GIRLHOUSE (2015)

 [As Girlhouse has spoiled my night, I have now spoiled Girlhouse. Read on with caution.]

Kylie Atkins' father has recently died, so it's porn for her.

After giving it some very little thought, she accepts the offer of a well-dressed stranger to appear on the porn-centric website "Girlhouse," a Big-Brother sort of set-up where a group of people live away from civilization in an isolated house with cameras in every room that broadcast their every move, only instead of "people" it's "girls," and instead of "every move" it's "every orgasm, fuck show, and methodical soaping of breasts." Once she's dropped off at the super-secret "Girlhouse" location, she meets all her costars, all of whom eventually take off their clothes, and none of whom are particularly memorable or developed.

As Kylie begins her show, she "meets" an online user by the name of Loverboy, whom all the girls know and call a sweetheart. Loverboy soon fixates on Kylie after he sends her a photo of himself and she doesn't throw herself out the window in response, but later on, after another "Girlhouse" performer finds Loverboy's picture and shows it to everyone and they all laugh and mock his not-so-ideal appearance, Loverboy loses his mind and decides there's only one fair way to handle this: murder. (He's also really good at computers, BTW.)

A film that manages to ape its concept from Halloween: Resurrection while somehow resulting in something worse, Girlhouse was written by Fred Olen Wray, directed by Jim Wynorski, and produced by Roger Cor-ohman, none of that is true. It wasn't a wrong assumption to make, however; add some corny self-awareness and even more exploitative nudity, and Girlhouse would have felt exactly like product from the 1980s -- more specifically, from the team who brought us Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers and Sorority House Massacre 2, only with a hip and modern shot of adrenaline (which means now it has internet, cell phones, and terms like "IP address" and "firewall"). An important distinction, though, is that when Corman et al. made those deliciously stupid B-movies, they weren't trying to impart any kind of wisdom or moral stature on their audience: they were more concerned with finding girls with ample breastage who could fit into all that old wardrobe recycled from their last several hundred movies that had "slime" or "massacre" in their titles. They weren't trying to be socially relevant or needlessly (and, inexplicably) preachy and indifferent all at once. They were just trying to make their films fun. And that's where Girlhouse really misses the boat. For actually managing to bring to fruition such an absurd concept as "house of slutty website performers become locked inside by one of its users who gets all pissed off because they called him ugly," only to try and turn it into some kind of disturbing or visceral experience -- well, that was the first misstep of many.

The reason it's neither disturbing nor visceral is because we just don't care.

At no point is there an attempt to devote background or development to any characters. Kylie's sole decision to become a pornographic actress is because "the money is good" and she wants to send some home to her mother. Because her motivation for her decision is to be considered selfless and done out of love and worry, we're supposed to forgive her for getting into porn, but it would have behooved our filmmakers to, perhaps, include a scene where Kylie and her mother actually share a conversation -- in person would have been nice, but over the phone would have been acceptable -- to enforce the significance of this relationship. At least once. As it is, their entire relationship is confined to them leaving voicemails for each other, and the word "MOM" appearing on Kylie's cell phone when it rings...which Kylie doesn't answer.

As for Kylie's pornsemble: two of the girls are (quite quickly) established as lesbians involved with each other, one of the girls as threatened by Kylie's appearance in the house, and another girl, who it would seem was once an actress in the house before her heroin addiction resulted in her getting the ax, makes a surprise return. Pity that NONE of these characters' subplots offer anything to the film rather than cheap thrills of girl-kissing and an additional body to hammer.

Kylie is an irritating character, a girl who willfully gets into pornography, but for whom we're expected to sympathize -- not because of any attempt at her inner conflict with the job, but because she tells anyone who will listen that her father is dead and that's really sad and then equal sign pornography. Not terribly likable, Ali Cobrin still manages to give an okay performance, but as you watch you'll suddenly realize her remarkably similar appearance to actress Rose Byrne, who tends to make good movies, and then you'll become irritated all over again because instead of watching a good movie that stars Rose Byrne, you're watching Girlhouse.

