HEROES SHED NO TEARS -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 Originally posted on 6/21/19

 

John Woo had already been directing films for 12 years before making HEROES SHED NO TEARS, aka "Ying xiong wu lei" (Film Movement Classics, 1986), but it's the earliest of his films that I've seen which already makes it an interesting watch for a fan of his dazzling, flamboyant directing style.

It was actually completed in 1984 but shelved until Woo's subsequent film A BETTER TOMORROW became a hit.  Sort of a contractual obligation film for Golden Harvest, Woo's heart wasn't completely in it, yet he packed this blazing war thriller with as much bloody, bone-crushing action and tearful sentiment as it would hold.

The story is simple: a group of seasoned Chinese mercenaries are hired by the Thai government to attack the jungle lair of a powerful, loathsome drug lord, destroy it, capture him, and make their way through Thailand, Cambodia, and Viet Nam to the coast and their pickup point.

But once they have him (after the film's first explosive action sequence gets things off to a rousing start), everything goes wrong. The next thrilling scene occurs when the group's leader Chan Chung (Eddy Ko) stops off at his home to check on his family (his son, sister-in-law, and her father), only to find them already taken hostage.

The tense, bullet-riddled mayhem that follows sets the tone for the rest of the film, which will consist of action scene after action scene connected by interludes of both sticky sentiment (Chan Chung and his son have many touching father-son moments) and out-and-out comedy relief supplied by two very gregarious young battle chums.

This is in addition to instances of shocking sadism supplied by an evil Vietnamese colonel with whom the group runs afoul when they rescue a female French journalist from being executed, during which the colonel loses an eye.

He not only orders his own men to go after the group, but also terrorizes a local tribe of villagers into tracking them down as well. With the Thai drug soldiers, the Chinese soldiers, and the native spear-carrying trackers all after our heroes, the film becomes sort of a jungle variation of Walter Hill's THE WARRIORS.

The aforementioned drastic shifts in tone are pretty much all over the place (a quality Woo was aware of while filming), but one hardly has time to take note of this before the next battle fills the air with bullets, blood, and fiery explosions.

At one point Chan Chung runs into an old American friend, one of those "never went home" ex-soldiers whose hut is rigged with about a ton of explosives, all of which will eventually go off when the bad guys find their way there.

Stylistically, the film has little or none of Woo's usual finesse, that certain artistic blend of slow-motion, creative camera angles, and meticulous rapid-fire editing to create a heady visual experience that goes beyond simply recording events.  Here, he uses more of a sledgehammer approach, well-staged but boisterous and bombastic. 

Along the way to their pickup point, our heroic mercenaries go through hell and have their number violently reduced one by one.  It's almost painful to watch when characters we care about are killed and situations go dreadfully wrong, but this is a testament to the relatively crude (by Woo standards) yet viscerally effective HEROES SHED NO TEARS, which is an absolute must-see for John Woo fans.  

Film Movement Classics
1986
99 Minutes
Hong Kong
Cantonese, English, Thai, Vietnamese (English subtitles)
Action, Drama
NR

Blu-ray Features

Interview with star Eddy Ko
New Essay by Grady Hendrix
Sound: 5.1 surround and 2.0 stereo

DVD Features

Interview with star Eddy Ko
New Essay by Grady Hendrix
 

HEROES SHED NO TEARS -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

BORDER RUN -- Blu-Ray Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 2/22/13

 

Sharon Stone as a conservative, "fair and balanced" TV reporter who's against illegal immigration?  Well, I just knew that sounded too un-Hollywood to be true, and sure enough, before BORDER RUN (2012) is over, her character has an epiphany that revs her overacting dial up to eleven and beyond.

Sharon plays "hard-nosed right-wing journalist" Sophie Talbert, who, with a black fright wig emphasizing her pale skin, hardly looks like someone who lives right on the Arizona-Mexico border.  Like Jane Fonda's initially conservative TV newswoman in THE CHINA SYNDROME, she's on the wrong side of the issue at hand (by Tinseltown standards, that is) until shown the error of her ways--in this case, when her own relief-worker brother Aaron (Billy Zane) disappears in Mexico and she must enter the world of the illegal immigrant herself in order to find him. 

