ANTHROPOPHAGOUS -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 Originally posted on 9/24/18

 

Italian goremeister Joe D'Amato does it again with the 1980 proto-slasher/thriller ANTHROPOPHAGOUS (aka "The Savage Island").  Like ABSURD, which he directed the following year, this bundle of blood-soaked chills doesn't pour on the gore non-stop, but when it does, it doesn't fool around.

Tisa Farrow (Mia's sister) stars as Julie, who's traveling to an island off the Italian coast to help care for a vacationing couple's blind daughter Henriette (Margaret Donnelly) in their opulent villa. 

She hitches a boat ride with a group of twenty-somethings out for some island-hopping fun themselves, but once they stop over at Julie's island to drop her off, things start going wrong.  And I mean really, really, gore-splatter-cannibalism wrong. 

It's strangely prescient of the 80s cliché of the group of young partiers cavorting off to some isolated location to be stalked and slashed by a psycho killer.  (A cliché that's still going strong today.)

Here, however, the premise hasn't yet become a tired trope, and the characters are mature enough so that their interactions, and later misfortunes, have a dramatic heft that makes them more than just subjects for fun gore effects.

D'Amato (BEYOND DARKNESS, EMANUELLE AND THE LAST CANNIBALS, THE ALCOVE) takes his time establishing all of this and letting us get to know such characters as the nervously expectant Maggie and her equally nervous husband, amorous Daniel who takes a liking to Julie right away, and brother-and-sister Andy and Carol, the former a level-headed good-guy type and the latter, a Tarot-reading flake whose unpredictable actions will eventually make a bad situation worse.

The bad situation in question, which they discover upon setting foot on the island, is an empty village in which (as we already know but they don't) the local population has been wiped out by a mysterious killer whose handiwork we saw in an earlier scene of a young couple getting meat-cleavered on the beach.

Taking up temporary residence in the villa of Julie's missing friends, the group makes a shocking discovery in the wine cellar that gets our own blood going as the story continues to build at a leisurely pace. 

More unrest within the social unit leads to creepy scenes within the big, dark house and its environs, including a crypt and a spooky foray into the shadow-strewn streets of the deserted village.  And before we know it, there's a sudden, cannibalistic attack that leaves one of them dead. 

To make a long story short, the character described in the title (if you can figure out what that title means, that is) finally makes himself known and proves a terrifying, stomach-churning force of un-nature with a voracious appetite for human flesh and one of the ugliest mugs in monster-guy history. 

Played by co-writer Luigi Montefiori (as "George Eastman"), who would portray a much less hideous killer in ABSURD a year later, the "Anthropophagous" dude is like something straight out of a nightmare, one of the most repellant stalkers ever to stalk. 

Blood 'n' guts sequences are few, but striking--the fetus scene alone is the stuff theater walkouts are made of. And D'Amato shows some style in unfolding the "dark, scary house", "deserted village", and "burial catacombs" scenes as well, giving us some genuine chills between the gouts of gore.  

The Blu-ray from Severin Films features a really nice-looking 2K scan from the original 16mm negative.  The film can be viewed either in Italian with subtitles or in English.

Severin doesn't disappoint with its usual ample menu of bonuses, here offering interviews with writer-star Luigi Montefiori, actor Saverio Vallone ("Andy"), FX artist Pietro Tenoglio, editor Bruno Micheli, and actress Zora Kerova ("Carol"). Three trailers for the film are also included.  The cover art is reversible.

ANTHROPOPHAGOUS has a simple, uncluttered plot that sets out to scare, startle, and sicken us, and it does exactly that with a singleminded determination.  It also boasts one of the ickiest cannibalistic creeps I've ever seen, whose final horrific act sets a standard of "WTF?" of which goggle-eyed gorehounds may never see the equal.


Special Features:
Don’t Fear The Man-Eater: Interview with Writer/Star Luigi Montefiori a.k.a. George Eastman
The Man Who Killed The Anthropophagus: Interview with Actor Saverio Vallone
Cannibal Frenzy: Interview with FX Artist Pietro Tenoglio
Brother And Sister In Editing: Interview With Editor Bruno Micheli
Inside Zora’s Mouth: Interview with Actress Zora Kerova
Trailers
Reversible Wrap

Buy it at Severin Films

ANTHROPOPHAGOUS -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

SINFONIA EROTICA -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 3/23/18

 

Spanish director Jess Franco burned his way through cinema like a fuse, voracious and volatile, leaving the ashes of his endeavor in his wake for us to sift through.

Much of it is of mere passing note to me, interesting only to see what such a prolific filmmaker produces when free to work fast and furious and pour out his id on film with little or no restraint.
 
But with this outpouring comes the occasional work that demands my attention and admiration (VAMPYROS LESBOS, SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY, COUNT DRACULA), and one such example is his 1980 anti-romantic, anti-erotic sexual nightmare SINFONIA EROTICA (Severin Films), based upon the writings of the Marquis de Sade. 

Franco's real-life love and muse Lina Romay (THE HOT NIGHTS OF LINDA, PAULA-PAULA) plays Martine de Bressac, returning home after months of confinement to a sanitarium by her husband, the Marqués Armando de Bressac (Armando Borges).

During her absence Armando has acquired and become addicted to a seductive, effeminate male lover named Flor (Mel Rodrigo), both of whom taunt and torture poor Martine with their flagrant contempt for both her emotional needs and urgent sexual desires.

Norma (Susan Hemingway), a timid young escapee from a nunnery, is found lying unconscious on the grounds during one of Armando and Flor's nature romps, and is taken in to become a part of their cruel sexual games. 

She ends up falling in love with Flor, and the two of them plan to not only aid in Armando's plan to murder Martine but to then get rid of Armando himself, leaving them free to run away together. Martine's only allies during all this are a sympathetic maid and a psychiatrist who may or may not believe her story.

Needless to say, SINFONIA EROTICA belies its opulent Victorian romance novel setting--Franco shot it in Portugal using gorgeous mansion interiors and magnificent exterior locations--with fervid, disturbing images of mental and physical cruelty in the form of ugly, non-erotic sex. 

When Franco makes a sex movie instead of a horror movie, the sex seems to replace the horror, or rather it becomes another kind of horror, of a deeper and more Freudian kind.

Here, he gives us a perversely erotic thriller that hates sex even as it's preoccupied with exploring Lina Romay's offbeat beauty and ample breasts as well as showing various joyless lovers rutting like animals in scenes that waver between softcore and hardcore action.

