'DIRTY HARRY'....JUST IN TIME FOR HOLIDAYS! "DO YA FEEL LUCKY? WELL, DO YA....PUNK?"

Dirty Harry (1971)   Not kidding with this post's sub-title.....Warner Brothers unleashed Clint Eastwood's law-unto-himself cop on December 22nd.....51 years ago,

             So why not welcome back San Francisco police Inspector Harry Callahan as a wonderful way to kick off the holiday season?   Nothing to make you feel all warm and fuzzy like the sight of Harry as he whips out (so to speak... )his cannon-like .44 Magnum to blow grapefruit-sized holes in assorted creeps, crooks and crazies. 

             Maybe that seems 'been there, done that' in today's climate of mass shooters and Nazi ex-Presidents, but 51 years ago, "Dirty Harry" upended cinema's usual depiction of cops as staid, stalwart upholders of the rule of law. 

             With big cities so awash in violent street crime they resembled Wild West saloons, Harry arrived to give San Fran a. much needed enema.  And what about the Miranda decision?  Reading perps their rights?   Screw that....Harry never got the Miranda memo.  (Or if he did, he mistook it for a napkin while wolfing down his fast food lunches...)

             Instead of Miranda-izing undeserving scumbags, Harry loved reciting them his now legendary mantra....("I know what you're thinking.....did I fire five shots or was it six?")  In a participatory, democratic spirit, Harry invited his cornered crumbums to play Russian Roulette with him.....and dared them to take control of their own fate. 

             (I should point out here that in Harry's view the worst crime committed by the jerks in the opening sequence seems more related to interrupting his hot dog lunch rather than their armed robbery.....a trope repeated in a few of the film's sequels.)

             To no one's surprise, most opted out of dueling with Harry, with the singular exception of his most formidable foe......a nameless, gibbering wild eyed loon, played to the very hilt by Andrew Robinson. 

               Robinson's sadist, psycho sniper, modeled on the 'Zodiac' killer,  is nothing less than a flesh-and-blood incarnation of "Forbidden Planet"s invisible Id monster........a babbling Grim Reaper who tries extorting the city, demanding they pay him not to kill people.

              Harry's clearly this guy's only equal (and the only one who understands the idiocy of caving in to his demands) ......but he's reigned in and restricted by both the weakling mayor (John Vernon) and Harry's equally timid superior (Harry Guardino).

              So round and round they go, Harry and his mad, mad, mad adversary, in a series of increasingly brutal encounters brilliantly directed by that master Hollywood pulp fictioneer, Don Siegel. (of "Invasion Of The Body Snatchers", "The Killers" and "Coogan's Bluff", his and Eastwood's warm-up for 'Dirty Harry')

                For anyone who didn't get this clash was on the level of primal, Mano-e-Mano gladiatorial combat, Siegel places Harry and Loony-Toon alone on an empty football field.....a God's eye view of the combatants, punctuated by the killer's screams as Harry grinds his foot Loony's severe stab wound, previously delivered by....guess who.

                 Siegel made 'Dirty Harry' come out like the film he'd been waiting to make his entire career.......he probably enjoyed a satisfied laugh at the the way 'Harry' appalled critics with its unabashed cruelty and warped moral compass. (And aggravating the critical community further by making a bona-fide superstar out of Eastwood, whom they enjoyed deriding as monotone and impassive.)

                  Foolish critics......they failed to comprehend Eastwood's canny underplaying of Harry, an essentially modern day urban version of John Wayne's solitary warrior Ethan Edwards from John Ford's "The Searchers". Like Edwards, Harry stands alone in his battles, barely tolerating those lesser humans around him and resigned to a lifetime of existing outside a civilized society that calls upon him for its defense.

                 Only a few years later, in one of cinema's most ironic twists, young screenwriters John Milius and Michael Cimino turned the tables on Harry in their script for "Magnum Force", the first of four sequels for the character.

                   In "Magnum", Harry faced a cadre of fellow police who took his disregard for the legal rights of violent offenders to its ultimate extreme......simply forming a death squad to execute the city's most scummy criminals before their lawyers got them off on technicalities.....(for the full review, see our post of 12/23/17.....)

