Last one!

Distribution possibilities don’t allow me to give an outright review, but I thoroughly enjoyed this successful overview of the American horror film. Visually, Nightmares in Red, White and Blue resembles one of those TV docs that pop up around Halloween time, counting down the scariest moments of what-have-you, but while those programs want only to be top ten lists of memorable movies, Nightmares takes it a step further by contextualizing those successful scares. More than any other film genre, horror is an industry that has grown along with its viewers, adapting to what makes its audiences afraid – World Wars, genocide, government paranoia etc. Even trashy film can be a wonderful chronicler of the human experience, directly or indirectly, because it will always be a product of the times in which it was made. With talking heads from horror bighshots like John Carpenter, Wes Craven, and George Romero and narrated by Lance Henriksen, I have to say: I took a class on the horror film in college and Nightmares is very much a condensed but equally insightful version of that information, for thousands of dollars less in tuition.

Future X Cops is a paint-by-numbers, sci-fi action flick that’s doing gangbusters in China but is unlikely to make it past the bargain bin here in the US. The reason for its success abroad is simple: Andy Lau is one of the world’s biggest superstars. They used to call him the “Chinese Tom Cruise,” but I think Lau’s publicists would prefer to steer clear of that comparison these days. Still, it’s hard not to compare the relative slump the two stars find themselves experiencing in 2010, with Cruise’s Knight and Day pulling in the smallest opening weekend in 15 years for the one-time sure thing, and Lau slumming it in Future-X Cops. A possible thread regarding Lau’s intentions here leads to his relationship with director Jing Wong, who coincidentally directed a film called Future Cops with Lau back in 1993. That film was a ‘Street Fighter’ parody with no relation to Future-X Cops, but the possibility remains that this is a case of old friends scratching backs. It better be because, contrary to what Cops would indicate, Lau is not usually this bad an actor.

Here are the numbers Lau and Wong paint in Future-X Cops: In the year 2080 the world has been saved from an energy crisis by a scientist who has invented a giant shield that envelopes the earth and soaks up solar rays. The loss is so devastating for the energy companies that they create a team of cyborgs to assassinate the scientist by going back in time to 2020 and stopping him from ever inventing the solar shield. Super-cop Kidd Zhao (Lau) travels back as well, to protect the young scientist and to seek revenge for the loss of his own wife.

It’s a simple set-up and, although it bars the film from bringing anything terribly original to the plate, it could still be a good time. After all, I cannot count on ten hands the number of horror films that tread familiar ground and still emerge as pieces of relevant cinema. But Cops unfolds as you would expect, with some broad humor and a misty-eyed love story, hoping to cover all the bases. As a sci-fi fan, the film’s worst insult is that it relies on visual effects and I’ve seen better CGI in pictures 10-years-old, including a few Asylum pictures(!). I considered enjoying Cops on the level of camp but found myself incapable of submitting to an experience that never decides whether it wants to be funny, thrilling or romantic. A somewhat novel scene at an amusement park did cause a smile, and bad guy Kalon is played seriously by Siu Wong Fan of Ip Man (2008) and Riki-Oh (1993) but he’s not really on screen enough to chew any of the cheap-looking scenery.

If you’re a Lau or STV Chinese-action-flicks fan, you’re likely steeled for a film like Future-X Cops already. Anyone else is looking for action in all the wrong places.

Also at The Evening Class and Twitch.

I wonder how often filmmakers work backwards from a good title, as director Julius Kemp has admitted to doing with Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre. The film itself seems to work its way backwards as well, opening threateningly with real whale-hunting footage and a gritty look, but perhaps sensing its slim chances of living up to the similarly titled Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), Reykjavik drops the grit about a half hour in to focus on black comedy. It’s a smart move, and the film is often darkly funny, I only wish the filmmakers had gone back and reworked the whole thing because I can see a lot of viewers shutting it off before they get to the good stuff.

