Only now does it occur to me... GRAVITY

Only now does it occur to me...  that the glory of 3-D has brought us a giant ape flinging boulders right at me and Jason Voorhees squeezing a man's head until the eyeball shoots out.  It's shown us Freddy Krueger, Michael Ironside, and even Charles Bronson in three-dimensions.  I've even seen blue cat people have strongly-implied weirdo hair sex.  But never did I ever expect to be...   
SPLOOSHED IN THE FACE WITH SANDRA BULLOCK'S CGI SPACE-TEARS!!!

 

Let me make this brief and relatively spoiler-free:  while GRAVITY indeed boasts some incredible visuals, its manipulative attempts at emotional depth are in general clumsy, unearned, and give off the overwhelming impression that they've been scraped together from the afterglow of superior movies (DON'T LOOK NOW?  APOLLO 13?).  Sadly, this cannot be remedied by an Ed Harris vocal cameo (he gets about 10 minutes of screentime, tops) or any number of George HaClooncinations, even when he does his best Doug Ross impersonation.

[It's also worth mentioning that Sandra Bullock's numerous wardrobe changes– from spacesuit into hot pants/tank top and back again– flavor the film with a "peekaboo– gym bod!" salaciousness that distracts from the narrative drive and nearly suggests a sexploitation movie, which gave rise to the idea that I'd much rather have seen a GRAVITY that was made in the 1970s, starring Pam Grier and Sid Haig!]

Perhaps I made a mistake in watching it nearly back-to-back with one of my all-time favorite 'survival journey' movies, THE WAGES OF FEAR, a film that that firmly balances character development and white knuckle thrills with virtuosic integrity; conversely, GRAVITY's mushier than a melty banana split (and I don't mean one made with astronaut ice cream!). 

Hell, I don't mean to shit on this thing; it seems that many have derived genuine emotional responses from it, including some teary-eyed patrons at my local theater.  Perhaps ours is a fragmented era of ramshackle profundities, where the existential hum can be quieted with a pat on the shoulder and a few empty platitudes.  Perhaps the legacy of cosmic wonder and moral wisdom forged by writers like Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, and Arthur C. Clarke has merely become... CHICKEN SOUP FOR THE ASTRONAUT SOUL.  Now that makes me sad.  I s'pose you succeeded after all, GRAVITY!

In closing, for its unsubtle attempts at emotional button-pushing and a visual vocabulary that consists of objects hovering slowly across the frame, I think perhaps a better title may have been:

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Only now does it occur to me... WORLD WAR Z

Only now does it occur to me...  that if I wanted to watch awkward, unwashed human forms piling on top of each other for nearly two hours...

...I'd have gone to a contact improv class!

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Only now does it occur to me... BULLET TO THE HEAD

Only now does it occur to me...  that I would ever witness the following tableau:  A drugged-out, minor henchman played by Christian Slater (in a fox mask), partying at a low-rent version of EYES WIDE SHUT's creepy ball 

is stalked into the bathroom by a sheet-music-mask-wearing, revenge-seeking Stallone

and abducted at knifepoint whilst mid-whiz

as Stallone uses the one-liner:  "Grip it and zip it, party boy!"

As to the film: though it's a mean, semi-lean action picture by the legendary Walter Hill, it's not quite as good as I wanted it to be, despite the meaty acting stylings of Mr. Stallone and the extended-cameo-appearance by The Slater Factor.  Carry on.

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Music Review: GOBLIN LIVE IN CONCERT (2013, U.S.)

As a part of their first-ever North American tour (after a long and on-again-off-again history dating back to 1972), I was lucky enough to see Goblin perform live last night at the Music Hall of Williamsburg in Brooklyn, NY.  

They played crowd-pleasing selections from the album ROLLER and from their soundtracks to ZOMBI (DAWN OF THE DEAD), PROFONDO ROSSO (DEEP RED), NON HO SONNO (SLEEPLESS), TENEBRE, and PHENOMENA, among others, often accompanied by gory mondo projections, including clips from DAWN OF THE DEAD and the Goblin-Argento oeuvre.