After Sophie arrives in Mexico, Aaron's co-worker Rafael (Rosemberg Salgado) offers to take her in his pickup to a meeting with someone named Javier who may be able to help her.  On the way there, they form an instant romantic bond that has them stopping off at a roadside bar to get drunk and dance while precious minutes in the missing Aaron's life tick away.  This odd passage indicates how awkward some of the tone shifts and scene transitions will be for the rest of the film.

Before we know it, Sophie and Rafael get separated and she meets up with Javier (Miguel Rodarte), joining a group of migrants whom he's smuggling across the border.  Naturally, Sophie's rigid attitude toward the whole thing begins to change when she discovers that some of the migrants are nice people with heartwarming personal stories (imagine that!), and that the process tends to be both dangerous and uncomfortable. 

Just how dangerous becomes clear when the tanker truck they're stashed inside gets diverted to a remote farmhouse well short of the border, where Sophie meets the film's main villain, Juanita (Giovanna Zacarías), a real piece of work who could easily be the poster girl for PMS.  We've already seen this mega-bitch-on-wheels repeatedly beating up the bound Aaron, who's also being held there, and now we get to see her kicking a pregnant woman in the stomach while one of her fat, sweaty henchmen has his way with the bound Sophie. 

This decidedly unpleasant rape scene gives Sharon Stone yet another chance to do some full-tilt emoting and it will be far from her last.  I won't go into everything that occurs next but after an escape, a chase, and the proverbial run for the border, Sophie ends up in a border station where her newly-found righteous indignation against U.S. immigration policy is given full vent.  Here, Sharon lets loose with a "big acting" moment by throwing a fit that is borderline (excuse the phrase) hilarious.

You might think that the film, having made its point, will fade out on Sophie's return to the USA to crusade against immigration reform, but this is when BORDER RUN pulls a plot twist on us that's worthy of a horror movie, with Sophie suddenly ending up in more grave peril than ever.  With this added sequence, the film finally lurches all the way into "so bad it's good" territory and makes me wish I'd been watching it as a wacky exploitation flick instead of a misguided message pic all along.

As mentioned before, Sharon Stone's performance here is wonderfully bad, especially since director Gabriela Tagliavini seems intent on photographing her as unflatteringly as possible from start to finish.  Billy Zane, who plays Aaron, demonstrates once again that if a project doesn't make him feel like turning on the old "Billy Zane" magic, he's Stiff City.  And as the monstrous Juanita, Giovanna Zacarías almost makes Al Pacino look like a study in subtlety.

The Blu-Ray disc from Anchor Bay is in 2.35:1 widescreen with Dolby 5.1 sound and subtitles in English and Spanish.  No extras.

BORDER RUN is ridiculously melodramatic where it means to be hard-hitting, and goes for big emotional moments that it hasn't really earned.  A weird combination of social relevance and pure exploitation, it fails as a "good" movie but succeeds, to some extent anyway, as a perversely entertaining train wreck. 

BORDER RUN -- Blu-Ray Review by Porfle

THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS (1955) -- Movie Review by Porfle

 

 (Originally posted on 11/22/2009. My reviews were pretty spoiler-y back then--in fact, I pretty much recapped the entire movie. So fair warning.)

 

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! 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 (1955) -- Movie Review by Porfle

FIST OF FEAR, TOUCH OF DEATH -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 4/25/20

 

Some movies take material that's unused or left over from other films, shoot new footage to augment it, and repackage it all as a new film. But every once in a while a movie is such a mishmash of various elements that it looks like something out of Dr. Frankenstein's laboratory.

Which brings us to the 1980 martial arts monstrosity FIST OF FEAR, TOUCH OF DEATH (Film Detective), one of the most stupefyingly shameless Bruce Lee death-sploitation pastiches you'll ever see.

Being that he was the most popular martial arts superstar of all time, Bruce Lee's death brought on an endless parade of cash-ins that used either random footage of the man himself or lookalikes pretending to be him, or both, all hoping to appeal to fans of actual Bruce Lee films such as ENTER THE DRAGON.

Here, exploitation producer Terry Levene discovered a print of a black and white film called "Thunderstorm" which featured a very young Bruce Lee in a pedestrian family drama.