                    The homicidal cops, as you knew they would, fatally misjudge Harry, thinking he'd appreciate their bending of the rule of law to achieve justice.  But to Harry, they were just another bunch of rampaging murderers who needed immediate...uh...Magnum Force......no different than the maniac Zodiac he pursues in the first film. 

                    And just like "Dirty Harry", "Magnum Force" was Warner Brother's Christmas gift to theaters everywhere......so that must be why, right around this time of year, I want to get in the spirit of the holidays.....

                    .....and Deck The Halls with Dirty Harry. 5 stars (*****), a FIND OF FINDS. 

                      

'DOOMED! THE UNTOLD STORY OF ROGER CORMAN'S 'THE FANTASTIC FOUR'....MARVEL GOES CLOBBERIN' TIME ON THE FIRST OF THE "4"

 Doomed! The Untold Story Of Roger Corman's 'The Fantastic Four'  (2015)

                  Yes, boys and girls.....a long time ago (1993).....in a Meta-Verse far far away.....a hardy little band of low budget filmmakers zipped out a low budgeted Fantastic Four movie.........

                  Constantin, a German outfit, co-produced it with the Emperor Of All Quickie Shlock himself, Roger Corman.......for the overwhelming sum of....one million dollars.......with special effects that looked borrowed from Saturday Morning cartoon shows......

                  Never heard of it?  According to the late beloved Marvel Maestro Stan Lee, it was never meant to be seen......never should've happened. 

                  And with the mighty power of 20th Century Fox (Marvel's designated proprietor of the "4")  Stan buried it deep, deep, deep, deep deep in a vault somewhere.......(maybe resting comfortably next to Jerry Lewis's "The Day The Clown Cried" and the recently evaporated "Batgirl" movie.....)

                   Which makes the strange story behind this film the only Marvel movie where Stan Lee is far from an avuncular, beloved figure. 

                   To explain, let us return to the early 1990's, when Marvel was not yet the corporate behemoth we know today.  Without any option for creative control, Stan Lee would farm out Marvel characters to whatever studio wanted to cough up some cash to make a cheesy movie or TV show.....

                  Constantin's hold on 'The Fantastic Four' was due to expire in 1993, so they cut a deal with Corman to actually make a ultra-cheap, ultra quickie version........presumably for some fast quick cash......

                   Oh, they wanted cash back on their investment alright......but not from releasing the film. Their big bucks would come from the corporate entities who didn't want a cheapo "4" to see the light of day.....especially if they planned their own mega-budget blockbuster franchise starter entry....

                  This vital chunk of info was never revealed to all the creative and technical talent who assembled to make the low budget 'Fantastic Four'.  With honest enthusiasm and a willingness to make their film with little or no money, these folks plunged ahead, doing their best to make a movie they really thought would hit the comic-cons and the theaters......

                  Little did they know.......and had their hearts broken and hopes crushed when 'beloved' Stan Lee (who often visited their set to offer encouragement) revealed the truth...... Marvel never meant the movie to exist......

                   But, (a little big of good news) the movie very much still exists, copied and bootlegged by some anonymous film lab buccaneer  before Marvel and Fox seized it for oblivion.  

                   "Doomed!" consists mostly of chatty, informative and sometimes downright funny recollections of the film's actors, director, and producer......even Roger Corman chimes in a few times. 

                   For fanboys, film buffs and anyone who gobbles up cautionary tales of Hollywood lunacy and greed, seek out "Doomed!" for some fascinating viewing. (Stay tuned for a later post on the movie itself.....)  For this weird and sad first adventure of the Marvel quartet, 4 stars (****).

'SEE HOW THEY RUN'.....A MERRY CHRISTIE AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR........

 See How They Run (2022)    By the time this wink-wink, sly little homage to Agatha Christie winds down, you might find yourself still smiling a bit......but left wondering, "That's it? That's all there is?"

              I don't mind a movie that wallows in its own perceived cleverness.....(a quality that director Wes Anderson built his entire career on).....but I do mind such a film when surrenders to simple farce and leans too heavily on the frantic behavior of its quirky characters to do the heavy lifting for it. 

               And that's what leaves my final impression of "See How They Run" as nothing more than.....modestly amusing.....from time to time.

              The meta trope here involves "The Mousetrap", Dame Aggie's stage play murder mystery that managed to run continuously for decades and decades......to the point where the play itself (which never was any great shakes, to be honest) became as much a Brit institution as the Tower Of London and Big Ben. 

