VENGEANCE TRILOGY (SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE/ OLDBOY/ LADY VENGEANCE) -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 3/21/10

 

As one who was eager to discover Korean director Park Chan-wook and his famed "Vengeance" trilogy, I found Palisade Tartan Asia Extreme's eight-disc VENGEANCE TRILOGY--containing SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE, OLDBOY, and LADY VENGEANCE, and brimming with extras--to be a veritable treasure trove of fun. Not that the subject matter is fun, mind you, since this is hardly the kind of revenge flick where Charles Bronson blows away bad guys as we cheer through our popcorn. For these unfortunate characters, vengeance ain't necessarily good for what ails 'em.


SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE (2002) begins the trilogy with the old story of a "simple plan" that inevitably goes all to hell. Ha-kyun Shin plays Ryu, a green-haired deaf-mute who toils in a factory while desperately waiting for a donor kidney for his dying sister (Ji-Eun Lim). His attempt to purchase the necessary organ on the black market ends disastrously, as he loses not only all his money but one of his own kidneys as well. Then he gets laid off from his job just as the doctor informs him that a donor kidney, which he can no longer afford, is finally available.

Ryu's domineering girlfriend Yeong-mi (Du-na Bae), a radical political activist with terrorist ties, concocts a scheme to abduct the young daughter of wealthy businessman Park Dong-jin (Kang-ho Song) and hold her for ransom, with the naive confidence that it will be a benevolent kidnapping and result in happy endings for all involved. Her prediction goes horribly wrong, as does the kidnapping, and she and Ryu find themselves the targets of a vengeful father whose emotional devastation demands a payment in blood. Ryu, meanwhile, attempts to track down the illicit organ merchants and extract some lethal payback of his own. Both find the price of revenge distressingly high.


"I wanted to make something that felt too real," director Park Chan-wook explains in one of the bonus disc's interviews. "I wanted the audience to be tired when they finished the film." As opposed to the later OLDBOY'S flamboyant surrealism and absurdity, the bad things that happen during this film are disturbingly matter of fact, with no suspenseful music or editing, often occurring in the background of a shot. We're allowed to search the frame for information ourselves rather than have everything pointed out to us, which can be strangely unsettling.

"As a director, I think this unkind way of presenting the story makes the viewer a more active participant in the film," says Park. Lengthy wide-angle shots often place the characters far from the camera, punctuated by unexpected images from odd angles which tease us with brief snippets of information. One of the most important death scenes in the film occurs almost peripherally within the frame as the static camera lingers over a placid rural setting. Without the usual editing and camera angles leading the viewer through the scene, we're left to watch helplessly as the tragedy unfolds with dreadful inevitability.


Still, Park occasionally gets up close and personal, as in a brutal torture-by-electricity scene or a shocking knife murder of a man by a group of terrorists. Here, in a subtle bit of absurdity that's almost funny, the camera impassively observes the dying man as he strains to read the death warrant pinned to his own chest by a knife. Even in a sequence which in any other film might play out as a brisk action setpiece, such as Ryu's bloody final encounter with the organ merchants, Park tweaks our expectations by approaching the familiar scenario with a fresh and pleasingly odd perspective.

Disc one contains the film plus a commentary track with director Park and actor-filmmaker Ryoo Seong-wan. Disc two features lengthy interviews with the film's director and stars, behind-the-scenes featurettes, storyboards, trailer, and Johnathan Ross's 17-minute profile of Park for the BBC.

"When you set out for revenge, first dig two graves," someone told James Bond way back in 1981's FOR YOUR EYES ONLY. With SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE, Park Chan-wook takes that hoary old proverb and dramatizes it in dispiritingly downbeat and often heartrending new ways, focusing in almost clinical fashion on tragic details that linger in the mind. Perhaps the most disturbing thing about this chain reaction of consequences is that there are two sides headed for a deadly collision, and our sympathies extend to both of them. This is a theme that will carry over into the next film in the series.


OLDBOY (2003) is very different from SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE and might be seen as a stylistic evolution for Park. Where SYMPATHY was more lean and straightforward, OLDBOY is an explosion of cinematic expression that almost overwhelms the viewer with its aggressive intensity. SYMPATHY invites us to sit back and gaze attentively at characters gradually sliding into inevitable ruin; OLDBOY straps us in and takes us on a wildly disorienting bumper-car ride.


Min-sik Choi gives a brilliant, intense performance as Dae-su Oh, a workaday family man who, after drunkenly celebrating his young daughter's birthday, suddenly wakes up in a motel room-like prison cell where he will spend the next fifteen years. During that time, his wife is murdered and the crime scene is doctored to make him the suspect, while his daughter is placed in foster care. He learns of this on television, which is his only link to the outside world.

After his release back into a world that is now strange to him, Dae-su is understandably obsessed with finding out who imprisoned him and why. Thus begins a mysterious and violent odyssey that eventually takes him back to a single indiscretion in his youth which ignited a chain reaction of tragedy for the person now devoted to punishing him. Dae-su is aided in his quest by a sympathetic young sushi chef named Mido (the very cute Hye-jeong Kang), who becomes his lover and offers much-needed moral support and solace. As he gradually gets closer to the shocking truth, he finds that prison was only the beginning of a diabolical web of torment devised for him by his unknown nemesis.


In some ways, the incarceration has a beneficial effect on Dae-su Oh. Over the long years he builds his physique, becomes a fierce boxer by banging his fists against a figure he's drawn on the wall, hones his instincts and willpower, and develops the patience and determination of a caged animal. He also divests himself of the frivolity and childishness his character displays when we first meet him, becoming a ruthless force to be reckoned with.

His repressed rage later allows him to take on well over a dozen oppenents in a cramped hallway during what I feel is the film's most astounding sequence. Most of this furious fight is done in one incredible take with the camera slowly dollying along with the actors as they perform a dazzling series of choreographed fight moves with bone-crushing realism. (This surely ranks among the greatest long takes ever filmed.) Wielding a claw hammer and with a knife protruding from his back, Dae-su becomes one of the most thrilling action heroes in recent memory in a balls-out brawl that eschews fancy moves or wirework of any kind.

Violence punctuates the film at several points--a man is stabbed to death with a broken DVD, another has his teeth yanked out one by one, people are driven to suicide--culminating in an extended sequence within the mystery man's spacious penthouse suite which becomes an escalating ordeal of physical and emotional devastation. Each shot is carefully devised by Park for maximum effect as Min-sik Choi's performance reaches a peak that is stunning.


A wealth of special features begins on disc one with three separate commentary tracks subtitled in English, each with the director and various crewmembers. Disc two features cast and crew interviews in which they discuss the conception of the film and its characters beyond the usual sound bites doled out to the press. There's a brief phone interview in which the author of the original story, Tsuchiya Garon, offers his favorable impressions of the film while we get to see several pages from the graphic novel. The film's production design, music, and special effects are explored, along with deleted scenes. Of additional interest are a look at the film's success at Cannes and a thoughtful Q & A between director Park and a small gathering of fans.

