SLEDGE HAMMER!: THE COMPLETE SERIES -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 12/8/11

 

Having just watched the 5-DVD set SLEDGE HAMMER!: THE COMPLETE SERIES, I find that, once again, I dislike something at first and then end up liking it after further consideration.  This proves either one of two things: (a) I'm wishy-washy, or (b) you can't always go by first impressions.  I'm going to go with the second alternative, since it's less uncomplimentary toward me.

I have a vague memory of seeing an episode of this show during its first run (1986-88) and dismissing it as a crappy "Police Squad!" wannabe.  That criminally brief 1982 series (six big  episodes and out) by the Zucker brothers, which introduced Leslie Nielsen's celebrated "Frank Drebin" character and inspired the NAKED GUN movie trilogy, continued the same outlandishly farcical yet totally deadpan vibe of the Zuckers' AIRPLANE! on a smaller scale. 

Naturally, I was disappointed when I approached "Sledge Hammer!" expecting it to be more of the same.  What I finally realized after watching several episodes, however, is that this show is its own addlebrained entity--it's still a lightheaded farce that often resembles something out of MAD Magazine and celebrates silliness for its own sake, but the deadpan humor is shot through (pun alert!) with heaps of pure, giddy goofiness.  In fact, "Sledge Hammer!" works both when it's aping the bone-dry "Police Squad!" comedy style and when it's making funny faces at us.



It takes awhile to get its groove on, though.  The first episode is a bit of a mess--production values are murky, the direction and editing are flabby, and, worst of all, there's a laugh track pointing out the funny parts to us.  Still, it has John Vernon (ANIMAL HOUSE) as the mayor, who demands that Sledge be let loose on the case when his daughter is kidnapped by terrorists. 

There are some funny bits and Hammer's character, who is a cross between Dirty Harry and his watered-down TV equivalent "Hunter" (also a likable fascist cop with a female partner), is well established when he uses a bazooka to demolish an entire building in order to stop a sniper ("Trust me, I know what I'm doing" is his oft-heard motto).  Overall, though, it's pretty limp.

We get to watch the show get its bearings and start firing on more cylinders as the season progresses, with the scripts getting funnier and more daring, and the direction improving (Bill Bixby eventually helmed eight of the series' best episodes, with Dick Martin of "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" contributing a couple of good ones).  Despite its lesser moments, there's a relentless quality to the hot-and-cold-running gags and a sort of earnestness from the stars that makes the first season somehow likable.  And some of the gags actually score big laughs, as when Hammer and an informant (guest star Dennis Fimple) conduct a secret conversation via adjoining pay phones.



Before long, the chemistry between Hammer and his female partner Det. Dori Doreau starts to click.  RUNAWAY's Anne-Marie Martin (who, incidentally, co-wrote TWISTER with Michael Crichton) is an appealing foil for Hammer even though her comedic skills take awhile to develop, and their relationship has a certain charm--Doreau sees the good behind Hammer's fascist, violence-loving, ultra-right-wing exterior and eventually finds herself falling for him even though Hammer's first love is his gun, which he talks to and sleeps with. 

As Hammer, David Rasche (BURN AFTER READING, UNITED 93) has a firm grasp on the character from the start but also gets better as he goes along.  Rasche has a field day in the role, with his trigger-happy detective shooting first and asking questions later while gleefully roughing up everyone from jaywalkers to the mayor's wife.  He reels off one-liners like nobody's business--when a nagging reporter asks if he has any predictions, Hammer's deadpan response is, "Yes...scientists will perform the first brain transplant, and you'll be the recipient."  We eventually learn that Hammer thinks the death penalty is too lenient, his favorite song is "Taps", and the only thing he fears is world peace.

As season one comes to a close, just about the time Patrick Wayne does a delightful guest shot as Hammer's long-lost brother, the show really starts getting serious about being funny.  The season-one cliffhanger is insane, opening with a introduction by Robin Leach in which he announces that the series is making a bid for renewal by packing more sex and violence into the upcoming episode and ending with Hammer frantically trying to disarm a nuclear warhead that could annihilate the entire city.  Cult star Mary Woronov plays the mad villainess in this one, which actually does end with a nuclear explosion. 

How they resolve this open-ended situation at the start of season two is undoubtedly one of network television's nuttiest moments, with the show even changing its name temporarily as part of the joke!  And this is just the beginning of a series of episodes that get progressively more willing to be weird, while cast and crew all seem to be on the same page at last and making funny things happen.  Movie spoofs dominate, with films such as SHAMPOO, JAGGED EDGE, and VERTIGO getting the treatment (with the occasional misfire such as a weak parody of PLAY IT AGAIN, SAM). 

"Hammeroid" finds Hammer seriously wounded by a juggernaut robot (which is reminiscent of a similar character on the cult series "The Avengers") and turned into a cyborg a la ROBOCOP.  Fans of that movie should love this affectionate spoof, while Bela Lugosi fans are in for a treat with "Last of the Red Hot Vampires", in which "Love Boat" alumnus Bernie Kopel does a surprisingly good Lugosi imitation.  (The episode is "dedicated to Mr. Blasko", the actor's real last name.)



In "Jagged Sledge", Rasche gives a tour-de-force performance when Hammer must defend himself while on trial for the murder of a mob boss (the great Tige Andrews of "Mod Squad" fame).  Another episode, which finds Hammer going undercover as a prison convict involved in a breakout attempt, actually beats NAKED GUN 33 1/3 (1994) to the punch with a strangely similar premise.

Harrison Page (CARNOSAUR) is undoubtedly the funniest supporting actor in the role of Captain Trunk, a dead-on spoof of the perpetually screaming squad captain whose blood pressure is always sky-high thanks to Hammer's destructive hijinks.  Avoiding what could've been a one-note performance, Page is one of the best things about the show and is a constant delight.  In addition to those already mentioned, a sterling roster of guest stars includes Ronnie Schell, Bill Dana, Nicholas Guest, Ray Walston, David Clennon, Armin Shimerman, Richard Moll, Adam Ant, Brion James, Bud Cort, Mark Blankfield, and Russ Meyer regular Edy Williams.  Directors Bixby and Martin pop up in cameos.

The 5-disc DVD (22 episodes) from Image Entertainment is in 1.33:1 widescreen with Dolby Digital mono.  No subtitles or extras.

It's interesting watching a show go from blah to good as we see with SLEDGE HAMMER!: THE COMPLETE SERIES.  It may not be perfect but it's just plain fun, and by the time the last few episodes rolled around, I didn't want it to stop being Hammer Time. 

SLEDGE HAMMER!: THE COMPLETE SERIES -- DVD Review by Porfle

THE ABANDONED -- Movie Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 11/19/10

 

I have to go to the bathroom real bad, damn it.  But the bathroom is at the end of a dark hallway which is behind a closed door, and it's late, and I'm by myself. 

Watching scary movies by myself at night isn't the same as it was when I was a kid; rarely do I see one that cuts right through my adult sensibilities and makes me afraid to go down a dark hallway because there might be something creeping up behind me or because when I turn on the bathroom light that same something will be standing in there ready to lunge at me.  THE ABANDONED (2006), however, is one of those movies.

The story begins as Marie (Anastasia Hille) arrives in Moscow to track down her origins, having been adopted as an infant after her Russian mother was found brutally murdered.  She discovers that she has inherited the old home place, a sprawling, dilapidated farmhouse in the middle of the deep, dark woods between nothing and nowhere, and hires a farmer to take her there in his truck.  Before they leave, an old Russian woman pleads with her not to go, while other bystanders regard her with fear and sorrow.  It's very similar to the scene at the beginning of DRACULA in which the villagers beseech Renfield not to travel to the evil Count's castle, and we all know what happened to him.