               We join the stage production in its prime, mid 1950's London, where it stars none other than Dickie Attenborough (yes, that one). A wiseass Hollywood producer Leo Kapnurnick (Adrian Brody) plans to make a "Mousetrap" movie version (which, incredibly, never actually happened in real life).  But plans go awry when Leo's found dead, clobbered by a pair of skis. 

               Enter our reliable, relentless Scotland Yard investigative team.....the bubbly young Constable Stalker (Saoiarse Ronan, the film's always delightful MVP) and her weary deadpanned-in-the-extreme Inspector Stoppard (Sam Rockwell). 

                 Through most of the film, Ronan and Rockwell perform like a precision, British comedy team. Constable Stalker, to her own embarrassment, favors terrible inappropriate jokes and puns, which Stoppard takes in his stride and sometimes even finds funny.

                  And you can almost hear screenwriter Mark Chappel patting himself on the back for engineering the film's central gimmick......turning the "Mousetrap" stage play into a virtually identical murder mystery.....thereby turning the play's actors into the same kind of suspects they perform on stage......

                  To dial up the cleverness factor even more, the cast all end up at Agatha Christie's country estate......whose main drawing room looks just like the single set location of "The Mousetrap".  With the usual pile of reveals and explanations (but not the end of "The Mousetrap", if you're worried), the murder mystery ensemble of actors frantically carry on like the characters they portray on stage......until the murder's unmasked. 

                 In description, that sounds like the movie swung for the fences....but not really.  Not much wit is left by that time, except for the half-hearted attempts to duplicate that elusive tinker-toy, snow globe quality of a West Anderson film like "The French Dispatch" or "The Grand Budapest Hotel". 

                 I'm generously handing out 3 stars (***), mainly for Saoirse Ronan's motormouthed, very funny portrayal of a formidable young girl the perfectly balances against Rockwell's deft underplaying.......

                  Fun to be had here, for sure, but could've been way better.

'BODIES BODIES BODIES'.....DOOMED ZOOMERS SLASH INTO EACH OTHER......(AND THAT'S A BAD THING, RIGHT? RIGHT?)

 Bodies Bodies Bodies (2022)    For anyone who thought that a kill-off-Gen-Z-slash-o-rama was long overdue, here's your movie at long last. 

              A whole bunch of entitled Zoomers plan to sit out an hurricane by partying at the mansion of the rich friend they all can't stand....(world famous high profile babe boffer Pete Davidson.)  And then a party game they unwisely choose to play ends up biting them in their collective asses. 

                Of course, it's a "murder" game where someone's assigned the role of killer and another given the part of their victim.......

                And to the surprise of nobody watching this, someone becomes a corpse for real......touching off a chain reaction of suspicion, hysteria......and to the surprise of of nobody watching this, the rapid accumulation of more dead bodies, bodies, bodies........

                The point of all this is......well, who knows. Or more to the point, who gives a **** anyway.  I suppose I could theorize that the film's declaring Zoomers as even dumber and more self-absorbed as millennials.....and therefore even more worthy of murderous karma.  

               But's that's only a a guess. And this movie isn't worth wasting a whole lot of time trying to figure out. 

                Come morning the movie plays its one ace card......the  finale where whoever's left alive faces a final twist dripping with the exaggerated irony of "Twilight Zone" episode.  (Or for those of you who hold some Jurassic Era memories, an O Henry short story......)

                 I could easily imagine the writers and director of this movie high fiving each other for their snarky, self-knowing sarcasm and what they no doubt considered the kick-in-the-teeth Big Twist Of The Year.

                 Sure you can enjoy "Bodies Bodies Bodies" on that basis.....

                 Or you can cheer it on at the sight of a high Gen Z body count.  Either way it never amounts to more than just another 2 & 1/2 star (**1/2) pile up of slash-test dummies.....

               (Happy Thanksgiving to one and all! And hoping your family get-together ends happier than the "Bodies" characters all night party.  Hint: avoid all political discussions.....in this day and age, nobody will ever convince anybody to see their point of view. Gnaw on the turkey leg and talk about your favorite moments in "A Christmas Story"........)

'ROAD GAMES'.....WHAT IN THE TRUCK IS GOIN' ON HERE?

