when Keith and Virgil come across a giant gold nugget in the desert, they become reluctant partners.  When Keith heads to another town to get an excavator so they can dig up the gold, Virgil remains in the desert.  His job is to guard the gold, though one has to wonder who he thinks he’s guarding it from.  Virgil is literally in the middle of nowhere.

Keith leaves Virgil with a set of instructions of how to survive in the desert.  However, within hours of Keith leaving, Virgil starts to lose it.  He doesn’t have enough water.  He doesn’t have enough food.  Keith has taken the truck so it’s not like Virgil could go anywhere, even if he was willing to abandon the gold.  There are feral dogs all around.  There are flies on Virgil’s face.  And there are other scavengers in the desert as well….

There’s really not much of a story to Gold.  Virgil waits in the desert and loses his mind, all because he’s not willing to surrender that gold.  He’s a victim of his own greed, which admittedly is not the most original idea in the world.  (Consider the case of Fred C. Dobbs, for instance.)  That said, you do have to admire Efron’s willingness to allow himself to look absolutely terrible on screen.  From the flies to the dust storm to the scorching sun, the film goes out of its way to destroy Efron’s good looks but there’s a bigger meaning to it beyond Efron’s well-known desire to be taken seriously as an actor.  With each fly and speck of dust that lands on Efron’s face, Gold reminds the viewer that the desert will always win.  The desert and the animals that call it home don’t care about gold and they certainly don’t care about their prey.  In the desert, it’s all about survival.  Civilization may collapse but the desert will remain forever.

Visually, there’s a harsh beauty to Gold.  The desert is both frightening and fascinating at the same time and the scenes of Efron frame against the landscape really do drive home the film’s point.  One way or the other, the desert will always win.

Lisa Marie’s Week In Television: 7/31/22 — 8/6/22

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Yes, I watched a lot of old TV shows this week.  I was doing some work around the office and the retro channels always seem to keep me focused.

Here are this week’s thoughts on what I saw!

Allo Allo (Sunday Night, PBS)

Fortunately, the attempted execution of Rene and Edith failed and they were safely returned to Nouvion.  Unfortunately, before they got back to their café, the Resistance attempted to run the business and thoroughly screwed things up.  Meanwhile, realizing that the war not going particularly well for them, the German occupiers made plans to leave France and perhaps relocate some place with a warmer climate.  While all of this went on, Officer Crabtree continued to wish everyone a “Good Moaning,” because Officer Crabtree was a professional.

The Bachelorette (Monday Night, ABC)

This week’s episode was extremely awkward to watch, with Rachel feeling insecure when compared to Gabby and the bachelors themselves not being particularly sensitive about the situation, but at least Meatball was given a second chance.  Seriously, this entire franchise will be redeemed if Rachel ends up getting engaged, even if it’s just temporarily, to Meatball.

Better Call Saul (Monday Night, AMC)

I am so worried about what’s going to happen to Jimmy/Saul/Gene!  During this week’s episode, we flashed back to Saul first meeting Walt and Jesse and then we flash forwarded to Gene treating Buddy and Jeff in much the same way that Walt used to treat Jesse.  Especially after Gene’s phone call to Kim, I’m starting to worry that Gene is becoming just as self-destructive as Walt was at the end of Breaking Bad.  Considering that there’s only a few episodes left before this show ends, that’s not a good development for those of us who are hoping that Jimmy/Saul/Gene gets some sort of a happy ending.

Big Brother 24 (Everyday, CBS and Paramount+)

I’m writing about the latest, surprisingly entertaining season of Big Brother at the Big Brother Blog!  This week, Nicole was voted out and proved to be as delusional on her way out and she was on her way in.  Even after Julie Chen explained to her why she had been targeted and voted out, Nicole still didn’t get it.