After what seems like hours of travel, the driver leaves Marie alone in the woods at night, within walking distance of the house.  Out of the corner of her eye, Marie thinks she sees a ghostly figure glide across the path up ahead.  She reaches the really, really spooky old house and goes inside, peering into the deep darkness with her flashlight and making her way slowly through shadowy, cobwebbed rooms and corridors.  She hears noises.  And maybe a voice or two.  I'm thinking, "Would I be in that house at that time?  No, I would not."  I'm also thinking that there's gonna be a "jump" shock any second now, and I'm right--there is.  But expecting it doesn't help.  In fact, it just makes it worse.


A lot of horror flicks these days depend on jump shocks, which can startle the crap out of you for a few seconds but are soon forgotten.  This film is filled with them, but they're often only the beginning of a long sequence of sustained fear that doesn't subside after you've been soundly goosed.  The interplay of the various cinematic elements is masterful in these scenes--direction, photography, special effects, and acting are all outstanding--creating the sort of sustained terror that usually comes along only in your worst nightmares.  This movie, in fact, is like one long nightmare that you don't even fully wake up from when the end credits start rolling.

But back to Marie.  After the first really scary stuff happens, she discovers that there's someone else in the house with her.  That is, another living, flesh-and-blood someone.  He turns out to be her twin brother, Nicolai (Karel Roden of BLADE II and HELLBOY), who has also been drawn to the house trying to find out what awful thing happened to their mother there, forty years ago.  After suffering through one hellishly terrifying ordeal after another, they finally find out.  I'm not going to tell you any more of what happens, but when Nicolai has a sudden realization and says ominously to Marie, "We're haunting ourselves...", you just might be thinking: "No sh*t!"  One thing's for sure--the old "blank white eyeballs" thing has rarely looked scarier.

The last haunted house movie that tried to scare me was THE MARSH.  But it tried to do this with a bunch of obvious CGI and noisy, flashy effects.  THE ABANDONED has some CGI, too, but it's the best kind--the kind that tries not to look like CGI.  Both of these films contain a similar scene in which a decrepit old room goes backward in time to its original state, but the difference is stunning.  One scene seems to say "Look at this cool CGI!", while the other is more interested in maintaining your level of involvement in the scene itself.


THE ABANDONED looks great, with beautiful photography and imaginative editing worthy of an art film, always establishing and maintaining the right mood without being merely for show.  The sound design and haunting score also contribute substantially to the ominous atmosphere, making even the scenes of Marie arriving in Moscow seem forboding and pulsing with bad tidings for what's to come.

The house itself is a marvel of production design, a labyrinth of dingy rooms, spooky corridors, and ominous passageways that constantly had me muttering "Don't go in there!"  And with it, the stage is set for Spanish director Nacho Cerdà to do his stuff.  To paraphrase a line from POLTERGEIST, he knows what scares you.  His handling of this type of material is masterful compared to the ham-fisted direction often seen in similar films.  And the two leads, Anastasia Hille and Karel Roden, are so good that they put the whole thing across with utter conviction.  It didn't even bother me that the last few minutes didn't really seem to make total sense, because the worst nightmares rarely do. 

I've seen a lot of horror films, especially of the haunted house variety, that tried their best to be scary but just didn't know how to do it, or how to sustain it all the way through to the end.  But THE ABANDONED knows how.  Boy, does it ever.  It left me feeling drained, stunned, entertained yet uncomfortably uneasy and disturbed; and most of all, really, really creeped out.  And I still have to go to the bathroom real bad, damn it.

THE ABANDONED -- Movie Review by Porfle

THE CARETAKER -- Movie Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 9/28/16

 

Some horror movies seem to be able to look right into our minds and find exactly what flat-out scares us, and then they use that to turn us into shivering, quivering, gibbering blobs of giddy terror.  Others, unfortunately, don't seem to have a clue and simply throw everything but the kitchen sink at us in hopes that something scary will stick.

And then there are those fright flicks that traverse the middle ground between the two, occasionally causing a tingly chill up and down the spine but never quite hitting that elusive terror sweet spot within our delicate psyches.  THE CARETAKER (2016, Level 33) is like that, although not for lack of trying.  It's a respectable effort.

Sondra Blake, a familiar face for those of us who grew up watching TV in the 70s (in addition to being married to Robert Blake, she played Susan Atkins' cellmate in the TV-movie "Helter Skelter" among many other things), is a welcome presence as dotty old hag Birdy, who lives in a huge antique of a house and drives away every caretaker hired to watch over her.

Not only is Birdie stubbornly unwilling to take the meds that keep her psychoses at bay, but when she isn't behaving like an even nuttier version of Blanche DuBois from "A Streetcar Named Desire" she tends at times to be...well, scary.

The movie's first (effective) jump scare, in fact, is due to her, which finally drives away caretaker Gilberto and forces her granddaughter Mallorie (Meegan Warner, "TURN: Washington's Spies") to move back into the old house she grew up in (Birdie raised her from the age of four after her mother's mysterious disappearance) to take over as caretaker herself.

Mallorie's boyfriend August (Sean Martini) comes along for the ride--the occasional chance to ride Mallorie, that is--although he chafes at having to sleep on the dusty old couch.  They'll both get more than they bargained for when Birdy turns out to be not only more unmanageable than they imagined, but also displays a tendency toward witchery that lends a growing air of creepy foreboding to the proceedings.

As the two young people learn more and more about Birdie's past--such as being expelled from her position as a circus medium, of all things, for heresy--Mallorie starts sleepwalking and seeing things.  She also tells August of the time as a child when she was in the living room one dark night and thought she saw a clown standing in the corner.  Okay, end of movie--I'd be outta there faster than a McDonald's employee asks "Would you like fries with that?"

Sondra Blake is pretty effective throughout, but in a relatively subtle way--she never really lays it on as thick as I thought she eventually would, even when Birdie turns the tables on her caretakers and teeters off the deep end. 

In fact, the movie itself never quite goes for broke, content to maintain a decent level of interest with the mystery of what terrible things happened in the house back in Mallorie's unremembered past, what secrets are locked away in the old dark attic, and other stuff about spells and seances and such.

What's missing, ultimately, is the sense of genuine fear we anticipate and desire but which the film is never quite able to pull off.  The elements are all there for an experience similar to that of, say, THE OTHERS, a movie that chilled us to the bone because it knew just how to pull our strings.  Even the potential to capitalize big-time on the clownophobia most people suffer from these days goes largely unrealized. 

The story does make one last stops-out attempt to end things with a bang, or rather a scream, but even this final twist is merely noteworthy (in a "hmm, that's an interesting end to the story" kind of way) rather than chilling. 

Still, although I was totally unmoved by the 1980 ghost story THE CHANGELING, some of the guys I saw it with found it really disturbing.  Similarly, your mileage may vary with THE CARETAKER.  It does have a nice creepy atmosphere, good performances, a decent script and production values, and Sondra Blake, which I found enough for an enjoyable if mostly non-terrifying experience.

THE CARETAKER -- Movie Review by Porfle

RED VS. BLUE: THE CHORUS TRILOGY -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 6/27/16

 

If you ever got tired of actually playing a videogame and starting fooling around with it--that is, making up your own storylines and dialogue, having the characters engage in activities that they weren't originally designed for, etc.--then you'll most likely understand the appeal of the web series from Rooster Teeth entitled "Red vs. Blue." 

In this rollicking sci-fi/action adventure, the characters and settings from the popular HALO games are repurposed in a sweeping saga about heavily-armored soldiers in an interplanetary civil war who overcome their initial mistrust of one another in order to join forces against a common enemy. 

Rooster Teeth's 3-disc limited edition steelbook Blu-ray collection RED VS. BLUE: THE CHORUS TRILOGY contains seasons 11 through 13 of the long-running series, following the events that occur after the Reds and Blues crash-land on the planet Chorus and struggle to convince two warring factions there to unite against their true enemy, a power-mad political leader known as "The Chairman" whose deadly army of mercenaries threatens to destroy them all.