 Road Games (1981)   Back in ancient ages, as a video store movie buyer, I loved stocking stores with movies like this.....

                Unheralded sleepers, these surprising little gems became steady money makers and perfect for store employees to recommend to customers when all the the copies of the big hits were rented out for the night.....

                This one came out of Australia, but fronted by two familiar American actors, Stacy Keach and the then new reigning 'scream queen' herself, Jamie Lee Curtis......(giving the film an immediate higher profile, much like other American actors popping up in spaghetti westerns.....)

                 And the set-up was striking, a Hitchcock homage transported to the long, lonely, but stunningly scenic roads of southern Australia. 

                  Essentially a highway bound "Rear Window", the film literally hits the road running. A cat-and-mouse, hunter-and quarry game ensues between long distance trucker Pat Quid (Keach) and a serial killer given to carving up girl hitchhikers into pieces after raping them. 

                  And Pat's far from a blue collar, monosyllabic Mad Max type of trucker. On the contrary, he's a gabby, loquacious sort, spouting a constant monologue filled with classic poetry quotes and witty asides about the drivers he passes on the road. (And it's fun watching Keach enjoy himself as this wildly overqualified soldier-of-fortune, tossing off his highway bon mots as if auditioning for a comedy club stand-up spot.)

                  But soon the creepy serial killer guy in the dark green van catches Pat's eye and the off-and-on road duel in on.  Not much in Pat's favor though.......one way or another, he manages to run afoul of every driver he encounters, which leads just about everyone in the cast to either fear or dislike him enough to suspect him of the killings.  (His faithful pet dingo, Boswell, also does little to endear him to the populace, since hunting season on dingos goes year 'round.) 

                   He does pick up an ally in a young girl hitchhiker (Curtis) whom he dubs "Hitch"......(cue the Hitchcock homage footnote), but their plans to corner and trap the killer go.....uh....you might say horribly awry.

                   And that at last brings us to the film's bravura finale, a rather fresh, inventive action-suspense sequence orchestrated to perfection by director Richard Franklin......a showdown that places Pat and his massive 18-wheeler stuck in a narrow alley, with a police car behind him and the maniacal killer in front of him. Holy Smokey And The Bandit!

                   A modest little thriller, but in its own way, "Road Games" offers up as many laughs and thrills that you'd find in any Huuuuuuggggge major-budgeted thriller.  If if the big big movies don't appeal to you tonight, pretend you're in a 1981 video store and check it out.  4 stars (****)

                   

                  

'ROSALINE'....10 THINGS SHE HATES ABOUT JULIET......

Rosaline (2022).....asks you right away to go with its gimmick -  a contemporary Young Adult romcom (complete with up-to-the-minute snarky patter) transferred to the 14th century Verona of Billy Shakespeare's teen angst epic "Romeo And Juliet"....

            So unlike 1999's "10 Things I Hate About You"  which plopped "Taming Of The Shew" directly into a modern high school, "Rosaline" plops its very 2022 teens into full  Montague and Capulet costumes - puffy sleeves, ornate hats, swords and all......

             Sure, I'll admit it sounds dire.....a labored, one joke idea with the potential to become tiresome after about 5 minutes....

             Surprise, surprise......the film somehow maintains a level of cleverness and enthusiasm thanks to its MVP Kaitlyn Dever, playing the title role with deadpan elan and expert comic timing. 

             What's that you say......you can't remember Rosaline from your high school study of 'R & J' or any other film version you sat through as a substitute? (including both versions "West Side Story")

             That's cause Shakespeare kept her strictly offstage, an unseen, unheard ex of Romeo's, clearing the field for him to pursue whats-her-name, the cutie-pie from the rival clan......

               Dever's Rosaline takes center stage here.....clearly a 21st century wiseass teen outfitted in full Medieval regalia,. She's defying her exasperated father (Bradley Whitford) by wanting her own career (!!), and rejecting the decrepit suitors her dad's line up for her.  Also on her 'to do' list, wreaking hell-hath-no-fury payback upon cousin Juliet (Isabela Merced), whom her beloved Romeo (Kyle Allen) has gone head-over-heels for. 

