Only now does it occur to me... STORYVILLE (1992)

Only now does it occur to me... a few things about STORYVILLE.

STORYVILLE is the only feature film to be written and directed by Mark Frost, co-creator of TWIN PEAKS. I watched it because I am a TWIN PEAKS die-hard. Here's what I learned:

#1. It can't decide whether it wants to be a John Grisham-style courtroom drama or a Cannon Film. Think that sounds ridiculous? Then just let me lay the plot synopsis on you, and you can tell me the exact point where Grisham gives way to Golan-Globus:

Clay Fowler (James Spader) is a young Louisianan whippersnappuh and ace lawyer running for Congress.

There's all sorts of corruption and family history and bayous and rockin' chairs and microfiche––


Most films of this kind make you wait about an hour for the microfiche montage sequence, but STORYVILLE delivers it in the opening shots of the movie!

and there're backroom deals and suspenders and an irascible performance by Jason Robards,

and pathos exuded by Woody Strode in browline eyeglasses,

but then––ladies and gentlemen, just when you think you're watching THE CLIENT or THE PELICAN BRIEF, James Spader finds himself in hot water (literally) when he is blackmailed after being videotaped having sex with a martial arts instructor in her studio's (ninja) hot tub:

And this is after they've already 'sexy-sparred' like Grace Jones and Christopher Walken in A VIEW TO A KILL.


A VIEW TO A KILL meets A TIME TO KILL?

Allow me to reiterate two things. One: I am not making this up. Two: ninja hot tubs are a staple of 1980s cinema, and I don't know why. I call them "ninja" hot tubs and not "martial arts" hot tubs (or even "jiu jitsu jacuzzis"), because they first appear in the Cannon classic REVENGE OF THE NINJA, where three separate hot tubs involving ninjas are made integral to the plot. In Cannon's NINJA III: THE DOMINATION, a ninja hot tub makes a notable appearance as a site of possessed ninja murder. In BLIND FURY (not a Cannon film, but starring Cannon's Sho Kosugi), there is a climactic martial arts and swordfighting duel over a hot tub. Later on in STORYVILLE, Spader returns to the scene of the ninja hot tub and battles a martial arts assassin. What does all of this mean? I was hoping you could tell me.



#2. If you're looking for TWIN PEAKS, you found it... (kind of).

There's a small town, quirky characters, and a dead body floating in the water in the opening scenes.

He's dead... Wrapped in... the clothes he was already wearing, I guess. 

It shares with TWIN PEAKS its casting director (Johanna Ray), cinematographer (Ron Garcia), production designer (Richard Hoover), set decorator (Brian Kasch), second-assistant director (Randy Barbee), and co-producer (Robert D. Simon).  It features a small, weirdo role for Catherine Martell herself, Piper Laurie:

and a villainous turn (obviously) by Renault brother Michael Parks:

 

who is sort of playing the same corrupt cop he played in THE HITMAN, though in this role he is permitted both the Cannon flourish of beating up James Spader while wearing a terrifying mask:

as well as the Grisham flourish of testifying in a courtroom that the judge "will not allow to turn into a circus!"

Michael Parks was a national treasure, by the way.

In closing, this is a strange (and, I'll be honest, often mediocre) little movie that may find appreciative viewers among TWIN PEAKS enthusiasts, hot tub fans, Grisham die-hards, and, I daresay, aficionados of the Southern Fried Crawdad-Lickin' Sleaze-O-Rama genre.

R.I.P., Michael Parks

Dammit––another great one gone.



Parks as Ambrose Bierce in FROM DUSK TILL DAWN 3.

From playing "Adam" in THE BIBLE to "Josey" in THE RETURN OF JOSEY WALES to the scariest Renault brother in TWIN PEAKS to Norris antagonist in THE HITMAN to his latter-day Rodriguez and Tarantino-fueled resurgence, Michael Parks always brought his A-game. Whether he was in a television bit part, or a villain in a straight-to-video actioner, he was bringing Shakespearean complexity and Strasbergian specificity to his roles, fusing the diligence of a craftsman with the fervency of a true believer.

I'll leave you with a true celebration of his acting chops––a brief scene in DEATH WISH 5 that can only be described as "Michael Parks forcing Charles Bronson to question his sexuality":
You'll be missed, Mr. Parks.

