'LEONARD PART 6'....THE FORGOTTEN FLOP FROM THE STAR BEST FORGOTTEN.....

Leonard Part 6 (1987)    If Bill Cosby hadn't been revealed to the world as a predatory serial rapist, I suppose this movie would've stood as the worst atrocity he ever inflicted on the the public. 

            The film arrived in the midst of the toxic chaos surrounding its studio Columbia and its reviled chief David Puttnam,,,,,,,,

             British producer Puttnam, thoroughly disliked and resented by the Hollywood community, somehow ended up running Columbia after riding the wave of success generated his producing films like 'The Killing Fields' and 'Chariots Of Fire'. To his great credit though, he tried to pull the plug on 'Leonard' while the film was still in production.  Bill Cosby would've owed him a huge favor.

               Whenever I attempt reviewing a certifiable disaster, I at least try to imagine what kind of film its creators might've had in mind. Did it sound like a great idea on paper?  Did it fall down in execution? Or was it always a rotten idea to begin with;........ 

               In this case that last one applies......I possess  what I consider a fairly good imagination, but I cannot comprehend this film ever at a stage where it didn't appear abysmally stupid and unfunny. 

               But such was the clout of all powerful superstar Cosby (dubbed 'America's Dad' from his hit TV show), that he could get this misbegotten, atrocious film, for which he wrote the story, into production, 

               Intrigued, I finally managed to view it only 24 hours before Tubi was due to kick it out of its inventory.......(and I'm guessing that's the last you'll see of it on any streaming service.....)

               I watched astounded. And utterly confused as to who exactly 'Leonard Part 6', a frantic, silly secret agent spoof, was designed to entertain. 

               Families?  Small children?  Possibly, since it flaunts an atmosphere of Saturday-morning-cartoon-show idiocy with abandon. But then again, it features armies of cute and furry animals used to assassinate people as a kind of an ongoing sick joke......complete with crime scene photos of of murdered victims....

               For Cosby fans maybe? Not much here for them to enjoy.   He mostly wanders through the film impassive and distracted, as if he wants to be anywhere else than in the movie. And who can blame him?  The only desperate attempt at  humor comes from his deadpan reaction to his estranged ex-wife (Pat Colbert) throwing food on him.  That comes after he's labored, but not very hard, to earn a few chuckles from his appalled reaction to his twenty something daughter (Victoria Rowell)  engaged to a 65 year old Italian filmmaker (casting Moses Gunn in this role serves as the film's one and only off the wall funny idea....)

               Or maybe the goal was ti appeal to people who still remembered the ridiculous avalanche of brainless, infantile spy spoofs that flourished throughout the 1960's.These feckless farces arrived in the wake of the James Bond frenzy that gripped the world after the release of 'Goldfinger'.  A few other 1980's films took a crack at the genre with teen heartthrob stars ("Never Too Young To Die", "If Looks Could Kill") but none of them landed with audiences..... 

                Nobody enjoyed any real success with Bond spoofs until Mike Meyers' blissfully dopey "Austin Powers" trilogy which benefited from really funny scripts and from Meyers performance being fully invested in its silliness....a far cry from Cosby, who trudges through 'Leonard' like he spent the entirety of the film counting down the hours until quitting time.  

                 As a show of mercy, I'll spare our beloved BQ visitors any scene by scene details. Just imagine a series of bizarre, calamitous events meant to come across of amusing, but mostly idiotic. And all of it slapped together with choppy editing, ludicrous special effects, and that 'get-me-out-of-here Cosby non-acting.

                 Upon its opening, film immediately became a legendary monumental catastrophe. Cosby wasted not a minute disowning it and publicly reveled in its sweep of the Razzie awards for worst movies of the year.  This even prompted the Fox network to make him solid gold replicas of his Razzies. Years later, the film's director, Paul Weiland, recalled the nightmare of making "Leonard' and seeking careful, diplomatic ways to tell Cosby his scenes deadened the pace and and weren't funny at all.

                 Cosby, of course, went about his business of making millions until.........well, the rest is sordid, ugly history......