              And like all romcom heroines, Roz comes fully equipped with a wisecracking gay best friend (Spenser Stevenson) and to her great annoyance, Dario  a smoldering young hunk (Sean Teale) who's her father's latest pick in the "Marry off Rosaline" sweepstakes......(and left over from the actual play is forever put-upon Nurse, here slyly embodied by Minnie Driver, frequently declaring to one and all, "I am a registered nurse!")

                Anybody want to take a wild guess as to whom Rozzy finally realizes is the one true love for her?   (/Ever so slight hint:   the answer could only come as a surprise if you'd never, never, never , ever seen a romcom or heard of how they end in your entire life).

                 The script finds all manner of amusing  ways to intersect  Rosaline's desperate romance-thwarting machinations with the headed-for-doom fates of the world's most legendary lovers. And after living a lifetime of watching all the stage, film and TV iterations of R & J's tragic finale, it's a real kick to see the expected heart-wringing moments converted into an all out farce. 

                Having gobbled up 20th Century Fox, Disney's now using its Hulu streaming service as a kind of attic for parking unreleased Fox films like "Rosaline".......in this case, not a bad thing at all if you're signed up for Hulu. For the quick-witted script and Kaitlyn Dever's droll sharp performance, it turns out as an unanticipated 3 star (***) diversion.

                 

                

              

              

WEEKEND MADNESS WRAP-UP.....SPECIAL "WORST PRESIDENTIAL SEQUEL EVER" EDITION.....

 

            Trump announces his run for the Presidency in 2024,,,,,prompting the SyFy Channel to start immediate production on their new sci-fi-horror film, "Trump-Nado 3 - No Sharks, But Deadly Hot Air'.

             Rupert Murdoch's New York Post gives Trump's 2024 candidate declaration one single sentence at the bottom of the front page....("Florida man makes announcement...")  According to anonymous Post staffers, one sentence headlines also considered were "Trump fails to hug American flags behind him."  "Trumpty Dumpty Thinks He Has Balls", and "Worst sequel since 'Police Academy 3"...

               Twitter in disarray and near collapse as hundreds of employees quit rather than endure the horrors of working for Elon Musk......in an inter-office memo, Musk warned all remaining employees that any further rebellion will result in cancellation of their Mars excursion and suspension of free recharging privileges for their Teslas......

              Marjorie Taylor Greene compares illegal immigrants coming into the U.S. to Russians invading Ukraine.......wasting no time, Russian leader Vladimir Putin awards Greene the Order of Lenin for exemplary service to Russia and books her a luxury penthouse suite at Moscow's finest hotel.....("She's welcome to stay any time, we spent years disinfecting the room, so you can hardly smell Trump's pee if you throw open the windows.....

Kari Lake threatens to contest her loss in Arizona Governor's race, using the "best and brightest" legal team......While Rudy Giuliani is busy preparing her lawsuit (under the title 'Fascist Barbi Vs.The State Of Arizona',  Mike Lindell offered the State's Supreme Court Judges a lifetime supply of My Pillows if they overturn the election.....

'FALLING FOR CHRISTMAS'.....THE LOHANAISSANCE OF LINDSAY....

 Falling For Christmas ( Netflix - 2022)     I'm as happy as everyone else at the resurrection of Lindsay Lohan from the depths of notoriety and mockery......

               While she might never ascend to A-List glory, her starring role in this Netflix Christmas movie is a Mt. Everest sized leap from her previous projects.....mostly consisting of unwatchable, direct-to-the-WalMart-bargain-bin movies and that woeful MTV thing where she managed a Mykonos beach club....

              And leave it to Netflix to make sure her comeback in a holiday rom-com is so especially Christmas-y, it makes the Hallmark movies look like 'Nomadland'...... 

               There's tons of snow.....there's a sleigh.....there's a Christmas tree lighting......there's a hunky widower and his indescribably cute little daughter......there's amnesia.....character redemption......and Lindsay Lohan!   What more could you want?

                It's futile and a waste of time to apply critical standards to a TV Christmas romance......this genre and all its accumulated tropes are as carved in stone as the Ten Commandments.....like opening a box of  gingerbread cookies and reviewing each one individually........

              "Falling " starts out by somewhat cribbing from 1987's "Overboard". Lohan's a pampered heiress coping with a babbling bisexual boyfriend, a preening doofus who lives only for more clicks on his Instagram  and Twitter feeds. His mountaintop marriage proposal goes awry when Lohan tumbles off the peak......and then subsequently rescued by....you know it.....Hunky Widower with indescribably cute little daughter. 