It was a pleasure to see three of the original members:  the legendary Claudio Simonetti (wearing a DANGER: DIABOLIK t-shirt),

Simonetti tinkles the ivories.  Photo by Greg Cristman, from the writeup at Brooklyn Vegan.

veteran Maurizio Guarini jammin' on the second keyboard, and virtuoso Massimo Morante (prog) rocking out (on his birthday, no less!) in tight leather pants, sunglasses, and a bandana that could hardly tame his frizzy, Italo-rocker 70s hair.

Massimo plays it loud. Photo by Greg Cristman, from the writeup at Brooklyn Vegan.

This was, obviously, outstanding.  (They were also joined by newer members, drummer Titta Tani and bassist Bruno Previtali.)

A near front-row view afforded me a glimpse of their tightly-knit, non-verbal shorthand, from which I get a sort of furtive satisfaction when I have the privilege of seeing it live from a band I love.  Their Italian-accented banter with the audience was endearing and fantastic ("Hello Brew-kleen!"), Claudio did the vox effects from TENEBRE live, and he dared the audience to do their best witchy whispering along with him on SUSPIRIA– in short, I had a big dopey grin on my face the entire time.

Also, I never thought I would see Claudio Simonetti and Massimo Morante sing "Happy Birthday to Me" and mock-drink from a giant cardboard cut-out of a bottle of Jim Beam while a crowd of Brooklynites roared in approval.  And, my Lord– they may be getting a bit long in the tooth, but as my ringing ears can attest, they played it loud.  What a show– and a fine start to my Halloween season!

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Only now does it occur to me... PIRANHA 3DD

Only now does it occur to me...  that Gary Busey and Clu Gulager have ever fused together their particular demented aesthetics and artistic manias in the form of something as accessible as a "film scene."

Yes, the opening scene of PIRANHA 3DD (directed by Clu's son, John) affords us such an opportunity, as two hapless backwater folk (Busey and Gulager) wade into ominous marshland to examine a flatulent, piranha-infested cow-corpse.  Needless to say, they don't last for long, but Clu (still wonderful, at 84 years-young) gets to growl out some "God damns" and "What the hells"

and Busey gets to (improvise?) some peculiar dialogue:

so it certainly maintains a kind of integrity.

(And for those of you new to the Gulager "scene," I advise checking out my review of THE KILLERS, which spells it out more thoughtfully.)

Anyway, the incredible mixture of the two volatile substances that are Busey and Gulager had me wondering if this was the first time it had ever happened.  Some IMDb-ing revealed that in 1991, they both appeared in MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS BEEN COWBOYS, a rodeo drama which co-stars Scott Glenn, Kate Capshaw, Ben Johnson, and Clarence Williams III, among others.  While I've been unable to discern whether or not Busey and Gulager shared any scenes together, I have been able to discern that it is a film that must be seen!

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Film Review: THE PAPERBOY: BASED ON THE NOVEL "THE PAPERBOY" BY PETE DEXTER (2012, Lee Daniels)

Jellyfish Stings: 5 of 5.
Running Time: 107 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Starring Zac Efron (HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL, 17 AGAIN), Matthew McConaughey (TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE: THE NEXT GENERATION, ANGELS IN THE OUTFIELD), Nicole Kidman (BMX BANDITS, BATMAN FOREVER), John Cusack (ONE CRAZY SUMMER, CON AIR), David Oyelowo (RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES, JACK REACHER), Macy Gray (THE CROW: WICKED PRAYER, the Schwarzenegger AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS), and Scott Glenn (URBAN COWBOY, BACKDRAFT). Co-adapted, and based on the novel by Pete Dexter (MICHAEL, PARIS TROUT, WILD BILL). Directed and co-adapted by Lee Daniels (PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL "PUSH" BY SAPPHIRE, SHADOWBOXER).
Tag-line: None that I could find.
Best one-liner: "IF ANYONE'S GONNA PISS ON HIM, IT'S GONNA BE ME!"