                 .......that makes rating both 'Leonard Part 6' and Bill Cosby himself  a 2 for 1 deal.  Both of them more than earn BQ's most  dreaded rating ....both an ABF....each an ABOMINATION FROM HELL......and both deserve forgetting forever..

'STAR 80'....BOB FOSSE'S SHOWBIZ FROM HELL......

 Star 80 (1983)   Nobody, but nobody knew the dark underbelly of show business as much as celebrated  director-choreographer Bob Fosse.......

               Through tap-dancing in seedy dives as a kid, then toiling as an MGM musical chorus boy and then on to his ultimate ascendency as premier crafter of iconic Broadway musicals and films, he never wavered from his deeply acidic view of  his art......

               Fosse wanted us to look behind the showstopping performers, the razzle-dazzle dancing, the glitz, the tinsel, all the stuff that provokes audiences into standing ovations...... he most excelled at .peeling off the glossy veneer of the world of entertainment, only to uncover.....

                 ......a corrupt, soulless abyss, swarming with greed, cruelty and the very worst of human impulses. But hey, that's our wonderful business of show, folks.

               And in "Star 80", his final film as a director, he found the perfect true story to evoke his world view.....the brief, doomed life of movie starlet and Playboy Playmate Dorothy Stratten, brutally murdered by Paul Snider, her lowlife psychopathic husband-manager. 

               Stratten and Snider, superbly brought to life by Mariel Hemingway and Eric Roberts, each in their own way were seduced by the promise of fame, glamour and success. Dorothy's a sweet naive  innocent blessed with the most marketable commodities of showbiz, a beautiful face and body. Snider's a bottom feeding hustler who latches on to Dorothy as his golden ticket to the razzle-dazzle and boundless wealth promised to those who can push their way into the entertainment industry hierarchy. 

               Anyone who's watched any of the versions of "A Star Is Born" can see these characters destinies are practically pre-ordained.  Dorothy rapidly moves up the Hollywood food chain to bigger and better projects while the showbiz bigwigs speeding her way to the top already spotted Snider as a worthless parasite. Shunned, cast aside and his dreams denied, Snider's rage comes to a full boil......much like Joaquin Phoenix's 'Joker' and Robert DeNiro's demented fanboy Rupert Pupkin in "The King Of Comedy". 

                Bob Fosse, in films like "Lenny", "Cabaret" and his own semi-autobiography "All That Jazz" always tried to show us the emptiness (and sometimes downright evil) of showbiz razz-ma-tazz.....to smear off the greasepaint , the precision dancing,  the eye catching spectacle to reveal there's nothing of real value underneath......

                 Which makes the blood splattered tragic conclusion of "Star 80" represent the inevitable and exact end result of how he viewed the world of entertainment........a con, nothing but a smoke and mirrors magic trick perpetrated to separate the suckers from their money.  Fosse didn't just want to entertain us to the point of breaking into rapturous applause, he wanted to rub our noses in the unspoken falsehood and insincerity he experienced from living  a lifetime in performing arts. 

                (And I don't want to leave out some of Fosse's savvy casting choices here, including Cliff Robertson smoothly playing Hugh Hefner and Carol Baker, herself a movie sex goddess of the 1960's, as Stratten's mother. The film's only stumble is Roger Rees playing an up and coming British director enamored with Stratten.....his character's an obvious watered down (to avoid lawsuits) version of real life director Peter Bogdanovich, who cast Stratten in his stillborn Audrey Hepburn comedy 'They All Laughed'. His ongoing love affair with her while she was still married to Snider, touched off Snider's murderous rage.....)            

              Not an easy film to  sit through by any means, , but "Star 80" still stands as its director's most personal work.....and therefore a 4 star (****) essential.

               

               

               

BQ RETURNS!!! FULLY BACK IN ACTION 11/29/23!

         

 So sorry to be away for so long.  Those pesky medical issues came bubbling up to torment your faithful move 'n book blogger, sideling me for over a week or so........

           I'll go right to the good news. I'm back! I'm alive! And I'm pissed off that I couldn't let you know about the films I've been consuming (some of them while in the hospital, which I had to re-watch at home to catch the parts I missed when so rudely interrupted for blood pressure checks, electrocardiograms and I.V. flushings)

           BQ's just about on the mend, so please, please, stop back into the site tomorrow and I promise you a whole load of reviews, snarky commentary and much more.....

