'SOMEONE YOU LOVED'....LOVE DAWNS ON GRIEVING TEENS, WARY OF WHO THEY'LL HURT....

 Someone You Loved by Robin Constantine (2023)

                   BQ can already imagine the thousands of eager readers who'll gravitate to this book with just one glance at its striking cover, featuring two teens with a decided resemblance to....well, no one will have any trouble guessing. who.....

                  And they'll be in for an even nicer extra bonus.......the book inside between the covers....

                  What I loved most about "Someone You Loved"......for a refreshing change, it offers a sweet, poignant teen romance without an excess of plot baggage that might threaten to bog down its forward momentum. 

                   The tragic accidental death of Alex a much beloved high school basketball star, leaves a cloud of grief over the community......and most of all, those closest to him who loved him dearly.  Those deeply grieving for Alex include his younger sister Ash, Sarah,  his girlfriend who's also Ash's best friend and  Jake, Alex's best friend and fellow teammate. 

                   Even more conflicting feelings run through these three well drawn characters.  The stricken Ash can't even look at Jake because she resents and blames him for her brother's death, since he was there when it happened.  Sarah, whose romance with Alex was brief but fiercely intense, can hardly deal with her sense of crushing loss while consoling Ash. And Jake, guilt-wracked  and uncomfortable in replacing Alex as the team's captain and guiding light, also contends with his lifelong crush on Sarah. He's held an unrealized love for her long before she ever became Alex's girl. 

                     From that primal, basic set-up, you can easily see there this is going.  Connecting in their shared grief and thrown together to plan a fundraising event in Alex's memory,  Jake and Sarah.......well do I really need to say more than simply.....Jake and Sarah. 

                    The slow but sure development of their romance is handled with exactly the right amount of tenderness and the anxiety that threatens to tear them apart.  Sarah fears her growing union with Jake will anger and hurt the already wounded Ash, while Jake dreads anyone thinking he's appropriated every aspect of Alex's life......as both star of the team and boyfriend to Sarah. 

                     You can't help rooting for Jake and Sarah every step of the way and even better. author Robin Constantine deals with the supporting characters around them with a knowing gentle sympathy.....even when  a few of them might annoy you at times. 

                      Not an earth-shaking story by any means, but you can never have enough heartwarming experiences like the one this book delivers.  Never mind who's on the cover.....the really good stuff's in the pages.  5 stars (*****)

'THE SHADOW SISTER'...SIBLINGS AT WAR, SERIAL KILLINGS, A STARTLING FINALE......

 The Shadow Sister by Lily Meade (2023)

               First let me add to the consensus that "The Shadow Sister" grabs you right away with one of the most beautiful, perfectly realized covers I've seen this year. 

              And the book itself, a debut novel for author Lily Meade, made for a compelling, suspenseful and most  urgently current read......particularly in its weaving in of black history and systemic racism. 

               In a biracial family of a black father and white mother, teen sisters Sutton and Casey's relationship has devolved into a toxic battleground.  Casey's come to deeply resent  what she feels is the family's favored treatment of her older sister, thought of as the perfect 'golden girl'. 

                Sutton disappears, touching off a wide but futile community search orchestrated by her desperate parents. (She's not the first black teen girl to missing.) But unlike the other missing girls she re-appears as mysteriously as she vanished. And Casey notices not only Sutton's memory of what happened to her is gone, but also her previously combative, self-centered personality.....as if her sister's been permanently altered (and somehow more humanized) by her unknown experience......

             Lily  Meade's expert, intuitive creation of the lifelong love-hate bond between these siblings held me in a tight grip from beginning to end.  And the book's ability to blend in the growing suspense and chills of a thriller along with the heartrending legacy of the family's black ancestors  left me even more impressed.

              But while I was well on my way to a 5 star review, the final climactic chapter, top heavy with sudden,  startling, jaw dropping reveals, became problematic on multiple levels.  It came across to me like a very rushed, Hail Mary pass with an abrupt closeout guaranteed to leave a reader hungry for an epilogue.  That climax packs a punch alright, swerving  the book into a jarring, hairpin turn.......and  hurled it into a completely different genre altogether.   I guess you either go with it fully or just mutter, "Say what now?"

              I cannot forget or deny, however, the brilliant use of character development and skillful writing that brings the story of these two sisters and their family to such vivid, relatable life.  And combining this with all the tropes of an ominous thriller stands as quite an achievement.  Even with its much worthy of discussion finish,  it still came out as a 4 star (****) page-turner for me.....and a fine introduction to a new author I'm eager to try again.