In addition to some Palisades Tartan trailers, disc three boasts a three-and-a-half hour documentary entitled "The Autobiography of Old Boy Video Diary." An exhaustive record of the making of the film, it documents the shooting of virtually every scene in great detail, without narration, demonstrating not only the meticulousness of the director but also how grueling the shoot was for the actors. This is especially true for star Min-sik Choi, who did many of his own stunts and got banged up quite a bit. Good spirits generally prevail (although the difficult New Zealand shoot frayed some nerves) and the details of how some of the most memorable scenes were accomplished make for absorbing viewing.

Dense, complex storytelling that is anything but light viewing, OLDBOY demands viewer involvement on a much higher level than the usual revenge flick. Like SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE, the complicated story presents two identifiable points of view in a conflict that goes beyond the usual heroes and villains and refuses to offer easy or clear-cut resolutions. Park Chan-wook's command over the language of film enables him to express all of this visually to a degree that's endlessly impressive. "They say you can't catch two rabbits at once," he reflects on his accomplishment. "I feel like we caught two rabbits, a deer, an otter, a badger, and many other animals."



I first thought LADY VENGEANCE, aka Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (2005), was going to be another hot-action-babe flick along the lines of MS. 45. So it came as a pleasant surprise to find that it's the most thoughtful, richly artistic and deeply introspective film in the trilogy. It's also the one in which Park Chan-wook seems to express his most heartfelt, poetic, and yes, sympathetic thoughts on the subject.

The story begins with Geum-ja Lee (Yeong-ae Lee) being released from prison after serving 13 years for the kidnap and murder of a little boy, Won-mo. Former cellmates with whom she reunites on the outside are shocked to find that the cheerful and loving "angel" they knew before now appears to be cold and emotionless. In reality, she's been gaining their allegiance in order to use them to help carry out a plan of revenge against Won-mo's actual killer, Mr. Baek (OLDBOY star Min-sik Choi), a serial child murderer who threatened to kill Geum-ja's infant daughter if she didn't confess to the crime. The fact that she aided in Won-mo's abduction (naively thinking it to be the same sort of "good" kidnapping as described in SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE) makes her desire for atonement and redemption all-consuming.


Geum-ja tracks down her now 14-year-old daughter Jenny (Yea-young Kwon), who thinks that her mother "dumped" her, and desperately tries to reconcile with her. In the meantime, she has found Mr. Baek, still working as a school teacher and preying on children. She summons the families of several murdered children to an abandoned school, shows them Baek's own videotapes of his gruesome deeds, and reveals to them that he is bound and gagged in the next room. Geum-ja then gives them all a choice--turn him over to the legal system, or deal with him themselves.

Flashbacks of the beatific image Geum-ja projected while in prison are starkly contrasted with her later zombie-like state, which reflects a deep self-loathing. These jarring impressions are often depicted with abrupt editing and off-kilter camera angles. Only when she reunites with Jenny does she allow her feelings to overwhelm her again, and as the story becomes more emotional Park Chan-wook's direction settles into a more stately and elegant style while remaining fluid and inventive. This is especially true of the protracted revenge sequence in the abandoned school, as Park lingers on the inner conflict and seething rage of the family members. As the film winds down to a wistful and almost dreamlike denouement, with Geum-ja grasping for a last fleeting chance at redemption, we're left with haunting, delicately-wrought images of serene beauty and sadness.


There are several fascinating closeups of the remarkable Yeong-ae Lee as she runs the gamut of emotions with impressive depth. One that's particularly striking comes near the end, when her face twists into a masklike rictus of mindless, sadistic glee. Hardly the typical action heroine, her anger is expressed in messy, kinetic bursts. There is one thrilling sequence, however, in which she fights off two attackers hired by Mr. Baek (Ha-kyun Shin and Kang-ho Song of SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE) in a snowy alleyway at night, and for a brief moment is given full cinematic awesomeness by Park Chan-wook.

Disc one features two commentary tracks in which Park is joined by actress Yeong-ae Lee and his art director, and a third with film critic Richard Pena. Disc two is virtually identical to disc one, except that it contains what is described as the "Fade to White" version of the film. Here, after a brief introduction by the director, we see his original intent to slowly drain the color from the film during its running time until finally the last twenty minutes or so would be completely black-and-white. Park himself had trouble deciding whether or not to go with the idea, which he'd been considering as far back as the first film in the trilogy, so it's not exactly what I'd consider his "original vision" of the film. But it's an interesting "what-if."

Disc three begins with a "making of" featurette and an electronic press kit with various goodies. These are followed by technical featurettes, director and cast interviews, deleted scenes, a look at the film's successful showing at the Venice Film Festival, trailers and TV spots, and a poster gallery. "Get Together" shows how many of the actors from the first two "Vengeance" films returned to appear in this one.

All three films are in anamorphic widescreen with Dolby 5.1 DTS and surround sound. Language is Korean with English and Spanish subtitles. In addition to the previously-mentioned extras, the set comes with a 32-page booklet of essays by Eli Roth, producer Don Murphy, stunt-coordinator John Kreng, Palisades Tartan's Rick Stelow, and filmmaker Susan Montford, and is richly illustrated with full-color photographs. All in all, this set turned me into a Park Chan-wook fan and continues to make me giddy with cinematic joy each time I rewatch these amazing films.


It's been said that LADY VENGEANCE lapses into the conventional by having a one-dimensional bad guy devoid of the usual shadings. I think it's good that Park ends the trilogy by finally giving us a bastard who clearly and richly deserves his punishment, which serves as an uneasy catharsis for the viewer as well as the story's participants. Still, their satisfaction is short-lived and brings not happiness, but merely another level of spiritual uncertainty that they must continue to deal with. If Park hadn't touched on this aspect of revenge and explored its consequences, the trilogy begun by SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE and OLDBOY would have been incomplete.

VENGEANCE TRILOGY (SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE/ OLDBOY/ LADY VENGEANCE) -- DVD Review by Porfle

VANQUISHER -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 3/28/11

 

The Thai action flick VANQUISHER, aka "Final Target" (2010), is loaded with action but it's a hit-and-miss deal, with several sequences that don't quite live up to their potential.

CIA black ops agent Claire (Jacqui A. Thannanon) is sent to Thailand to capture a terrorist.  She's also ordered to liquidate her "Vanquisher" task force once the job is done, so she takes off in a helicopter with her captive and then blows up the dock that the ladies are standing on.  

One of them, a Thai police force agent codenamed "Gunja" (Sophita Sriban), survives and returns to duty.  When Claire is ordered back to Bangkok two years later in pursuit of another terrorist, she runs into Gunja again, and this time the two warrior women are on decidedly less-than-friendly terms. 