           Hope to see you all tomorrow when The Beached Quill comes roaring back into action......with a special new department..."Films you never heard of or forgot they ever existed at all"!!  Happy Holidays to one and all.......

                                                     Love, actually......BQ

'THE TODD KILLINGS'....A THRILL-KILLER PREYS ON HIS TEEN FAN CLUB......

 The Todd Killings (1971)   Even though BQ consumed vast amounts of movies throughout the 70's, this one slipped right by us......which wasn't hard since it parked briefly in theaters for less than week. I don't remember it ever popping up on TV, and even if it did, network censors would've sliced to ribbons.......

            I vaguely recall not feeling too bad about missing it, since its generic, mundane title and poster made it look like a cheapjack TV movie that somehow stumbled into theatrical distribution.

           Catching up with it 52 years later (on TCM, where you can still stream it till 12/14/23) I discovered a long lost gem that's anything but generic and unimaginative. 

            It's based on a real life serial thrill-killer known as 'The Pied Piper of Tucson' That title referred to his ability to befriend, enthrall, seduce and finally murder teens who flocked to him as the neighborhood rock star.....the coolest guy ever. 

            Fictionalized here as 'Skipper' Todd, (Robert F. Lyons) he's a 23 year old layabout sponging off his mom (Barbara Bel Geddes) who runs a seedy nursing home in a former motel. He fills his days and nights as the exalted, popular too-cool-for-school guy among the town's high schoolers. 

           The kids dig him, oblivious to the fact he's a murderous sociopath who already killed one of them just for the sheer adrenalin rush.  Though 5 years older than most of them they embrace him as one of their own and Skipper's wily enough to always enact the role of polite gentlemen to their parents. 

            There's more than a few surprises and delights to discover here, if you're up for seeking out the film. Lyons inhabits the charismatic, seductive Skipper to chilling perfection......he's smooth as creamy sun tan lotion until something (or someone) provokes him enough to drop his mask of normality.  The someone specifically is elusive teen Roberta,(Belinda Montgomery) whom Skipper pursues even though she and town cops are the only ones who sees through him.........(but not all the way and not soon enough.....)

            The other bonus that staggered me......the incredible line-up in the film's supporting cast. Where do I even begin?  Richard Thomas, only a year away from TV stardom as John-Boy in "The Waltons" shows up as a reform school refugee whom Lyons takes under his wing. Bel Geddes (of "Vertigo") I already mentioned. Then there's star-crossed ex-starlets Fay Spain and Gloria Graham as some of the parents,  James Broderick (yes, Matthew's dad)pops up as Skipper's former high school teacher, painfully insightful on his ex-student's failings as a human being. Ed Asner weighs in as ominous adult who also knows Skipper all too well.....and reliable character guys Michael Conrad, George Murdock and Geoffrey Lewis (Juliet's dad) are in the mix too. 

            Leonard Rosenman throws in a edgy nervous score but the only the only thing here I wasn't crazy about was the muddy, soft focus photography, which, sorry to say, dates a lot of 1970's films. But I'm willing to literally look around it and recommend "The Todd Killings" as a top-tier 3 & 1/2 star thriller worth checking out (***1/2).    An unsettling portrait of a predator and his not-too-bright prey.

'THE KILLER'....THE QUINTESSENTIAL NETFLIX NON-EVENT

The Killer (2023)   After enduring its interminable two hours, this David Fincher film left me gaping with one simple reaction.....

             That's it??  This is what Fincher poured all his considerable talent and effort into??  Ya gotta be shittin' me........

              Nobody's denying this movie is slick, stylish, polished to a high sheen and played to perfection by a few charismatic, gifted actors like Michael Fassbender and Tilda Swinton.....

              But then again, so were dozens and dozens of other, older films that "The Killer" duplicates. 

              Just to name a few...."Point Blank" with Lee Marvin, Le Samouri with Alain Delon, Collateral with Tom Cruise, Leon The Professional with Jean Reno........

              So what's new in "The Killer"?  Did Fincher uncover all sorts of illuminating insights into the mind of a sociopathic assassin that all those other films missed?