'NO HARD FEELINGS'....J-LAW TRIES TO JUMP-START THE LONG FORGOTTEN RAUNCH-COM

 No Hard Feelings (2023)   If any lesser actress than Jennifer Lawrence had starred in this thing, I wouldn't waste 10 seconds watching it.......

               But what can I say?  Here at BQ, we dearly love us some J-Law, so how could we ever stay away from it?  Especially when she's attempting to breathe new life into a genre that once ruled the multiplexes and video stores of the 1980's......the raunch filled rom-com loaded with horny young guys and hot-to-trot babes bursting out of their bikinis........oh yes, please......

               And to her everlasting credit, the Oscar-winning Lawrence goes all in here, fully hurling herself into the no-holds-barred, shameless smutty spirit that any Raunch-Fest worth its sleaze demands......

              While she more than held up her end of the bargain, writer-director Gene Stupnitsky did not. This guy dropped the ball so badly, the film stinks on multiple levels.   

               Minimal raunchy gags and situations pop up,  and what little of them the film sparingly doles out (mostly in the first half hour),,,,,,,they aren't worth more than a few smirks and chuckles. You can tell from the way every unfunny gag lands with a thud, that Stupnitsk has no affinity whatsoever for this stuff.  His heart just isn't in it, even as his lead actress practically burst blood vessels to squeeze out some laughs.....

                After the film's first act, it more or less gives up on the whole raunch-com idea and struggles to turn itself into some sort of half-assed, sentiment-stricken coming-of-age story. 

                J-Law, a take-no-prisoners Uber-driver/bartender, can't make ends meet as a workin' stiff in  Montauk New York, a Long Island beach vacation spot for wealthy uppercrusts.  Desperate to pay the now exorbitant property taxes on her house, she takes on a task offered by a couple of those 1 percenters (Matthew Broderick, Laura Benanti).......the mission - to  bring their severely introverted, solitary, virginal son (Andrew Barth Feldman) out of his shell before he starts college in the fall.   

               And we all know what "out of his shell" means, don't we.....heh, heh, heh.......

               Lawrence, as you'd expect, starts out by cornering the boy with overly aggressive sexuality, but the kid's sweet, gentle nature serves to soften her up, smooth out her hard edges  and reveal her own vulnerabilities.

              But as you watch the whole film play out, you start to realize why this movie can't handle any of the disparate genres it's dabbling in.........the raunch is dumb and mirthless and the coming-of-age tropes look and sound phoned in from a standard playbook. 

             And watching J-Law toil herself into the ground to make this worthless script into something worth sitting through is a depressing sight......and one of the biggest disappointments of the year so far.

             1 & 1/2 stars (* 1/2) for her tireless bravura work here......otherwise I'd slap "No Hard Feelings" with a Zero.......fans of the actress might want to wait until it lands on a streaming service that doesn't require an extra sign-up fee.......

'KNOCK AT THE CABIN'.......GOD AND SHYAMALAN LOWER THE BOOM ON GAY DADS........

 Knock At The Cabin (2023)   Taken from Paul Tremblay's startling little horror novel,  "The Cabin At The End Of The World", M. Night Shyamalan's movie starts out like the start of a long, long twisted joke.....

             You know the kind.....one of those endless tall-tale anecdotes that takes 15 minutes to slog its way to an eventual punchline......

              So instead of "a priest, a rabbi and a minister walk into a bar", we have, "Four sick, crazy shitheads walk in on two gay dads in a remote vacation cabin with their 8 year old adopted Asian daughter"

             The cult-like shitheads, led by gentle, soft-spoken man-mountain Leonard (Dave Bautista) shared a vision of a Biblical sized apocalypse Their visions came complete with tsunamis, plagues, planes dropping out the skies and the whole world bursting into flame. Yikes.

              Comprising the rest of this jolly quartet are a pissed off thug (Rupert Grint), and two young women, (Nikki Amuka-Bird, Abby Quinn),obviously as weak-minded and true-believing as Trump supporters......(all of them wielding lethal handmade weapons crafted from garden tools according to God's Ikea-like instructions in their visions')

              But God (God bless 'im) offered an escape clause...... if the gay dads (Jonathon Groff, Ben Aldridge) and daughter Wen (Kristen Cui) willingly agree to take one for Team Humanity and sacrifice one of themselves, God will cancel the End Of Days...oh joy, yay us. ..