I feel intensely bad for rapper-turned-actor Slain, thanks to his appearance in this mess as Loverboy, and not just because he's the only one attempting to bring actual depth to his performance (which vanishes following the start of the third act, unless we're being asked to believe that it was the actor himself and not an underpaid body-padded stuntman who wore the jumpsuit and girl mask to stalk his house of whores), but rather because he got a pretty good head-start on a career 2.0 when Ben Affleck cast him as the revered Bubba Ragowski in Gone Baby Gone. Affleck subsequently cast him again in his box-office and bank-smashing crime thriller The Town before director Andrew Dominik chose him to play a minor role in his Brad Pitt-starring Killing Them Softly. And here, in... sigh... Girlhouse... Slaine is slumming it, with the kind of bravery needed to play a role of someone who dwells in a basement, subscribes to and depends on pornography, and who feels ostracized because of his physical appearance. The only problem is he's going through all that effort for the film Girlhouse. The actor deserves better.

Ironically, the makers of the film are selling Girlhouse as a "Halloween-type slasher," and by god are they testing the durability of the word "type," for the only thing these two films have in common is that someone wears a mask and kills some girls. Kylie is supposed to be Girlhouse's version of Laurie Strode, only instead of her character being virginal and pure by abstaining from acts and behavior that would force her to retire those traits, she instead embarks on her pornographic webshows where she willfully shows off her naked body to her viewers, but with the camera never showing her breasts: according to these filmmakers, that makes her virginal and pure. Added to Halloween are the nauseating references to Rear Window and its director, Hitchcock, who as you know reveled in cinema in which girls played strip-poker or strip-billiards and performed dildo shows on websites for users named "Tugboat" and "Cream_Slinger." Hitchcock would be sincerely proud. No, that's not sarcasm - not at all. I mean that, you idiots, he would love your dumb fucking movie.

Girlhouse is violent and filled with nudity, if you're into that sort of thing. I am, normally, but only when the actual movie surrounding the violence and nudity is worth a damn. Girlhouse isn't. Girlhouse is about as subtle as a truck carrying fireworks driving through a fireworks factory. It makes no bones about clearly endeavoring to satirize the "art" of pornography, but then doing absolutely nothing to either support or condemn it. Girlhouse offs a character by beating her in the head with a dildo before shoving it into her mouth and sealing her head with packaging tape so she suffocates. Girlhouse offs another character by having her commit suicide after her confrontation with the killer has left her mutilated because OMG, without pornography, she is, like, of no use to anyone. Girlhouse fucking ends with Kylie beating her killer to death with a camera. If that's not a failed idea at clever subtlety, ladies and gentleman, I don't know what is.

BLU-RAY REVIEW: GRINDHOUSE RELEASING'S 'THE TOUGH ONES' (1976)

One of the most popular European cinematic sub-genres of the ‘60s and ‘70s was the giallo — a hyper-stylized approach to filmmaking pioneered by Italian filmmakers Mario Bava and Dario Argento, and largely credited as the inspiration behind the slasher sub-genre. Another movement also came to prominence during this time, spearheaded by European filmmakers less interested in depicting the ghastly crimes and more in the ensuing police investigations that looked into them—poliziotteschi: dark and gritty cop and crime thrillers that often offered the same kind of pulpy thrills and graphic violence, but in far less amounts. In American terms, films like Dirty Harry and The Laughing Policeman would fall under the poliziotteschi label, even though they were less graphic than their European colleagues. While poliziotteschi weren’t necessarily graphic with horrific imagery, they often could be.

Enter 1976’s The Tough Ones (aka Rome Armed To The Teeth – god I love Italian movie titles), directed by Umberto Lenzi (the giallo Seven Blood-Stained Orchids). Leaning back on the prior example of Dirty Harry, The Tough Ones tells your typical story of a police detective making it a personal mission to stop a killer while skirting “official channels” and “the book” in order to make that happen. Detective Leonardo Tanzi (the Frank Nero-looking Maurizio Merli) is that official channels skirter, furious with a system that coddles instead of punishes, and will absolutely, positively get his man -- by any means necessary. That man? The very Scorpio-ish Vincenzo Moretto (Tomas Milian), a hunchbacked slaughterhouse worker involved in much bloodier business than merely slicing cows down the middle, and who somehow manages to out-ooze Dirty Harry’s Andrew Robinson. (“I shat this out just for you,” he tells Tanzi at one point, holding up a bullet that Tanzi forced him to swallow in a total act of male dominance earlier in the film. Talk about having explosive poop! I’m sorry!)