Redubbing it to turn it into a story of a young man who wants to be a martial artist despite his parents' wishes, Levene also added lengthy scenes from an unrelated samurai film as flashbacks, its lead character now identified as Bruce's great-grandfather who was a great warrior.

But Levene wasn't done yet. To this he added new scenes with action star Fred "The Hammer" Williamson, martial arts legend Ron "The Black Dragon" Van Clief, and fight promoter and star Aaron Banks, in a wraparound scenario which takes place during a major fight event at Madison Square Garden in which a new successor to Bruce Lee is to be named.

Some of the ring action is as fake as WWE wrestling (one fighter plucks out an opponent's eyeballs and tosses them to the fans) but there are also some exhibitions of skill and a climactic kickboxing match.

With Banks promoting the actual event, a non-union film crew was allowed access disguised as a TV news crew, including golden-voiced actor Adolph Caesar (who would later be nominated for an Oscar for A SOLDIER'S STORY) serving as both sports commentator and the film's narrator.

Caesar's narration and interviews with actual fight stars give the film a mockumentary quality at times, and his reminiscences about Bruce Lee's early life serve to introduce the "Thunderstorm" footage.

This storyline fails to generate much interest save for the novelty of seeing the charming young star playing a "gee whiz" teen who just wants to skip homework and attend the big karate match.  The "samurai" scenes are even less compelling since we keep joining them in progress and don't really know or care what's going on in them.

In fact, when the film starts juggling scenes from these different old movies in earnest, you may want to start chapter skipping through them just to see what this dizzying patchwork narrative has in store for us next.

I like the Fred Williamson storyline, with some funny touches such as having everyone mistake him for Harry Belafonte. When he fights over a taxi with a nerdy white dude in a suit, I even laughed out loud at the obviousness of the guy's name (scripter Ron Harvey as "Jasper Milktoast").

Later, martial arts star Bill Louie rescues two women from being raped in the park, fighting off a horde of thugs while dressed as Bruce Lee's character "Kato" from TV's "The Green Hornet." And interlaced with all this is actual interview footage of Bruce Lee, dubbed with new dialogue.

Restored from the original 35mm camera negative, the print is not bad at all for an old grindhouse flick such as this. Special features include trailers and a lengthy making-of featurette with Levene, Harvey, Williamson, Van Clief, and director Matthew Mallinson which I actually found more enjoyable than the feature (!) The keepcase includes liner notes from Will Sloan and Justin Decloux, hosts of The Important Cinema Club podcast.

Bottom line: if you get a kick out of this sort of cinematic oddity, then you know just what you're in for and should view FIST OF FEAR, TOUCH OF DEATH in a state of giddy delight. If not, then chances are you'll like it about as much as a swift kick in the teeth.




SPECIAL FEATURES

    Restoration from the original 35mm camera negative
    A featurette of behind-the-camera takes on the film in brand new interviews with Fist of Fear, Touch of Death actors Fred Willaimson and Ron Van Clief, producer Terry Levene, director Matthew Mallinson, and scriptwriter Ron Harvey
    Original theatrical trailer
    Liner notes from Will Sloan and Justin Decloux, hosts of The Important Cinema Club podcast

Release Date: 3-31-2020
Runtime: 82 minutes
Genre: Action
Language: English
Rating: R
Color/BW: Color

FIST OF FEAR, TOUCH OF DEATH -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

PANTHER GIRL OF THE KONGO -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 1/19/22

 

Serials are a wonderful phenomenon unto themselves. They aren't self-contained units like movies or TV show episodes.  They're something that we watch in a different way entirely, with each open-ended chapter gradually adding up to a cumulative whole. 

And since the usually rather uncomplicated overall story must be sustained throughout these multiple chapters, it must necessarily be rambling, padded, stretched-out, repetitive, and filled with dead ends and shaggy-dog subplots.  (This is why so many serials have so easily been edited down into regular-length feature films.)

Because of this, serials seem to take place in their own unique, utterly unreal universe where actions are rash, dialogue is corny, the laws of physics don't apply, and logic as we know it simply doesn't exist.

Regarding the serial-like Saturday morning TV series "Jason of Star Command" I once said: "There's nothing like a show that's both stupid and cool at the same time to bring out the kid in me." This is, to me, a perfect summation of the appeal of the serial.  Since it's resolutely unlike anything else, it offers a whole different appeal and a refreshingly naive and uncomplicated kind of fun that's simply indescribable. 