                 Waking up with amnesia in Hunky's struggling little bed-and-breakfast lodge,  Lohan's still a fundamentally warm-hearted, sympathetic soul, but clearly incapable of everyday tasks like making a bed and doing laundry. But that's nothing to worry about, since Christmas Movie Commandments dictate she'll bond with Indescribably Cute Little Daughter and slowly but surely fall for HunkyWidower.  

                  And anyone who frets about whether Hunk Dad will keep the lodge out of bankruptcy.....you folks need to see more Christmas movies.....

                 Lindsay Lohan truly shines as the MVP here, because let's face it, the female leads in Christmas movies rarely posses any amount of natural movie star charisma. Since all of us as a collective audience already know she's been though more ups and downs than Olympic skiers, we can't help  rooting for a happy-ever-after for her. 

                  Does she get one?  Hmmmmm........ It's a Christmas movie. What do you think?

                 There's no middle ground with holiday romcoms. You either love, adore and embrace them or you run screaming in disgust if you even see 10 seconds of the trailer.  For the first group, 4 stars (****) For the Screaming In Disgust contingent.......a rating's redundant for this, right?

               

           

'EMPEROR OF THE NORTH' & 'BULLET TRAIN'......FLYING OFF THE RAILS.....49 YEARS APART...

                All aboard....choo choooooo.....for two train movies that not only come from different decades, they appear to come from separate universes altogether......

                  Emperor Of The North (1973)  may be one of the finest, most perfectly realized films of director Robert Aldrich, the very epitome of Aldrich's worldview and cinematic storytelling. 

                   Aldrich films were always gaudily melodramatic, brutal, in-your-face with a vengeance with  actors performances dialed up way into the red danger zone.

                  This is the guy who gave us "Kiss Me Deadly", "Whatever Happened To Baby Jane", "The Dirty Dozen", "Flight Of The Phoenix", "The Longest Yard"....(and one of my favorite guilty pleasures, the demented 'Vertigo' goes Hollywood "The Legend Of Lylah Clare") (see the post of 3/15/18)

                   Aldrich favored tough-as-nails stories and the characters to go with 'em......and never shied away from peppering his films with cruelty and violence that bordered on nihilistic. 

                   For "Emperor", he takes us back to 1930's Depression-stricken America.  Poverty reigns. Jobs are scarce, nearly non-existent.  FDR's trying to get the country back on its feet while calming everyone on the radio. 

                   And a burgeoning population of homeless, jobless hobos have established their own sub-culture, travelling around by hopping on to railroad cars for free rides from place to place.

                    The acknowledged legendary King of the 'Bo's' is "A # 1" (Lee Marvin) a seasoned survivor of hard knock rail-riding.  To his infinite annoyance, he comes across "Cigarette" (Keith Carridine), a hot-tempered young blowhard whose empty bragging betrays his inexperience at every turn.

                     Together, they take on the most life threatening challenge a hobo can dare to attempt......bumming a ride on  "No. 19", a freight train policed by 'Shack',(Ernest Borgnine, popping his eyes in perpetual rage) its insanely brutal guard and conductor. 

                   (In case anyone didn't get the premise here, the film starts off with Shack literally hammering a hobo off his train, sending the poor bum underneath the wheels and on to a quick,  instant bisection.)

                   A #1 wearily schools the ever obnoxious Cigarette as they torment the frenzied, enraged  Shack by managing to hide on his train.........which ultimately leads to a marathon Duel-Of-The-Titans between Borgnine and Marvin, having at each other with chains, lumber planks,, fists and and ax. It's one corker of a battle, brilliantly staged and edited.

                  And as with all Aldrich productions, his cast is heavily populated with the most reliable, familiar and memorable character actors of the era.....Charles Tyner, Malcom Atterbury, Simon Oakland, Matt Clark, Elisha Cook Jr., Liam Dunn, Sid Haig, Karl Lukas, John Steadman, Vic Tayback, Dave Willock and loads more.