Despite joining most of this in-progress, it didn't take me long to settle into the story and grow accustomed to its novel presentation.  I used to watch a lot of Adult Swim on the Cartoon Network, particularly shows such as "Sealab 2021" in which the animation from a "serious" old cartoon is reworked to create a surrealistic comedy, so it's not exactly a strange new concept for me. 

In this case, the pre-existing animation is a videogame that can be "played" by the show's writers to conform to their brand new stories and salty dialogue, augmented by new artwork inserted here and there and also a good deal of motion-capture. 

This ensures that the show is visually interesting and at times downright spectacular, especially during the imaginatively-staged battle sequences.  In fact, one of the most appealing aspects of "Red vs. Blue" is seeing how cleverly the HALO elements are used in each new scene and setpiece in the saga.

 

The only drawback to this technique is that the soldiers are all permanently encased in their battle armor and are thus faceless, making it difficult to tell them apart sometimes.  (They also must carry their weapons poised to fire at all times.)  Still, the voice actors do a masterful job of creating individual personalities for them, and they're written in ways that make them incredibly appealing.
 
Even more noteworthy is the fact that these characters are versatile enough to be used in situations that range from dead-serious drama to hilarious situation comedy and back again.  This gives the writers enormous freedom to explore everything from straight drama to nuts and bolts sci-fi action to gut-busting farce, and even all-out slapstick, without breaking their stride. 

Each dialogue-heavy episode indulges in plenty of sitcom humor that allows the funnier characters such as resident idiot Caboose (who sounds exactly like Adult Swim's "Brak"), the humanoid robot Lopez who's programmed to speak only Spanish even though nobody else does, and the comically gung-ho veteran Sarge (later promoted to Colonel Sarge) ample opportunity to make us laugh.

Meanwhile, the more serious story elements underlying it all eventually culminate in furious, sustained battle sequences (enhanced with the occasional mind-expanding sci-fi concept) and made all the more suspenseful by the inclusion of two ruthless super-soldiers, Locus and Felix, hired by the Chairman to wipe out the Reds and Blues at any cost.

The three Blu-ray discs from Rooster Teeth and Cinedigm Entertainment come in a sleek steelbook case with a clear plastic slipcover.  Each disc features a season of the show (almost 8 hours total) complete with commentary tracks and several more hours of informative behind-the-scenes featurettes, outtakes, and trailers.  The feature presentation is in 16x9 widescreen with Dolby 5.1 audio.

With surprisingly three-dimensional characters (even the comic-relief ones have their moments) and engaging sci-fi situations along with raucous comedy, RED VS. BLUE: THE CHORUS TRILOGY is total genre goodness for gamers and non-gamers alike. 

RED VS. BLUE: THE CHORUS TRILOGY -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

MILLENNIUM CRISIS -- DVD review by porfle

 

Originally posted on 2/18/11

 

As Ted Raimi states in one of the DVD's bonus featurettes, you don't see that many low-budget independent sci-fi flicks that are much more than talking heads in rooms, yakking a lot of dialogue at each other. The makers of MILLENNIUM CRISIS (2007) have attempted to sidestep this problem by filling their shot-on-video space opera with plenty of really cheap-looking special effects and hoping we'll like the story enough to play along and really, really suspend our disbelief.

Fortunately, they did a pretty good job of this. The effects shots range from tolerable all the way down to the level of Monty Python-style animation, but I have to give them an A for effort. If you use your imagination, you might get into the cheapo atmosphere after awhile. The sets are minimal--some are even, well, subliminal--but much is done with a little sleight-of-hand and lots of weird lighting effects, with the help of a good ambient musical score by Aaron Paul Low which adds to the dreamlike quality of certain scenes. And yes, the story is interesting enough to have kept all of this from making me switch to hibernation mode.

I had trouble following some of it, but the main gist I got was that in the distant future, the warring Terrans and Andromedeans are enjoying a fragile period of truce. But a race of space vampires known as the Kluduthu are scheming to get everybody at each other's throats again so that they can enslave the survivors and feed off them. Which, I think we can all agree, isn't very nice.


A woman named Aurora (Clare Stevenson), who doesn't know where she came from or exactly what race she belongs to, is kidnapped by Kluduthu leader Harkness (a quietly effective Ato Essandoh of BLOOD DIAMOND) and his android cohort Lucretia (Olja Hrustic, who played one of the "Werewolf Women of the S.S." in GRINDHOUSE) because they suspect her to be the last of a species of aliens known as Bloodmasks, who can mimic the physical characteristics of any other species they come in contact with. Harkness and Lucretia plan to use Aurora to infiltrate a peace conference between the Terrans and Andromedeans and assassinate an important ambassador, thus sparking interplanetary war.

Clare Stevenson is a capable actress who makes Aurora a very likable character. She's a bit like Alice in Wonderland, wandering through one mind-boggling situation after another as she tries to find out who and what she is while doing her best to avoid being used as a secret weapon by the bad guys.

One particularly fun sequence aboard a space freighter has Aurora accidentally awakening some sentient androids, which then automatically awakens a Nosferatu-Class Neuronecromotron (really just an ugly bald guy who scowls and growls a lot) who is programmed to kill anything that moves in order to prevent any of the androids from escaping. I like the way the actors play these wide-eyed, innocent androids, and how Lucretia, the ancient android who's been around the galaxy a few times, sardonically informs them of the fruitlessness of their gosh-a-rootie plan to run away and live in freedom.


Ted Raimi appears in a few sequences as a flaky archeologist named Professor Keene, who gets mixed up in the whole thing and helps Aurora. Ted is probably the most experienced actor in the cast, but he gets barely enough screen time to justify giving him pole position on the DVD cover.

Lindsey Roberts (HUSTLE & FLOW) plays a Kluduthu assassin named Fiona, and if you like coldblooded warrior women she'll probably float your boat. There's a cool swordfight between her and Andromedean agent Murnau (Daryl Boling), in which Fiona just happens to accidentally be topless (oops!) for some reason. It's shot in what comes closest to being an actual honest-to-gosh set, is well-lit and nicely-choreographed, and makes this look a bit more like a real movie for a couple of minutes.

The best part of the movie for me is the Lucretia character. Olja Hrustic is a looker who plays the ages-old android with a cool, cynical detachment and air of mystery and superiority over everyone else. Lucretia's most startling feature is a long, metallic tentacle that springs from I-don't-know-where and can either mess you up, suck your life force, or just screw around with you. That, in addition to a cool chain-mail headdress and tight green bodysuit, helps to make Lucretia one of the most enjoyable visual aspects of the film.


On the negative side, the harsh lighting gets to be irritating from time to time, as does a frequent tendency of the editors to connect a sequence's shots together with an unnecessary white flashing light effect. There's a lot of imagination at work, though, in many of the futuristic elements of the different environments. And some of the images director/co-scripter Andrew Bellware has come up with are rather stunning--there's a reclining shot of Lucretia at about the halfway point that I swear I'd kill to have framed on the wall of my livingroom. Shortly before that, there's another shot of Aurora in repose inside her small living cubicle that would accompany it nicely.

The DVD from Shock-O-Rama cinema is in widescreen with Dolby Digital 5.1 sound.  Bonus features include a director/producer commentary, interviews with Raimi and other castmembers, a visual FX documentary, and a Shock-O-Rama trailer vault.

It's all unmistakably cheap but hardly amateurish. There's a lot of talent evident here, making the best of severely limited resources in imaginative ways, which I will always find just as much fun to watch in its own way as most of the big-budget razzle-dazzle stuff. With an intriguing sci-fi story, a good cast playing interesting characters, and some resourceful talent behind the camera, MILLENNIUM CRISIS manages to rise above its barely-existent budget to become somewhat more than the sum of its parts.