Which brings us to PANTHER GIRL OF THE KONGO (1954), the latest classic serial to be released on Blu-ray and DVD by Olive Films.  The penultimate chapter play from Republic Pictures, who gave us THE ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN MARVEL, it came near the end of the glorious serial era but still serves as a fun and exciting example of it.

The lovely and talented Phyllis Coates, who first played Lois Lane opposite George Reeves in the TV series "The Adventures of Superman", stars as Jean Evans, known as "The Panther Girl" by the local natives due to an earlier incident which has become legend.  Jean's profession as a fearless wildlife photographer makes her a bit of a female Carl Denham, who once boasted that he would've gotten "a swell shot of a charging rhino" if his assistant hadn't run away with the camera.

 

Here, however, the charging rhino is replaced by a "claw monster" created by Dr. Morgan (Arthur Space, THE SHAKIEST GUN IN THE WEST, THE RED HOUSE), a shady scientist operating in the area.  Morgan and his burly henchmen Cass (John Day, THE RELUCTANT ASTRONAUT, SILVER STREAK) and Rand (Mike Ragan, EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS, THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL) have an illicit diamond mine but can't work it until the natives and other snooping interlopers have been run out of the area. 

To this end, Morgan has created a growth formula to turn crawdads--yes, crawdads!--into giant lobsters known as "claw monsters" which Cass and Rand then herd toward the village to wreak fear and havoc.  (And, potentially, one hell of a seafood dinner.) 

The whole thing's too much for even the intrepid Jean to handle by herself, so she calls upon the aid of her pal, big-game hunter Larry Sanders (Myron Healey, THE SHAKIEST GUN IN THE WEST, THE UNEARTHLY, RIO BRAVO) to come join in the hunt for the claw monsters and to help deal with Cass and Rand, who make quite a nuisance of themselves at the behest of Dr. Morgan.

Thus, we have the groundwork for 12 entire chapters filled with furious fistfights, blazing shootouts, jungle perils, and an ample serving of giant lobsters.  Sanders handles the frequent fisticuffs, with Jean usually falling and conveniently getting knocked out at the onset of each fight.  The shootouts are a different matter, as Jean wields a rifle or a pistol with equal skill. 

Each chapter ends, of course, with a cliffhanger, with Healey's character being the subject of a surprising number of them.  Most aren't all that imaginative, involving falling trees, exploding dynamite, quicksand, etc. but some end on a more exciting note with Jean being menaced by a giant lobster claw or an advancing gorilla-suit suitor. 

Phyllis Coates, who somehow looked appealingly MILF-y even in her 20s, makes for a fetching heroine when Healey isn't hogging the action limelight himself.  Many viewers used to seeing her in the prim 50s fashions Lois Lane wore in "Superman" will delight at the sight of Phyllis running around in her jungle miniskirt and boots for 12 chapters.  (She also sports a robust, chest-heaving scream that rivals that of the great Fay Wray herself.)

While much of the action consists of stock footage from the 1941 Frances Gifford serial JUNGLE GIRL, Phyllis gets ample opportunity to show off her character's derring-do when the usually self-reliant Sanders stumbles into a few sticky situations that require rescue by the Panther Girl.

In one scene she executes a thrilling high dive off a cliff to save the drowning hunter.  In another, she does a backflip off a swinging vine just in time to wrestle a crocodile that's about to eat him. 

Since this is a budget-conscious jungle adventure, the Republic backlot is pressed into service to stand in for darkest Africa, along with a standing town set, a simple native village, and a limited number of interior sets including the doctor's lab, the diamond mine, a saloon, and Jean's rustic jungle bungalow.

Special effects by the ubiquitous Howard and Theodore Lydecker (COMMANDO CODY: SKY MARSHAL OF THE UNIVERSE, JOHNNY GUITAR) include some cool rear-projection shots of those wonderfully hokey-looking claw monsters with Jean and Sanders blasting away at them in the foreground. 

The DVD from Olive Films has an aspect ratio of 1.37:1 with mono sound and optional English subtitles.  No extras.  The transfer is from a near-pristine print with beautiful black and white photography that's just a joy to look at.  (Note to subtitle writers: in 1954 it was "Miss", not "Ms.")