After making PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL 'PUSH' BY SAPPHIRE, Lee Daniels decided to win over mainstream filmgoers once again with a film designed to address capital-I "Important" issues in broad, hilarious strokes and deliver the sort of glossy, over the top melodrama audiences have been deeply craving in the wake of jaw-dropping trashterpieces like CRASH '04, and other films of its ilk.

Originally designed as Pedro Almodóvar's English-language debut (for those who are unfamiliar, he's the post-Franco, candy-colored Spanish fusion of Alfred Hitchcock and John Waters), it was handed off to Mr. Daniels, who no doubt sought to replicate the awards buzz and loving glow he received from PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL 'PUSH' BY SAPPHIRE.   Lucky for us all, Almodóvar left a few of his delightful fingerprints behind on this thing (he supposedly tweaked the treatment, if not the script), and that, combined with a high-budgeted, borderline santicmonious disposition has created a work of lunatic, corporate-funded camp, the likes of which I've never seen before.  It's like if Paul Verhoeven did a remake of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, or as if Lucio Fulci directed THE FIRM.  It is a movie so spectacularly awful and so splendidly sure of itself that it transcends kitsch:  it is "kitschscendent." Ladies and gentlemen:  it's the second installment of Crawdad-Lickin', Southern-Fried Sleaze-O-Rama, and hot damn– my Dixie cup runneth over!

Here's the 1950s sci-fi movie poster rundown:

SEE!

Nicole Kidman giving a Southern accent her best shot and engaging in some "no-touch" masturbation in front of an audience so that her convicted murderer boyfriend (John Cusack) can get off, via mutual manacle masturbation.

Cusack contemplates: mutual manacle masturbation, his paycheck.

This scene is somehow the exact median point between Kathleen Turner's wild courtroom leg thrashing in SERIAL MOM and Sharon Stone's leg-cross-and-uncross technique in BASIC INSTINCT.


Zac Efron's two modes of acting:  looking toward and away from Nicole Kidman.

Just when you think the scene has "peaked," it continues to devolve/escalate and reach new, even trashier depths/heights.  If this film had actually won Academy Awards, I would like to think that this scene– in slow motion and set to sweeping music– would one day be featured in a heartstring-tugging montage about the social courage of Hollywood.

McConaughey's arched eyebrow is well-placed.


David Oyelowo averts his gaze, an act that the audience is somehow unable to do.  It's like watching a car accident.


Pictured:  Oscar gold.   Well, at least Golden Globe gold.  Er, at least Golden Globe nomination gold.  And Golden Globe nominations still mean something– I mean, you can't bribe your way into getting one for anything less than a Cher concert!

WATCH! 

An elderly Scott Glenn successfully maintain his dignity (and some wicked old man sideburns) in the midst of this bayou-blastin' shitshow!

This ain't URBAN COWBOY, pardner!


BEHOLD!

(not pictured)

Matthew McConaughey– bloody, naked, and hogtied– after being raped and tortured by some random dudes in a plotline designed to highlight the plight of closeted gay men during the 1960s, but which instead feels like oddly corporate rape-sploitation that makes PULP FICTION's gimps n' samurai swords look tasteful in comparison.  At least McConaughey is having fun with it, though– after all, this was made the same year as KILLER JOE and MAGIC MIKE.


BEAR WITNESS!

To the best urination scene in Oscar bait since THE GREEN MILE.  You see, what happens is this:

Zac Efron is out for an innocuous swim when he is stung by a cluster of CGI jellyfish.


He makes his way back to the shore in agony, sadly crawling toward trashy Nicole Kidman– his unrequited summer love.  (Did I mention that this movie is sort of framed like a nostalgic, star-crossed, romantic coming of age film?)

Anyway, he is first spied by a gaggle of young women who take note of his jellyfish-stung state and debate who is going to have to urinate on him.

Then Nicole Kidman arrives, and despite being told to call an ambulance,

she becomes combative, drives the young women away, and delivers a line that clearly should have been delivered by, I don't know, an aging Joan Crawford?:

  

"IF ANYONE'S GONNA PISS ON HIM, IT'S GONNA BE ME!"  

Sheer poetry.  This is followed by:

"HE DON'T LIKE STRANGERS PEEIN' ON HIM!"  