             The dads, tied to chairs by Len and company,  naturally, ain't buyin' this crapola. This forces  Len and the gang to start executing each other, just to show the little family how their refusal to go along, brings on tidal waves, plagues, yada yada...      The four horses asses  of the apocalypse slaughter themselves via those Ikea weapons handed down by heavenly Big G. Himself. 

              More tragic carnage ensues, sometimes interrupted by flashback to the trials and tribulations of the gay dads)......and here's where Shyamalan makes his fatal error, tossing out Paul Tremblay's third act for his own.....

               Shyamalan, sensing he'd leave a foul, sour taste in an audience's mouth with Tremblay's more horrific, inconclusive wrap-up, attempts an ending that wants it every which way. You can sense his desperation to leave you unsettled but somehow soothed and satisfied......

              Instead of the director's trademark twist endings that he attaches to his own original screenplays, he allows "Knock At The Cabin" to play out as it was pre-written for him by the Universal Studios marketing department, focus group screenings and CEO's of movie theater chains.......

              I suppose that'll insure Shyamalan that he'll get another movie to direct......but it leaves his film with an unsurprising, connect-the-dots structure.......and if there's not one single twist in store, you'll start to wonder why you wasted time watching such a wacky story to begin with.......

             Bur let me hail two huge pluses here.......

              First - even when his scripts turn ridiculous, Shyamalan remains a superb visualist and a modern master of what Hitchcock called 'pure cinema'....  every single shot's masterfully composed for maximum impact. This guy, like Spielberg and Scorsese, knows the power of edited imagery and how to to use it to his best advantage. 

              Second - the positively jaw-dropping, award-worthy performance of Dave Bautista, an actor only previously used for his sheer, threatening bulk. He manages to pull off a tightrope trick I've seen very few actors accomplish........he breaks your heart and scares the hell out of you all at the same time.  Who knew there was a actor lurking underneath those ten layers of muscle?

             For these two reasons - Shyamalan's meticulous filmmaking expertise and Bautista's extraordinary work, I'm probably handing out 1/2 a star more than this movie deserves. Together, these two guys cobble together a still watchable film even stuck with a loony premise and a blatant, cornball Hollywood-ized finale. Proceed at your own risk.   2 & 1/2 stars (**1/2)

WEEKEND MADNESS WRAP-UP....SPECIAL "COMMUNISTS ARE OUT TO GET ME!" EDITION......

 

Trump pleads with Congress to save him after prosecutor Jack Smith reveals some of the evidence against him to Trump's legal team...and just to be on the safe side, tweets, "Vlad!  Clear out a Moscow airport runway.....I might drop in for a a couple of years...."

 Taylor Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert verbally brawl in Congress......prompting Mel Gibson to immediately off them a chance to star in a new sequel,  Sad Acts: Beyond Blunderdome".....

Trump resorts to referring to those investigating his crimes as "communists".....as he explains in a Fox News interview, "There's at least 57 communists in the DOJ and the Democratic Party.....didn't you ever watch 'The Manchurian Candidate"? Not only that I know for a fact that animal prosecutor Jack Smith came directly out of one of those body snatching seed pods..."

'THE QUIET TENANT'....A DUTIFUL DAD, HIS YOUNG DAUGHTER.....AND DAD'S CAPTIVE SEX-SLAVE....

 The Quiet Tenant by Clemence Michallon (2023)

           What a grand slam of a thriller. I'm still breathless from the read. 

          Put simply, "The Quiet Tenant" is textbook example of everything you want in a stay-up-all-night, page turner. By the time you reach the final chapters, you realize the book has you completely by the throat and racing to the finish at 'Star Wars' hyper-drive speed. 

          Author Clemence Michallon picked a well worn (some would even say worn out) genre - the sick twisted path of a serial killer who stalks and then keeps his victims as sex slaves until he decides he's finished with them.....and then he finishes them.  

         And of course, this inhuman soul, as many of them do,  lives a life as a beloved, friendly, upstanding member of his community, a respected dutiful single dad to his 13 year old daughter. Following his wife's cancer death,  the town reaches out even more to embrace this poor tragedy stricken dad and child.