PANTHER GIRL OF THE KONGO probably wouldn't rank among the best serials of all time, but darn if it isn't one of the most downright fun and enjoyable ones that I've seen.  There's just something about these things--stupid, yes, but totally cool--that I find utterly irresistible.

PANTHER GIRL OF THE KONGO -- DVD Review by Porfle

Phantom Hand Blooper in "From Russia With Love" (1963) (video)

When Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya) greets Tatiana Romanova (Daniela Bianchi) at the door in the second James Bond movie "From Russia With Love" (1963, with Sean Connery), something odd happens--a phantom hand appears where you might least expect it.  See if you can spot it!


I neither own nor claim any rights to this material. Just having some fun with it. Hope you enjoy it!

Phantom Hand Blooper in "From Russia With Love" (1963) (video)

Switcheroo Stunt in "DR. NO" (1962) James Bond (video)

It's a common but fun trick when the star "becomes" the stunt person in one unbroken take.

My favorite example is in the first James Bond film, "Dr. No."  First, we see Sean Connery and Ursula Andress.

They run behind some scenery, and, without cutting away, the stunt people emerge to dazzle and amaze us. 


I neither own nor claim any rights to this material.  Just having some fun with it. Thanks for watching!

Switcheroo Stunt in "DR. NO" (1962) James Bond (video)

"MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN" Corkscrew Car Jump: NO Slide Whistle! (video)

The cartoony slide whistle always ruined the effect of this great stunt for us.

So we took it out and replaced it with cool Bond music!

I neither own nor claim any rights to this material.  Just having some fun with it.  Hope you enjoy it!

"MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN" Corkscrew Car Jump: NO Slide Whistle! (video)

Sean Connery's Kid Brother In A James Bond Rip-Off? ("Operation Kid Brother", 1967) (video)

Sean Connery's James Bond movies were so popular in the 60s...

...that in 1967, Sean's younger brother Neil was courted to star in a Bond clone.
It was called "Operation Kid Brother", aka "O.K. Connery."

Neil bore a resemblance to Sean, but with little of his screen presence.
And although he sounded much like his brother, Neil's voice was dubbed by another actor...
...because he'd suffered a throat injury prior to the ADR sessions.

The producers cast as many familiar faces as possible from the actual Bond films.

The music was composed by Ennio Morricone and Bruno Nicolai.
The movie itself was your typical Italian "spy-ghetti" romp.

Sean Connery was so upset by it that he didn't speak to any of the participants for some time.
But most earned more for this film than for their Bond movie roles.

And it still has its fans.


I neither own nor claim any rights to this material.  Just having some fun with it.  Thanks for watching!

Sean Connery's Kid Brother In A James Bond Rip-Off? ("Operation Kid Brother", 1967) (video)

Was This Scene In "Inglourious Basterds" Inspired By "The Culpepper Cattle Company"? (video)

 

Video by Porfle Popnecker. I neither own nor claim any rights to this material. Just having some fun with it. Thanks for watching!

 

 

Was This Scene In "Inglourious Basterds" Inspired By "The Culpepper Cattle Company"? (video)

BREAKER! BREAKER! -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 3/11/16

 

I wouldn't have been caught dead going to a redneck trucker flick in 1977.  Or even renting it or watching it on HBO in 1988.  Especially if it had anything to do with CB radios, which I regarded with utter disdain.  Not only did I not see movies like CONVOY back in the day, but the C.W. McCall song itself made my soul hurt.

But that was then.  Now, in retrospect, I can enjoy a low-rent indy truck opera like Chuck Norris' BREAKER! BREAKER! (1977) as I bask in its retro-retro charm.  In fact, this simple little tale of good guys vs. bad guys and righteousness against injustice is such utterly unassuming and straightforward fun that its purity is practically bracing.

In only his first starring role, Chuck is hardly the fabled Superman he would later become although he can already spin-kick his share of butt.  Here, with his youth and lack of facial hair making him look a bit unformed, he's an easygoing truck driver who'd rather mind his own business than have to prove how tough he is.

 
But prove it he must when his younger brother, Billy, gets detoured through the small town of Texas City, California during his very first trucker run and finds out its one of those places where everyone is dishonest, especially the scummy police and the man who runs everything as mayor, judge, and whatever else he wants to be at any particular time--namely, the loathesome Judge Joshua Trimmings. 