               Nope. Same old stuff. Cold, cool guy who maintains his distanced aloof attitude toward his chosen field.....maintaining his independence as a freelance hitman for hire. 

              In its first half hour, the film pounds the Hitman Philosophy into your head until you'll beg for mercy......as espoused in the endless internal monologue of the unnamed title character (Michael Fassbender).

               For a quicker, more to-the-point condensed version of the killer's blathering musings, you can just refer to the few succinct lines written for Max Von Sydow's assassin in "Three Days Of The Condor",

                When Fassbender's latest hit goes awry, the corporate lizard who hired him needs to clean up loose ends, Fassbender being one of them.  This results in grievous injury to the killer's beloved girlfriend parked in his sumptuous Dominican Republic hideaway......

               For hitman, that's sets his usual non-existent moral compass a spinnin'......so off he goes to methodically wipe out everyone on the murder-for-hire food chain, right up to the top lizard (Arliss Howard).

               At this point, before you drift off to sleep, you'll want to stay awake for a bravura brawl between our killer and the hulking goon who damaged his fair damsel. It's runs comically too long, with Fincher and his stuntmen doing their best to surpass that epic punch-up between Daniel Craig and Dave Bautista in "Spectre".

                Then the hit list lights on the killer's fellow colleague, dubbed here "The Expert" played by Tilda Swinton and compared (not without some accuracy) to a Q-tip.  In a film mostly devoid of dialogue, Swinton makes the most out of her 'Farewell to me' speech, thereby justifying her presence in the film.......

                 If Fincher wanted to prove he could craft a film to rival the spiffy, visually dazzling but utterly hollow thrillers of...,say Tony Scott or Michael Mann, then mission accomplished.......

                  But for a filmmaker famous for swinging for the fences, what a tiresome, uninteresting mission to pursue......2 stars (**)>

               

'PERFECT SHOT'....A VERY SPECIAL AGENT HUNTS DOWN A TICKING HIJACKED NUKE

 Perfect Shot by Steve Urszenyi (2023)

           Wow. And double wow. I tore through this book faster than the bullets that come flying in all directions at Special Agent Alexandra 'Alex' Martel. For every reader who loves diving into a non-stop, perpetual motion international thriller. this one's a must.......this is the epitome of Action-Adventure with two capital "A"s.

          FBI Special Agent Martel, combat veteran, ex-paramedic and world class sniper is on loan to Interpol for her 'particular set of skills'. And she's instantly plunged into thwarting an attempt by terrorists to swipe a nuclear warhead.

            But in this world of increasing, dire global threats and double dealing espionage, nothing (and nobody) is what they appear to be. And that includes a murdered young woman whom Alex once befriended in Paris and now revealed as an MI5 British agent......an agent who may have died uncovering intel related to Alex's hunt for the stolen warhead.

            Up against continuous violent action, Alex finds herself at odds with her new unwanted partner CIA special operative Caleb. But you can bet your Sig Sauer firearms they've got each other backs when bullets and fists start coming at them at every twist and turn of the plot And once Alex is provoked into action, it doesn't bode well for her many assailants.

           From the opening firefight to the slam bang clock-ticking-down finale, 'Perfect Shot' gave me perfect thrill ride, guaranteeing I'll be first in line to read Alex's next adventure. And I'm pretty sure everyone's figured out by now that I'm talking 5 star review here....... (*****)

'THE HORRIBLE DR. HICHCOCK'.....HE'S HELL IN BED....AS LONG AS THEY'RE DEAD........

The Horrible Dr. Hichcock (1962)    In the much lampooned "Love Story", the operative phrase  was 'Love means never having to say you're sorry....."  (Yeah, right....)

            This Italian gothic horror, dripping with atmosphere and candle wax, gives out a different bit of wisdom......

            Necrophilia means never having to say goodbye........

            Now here's a film truly ahead of its time for 1962.......even the most perverse, most blood drenched horror films of the era stayed away from sex with dead people. That particular kink was maybe just a corpse too far for even the most depraved producers of scary stuff......

            But not director Riccardo Freda, a prolific purveyor of international pulp Euro-trash ("Caltiki The Immortal Monster", "The Giants Of Thessaly", "Theodora, Slave Empress").