The Tough Ones is hard-hitting and angry. Everyone is angry at everyone else. Tanzi hates Moretto, who hates him back. Tanzi and the police chief share an equal and mutual hatred. Tanzi, at times, even seems to hate the very woman he’s dating (Maria Rosaria Omaggio), as she basically represents the liberal society that releases all of the criminals he arrests on a daily basis. Like other films from this time period, and especially with it being an Italian production, The Tough Ones is very much indicative of its era. It’s impatient and cynical like lots of ‘70s cinema, with the added discomfort of pure misogyny, perpetrated against every single female character, and often at the hands of our lead hero. At the worst of them is a random rape attack committed by a group of thugs, most of which is thankfully left to the imagination, along with a disturbing insinuation that, post-rape, the victim was additionally sexually assaulted with a tree limb. There’s more than one instance of a woman being slapped, or talked down to, or outright threatened – not a single female character walks away unscathed in some form or another. Most cinephiles already well versed in this era of filmmaking likely won’t be surprised or turned off by this, but for those of you just getting started, best prepare yourself now.

Most importantly, Lenzi knows how to stage exciting action sequences, with the standout being an extended car chase that directly leads into the finale. The chase never reaches the heights of the graceful automotive ballet Bill Hickman achieved during his stunt driving in the likes of The French Connection, Bullitt, and The Seven-Ups, but only because Lenzi wants the car chase to look manic, gritty, and very dangerous instead. Leading up to that is an impressive barroom fight, which sees Tanzi taking on a Van Damme level of henchmen and reigning supreme. (A punk gets his head smashed through the glass top of a pinball machine and it’s the most satisfying thing.) The shootout during the climax, also, gets that blood pumping – that fun, unrealistically bright kind not seen since Romero’s Dawn Of The Dead. Like most Italian genre flicks, the plot doesn’t fully gel, and the editing can sometimes make the film’s events hard to follow, but, like Bullitt, the plot of which is near incomprehensible, Lenzi’s visceral way of presenting the story and the action make up for the weak cohesiveness. 

From a technical perspective, The Tough Ones looks and sounds fantastic, lovingly restored for a 4K presentation. The release comes with both English and Italian audio tracks, along with English subtitles for the Italian track only. You can attempt to watch English with English, but the subtitles barely match; the intent is the same, but the dialogue is always different. (One of the best examples of this is when someone calls someone else a “dummy” onscreen, but the subtitles replace it with “proletarian,” which I found very amusing.)

As typical for a title from Grindhouse Releasing, this new edition of The Tough Ones comes absolutely packed to the gills with special content, not the least of them being a third bonus CD of the film’s soundtrack by Franco Micalizzi. Most viewers will likely start with the new interview with director Lenzi, which runs 55 minutes in length. Lenzi starts at the beginning of his career, talking about how he got started, along with his admitted comfort in working in the crime genre over horror, despite his having contributed several titles to the latter. But if there’s a must-watch supplement on this release, it’s the 90-minute(!) interview with Tomas Milian. He explores similar ground as far as his start in filmmaking and acting, but his interview begins with a deeply personal and sad account of his childhood at the hands of loveless and abusive parents. If you’re anything like me, you’ll be hooked on his every word following this stunning admission.

The complete list of special features included on this release is as follows:

• NEW 4K RESTORATION OF THE UNRATED AND UNCENSORED DIRECTOR'S CUT OF THE FILM
• Optional Italian language soundtrack with optional English subtitles
• Audio commentary by Mike Malloy, director Of Eurocrime! The Italian Cop And Gangster Films That Ruled The 70s
• NEW in-depth interviews with director Umberto Lenzi, actors Tomas Milian, Maria Rosaria Omaggio, Sandra Cardini, Maria Rosaria Riuzzi and Corrado Solari, screenwriter Dardano Sacchetti, and composer Franco Micalizzi
• Special tribute to Maurizio Merli with appearances by Enzo Castellari and Ruggero Deodato
• Vintage VHS intro by cult movie superstar Sybil Danning!
• Original international theatrical trailer
• Liner notes by Italian crime film expert Roberto Curti
• Deluxe embossed slip cover
• BONUS CD – original soundtrack album by Franco Micalizzi – newly remastered in stunning 24 bit/192khz sound from the original master tapes
• AND OTHER SURPRISES...
• LIMITED BONUS - Custom 30-Caliber Metal Bullet Pen – Strictly Limited to 2500 Units