The Challenge (Wednesday Night, CBS)

This week, yet another former member of Big Brother 23‘s Cookout was eliminated.  Azah is out of the game, leaving Kyland as the last member of the Cookout standing.  Considering what happened when Kyland was voted out of the Big Brother House, it somehow seems cosmically appropriate that he’s managed to survive the Challenge while the other members of his former alliance have been eliminated.  That said, I hope Derek X. wins the show.

CHiPs (Weekday Afternoons, Charge TV)

I watched two episodes of this 70s motorcycle cop show on Monday.  Both episodes were pretty much the same.  There was a big accident on the freeway.  There was a lot of motorcycle cop action.  There was some pretty California scenery.  The bass-driven theme song is the main thing that I remember about the two episodes.  The show was bland but the music was great.

Diff’Rent Strokes (Weekday Afternoons, Rewind TV)

Diff’Rent Strokes is one of those old sitcoms that I’ve heard a lot about but I’ve never really watched, just because everything I’ve ever heard about it just made it sound like a pretty stupid viewing experience.  That said, I did need some background noise on Monday so, when I saw that the show was now on Rewind TV, I decided to catch two episodes.

In the first episode, old Mr. Drummond attempted to go camping with his new stepson but things got complicated when his stepson’s biological father also decided to tag along.  In the second episode, Mr. Drummond decided to do the Undercover Boss thing by working in one of his factories.  He discovered that he wasn’t popular with his workers and that he needed to pay them more.  Surprisingly, no one saw through his disguise, despite the fact that it only consisted of a fake mustache that didn’t even match his hair color.  It was all pretty dumb.  For a rich man, Mr. Drummond lived in a really boring penthouse.  Like seriously, if you’re that rich, update your décor.

Family Ties (Weekday Afternoons, Rewind TV)

I used two episodes of this very 80s sitcom for background noise on Monday.  On the first episode, Elyse (the mother of the family at the center of the show) was struggling with her conscience about whether or not she should fire a recently divorced but extremely annoying employee.  It was kind of obvious that Elyse needed to fire her but Elysa was a former hippie and, as a result, had no idea how to wield authority.  On the second episode, an impossibly young Michael J. Fox had to babysit his bratty younger sister.  He took her to a poker game.  She got annoyed with being treated like an afterthought and wandered off.  Luckily, everything worked out in the end and lessons were learned all around.

Fantasy Island (Monday Morning, GetTV)

I watched two episodes of the original Fantasy Island on Monday morning but I have to admit that I was half-asleep during both of them.

The first episode featured two fantasies.  In the serious fantasy, a jazz trumpeter went back in time to New Orleans so that he could play with his idols.  In the comedic fantasy, a woman and the two men who were in love with her got stranded on an island in the Bermuda Triangle.  The goofier of the two men was played by football player Joe Namath.  His performance here was better than his performance in C.C. and Company but not by much.

In the second episode, the main fantasy dealt with a private detective who wanted to solve a case with Humphrey Bogart.  The guy playing Bogart did a passable imitation.  The other fantasy featured Michelle Phillips as a woman who wanted to be “the most famous equestrian in history.”  She thought this would mean that she would be famous but instead, the Island took her words literally and she was transformed into Lady Godiva.  First off, why did the island take her words literally when it didn’t do that for anyone else?  And secondly, is Lady Godiva really the most famous equestrian in history?  Oh well, the important thing is that everyone learned a lesson.

Full House (Sunday Evening, MeTV)

I watched two episodes of this show on Sunday and I’m sure I lost at least two brain cells as a result.  The first episode featured Uncle Joey auditioning to be the voice of a cartoon chipmunk or something like that.  Frankie Avalon was the episode’s special guest star.  Remember Frankie’s cameo in Casino?  “I have 8 children.  It was my pleasure.”  This was followed by an episode in which Aunt Becky told Danny that DJ was sneaking out of the house to hook up with her boyfriend.  DJ got mad and said, “I thought you were my friend!”  Poor DJ.  I don’t blame her for wanting to escape the Full House.