                 Another bonus.....pre-CGI, so all the trains are real.....but Aldrich's best special effects were always his actors.....and Borgnine, always ready to self-detonate at any give moment, dominates the proceedings   

                  "Emperor Of The North" stands as pure 100 per cent Aldrich, whose films could never be mistaken for any other director's.....4 stars (****).

                  And now, from the sublime to the ridiculous. Let's jump off the Aldrich express and hop on the crazy train of "Bullet Train" (2022), which parked itself in mult-plexes a few months ago as the latest noisy, brainless, over-digitized CGI junk-fest 

                  Yes indeedy, the film unfolds on one of those Japanese speed-of-light trains, with a passenger list consisting almost entirely of chatty, quirky professional assassins. 

                   And in true re-heated, warmed over Tarantino fashion, they're all fully armed, not only with firearms but with endless blah-blah-blah conversational pop culture quips.  Pardon me, while I suppress a deep yawn here. 

                    Please don't expect me to remember why or how all these pseudo-witty hit-folk are all on the train together......I've forgotten already. And it's a given they'll all start killing each other for reasons I've already forgotten as well. 

                    Amid the non-stop chaos and carnage, a few of these lethal loons stand out, starting with Brad Pitt as 'Ladybug' the film's designated lead. Ladybug hopes to conduct his mission (don't ask, I forgot again) with mellow non-violence, so we're all free to mutter "good luck with that..."

                    If you're willing to switch off all thought processes (or undergo a lobotomy beforehand), the film does deliver all the fast-and-furiously paced action wham-bams you'd expect from something called 'Bullet Train'.

                    The main problem here......with its slavish devotion to Tarantino-like snark, the movie is never as clever and funny as it apparently thinks it is.  The exhausting, failed attempts at ironic repartee reminded me of those sad, gasping, unfunny "Pulp Fiction" knock-offs that flooded theaters and video stores after 1994 and beyond. 

                    So how much you enjoy the ride given here will strictly depend on your tolerance (or love of) over-edited fight scenes, and absurdly apocalyptic action rendered by the usual 4,000 digital animators toiling for multiple  visual effect houses with all sorts of fanciful, amusing names.  (All of whose names you can read during the 15 minute credit crawl....)

                    Well, at least I was never bored.....(and certainly that lobotomy came in handy for enjoying it)  2 & 1/2 stars (** 1/2)

                   

                   

                   

'BLOCKBUSTER'.....FOR YOU GUYS, MORE FRANTIC THAN FUN.......FOR BQ.....THE HORROR....THE HORROR.....

 Blockbuster (Netflix- 2022)    I approached this 10 episode comedy series with some amount of anticipation.......and some amount of fear and loathing.....

                  Way back in the BQ's history of toiling in the video industry salt mines, I endured (and managed to survive) a hellish year at Blockbuster.  

                   I suffered through the experience just as this emerging evil empire was making its dominating breakthrough in the U.S., forever destroying and wiping out the friendly neighborhood "Mom 'n Pop" video entrepreneurs who began the movie rental industry. 

                   To preserve my sanity, self-worth and health, I fled the Death Star of retailing after a year....to continue on in competitive companies......until Netflix and streaming finally drove a long overdue stake in Blockbuster's soulless, empty heart. 

                    With the now famous exception of one last Blockbuster store in Oregon,, whose plucky management and staff managed to still operate, even though no longer able to latch on to the long gone BB corporate tit. 

                    Which is what this show draws upon on for its premise......

                     Its primary inspiration, however, comes mainly from shows like "30 Rock" and "Superstore"......where a lovable bunch of wacky, quirky, wisecracking employees grumble, stumble and bumble through various misadventures.   And you can hardly keep up with the rapid-fire pop-culture gags that spew out of their mouths as if they were cattle auctioneers......

                    Naturally, my anticipation came from the curiosity of seeing a depiction of a working Blockbuster, of which I have still painful direct knowledge.

                      And I hoped the show would end up being funny enough not to trigger my worst memories of the place.....the toxic, evil District Managers, the monthly all night inventories, the corporate Stalinist purges of employees and managers, the phony "no late fees" promotion which like all BB promotions was a scam designed to falsely charge customers' credit cards at every opportunity. 

                      Nope. Overall, it's not funny enough. The cast of supposedly lovable Blockbuster oddballs do spit out rapid-fire DVD movie gags at light speed.......but only a few of these lines ever land enough to make you laugh. 