VANQUISHER is nicely directed and shot for the most part, but the fact that this is Manop Udomdej's first action film is pretty obvious.  Camerawork and editing are all over the place in several scenes even though the choreography is good enough not to need such cosmetic misdirection.  The action is often confusing as we try to make out what the seemingly capable performers are doing through a barrage of shaky-cam images.



Still, the film manages to be exciting once things pick up around the halfway point and there aren't so many scenes of people sitting around spouting exposition.  Once all the plot details are ironed out the pace stays pretty brisk through a steady series of gunfights, sword battles, and chases, all featuring an impressive variety of stunts.  The frustrating thing is, you keep wanting these scenes to be better than they are--with more skillful handling, this movie could've been downright exhilarating.

Doing their part to keep us on the edge of our seats are the three leading ladies, who are not only beautiful but can kick some big-time ass in the action setpieces.  At first, Sophita Sriban looks way too cute and likable for the role of Gunja, but this impression is quickly dispelled as soon as she starts slinging a sword or blasting away with twin automatics.  Like Bruce Willis, she has a great "war-face", which director Udomdej captures exquisitely as he does the other female leads--the guy does love to photograph these ladies at their best.

As the duplicitous Claire, Jacqui A. Thannanon has a strong presence and is both sinister and exotic.  The only downside to her performance is that she seems to stumble a bit over the English dialogue--when speaking her native tongue (the film has a bilingual screenplay) she's terrific.  Lovely and lithe Nui Ketsarin plays Sirin, a Thai cop who teams up with Gunja against Claire and her ninja goons, and matches Sophita Sriban's acting skills in the frenetic fight scenes.
 

A late plot development has Bangkok on the verge of being racked with explosions which the bad cops plan to blame on the terrorists, and, while this angle isn't explored as fully as it should've been, it does give the SPFX guys an excuse to cook up some fake-looking fireworks.  Other digital effects range from fair (the scene where Gunja jumps a dirt bike onto a moving train which is then blasted with a bazooka) to not-so-hot (a ninja turns into a cartoon during an upwards leap).  One of the film's strengths is a robust, percussion-heavy musical score by Patai Puangchin.

The DVD from Magnolia's "Magnet" label is in 1.78:1 widescreen with English and Thai Dolby Digital 5.1 sound.  Subtitles are in English and Spanish.  In addition to the international trailer, extras consist of an eight-minute "making of" featurette and another which gives us a look behind the scenes during filming.

VANQUISHER survives a slow start to become a hokey but fun guns-and-swords fest with some very appealing female characters.  The main drawback is that you might wear yourself out trying to mentally reshoot and re-edit the action scenes so that they'll be as good as they should have been. 

VANQUISHER -- DVD Review by Porfle

TRIGUN: BADLANDS RUMBLE -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 9/4/11

 

Cliched though they may sound, "rollicking" and "rip-roaring" are pretty good descriptive words for director Satoshi Nishimura's TRIGUN: BADLANDS RUMBLE (2010), an eye-pleasing anime that's bursting at the seams with fast-moving action and comedy.  A feature-length version of the manga by Yasuhiro Nightow and the popular television series, it's a dense conglomeration of sci-fi, steampunk, Westerns, and various other genres with energy and style to burn.

The film opens with hulking outlaw Gasback and his three henchmen robbing a fortress-like bank but then having a falling out over Gasback's tendency to invest all their spoils in bigger and more elaborate robberies, which is his sole motivation.  Before the three traitors can kill him, however, he's rescued by Vash the Stampede, who values all life even more than he values fun, adventure, and donuts.  Unfairly regarded as a villain and bearing a sixty-billion double-dollar price on his head, Vash (known as "The Humanoid Typhoon") is a wanderer who only wants to help people and have a good time. 

Gasback, meanwhile, has patiently waited twenty years for his former allies to rise to positions of wealth and prominence, so that his revenge will be even greater.  After destroying the livelihoods of the first two, he's on his way to Mecca City to bring down Caine, who is now the mega-wealthy owner of the town's massive power plant.  News of Gasback's impending arrival has drawn hundreds of bounty hunters from all over, including the beautiful Amelia who has some unfinished business with him.



Jittery insurance agents Meryl Stryfe and Milly Thompson, old friends of Vash, are also in town to protect Caine's giant bronze statue of himself, which their company has insured for five billion dollars.  And mysterious clergyman Nicholas D. Wolfwood, another of Vash's past acquaintances, shows up as Gasback's current bodyguard, fulfilling a debt to him with the help of his huge cross-shaped rocket gun.

With its sleek character design and detail-packed backgrounds, TRIGUN: BADLANDS RUMBLE is a constant joy to look at.  Along with a colorful vehicular caravan, the bounty hunters travel to Mecca City aboard a huge steamship that hovers across the desert and serves as the setting for some lively encounters between Vash, Amelia, and some troublesome competitors.  The city itself is a clever combination of modern and Old West design, where the main characters engage in an old-fashioned barroom brawl before Gasback's attack sparks a spectacular battle sequence filled with sound and fury.

With so much explosive action going on, the body count in this bullet-riddled but lighthearted tale is practically nonexistent.  Much of the emphasis is on comedy as Vash courts an unwilling Amelia, who is literally allergic to men, while Meryl and Milly work themselves into nervous fits worrying about the fate of Caine's big, gaudy statue. 

Even hardbitten characters like Gasback and the hordes of bounty hunters out for his head contribute to the story's often deadpan-comic atmosphere.  The story isn't all fun, however--surprisingly, things get a little emotional now and then, particularly when we learn of Amelia's tragic origin and at least one of the main good guys bites the dust. 



Before the dust settles over the ravaged Mecca City, the action heads out into the desert as the bounty hunter caravan pursues Gasback in a thrilling sequence heavily inspired by THE ROAD WARRIOR.  Later, a final showdown between the good guys and the bad guy revels in heaping helpings of Spaghetti Western goodness, with Sergio Leone's influence nicely recycled into over-the-top cartoon visuals.  Here, all the various threads of the story are neatly tied up with a satisfying conclusion that extends through the closing credits crawl. 

The DVD from Funimation is in widescreen with English and Japanese Dolby 5.1 sound and English subtitles.  Disc one is the movie and some Funimation trailers.  Disc two contains a number of bonus features including several lengthy, lively cast-and-crew panel discussions at various locations including the film's premiere.  There's also a post-recording short, promotional clips and trailers, and other assorted tidbits.

Like an old Mad Magazine comics panel from the 50s, TRIGUN: BADLANDS RUMBLE is so richly detailed that it bears repeat viewing just to take in everything you missed the first time.  But most of all, this seriocomic burst of creative energy is just a ball to watch.