Ghost Whisperer (Weekday Mornings, Start TV)

I watched an episode on Monday.  Melinda was (understandably) concerned that Aiden was now seeing and talking to ghosts.  When the ghost of a girl who had recently died of Leukemia insisted on taking Aiden on a journey through town, Melinda had to track them down and find out what the girl wanted.  Fortunately, since this was Ghost Whisperer and not Medium, things worked themselves out.

Hart to Hart (Monday Morning, GetTV)

In this very 80s detective show, a fabulously rich married couple (played by Robert Wagner and Stephanie Powers) traveled the world, spent a lot of money, and occasionally solved mysteries.  Their loyal chauffer was Max, played by the gravelly voiced Lionel Stander.

I watched two episodes of Monday morning.  In the first episode, the Harts were taking part in a car race in Greece.  A Greek tycoon wanted to kill off Jonathan Hart so that he could take over Jonathan Hart Industries.  Fortunately, he didn’t succeed.  If he had, I imagine they would have had to change the title of the show.  The second episode featured a mysterious woman who claimed to Jennifer Hart’s half-sister.  Needless to say, Jonathan did some investigating and it turned out that there was more to the story.

Anyway, the two episodes that I saw were kind of dull plotwise but I did enjoy the show’s shameless celebration of money and glamour.  It was all very 80s.

Inspector Lewis (YouTube)

I watched an episode with my TV Mysteries friends on Tuesday night.  A buried body was discovered.  Hathaway and Lewis investigated.  Lewis was in a notably cranky mood in this episode and even dismissively referred to one woman as being “Miss Marple.”  My theory is that Lewis had a drinking problem.  Usually, Hathaway was able to cover for him but this week, Lewis just lost control.

King of the Hill (Hubi)

Early Friday morning, I watched the episode in which Hank and his undefeated softball team took an exhibition game against the Ace of Diamonds and His Jewels just a bit too seriously.  “Believe to achieve.”

Kojak (Monday Morning, GetTV)

Kojak is a show from the 70s, about a bald homicide detective who calls people baby and who sucks on lollipops.  Kojak was played by Telly Savalas, who was also Blofeld in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and the Devil in Lisa and the Devil.

The episode that I watched on Monday morning was the first episode that I had ever actually seen of this show, though I had read about it in the past.  In this episode, Ruth Gordon played a psychic who had been having dreams in which she saw women being murdered.  Luckily, Kojak was there to eventually capture the killer.  Neither Gordon nor Savalas were particularly subtle performers and, in this episode, they both seemed to enjoy competing to see who could best steal every scene that they shared.  Add to that, the killer was played by Andy Robinson, who also played Scorpio in Dirty Harry.  It was kind of entertaining to watch.

Magnum P.I. (Weekday Mornings, Charge TV)

On Monday, I watched an episode of the original 80s Magnum, P.I.  Magnum’s friend T.C. was in a coma.  Magnum had to figure out why T.C.’s helicopter crashed.  Luckily, the mystery was solved and everyone survived.  The Hawaiian scenery was lovely.

Medium (Weekday Morning, Start TV)

On Monday’s episode, Allison had a dream about a courtroom shooting and also discovered that she wasn’t the only psychic offering up her abilities to the legal system.

Mike Judge’s Beavis and Butt-Head (Paramount+)

I watched the first two episodes of this show on Thursday night, immediately after the Nicole eviction on Big Brother.  I laughed and I cringed.  Beavis and Butt-Head don’t look like they use deodorant so that worries me.  You can read Jeff’s review of the show here!

Open All Hours (Sunday Night, PBS)

It’s been a few months since I last watched Open All Hours.  I checked it out this week.  Arkwright was cheating his customers and Granville was consumed with resentment.

Traffik (DVD)

I watched Traffik on Wednesday and Thursday and I wrote about it here.