          The story unfolds from three viewpoints......the currently enslaved, abused woman,, kept in a shed and forced to call herself "Rachel" by her captor, 'family guy" Aiden Thomas......Aiden's daughter Cecelia, painfully lonely from being cut off from almost all socialization by her father........and lastly Emily, a young bartender/restaurant manager who's become overwhelmingly smitten by Aiden, unaware he's selected her as his next victim. 

           The narrative belongs primarily to "Rachel", and her heart rending account of how somehow she's managed to stay alive longer then any of the women who came before her. Sensing her time's running out, she sees a desperate chance in a sudden, drastic change for Aiden and Cecelia.

         Forced to vacant his house, (and its shed), Aiden must move to a home with no secluded hiding spot, He's put in the position of imprisoning "Rachel" in the new house itself and passing her off to Cecelia as a good friend needing 'quiet time' to recover from some shattering trauma. 

          Author Michallon sure knows how to suck you in to these characters and totally invest you (and fear for) the ultimate fates of Rachel, Cecelia and Emily.  The suspense steadily builds to near excruciating levels and once the endgame commences, I don't know how anyone could possibly put the book down. 

          Even if there's readers who think they've read every variation of a story like this, I still say don't miss this one. A thriller that thrills like "The Quiet Tenant" is a 5 star(*****) essential and a "must have" for this year.

WEEKEND MADNESS WRAP-UP.....SPECIAL "I DID NOTHING WRONG!" EDITION

    
    Hard to keep up with the madness when it flows out faster than the sewage spilling out of Baby Orange's mouth on a daily basis......but I'll give it a try.....

PGA merges with LIV golf, owned and operated by the bloodsoaked Saudis......and announces its exciting new tournament, The Bonesaw Invitational, where golfers will face fairways obstructed with various remaining pieces of Jamal Khashoggi.......

Trump arrives in Federal Court for arrest on 37 Felony counts....and encourages crowds at his rallies to yell in unison, "Bail Him Out! Bail Him Out! Bail Him Out!"

......and also issues new Truth Social rant, "I'VE GOTTEN MORE INDICTMENTS THAN THE WORLD HAS EVER SEEN! THE MOST BIGLY INDICTMENTS THAT NO EVER EX-PRESIDENT COULD EVER DREAM ABOUT!"

In his Truth Social rant, Trump includes "mutants" among the list of people responsible for his Federal Indictments.....leading to Wolverine to post on Instagram...."This ****in' guy?...LOL..."

Ted Cruz, when asked if the U.S. Senate would ever impeach and convict Joe Biden, states:  "I don't think Senate Democrats, if you had a video of Joe Biden murdering children dressed as the devil under a full moon while singing Pat Benatar, the still wouldn't vote to convict.".....Pat Benatar responded by immediately sending Cruz a video of "Hit Me With Your Best Shot".  President Biden requested that the president of Mexico revoke the medal awarded to Cruz as 'Honorary Mayor Of Cancun"......

'SPLIT SECOND'.....ATOMIC NOIR! PREPARE TO DUCK 'N COVER!

 Split Second (1953)   That's right, boys and girls......another A-Bomb detonation is imminent, so get ready to save yourselves by keeping your head down and diving under the nearest desk or table......

          Or so we Baby Boomers were told as our Government and military, giddy with their atomic toys, constantly set off A-Bombs into the atmosphere......because....uh....because they could. And oh boy did those towering mushroom clouds look awesome.....

          Years later, we realized what they should have told us to do is bow our little heads between our legs and kiss our asses goodbye....

          Meanwhile, Hollywood studios, smelling big box office moola in Da Bomb, responded mostly with cheapie sci-fi horrors about radiation-spawned mutated creatures running amuck. (1954's brilliant "Them!" forever set the template for this genre....)

           But a year before "Them!" crooner, turned actor-director Dick Powell slapped together this mean 'n lean little atomic blaster for RKO Radio Pictures. No mutants in sight, unless you count ruthless escaped convict Sam Hurley (Stephen McNally, a B-movie toiler making the very most of his showy role.)

           Amidst the Nevada desert landscapes, Sam's on the lam with a flunky (conveniently named Dummy (Fran DeKova) and suffering best bud Bart (Paul Kelly) who's nursing a slug in his gut from a botched robbery.  Their master plan - temporarily hang out in an old abandoned mining town that sits only a mile away from the latest A-Bomb test....due to go kaboom the next morning. .

            Well, nobody said these guys were the sharpest tools in the shed........