TRIGUN: BADLANDS RUMBLE -- DVD Review by Porfle

THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 11/28/08

 

Taking over the directorial reins from Stephen Sommers, Rob Cohen (DRAGONHEART, XXX) continues the saga of Rick and Evy O'Connell and their never-ending battle against mummies in 2008's THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR. If you didn't like the first two, chances are this one won't win you over either. If you did like them, you should have an exceedingly good time.

A lengthy prologue tells the story of Emperor Han (Jet Li), a ruthless conqueror who's bent on ruling the world with an iron fist. He summons the aid of a beautiful witch, Zi Juan (Michelle Yeoh), to make him immortal, but when she falls in love with his trusted General Ming, the jealous emperor condemns them both to death. Zi Juan then places a terrible curse on him, turning him and his entire army into terra cotta statues.

Cut to 1946, as a retired Rick and Evy's grown-up son Alex (Luke Ford), now an action archeologist like his parents, uncovers the emperor's tomb. Needless to say, old clayhead gets resurrected and sets off to find the legendary city of Shangri-La, where he'll be able to shed himself of the curse once and for all, reanimate his terra cotta army, and conquer the world.

All our favorite characters are back, though some have changed a bit. Evy looks a lot more like Maria Bello than Rachel Weisz these days, which is cool since I've always been a fan of the lovely Maria. Luke Ford is a reasonable grown-up version of son Alex, who displays character traits from both parents--intelligence from his mom, recklessness from his dad. And speaking of Dad, Brendan Fraser is his usual wonderful self, able to perform comedy and action heroics with equal skill as few other actors can. John Hannah returns as Evy's cowardly brother Jonathan, while newcomers to the Mummy saga, Jet Li and Michelle Yeoh, add a whole new dimension to everything, as does Isabella Leong as Lin, Zi Juan's daughter and love interest for Alex. A particularly welcome presence is Anthony Wong (INFERNAL AFFAIRS, EXILED) as the Emperor's toady, General Yang.

Rob Cohen's direction and editing are too busy-looking at times, and I found myself wishing he'd just keep the camera still more often. Another thing that bugged me is the frequent use of less-than-convincing CGI. Of course, that's something I should be used to by now after watching the first two MUMMY films, yet it always seems to take me out of the movie.

Some of it works--an avalanche that threatens to annihilate the O'Connell party in the Himalayas looks pretty awesome, as do some of the climactic battle scenes between the Emperor's army and a horde of ancient undead summoned to engage them. The Yeti are another story, though, along with some of the character animation of Jet Li and the various supernatural creatures that he turns into (one of which bears a startling resemblance to Ghidrah). But if the digital monsters in the first two MUMMY movies or in Sommers' own VAN HELSING didn't bother you, then you shouldn't have any problem with these.

That said, there is a ton of exciting action setpieces in this film. A lengthy chase scene down the crowded streets of Shanghai is a highlight, and a fierce gun battle in the Himalayas is pretty intense. The clash between the terra cotta army and the undead is reminiscent of RETURN OF THE KING's main battle sequence. Along the way we're treated to lots of hard-hitting fistfights and other mayhem, and we even get to see Chinese superstars Jet Li and Michelle Yeoh go at it. The settings for these scenes are fantastic, including some impressive standing sets found in China (such as the old Shanghai streets) and numerous actual locations. Interior sets constructed for the Canadian phase of the shoot are also quite lavish.

Presented in anamorphic widescreen 2.40:1 with Dolby Digital 5.1 and 2.0 sound, the movie looks and sounds great. Disc one of the deluxe edition features some deleted and extended scenes and a scene-specific commentary from director Cohen. Disc two includes featurettes "Preparing for Battle with Brendan Fraser and Jet Li", "The Making of The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor", "Jet Li: Crafting the Emperor Mummy", "Creating New and Supernatural Worlds", "Legacy of the Terra Cotta", "A Call to Action: The Casting Process", and "From City to Desert." Subtitles are in English, French, and Spanish, and there's even one of those tracks for the hard-of-seeing with a narrator breathlessly describing what's going on ("Rick ducks behind a column as the Emperor throws a fireball!")

While perhaps not the best in the series (I still prefer the second one), THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR is a welcome continuation of Rick and Evy's seriocomic adventures. Extravagant, action-packed, funny, and loaded with dazzling imagery, it's what the term "dumb fun" is all about.

THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR -- DVD Review by Porfle

AVATAR -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 4/25/10

I missed AVATAR (2009) at the theater, which is hardly surprising since I rarely go to the theater anymore unless I'm having my house sprayed or something. In a way that's good since, with the release of James Cameron's blockbuster sci-fi epic on DVD, I can now judge it without being bowled over by the whoopty-doo big-screen 3D experience. And as far as I'm concerned, it pretty much lives up to all the hype. Unless you simply have an aversion to James Cameron films, which I don't.

Everyone probably knows the story by now: in the future, a paraplegic Marine named Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) travels to the distant planet of Pandora and takes his deceased twin brother's place in a research project aimed at studying an indigenous alien race called the Na'vi. To do so, team members such as Jake, Norm Spellman (Joel David Moore), and crotchety project leader Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver) mind-jump into cloned Na'vi bodies ("avatars") which also contain their own DNA (which is why Jake was chosen to take over for his deceased twin).

Jake gets more than he bargained for when circumstances bring him into direct contact with a Na'vi tribe which is initially hostile toward the intruder. He falls in love with the tribal chief's daughter Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), who has been charged with teaching him their ways, and learns to appreciate their amazing physical and spiritual connection with nature,eventually becoming accepted as one of them. But a greedy corporate executive, Parker Selfridge (Giovanni Ribisi), wants the Na'vi off their mineral-rich holy ground and tasks his ex-military security force, led by the extremely hostile Colonel Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang) to get the job done even if it means using deadly force.


AVATAR is James Cameron's love letter to tree-huggers everywhere, and his message does resonate within the context of the film (although after awhile you just get a little tired of how perfect the Na'vi are compared to us horrible humans--even their deity is realer than ours). The familiar story contains elements of, among other things, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Kipling's "The Jungle Book", Disney's POCOHANTAS, DANCES WITH WOLVES, LITTLE BIG MAN, and, of course, a certain story about some starcrossed lovers named Rose and Jack.

But while Cameron once again gets to indulge the romantic side which bubbled to the surface of his roiling id in TITANIC (all that's missing, unfortunately, is a "cry moment" at the end), what really gets his moviemaking mojo in gear is the massive battle between the humans and the Na'vi which takes up the latter third of the film. Huge warships and helicopters maneuver around the floating mountains, firing incendiary bombs and other nasty things into the heart of the Na'vi habitat, while ground forces in mechanical power-suits (which are like a combination of similar creations in both ALIENS and MATRIX: REVOLUTIONS) do furious battle with thousands of bow-wielding Na'vi warriors. These battle scenes are spectacular and are my favorite part of the movie. I suspect they're Cameron's favorite part, too.