            With a poverty level budget and shooting schedule, Freda somehow slapped together this haunting, utterly bizarre nightmare. Like all iconic horror films, it bears the appearance of a bad dream you're experiencing while wide awake.....(very much like Argento's legendary "Suspiria")

             And every so often, some of the startling, brightly colored imagery in play can stay with you for decades. 

            It's near the turn of the century at the forbidding mansion of the cold, imperious medical genius Dr. Hichcock (effectively played by stiff-upper-Brit Robert Flemyng, who wanted to bail out once he found out he'd have to ravish some stiffs.....real stiffs, not just dumb starlets....)

            Doc H. loves his gorgeous wifey Margareta (Maria Teresa Vianello), but only after he induces her into a coma so she'll look dead when he jumps her bones.  But ooops.......too much sleepy-juice and poor wifey goes belly up for real, literally Margareta-ville wasting away..........leading Doc to flee for Italy.....

            But years later, he's back at haunted Hichcock-ville with a spankin' new wifey Cynthia (the exotic, drop dead gorgeous Barbara Steele, at the very height of her reign as the magnificent Malificent of Italian horror) Sexless prude that he is, Doc leaves Cyn to her own devices, since he much prefers the hospital, where he's free to cop a feel off a corpse.....

            While Doc's at his clinic, honeymooning with newly-deads at the morgue, poor Cyn's being haunted by none other than Margareta........but surprise, surprise, slightly decomposed Margie's still alive, cared for by Doc's extra creepy housekeeper Martha (Harriet Medin, who's only missing a 'Martha-Extra Creepy Housekeeper' name tag to complete her performance.)

           All these grisly goings-on finally culminate during one of those famous Gothic Movie Storms, where the thunder and lightning continuously pounds non stop, as if on a pre-recorded loop) 

          Overcooked and as silly as it sounds, I couldn't deny the film's ripe visuals and attentive artistry....especially the film's most eyeball-poppin' image of Robert Flemyng during one of Steele's nightmares.....his face, bathed in glowing scarlet, warping into a twisted representation of Dr. Hichcock's true evil nature. 

           ......which makes the film a must see for all horror completists. Even today, you won't find too many films willing to show a doctor who'll fully examine a patient with the ultimate pre-existing condition.....3 stars (***).

WEEKEND MADNESS WRAP-UP.....SPECIAL 'SCUM AND SCUMMIER' EDITION

 

Nikki Haley mutters, "You're just scum" to Vivek Ramaswamy during GOP debate......at the conclusion of the debate, Donald Trump offers Haley the Secretary Of Defense position in his potential Presidential cabinet, while telling Ramaswamy he's got a good shot at Mar-A-Lago cabana cleaner as soon as there's an opening.........

November 2023 voters let the GOP know what they really think of their abortion banning policies....to the astounding shock and surprise of no one except Republicans.....to which GOP leaders respond...."We stand by our God-given right to poke our noses into every woman's uterus so we can fully check to see what's going on in each one....especially the raped ones..."

Sen. Tommy Tuberville blames the Democrats for his months long blockade of military promotions......and sends 'Thank You' notes for the gift baskets of fruit and candy sent to his office by Vladimir Putin, Kim Jung Un and Hamas commanders......

Trump makes gaffe after gaffe at his rallies, at one point confusing China with North Korea.....in an angry Truth Social rant, Trump denied that streams of orange dye were seen dribbling out of his ears, leading to severe brain damage........

'THE MARSH KING'S DAUGHTER'......THE SPARKNOTES VERSION OF THE BOOK......

The Marsh King's Daughter (2023)    I'm not necessarily in favor of turning every novel into a 10 episode streaming mini-series, as opposed to a single, self-contained feature film. 

           But this might have been the best way to go to present a filmed adaptation of Karen Dionne's 2017 book.

            Make note of the publication year.....over six years ago.  Anybody remember the book?  Anybody remember reading the book?  Bueller? Bueller?

            It should've hit the theaters in 2018, but cruel fate let it languish in development hell.....and then came COVID......