The Judge is played by familiar character actor George Murdock (EARTHQUAKE, ANY WHICH WAY YOU CAN), who was born to play a smalltown tyrant in a baggy off-white suit.  (Not to mention God in STAR TREK V: THE FINAL FRONTIER.)  He convicts our hapless Billy of various cooked up crimes and sentences him to pay up or go to jail. 

Billy balks, gets beaten up, and disappears.  Cue big brother Chuck coming to town to rescue him and you've pretty much got the rest of the plot figured out.

The big rig angle actually comes into play only at the very beginning of the film and again for its finale, with most of the running time consisting of Chuck dealing with the local yokels (this is one of those Southern-like towns that seems to have been plunked right down in the middle of California) who are all either shining him on or trying to kill him.

Chuck, needless to say, handles himself capably but does so with a minimum of fancy fight choreography, making do with a well-placed spin-kick here and there in addition to some good old-fashioned fisticuffs.

Even the big fight at the end is kept fairly simple, save for lots of slow-motion a la "The Six Million Dollar Man." The mayhem tends to be on the lighter side, too, with nary a fractured limb or geyser of blood spewing from someone's mouth after a crushing blow.

Murdock, naturally, takes home the acting honors, while ERASERHEAD's Jack Nance gets to overact as a manic redneck trucker.  As for Chuck, his skills are pretty basic here--in one scene, it looks as though director Don Hulette filmed closeups of him expressing various emotions so that he could simply insert them wherever needed.  Of course, it's not like we really watch Chuck Norris movies for the acting.

As Arlene, a local woman and single mother who sides with Chuck against the town's corruption and becomes his romantic interest, Terry O'Connor is an appealing presence.  Their romance is quick and virtually without dialogue, with a brief, sappy ballad and a montage of them strolling around in the woods for a minute sufficing to encapsulate their courtship. 

The Blu-ray from Olive Films is in widescreen with Dolby 2.0 sound.  No subtitles.  The sole extra is the film's trailer.

With all of Chuck's trucker friends converging on the town for what might be called a "smashing" finale, BREAKER! BREAKER! finally breaks a sweat after pleasantly coasting along like a big rig on a downward grade for an hour-and-a-half.  It's hardly a blockbuster action thriller, but if you love the 70s, then movies like this are probably one of the reasons why.


Release date: March 22, 2016

Pictures shown are not taken from the Blu-ray

BREAKER! BREAKER! -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

CIRCUS WORLD -- Movie Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 4/12/21

 

 

Currently watching: CIRCUS WORLD (1964) with John Wayne, Claudia Cardinale, and Rita Hayworth. Also with Lloyd Nolan, Richard Conte, and John Smith of the TV western "Laramie."

 

Henry Hathaway (TRUE GRIT, THE SONS OF KATIE ELDER) directed this departure from Duke's usual western adventures, although the rugged star still sports his trademark cowboy hat and inimitable swagger.

 

This time, however, his "Matt Masters" character is a circus owner whose dreams of touring Europe are dashed when the ship carrying his entire enterprise (animals, people, and equipment) all but capsizes in a Barcelona harbor.

 

 

After a slow start, this shockingly sudden sequence, which occurs early in the film, is both jarring and breathtakingly spectacular, using a full-scale ship mock-up that rivals the one constructed by James Cameron for "Titanic." 

 

Several minutes after this impressive spectacle gave way to Masters and his young partner Steve (John Smith) beginning the long, arduous task of putting another circus together, I was still breathless from that thrilling maritime disaster.

 

The middle part of the film is practically sedate in comparison, settling into an ensemble comedy/drama that focuses on young Claudia Cardinale's aspiring circus performer Toni, her budding romance with Steve, and a very serious subplot about her estranged mother Lili, played wonderfully by veteran actress Rita Hayworth.

 

 

 

The interplay between the various characters isn't as effortlessly light or involving as Howard Hawks managed in Duke's previous adventure "Hatari!", although the script, whose writers included Nicholas Ray, Ben Hecht, and James Edward Grant, mercifully avoids most of the usual circus story cliches. 