The SPFX are consistently amazing, providing the viewer with some of the best eye-candy to ever grace the screen. We've already come a long way from, for example, those beautiful vistas of Naboo in THE PHANTOM MENACE--Cameron's alien planet is filled with bizarre flora and fauna amidst a kaleidescope of vibrant colors (especially at night when everything turns luminescent), and looks like a conglomeration of Yes album-cover artist Roger Dean's wildest fantasies brought to life. The flying reptiles ridden by the Na'vi are especially impressive, although some of the other forest creatures look somewhat less convincing than one might expect.

The Na'vi themselves are the last word in CGI motion-capture technology, their performances every bit as expressive as those of the live actors. Worthington, Weaver, and Moore are, by necessity, recognizable in their alien form (it's really fun seeing Weaver's face on one of these things), while the faces of the native characters played by Zoe Saldana, Wes Studi, and CCH Pounder are creations of the FX artists which allow us to get to know them as individuals without any preconceptions.


Sam Worthington is good as the "stranger in a strange land" hero, making a convincing transition from dedicated Marine to Na'vi convert (some would say traitor), and Zoe Saldana is very appealing as Neytiri. Sigourney Weaver is her usual awesome self as Dr. Augustine, although for someone who's supposed to be a nicotine addict she smokes a cigarette like she had a fishing worm dangling out of her mouth. The versatile Giovanni Ribisi is hilarious as the cartoonishly greedy, self-obsessed "unobtanium" (THE CORE, anyone?) tycoon Parker Selfridge, a kindred soul to ALIENS' Carter Burke. My favorite, though, is equally versatile Stephen Lang (MANHUNTER, TOMBSTONE) as the quintessential hard-ass military ogre, Quaritch, who's itching for a bloody showdown with the Na'vi "hoss-tiles" regardless of provocation or lack thereof. And lest I forget, Michelle Rodriguez makes the most of her role as a spunky military pilot who sympathizes with the scientists.

The DVD from 20th-Century Fox is a barebones affair unless you consider chapter selections and subtitles to be "special features." Not surprisingly, a super-duper edition is in the works for later this year. If you can't wait to own it, though, and simply want the movie itself, this will do. Image and sound quality are very good as you might expect.


So, AVATAR is a colorful, fanciful comment on the displacement of indigenous populations by encroaching interlopers, the destruction of the rain forests, U.S. military intervention into other countries, etc., etc. I don't care about any of that stuff. Cameron can exorcise his white liberal guilt and make big statements reminding us that racism=bad and the environment=good, and have the greenest mansion, land yachts, and private jet in Hollywood for all I care. I just happen to get a big kick out of the massive, powerhouse feats of action-adventure cinema this often underestimated and derided filmmaker manages to successfully pull off at great risk and expense (in addition to his earlier, lower-budgeted stuff, of course). While I don't love the guy with a fanboy's zeal (and am, quite frankly, glad I don't ever have to be around him in real life, ever), I find his movies visually sumptuous and incredibly entertaining, which fits quite nicely into one of the most vital niches of my movie lover's soul.

AVATAR -- 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

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

THE KEEPER -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 1/28/10

 

 

You have to hand it to Steven Seagal--he's managed to maintain a fairly popular action-hero persona that barely requires him to either move or speak intelligibly. These days, his movies don't even have to be very good at all as long as he's in them. His latest, THE KEEPER (2009), dog-paddles in the DTV end of the pool with the rest of his recent output, neither sinking all the way to the bottom nor demonstrating any fancy strokes to speak of.

The first ten minutes are a mini-movie in which Steven, as L.A. cop Roland Sallinger, is shot by his two-timing partner during a drug bust. He survives, then manages to kill the rat from his hospital bed when he comes to finish the job. Forced to retire due to his injuries, Roland then accepts an offer from his old friend Connor Wells, an ex-cop who's now a Texas oil millionaire, to play bodyguard for his daughter Nikita. She's in danger because a rival millionaire named Jason Cross wants to kidnap her in order to force Wells to sign over some land on which uranium has been discovered. Complicating things is the fact that Nikita's weaselly boyfriend Mason, a two-bit boxer, is in league with Cross.

I'm sure you'd like for me to skip the preliminaries and get to the action scenes, because we don't watch Steven Seagal movies for the acting and dialogue, right? Well, he hasn't been in town for five minutes before he sees a young Mexican woman in distress and has his limo driver pull over so he can whoop a few bad-guy butts. As most of us are aware by now, his fighting style now consists mainly of standing in one spot while flailing his arms wildly, disarming his opponents and bending their arms the wrong way until the bones crack.

Occasionally, he'll let loose with a low kick--his days of planting a flying foot in somebody's face are long past. And even with this limited mobility, a stand-in is often used for the shots in which his character is required to move with some semblance of agility. These fight scenes consist of many short shots and rapid-fire editing to give the illusion that our hero is a lightning-fast flurry of movement.

That said, it's still Steven Seagal, and somehow that's enough. I like the way he strolls into a heated situation and makes the bad guys suffer for being stupid enough to take him on. I'd love to be able to do that myself. And he's so damn sure of himself, mixing it up with multiple opponents with a supreme confidence that's bracing. It's especially fun when he screws around with them a little first, pretending to be intimidated, before giving them that patented Steven Seagal scowl and laying into them. And on the plus side, he seems to have shed some weight since the last time I saw him, so he no longer resembles a giant burrito or appears to be wearing his car instead of just driving it.

Later, there's a kidnapping attempt involving a car chase, and a couple of minor shoot-em-ups on the streets. A few more quick hand-to-hand battles lead up to the final confrontation between Steve and the kidnappers, with Nikita's life in the balance. It's all passable stuff, but none of it is in any way memorable or outstanding. The big guy does put his hand through somebody's throat at one point, which fulfills the requirement that he do something really overtly violent at least once per movie to whatever bad guy wins the honor of deserving it.

Technically, THE KEEPER is your basic meat-and-potatoes job with some irritating stylistic touches thrown in. There's the speed-up-slow-down effect, the appeal of which I never understood, mixed with quick camera moves that make a whooshing noise. Even a brief pan of some trophies Steve has amassed during his cop career does the speed-up-slow-down thing and makes a whooshing noise. Oh yeah, and some of the transitions are accompanied by a flashing white light that also makes a whooshing noise. I guess it's all meant to make the movie look more hip and contemporary, but that kind of stuff just has DTV written all over it. Seagal's 2007 film URBAN JUSTICE eschewed all of that crap for a leaner and more old-school, Don Siegel-type visual style and is all the better for it. To his credit, though, director Keoni Waxman spares us the usual Shaky-Cam overload.