Although involved in several projects at the time (including THE SADIST OF NOTRE DAME and TWO FEMALE SPIES WITH FLOWERED PANTIES), Franco seems neither rushed nor slapdash here, despite his usual shakily handheld camera. 

He lingers over his finely-rendered, sometimes impressionistic imagery as though following a deeply-pondered train of thought, and many of the shots are arranged with both a painter's sensibilities and a perceptive filmmaker's orchestration of character and movement.

Romay is at her best as Martine, looking strangely enticing at all times while also surrendering to the role with an intensity that evokes excitement and sympathy for her character. 

As Armando, Borges plays the heartless cad to a tee, relishing his own sadistic impulses which will eventually include coldblooded murder, which Franco depicts in non-graphic yet chilling style.

But the lack of graphic violence is made up for by the horrific depiction of sex and sexual desire as a Freudian nightmare that leads to madness when infused with malevolence and perversion.

Severin's Blu-ray disc (also available in DVD) is a 4k restoration of an uncut 35mm print which is the only known copy of this cut to exist.  There are some rough spots here and there, but, as I've often said, I prefer for a wizened exploitation print such as this to look like it's been around the block a few times. Otherwise, picture quality is fine. The soundtrack is in Spanish with English captions.

The visually rich fever dream that is SINFONIA EROTICA draws us into Martine's dark, corrupting psycho-sexual ordeal and has its way with us until somebody dies.
 

Special Features:
Jess Franco On First Wife Nicole Guettard – Interview With Director Jess Franco
Stephen Thrower On Sinfonia Erotica – Interview With The Author Of ‘Murderous Passions – The Delirious Cinema Of Jesus Franco’

SINFONIA EROTICA -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

EMANUELLE AND FRANCOISE -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 4/27/19

 

Is "Cinemax After Dark" still a thing? I remember in the 80s when HBO's sister channel Cinemax would show softcore sex comedies and thrillers during the late-night hours. Director Joe D'Amato's EMANUELLE AND FRANCOISE, aka "Emanuelle's Revenge" and "Blood Revenge" (Severin Films, 1975), is a lot like what would happen if one of those softcore sex thrillers had a head-on collision with one of the director's celebrated blood 'n' guts gore epics. 

Francoise (Patrizia Gori, WAR OF THE ROBOTS, DEADLY CHASE) is a cute, chipper fashion model whose life would be sunshine and lollipops if her live-in boyfriend Carlo (well-played by George Eastman of D'Amato's ABSURD and ANTROPOPHAGUS) weren't such a horrible cad.

 

Not only does he make her have sex with guys he owes money to, but when she walks in on him getting it on with another woman, his response is to stuff her clothes in a suitcase and toss her out on her ear.  Poor heartbroken Francoise goes straight to the nearest train track and throws herself in front of the next speeding locomotive.

Enter Francoise's worldly older sister Emanuelle (Rosemarie Lindt, SALON KITTY, PORNO-EROTIC WESTERN), who, after reading Francoise's novella-length suicide note, vows revenge against Carlo. 

She contrives to meet him and then leads him on until he ends up in her trap--a secret prison cell behind a sliding wall in her living room, with a two-way mirror through which chained-up Carlo must watch her indulge in the culinary and sexual delights he is now denied (with a much harsher final punishment reserved for the end).

The film is an example of how capable director Joe D'Amato (THE ALCOVE, ABSURD, ANTROPOPHAGUS, BEYOND THE DARKNESS, EMANUELLE AND THE LAST CANNIBALS) was at handling this sort of sexy potboiler, which has the look of one of the better low-budget Italian films of its kind being produced during that era. 

There's a good deal of nudity and sexual activity, from Francoise's unfortunate encounters to Emanuelle herself cavorting with various male and female partners for Carlo to see.  Rosemarie Lindt, not exactly the kind of woman I picture when I hear the name "Emanuelle", is a good actress with sort of an Honor Blackman quality.

Co-written by D'Amato and Bruno Mattei (SHOCKING DARK, ZOMBIE 3, ZOMBIE 4), the film resembles a giallo much of the time, but what really plunges it into horror territory is when Carlo, forced to watch as his captor and her guests gorge themselves on an elegant candlelight dinner, imagines them feasting on human body parts.  Thus we see these sophisticated diners happily chomping away on severed hands, feet, and various other carnal delicacies rarely seen outside of a zombie flick.

A later scene (which may or may not be a hallucination) finds Carlo on the loose after escaping his secret room and attacking Emanuelle with a meat cleaver.  This scene consists mainly of Lindt rolling around nude in a gallon or two of fake blood while a crazed Eastman swings the meat cleaver, which doesn't look very convincing but is certainly lively and fun to watch.

Things finally come to a head when Emanuelle decides it's time for Carlo to pay the ultimate price (I'll give you three guesses what that is), leading to an entertaining final sequence with a pleasing twist ending.  It's more of a kick in the rear than a gut punch, but fans of both sexy thrillers and gruesome gorefests should find that EMANUELLE AND FRANCOISE fits the bill on both counts. 



Buy it at Severin Films

Street date: April 30, 2019

Special Features:
    Three Women and a Mirror: Interview With Actress Maria Rosaria Riuzzi
    The Other Side of the Mirror: Interview With Actor George Eastman
    Deleted/Alternate scenes
    Trailer
    2k Scan From Original Negative
    Reversible Cover

EMANUELLE AND FRANCOISE -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

NIGHT KILLER -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 6/29/19

 

Italian director Claudio Fragasso, who gave us such films as TROLL 2 and ZOMBIE 4, decided that his final genre film before moving on to more respectable "auteur" projects would be a Bergman-like psychological thriller called NIGHT KILLER (Severin Films, 1988), about a traumatized woman kidnapped by a mystery man who's obsessed with her and who may or may not be the crazed serial killer who caused her to lose her mind.

The producers took one look at Fragasso's heated tale of twisted love and obsession and handed it over to Fragasso's fellow Italian horror filmmaker Bruno Mattei (VIOLENCE IN A WOMEN'S PRISON, ZOMBIE 3, ROBOWAR, SHOCKING DARK), who shot new scenes of graphic gore--such as the fright-masked killer plunging his razor-sharp claw-glove all the way through his screaming victims' bodies--and renamed it TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE 3.

 

The two styles would seem to be at cross purposes, yet Mattei's stalker-slasher scenes occur mainly in the early part of the film and, in my opinion, actually make Fragasso's thriller much more interesting while raising the stakes for poor Melanie Beck (Tara Buckman, THE CANNONBALL RUN, SILENT NIGHT DEADLY NIGHT) when she gets terrorized by the killer in her house during one of the film's most suspenseful scenes.