After the whaling footage we are introduced to an international cast of harpoon fodder – a rich Japanese couple, a drunk Frenchman and a few other forgettables – and everyone speaks in their native language or terribly stilted English. The realities of working with such a diverse cast make the ‘getting to know you’ phase of Reykjavik feel like everyone is playing charades. It’s hard to spot those often clearly-defined heroes or villains – well maybe you can pick out the villains. Initially, it’s hard not to compare Reykjavik to TCM, no matter how dissimilar they wind up being. The villainous family are whale fishermen down on their luck, similiar to Texas’ family of slaughterhouse workers, and they come to the faux rescue of the whale watchers after a violent accident. Then there’s the casting of Gunnar Hansen as captain of the troubled boat. Having played the chainsaw-wielding Leatherface in the original 1974 Massacre, Hansen is a well-known name to horror fans and a big reason Reykjavik is getting so much play at horror themed festivals like Hole in the Head.

Once you get to the actual massacre, Reykjavik drops the pretenses of plot and becomes kind of fun. It still feels like it was written in one sitting, but now those numerous narrative inconsistencies bring big dumb applause. It can be hard to tell how much is meant to be taken as comedy, but at some point I decided I was going to have a good time with it and that was not hard to do. The harpoon I mentioned earlier is particularly enjoyable, the violence fairly brutal and the character reversals completely off-the-wall. It never makes any real sense, but in its own way Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre is better than most STV horror. Still, I imagine its best days will be on the festival circuit. Watching with a crowd of like-minded fans, all of them playing spot the reference, is the kind of mindless experience that we go to these festivals for.

Look at that, I went the whole review without a single Eyjafjallajokull joke.

*************************

I’ll be back tomorrow with a review for the closing night film Future-X Cops!

Also at The Evening Class and Twitch.

I always assumed that kappa meant cucumber in Japanese, leaping to the conclusion as a result of an immodest consumption of kappa sushi rolls over the course of my life. I now know that kappa are green goblins that live in Japanese ponds, and who specialize in swimming and sumo wrestling; it is because the kappa’s favorite food is cucumbers that the sushi received its name. These gaijin-centric facts are revealed early on in Death Kappa by a self-identified Professor Tanaka who speaks directly to the camera, and including them for viewers indicates the producers’ awareness of the appeal of low-budget Japanese filmmaking in the West.  Thanks to the unexpected success of splatter hits Tokyo Gore Police (2008) and Machine Girl (2008), producers Yoko Hayama and Yoshinori Chiba are familiar with the tastes of Western audiences and the first half of Death Kappa, with its similar barrel-scraping budget and gleeful stupidity, is familiar ground.

The story goes that a young girl promises to protect the kind kappa who lives near her grandmother’s house. The kappa is pretty gross looking, with a turtle shell on his back and hair in all the wrong places, but that’s part of its charm. This particular kappa also loves terrible J-pop and dances around in the backyard before being suddenly ensconced by a team of renegade japanese soldiers accompanied by a woman dressed like Female Convict: Scorpion who wheels her dead grandfather around in a wheelchair and who wants to use the kappa to create an army of “amphibious weaponized fishmen.” To be honest, I don’t understand half of what I’m talking about anymore, but I figure If you pay too much attention to the details of Death Kappa you’re missing the point. I’ve made films and I can recognize a group of people just having a great time making movies.

Around the halfway point, the film jarringly switches directions and becomes the kaiju film touted by the trailer. As fun as all the goofy evil-scientist stuff is, the kaiju portion is way more entertaining, with large sets full of miniatures and projections and attack planes with clearly-seen strings attached. The kappa, now huge-ified, must battle a monster whose name I didn’t note but I’m pretty sure rhymes with Legolas, as the japanese army attempts to stop them both. It’s immensely silly to watch little remote-controlled tanks and death rays shoot pop-pops at a man in a rubber suit. You’ll never catch me declaring Death Kappa a good film, but it never pretends to be. It’s good for a laugh. Two laughs? Well, mileage will vary.

At 75 minutes, Kappa will be either just the right amount of fun or a real struggle, depending on how funny you find watching the big rubber suits crush plastic models. Boys will be boys, after all.

***********************

It’s a nice kappa, I swear.

Death Kappa screens tomorrow night as one of Hole in the Head’s opening night films. Cross-posted at The Evening Class and Twitch.