MILLENNIUM CRISIS -- DVD review by porfle

ZAPPED! -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 5/22/16

 

The weird thing about a movie like ZAPPED! is that if I'd seen it in 1982 when it came out, I would've immediately dismissed it as lightweight teenybopper trash.  Now, however, the glorious gift of hindsight reveals what it truly is--a priceless treasure trove of nostalgic "I Love the 80s" wonderfulness.

Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a tad.  But seen today, this goofy little candy-coated cross between PORKY'S and CARRIE (with a dash of MERLIN JONES and ZOTZ! thrown in) is the sort of perversely entertaining time capsule that reminds me why I now look back on that much-maligned decade with such fondness.

ZAPPED! was the genesis of that dynamic duo of Scott "Chachi" Baio and Willie "Eight is Enough" Aames, who would go on to five full seasons in the 1984-1990 hit sitcom "Charles in Charge."

Here, they're a couple of typical high school seniors--one a science nerd, the other a wannabe playa--who have one heck of a senior year when lab-rat Barney (Baio) accidentally "zaps" himself with a formula for instant telekinesis and pal Peyton (Aames) starts coming up with all sorts of schemes to take advantage of it. 

It's the classic high school boy's fantasy come true, with Barney using his new power to make tight cheerleader sweaters pop open (which reminds me, Heather Thomas is also on hand as head cheerleader Jane) and to "pants" rival high schoolers and make them fly around the campus with their butts hanging out.  He also creates havoc during an intermural baseball game with amusing results.

Aames is a likable enough Lothario and Baio makes for an adequately identifiable nerd-hero, with Felice Schachter as fellow egghead Bernadette providing Barney's awkward love interest.  (Schachter's winsome good looks, of course, are "hidden" behind glasses and braces.)

While surprisingly smutty for a Baio/Aames vehicle, ZAPPED! somehow manages to retain a kind of curdled wholesomeness despite ample boobage (a body double stands in for Thomas), copious marijuana references, and even a sex scene with Barney and Bernadette that pretty much blows "abstinence" out of the water.
   
With Barney's mental misadventures fueling most of the plot, things come to a head during (you guessed it) the senior prom.  There's no pig's blood involved this time, but when a bump on the head gives free rein to Barney's mind powers, the occasion turns into the sort of blouse-bursting bacchanal we all dreamed about back in the day. 

Still, it's all just relatively harmless fun, aided in no small measure by a highly capable supporting cast of adults including Robert Mandan ("Soap") and perennial cutie Sue Ane Langdon as the prototypes for Principal Skinner and Ms. Krabappel, and Roger Bowen (MASH) and Marya Small (AMERICAN POP) as Barney's hilariously out-of-it parents.

Scatman Crothers (THE SHINING) and LaWanda Page ("Sanford and Son") also turn up as the school's coach and his clock-stopping wife.  The "teen" cast also includes STAR TREK: THE WRATH OF KHAN's Merritt Butrick and comedy legend Eddie Deezen as "Sheldon."

A couple of fantasy setpieces stand out: in one, Barney imagines the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise encountering his dog (with the ship consisting of an interesting hybrid of Enterprise and Millennium Falcon model kits), and in the other, a weed-addled Crothers hallucinates himself and Albert Einstein being chased by a bazooka-wielding Page.  Elsewhere, hilarity ensues when Barney's mom thinks he's possessed and enlists a couple of inept priests to exorcise him. 

The DVD from Olive Films is in widescreen with Dolby 2.0 sound.  No subtitles or extras.

With its cheesy rock songs, chintzy production values, and an overall air of goofiness, ZAPPED! is the sort of movie whose once-negative qualities somehow work entirely in its favor when viewed today.  I'm glad I saw it now instead of then--the 80s seem so much better when observed from a safe distance.

ZAPPED! -- DVD Review by Porfle

DAMNED BY DAWN -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 10/28/10

 

The DVD cover blurb for DAMNED BY DAWN (2009) states "Sick of waiting for EVIL DEAD 4?  Check out Damned by Dawn."  Well, not quite.  But it is about half of the spookiest movie I've seen in quite a while. 

Not that director and co-writer Brett Anstey, along with his filmmaking co-horts who call themselves The Amazing Krypto Bros., aren't going for a Sam Raimi vibe here, because they are.  It's just that they aren't quite capable of delivering the kind of balls-out gut-wrenching terror fest that the original EVIL DEAD was when it first came out.  Not for the entire running time anyway.  What they do manage to achieve to a certain degree, however, are the kind of good old-fashioned ghostly chills that get under your skin and give you goosebumps.

Though shot in Australia, the isolated setting of DAMNED BY DAWN has the fog-shrouded feel of the English countryside.  It's here that Claire O'Neill (Renee Willner) and her boyfriend Paul (Danny Alder) arrive at the old family estate where she grew up to visit her dying grandmother.  Paul meets Claire's dubious dad, Bill (Peter Stratford), and her bouncy younger sister, Jen (Taryn Eva), before setting off for the nearby village for some pizza.  He almost runs into a ditch at the sight of a spectral figure standing in the road.

Meanwhile, Claire is at Nana's bedside when the old woman begins to tell her a disturbing tale of a banshee who will come for her when she dies.  Claire awakens in the middle of the night to frightening far-off screams, and before long the entire family is beset by the Banshee herself and a host of other undead figures who have risen from the grave.  During a night of terror, Nana is taken away and their efforts to find her result in some grisly deaths.  The survivors attempt to escape the next day but are confronted by an army of the dead at every turn.


An atmosphere of unease begins to build from the very start and sets us up for the kind of scares that used to have us peeking through our fingers when we were kids.  An early shot of the Banshee appearing in an old family photograph during a flash of lightning is just the beginning of a series of chilling jump scares that are truly frightening.  Earlier, when Paul is standing on that dark road after his fleeting vision, a brief glimpse of the white-shrouded spectre floating by in the background should raise a few hackles. 

Director Anstey places her off-center in several shots and lets us discover her slowly approaching figure ourselves as she emerges out of the fog, along with the terrified Claire who watches from a window during the initial siege.  The front door slowly swings open in a swirl of mist, the Banshee enters, and Claire hides in a closet as the ghostly apparition moves through the house.  It's like something out of a child's nightmare, recalling some of our earliest irrational fears and giving us that old familiar shivery feeling. 

The film succeeds in doing so only sporadically from that point forward.  There are some nice shots of zombie-like wraiths floating through the air, one of them wielding a scythe in Grim Reaper fashion as he inexorably pursues his living victims.  These figures begin to lose their effectiveness, however, as the film's reliance on less-than-convincing CGI steadily increases.  Rarely are computer-generated ghosts scary, and DAMNED BY DAWN is no exception. 

The mood is further diminished as the film makes the same mistake that ruined the finale of POLTERGEIST along with many other supernatural films--namely, the belief that ratcheting up the noise level and adding a bunch of flashy effects and frantic activity will increase the scare factor, when, in fact, it has the opposite effect.  Having the Banshee repeatedly break out in prolonged, supersonic screams is also less than terrifying.  As the story goes on, long stretches in which a character creeps around waiting for something to jump out at her tend to further drag the pace of the film's second half.


Still, there are some good moments throughout.  When a shotgun-wielding Claire warily enters an old barn in search of her missing sister, last seen being yanked away from a window by an unseen force, the sequence generates jittery suspense.  The gross-out factor takes front and center with a Raimi-inspired episode in which a character previously hanged by his own intestines shows up in the kitchen the next day, spilling entrails from his gaping stomach and vomiting cockroaches.  Kindly old Nana gets into the act herself later on when she returns as one of the hostile undead in the film's frenetic climax.

For a low-budget effort, DAMNED BY DAWN looks great and is clearly the work of a talented and enthusiastic bunch of filmmakers.  The cast is uniformly good, especially Renee Willner as Claire and Dawn Klingberg as Nana.  Bridget Neval does her best as the Banshee, though the character's effectiveness varies depending mostly on the director and the script.  She's never better than in those early scenes in which her unnerving presence is fleetingly seen.  (Call me weird, but I think she's pretty hot, too.)