            More of Sam's stupidity follows, taking a whole variety of innocents hostage.....a newsguy (Keith Andes), a broke (and broken) blonde floozy (Jan Sterling), a haughty, fur-clad diva (Alexis Smith) and her feckless dopey lover (Robert Paige).  Diva and Dopey were on their way to Reno, for a quickie divorce from Diva's kindly doctor hubby (Richard Egan),

           Before the violent, cold-hearted Sam drags this bunch to the A-Bomb ghost town, he calls Kindly Doc, warning him to drive over, join the party to help poor Bart or he'll perforate the Diva.....(whom the Kindly Doc still feels for) 

           And so the entire bunch assemble at the soon to be nuked old town, along with its only resident Asa , a grizzled old prospector (beloved character actor Arthur Hunnicutt, only 43 at the time but already doing ancient and grizzled.)

           In true noir fashion, high tension feverish melodramatics erupt all over the place,,, ,including Sam puttin' the moves on both Floozy and Diva. But in the interests of top-secret movie security, I don't dare reveal who dies and who survives......but let's just say that nothing beats an atomic bomb for quickly sorting members of an ensemble cast ....one way or the other,,,,,

           As previously pointed out, the hulking, loud, and aggressive McNally dominates the movie.....given the plumb prize playing a trigger-happy, hot-tempered thug who's apt shoot anybody at anytime (and often does), he seizes the day with bravura work.  It's a toss up as to what's scarier....McNally's Sam or Da Bomb.

            And Hunnicutt continues to build his growing reputation as a reliable scene stealer.......as Kindly Doc operates on bleeding Bart, Hunnicutt's ole Asa recalls his frontier days when he had to remove a guy's lung with a broken bottle.  ("Made 'im cut back on smokin'" though".....)

            For all lovers of long forgotten, underappreciated 1950's gems, don't waste a split second if you come across "Split Second", a truly explosive (heh, heh) 5 star (*****) FIND OF FINDS.  (Hint: you can snag your very own Warner Archive DVD copy for only 8 bucks and change....but no guarantee on how many are left.....)

             

            
 .

'CINEMA SPECULATION'....Q. T. CHATS ABOUT THE MOVIES THAT MADE HIM........

 Cinema Speculation by Quentin Tarantino (2022)   Nobody's ever going to include this title on a list of definitive books that deeply analyze the art of cinema.....

            But then again, it's a near perfect realization of what you imagined a Tarantino book on movies would read like......

             It reads like you sat down for a couple of hours with QT and split a a couple of six packs to hear him shoot the breeze......... about the movies he grew up with, the ones that influenced his own work, the ones that defined him.  

              It makes for a damn fun experience, and made me think back to my own childhood history with the movies......

              Whenever my mom and dad couldn't find a babysitter for me, off to the neighborhood theaters I'd go with them........taking in all sorts of 1950's  dramas, comedies, adventures and westerns that in no way were designed for small children......

               Tarantino, born in 1963, also found himself taken to movies by his mom and assorted relatives. But where my introduction to film came from the conservative tropes of  the 1950's, young Tarantino feasted on the groundbreaking upheavals of 1970's cinema,  movies that blazed previously unthinkable new trails in subject matter, sex and violence.  

              So reading these chapters, you can easily spot the origins of Tarantino's stuff, which heavily draws upon the grindhouse genres of his young days in darkened movie houses. 

               It was an incredible era to discover movies........while legendary, iconic directors still actively worked,(like Don Siegel's "Dirty Harry") the rise of the "movie brats" shook Hollywood and the world like an earthquake way off the Richter scale ....( with breakthroughs by Coppola, DePalma, Scorsese,  Milius, Lucas, Spielberg, Bogdonovich, Schrader, Boorman,  among others...)

               QT simply takes a reader through a chatty, funny, incisive conversation about movies still burned into his memories, for one reason or another. He's so sure of his insight into some these filmmakers' abilities, he boldly theorizes about what films like 'Taxi Driver' would look like they'd swapped directors.  Whether you fully agree or hotly dispute his opinions, the chapters are never less then thought-provoking entertainment........

                And what a strange, eclectic trip down memory lane he''ll take you on......the propulsive, now legendary iconography of John Boorman's "Deliverance", Peckinpah's "The Getaway", DePalma kicking off his lifelong homage to Hitchcock with "Sisters", John Flynn's two underappreciated, in-your-face shoot em ups, "The Outfit" and "Rolling Thunder".....and even Tobe Hooper's carnival horror, "The Funhouse" and Peter Bogdonovich's much reviled Henry James adaptation, "Daisy Miller"........