Only now does it occur to me... FROM DUSK TILL DAWN 3: THE HANGMAN'S DAUGHTER

Only now does it occur to me... that FROM DUSK TILL DAWN 3: THE HANGMAN'S DAUGHTER is the finest Ambrose Bierce fan fiction ever made.

The second straight-to-video sequel to Tarantino and Rodriguez's hardboiled vampire flick FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, THE HANGMAN'S DAUGHTER is a period piece, set in in 1913.  Essentially, it follows the structure of the original: a Western/crime drama which makes a sudden turn into horror territory around the one hour mark.

FROM DUSK TILL DAWN 2: TEXAS BLOOD MONEY was not without its high points, but part three outdoes it on nearly every count––primarily, in concept. 

Ambrose Bierce (THE DEVIL'S DICTIONARY, AN OCCURRENCE AT OWL CREEK BRIDGE, THE DAMNED THING) was one of America's finest satirists, a witty, wayward, and delightfully bitter man whose attitude was somewhere between Jonathan Swift's and Robert Mitchum's.  "Nothing matters" was his motto, and, at seventy-one, rather than suffer the sins of geriatric boredom, traveled south into Mexico with the intention of joining the Revolution.  He was never seen again... 

"...Or was he?"  So supposes FROM DUSK TILL DAWN 3: THE HANGMAN'S DAUGHTER, which delivers the masterstroke of casting the inimitable Michael Parks (DEATH WISH 5, TWIN PEAKS, THE HITMAN, KILL BILL) as Mr. Bierce.


Parks delivers an understated performance that strives for poetry; he imbues the film with a haunting sense of élan vital.  And yes, I'm still talking about a straight-to-video vampire flick.  Remember, this is the actor who can make "waiting around and drinking coffee in a car" rife with pathos (in THE HITMAN).

Written by Robert Rodriguez's cousin Álvaro (and based on a story by the two cousins), THE HANGMAN'S DAUGHTER places a drunken and detached Bierce amid a sea of outlaws, missionaries, lawmen, revolutionaries, and Aztec vampires, where he can quote one-liners from THE DEVIL'S DICTIONARY and generally not care a damn.

This is about as brilliant as having Oscar Wilde become Paladin's sidekick in a particularly memorable episode of HAVE GUN, WILL TRAVEL.

Director P.J. Pesce, long imprisoned by television and straight-to-DVD sequels (THE LOST BOYS: THE TRIBE, SMOKIN' ACES 2: ASSASSIN'S BALL, SNIPER 3) brings a genuine style to the proceedings; you see the talent and joie de vivre of a young director excited to be playing with the medium––this is not a man phoning it in, and boy, that makes a difference.

True to the Tarantino/Rodriguez oeuvre, it's packed with loving homages to everything from THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY to FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE to TAXI DRIVER, and composer Nathan Barr even turns in a borderline brilliant score, heavily inspired by Ennio Morricone by-way-of John Zorn.

Also of note: Danny Trejo is still tendin' bar eighty years prior (he has about three minutes of screentime),

Though he says, "We don't need no stinking brushes!" in perhaps the saddest nod to THE TREASURE OF THE SIERRA MADRE ever made.

Sonia Braga (KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN) has a blast as the Elvira-ish innkeeper/madame (and mother of Salma Hayek's character from the first film),

and Temuera Morrison (ONCE WERE WARRIORS, Boba Fett's dad in the STAR WARS prequels), is the titular "Hangman" and he gives it his all in a sort of an "evil Yul Brynner" performance.

More "bizarro MAGNIFICENT SEVEN" than WESTWORLD.

Sure, there's plenty of bad CGI, and I would never call it a masterpiece, but the act of shoehorning a literary figure into a bargain bin horror flick and then hiring an actor capable of embodying said figure is something of an artistic coup, and it's why FROM DUSK TILL DAWN 3 ought to outlive its intended shelf-life.
 
Here's to you, Mr. Bierce... and Mr. Parks.

PS: And if you check it out, stay tuned after the end credits for a mildly amusing, meta scene involving the singular Mr. Parks.

Film Review: THE HITMAN (1991, Aaron Norris)

Stars: 3.5 of 5.
Running Time: 95 minutes.

Tag-line: "He's so far undercover, he may never get back."