The DVD from Image Entertainment is in 1.78:1 widescreen with Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound.  No subtitles this time.  Along with the trailer there's a 55-minute behind-the-scenes documentary that is quite engaging.  A crew commentary provides more information on the making of the film, while the cast commentary (most of them are seeing it for the first time) is lively and fun.

Although DAMNED BY DAWN isn't entirely successful and can't maintain its ability to scare us past those chilling early scenes, it's still a worthwhile effort that should please horror fans.  Definitely the sort of thing to liven up your Halloween viewing experience.  

DAMNED BY DAWN -- DVD Review by Porfle

PALISADES TARTAN TERROR PACK VOL. 1 (SHEITAN, CARVED, SLAUGHTER NIGHT) -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 10/15/09

 

A sampler of scares from around the world, Palisades Tartan's TERROR PACK VOL. 1 offers a tasty assortment of horrors with an international flavor. These may not be the most utterly nightmare-inducing films you'll ever see, but they're definitely kooky, spooky, and very entertaining.

Much of Japan's creepiest film horror is derived from their popular ghost stories and urban legends. CARVED: THE SLIT-MOUTHED WOMAN (2007) is a prime example, beginning with the rumor of the titular ghost being passed from child to child at school until the entire populace is on edge. Before long, kids start disappearing as the terrifying slit-mouthed woman, a trench-coated apparition with long black hair and a hideous visage, appears with her long, razor-sharp scissors. "Am I pretty?" she asks cryptically before snatching them away.

Two young elementary school teachers end up on the ghost's trail for various reasons--Ms. Yamashita (Eriko Satô) seeks to make amends for abusing her own daughter, while Mr. Matsuzaki (Haruhiko Katô) has a terrible personal connection that enables him to sense the ghost's next attack before it happens. They encounter her several times before a final battle in her hidden cellar of death becomes an ordeal of unspeakable horror.

CARVED isn't nearly as blood-curdlingly terrifying as some of the Asian ghost stories I've seen, but it's the kind of macabre tale that brings back that childhood feeling of walking home in the twilight after trading too many scary stories with your friends. With her staring snake eyes and gaping ear-to-ear gash of a mouth (the makeup is great), the slit-mouthed woman is an imposing presence. The acting by the kids is very good, but if seeing children getting wasted is too much for you, you might want to skip this one. Because of this factor, much of the film is more disturbing than scary.

The DVD is presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen with Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 surround sound. The soundtrack is in Japanese with English and Spanish subtitles. Extras include "The Making of Carved", cast interviews, and original theatrical trailer and TV spots.

Kôji Shiraishi's direction is smooth and unobtrusive, with some cleverly executed shots. He stages the fright scenes well and maintains an unsettling aura of fear without relying solely on jump scares. The finale is tense and suspenseful, and the movie fades out on a disturbing open-ended note.



The Dutch horror film SLAUGHTER NIGHT, aka SL8N8 (2007) seems at first to be your typical "teens getting stalked and slaughtered" bore, but it turns into one killer spookhouse ride as soon as our stereotypical group of good kids and party animals find themselves trapped in an abandoned mine and terrorized by the vengeful ghost of a maniacal serial killer.

A prologue detailing the gruesome murder spree of one Andries Martiens (Robert Eleveld) centuries ago gets the movie off to a shocking start as he captures several children, then lops off their heads and mounts them on poles (another warning to those who find child murders hard to watch). Killing eight people in this way will allow Martiens to enter Hell and return, for reasons made clear later on. His plan is thwarted as he is captured and put to death.

Switch to present day, as our fun-loving youngsters take a tour of a vast system of mine tunnels that is haunted by Martiens' ghost. After the elevator goes on the fritz and they're trapped underground, Martiens begins to possess them one by one and resumes his headhunting expedition that was interrupted centuries before. The result is a series of extremely unnerving stalk-and-kill sequences with some gruesome and very inventive deaths (the shovel beheading is truly memorable).

Victoria Koblenko stars as Kristel, the level-headed girl whose father was recently killed in a (spectacularly staged) car crash and who is now helping them from the other world via a Ouija board. Kurt Rogiers is also good as her would-be boyfriend Mark, and Linda van der Steen is quite convincing as the spoiled bratty girl, Estrild, who becomes one hot monster later on. The EXORCIST-style makeup on the possessed characters is chilling and the actors do a great job as either terrified victims or crazed psycho-killers.

The DVD is in anamorphic widescreen with Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 surround sound. Soundtrack is the original Dutch with English and Spanish subtitles. Extras include "The Making of Slaughter Night", outtakes, and the theatrical trailer.

The movie looks great and directors Frank van Geloven and Edwin Visser stage everything beautifully. Even the Shaky-Cam is used to good effect most of the time. SLAUGHTER NIGHT is one of the best movies of its kind that I've seen in a long time, maintaining a high level of fear and suspense with a pace that never lets up.



While the DVD cover of SHEITAN (2006) is clearly a ripoff of Anthony Hopkins' leering visage as HANNIBAL, I'd be hard-pressed to think of anything that the film itself could be compared to. This French "WTF?"-fest is one seriously, and I mean seriously, deranged movie.

Three unlikable, perpetually-horny party boys--Bart, Ladj, and Thai--get thrown out of a hip-hop club and follow a mysterious girl named Eve (Roxane Mesquida) home to her large family mansion in the country. The club's bartender, a nice Middle Eastern girl named Yasmine (Leïla Bekhti) tags along. The guys lust after the girls and compete for their attentions while Eve goads and teases them.

Into this scene blusters Eve's groundskeeper, Joseph (Vincent Cassel), a garrulous, overbearing, invasive force of nature who's always grinning like a loon. With his bulging eyes, handlebar moustache, and freakish demeanor, Joseph is a nerve-wracking presence whom the youngsters find alternately fascinating and disturbing. Bart is especially put off when Joseph keeps inviting him to go skinny dipping in a nearly hot spring.

Like a French version of DELIVERANCE or TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE, the film places a bunch of city kids in the middle of inbred hillbilly hell and then ratchets up the "weird" factor with each new character and situation. We know something strange is going on between Joseph and his pregnant sister, whom we never see until later on, and a wild story he tells during their feast of a freshly-slaughtered goat--something about a man who makes a deal with the Devil ("Sheitan") in order to become invincible and then impregnates his sister to create a Devil child--has an uncomfortable ring of truth. By the time our protagonists finally discover the real reason why they've been invited to the house, all hell has already broken loose and there's nothing left to do but scream.

Much of SEITAN is sneaky build-up, with Joseph and the other locals being weird and the boys vying for the girls' affections (with Eve deviously egging them on). It's intriguing enough that the promise of what's to come sustains interest until a point about three-quarters through when I finally thought to myself, "This is really starting to drag." It's right about that time, however, that the Sheitan hits the fan and all that build-up suddenly starts paying off like a bank of slot machines.

The last fifteen or twenty minutes of this film are an explosion of mind-bending bizarreness that had me shaking my head in giddy disbelief. I don't want to ruin it by describing it in too much detail, but we finally get to see Joseph at his full power, and we find out what eyeballs have to do with everything, and, last but definitely not least, we meet Joseph's sister. In a word, "yikes."

First-time director Kim Chapiron does a beautiful job of putting all of this on the screen in interesting and dynamic ways, and the highly-capable cast does a convincing job with the characters. Cassell, of course, is the standout as Joseph, having a field day with the role and instantly becoming one of the most fascinating maniacs in genre history.

Like the other DVDs in this set, SHEITAN is 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen with Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 surround sound. The soundtrack is in French with English and Spanish subtitles. Bonus features include "The Making of Sheitan" and the original trailer.