                 For all film buffs who'd love a tour through Quentin Tarantino's major influences, consider "Cinema Speculation" required reading,  Think of it as a 5 star (*****) appetizer for a future, more comprehensive movie book that hopefully QT will eventually write.  A fun read, through and through.   

TONY AWARDS 2023......BROADWAY MINUS THE WGA.....

The Tony Awards 2023.....will occupy a unique niche in history - the first full fledged awards ceremony to put on on a complete 4 & 1/2 hour show without any use of scripted material. Such material, of course, would normally come from members of the Writers Guild Of America, currently on strike. 

               So the major thing missing, something we've all become accustomed to - absolutely no cringe-inducing cutsey-wootsy, supposedly comedic byplay between the teams of presenters. 

               Tony presenters merely announced their names and got on with the business of naming the nominees. 

               Guess what? Nobody missed the cutesy-wootsy byplay.......and I say this as a writer myself who full supports the WGA and hope their members triumph in demanding and receiving their fair share of pay from the scum-sucking reptiles who control the film studios, TV networks. and streaming channels.

              This show exists for one vital primary function.......to offer America a chocolate box sampling of Broadway musicals in all their furiously choreographed, standing ovation glory.  And convince visitors to New York that any one of these shows is worth laying out hundreds of dollars for a couple of tickets....

               Yes, you heard me right about those prices.......these days, dinner and a show on the the Great White Way could potentially force you to take out a second mortgage, or maybe postpone your kid's college education for a few years.......

             But then again, you' will watch awestruck as leading role actors burst their vocal cords belting out tunes to the upper balcony,  while dancers choreographed with military precision hurl themselves across the stage like tracer bullets. Actual real people....no CGI in sight. 

             All of that was certainly on view at last night's Tony Awards, along with the winners' well spoken, emotional and  heartfelt acceptance speeches. 

              Anyone who's ever watched a Tonys show (or been in high school drama club)  knows that the world of theater  has always been a welcoming haven and Godsend for all the gifted, creative artists of the LGBTQIA+ community. So as expected, many of the acceptance speeches addressed the toxic culture wars currently waged on them by fascist MAGA-morons of the GOP like Ron DeSenseless. 

              But exuberant, joyful show stopping performances are what dominated the night, with big numbers from "Some Like It Hot", "Camelot", "Shucked", "& Juliet", "Kimberly Akimbo", and "Funny Girl",,,,,(with all of them more than earning their Standing O's.....even for the thoroughly despised diva Lea Michelle, who ripped through "Don't Rain On My Parade" at warp speed...)

             I can only wish them well and hope these shows can collect enough tourists willing to cough up the vast amounts of cash required to secure them tickets and take in the unique thrill of live theater. 

             Well done, loads of fun and just about the only awards show I actually look forward to seeing year after year. 5 stars (*****)

WEEKEND MADNESS WRAP-UP......SPECIAL "ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK" EDITION

 

                 

                  Finally........

                  Finally, after a long 77 year lifetime of grifting, lying, cheating, whoring, stealing......

 

                  Finally, after infecting the very heart and soul of America with hatred, bigotry, misogyny, cruelty and a never ending cascade of lies.......

                  Finally......the slowly turning wheels of justice and the rule of law caught up with him......

                   Finally.....cornered like the rat he's always been......with at long last, no place to hide. 

                   A day for sadness and a day for celebration.

                   Sadness for the amount of damage he wreaked upon us.......damage that our historians will study, interpret and asses for generations to come.......

                    An empty soul, a bottomless abyss of a human being.....who yet somehow seduced millions to stand under his banner of stupidity and ignorance. 

 

                  But a day for celebration, because for the first time ever, we've lived to see the day that may mark the beginning of the end for him......

                  Not that any of this will go easy on anybody......a long, tortuous road ahead for certain. 

                  Sensing that his life as a human turd now approaches a final flush down the bowl,  he'll want to take America with him......

                  We must not let him.

                   If enough of us stay strong, resolute and resolved, we'll live to see the day  that millions upon millions of Americans hoped and prayed for....