Notable Cast or Crew:  Chuck Norris (DELTA FORCE, DELTA FORCE 2: THE COLUMBIAN CONNECTION), Michael Parks (FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, DEATH WISH 5, KILL BILL, TWIN PEAKS), Al Waxman (CAGNEY AND LACEY, HEAVY METAL), Alberta Watson (THE SWEET HEREAFTER, POWER PLAY), William B. Davis (THE X-FILES, AIRWOLF), Ken Pogue (CHAINDANCE, THE DEAD ZONE), James Purcell (DEATH WISH 4: THE CRACKDOWN), Salim Grant (L.A. CONFIDENTIAL, GHOST DAD).  Co-written and produced by Don Carmody (producer on Cronenberg's SHIVERS and RABID, WEEKEND AT BERNIE'S II, CHICAGO).   Co-produced by André Link (SNAKE EATER, MEATBALLS, MY BLOODY VALENTINE).

Best One-liner:  "You!  Fuck!  Motherfuck!"  or perhaps "He's gonna cut off your balls and stick 'em up your ass!" or perhaps "It's your job to carve him a new asshole, right between the fuckin' eyes!" or perhaps "Don't come in my house and shit on my furniture!"

THE HITMAN is a post-Golan Cannon Film originally intended as a Charles Bronson vehicle.  After a labyrinthine pre-preduction period, however, it ended up as an atypically dark Chuck Norris flick.  Fine by me.  It has a strange kind of RED HARVEST/YOJIMBO/A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS vibe to it, with "good-guy" Norris masquerading as a mobster in order to play different criminal factions against one another.  So as not to blow his cover, he must engage in all sorts of morally reprehensible behavior.  Subsequently, it doesn't feel like a dose of the "All-American Chuck" like we see in DELTA FORCE, and definitely it would have made more sense as a Bronson vehicle, or even a Steven Segal one.  The picture's dark, too, and I mean literally dark.  Most of it takes place at night, and it has an overwhelming shadowy feeling, with the fog machines working double overtime.  Who knew Seattle (I mean Vancouver, where they actually filmed most of this) was so spooky?

Anyway, all this gritty atmosphere is meant to disguise the film's frequent nonsensicality– it's made up almost entirely of scenes with no anchor, action governed by motivations we barely understand, and a population of characters we don't know who are floating in and out of the proceedings with seemingly no rhyme or reason.

Yes, THE HITMAN's a strange, confusing, and awkwardly disquieting film.  Obviously, those are three of my favorite attributes in cinema, and so here are the six strangest and most disquieting facets of the trash-terpiece that is THE HITMAN:

#1.  Michael Parks.

As Chuck's former partner who betrays him and leaves him for dead, character acting legend Parks is the ostensible antagonist of the film.  I can't say this often enough: gosh gad-diddly goddamn, Michael Parks is amazing.  He's always so powerfully in the moment, he can give weight and pathos to drinking coffee.  I mean, look at him:

Upon seeing THE HITMAN, it now occurs to me that he must always be improvising his own dialogue.  After seeing him in the Tarantino and Rodriguez cycle (KILL BILL, PLANET TERROR, FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, DJANGO UNCHAINED), I assumed that they had settled on the folksy, foul-mouthed curmudgeon he plays and kept it consistent for aesthetic purposes– but now I realize they must simply turn him loose to do his own thing.  There's no way that a writer for Cannon Films came up with "My dick's like a cold stack of buttons" or "I'm so horny I could fuck mud" or "Funny as a dead baby" or "You can take it any way you fuckin' like, jackoff!" or his constant use of expressions like "fuckin' the dog" and "numbnuts."  He spits all the time, too, as if he's spewing tobacco juice nonstop, and somehow it's the perfect punctuation for each ridiculous and colorful bit of vulgarity.

The film begins with a buddy-cop style exchange between him and Norris where his acting so outshines his scene partner that it becomes essential to turn his character evil just to get him offscreen and keep him from embarrassing Chuck too badly.  (See also:  DELTA FORCE II: THE COLUMBIAN CONNECTION, in regard to the acting brilliance of Billy Drago.)

Later, there's a mind-blowing dream sequence, whereupon Chuck Norris imagines he's being shot by Michael Parks, but then wakes up, safe and sound, napping away in his Yuppie-Western chic bedroom.

I have slightly altered and edited this remarkable scene into a nearly endless, hypnotic clip I have entitled "Chuck Norris vs. Michael Parks Dream Loop."
Also, speaking of dreams, could this random blue velvet curtain be a reference to his work with David Lynch on TWIN PEAKS?

I'm probably reading too much into that one.