Alternately shocking, funny, sexy, gory, and incredibly perverse--with a final shot that will be seared into your memory--SHEITAN is one of those movies that seems relatively harmless at first and then knocks you right on your ass.

If you're in the mood for a ghastly good time with some well-made, effective, and genuinely creepy flicks, TERROR PACK VOL. 1 from Palisades Tartan Video is the right stuff. I'll be looking forward to more in this series.

PALISADES TARTAN TERROR PACK VOL. 1 (SHEITAN, CARVED, SLAUGHTER NIGHT) -- DVD Review by Porfle

APARTMENT 1303 -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 7/1/08

 

Asian horror has gotten a reputation lately for being the real deal, but that doesn't mean every film in the genre is a total terror-fest. Tartan Asia Extreme's APARTMENT 1303 has many of the familiar elements, but it isn't all that successful in putting them to good use.

As the story opens, a young woman who just scored a great apartment with an ocean view for a paltry sum goes flying off the balcony the day she moves in--SPLAT! A month later, Sayaka moves in and moves out the same way--SPLAT! Turns out she's number five on the hit list, a small detail the landlords conveniently forget to mention to prospective renters. The perplexed police, meanwhile, chalk them all up as suicides.

Sayaka's big sister, Mariko, decides to investigate and discovers that two of the previous tenants were an abused girl and her crazy mother, whose restless spirits still inhabit the apartment and don't take kindly to anyone else moving in. When a group of teens rent the place for the summer and start sailing over the balcony rail--it's a triple-header this time!--Mariko goes in for a face-off against death.

The first half of APARTMENT 1303 is the creepiest. Director Ataru Oikawa does a good job of establishing an eerie, anything-can-happen atmosphere within the claustrophobic confines of the apartment, even making a simple closet seem like a thing of dread. There are a few of the traditional "gotcha!" shots here, and one in particular had me jumping out of my skin about halfway through. Special effects are pretty good without relying much on CGI. The cast does a nice job, particularly Noriko Nakagoshi as Mariko, and there's also a little girl who lives in apartment 1302 who really started to give me the willies after awhile.

After a promising start, however, the film fails to realize its potential. The apparitions that keep popping up now and then aren't that scary, even when one of them starts sprouting yards and yards of knotty black hair for no reason. One of them has so many long closeups that we begin to concentrate on the somewhat unconvincing makeup.

The climactic confrontations between the living and the dead are filled with lots of fog, wind effects, flashing lights, etc., which aren't any more frightening here than they were in POLTERGEIST. There is a pretty chilling moment shortly before the fadeout, but it leads to what I found to be a distinctly less-than-satisfying ending. After all is said and done, in fact, the most effective part of the film is probably the drama between Mariko and her hopelessly grieving mother.

The DVD comes in 1:85:1 anamorphic widescreen with Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS surround sound. The soundtrack is in Japanese with English and Spanish subtitles. Bonus features consist of a photo gallery plus the trailer for this and six other Tartan Asia Extreme releases.

Not a bad film by any means, APARTMENT 1303 would probably make for a good introduction into Asian horror. But for those who have already shivered in fear at the cream of that genre's crop, this one may seem hardly scarier than an average episode of Rod Serling's "Night Gallery."

APARTMENT 1303 -- DVD Review by Porfle

INCREDIBLY EVER AFTER -- Blu-Ray/DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 11/9/12

 

Mixing wuxia-style hijinks, superhero heroics, and screwball domestic comedy comes INCREDIBLY EVER AFTER, aka "Mr. and Mrs. Incredible" (2011), one of the more warm and sweet-tempered Chinese action flicks I've seen.

Unlike modern-day superhero adventures, the story takes place in ancient China after Mr. and Mrs. Incredible have already retired to a quiet life of marital bliss in a remote mountain village.  Flint (Louis Koo, TRIANGLE, PROTEGE'), the former "Gazer Warrior", is now head of the town guard--a job that requires practically zero effort--while his wife Rouge, the one-time "Aroma Woman", divides her time between domestic duties and trying to get pregnant despite the fact that civilian life has severely slowed her metabolism.

Enter the Bai Xiao Clan, whose job it is to sort out and rank the many different sects of Chinese martial arts and who have decided to hold a competition in the village.  While hoping the excitement of the event will stimulate Rouge's fertility, the super duo also begin to notice strange things about the young man in charge, Grandmaster Blanc (Wang Bo-Chieh), whose hidden agenda will force Flint and Rouge back into action in a life and death battle against evil.

Those expecting non-stop thrills and mind-bending excitement will very likely be disappointed in INCREDIBLY EVER AFTER, which for much of its running time is a gentle, low-key domestic comedy that's as laidback as its rural setting.  Much of the humor comes from Flint and Rouge trying to agitate themselves into a more fertile state by provoking one another to anger and jealousy, with their methods becoming more and more desperate and absurd.  (Their anger, however, never lasts long.)  We also get to see the lengths they must go to in order to hide their super powers from their neighbors--even something as simple as a sneeze can have drastic results.

The martial arts ranking competition provides unexpected slapstick humor as some of the different fighting styles prove laughably lame.  Flashbacks give us a peek at the former exploits of Gazer Warrior (his capture of the Pest Four during a bank holdup is a highlight) and Aroma Woman, who uses her olfactory powers to foil a domestic abuser.  Their meeting and subsequent love affair are delightfully depicted with plenty of lighthearted charm, as is their devious use of super powers in their everyday lives (especially to help persuade a real estate agent to lower the price of their seaside dream home).

Standard superhero action comes to the fore late in the film when Grandmaster Blanc finally makes his move and Mr. and Mrs. Incredible must don their legendary heroic guises once again.  Much of the action here is dominated by cartoonish CGI and has an absurd quality that's somewhat reminiscent of the Shaw Brothers' earlier HOLY FLAME OF THE MARTIAL WORLD or THE BATTLE WIZARD although not nearly as mindblowingly outlandish.  As in the rest of the film, the violence is mild and nothing is taken overly seriously, although there's a touching depth to the feelings expressed by our heroes for one another during their most desperate moments.

Vincent Kok (FORBIDDEN CITY COP) directs with a sure hand and deftly handles both the action and comedy elements.  Colorful, eye-pleasing visuals are enhanced by some nice location photography and sets.  The main draw here, however, is the pairing of Louis Koo and Sandra Ng Kwan Yue as one of the most appealing, endearing screen couples I've seen in a long time.  I love how, no matter what they do to agitate and provoke one another (all in their effort to conceive a child together), they simply can't stay mad at each other.

The Blu-Ray/DVD combo from Funimation is in 16x9 widescreen with Dolby 5.1 Cantonese surround sound and English subtitles.  Extras consist of four different trailers (containing new material) and previews of other Funimation titles.  The closing credits crawl features bloopers from the film.

I've seen comments pointing out the lack of action (except in the final fifteen minutes of so) and the similarities between this and Pixar's THE INCREDIBLES.  But as far as I'm concerned, the almost effortlessly charming INCREDIBLY EVER AFTER is simply too much of a sheer delight to complain about. 

INCREDIBLY EVER AFTER -- Blu-Ray/DVD Review by Porfle

THE WOMAN KNIGHT OF MIRROR LAKE -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 5/9/12

 

What I first thought was going to be a dry-as-dust biopic quickly turns into a superb action-drama that gives equal time to both the heartrendingly emotional and pulse-poundingly exciting aspects of the life of Qiu Jin, THE WOMAN KNIGHT OF MIRROR LAKE (2011).

Huang Yi, who looks really sharp in a mannish jacket and tie, gives a stirring performance as a woman in early 20th-century China whose life becomes dedicated to rebelling against two things: the systematic oppression of women, and the Qing Dynasty's grievous mismanagement of the government. 

The young Qiu Jin is seen cutely refusing to have her feet bound and then being educated along with her brother in everything from literature to martial arts.  When reminded of her future marriage and subjugation to her prospective husband, her reaction lets us know that things aren't going to work out that way. 