She survives, but her memory is gone and she no longer recognizes her daughter Clarissa (Tova Sardot) or her friends Sherman (Richard Foster) and his wife who are caring for Clarissa while Melanie's in the hospital. 

As soon as she's released, however, a crazed stalker named Axel (Peter Hooten, ORCA, THE INGLORIOUS BASTARDS) hunts down and abducts her, tying her to a bed and playing life-or-death mind games with her as we wonder if (a) he's the masked killer, and (b) he'll make good on his promise to eventually have the already suicidal woman begging him to kill her.

During these scenes, Fragasso gets to indulge his more artistic side with long takes featuring Axel and Melanie in dramatic close-up interactions of intense  psychological and emotional conflict. 

While the script may seem a bit overheated at times, it's actually quite dramatically engaging and the stars give riveting performances despite the fact (as we learn in one of the disc's bonus interviews) that they actually didn't like each other at all.  This is where Fragasso's desire to create something more than a slasher film really manifests itself and the film takes on perversely romantic overtones.

Meanwhile, on the other side of NIGHT KILLER'S stylistic divide, Bruno Mattei's industrious contributions keep gorehounds happy with at least three bloody murder setpieces, all climaxing with the old claw-glove through the torso bit.

Mattei's lurid, less refined visuals are a real contrast, as is a lengthy sequence of pure 80s flash-dancing in leg warmers and leotards as some really awful dancers practice a routine onstage which is mercifully interrupted by the film's first kill.

To be honest, I doubt I'd have detected the presence of two directors if I hadn't already known of it, since NIGHT KILLER comes off sort of like a suspenseful Giallo whodunnit infused with extra helpings of gratuitous nudity and graphic violence (not to mention a couple of nifty plot twists) to make the whole confection just that much tastier.


Buy it at Severin Films

Scanned in 4k from the original negative

Special Features:

    The Virginia Claw Massacre: Interview With Director Claudio Fragasso
    Mindfuck: Interview With Screenwriter Rossella Drudi
    Trailer

NIGHT KILLER -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

THE STRANGE VICE OF MRS. WARDH -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 6/13/20

 

I'm not as well-versed about giallo as the popular Italian genre's more fervent fans, so it's fun to run across a choice selection such as THE STRANGE VICE OF MRS. WARDH (Severin Films, 1971) and enjoy it to its fullest while discovering even more reasons why the best of these films are so much fun in the first place.

Lovely cult favorite Edwige Fenech (ALL THE COLORS OF THE DARK) stars as Julie, a sadly-neglected wife returning to Austria from America because her wealthy Wall Street tycoon husband Neil (Alberto de Mendoza, HORROR EXPRESS) has business there.

Julie, it turns out, has some business of her own, which is mainly to hesitantly fall sideways into a romantic tryst with persistent suitor George (George Hilton, ALL THE COLORS OF THE DARK) while avoiding former lover Jean (Ivan Rassimov, EATEN ALIVE), a first-class creep who had a sick relationship with Julie years ago and who may or may not be the razor-wielding, throat-slashing psycho killer currently terrorizing the city.

 
Julie's sassy best friend Carol (Cristina Airoldi) just happens to be George's cousin and is about to share with George a windfall inheritance from a recently-deceased uncle.

Not only is Carol a fun character who gets to speak her mind about everything, but she also throws a fun party (where Julie first runs into Jean again) which embodies the late 60s-early 70s ambience of the film right down to two party girls in paper dresses having a catfight in which they claw each other's clothes off. (Carol will also play a key role in one of the film's finest sequences, an eerie rendezvous with someone who may be the killer.)

What really gets the giallo juices flowing is when the mysterious killer suddenly and for no apparent reason takes a distressingly keen interest in Julie, right down to peering through the window during one of her naked romps with George and sending her flowers along with creepy, cryptic messages. Julie and husband Neil are convinced that the culprit is the already scary Jean. But is he too obvious a suspect?

 
Director Sergio Martino (ALL THE COLORS OF THE DARK) and co-writer Ernesto Gastaldi keep us guessing for the film's entire running time as we ponder the guilt or innocence of just about every main character besides Julie as evidence shifts back and forth and red herrings abound.

Meanwhile, we're treated to some murder setpieces that are both genuinely creepy and unsettling but also manage to generate Hitchcock-level suspense for sustained periods of time.

One in particular takes great pictorial advantage of a terrific outdoor location to present a stalking scene that is deeply nerve-wracking. And in each case, that gleaming straight razor is always poised for bloody carnage.

With Julie's guilt over cheating on her husband compounded by fear of her elusive stalker, even the story's romance elements have a queasy decadence that keeps us on edge.  This includes a flashback of Julie's sick affair with Jean, a beautifully shot, dreamlike passage with him slapping her repeatedly by the side of the road in slow-motion during a driving rainstorm.

Director Martino  is the equal to fellow Italian giallo maestro Dario Argento in such matters, perhaps not with as fine a degree of photographic artistry but driven by the same surehanded directorial finesse that creates memorably effective scenes. 

 
The Blu-ray from Severin Films is "newly scanned in 4k from the internegative" and boasts their usual well-stocked bonus menu including interviews with director Martino, co-writer Gastaldi, actor George Hilton, and, in archival footage, Edwige Fenech. There's also an audio commentary with Kat Ellinger, author of ‘All The Colors Of Sergio Martino’, a trailer, and last but not least a bonus CD of the film's lush, lively soundtrack music.

After putting us through the mill for the entire length of the film, THE STRANGE VICE OF MRS. WARDH ends on a shocking note, then pulls a fast one on us that's even more shocking and, ultimately, delightfully satisfying. It left me happy and content that once again a really good giallo had worked its magic on me.



Buy it from Severin Films

Special Features:

    Of Vice and Virtue: Interview with Director Sergio Martino
    Cold As Ice: Interview with Screenwriter Ernesto Gastaldi
    Vienna Vice: Interview with Actor George Hilton and Italian Genre Historian Antonio Bruschini
    Archive Interview with Actress Edwige Fenech
    Introduction by Actor George Hilton
    Audio Commentary with Kat Ellinger, Author of ‘All The Colors Of Sergio Martino’
    Trailer
    CD Soundtrack [Limited to 3000 Units]
    The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh Comic Book [WEBSTORE EXCLUSIVE]

 

THE STRANGE VICE OF MRS. WARDH -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

CARJACKED -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 11/10/11

 

Having just watched CARJACKED (2011), I must admit feeling a little confused.  I can't decide if the filmmakers were actually trying to make a serious thriller, or if they were aware that they were making one of the dumbest movies I've seen in quite a while.  Either way, it isn't much fun until it decides to go full-out goofy in the second half.