#2.  Cigarette-Smokin' Doc.
After Parks shoots Norris, he's declared clinically dead and undergoes a magical resurrection, replete with Christian imagery,

and is reborn as an even bigger badass with a rockin', always moist mullet.

Note moisture.

Upon waking, Chuck's physician is played by William B. Davis, a.k.a., "The Cigarette-Smoking Man."

These events seem pretty inexplicable to me... perhaps we should open... an X-FILE?  Drop a dime and get Scully and Mulder on the horn, pronto!


#3.  Religious tolerance?  Nah.
There's an extremely out-of-place torture scene that feels like something out of HELLRAISER flick

that also involves force-feeding pork products to a Muslim (oh, Cannon Films– always keeping it klassy).  As if this wasn't offensive enough, later Chuck wanders into a Middle Eastern restaurant, insults the very concept of couscous, 

and in response to the proclamation, "Allah will protect us," shouts "Then this shouldn't hurt!" before kicking everyone in the face.  Hoo boy.

#4.  Racial tolerance?  Kind of, but the creepy kind.

So Chuck meets a black neighbor boy and takes him under his wing (initially, without his mother's knowledge), begins calling him "Tiger," gives him a key to his apartment, and promises to build model airplanes.  Meanwhile, he's continuing to work undercover as a mob enforcer, which means that there are people even more unsavory than Chuck hanging around all the time, too.  This is all pretty creepy, but it gets weirder.

He's always offering the kid "juice" to drink, and the kid declines because he's heard of roofies, and then Chuck offers the juice again and again and again.

"C'mon, just a sip."  –"Hey, man, I said 'no' once already!"  

The kid reveals that racist bullies are giving him a hard time at school, so Chuck starts training him in martial arts and inappropriate touching

and when the kid is ready, he says "When I call you Tiger now, I'm gonna mean it!"
Furthermore, he delivers an anti-racist pep talk about being on the receiving end of reverse racism from some mean, mean Native Americans, which I later found out was an autobiographical anecdote inserted in the film by Chuck himself.  Fresh with the knowledge that Chuck overcame reverse racism through self-righteous punching, the kid defeats the bully, the poor man's redneck Edward Furlong,

and then Chuck defeats the bully's dad in a clip I have entitled "Chuck Norris Tackles Racism."
 Dig that slappy bass!


#5.  Evolution!
Chuck ordinarily wouldn't touch evolution with a forty-cubit pole, but here it's all over the place!

Meeting his police handler in the dolphin wing of an aquarium, he incorrectly surmises "Did you know there was a time that they walked on land?"  WHAT?!   Seriously.  Where is this coming from?  Then he strokes the glass of the dolphin tank, muttering "Yeah, yeah, baby, yeah, you're beautiful..." in what may be the creepiest line reading in the history of cinema.  Don't believe me?  See for yourself:

And how'd you like that bit at the end of the clip, there?  He's meeting with a French mobster who calls his boss an "Oily anthropoid," prompting Chuck to declare that he's not here "to discuss evolution."  Oh, but he is!  

(It must also be noted that "oily anthropoid" is one of the greatest, most head-scratching insults to come out of the Cannon canon, on par with anything from MURPHY'S LAW.)

#6.  The Final Showdown.

It doesn't disappoint.  Michael Parks brings the art of acting, and Chuck Norris brings the art of kicking.  And I think that one specific element of the finale may have even inspired the fate of the Joker in THE DARK KNIGHT.

Bon appetit.  Three and a half stars, ya oily anthropoids!

–Sean Gill

P.S.– Halloween schtuff coming soon!

Film Review: DEATH WISH V: THE FACE OF DEATH (1994, Allan A. Goldstein)

Stars: 4.2 of 5.
Running Time: 95 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Charles Bronson, Lesley-Ann Down (MUNCHIE STRIKES BACK), Michael Parks (THE HITMAN, THE RETURN OF JOSEY WALES 'Jean Renault' on TWIN PEAKS, 'Earl McGraw' in KILL BILL, PLANET TERROR, et al.), Saul Rubinek (UNFORGIVEN, TRUE ROMANCE), Miguel Sandoval (CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER, JURASSIC PARK, DO THE RIGHT THING), Kenneth Welsh ('Windom Earle' on TWIN PEAKS), Robert Joy (ATLANTIC CITY, LAND OF THE DEAD).
Tag-line: "No judge. No jury. No appeals. No deals."
Best one-liner: "Guns make you nervous?" –"Guns have their uses. Idiots with guns make me nervous."