Hole in the Head always prefers that you have a good time over a good film. This year’s line-up continues the gore and guffaws, and some of the films manage to be wholly original through sheer gumption and insanity. Titles like Mil Mascaras vs The Aztec Mummy and Ticked-Off Trannies With Knives seem to only encourage audiences to come to the showings drunk, and the programmers’ obsessions with Miike and The Machine Girl bring the latest iterations of each, but for my money Hole in the Head’s best films might be the older ones on the bill – The Exterminator, Lady Terminator and Metropolis 1984 Redux.

The Exterminator (1980)

The Exterminator is a classic of crap genre film, a NY anomaly of gleeful macho-isms and vigilante justice in the wake of Death Wish (1974). Opening with a bang in the jungles of Vietnam before taking to the streets of The Big Apple, The Exterminator has some great scenes of slo-mo action and gore but struggles with a scattered narrative and pretty piss poor action hero – but those are both pros and cons for a film of this ilk. Robert Ginty as John “The Exterminator” Eastland has a droopy face and very little motive to do in a lot of the street punks he murders, but luckily there is only a single city cop on the case and he’ll never catch Eastland because he keeps taking time off to go on dates. Made in 1980, The Exterminator still has that gritty 70s grindhouse look and feel, and it even takes a stab at an ending that reflects post-Vietnam paranoia. Doesn’t work though.

Lady Terminator (1988)

Killing two male fantasies with one stone, this Indonesian production beat its inspirators by 15 years in bringing a female Terminator to the screen. Mixing island fantasy with sci-fi, the female Terminator of the title is actually the reincarnation of The South Sea Queen, a demon who seduces men and then cuts off their you-know-whats. The differences barely matter though, and Lady Terminator does more than pay homage to the 1984 classic, fully recreating the eye gouge at the sink and the “Come with me if you want to live.” With die-hard pacing, 80s fashion and Indonesian pop music, Lady is easily one of the better cheapo action flicks of the 80s, Indonesia or otherwise, and sports some great-terrible dubbing.

Metropolis 1984 Redux

Yep, that Metropolis. Having really enjoyed the 1927 silent classic, disco-star Giorgio Moroder pulled some strings and re-cut his own version, tailor-made for 1984 audiences. The man behind Midnight Express’ “Chase” theme and the mastermind of Donna Summer’s best hits re-scored the film and added a bunch of crazy colors, but the core remains. In addition, Moroder re-imagined a lot of lost scenes from the original cut, but managed a product 40 minutes shorter by making most of the inter-titles subtitles. Is it blasphemy? Well, for the haughtier of film fans there can be no doubt, but Moroder’s release did gain the film a new audience who would not have otherwise seen the film and his redux version has its own charms stemming from a time-capsule candy coating and terrible Freddie Mercury theme song. Sure, there were probably a bunch of kids who treated Metropolis Redux like a planetarium laser show, but let’s not pretend we’re above something as fun as a laser show.

**********************

Hole in the Head 2010 begins on Thursday the 8th and continues until the 22nd. I’ll have a bunch more reviews coming over the next couple of days, so stay tuned.

Lovingly cross-posted at The Evening Class and Twitch.

Splice (2010)

Splice is the best kind of sci-fi movie – original and surprising. When maverick geneticist Elsa (Sarah Polley) asks “What’s the worst that could happen?”, we cannot fathom that the worst will manifest itself as a hybrid creature named Dren. But that’s what you get when you illegally splice human DNA with the genetic material from a number of animals, including frogs and birds, I guess. More surprising is the speed at which Elsa and her husband Clive (Adrien Brody) come to care for Dren, breaking more rules to keep her alive and a secret. Splice is a horror film and it is often very tense, but in concentrating on the relationship between Clive and Elsa over blood and action, Director Vincenzo Natali sidesteps the “chinese food” experience that lesser horror is prone to. For a film that is often daring and inventive, Splice sports a surprisingly conventional climax, but at least I wasn’t still hungry.