 

It's fun watching Duke and the gang rebuild their finances by working in a wild west show for European audiences, and seeing how he wrangles a circus as opposed to a cattle ranch or lawless town. 

 

Old standbys Nolan and Conte help keep things real while an appealing young Cardinale adds spark to her scenes four years before she would attain screen immortality as "Jill McBain" in Sergio Leone's classic western "Once Upon A Time In The West."

 

 

 

Best of all, though, is a more mature Rita Hayworth bringing her considerable presence to bear as her character reenters the performing world while desperately trying to mend the rift between her and her daughter Toni. 

 

But just as the film caught fire early on during the shipwreck sequence, an equally spectacular finale gives us nothing less than a raging inferno which threatens to burn down the entire bigtop and everything in it on the very day of the new circus' debut, and again an otherwise unremarkable film is transformed into a thrilling nailbiter that had me on the edge of my seat. 

 

It's these two bookend scenes that make CIRCUS WORLD a must-see for John Wayne fans. But while everything in-between comes off as relatively pedestrian, it's still a pleasure to spend time with these actors and their likable characters.

 

CIRCUS WORLD -- Movie Review by Porfle

Presenting -- The JOHN WAYNE/ "GREEN BERETS" Lunchbox!

Okay, this isn't a real lunchbox--we were just having a bit of fun with one of the goofier characters from John Wayne's controversial 1968 Viet Nam epic, THE GREEN BERETS. Namely, the doggedly "cute" little Vietnamese kid named "Ham Chunk" (Craig Jue) who's intended to make our heartstrings go all a-flutter.  (Click pics to enlarge.)

In the movie, Ham Chunk is an orphan who hangs around a U.S. military base deep in the combat zone and likes to play pranks on the soldiers (after which he points and utters his catchphrase, "Ha ha, you funny!")

He gets adopted by--or rather, adopts--an unconventional lieutenant named Peterson, played by Jim Hutton, who becomes his father figure.  The cuteness factor is cranked up to eleven during their scenes, especially when accompanied by film composer Miklos Rozsa's bathos-enriched "Ham Chunk" theme music.



[SPOILER] When Peterson fails to return from a dangerous mission, the kid loses it.  "Peter-san!  Peter-san!" he wails, searching desperately amongst the empty helicopters to no avail. 

It's up to the Duke to step up, take the poor kid by the hand, and lead him into the sunset (which, famously, sets in the East). [/SPOILER]

Anyway, the lunchbox may be fictitious, but we'd love to have one.  Whether in the lunchroom at school or the breakroom at work, it would make a dandy conversation piece!

[MORE SPOILERS:]

Presenting -- The JOHN WAYNE/ "GREEN BERETS" Lunchbox!

The Character-Defining Tableaux of "Taxi Driver" (1976) (video)

 

In Taxi Driver, director Martin Scorcese sums up certain characters...

...by arranging a tableau of their lives and photographing it from a "God's-eye" view. 

These impressions mark Travis Bickle's journey through life. 

 

Video by Porfle Popnecker. Music by Bernard Herrmann. I neither own nor claim any rights to this material. Just having some fun with it. Thanks for watching!

 

The Character-Defining Tableaux of "Taxi Driver" (1976) (video)

DEMON WARRIORS -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 8/2/09

 

A supernatural action thriller that mixes bloody, bone-crushing fights and shoot-em-ups with some puzzling mysticism, Thailand's DEMON WARRIORS, aka Opapatika (2007), is a lot of sound and fury signifying something that I never could quite figure out.

The "Opapatika", or "demon warriors", are former humans who committed suicide and then, for some reason, were able to return to life as superior beings with special powers. A young human, Techit, seeks out an old Opapatika master named Sadok in order to get one of those reincarnation makeovers and is promptly instructed to blow his own brains out, which he does. Sadok tells the newly-risen Techit that since he was unusually intuitive in his former life, his Opapatika power is the ability to read minds. Unfortunately, every time he uses this sixth sense his other senses begin to fade one by one. Sadok's power isn't revealed to us at first, but we do discover that using it causes his body to decay a little at a time.