The story opens with divorced mom Lorraine (Maria Bello, THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR, PAYBACK) attending a touchy-feely women's group therapy session.  Dumped by her husband Gary and facing a losing custody battle over their son Chad, Lorraine is too much of a simpy doormat to fight back or get angry about it as her brassy session mate Betty (Joanna Cassidy in an ultra-brief role) urges her to do.  When she relates how she earned the nickname "Klutzy" by accidentally shooting her dad's friend in the ass at the gun range, her counselor asks, "How did that make you feel?"  Yikes.

Already an emotional wreck, all she needs is for her and Chad to be carjacked by an escaped bank robber named Roy (Steven Dorff, BLADE, PUBLIC ENEMIES) on their way home, which of course is what happens.  Forced to drive Roy to a rendezvous 350 miles away, Lorraine somehow makes a connection with the chatty criminal and shares her feelings with him instead of being totally terrified like a normal person would.  Thus, we're not really all that scared for her and apart from a couple of halfhearted escape attempts, little suspense is generated by her ordeal.  At one point she even seems to consider running off to Mexico with Roy and his money.



Maria Bello, whom I've always considered a pretty good actress, is pretty awful as Lorraine.  Never convincing as a kidnap victim, she plays the role with a series of weird expressions and nervous tics, occasionally getting a comically peeved look when Roy says something threatening or offensive.  We expect Lorraine to eventually turn the tables on Roy, which will be just the thing to boost her confidence and assertiveness, but she's remarkably stupid--during an attempt to call 911 on her cellphone while in the bathroom, she gets 411 instead and can't understand why the operator keeps asking, "What city, please?" 

At first, Dorff plays Roy as the most patient and non-threatening carjacker in movie history, reducing his character's menace during the film's first half and even coming off as sympathetic while talking with Lorraine--for awhile there, it seemed this was going to turn into a road trip movie.  It's only later that we find he enjoys lulling his victims into a false sense of security before doing something horrible to them, as Lorraine discovers when they finally reach the rendezvous. 

At that point, it looked as though CARJACKED was finally going to turn into a tense thriller, but instead it seems to morph into a black comedy designed to have us thinking "WTF?"  In addition to some comical rednecks at a truckstop (the kind played by actors who have never actually seen a real one), we get a car chase that looks like something out of a Hal Needham movie followed by some highly improbable hijinks in a deserted warehouse.  With believability well and truly thrown out the window, all that remains is for the film to end with a wrap-up scene that seems to have been written under the influence of laughing gas.



John Bonito's direction is okay if somewhat self-indulgent at times, although that thing where the camera does those little zoopy zoom-ins on a character's face while they're driving doesn't even look good when Michael Bay and Paul W.S. Anderson do it.  Acting-wise, Dorff is okay while Cassidy isn't in the film long enough to make an impression.  Bello is hard to figure out--she seems aware that the film is going to turn into a semi-comedy in the second half, but since we don't know that, her performance seems curiously flaky throughout.  I kept thinking, "I hope she's in better form taking over Helen Mirren's role in PRIME SUSPECT."

The DVD from Anchor Bay is in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen with English 5.1 and Spanish mono sound.  Subtitles are in English and Spanish.  The sole extra is a very brief behind-the-scenes short.

After a so-so start, the last twenty minutes or so of CARJACKED are so unexpectedly nutty that I actually began to enjoy it on that level.  But I still can't figure out if the filmmakers were trying to make a serious thriller and failed, or if they were just messing with my head the whole time.

CARJACKED -- DVD Review by Porfle

OPERATION: ENDGAME -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 7/21/10

 

A fast-moving cloak-and-dagger action flick that's smart and funny, OPERATION: ENDGAME is adrenaline-fueled fun from start to finish.

The whole thing takes place in the secret subterranean headquarters of a hush-hush black ops group known as The Factory, where two teams, Alpha and Omega, keep each other tenuously in check while performing dirty deeds for the government.  Each member is code-named for a tarot card, and it's The Fool's (Joe Anderson, THE CRAZIES) first day on the job.  The nervous new guy is given a tour of the facility by a drunken, foulmouthed burnout named Chariot (Rob Corddry, BLADES OF GLORY) and the hot but deadly High Priestess (Maggie Q, LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD), finding it to be like a cross between "Get Smart" and "Office Space."

But The Fool soon discovers that his first day will be anything but typical when their mentally-unbalanced, suicidal leader, The Devil (Jeffrey Tambor), unexpectedly sets "Operation: Endgame" into motion.  This means that the complex is sealed off and will explode in about two hours, and that the two teams will now try to kill each other while searching for a hidden exit known only by their late boss and a spooky lone agent named The Hermit (Zach Galifianakis).  Things become even more complicated when The Fool encounters an opposing team member named Temperance (Odette Yustman) who happens to be an old girlfriend.

What follows is an exciting, often amusing series of surprisingly bloody death matches between various agents.  We never know who's going to be paired off against each other next since there are so many unknown agendas involved in "Operation: Endgame" and some of the more psychotic participants, such as sweet-looking Bible thumper Heirophant (Emilie de Ravin), have a survival instinct that is matched only by their bloodlust.  (When we first see Heirophant, she's sitting in her cubicle scribbling "I love killing" repeatedly on a notepad.) 

Some of the fight scenes are reminscent of the Bond vs. Grant train sequence in FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE while others are just a bloody mess with the unarmed agents flailing away with whatever office supplies or other sundry items they can creatively use as weapons.  Meanwhile, Michael Hitchcock and Tim Bagley play Neal and Carl, two mild-mannered, befuddled office drones who man the surveillance center and watch what's happening as though it were a reality TV show. 

One-liners and droll character gags abound--Jeffrey Tambor ("Arrested Development", "The Larry Sanders Show") is especially good as he wearily trades snide insults with his uppity underlings.  As the sardonic "Empress", Ellen Barkin continues in the "Rosa Klebb" mode she displayed in BROOKLYN'S FINEST but with more sex appeal and a wicked sadistic streak.  Clearly having fun without straining himself too much, Ving Rhames plays "Judgement", a bomb expert who never passes up a pun on his codename ("It's judgement time, baby").  The rest of the cast is fine, with Bob Odenkirk ("Mr. Show") his usual wonderful self as "Emperor" and Joe Anderson's semi-heroic rookie agent convincingly clueless about the whole thing.
 