                       The cast, led by Randall Park as the store manager, works overtime on the borderline hysteria and mania of their characters, but none of them even remotely resembles the real employees I worked with during my BB incarceration.

                      But every so often, the show does come up some actual moments I could relate to.....the best being the employees attempting  the impossible task of assembling a mammoth cardboard display touting  a big new kids-family movie.  A very accurate rendition......putting those 80 piece nightmares together would stagger the slaves who built the Pyramids......

                     The only other one of the 30 minute episodes that coaxed a smile out of me showed Park and his staff attempting a store inventory.......with clipboards (!!) and while the store was still open.  That told me right away that creator Vanessa Ramos's only real experience with any Blockbuster came from driving by one on her way to work. 

                       (Just so you'll all know.....a Blockbuster inventory consisted of manager and staff using scanning wands on every single movie box's barcode.....and done from 12 midnight to the break of dawn.....)

                        For the finale 10th episode, the writers concoct multiple apocalypses for the store, including a solar storm that knocks out their power and the disastrous personal appearance of a wildly drunken ex-child star of Christmas movies (Bobby Moynihan, giving it his full SNL 'Drunk Uncle' enthusiasm.)   But like the bulk of the show, it plays more desperate than funny.

                       Anyone hoping for the kind of non-stop, mile-a-minute laughs of a "30 Rock"  won't find it on 'Blockbuster', any more than I found any humor in working  for the real company.....(may they and all their former execs and DM's rot in hell.....please.)

                      If by some miracle Netflix allows this show a second season, the showrunners and their cast could all benefit by calming down a little.......and making it more real. 

                      BQ's available for consultation....but for this season 1 & !/2 stars (* 1/2).

'DR. JEKYLL AND SISTER HYDE'....A HAMMER'D DR. J. TURNS NON-BINARY

 Dr. Jekyll And Sister Hyde (1971)   At long last......a person who really does deserve plural pronouns....

        And brought to you by, of all people, by the Hammer horror factory, whose regular stable of monsters (Dracula, Frankenstein, the Mummy) were always aggressively heterosexual.......

          Who'd have thought Hammer would end up decades ahead of their time,.....presenting the young, scowling Ralph Bates as a Jekyll who transforms himself into his....uh....twin sister "Mrs. Hyde", played the the darkly predatory Martine Beswick. (the clawing Gypsy fight girl in "From Russia With Love" and later the doomed British agent in "Thunderball")

         Yes, I'm kidding about Hammer's ability to see into our transgender, non-binary current era.  As the 70's began, the Golden age for Hammer was over and in their desperate efforts to stay current and afloat at the box office,  they filled up their horrors with  sex, skin and kink.....(not that it did them much good in the long run...)

          One thing never changed about Hammer House (and I dearly love 'em for it)......their gifted ability to produce their films on rock bottom budgets and still make them look sumptuously photographed and designed. 

           And for anyone who dotes on eerie foul deeds committed on the dank, foggy streets of 19th century London......you cannot pass this one up. It's all here for you.....  Pea Souper Fog! Stabbed whores! Body snatching!  Organ snatching!  Instant sex change! (Well, maybe that last one's a new additions to the London tropes....)

            Let's also hear it for the tireless  prolific  TV and screenwriter Brian Clemens, who didn't want to waste a single opportunity when creating a fogbound London thriller.  In a clever conceit he has Doc J. and his feminine alter ego slicing and dicing Whitechapel floozies, hence combining the Dr. Jekyll and Jack The Ripper legends in one neat package. 

            But wait...there's more! In another nifty plot turn, who else would Jekyll hire to secure him dead bodies for experimentation but those two jolly gentlemen Burke and Hare?  Like their other clientele, Jekyll doesn't think to question the death-dealing duo how they always come up with fresh corpses....heh, heh, heh....

            Loaded with atmosphere, the film also benefits from its casting......you can more or less believe that Ralph Bates could turn into Martine Beswick....and the moments when the two struggle over control of the body they share are priceless and every so often, truly creepy.....(including the sight of their transformation battles as viewed through the warped color of a stained glass window.....)

            A must for all Hammer hounds and for anyone who can't get enough of seeing an ominous, cloaked, top-hatted figure moving through the fog, clutching that little leather bag of scalpels......

             3 stars (***).