                   The day when Donald J. Trump finally wears a jumpsuit to match the greasy, citrus colored sludge he smears on his face.....when the constant flowing sewer of his mind and mouth will flood nothing but prison floors and walls......

                    Let's all continue to hope and pray for that day.

'THE LEGEND OF THE LONE RANGER'.....'WHO WAS THAT MASKED MAN?..... WHO THE **** CARES?

The Legend Of The Lone Ranger (1981)   Strange, but I hold no memory of ever seeing this movie, when it showed up instantly dead on arrival, vilified and mocked by critics, ignored by audiences. 

           No wonder. The damn thing went wrong in so many ways, it disappears in front of your eyes while you're still watching it. 

           The idea of rebooting the ancient western hero of radio and TV into a Big Summer Family flick came from producer Jack Wrather and his wife Bonita Granville. Wrather produced the "Lassie" TV series and once upon a time, Granville enjoyed a minor career as a 1930's movie cutie-pie. 

           Drooling at the profits of the 1979 "Superman", the Wrathers thought they possessed enough talent and smarts to do the same for The Lone Ranger and his faithful Indian companion, Tonto. 

            Talk about delusions of grandeur......

             These dunces first proceeded to generate toxic publicity for themselves by forcing poor old Clayton Moore, the original Ranger, to cease and desist making costumed personal appearances as the beloved hero we boomers all grew up with.  Way to go, guys.... harass our original Ranger and alienate  your target audience (boomers and their kids) before you even get the film in theaters. Genius;

             But wait.....the worst was yet to come. The blithering Wrathers hoped to surprise and delight the world with the equivalent of  "Superman" s Christopher Reeve. For their new, young Ranger, they chose a non-acting non entity named Klinton Spilsbury.  This thin side of beef was such a blank on screen, they used actor James Keach to dub him. But Keach could only deliver deadened, flat line readings match the deadened flat expressions on Spilsbury's face. 

              Surprise, surprise.....With his obnoxious, diva-like behavior on the set and total of acting ability, Splilsbury effectively spilsburied himself.....went off the radar, never to make another film or ever be heard from again....reducing himself to a trivia question.

             Even more calamity followed. The script wasted over an hour of running time to establish the origins of The Lone Ranger. By the time he's fully outfitted with a mask and his 'Hi Yo Silver' white stallion the plot lurches into a stale re-hash of the 'Wild Wild West TV show.......with the Ranger and Tonto rescuing President Grant (a game Jason Robards) from rogue madman Butch Cavendish (Christopher Lloyd) who's setting up his own Independent Kingdom Of Texas. 

              (In the film's one and only clever idea, a trio of Grant's legendary pals also come charging in....no less then Wild Bill Hickock, Buffalo Bill Cody and George Armstrong Custer.....)

            The film also shilled out enough cash to pay for a John Barry score, but from the sound of it, Barry dutifully threw in some generic Barry-like music, ,punched the clock and moved on. Visually, the film's a total loss. This cornball epic cried out for sharp, ripe Technicolor but it's  smeared over with that soft focus, yellowish-gold veneer, usually applied to bloody 1970's revisionist westerns. 

           Speaking of bloody, "The Legend of The Lone Ranger", supposedly an all ages movie, freely indulges in plenty of shootout slaughters.....not to mention a explosion-laden climax that blows dozens of bad guys to kingdom come as they fly through air screaming their last screams. And yet at times the movie unashamedly resurrects antiquated scenes of the Ranger yelling 'Hi yo Silver' and away! as the clarion call of the William Tell overture erupts. Devoid of humor and wit, it's never really clear what kind of audience this film's catering to.... either the "Wild Bunch" gorehouds, or boomers steeped in 1950's nostalgia or little kids who like watching horsies go fast. 

            Reaping the failure it practically begged for, this 'Lone Ranger' went blowin' in the wind faster than a tumbleweed in a sandstorm.......No filmmaker would dare touch this material again until the bloated, misbegotten CGI crapfest Lone Ranger arrived in 2013 with the now cancelled Armie Hammer as L.R. and a misguided Johnny Depp as Tonto. More on that one in another post......

             One shred of good news. After both Klinton Spilsbury and his Zero star (0) movie dropped out of sight forever, our good ole TV Ranger Clayton Moore went right back to appearing at State Fairs and shopping malls. Hi Yo, Clayton!

              

            

             

            

'ALWAYS ISN'T FOREVER'....A BOY MOVES HEAVEN AND EARTH TO RETURN TO HIS SOULMATE....