Exposition flies by early on so you might want to keep your finger on the rewind button until you get all the details straight, although they don't really matter that much.  It all has something to do with the transition of power from Bush to Obama, with the evil Bushies scrambling to cover up their covert misdeeds before the honest and open Obama administration sheds its heavenly light upon them and cleans up Washington.  (As Michael Corleone once said:  "Now who's being naive?")  Anyway, the "Bush bad, Obama good" campaign-commercial vibe gets old pretty quick, but unless this appeals to you, just ignore it and you should be okay.

The DVD from Anchor Bay is in 2.40:1 anamorphic widescreen and Dolby Digital 5.1 with English and Spanish subtitles.  Extras include a behind-the-scenes featurette plus alternate opening and ending scenes.

OPERATION: ENDGAME is an imaginative blend of laughs and thrills that takes itself just seriously enough to maintain genuine suspense. Watching this colorful array of deadly eccentrics going at each other tooth and nail as the countdown to obliteration ticks away makes for a pretty entertaining action-comedy flick.  

OPERATION: ENDGAME -- DVD Review by Porfle

TENEBRE -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

 Originally posted on 5/8/08

 

I'm a Dario Argento fan but have yet to see all of his films. So it was a real treat to get the chance to watch TENEBRE (aka TENEBRAE), the Italian director's 1982 return to the giallo style after a detour into the supernatural (SUSPIRIA, his masterpiece, and its follow-up INFERNO). According to Wikipedia, "giallo" films are typically slasher-style whodunits characterized by "extended murder sequences featuring excessive bloodletting, stylish camerawork and unusual musical arrangements", which would make this a prime example of the genre.

Tony Franciosa plays Peter Neal, a murder mystery writer who's just arrived in Rome to promote his latest book, "Tenebrae", only to find that a serial-killing stalker is using his new novel as a template for ridding the world of sexual deviates and other undesirables. With the help of his secretary and budding love interest Anne (Argento collaborator and former spouse Daria Nicolodi) and eager young assistant Gianni (Christian Borromeo), Neal hopes to add a feather to his literary cap by solving the real-life murder mystery himself as bodies begin to pile up. The arrival in Rome of his spurned ex-lover Jane (Veronica Lario) and the presence of a television journalist named Berti (John Steiner) who appears to be a little too obsessed with Neal and his writings are just two of the many pieces in Argento's jumbled jigsaw puzzle.

One of the first things I noticed about TENEBRE is how bright it is. Much of it takes place in broad daylight, while the night scenes are often overly-lit. Argento has stated that he wanted the film to look hyper-realistic, with no shadows for either the victims or the killer to hide in. It's an interesting stylistic choice that Argento uses effectively. The often light-bleached visuals and pallid settings also allow him to emphasize certain elements such as a woman's fire-engine red pumps or the gouts of blood that liberally decorate several moments of terror.

Some of my favorite Argento touches are well-represented here, including: a haunting flashback, the details of which are only gradually revealed to us (not unlike Harmonica's recurring childhood memory in ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST, which Argento co-wrote); characters not picking up on an important visual or aural clue until it suddenly occurs to them after much reflection, as in the "three irises" scene from SUSPIRIA or the mysterious painting in DEEP RED; and several POV shots that disconcertingly put us in the killer's shoes as he (or she) is on the prowl.

As usual, Argento uses sound very effectively. In particular, he shares something in common with singer Nick Lowe--he loves the sound of breaking glass--so if you see a plate glass window in this movie, chances are it's going to shatter when you least expect it. Argento uses such devices to make his murder sequences even more nerve-wracking than they already are, usually after some very careful buildup and a few fake-outs to keep us off guard. And when the killer strikes, it's disturbingly violent. But unlike the standard slasher bore such as FRIDAY THE 13TH, Argento is more interested in the imaginative cinematic depiction of violence rather than simply racking up outlandish yet by-the-numbers body counts. When he does go for the gore, it shocks us, and it happens to characters that we care about and for reasons that keep the story moving.

Oh, and speaking of nerve-wracking, Argento managed to reunite three members of the disbanded rock group Goblin (Claudio Simonetti, Fabio Pignatelli, and Massimo Morante) to supply the original score. Unlike their music for SUSPIRIA, this has a synth-heavy, somewhat cheesy 80s sound that seems to be influenced at times by Giorgio Moroder's drum-machine disco rhythms. Other passages resemble their music for George Romero's DAWN OF THE DEAD. But it has that unmistakable Goblin sound, which somehow manages to compliment Argento's style even as it's turning your eardrums to mush.

Tony Franciosa is an old pro who did a lot of television while I was growing up, in addition to appearing in scores of fun films (a year after this, he got to do a steamy love scene with my favorite actress, Isabelle Mejias--the lucky dog--in the lively Canadian thriller JULIE DARLING). John Saxon, who plays Peter's literary agent, is, of course, always a welcome presence, and Veronica Lario is very effectively creepy as Jane. The rest of the cast is good, too--I especially liked Giuliano Gemma and Carola Stagnaro as a pair of homicide detectives--although in most cases the dubbing makes it hard to fully appreciate their performances. Daria Nicolodi does her usual fine job as well.

There are some really nice-looking women in lesser roles, adding considerably more sex appeal than you usually find in an Argento film. Ania Pieroni appears briefly as a lovely kleptomaniac who uses sex to beat a shoplifting rap but can't escape the fate awaiting her when she gets home. Lara Wendel plays a lesbian magazine writer whose promiscuous, half-naked housemate is the heart-stoppingly gorgeous Italian model Mirella Banti, in a sequence that allows Argento to indulge his stylistic impulses to their fullest.

Most interesting of all, perhaps, is the casting of Eva Robins as a woman who appears in several strange flashbacks to a traumatic event in the killer's youth. Born a male, Robins reportedly began to develop breasts and other female characteristics during puberty, to an extent that convinced her that nature intended her to live as a woman. At any rate, she's convincing enough as the "girl on the beach" in some of the film's strangest scenes.

The new DVD from Anchor Bay features an uncut, remastered widescreen (1:85:1) transfer enhanced for 16x9 televisions. Aside from the trailer and an Argento biography, there's a commentary track featuring the director along with composer Claudio Simonetti and journalist Loris Curci, which is as informative as you might expect although much time is spent waiting for Argento to figure out how to say everything in English--I kinda wished it could have been in Italian with English subtitles. "Voices of the Unsane" is a nifty 17-minute featurette with Argento, Nicolodi, Simonetti, and other principals discussing the making of the film. (UNSANE was the retitled, badly-edited version first shown in the US.) Other brief featurettes explore the creation of TENEBRE's sound effects and the filming of an intricate extended shot featured in one of the murder sequences. All in all, not a bad array of extras.