Well, I've been sick this week, have fallen behind in my reviews, and now it looks like 'Batshit Craziness Week' may just turn into 'Batshit Craziness Fortnight,' so brace yourselves.

Charlie's back and he's pushin' 80; we got the Golan, lost the Globus– DEATH WISH is ready to take on the 90's. Well, you're probably wondering, how does the franchise hold up in the post-Cannon breakup era? The answer: excellently. Within, literally, the first ten seconds, we have three hairdressers, a ton of models, some asscrack, and a touch of nipple. Golan, you dog!



Yup, we're at a fashion show. Well, why wouldn't we be at a fashion show?- this is a DEATH WISH movie, after all. Bronson's back in the Big Apple, and he's got yet another doomed ladyfriend, this time Lesley-Anne Down of MUNCHIE STRIKES BACK fame.

Munchie never pulled any shit like this.

Michael Parks is her rabid ex and the main villain of the piece.

He's so goddamned scary, I was hiding behind my couch for half the movie. Looking a bit like Clu Gulager, doing gleefully racist impersonations, and eagerly slicing up a fat man's guts with some kind of sewing machine, Parks plays your typical mobster/high fashion magnate. He and his cronies are laundering money, so they have to toss a bunch of mannequins and clothes into a vat of acid to make up for it or something?

I'm not sure that makes any sense, but I have complete faith in Golan, so I'm sure it's my fault for being confused. Then there's Chekhov's rule about vats of acid in Bronson movies: if there's a vat of acid in Act 1, Bronson will push some d-bag into it by Act 3. Anyway, at first you'll think that the fashion industry setting was chosen so that Golan could showcase his kickass flamboyance (see also: THE APPLE, SALSA), but as it turns out, I think it was chosen so that people could be tortured by the associated industrial machinery.

But I digress. Bronson's in the witness protection program now, working as a professor. This is brilliantly conveyed when Saul Rubinek says something like 'Ah, yes, remember when I put you in the witness protection program? How's that working out? Are you still a professor?' Rubinek, naturally, is playing himself, but he does it well enough that he nearly challenges Parks for 'Best Actor in DEATH WISH 5.' But there are actually some pretty solid performances here- Kenneth Welsh

(Windom Earle from TWIN PEAKS) as the beleaguered top cop, Miguel Sandoval as a possibly nefarious buddy, and Robert Joy as a killer dude in drag who's kinda like the poor man's John Glover/Klaus Kinski. (And it must be mentioned that by no means is that an insult- even the poor man's Glover/Kinski is better than 90% of actors working today.) Joy's main character trait is that- I shit you not- he suffers from a dandruff problem (his name is "Freddy Flakes"). In one mind-boggling sequence, Mr. Flakes disfigures Bronson's gal as Michael Parks distracts Bronson by blowing him kisses.


Again, though Bronson probably is incapable of understanding the concept of same-sex attraction, the chemistry is palpable. Parks even has difficulty tearing his eyes away from him as his rent gal pines for a smooch. Regardless, Joy brings his all- and then some- to the scene.

Not sure how a wig can have dandruff, but I'm goin' with it.


Flakes relaxing at home.

Described as a "very lethal guy," Bronson dispatches Freddy with extreme prejudice and a remote control soccer ball bomb, deliciously intoning "I'm gonna take care of your dan-druff problem for you!" This is full of those phrases that probably originated in the screenwriter's head as 'one-liners,' but once they roll off of Bronson's tongue, they achieve "It's MY CAR!" status. Like "I don't need anything...but YOU need a BATH!" or "You got a PROBLEM?":



We've got probably the most brutal hit and run in film history (which must be seen to be believed), the 'dummies flung from buildings' quotient filled (Bronson himself even gets to take a kickass leap!),

and ridiculous Italian stereotypes (cannolis, opera, spaghetts, and a woman named 'Mama' converge in a matter of seconds). Bronson gets to torture a dude with saran wrap:

and it all ends on an EXTERMINATOR 2-inspired freeze frame.

Bravo, gentlemen. A fitting swansong for a hero who inspired us, astonished us, and delighted us every time gunned down purse-snatchers, professed his love for chicken, or stuck his boot up the ass of some cheap punk who totally didn't see it coming.

He touched our hearts, he blew our minds, and then he blew the bad guys away- and I never got tired of seein' him do it.

-Sean Gill