As for the cast, most are capable performers. Steph DuVall as Wells and Luce Rains as Cross are a couple of old pros who know their stuff (although DuVall slips up and calls Seagal's character "Ballinger" at one point), while Arron Shiver does a good job as the slimeball Mason. As Nikita, Liezl Carstens handles the screaming and being scared parts well. When paired with Seagal for a dialogue scene, however, it's as though they're competing in a slow race to see who can underplay the other, and they may have you wondering which one will simply keel over unconscious first.

Seagal, as usual, emotes as though his meds just kicked in and his lines are being fed to him through an earpiece. This time around, he doesn't have any good lines such as "I'm gunna kill the muhfuh that killed mah son", nor the kind of vengeance-driven motivation that a dead wife or family member can provide, both of which are missed. And also unlike URBAN JUSTICE, which had a fadeout that was just cool as hell, this movie just ends when it runs out of stuff to do.

The DVD from 20-Century Fox is in 1.78:1 widescreen with English 5.1 Dolby Digital and Spanish Dolby Surround, subtitled in English and Spanish. There are no extras.

With THE KEEPER, you get pretty much what you might expect by now--standard latter-day Seagal with just enough of the old magic to keep it from being totally dispensible, yet little to make it of any interest to anyone but his most loyal fans. If you're among that number, check it out. Otherwise, why bother?

THE KEEPER -- DVD Review by Porfle

PREDATORS -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 10/23/10
 

 

Not the adrenaline-charged action blowout I was expecting, PREDATORS (2010) is still a reasonably exciting and, for the most part, absorbing monster flick.

Things get off to a dynamic start as mercenary soldier Royce (Adrien Brody) wakes up to find himself in the middle of a harrowing freefall through the clouds.  His chute opens just in time but he still goes crashing perilously through the ceiling of a dense jungle below before finally thudding into the turf.  Before long he discovers he's not the only one, as more confused people keep popping up and wondering where the hell they are and how they got there.

Curiously, they all seem to be adept at killing, either for business or pleasure.  Along with soldiers Isabelle (Alice Braga), Nikolai (Oleg Taktarov), and Mombasa (Mahershalalhashbaz Ali), there's drug cartel executioner Cuchillo (Danny Trejo), a Yakuza named Hanzo (Louis Ozawa Changchien), and a flaky rapist-murderer from Death Row named Stans (Walter Goggins).  The odd man out is seemingly mild-mannered doctor Edwin (Topher Grace), who, like the others, was abducted in a flash of white light.

They may be in the dark as to what's going on, but most of us viewers are well aware that these hapless individuals are the latest prey for big, vicious aliens known as Predators, who hunt and kill for sport.  As we wait for them to appear, the humans, with Royce taking the lead, trudge through the jungle toward higher ground and eventually realize that they're on another planet.  The game now afoot, they're soon tracked down by a pack of doglike creatures in a lively attack sequence that's pretty nicely CGI-rendered.
 

 

Some of the characters start dying off before we get to know them at all, while the rest remain sketchy and enigmatic.  Royce, who cultivates a cold ruthlessness in order to survive, gives Adrien Brody a welcome chance to not be a wuss for a change.  Isabelle (played by Sonia Braga's niece Alice) and Nikolai are patriots who kill efficiently for their country yet retain their humanity--Nikolai proudly displays a photo of his kids at one point, while Isabelle refuses to leave a wounded Edwin behind. 

Cowardly blowhard Stans reminds me a little of Bill Paxton's "Hudson" from ALIENS, until he starts fantasizing about getting coked up and going on a raping spree when he gets back to Earth.  A surprising new character introduced late in the film (I won't go into any details) provides the story with its strangest and most interesting interlude.  The dialogue is serviceable but nobody is given anything very memorable to say, including the sort of pithy one-liners Arnold spouted in the first film. 

KNB EFX Group, Inc. provide the excellent makeup effects which we get to see in loving close-up.  The "original" Predator, we discover, was a little feller compared to the bigger, badder species introduced here, and it turns out there's a blood feud between them which becomes important to the plot later on.  I still prefer the original-style Predator to the jazzed-up new version, and it's a little disconcerting to see him diminished in comparison.
 

 

Highlights include a clash of swords between Predator and Yakuza, an inter-species Predator showdown, and a final clash between the baddest Predator and the most resourceful human.  But while there are several action setpieces and some thrilling stunts here and there, viewers expecting a monsters-versus-humans free-for-all along the lines of ALIENS will probably be disappointed.  The breakneck pace of that film is also missing here, as the story moves rather leisurely between action scenes and never really maintains much momentum.  Still, PREDATORS remains fairly absorbing throughout. 

The DVD from 20th-Century Fox is in 2.35:1 widescreen with soundtracks in English Dolby 5.1 and Spanish and French Dolby 2.0.  Subtitles are in English, Spanish, and French.  Extras include a chummy commentary track with director Nimrod Antal and producer Robert Rodriguez, a look at the film's location shooting in Hawaii and Texas, three short motion comics, the theatrical trailer, and several trailers from other 20th-Century Fox releases. 

Good performances, top-notch makeup effects, and high-gloss production values keep this somewhat lackluster screenplay moving along well enough.  But Nimrod Antal, while certainly a capable director, doesn't have that Robert Rodriguez touch, and PREDATORS comes off as an entertaining but unremarkable sci-fi/monster flick with a direct-to-video vibe.

PREDATORS -- DVD Review by Porfle

THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS -- Movie Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 11/22/09

(Caution: lotsa spoilers)

I saw the 2001 Vin Diesel remake of this when it first hit home video, and now I can't remember a friggin' thing about it. Except it had some hinky CGI car-driving shots in it. They gotta use CGI just to show people driving cars now? They can't get actual stunt drivers to do actual cool car stunts? Anyway, I do remember one single zoopy-doopy CGI shot of Vin Diesel driving a car. Real memorable flick there.

 

Of course, it wasn't really a remake--it just used the same cool title. The original THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS (1955) was the historic first film released by American International Pictures, the undisputed kings of the low-budget exploitation flick during the 50s and 60s, and one of the first films produced (and co-written) by the legendary Roger Corman. 

 

It was co-directed by Edwards Sampson (MONSTER FROM THE OCEAN FLOOR) and the film's star, John Ireland (RED RIVER), and probably didn't cost very much to make, since most of the running time consists of people driving around, walking around, having picnics, and reacting to some ragged stock footage of auto races. 

 

Ireland plays Frank Webster, an independent trucker falsely accused of running another trucker off the road and killing him, when this was actually the other trucker's intention--(hmm, "other trucker" sounds kinda dirty somehow)--since lone wolf Frank was cutting in on a big trucking company's business. Well, Frank breaks out of jail and takes it on the lam with half the cops in the state hot on his trail. 

 

 

 

When he meets free-spirited racing enthusiast Connie Adair (Dorothy Malone) on her way to participate in a big race, he kidnaps her and heads for the border in her souped-up Jaguar with her as his beard. It turns out that the cross-country race will end in Mexico, so he enters it. Along the way, he and Connie fall in love (awwww) when she realizes he's really a nice guy who only acts mean and tough when he's kidnapping people and threatening to kill them.