It's interesting to see Argento eschew the sumptuous, fairytale look of SUSPIRIA for a more stark and austere style here. Without the dark shadows and saturated colors, TENEBRE is like a blank canvas splattered with bright red, with a realism that's as brittle and sharp as all that broken glass. Only when the killer's identity is revealed at last in an axe and straight razor-slashed finale do we get a really dark, lightning-streaked scene, and it's horrifying enough to warrant the seemingly never-ending screams of the last person standing as TENEBRE fades out into its closing credits. And if you're a Dario Argento fan, you'll definitely want to be there when it happens.

TENEBRE -- DVD Review by Porfle

13 -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 10/28/11

 

In THE DEER HUNTER, a game of Russian Roulette proved so overwhelmingly intense that, as I sat watching it in the theater, I wasn't even sure if I'd be able to get through it.  Géla Babluani's 13 (2010) gives us an entire movie based on the game but manages only to be moderately entertaining without coming anywhere near that level of tension.

Sam Riley is Vince, an average young guy whose family--mom, dad, and two sisters--has hit rock bottom financially after the father is badly injured.  Stumbling across an illicit Russian Roulette tournament involving some very high-stakes betting, Vince manages to take the place of one of the entrants in hopes of surviving to solve his family' money problems.  Needless to say, this descent down the rabbit hole will be a nightmare with the spectre of sudden, violent death hovering over him every minute.

Riley gives a restrained but effective performance and makes his character easy to root for.  Vince is believably freaked out during the first round while quickly getting more hardened to the game out of necessity.  When he makes it to the final round, which we know he will since the opening flash-forward gives it away, he's still reluctant but his initial hesitance has been overcome by sheer desperation.



Technically, 13 is as good as it needs to be but no more, relying on the inherent fascination we derive from seeing a group of men standing in a circle, each with his gun pointed at the head of the man in front of him and then firing on command, with some surviving and others thudding clumsily to the floor.  With each round the stakes rise along with the number of bullets in each gun.

Even so, we never really get that caught up in the game itself, and it's the sketchily-drawn characters who provide the most interest.  As Jasper, Jason Statham is likable as usual even playing a rat who plucks his brother Ronald Lynn (Ray Winstone) out of a mental hospital to compete in the game.  Winstone is an imposing figure, even more so when Ronnie's meds start wearing off and he becomes increasingly hostile both to Vince and to Jasper for using him. 

Mickey Rourke is interesting to watch even when he's coasting through a role as he does here, playing a convict named Jefferson who's been whisked out of a Mexican prison and into the competition against his will.  Rapper 50 Cent plays Jefferson's handler, Jimmy.  Belgian actor Ronald Guttman, whom I recognized as one of the Russian defectors in THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER, is Vince's sponsor in the game, and David Zayas of "Dexter" is a police detective trying to put an end to it. 

Film and TV veteran Ben Gazzara is a welcome presence as Schlondorff, sponsor to his own nerve-frazzled entrant.  In the small role of Vince's handler, Jack, Swedish actor Alexander Skarsgård manages to convey an unspoken sympathy for Vince that makes his character more tolerable.  Michael Shannon (airplane mechanic "Gooz" in PEARL HARBOR) plays the role of coldblooded game ringmaster Henry with particular relish, harshly barking out commands such as "Spin the cylinder!" and "Cock the hammer!"  Gaby Hoffman, who was little "Maisy" in UNCLE BUCK, is all grown up now and plays Vince's sister Clara in a brief role.



Ray Winstone's menacing character becomes the focal point in the game's final stages and gives 13 its most gripping scenes.  After the game, however, the film wanders down a pretty predictable path and finally comes to a stop after failing to find anything interesting to do with itself save for a mild attempt at some kind of irony.  Director Babluani and his co-scripter Gregory Pruss really needed to throw a few more ideas around before settling for this acutely unremarkable ending.

The DVD from Anchor Bay is in 2.40:1 anamorphic widescreen with Dolby 5.1 sound and subtitles in English and Spanish.  There are no extras.

In other hands, 13 might've been a really riveting nailbiter.  As it is, it's a nifty little suspense yarn that doesn't quite make you feel like you've gotten your money's worth when it's over.

13 -- DVD Review by Porfle

CATCH .44 -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 12/9/11

 

Ever since PULP FICTION came out, various talky, quirky crime flicks have been described as Tarantino rip-offs.  Or, more generously put, "Tarantino-esque."  Despite all the bad things I've heard about it, I feel generous toward the talky, quirky--and fairly entertaining--crime flick CATCH .44 (2011) so I'll use the latter term.  Besides, people were making movies sorta like this before QT came along, but there just wasn't as convenient a way of describing them.

Not surprisingly, the movie takes the timeline of its not-all-that-complicated story and reshuffles it all over the place just for fun.  Most of the action occurs in an out-of-the-way Louisiana diner at 3:00 a.m., where three girls--Tes (Malik Akerman, WATCHMEN), Dawn (Deborah Ann Woll), and Kara (Nikki Reed, CHAIN LETTER, TWILIGHT)--are on an assignment for local drug kingpin Mel (Bruce Willis) and waiting for something to happen.  When it does, people start getting blown away, including one of the girls. 



We'll keep returning to the diner, with intermittent flashbacks bringing us up to speed a little at a time (a la RESERVOIR DOGS), until everything and everyone comes together at the end.  Meanwhile, we rewind to the dead girl and her two cohorts getting stopped by this really weird highway cop.  Only he isn't really a cop, because we just saw him shoot the real cop in the head during a routine pull-over.  Ronny (Forest Whitaker in another interesting performance) is a scary and enigmatic guy whose intentions are as yet unknown, but we're pretty sure he's going to end up at that diner, too.

Writer-director Aaron Harvey manages to keep things zipping along even when he's imitating Tarantino's chatty dialogue style with long, talky scenes that have their own modest rewards while never quite bagging the elusive Royale With Cheese.  A three-way Mexican standoff inside the diner (also a la RESERVOIR DOGS) after the initial shootout is nicely handled, prolonging the tension with various revelations and teasing us as to what certain characters' motivations are.  Whitaker is especially good here, with Shea Whigham doing a nice turn as a twitchy fry cook with a pump shotgun.  (Lovable oddball Brad Dourif also shows up for a couple of scenes as, of all things, a cop.)