Sadok is seeking out other Opapatikas for some unknown reason and puts Techit on the trail, along with his super-badass human assistant, Thuwachit. The ones they're searching for are: Paison, a contract killer with unerring aim whose body takes on the wounds of his victims; Aruth, a gentle soul by day who turns into a kill-crazy psycho beast after sundown; Ramil, who can manifest his evil side into a seperate entity with a face only an exorcist could love; and Jiras, who considers his immortality a curse of endless suffering. Weaving her way through their lives is the mysterious Pran, a beautiful woman who becomes an object of great conflict among them all.

Thuwachit narrates the story and doles out exposition like a gum machine although I can't figure out what he's talking about half the time. But mainly he leads group after group of armed soldiers into furious battles with the Opapatika, with the hapless humans getting the ever-livin' crap kicked out of them every time. These guys must be getting paid a ton of money because they just keep getting slaughtered by the dozens in several nicely-staged battle sequences drenched in cartoonishly spewing blood and flying limbs.

One particularly lively setpiece features an encounter between the soldiers and the deadly Aruth in the inner courtyard of an apartment building as they take the fight up and down stairs and across various landings, with lots of leaping and shooting and all kinds of horrible deaths. Thuwachit and his doomed army fare no better against the pistol-packin' Paison, who streaks amongst them firing off one kill-shot after another and racking up a death count that should keep the local morticians busy for months to come.

But as frenetic and action-packed as these scenes are, their one-sided nature--the Opapatika are practically invulnerable to physical harm--renders them a bit tiresome after awhile. The same can be said for the fights between the demon warriors themselves, which are filled with gunfire, swordplay, and carnage, but seem somewhat pointless since these guys just can't seem to manage to kill each other.

In the downtime between all this violence, the movie screeches to a crawl. There are some interesting backstories, Paison's being particularly moving, and some nice artistically filmed scenes of Pran gliding elegantly around the house in her windblown gown and listlessly playing the piano as Aruth and Ramil gaze at her like lovesick puppies. Jiras warns them to stay away from her, apparently knowing something about her that we don't know. Characters either talk a lot about being trapped between reality and limbo or sit around thinking about it, and Thuwachit does some more narration for us, which he is wont to do.

The Pran situation eventually erupts into another big gunfight in her house between all the demon warriors, including Techit, who hasn't really done much up till then besides smoke cigarettes. (According to the synopsis, he's supposed to be a detective, but I never really got that impression.) The rapidly-deteriorating Sadok eventually shows up and reveals his connection to all this, including a surprising link to Pran, and we finally discover just how sinister his intentions are.

By the time we get to the last two or three prolonged battle scenes with the Opapatika mowing down soldiers like so many cans of tomato soup or having generally pointless fights with each other, I was looking forward to seeing them all finally start to friggin' die already. Making things even harder to endure is the fact that for some reason, director Thanakorn Pongsuwan suddenly eschews the perfectly good style that he's employed for the first two-thirds of the film and starts doing everything in highly-annoying Shaky-Cam. This detracts from the dramatic finale in which the story of Thuwachit (my favorite character since he's such a hardcore badass for a human) is resolved along with the insidious scheme of his master Sadok. At least we get to see some of these invulnerable bastards getting killed at last, which comes not a moment too soon since by now things have started to list perilously toward the boring side.

The DVD is in 1.78:1 widescreen with 5.1 and 2.0 Dolby Digital sound. You can listen to it in the original Thai with English or Spanish subtitles, or in an English dub. Included as a bonus feature is a 15-minute "making of" featurette.

DEMON WARRIORS has cool makeup effects, stunningly violent and bloody action (complete with massive spew), and some very nice production design and cinematography. But aside from the exciting early fight scenes, the story tends to get exceedingly dry and the action becomes repetitive. I did like this movie to a certain extent and appreciate the effort put into it, but the fadeout came as a bit of a relief.

DEMON WARRIORS -- 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

SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE -- Movie Review by Porfle

  Originally published on 11/20/17

 

SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE (2002) begins Park Chan-wook's celebrated vengeance 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. "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.

"When you set out for revenge, first dig two graves," someone told James Bond way back in 1981's FOR YOUR EYES ONLY. Here, 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.)  SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE 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.


Read our full review of Palisade Tartan Asia Extreme's eight-disc DVD set THE VENGEANCE TRILOGY

Read our review of OLDBOY
Read our review of LADY VENGEANCE

SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE -- Movie Review by Porfle