Leaving the poor tradition-bound sap and her two children to attend school in Japan, Qiu Jin's fierce campaign for gender equality is soon eclipsed by a different revolutionary fervor when she meets Xu Xilin (Dennis To, Huang Yi's co-star in THE LEGEND IS BORN: IP MAN, also directed by Herman Yau) and joins his band of political warriors who are planning the violent overthrow of the government. 

The film's furious fight action gets underway right off the bat with the group's assassination attempt on an elderly governor, prompting fierce and meticulously choreographed combat between police and rebels within two schools that serve as their training ground. 

After Xu Xilin is defeated the governor's lieutenant Liu Xiao Ming goes after Qiu Jin and her students, the result being a no-holds-barred fight sequence (the first of many) involving fists, swords, guns, wires, and things that explode.  More bloody, action-packed skirmishes will occur throughout the rest of the film as well.

Qiu Jin's capture and subsequent mockery of a trial, during which she is brutally tortured, evokes memories of THE PASSION OF JOAN D'ARC and forms the framework for well-integrated flashbacks of her life up to that point.  (Anthony Wong of EXILEDand THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR appears as a sympathetic but powerless magistrate.) 

There's a deft counterbalance between the violent and more tender moments, with Huang Yi aptly conveying Qiu Jin's personal anguish over the life she could have had as well as the quiet fervor of her revolutionary spirit.  Qiu Jin is so unassumingly righteous in her beliefs that it's no more shocking to see her engaged in a blazing gunfight with police in the streets than weeping over her decision to disappear from her family's lives. 

As the film heads inexorably toward Qiu Jin's conviction and execution, the flashbacks bring us back to where we began, only this time the armed uprising is seen in all the thrilling detail that director Herman Yau can muster as armed police lay siege to Xu Xilin's training school. 

The prolonged hand-to-hand fight between Xu Xilin and Liu Xiao Ming (an intense Xiong Xinxin) as the battle rages around them is a particular highlight, one of the most furious I've seen in a long time and filled with a wide variety of martial arts styles, weaponry, and even some semi-hokey wirework.  Not even all this action, however, can overpower the emotional impact that the story manages to convey as it draws to a close and we learn Qiu Jin's fate.

The 2-disc Blu-Ray/DVD combo from Funimation is in 16x9 widescreen with Dolby 5.1 surround in Mandarin and English.  Subtitles are in English.  The sole extra is a "making of" featurette. 

While I have no idea of how historically accurate THE WOMAN KNIGHT OF MIRROR LAKE is, I sorta doubt if the real-life Qiu Jin could fly around like Darth Maul and fight off hordes of armed attackers singlehanded.  It does make for a more interesting biopic, though.  And aside from all the other good things about the film, Huang Yi's exciting performance alone makes this one worth watching again. 

THE WOMAN KNIGHT OF MIRROR LAKE -- DVD Review by Porfle

THE GREAT CHALLENGE -- Movie Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 3/26/10

 

In THE GREAT CHALLENGE, aka Les fils du vent (2004), Burt Kwouk, who played Inspector Clouseau's constantly-attacking butler Cato in the PINK PANTHER series and was "Mr. Ling" in GOLDFINGER, is a millionaire business tycoon named Wong who's also a big boss in the Triad. He's giving an elegant garden party at the foot of the Wong Building in beautiful downtown Bangkok, when suddenly, in one breathtaking shot, the camera pans upward and zooms in on two black-clad figures doing a "Human Fly" routine up the side of the building.

In the next few minutes, one figure will engage three business-suited guards with fists, feet, and swords, while the other steals a priceless Red Dragon statue from Wong's office. Doffing their masks, they are revealed as brother and sister Kien and Tsu. The camera follows their slow-motion escape amidst gunfire as they dash toward a window, shooting holes in it as they go, and then crash through into the rain-drenched night. It's a nifty pre-titles sequence, and barely five minutes into the movie I was already impressed.

Kien and Tsu are half-breeds--only half-Chinese--and are rejected by all except the Yakuza, whose acceptance Kien is struggling to attain. Tsu, however, feels that their mother didn't raise no criminals, and acts as Kien's conscience, preventing her brother from giving himself over wholeheartedly to the dark side. Her rebelliousness, however, keeps them both in constant hot water with Kitano, the Yakuza boss who also just happens to be Mr. Wong's son-in-law and is scheming to take over control of the city from him. It appears that an all-out war between the Triad and the Yakuza is imminent.


Into this volatile situation come the Yamakasi, a real-life group of incredible athletes led by Laurent (Laurent Piemontesi), who wishes to open up a gym for street kids in Bangkok. Their sport involves running and jumping and flipping around the outside of buildings and stuff, often several stories in the air--you've got to see it to believe it--with emphasis on, as Wikipedia puts it, "aesthetics and complete freedom of movement from point A to point B." (This is the second film featuring the group--the first, YAMAKASI:LES SAMOURAIS DES TEMPS MODERNES, was released in 2001.) Their motto, it seems, might be "leap before you look." The title sequence illustrates this beautifully as two opposing groups compete to get from one rooftop to another first. It doesn't take long to notice that these people never heard of stairs, elevators, or caution, and watching them hurl themselves about from place to place over dizzying heights with total abandon is thrilling.

Unfortunately, Laurent has had unfriendly dealings with the Yakuza in the past and his new Yamakasi group is doomed to confront them. In an early scene they're having a workout on some bamboo scaffolding surrounding a building under construction, when Kien and some Yakuza thugs attack This leads to another amazing sequence of stunts, and when Tsu shows up to try and stop the fight, she encounters Logan (Charles Perrière), the Yamakasi she is destined to fall in love with. Their Romeo-and-Juliet romance will provide a lot of the drama between the fights, shoot-outs, etc. that appear frequently throughout the rest of the film.

They're all pretty exciting, too. The Yamakasi acrobatics give a new dimension to the usual martial arts displays and gunfights, and it's all thrillingly staged and performed. The wirework is only occasionally obvious--most of the time we get to see real, amazing stuntwork, and the best thing about it is that it's mostly done by the lead actors themselves. It's almost like watching a movie with an all-Jackie Chan cast. Some of it is tricked-up, of course, since the producers didn't want any of their lead actors getting killed or ending up in traction during filming, but for the most part, what you see is what you get.


Julien Seri directs it all with a great degree of style--some of his dramatic sequences come close to the aesthetic beauty of great anime', and the cinematography is often exquisite. Christian Henson's original score combines driving techno-style beats with lush orchestral passages that remind me of Joe Hisaishi's music for Hayao Miyazaki epics like SPIRITED AWAY. The editing, however, could've been a bit less frenetic in some scenes--the stuntwork and fight choreography are so good here that I'd like to have seen some of it play out without so many rapid-fire shots coming at me. Plus, the dubbing takes a bit of getting used to.

Most of the actors in this movie have interesting faces--they're fun to look at--and the director fills each scene with dramatic close-ups of them. In particular, Châu Belle Dinh as Kien and Elodie Yung as his sister, Tsu, have very expressive faces which dramatically convey their emotions. Charles Perrière is similarly intense as Logan, my favorite character among the Yamakasi. Santi Sudaros as Kitano, the Yakuza boss, is a formidable actor as well. And then, of course, there's Burt Kwouk as Mr. Wong, whose very presence makes the movie more fun to watch.

A plot by Kitano to kidnap Wong's only son and heir sets up the big finale, which will pit the collective muscle of the Triad and the Yakuza against each other in a wild free-for-all of guns, swords, and kung fu, with the Yamakasi right in the middle of it all, trying to fight their way out. It reminded me of The Bride vs. the Crazy 88's in KILL BILL, but without the ironic self-awareness or black humor--just tons of non-stop action. And the ending is pretty cool--everything's tied up nicely, and I felt thoroughly entertained.