The Tough Ones is now on Blu-ray from Grindhouse Releasing. 

[Reprinted from Daily Grindhouse.]

PET SEMATARY (2019)

[Contains spoilers for the novel and both adaptations of Pet Sematary.]

A remake of Pet Sematary has been bouncing around Hollywood since 2006, ever since George Clooney and Steven Soderbergh attempted to produce it through their then-new company Section Eight Productions, which had also done Christopher Nolan’s remake of Insomnia. Clooney was even set to star as Louis Creed, patriarch and serial burialist of the Creed family. That, obviously, didn’t happen. But, after a decade of development hell, Pet Sematary has arrived, and…this is what we got.

Dennis Widmyer and Kevin Kölsch, the directorial pair behind the creepy and successful indie Starry Eyes, had their work cut out for them. Doing a remake is thankless. From the very beginning, you have two choices: stay faithful to the source material (King handled the screenplay for Mary Lambert’s 1989 take, so it’s nearly identical to the book), which will have people asking you, “Why bother?” (see: The Omen remake), or find ways to stay true to the spirit of the story while taking new chances. The danger with this latter approach is making changes that devout fans will see as arbitrary, but something about which the filmmakers can say, “See? It’s different.” Pet Sematary does this a lot—makes small, seemingly unnecessary changes. Yet, if you sat down with the redux for any five-minute segment without actually knowing what you were watching, by the end of those five minutes, you would know. It’s a familiar story with familiar characters, and certainly a familiar concept; Pet Sematary never strays so far as to become unrecognizable, but if you’re already intimate with the story, you can’t help but think, again, “Why bother?”

To its credit, Pet Sematary wants to include as much as it can from the novel that the filmmakers consider “essential,” but with everything vying for space, significant portions of these elements are spread too thin. Victor Pascow (Obssa Ahmed) is barely utilized, reduced to such a footnote that you have to wonder why the filmmakers felt compelled to include him; and despite a far more graphic head wound, complete with pulsating brain, the specter doesn’t come close to matching the former’s onscreen presence. Additionally, we’re robbed of Louis and Jud meeting for the first time, given the dynamic the two men will share and the things they will experience together; instead, we find that the men are already politely acquainted halfway through a throwaway dinner sequence. Weirdly, there’s a complete lack of acknowledgment regarding the connection between the existence of the pet cemetery and the very dangerous road that cuts through the Creed and Crandall estates, being that canon explicitly states the former exists because of the latter. Meanwhile, the Timmy Baterman story, one of the creepiest sequences from the original, is downgraded to a newspaper headline. The character of Zelda, the most terrifying part from the original and the novel, is reduced to a pile of rubber bones and limbs dropped repeatedly down an elevator shaft. (Seriously.) The mishandling of this character in particular is Pet Sematary’s worst offense.

From the first frame, even before a single “scary” thing has happened, Mary Lambert’s 1989 original adaptation oozes dread. You can feel that things will go very badly for the Creeds, and already your chest begins to tighten. For example, she knows everyone has read the book, and she knows everyone will be waiting with bated breath to see little Gage lose his life in the road. That’s why she, wisely, cunningly, even sadistically, introduces the Orinco truck several scenes before the final encounter, because she wants to milk that suspense for every ounce, interrupting a happy-go-lucky picnic more than once to cut back to the truck speeding down the road toward them. Now, when the Creeds 2.0 pull up to their new rural home, you already know bad things are going to happen—not because of any induced dread, but because you’ve experienced this story twice already, so no shit. Yet, there’s a complete lack of suspense or ominousness. The admittedly beautiful opening overhead drone shot of a burning house, which we all know to be Jud’s, is another immediate reminder that, yep, bad things are afoot, but it still doesn’t quite help stoke those brooding fires. Nor does the surprisingly lifeless score by Christopher Young, who ordinarily dominates the horror genre.  