            So here at long last, we have a semi-competent film which efficiently (if nothing else) crams the book's story, characters and events into 110 minutes.......sometimes quickly, sometimes not. 

            No major liberties are taken with the book's basic structure, but its deep dive into physical abuse, and psychological trauma end up simplified and condensed for quick easy digestion. Author Dionne clearly had more on her mind than mere thrills 'n chills......making her story seem like a blending of "Deliverance" and "Where The Crawdads Sing".

             But Lionsgate shaved off the subtext and character development, keeping only the immediate violent whim-whams........you know, the stuff that looks good on the trailer.  The company also shaved off any money to promote the film, with not a single ad in sight.  The corporate lizards simply dumped it into theaters, in the remote hope that maybe a few people would recall the book. 

           I did. But not the only other people who attended my showing, a young millennial couple who decided to take a chance on the film without knowing a thing about it. 

           Basically, the film presents a swift, slimmed down synopsis of the book, minus any of the depth of characterization that Dionne brought to the novel.

           Young married mom Helena (Daisy Ridley) was birthed by an abducted, raped teen (Caren Pistorius) held prisoner for years in remote Michigan marshlands by evil loon Jacob (Ben Mendelsohn).  Years after mother and daughter escaped, the imprisoned Jacob breaks free after killing several prison guards. 

           Helena's forced to reveal her terrible backstory to her stunned husband. (Garret Hedlund), rocking her marriage.  Trained by her father to survive and thrive in the wild, she knows she's the only one who can hunt him down before he gets around to enslaving both her and her own toddler daughter. 

         Then it's off to the swamps and woods for the extended brutal duel between the devilish dad and his grown-up little girl determined to end him.......(which will make the DVD a wonderfully perverse Father's Day gift....heh, heh, heh...)

          At least it's well cast. Ridley really brings the nervous angst and long suppressed fear and rage. And Mendelsohn deftly underplays the wilderness psycho, making him all the more scary. Where the film badly falls down is in its perfunctory, abbreviated treatment of Helena's mother, seen only briefly in flashbacks. Mostly gone from the film is the book's tragic haunted portrait of the mom as a young girl, forever broken and emotionally destroyed by years of captivity and horrific abuse.

        What's left here.....a passable, time-waster of a thriller, but only if you wait for it for settle in to Netflix or some other streaming service that you already subscribe to. Which is where this movie should've parked itself to begin with.........  2 & 1/2 stars (**1/2)

'THE PORCELAIN MAKER'.....EPIC LOVE, SUSPENSE, DANGER, ARTWORK......AND HIMMLER!

 The Porcelain Maker by Sarah Freethy (2023)

         What a stunning debut novel.........and what a heart-wrenching, immersive reading experience this was. This book captivated me on so many different levels. It begins as an intriguing family mystery at a Cincinnati auction house in 1993 and then plunges backward into the darkest, most horrific era of world history.

         As the evil of Nazis and fascism spreads across 1920's Germany, we're introduced to star-crossed lovers Max and Bettina, both brilliant creative artists in their respective fields. Max is an Austrian Jewish architect planning the Autobahn and Bettina's already making a name for herself as a groundbreaking avant-garde artist.

        Like many others, Max and Bettina unwisely remain in Germany until it's too late to escape. Captured and sent to Dachau concentration camp, Max survives by his talent for sculpting porcelain figurines for no less than Nazi commander Heinrich Himmler.

           While desperately trying to contact Max,, Bettina joins a resistance movement by marrying a repulsive SS officer for the purpose of spying on him. The non stop peril these two artistically gifted soulmates find themselves in reaches excruciating levels of suspense and overpowering heartbreak.

           In those 50 years later flash-forwards, Max and Bettina's story is painstakingly pieced together by Bettina's daughter Clara, the person seeking out figurines at that Cincinnati auction, the ones possibly crafted at Dachau. And here's where author Sarah Freethy delivers all the emotional gut-punches guaranteed to leave readers shaken and tearful.

           With its sweeping epic history, aching romance and unbearable tension, I'd consider this as one of the Must Reads of this or any year. An absolute 5 star bell ringer. (*****)

WEEKEND MADNESS WRAP-UP......SPECIAL "VLADIMIR TUBERVILLE" EDITION.......