Always Isn't Forever by J.C. Cervantes (2023)

             The amount of tears readers will shed while experiencing this book will no doubt equal a tsunami of epic proportions.  By all means grab this, but not without a family-size package of tissues handy.

           Two primal emotions rule here -  the unconditional, intense love of a couple who've been soulmates since childhood and the overpowering, wounding grief befalling them due to the cruelest of fates. 

            Teens Ruby and Hart were practically born to be together, until Hart loses his life through a selfless act of bravery. But while his physical body has succumbed, an intervening angel offers a chance for his spirit and soul to live inside someone else who's positioned on the border of life and death. 

             Seizing the opportunity to come back to Ruby, Hart inhabits the body of Jameson, the high school's star athlete/and all-around obnoxious jerk. about to come out of a motorcycle accident coma.  

             Here's where the book's particular heaven-and-earth mythology becomes quite complicated and involved, presenting Hart, in his new incarnation, with a daunting challenge to win back the grief stricken Ruby. His, sensitive artistic soul now exists side by side within Jameson, along with Jameson's own abilities and memories. But Hart's memories, including those of Ruby are only taking up temporary residence.....they're fading fast and the clock's ticking.

             Even worse.....how can Ruby comprehend why on earth Jameson, once a smug, self centered delinquent, has transformed into such a caring, kind soul?  And what kind of unbelievable news, something he's incapable of saying out loud, is he desperately trying to communicate to her?

            Once J.C. Cervantes hooked me with this incredible combination of suspense and gut-wrenching emotion, I literally could not stop reading until the end.....and yes, it's just about impossible to navigate through this story with dry eyes.  It's everything you'd expect from a romance that keeps you on the edge of your seat, hoping and praying for the ripped-asunder soulmates to somehow find each other again. a truly passionate 5 star read for sure.  An absolute TBR must-have. (*****)

'MAEVE FLY'......A PSYCHO DISNEY PRINCESS LETS IT GO......

 Maeve Fly by CJ Leede (2023)

          You'll have to pardon me while I hose down the gallons of blood, severed limbs, assorted organs and at least one random eyeball that came flooding out this book......

.
            A bit much? Not at all, cause I think it's essential that only readers who can stomach (and really love) hardcore horror go anywhere near 'Maeve Fly'  Everyone else?  Stick with 'The Addams Family'.......

             Imagine, if you will 'American Psycho's Patrick Bateman reconceived as a Disneyland park Princess Elsa, that beloved "Let It Go' belter from "Frozen". Just the perverse audacity of that idea made me laugh and shake my head in admiration. 

             To the delight of park visitors, the live action Elsa's well  played by none other than our title gal Maeve Fly, while sister Anna's played by Maeve's BFF, Kate. 

             Maeve loves her work with a passion, even tolerating Liz, her officious, micro-managing supervisor. Kate, however an aspiring actress, struggles to snag a film or TV role. And this is a perfect moment to mention how author CJ Leede evokes and beautifully portrays Los Angeles in all its sun-drenched madness - especially the underbelly of showbiz where's everybody's grasping for their dream while only a precious few achieve it.  Perceptive, sharp and darkly funny, at times the book reads like a modern day "Day Of The Locust"... only with way more blood.

 
            Speaking of dark.....that's Maeve through and through. At the house she shares with Tallulah, her once-upon-a-time movie star and infirm grandmother, she celebrates Halloween like it's Christmas at Hallmark.  All she really needs to tip her over into complete insanity is something  (or someone) to light her fuse. 

           Sure enough, Maeve finds the fuse lighter in the person of Kate's hunka-hunka Hockey star brother Gideon, newly arrived to play for the L.A. Kings. Gideon, with rippling abs and libido to match, sees directly into the bottomless abyss of Maeve's empty, violent, psychotic heart.  He seems at least a possible kindred spirit, and for Maeve, who's already rapidly giving in to utter madness, that's all she needs to...uh... let it go.....and go medieval on any number of...uh....poor unfortunate souls. (but that's another movie, right?)

            As I previously forewarned, the carnage here is way, way, way over the top, but author Leede turns the whole thing into such a funhouse ride, you're never sure whether to giggle or gag. And I could only smile and nod at the finale's big twist, dripping with irony....(among other things).  For those who can take it, it's a 5 star (*****) ride into a human void. Dive in if you dare.