Winter’s Bone (2010)

I can see why Winter’s Bone racked up the awards at Sundance and took home the audience award here at the SFIFF. It features an immensely strong female lead in young actress Jennifer Lawrence (The Burning Plain, 2008) and it’s a very American film, in so much as it is a story that would not have the same impact were it set anywhere else. High in the Ozark Mountains, seventeen-year-old Ree Dolly (Lawrence) is informed that her meth-cooking father has put up the family property as collateral to secure bail for an impending court date, and if he fails to show, Ree, her two younger siblings and her invalid mother will be thrown off their land. An Odyssean quest for Dad, through seedy shanties and encounters with less than friendly folk, Winter’s Bone’s always menacing atmosphere and authentically-somber tone more than make up for a sometimes languid pacing.

Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work (2010)

Joan Rivers : A Piece of Work isn’t your traditional biopic, instead inviting audiences to watch as Joan Rivers desperately searches for work. At 75 years old, Rivers is at a severe disadvantage in a youth-centric field, but when you’re the first woman to push the boundaries of comedy you don’t just stop. A Piece of Work follows the sharp-tongued comedienne over the course of a year in the industry as she stars in her own play (Rivers prefers to think of herself as an actress), joins a cast of “D-listers” on The Celebrity Apprentice with her daughter Melissa, and slums it in New York nightclubs where her act is as outrageous as ever. Rivers is at a time in her life where nothing is off-limits, a windfall for any documentary, and hearing Rivers admit that she’s willing to do denture commercials and wear diapers in order to keep working is both funny and profound, proving what a powerful addiction celebrity can become.

Whoever said “Nobody likes a critic” never met Roger Ebert. From his early days writing reviews for the Chicago Sun Times and moonlighting screenplays for Russ Meyer, to the inimitable (so proven since his departure) At The Movies, Roger Ebert has boldly walked to places other critics wouldn’t have dreamt possible if Roger hadn’t done it first. He also sets the bar high for the rest of us – a Pulitzer Prize for criticism? Someday…

As a personal inspirator, I was thrilled to learn that Roger had been selected to receive the Mel Novikoff award at this year’s San Francisco International Film Festival. Flying into town just days after the end of his own Ebertfest in Chicago, Roger and his wife Chaz tempted exhaustion in joining a troupe of Ebert-lovers and big-time movie makers at the historic Castro Theatre.

The recent victim of thyroid cancer, Roger has lost his ability to speak but the constraints of silence have made the man only more animated. As he and Chaz were remembered on stage by directors who have been blessed personally by his enthusiasm for film, Roger played class clown, literally poking fun at the acclaimed directors as they spoke from a podium facing the audience and colluding with the audience with his permanent smile.

(L to R) Terry Zwigoff, Jason Reitman, Roger Ebert, Phillip Kaufman, Errol Morris.  Photo by @popcornreel, via Roger’s Twitter

Terry Zwigoff led the charge and embodied his films’ tendencies to revolve around an “oddball outcast” as he flashed back to the time he forged the audience cards for a pre-screening of his 1994 film Crumb. Both Zwigoff and next speaker, documentarian Errol Morris, spoke openly and from the heart about Roger’s championing of small films, while Jason Reitman delivered a pre-written speech that displayed his own talent as a writer. As one of the more recent benefactors of Roger’s promotion, with the indie success Juno just three years back, Reitman was by far the youngest filmmaker on the stage but his humor and energy ingratiated him to the lively audience.

Last speaker of the night, director and local San Franciscan Philip Kaufman (The Right Stuff, 1983) chose to sit at Roger’s level and tell him face-to-face what an enormous inspiration his enthusiasm had meant to Philip’s life and work and the moments he shared with his late wife Rose Kaufman. As Kaufman grew visibly choked-up, I was struck by the reach of Roger’s words on the world, the lives that he has touched merely by delivering engaging film commentary. Following his speech, Kaufman also delivered the night’s biggest surprise: Mayor Gavin Newsom’s signed plaque proclaiming May 1st, 2010 as San Francisco’s Roger Ebert Day.

Prior to the the film accompaniment of the evening, Roger broke his silence with a statement delivered via his Macbook’s text-to-speech application, thanking the presenters for doing him the honor of joining him on stage and saying, as he tweeted later “My life would be less without them.” Roger’s signature humor was everywhere in that speech, as he railed on the rise of 3-D, the decline of the theatre experience and finally inviting us to stay and enjoy the film he had selected, last year’s overlooked Julia.