 GOP senators finally berate Tommy Tuberville for hobbling the U.S. military by holding up promotions over his obsession with abortion.... while desperately ill patients waited for donor hearts, livers and kidneys, the Republican senators bumped to the head of the line for spine transplants. Sen. Lindsay Graham, after spending years un-spined by Donald Trump, commented, "Holy crap, I'd forgotten what it's like to stand up and speak sanity and truth. So that's what a spine feels like!"

Full time MAGA-Moron and Trumpanzee Speaker Of The House Mike Johnson becomes second in line for the Presidency should anything happen to Joe Biden and Kamala Harris......and already  consulted with the Department Of Defense.....asking if nuclear strike targets could include Planned Parenthood centers, gay bars and theaters featuring drag shows.....

Mike Pence drops out GOP Presidential race.....Trump seethes over Pence's failure give him an endorsement......muttered the angry ex-President, "That miserable little bible-thumping pussy......he was never in any real danger on Jan. 6th......I'm sure my supporters would have cut the hanging rope just before he choked to death....they're very good people, ya know. And.some people just can't take a joke...."

Trump continues to defy multiple gag orders.......and also threatens Federal judges that he'll hold his breath and won't eat his green beans if they don't stop scolding him......

Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump testify at their father's fraud sentencing hearing, only managing to dig deeper holes for themselves and Donald St........recent medical exams proved the Trump sons truthful when they claimed "to pour concrete" and get involved in accounting details.  MRI scans revealed large deposits of concrete in each of their brains....." Announced their family physician, "Yes, it's true.....medically, they're what we always imagined.....dumb as rocks....."

'THE SWARM'.....YRR'S, MINE AND OURS.......

 The Swarm (2023-Mini-Series)    I really looked forward to enjoying the hell out of this ambitious, German produced 8 episode series. 

             And in various chunks and spurts, I did. 

             But I'm also sad to report that much of it, way too much of it, turned out to be a boring slog to get through. For six of its 8 episodes, it wallowed, as if in quicksand, in the tedious, superfluous soap opera  troubles of its characters.  

               And all the exciting, ominous sci-fi action-adventure-suspense sequences would slow down to a crawl to make way for the groan-worthy "Days Of Our Lives" crapola.

               The premise, which couldn't possibly be more timely, seizes you by the throat and gut. Based on a worldwide best seller by Frank Schatzing, it presents an up-to-the minute 'War Of The Worlds' scenario........with the two worlds in combat  sharing planet Earth - humanity on the land versus a sentient lifeform that's lived in the oceans since the dawn of oceans. 

                The 'Yrr' (as they're dubbed by the scientists who figure out their existence) function as a collective of single cells into one intelligent mass,  And they're pissed and ready to rumble. 

                Fed up with humankind turning their oceans into toxic dumps, the Yrr declare war on us......sending out whales, crabs, mussels, deadly species, fatal viruses to wreak death and destruction upon us uncomprehending humans.  And when the Yrr start generating tsunamis to wipe us out in mass quantities,, a small band of scientists finally theorize we're in the Yrr's crosshairs and they're out eradicate us. 

                Stuffed with that sudsy filler I've already complained about, the first six episodes dawdle and poke along. Thankfully, by the final two episodes 7 and 8, the writing and direction focus completely on the ultimate showdown between humans and Yrr. The science gang travel to arctic seas to meet the Yrr on their home turf, with the intent of either making peace with them or learning what'll destroy them. 

                  While Schatzing's book comes to a most definite conclusion, the mini-series indulges in a fanciful "2001" array of visuals before serving up an abrupt, surprising end. It leaves viewers the option of either coming up with their own explanations and settle for waiting for the next season......

                Personally, I hate that kind of corporate smoke-and-mirrors cliffhanger nonsense......forever dangling closure in front of viewers, making us all think we've been tricked into watching nothing but an extended trailer for Season 2. 

                  BQ calls bullshit. And that's why I'm only handing out 2 & !/2 stars (**1/2) . Well put together, with excellent work from the entire cast. But if there are in fact more episodes in the works, the showrunners might consider keeping their eye on the ball......less human angst, more Yrr!