 

Bruno VeSota, who played living-doll Yvette Vickers' cuckolded husband in ATTACK OF THE GIANT LEECHES and popped up in about half a million other things later on, turns up in an early diner scene in which innocent fugitive Frank practically puts him into a coma. Another familiar face, Iris Adrian (BLUE HAWAII, THAT DARN CAT!), plays Wilma the gabby waitress. And during Frank and Connie's picnic interlude, who should turn up as the park caretaker but silent-film star Snub Pollard, whose movie career began in 1915. Pretty interesting cast, if you're warped like me.

 

The first half of the movie consists of Frank and Connie driving around and arguing a lot while evading the police, often while sitting in front of a screen with highway footage projected on it. The best thing about this is getting to look at the gorgeous Dorothy Malone. Holy schnikes, was she ever hot. You may remember her as Bob Cummings' girlfriend in the original beach party movie, BEACH PARTY. Or not. Anyway, she was definitely easy on the eyes, and she gives a lively performance as Connie, constantly griping about being hungry and tired, and throwing the keys out of the moving car and trying to get away every time Frank turns around, and generally getting on his nerves as much as possible. Which he deserves, since he's pretty much of a horse's ass, actually. 

 

 

When they get to the place where the big race is being held, Connie runs into an old acquaintance, Faber (Bruce Carlisle, who was only ever in one other movie, FEMALE JUNGLE, thank god), who has the hots for her and starts trying to squeeze ol' Frank out of the driver's seat. Faber is a huge, irritating turdhead who is so creepy that he even makes Frank look like a barrel of laughs in comparison. When the race starts, Faber and Frank go at each other like characters out of the old "Wacky Races" cartoon all the way to Mexico. 

 

And just as you're thinking "Die, Faber, die!" he crashes, setting up the startling ending that is dripping with irony. Well, maybe not dripping. More like a faint irony condensation around the rim. So when this happened I checked the running time to see how much time was left for the wrap-up, and it said forty seconds. Forty seconds? Yikes--when this movie decides to end, it doesn't let the screen door bang its sprockety ass on the way out. 

 

One more thing I feel compelled to mention: right before the race, Frank decides to lock Connie in a secluded shack so she can't call the police and turn him in for his own good (she's convinced he'll get a square deal since he's really innocent, ha ha). So what's the first thing she does? She sets it on fire. I don't know about you, but setting the old wooden shack that I'm locked up in on fire wouldn't be my first idea. It would be around #11 or #12 on the list, tops. 

 

Fortunately, a passing motorist sees the smoke and gets her out, and he's played by none other than an unbilled Jonathan Haze of LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS. Heck, Roger Corman himself even turns up early on as a state trooper. But, please--if you ever find yourself locked in a wooden shack, don't set it on fire right off the bat just because Dorothy Malone does it in this movie, because chances are that in real life, the guy who played Seymour Krelboin isn't going to toodle by and let you out.

 

So, while THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS isn't exactly an edge-of-your-seat nailbiter, it's fun to watch if you're into low-budget exploitation flicks from the 50s, and especially if you're a Roger Corman fan. And it actually has real people driving real cars. You even get to see Dorothy Malone tearing ass down the highway in one scene, which is cool in some weird sexual way that I can't even begin to explain. Plus, it was made twelve years before Vin Diesel was even born, so there's absolutely no danger of him being in it.

 

 

THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS -- Movie Review by Porfle

THE DARK KNIGHT -- DVD Review by Porfle

(First posted Dec. 17, 2008)

How dark should a "Batman" movie be? Some fans despise the Frank Miller-influenced take on the character that's become popular in recent years, especially after Tim Burton exorcised all of that jolly Adam West campiness once and for all back in '89. Others, like me, loved the Michael Keaton version of the caped crusader and were even happier to see director Christopher Nolan's BATMAN BEGINS take the subject to still greater heights of realism. Now, with Nolan's 2008 sequel THE DARK KNIGHT, Batman gets his darkest and most adult screen adventure yet, and--unless you prefer your Batman scurrying around on giant pennies with Robin and Bat-Mite--it's a complex and magnificent achievement.

The story opens with a Gotham City beseiged by a hornet's nest of gangland criminals stirred up by the Batman's tireless efforts to thwart their underworld enterprises. Desperate to stop him, they turn to the only person who seems crazy enough to take him on--The Joker, a mysterious, seemingly fearless psycho in clown makeup who lives to create as much chaos as possible. He also aims to prove that anyone is corruptible by taking on Gotham's dauntless new D.A., Harvey Dent, who rivals Batman as a crusader against crime. To do this, Joker plans to murder Dent's one true love, assistant D.A. Rachel Dawes, and place the blame on Batman and newly-appointed police commissioner James Gordon, thus twisting Dent himself into a vengeful agent of terror.

There's a lot of story packed into this film's 152-minute running time, perhaps even too much--it took me two or three viewings to get everything straight and fully appreciate all the twists and turns--but it's riveting. More than just a superhero flick, THE DARK KNIGHT is a top-notch crime drama that takes itself seriously in every respect, while also fully exploring the dimensions of each character. Mix all that with a series of breathtaking action sequences featuring Batman in some of his most dazzlingly audacious exploits ever, and the effect is nothing less than exhilarating.

The best thing about the action scenes in this movie is how much of it is done without CGI, using good old-fashioned stuntwork and practical effects instead of digital cartoon figures slugging it out. This is especially true of the film's central setpiece, in which Harvey Dent is being transferred to the county lock-up after publicly confessing that he is Batman. It's all a ruse, of course, to draw the Joker into the open, and it results in a no-holds-barred chase scene involving police and SWAT vans, a tractor-trailer rig, a garbage truck, and the Batmobile. At one point, Batman emerges from the wreckage of the Batmobile riding his new Batcycle (officially it's called the "Batpod", but I like Batcycle better), which you gotta see to believe. The Joker takes one look at this contraption careening out of an alleyway and remarks appreciatively, "Now THERE'S a Batman."

It's this admiration and respect for Batman that helps make the Joker character interesting. Heath Ledger doesn't act stereotypically evil as much as gleefully, insanely prankish, almost childlike at times, as though the Joker simply gets a thrill from messing things up and causing trouble, and rather than try to kill Batman, he finds him a delightfully fun playmate with whom to engage in deadly games. With little regard for self-preservation and a pronounced suicidal streak ("HIT ME!" he shrieks as the Batpod bears down upon him), he hurls himself into each harrowing situation with utter abandon. But he's incredibly dangerous, too, as evidenced by his explosive escape from police custody and his lethal dealings with Gotham's mob underworld.