THE GREAT CHALLENGE -- Movie Review by Porfle

KITES -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 2/18/11

 

High-octane chick flick?  Or sensitive love story for guys?  Whatever you call it, the Indian film KITES (2009) is a dazzling achievement that starts out looking all flashy and superficial and ends up steeped in genuine operatic romance.  And shoot-outs.  And car chases.

When a bunch of Mexican farm workers descend on a freight train with pitchforks to unload bales of hay, an unconscious man rolls out with a bullet in his back.  As an elderly peasant removes it, flashbacks reveal the man as J (Hrithik Roshan), a pretty-boy con man from India who gives dance lessons in Vegas and marries illegal immigrant women seeking green cards on the side.  When one of his students, Gina (Kangana Ranaut), falls for him, he's uninterested until he discovers she's the daughter of immensely-wealthy casino kingpin Bob (Kabir Bedi). 

Gina's gangster brother Tony (Nicholas Brown) is getting married, and wouldn't you know it--his intended, Mexican beauty Linda (Bárbara Mori), is one of J's former green-card brides, and the only one he ever felt anything for.  When J sees how Tony abuses her, he takes action.  The result is that J and Linda are now on the run from Vegas' most powerful crime family, with every cop and bounty hunter in the state on their tail along with Tony and his henchmen.



It's been awhile since I finished watching KITES, and I still haven't come in for a landing.  This shimmering cornucopia of movie magic overflows with so much good stuff during its two-hour running time that it's almost like one of those lucid dreams you don't want to wake up from.  Brilliantly directed (by Anurag Basu), sumptuously photographed, and exhilaratingly cinematic, it's almost a throwback to the silent days with extended passages of compelling images that involve the viewer on a non-verbal level.

The dialogue, when not purely functional, is used mainly for both romantic and comedic effect as various language barriers (English, Spanish, Hindi) prove awkward.  Rajesh Roshan's poignant original score is a major element throughout, as are several spirited song montages.  Unlike a lot of other films, frequent lapses into slow-motion work because we're seeing everything from J's point of view and he's pretty much in a constant dream state.
 

The early scenes are lighter in tone, with J and Gina's electrifying performance in a breakdancing exhibition providing a lively interlude, and some of J and Linda's adventures on the road are fun.  But danger and desperation begin to darken the story as the fleeing lovers encounter peril at every turn, and this is when KITES turns into one of the most thrilling action flicks of recent years. 

There are at least three major car chases, one of which is jam-packed with incredible crash stunts that will leave you breathless.  The film doesn't skimp on bullets either, nor is there a lack of genuine dramatic tension when things really start to go wrong for our protagonists.  Along the way, we get to see J's character transform from superficial street hustler to a man willing to die (as well as kill bad guys) for love, which endows him with blind courage and a fiendish resourcefulness during the action scenes.

My estimation of Hrithik Roshan as an actor grew as I watched his character develop.  It may not be apparent at first, but beyond his male-model looks he's very good.  (He also, incidentally, has two thumbs on his right hand.)  As Linda, Bárbara Mori is more than just radiantly beautiful--she gives a thoroughly captivating performance that's at times deeply affecting, whether trading playful romantic barbs with J or facing death at the edge of a cliff.  All of the supporting players are fine as well, notably Nicholas Brown as the homicidally hostile Tony.


The two-disc DVD from Image Entertainment is in 2.35:1 with Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound.  There are no extras--not even chapter selections.  Disc one is the original 123-minute Bollywood version in all its glory, while disc two contains Brett Ratner's 92-minute "Cliff Notes" version.
 
Ratner's remix strips the original of all its more contemplative passages and musical montages, including the early dance sequence and other important scenes in their entirety.  Graeme Revell's less effective new score replaces the intensely romantic one by Rajesh Roshan, including the love theme (which, admittedly, is a rip-off of Enya's theme for Aragorn and Arwen from the LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy), robbing the film of much of its heart.
 
Already a fast-paced film, the remix is downright ADD-friendly--trimmed and "time-compressed" the way syndicated TV episodes are carved up to make room for more commercials--and nowhere near the exquisite collaboration between images and music as the original version.  In his attempt to reshape the film into something more appealing to short attention spans (while adding a few more titillating shots here and there), Ratner rushes so impatiently through the story that even the deeply moving ending is seriously blunted.

Even if unabashed romanticism makes you uncomfortable, you might as well just give in to KITES and allow it to do its thing for a couple of hours.  Either you won't like it--and I imagine a lot of people won't--or it will be one of the most thoroughly intoxicating movie experiences you've ever had.  My advice is to let it sweep you up in its emotional and sensory embrace, and--heaven forbid--maybe even get a little misty-eyed at the end.  This movie earns it.

KITES -- DVD Review by Porfle

CLASH OF EMPIRES -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 8/17/11

 

Malaysian historical legend gets a retelling in the small-scale epic CLASH OF EMPIRES (2011), aka "The Malay Chronicles: Bloodlines."  But while providing some entertainment and the occasional "ooh, ahh" moment, it's not quite the stirring and inspirational saga it aspires to be. 

You have to hand it to director/co-writer Yusry Kru for being ambitious and trying to wring as much spectacle as he can out of what appears to be a non-Hollywood budget.  There's some sweep to the story (circa 120 A.D.) of a Roman prince and a Chinese princess whose pre-arranged marriage on a neutral shore is interrupted by an attack by the dreaded pirates, the Garuda. 

Their most ruthless warrior, Kamawas (Khir Rahman), whose magic amulet gives him invincibility, kidnaps the princess for ransom.  Merong, a Malaysian rogue hired to guard the prince, leads the local tribesmen in battle against the Garuda after discovering that he is the great warrior whom prophecies foretell will unite them in victory. 

CLASH OF EMPIRES blends elements of high seas adventure, historical warfare, and romance with generous doses of mysticism and sorcery.  The paunchy Garuda chieftan Taji gestures broadly at the gods to bring thunderbolts down on his enemies while armies on the seashore engage in speeded-up combat that's impressively violent while not being especially well shot or choreographed.  What the battle scenes lack in finesse, however, is made up for by the sheer amount of slice-and-dice action.



Stephen Rahman Hughes as Merong displays some martial arts dexterity and lots of enthusiasm along with a welcome sense of humor.  Much of the first half of the film, in fact, in played rather lightly, especially with the corny romantic banter between Prince Marcus (Gavin Stenhouse) and the reluctant bride-to-be, Meng Li Hua (Jing Lusi).  The antics of the Princess' handmaiden Ying Ying (Nell Ng) may even start to grate on your nerves after awhile.

Things get serious, however, with the Princess' abduction and Merong's realization of his true destiny.  As his ships near the Geruda camp, the film does its best to expand to epic proportions while not quite getting there.  Merong's "sword day" motivational speech to his men doesn't have that RETURN OF THE KING vibe it strives for although it seems to have the intended effect of making them all willing to die. 

The magical element returns when Merong unveils a death ray he's constructed from broken mirrors, which causes the enemy to burst into flames and flop limply out of their boats.  Flabby fight choreography tends to drain the excitement out of much of the subsequent battle, while some low-level CGI gives certain scenes a rinky-dink veneer. 



At times the film suffers from murky cinematography that looks like its been tinkered with too much digitally--a few more bursts of vivid color here and there would've greatly improved the visuals.  Exotic locations and good production design are a big help, as is Edry Abdul Halim's lively score as performed by the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra.

The DVD from Image Entertainment is in 1.78:1 widescreen with Dolby 5.1 surround sound and subtitles in English and Spanish.  The sole extra is a theatrical trailer.

CLASH OF EMPIRES is an earnest depiction of Malaysian folklore that tries hard to match the grandeur of other epics but can never quite rise above its own limitations.  Still, it's relatively entertaining in its own modest and rather endearing way. 

 

CLASH OF EMPIRES -- DVD Review by Porfle