She then proceeds to, well, pee on him in a drawn-out mess of a scene, which, as you can see, is described by the subtitles as "full of grunting."

This is one of those

seminal moments

in an aging actress's career,

like Anna Magnani in THE ROSE TATTOO, or Susan Sarandon in DEAD MAN WALKING, or

or Katherine Hepburn in almost anything, from THE AFRICAN QUEEN to GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER 

to, say... ON GOLDEN POND?

CONTEMPLATE!

The long awaited, crawdad-lickin' sex scene between a recently freed John Cusack and his lady love, trashy Nicole Kidman.  Somehow, you already knew that it was going to involve some self-esteem building salad tossing, right?:


It's not my fault that this particular activity has become a recurring motif during this Southern-Fried Sleaze-O-Rama series (or as I newly christened it, "Mason Licksin'").  Also, their sex scene is artfully crosscut with footage of wild boars.

Note grunting.

Either this is a stroke of hilarious, subversive genius worthy of Luis Buñuel...  or an incredibly shallow person's attempt at capital-S "Symbolism."  Either way I'm entertained, so I suppose it doesn't matter much.


GAZE UPON!

An axe versus machete fight scene between an eye-patch-wearing Matthew McConaughey and a greasy bayou John Cusack!  This is clearly worth the price of admission alone.  Though it's brief, it nearly plays like a deleted scene from HARD TARGET!  (No JCVD and Wilford Brimley, though.)


Place yer bets, kiddies!


TAKE A GANDER AT!

The absurdist finale, whereupon the film fully transforms into a FRIDAY THE 13TH sequel, complete with a machete-wielding Jason Voorhees John Cusack chasing a generic teenager Zac Efron around Crystal Lake the bayou.



Cusack taunts him in that ersatz Hollywood Southern accent, and it sounds like "Weahuh yew gooan, papuhboyyy?"  It's pretty damn good.


Hollywood, God bless you for unwittingly pumping cash into making the kind of ludicrous and expensive trash that Russ Meyer could only have dreamed of.
In closing, I have decided that I cannot award THE PAPERBOY any stars, but that I must give it five jellyfish stings out of five. And then I'm going to piss on them.

–Sean Gill

P.S.  Stay tuned for the third and final installment of Crawdad-Lickin', Southern-Fried Sleaze-O-Rama!  Hint:  it could very well be called, "FIFTY SHADES OF EASTWOOD."

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Only now does it occur to me... EVA

Only now does it occur to me... that there are monsters out there, human monsters, and they're actively wasting the talents of Michael Ironside.

EVA is a laughably bad World War II movie with Merchant/Ivory pretensions that only succeeds in achieving the dramatic heights of a made-for-TV movie on the Hallmark Channel, replete with bad CGI.


WAR IS HELL

It's sights are set at an epic war-torn romance á la CASABLANCA or GONE WITH THE WIND or THE ENGLISH PATIENT and it's trudging along pretty hideously and then– thank God! – Ironside.

 
IRONSIDE MAKE BELIEVES HE'S IN A BETTER MOVIE


 PARDON MICHAEL IRONSIDE, BUT COULD HE BOTHER YOU FOR SOME GREY POUPON?  HE'S OUT AT THE MOMENT

He plays the titular character's disapproving uncle who has clearly only been given the direction to "be harsh aristocratic and mean and uncle-ly."  And by the way, that suit and tie does not appear to be period appropriate.

Then, out of the blue, they tell him to be rapey and incesty and uncle-ly:

And you know what– Ironside's trying, somewhat.  You can tell what he thinks of the movie, but he's runnin' it up that flagpole anyway.

Then, he's suddenly and ignominiously defeated via a candlestick and some meticulously choreographed community theater stage combat:


Whereupon he pops back up with panache and a Michael Myers-style re-entrance (with shades of VISITING HOURS):

Before being promptly shot down by the eponymous niece

a mere thirty-six minutes into the movie, thereby rendering the remainder of the film wholly unnecessary.  Oh, well!  Nice to see you anyway, Mr. Ironside.

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