Harvey's directorial style is a pleasing amalgam of lesser you-know-who mixed with a little Robert Rodriguez, making CATCH .44 easy to look at.  It amazed me to discover that Harvey's only other directing credit is the absolutely wretched 2007 slasher flick THE EVIL WOODS, which is without question one of the worst pieces of dreck ever made.  The difference between the two films is stunning--if nothing else, Harvey deserves some kind of an award for "most improved filmmaker."



Lurking in the background, getting talked about a lot, and popping into view for a few key scenes is Bruce Willis' "Mel" character.  The PULP FICTION co-star lends his formidable presence to the film without really breaking a sweat, but by now just being Bruce Willis is enough to elevate a small film such as this to another level.  We see him being a rich, cool drug lord manipulating his unsuspecting employees (such as Tes, Dawn, and Kara) like pawns, and finally emerging for a long, talky final scene with Whitaker that manages a faint hint of the Bill and Beatrix exchange at the end of KILL BILL VOL. 2.  Barely a whiff of that Royale With Cheese, though. 

The DVD from Anchor Bay is in 2.40:1 anamorphic widescreen with Dolby 5.1 sound.  Subtitles are in English and Spanish.  A long, talky commentary track with Harvey and editor Richard Byard is the sole extra.

CATCH .44 doles out tantalizing scraps of story to us until the pieces fall into place, and once that's done, the final scene plays out in a way that resolves all the pent-up suspense in rather predictable ways.  There's no ironic twist or "gotcha" to fully justify so much story fiddling, and we realize that it was all done just to tell a very simple tale in a more interesting way.  Which is okay, since it does.  

CATCH .44 -- DVD Review by Porfle

DARK STORM -- Movie Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 11/15/10

 

After watching EARTHSTORM with Stephen Baldwin, I thought to myself, "Wow, I sure would like to see another cheapo Canadian ARMAGEDDON-inspired Stephen Baldwin sci-fi movie with the word 'storm' in the title." 

Well, the good folks at the SyFy Channel and Lionsgate must've heard me, because sure enough, here's DARK STORM (2006), a cheapo Stephen Baldwin sci-fi movie made in Canada with the tagline "Armageddon is on the horizon."  Yay...

At least Stephen Baldwin fit the part of a building-demolition expert in EARTHSTORM.  Here, he plays a scientist named Daniel Gray who's part of a secret government project to collect dark matter in space.  (I'm not quite sure what "dark matter" is, but it's one of those neat things like wormholes that you don't really have to understand in order for it to be a cool subject for a sci-fi flick.)  Seeing Stephen Baldwin in a lab coat is like seeing a gorilla wearing a tutu--somehow, the two just don't go together.  I kept expecting his associate Dr. Fred Flintstone to show up at some point so they could sneak out and go bowling together.

Anyway, this project is supposedly being done to benefit Mankind somehow, but the weaselly guy in charge of it, Dr. McKray (Gardiner Millar), turns out to be a dirty rat who's planning to turn the whole thing into a deadly weapon and sell it to the highest international bidder.  While demonstrating it to the visiting General Killion (William B. Davis, better known as Cancer Man from "The X-Files"), who controls the government purse-strings that finance the project, a containment leak in the orbiting dark-matter-collecting satellite is detected and a cloud of dark matter is spreading over the atmosphere.  (Sorry, but I'm just going to have to keep saying "dark matter" a bunch of times during this review.)
 

Dr. McKray doesn't want to lose his funding so he forces the reticent Dr. Baldwin and his coworkers to ignore safety measures and proceed with the demonstration, which causes the dark matter to enter our atmosphere at different points known as "spikes", wreaking all sorts of havoc with the weather and disintegrating airplanes and buildings and stuff.  This is done using that TV-quality kind of CGI that looks pretty good in some scenes and so hot at all in others.

Not only that, but Dr. Baldwin gets exposed to some errant dark matter himself during the botched test, which gives him strange super-powers that enable him to start his car without keys, lob dark-matter fastballs at bad guys, and repel focused beams of destructive dark matter with his mind.  He's Dark Matter Man!  This, too, turns out to be part of the repulsive Dr. McKray's plan to turn himself and everyone else into a race of dark-matter superbeings in order to bring Mankind's evolutionary process to its ultimate peak.  Wow--sounds just crazy enough to work!

It's interesting seeing William B. Davis as a good guy for a change, but without those fake cigarettes he used to chain-smoke on "The X-Files" he doesn't really know what to do with his hands anymore.  Camille Sullivan (THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT), who looks and sounds a bit like Sarah Jessica Parker but I didn't hold it against her, is okay as Dr. Baldwin's wife Ellie, and Keegan Connor Tracy (WHITE NOISE, FINAL DESTINATION 2) does a fairly good job playing the nasty agent of an unnamed government bidding for the dark-matter weapon.  I liked Rob LaBelle (FIDO, "Taken") as Dr. Baldwin's dorky associate Andy--he reminded me of a skinnier, shorter-haired Larry from the Three Stooges. 

Some of the dark-matter storm scenes are pretty cool but there are just enough shots of calamity and destruction, with varying degrees of cartoony-ness, to remind us that this is going on while the talkier, less-expensive scenes take up more running time.  Dr. McKray eventually has Dr. and Mrs. Baldwin kidnapped and taken to his secret dark-matter destructo-beam installation, and it's up to them to find a way to foil his evil scheme.  It all builds to a final super-powered showdown, with predictable results.

I liked EARTHSTORM better because its "Buck Rogers"-type space shuttle mission and other cheesy sci-fi elements were brighter and more fun.  DARK STORM, which is darker, more earthbound, and  a bit dreary at times, is a fairly entertaining time-waster and I didn't hate it, but that's about it.  

DARK STORM -- Movie Review by Porfle

12 DISASTERS -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 1/7/14

 

If one disaster makes for an exciting movie, then twelve of them would be twelve times more exciting, right?  Well...we're talking about the SyFy Channel here, and 12 DISASTERS (2012) is just the same old story they've been rehashing for years only with some slightly different but equally rinky-dink CGI.

Ed Quinn (BEHEMOTH) heads a cast dotted with several SyFy vets as rugged family man Joseph, whose 18-year-old daughter Jacey (Magda Apanowicz, SNOWMAGEDDON) turns out to be the "chosen one" in a long line of mystical women going all the way back to the Mayans.  She's the one who will have to stop the ancient Mayan prediction of the end of the world on 12/21/2012, as foretold in--brace yourselves--the Christmas carol "The 12 Days of Christmas." (The film's original title, as you might guess, was "The 12 Disasters of Christmas.")