Ledger's Oscar-worthy performance is amazing from start to finish, consistently fascinating and endlessly surprising. Some have said that the script gives him too many speeches explaining his behavior, as in his "I'm an agent of chaos" scene with a bedridden Harvey Dent, but I could listen to him all day. He's just plain fun to watch. People have mentioned detecting elements of Richard Dreyfuss or Jack Lemmon in his portrayal, while I thought I heard a little of Al Franken's "Stuart Smalley" in there as well. He's got that insane laugh down pat, too, but it isn't an affectation--he really comes off as a total loon.

The rest of the cast is awesome as well. There's Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman, and Gary Oldman from the first film (that's a kickass lineup right there), with the addition of Aaron Eckhart (THE CORE) as Harvey Dent, who later morphs into the hideous Two-Face. Maggie Gyllenhaal takes over the role of Rachel Dawes and is effective in a non-glamorous, down-to-earth way. Cillian Murphy makes a brief return as the Scarecrow early on, and Anthony Michael Hall appears as Gotham's leading television newsman. A really pleasant surprise for me was the appearance of one of my all-time favorite actors, Eric Roberts, as the head of Gotham's criminal element, and it's great to see him in a high-profile role such as this. Likewise, I enjoyed seeing Tommy "Tiny" Lister, who appeared with Roberts in the classic RUNAWAY TRAIN, in a brief but pivotal role, as well as Melinda McGraw as Gordon's wife Barbara and William Fictner as a shotgun-wielding bank manager during the film's exciting opening sequence.

As you might expect, the movie looks and sounds great on DVD. The standard two-disc edition is a little light on extras, though. There are two brief featurettes, one covering the creation of the new Batsuit and Batpod, the other describing Hans Zimmer's musical themes for the Joker. Six sequences from the movie are presented in their IMAX aspect ratios. My favorite is the six-episode series of segments from a fictional news show, "Gotham Tonight", with Anthony Michael Hall's character interviewing various Gotham notables. Rounding out the selection are production stills, poster art, trailers, and a digital copy of the film.

In addition to these, the Blu-Ray edition includes the following:
Movie with Focus Points (picture in picture)
Batman Tech: The incredible gadgets and tools (in HD)
Batman Unmasked: The Psychology of The Dark Knight--Delve into the psyche of Bruce Wayne and the world of Batman through real-world psychotherapy (in HD)
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THE DARK KNIGHT ends on a suitably dark note with the Batman on the run from the law, now a suspect in several murders and a pariah in Gotham City. Is this the traditionally downbeat middle chapter of a trilogy? In any case, the untimely death of Heath Ledger makes it a memorably unique cinematic experience that, regrettably, can never be reprised. But with just about everyone else on board for the following sequel--and not a trace of giant pennies or Robin in sight--I can't wait to see what Christopher Nolan has in store for us next.

THE DARK KNIGHT -- DVD Review by Porfle

VENICE UNDERGROUND -- Movie Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 11/20/11

 

The first thing I thought after watching VENICE UNDERGROUND (2005) for a couple of minutes was, "This looks like an episode of a TV series."  But after awhile I began to realize that if this were indeed the pilot for a series, no network executive in his right mind would pick it up.  In fact, if your dad had followed you around with a movie camera when you were a kid and filmed you and your friends playing cops and robbers, he would probably accidentally make a better movie than this one.

A prologue takes us to the office of police captain John Sullivan (veteran character actor Ed Lauter) as the mayor chews him out over the phone because of the ongoing carnage caused by two Venice Beach gangs, the Northside Surf Crew and the Southside Crips, who are waging an ongoing battle to control the local drug trade.  It seems like a hopeless situation until one of his underlings, an ambitious young sergeant named Frank Mills (Randall Batinkoff), waltzes in with a peach of a idea -- they will pluck a group of raw but attractive cadets out of the police academy, set them up in a beach house, and have them go undercover! 

That, of course, will be a lot better than putting experienced cops on the case, because, as Mills explains:  "The kids are all instinct and street smarts.  They know no boundaries."  Visions of "The Mod Squad" and "21 Jump Street" begin to dance around in Capt. Sullivan's head, with a little "Charlie's Angels" and "Baywatch Nights" thrown in for good measure.  What a great idea!

With their origin story out of the way even before the day-glo main titles have hippity-hopped their way across the screen, we are thrust right into the non-action as we join the J.N.F. (Junior Narc Force) keeping tabs on various gang members and trying to fathom their nefarious activities.  But they must deal with their own raging hormones as well, as Agent Tyler (Jodi Lyn O'Keefe) jealously observes her heartthrob, Agent Gary (a not-looking-too-good-these-days Edward Furlong), cavorting with a bikini babe.  It's all part of his cover, of course, but darn it, he just seems to be enjoying it a little too much.



Meanwhile, Agent Samantha (Nichole Hiltz) just failed her home pregnancy test, and isn't quite sure whether the father is Agent Danny (Eric Mabius), who wants to marry her, or good ol' Sergeant Mills, who just can't seem to keep his own member away from certain other members of the task force. 

These romantic entanglements play like a bad script from "Beverly Hills, 90210" performed by a grade school theater group, and the scenes of actual detective work that we witness from time to time seem to have been inspired by random episodes of "Scooby-Doo."  They even have their own mystery-mobile, a candy-apple red, mid-60s Mustang convertible, in which they all sit in broad daylight brandishing their guns as if to announce to any passing bad guys, "Yes, we are undercover narcs." 

Amazingly, though, no one ever figures this out, except for a mysterious figure who seems to anticipate their every move as he secretly watches them through blurry POV-shots like a stalker in a slasher flick, and, early in the story, actually kills one of them with his gold-plated revolver.  Who is this unknown enemy?  You're not supposed to know until the end, so try to act surprised.  Here's a hint:  it isn't the old caretaker at the haunted amusement park.

Director Eric DelaBarre is your basic point-and-shoot man but tries to "hip" things up with shaky camerawork, scattershot editing, and various other effects cribbed from music videos.  The acting, except from old pro Ed Lauter and Robert Rodriguez stock player Danny Trejo, is hopelessly amateurish, and the dialogue they're forced to recite is frequently laughable. 

This film resembles the kind of cheap exploitation flick they used to show on USA's "Up All Night" -- you know, the ones with all the good R-rated nudity and violence cut out and just the boring junk left in, although a few bare boobies make a cameo appearance about halfway through.  Soon after that we see a brief fistfight, and then later there's a small shootout, and at the end the mystery bad guy gets shot and a car blows up.  Actionwise, that's about it. 

I kept thinking about what Andy Sidaris, the guy responsible for all those great low-budget sex-and-violence thrillers like PICASSO TRIGGER and SAVAGE BEACH, could've done with a premise like this.  He wasn't a great filmmaker, but at least he gave us something fun to look at. VENICE UNDERGROUND barely even makes an effort.

 

VENICE UNDERGROUND -- Movie Review by Porfle