Starring the chameleon that is Tilda Swinton, Julia is exactly the type of film that needs an Ebert. The story of an alcoholic (Swinton) who agrees to kidnap the son of a mentally-unstable woman she meets at Alcoholics Anonymous, Julia is not a film that screams Hollywood or family values. Violent, gritty and marked by left-field moments of lightheartedness, there were indeed more than a few walkouts over the course of the film. But Julia needs championing – someone has to expose it to the audience it deserves and it’s lucky enough to have found a fan in Roger Ebert, the friend who just won’t shut up until you see a film he likes. I’m glad that I stayed, and Julia immediately became my favorite film of last year.

Staying to watch the film with us, Roger proved once again that he is not above the audiences he writes for. If there’s any audience that can embody Roger’s dream of becoming a “collective personality” I believe that the one at the Castro is it, and I hope we made him proud last Saturday night.

Soul Kitchen

Before the Monday night screening of German director Fatih Akin’s Soul Kitchen, head of programming Rachel Rosen asked the audience not to “put Fatih in a box.” Rosen wished to temper expectations of those in the audience who were already familiar with Akin’s recent festival successes Head On (2004) and The Edge of Heaven (2007), which were heady dramas. Soul Kitchen has drama, but it is very much within the framework of an independent comedy. Adam Bousdoukos plays Zinos, the owner of a run-down little restaurant in the outskirts of Hamburg who must deal with ill-natured employees, an childhood friend who wants to buy the place and his convict brother who needs a job at the restaurant as part of his parole. Juggling all those plots, Akin manages a great cast and a believable story that isn’t so far removed from his trademark dramatic style, but also invites a playfulness that’s more than welcome.

.

.

Wake in Fright (1971)

If there isn’t a mondo-style documentary about life in the Australian outback, I imagine Wake in Fright is the closest we’ll ever get. Traveling through a desolate outback town named Bundanyabba, a schoolteacher (Gary Bond) finds his Christmas vacation plans waylaid when he loses all his money in a nearby gambling house. As he quickly discovers, the locals are more than hospitable (“Discontent is a luxury of the well-off. We gotta live here, so we may as well like it.”) and the teacher finds himself taken in, well-fed and more than well-drunk in a town that prides itself on its alcoholism, sexual liberation and penchant for violence. Wake in Fright recalls a time in moviemaking when more could be said with an actor’s look or glance than his words, and Gary Bond says so much with his eyes. Thanks to the bizarre nature of the film, Wake in Fright is likely to remain somewhat marginalized, but it is undoubtedly a one-of-a-kind experience and a movie that deserves the second wind it’s been given with this re-master.

,

,

The Violent Kind

At a desolate cabin in the Northern California countryside, a motorcycle club party turns into a bloodbath when one of its attendees turns up covered in the red stuff and babbling incoherently. The third feature by the duo known as The Butcher Brothers, Mitch Altieri and Phil Flores, The Violent Kind is well-made and well-acted horror film, especially compared with the majority of independent horror cinema. Unfortunately, the film ultimately relies on a messy third act that might work on the level of spectacle but implies that the Brothers were simply trying to amuse themselves rather than create a cohesive or satisfying ending. The Violent Kind is enjoyable in the moments where it remains a violent biker drama, especially because my familiarity with bike culture begins and ends with FX’s Sons of Anarchy, but when the plot starts to shake out time-traveling greasers and aliens, you’re looking at everything and the kitchen sink.

******************************************************

I’ll have mini-reviews of Winter’s Bone and Splice, and lengthier pieces on The Loved Ones (2009) and Roger Ebert and Friends next week!

No, I didn’t quit the site, despite what the lack of fresh words on this page may indicate. I’ve been writing quite a bit for The SF Bay Guardian, and all my reviews are being printed  for the paper each week.

You can see most of this week’s film reviews at the online version here, some local music previews in The Weekly Picks section, and video game and DVD reviews in the Blog.

I’ll be back here when I can, folks!