Book Review: Mafia: The Government’s Secret File On Organized Crime

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

If you are a writer and you’re currently working on a novel or a script about the Mafia in the late 50 or early 60s, you simply must include a character based on Usche Gelb.  Gelb was born in Austria in 1897 and apparently came to New York City when he was just a teenager.  Between 1913 and the 60s, he was arrested multiple times and charged with everything from disorderly conduct to felonious assault to perjury to federal narcotics conspiracy.  According to the FBI, despite not being Italian, he was a powerful figure in the Mafia and served as a liaison with various international drug cartels.  He also worked as a machinery salesman and as a florist.  He and his wife Ethel lived on West End Avenue and spent their summers at Tenaha Lake.  His nickname was King Gelb.

You might also want to include a character based on Joey Caesar (real name: Joseph Divarco), who owned a glassware distribution but who was secretly one of the top men in the Chicago Outfit.  Or maybe Sam Giacana, who took over Capone’s organization and eventually ended up getting murdered in his own kitchen.  Don’t forget Luigi Fratto, the crime boss of Des Moines, Iowa who was so confident in his position that he flashed a big grin for his mugshot.  And certainly, be sure to remember Joe Civello, who ran the Dallas mob and who had the look of a weary accountant whose only client was being audited.

All of these people (and more) are profiled in Mafia, a fascinating book that contains the over 800 organized crime dossiers that the Treasury Department put together in the late 50s and 60s.  Some of the gangsters profiled have familiar names.  Meyer Lansky, Mickey Cohen, Lucky Luciano, Johnny Rosselli, Carlos Marcello, Vito Genovese, and Joseph Valachi are all included.  Even more interesting to me, though, are the less well-known gangsters.  All of them were prominent within their organization but most of them managed to hide in the shadows of history.

For history nerds and true crime buffs, it makes for interesting reading.  Almost all of the men profiled in the book came from blue collar backgrounds.  Many of them were immigrants.  The great majority were from Italy but Germany, France, Austria, and the United Kingdom are all represented as well.  When they weren’t committing crimes, many of them worked as salesmen.  Some were truck drivers.  Many of them were union reps.  A large number either worked at or owned small taverns.  Many of them had been arrested for violent crimes but most of them also had families and vacation homes and everything else that was held up as being a part of the American dream in the 50s and 60s.  Most people probably wouldn’t give these men a second look but, secretly, they were among the most powerful people in their city and state.

It’s hard not to become fascinated with the people in this book.  Enough details are provided in the government’s sparse reports that you get a clue for who they were but enough is left vague to reward those of us with an active imagination.  Why, for instance, was John Daneillo nicknamed “Baldy” when his mugshot shows that he had a full of head of hair?  Who nicknamed him Baldy and did it have anything to do with his day job as a construction worker?  And why did Lucky Luciano give Patsey Matranga, an olive oil salesman who was a known narcotics smuggler despite having never been arrested once in his life, an old Oldsmobile?  Was it a sign of friendship or something else?  Maybe Luciano was just sick of looking at the car.  These are the type of questions that are raised by reading the dossiers within Mafia.  They’re just waiting for creative reader to answer them.

Film Review: Ted K. (dir by Tony Stone)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Ted K. is a film about a man who lives in a cabin in the Montana wilderness.  The man was a child genius who attended Harvard University when he was only 16.  He worked briefly as a professor but, in the early 70s, he started to retreat from society.  He moved into a tiny cabin, one that he had previously built with his brother.  The man’s name is Ted Kaczynski.  He would later be known as the Unabomber.  As of today, he is known as prisoner #04475-046 at a Colorado supermax prison.

When Ted K. begins, Ted (played by Sharlto Copley) has been living in the cabin for close to ten years.  He is usually unshaven and unbathed.  He loves the wilderness but he hates all evidence of technology.  He screams at jets as they fly overhead.  When a group of vacationers ride their snowmobiles across his property, Ted responds by breaking into their house and taking an axe to their snowmobiles.  Ted carries on an inner dialogue with himself, talking about how technology and progress are destroying the world.  He also talks about how he can’t handle the idea of ever having to take orders from a woman.  Ted hunts a rabbit and then thanks its spirit for giving up its life so that he could eat.  I’ve never quite understood people who do that.  Is the spirt of the rabbit supposed to be happy that its body is getting eaten just because the schmuck who shot it offered up some halfass prayer?