You're probably singing that to yourself right now but it won't really help until you get to the part about the "five gold rings", which Jacey and her dad must locate and which are buried (for some damn reason I couldn't figure out) in secret locations all around their remote, rustic town (the usual Canadian location subbing for the U.S. Northwest).  Only with all five rings can Jacey ward off the impending twelve disasters which will destroy the earth.

We never really understand what the rest of the world has to fear since the disasters only affect their own small town, and most of them don't even qualify as "disasters."  There's a bad-CGI tornado, a mild earthquake, and some pretty cool giant ice shards that rain down out of the sky and skewer a few citizens (including Joseph's mom).

At one point, a crack in the earth releases some red gas that disintegrates a few bad guys who are under the impression that they can save themselves by sacrificing Jacey by fire (including the typical evil industrialist played by Roark Critchlow of EARTH'S FINAL HOURS). 

Another fissure in the earth's crust releases a sort of heat force-field that fries anything that tries to pass through it,  including some really poorly-rendered rescue helicopters.   The most interesting "disaster", for me anyway, is a rapidly-spreading cold wave that flash-freezes everything in its path, but we only get to see a few selected townspeople get turned into ice statues.  This is mainly due to the fact that these scenes don't feature a whole lot of extras.

Probably the dumbest-looking of the various deadly perils is a string of out-of-control Christmas lights that wrap themselves around a hapless victims and zap him to death in what might be Clark Griswold's worst nightmare.

The final and supposedly deadliest disaster occurs, as it so often does in these flicks, up in the mountains, where some meager volcanic effects billow and spew as Jacey and her dad scramble to locate the last ring.

Their quest to do so gets decidedly tiresome in the film's second half, as Critchlow's character menaces them while his cowardly cohort Jude (Andrew Airlie, APOLLO 18, "Defying Gravity") holds Joseph's wife Mary (Holly Elissa, ICE QUAKE) and son Peter (Ryan Grantham,  ICE QUAKE) hostage. (But at least you can pass the time picking out all of the script's obvious Biblical references.)

Director Steven R. Monroe of 2010's I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE and its sequel (as well as 2006's LEFT IN DARKNESS) turns in a passable but rushed job of bringing the screenplay by writer Rudy Thauberger (SNOWMAGEDDON) to a semblance of life.  Performances range from okay to not-so-great, with Magda Apanowicz as Jacey managing to work up the most convincing displays of emotion.

As Grant, an old codger who tries in vain to warn everyone of the impending doom, is veteran actor Donnelly Rhodes, whose mile-long list of credits includes playing the gambler who accuses Robert Redford of cheating in the opening minutes of BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID.

The DVD from Anchor Bay is in 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen with Dolby 5.1 sound and subtitles in English and Spanish.  No extras.

If you catch 12 DISASTERS in the right mood, you'll probably get some "bad-movie" enjoyment out of it.  At any rate, most of us pretty much know just what to expect from these SyFy Channel "end-of-the-world" flicks and whether or not we want to waste precious moments of our lives watching them.

12 DISASTERS -- DVD Review by Porfle

MISERY (Blu-Ray) -- DVD Review by Porfle

(Blu-Ray comments by Ian Friedman. Originally posted on 10/5/09.)


If you're a fan of Stephen King's books, you know that one of his favorite schticks is the "predicament" story. They're usually pretty simple and focus mainly on one character, with whom we identify, who is placed into a seemingly inescapable situation that will require ingenuity, endurance, and lots of suffering in order to come out of it alive. In "The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon", a little girl is lost in the woods and must survive on her own for several days. In "Gerald's Game", a woman is handcuffed to a bed by her kinky boyfriend, who then dies of a heart attack and leaves her helpless. Stephen's game, it would seem, is to come up with these challenging premises which he must then write his way out of.

Rob Reiner's impeccably-filmed 1990 horror thriller MISERY, based on King's novel of the same name, places James Caan's "Paul Sheldon" into a doozy of a predicament--after crashing his car during a blizzard, he wakes up in bed in the secluded home of widowed nurse Annie Wilkes, his legs and right arm mangled.

Paul, author of a series of wildly-successful romance novels about a heroine named "Misery Chastain", is told by the sweet and attentive Annie that she is his number one fan. But when she finds out that he's killed "Misery" off in his latest novel, Annie goes off the deep end and her violent and dangerously insane side comes to the fore. Thus, Paul is helpless and at the mercy of a lunatic from whom there seems to be no escape.

Caan gives one of his best performances as a rational man who is suddenly thrust into a twisted, nightmarish ordeal of dehumanizing abuse and utter lunacy. He's very believable in the role and his expressions of guarded concern, growing alarm, and finally terror, outrage, and agony are some of the most realistic and expressive acting he's ever done.

Kathy Bates, of course, is just incredible as Annie Wilkes, every bit as much of a genuine movie monster as Mr. Hyde or the Phantom of the Opera. Clearly based in part on Genene Jones, the infamous "Texas Baby Murderer", Annie is a big woman with a big mental problem, and Bates plays the role to the hilt. Still, so powerful is her presence that she never needs to go over the top, which makes her character all the more unnervingly effective.

The direction by Rob Reiner is deviously clever. I don't think I've ever used the word "Hitchcockian" before, but I think it would apply here. Reiner seems to be having a ball shooting all sorts of different shots of walking feet, shadows under doors, etc. and editing them together to build little vignettes of mounting suspense. While Paul is creeping around the house in his wheelchair or doing something he's not supposed to be doing, we know that Annie could appear at any moment and inflict terrible punishment. Buster, the local sheriff (Richard Farnsworth), investigates Annie's house in a scene that recalls the queasy unease of Vera Miles' search of the Bates home in PSYCHO.


Annie's every tiny mood swing or irrational suspicion can bring new terror, until we're jittery with dread whenever she's onscreen. Her solution for Paul's attempts to escape captivity, while not quite as extreme as in King's novel, is still not for the squeamish. The final confrontation between the two, which could've turned out ludicrous in lesser hands, is handled extremely well.

The new Blu-Ray 2-disc set (BD/DVD) from 20th-Century Fox is 1.85:1 with English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and Spanish and French Dolby Digital 5.1, and offers subtitles in all three languages. The Blu-Ray image looks pretty good. There is actually some print damage, which is a bit surprising--not too much, but that there is any is a bit strange. The picture is a little soft, but still offers a good amount of detail.

MISERY takes its time establishing the situation and characters and then building an aura of suspense that can at any moment erupt into nerve-wracking terror. It's a great example of how a movie can put the viewer through the proverbial wringer without the need for graphic violence and cheap shocks.

MISERY (Blu-Ray) -- DVD Review by Porfle