Sometimes, Ted goes into town and he calls his mom on an old payphone, one that regularly steals his coins.  He usually calls to demand money because Ted is incapable of holding down a job.  Ted yells at his mom, blaming her for his lack of social skills and sexual experience.  Ted swears that he will never again speak to his brother.  Later, Ted calls his brother to beg for money and swears that he will never again speak to their mother.  When he’s not in front of the payphone, he can be found buying tools at the local hardware store.  He also sometimes goes out so that he can peep through windows and point his rifle at anyone who he sees.  He gets especially upset when he sees a man and woman about to make love.  Little seems to anger Ted more than knowing that there are actually happy people in the world.

In short, Ted Kaczynski is a loser, an incel who is bitter about having never been able to get his once promising life together.  He hates everyone, with the exception of the always-sympathetic girlfriend who pops up in his fantasies.  Every loser needs someone or something to blame and Ted challenges his self-loathing and his sexual frustration into rage against modern society.  When he first appears in the film, Ted has already made his first bomb.  As the film progresses, he starts to send his bombs out.  Some, he mails.  Some, he leaves sitting in front of computer stores and university buildings.  Eventually, he becomes the most wanted man in the country but Ted has an offer to make to the authorities.  If they just let him publish his manifesto, he’ll call of his reign of terror….

Ted K tells the story of Kaczynski’s life in Montana, often using passages lifted straight from Kaczynski’s journals to illustrate his inner thoughts.  It’s an interesting film because, on the one hand, it’s clearly sympathetic to Kaczynski’s feelings about technology.  The film starts with a slow motion shot that makes the snowmobiles plowing through Montana wilderness look like an invading, faceless army.  Shots of blissful and silent nature are contrasted with shots of lumber mills, airplanes, and humming electrical wires.  On the other hand, the film never makes the mistake of trying to turn Kaczynski himself into a heroic character.  Ted is a creep from the minute that he first appears and he assures us in his own words that his main goal is to get revenge on a world that he feels has rejected him.  He’s a misogynist who alienates everyone that he meets and who tries to hide his insecurity behind a projected air of arrogance.  There are a few scenes in which Ted lowers his mask just enough to reveal his loneliness and that he’s someone who is incapable of understanding how communication works.  He desperately wants to be able to talk to people and have someone in his life but he doesn’t know how to do it.  His natural awkwardness gets in the way every time.  Ted turns his anger out on the world.  He may claim that he’s angry with what technology had done to society but the truth of the matter is that he’s angry at a world that has passed him by.  Retreating to a cabin to seek enlightenment is charming when someone is in their 20s but far less impressive when that person is nearly 40.

With a two-hour running time, Ted K runs a bit long.  The film’s final 30 minutes seem to move slowly, largely because we already know how the story is going to end.  That said, Sharlto Copley makes Ted into a compelling character without ever making the mistake of trying to make him sympathetic.  Director Tony Stone and cinematographer Nathan Corbin gives us some truly striking shots of the Montana wilderness.  (At the very least, one can see why Ted would view it as being a potential paradise.)  Blanck Mass provides a wonderfully ominous score, one that puts the viewer straight into Ted’s mind.  Ted K deserves credit for both its refusal to idealize Kaczynski and also its attempt to understand just what exactly causes him to take the actions that he did.  It makes for a valuable study of a man who has influenced terrorists on both the Left and the Far Right.

Incidentally, I once took a philosophy class where the TA was a huge Kaczynski fan.  He suggested that everyone read the Unabomber Manifesto and “judge it by what it says, not what the author did.”  I couldn’t get past the first paragraph.

Miniseries Review: Traffik (dir by Alistair Reid)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

First aired in 1989 and running a total of six episodes, Traffik is a British miniseries that takes a look at the War on Drugs.

British minister Jack Lithgow (Bill Paterson) has negotiated a treaty with Pakistan.  The UK will send increased aide to Pakistan if the government will crack down on the heroin trade.  In theory, it sounds like a good idea.  Pakistan will get extra cash while joining the effort to stop the flow of heroin into Europe.  In reality, it harms the poor farmers in Pakistan.  After soldiers destroy his village’s poppy fields, Fazal (Jamal Shah) is left with no way to support his family.  He travels to the city, where he gets a job with drug lord Tariq Butt (Talat Hussain).  It’s a job that Fazal has to take in order to feed his family but it’s also a job that puts his family’s safety at risk.

After the heroin in processed in Pakistan, it is smuggled into Europe by men like Karl Rosshalde (Juraj Kukura), a German businessman whose company is a front for his operations.  When two German police detectives (Fritz Müller-Scherz and Tilo Prückner) arrest Jacques (Peter Lakenmacher), one of Karl’s couriers, it looks like Karl might finally being going to prison.  However, Karl’s British wife, Helen (Lindsay Duncan), proves herself to be just a ruthless as he was when it comes to running his operations.

Even with Karl on trial, the drug trade continues.  The heroin that is processed in Pakistan and smuggled through Germany eventually ends up in the UK, where it is used to by Caroline (a very young Julia Ormond), the teenage daughter of Jack Lithgow.  When Caroline runs away from home, Jack searches the streets and back alleys of London and, for the first time, he starts to understand the futility of Europe’s war on drugs.

If Traffik sounds familiar, that’s because it served as the basis for Steven Soderbergh’s 2000 film, Traffic.  When I watched Traffik this week, I was actually surprised to see how closely Soderbergh’s film stuck to the plot of the miniseries.  The only difference, beyond shifting the action from Europe to North America, is that Soderbergh replaced the farmer’s storyline with a story involving Benicio del Toro as a Mexican policeman.  That’s a bit of shame, actually.  Traffic is one of my favorite Soderbergh films but it is a bit cop-heavy.  The people who actually do the day-to-day work in the drug trade, as opposed to the drug lords, aren’t really represented in Soderbergh’s film.  As the British miniseries shows, people like Fazal end up working in the drug trade not because they’re evil but because they literally have no other choice.  It’s either work for someone like Tariq or starve to death.

As I mentioned earlier, Traffic is one of my favorite Soderbergh films.  Considering that I usually find Soderbergh’s films to be hit-or-miss, it’s actually kind of remarkable just how effective Traffic is.  The original miniseries, however, is superior to the film in every way.  Some of that is because the miniseries has six hours to explore its world whereas Soderbergh had to cram a lot of incidents into 147 minutes.  Beyond that, the miniseries succeeds because director Alistair Reid takes a straight-foward, no frills approach to telling his story.  Even at his best, Soderbergh has a tendency to be a bit pretentious.  Even though Traffic deals with real-life issues, it never allows you to forget that you’re watching a film.  Traffik, on the other hand, tells its story with an almost documentary-style immediacy.  One need only compare the scenes where Bill Paterson searches for Julia Ormond in Traffik to the scenes where Michael Douglas searches for Erika Christensen in Traffic to see not only the differences between Reid and Soderbergh’s style but also to see why Reid’s more gritty style works better for the story that’s being told.  Whereas Soderbergh can’t resist framing Christensen with a blonde halo when she’s finally rescued by Douglas, Traffik leaves little doubt that Ormond has been through Hell and that, even if she does eventually beat her addictions, she’ll be carrying the scars of her experience for the rest of her life.  Whereas Traffic ended on a note of hope, Traffik ends with the realization that there is no perfect solution.

Traffic and Traffik are both good looks at the destructiveness of both drug abuse and the efforts to treat drug addiction as a crime.  Both are worth watching.