Pet Sematary makes the same mistake as another high profile remake, Rob Zombie’s terrible Halloween: whenever the filmmakers deviate from the story audiences know and love, you can feel their spark, their interest, their excitement in exploring this new direction. But when leaning back on the mainstay elements from those same stories, you can feel their obligation to just barrel through and begin tackling all their material—to infuse the property with their identity, to put a stamp on a title that they’ve temporarily borrowed before sliding it back onto the shelf. Pet Sematary doesn’t fully come alive until, ironically, Ellie does—from the dead, that is. Obviously, this is the biggest change in this new iteration, as the filmmakers felt using Ellie as the resurrected child would provide additional pathos. With Ellie being older and in a position to understand what was happening to her, she could better echo those sentiments to her god-playing father, which was meant to boost the film’s philosophical look at death. 

But what, ultimately, did we learn from this? 

What we already knew from the novel and the original adaptation.

Sometimes, dead is better. 

As for the ending, it’s dreadful; very strangely borrowing from Pet Sematary Two, it’s made even more frustrating by the fact that the alternate ending included on the home video release is far better—gloomier, more ominous, more satirical, and more tonally appropriate. The one that went to theaters was the stuff of Hollywood hokum, rendering whatever mature goodwill the film had achieved as kaput. Screenwriter Jeff Buhler says this is because they wanted the audience to leave with a smile, which seems like a bonehead decision, being that smiles don’t belong anywhere near Pet Sematary, a manuscript King found so vile that he shoved it into a drawer upon completing it, deciding it would never see the light of the day because he’d finally gone too far. 

In spite of all the whining, Pet Sematary isn’t a bad flick, and there are several things lending to its favor. Ellie’s post-resurrection appearance is subtly but deeply unnerving; a drooping eye hints at major damage going on beneath the surface (that bathtub sequence…Jesus), and young Jeté Laurence is incredibly creepy in the role before the film falls victim to the pitfalls of the “evil kid” genre. After a while, she’s reduced to a pint-sized zombie kid using “scary” glaring eyes and coming a little too close to rattling off ironic Chucky-like threats. Amy Seimetz as Rachel is easily the film’s most interesting character, and Seimetz’s performance is a large reason why: she ably sells Rachel’s extremely mangled view of death, due to her childhood experience with her sickened sister, Zelda. Lithgow, too, does fine with the role of Jud Crandall, made iconic by Fred Gwynne, though he sheds Gwynne’s folksiness in favor of curmudgeonness. He also doesn’t even attempt a New England accent. (Not a single a’yuh! What gives!) Lastly, there’s Jason Clarke—an actor capable of much more than the scripts he signs onto. It feels weird to say, but his take on Louis never reaches the same emotionally tormented heights of the original’s fairly unknown Dale Midkiff (whose “NOOOOOOOO!” is still one of the best anguished screams in cinema). 

The filmmakers poke fun at their audience by presenting sequences they think they know, only to see they’re heading off in different directions. (Jud’s death is a perfect example.) Additionally, and I don’t know this for sure, but I’d swear they lifted audio from the original flick, borrowing one use each of Zelda’s screechy “RAAAAACHEL!” and a growl from an undead Church. There also several loving nods to King’s other works, one of which includes an off-screen Jud telling a guest at Ellie’s birthday party about a rabid Saint Bernard. Widmyer and Kölsch’s design of the deadfall and the Indian burial ground behind it is ripped right from the film cells of old fashioned monster movies like Frankenstein and The Wolf Man, depicted as dreamlike and different, since this part of Ludlow’s woods are meant to be evil and mysterious. As a concept, this is tremendous, though it suffers in execution from some surprisingly shoddy green-screen. 

Paramount’s Blu-ray contains over 80 minutes of special features, including the before mentioned alternate ending, along with “Beyond the Deadfall,” which runs an hour in length across four different “chapters.” This supplement is rich with information and content, and goes beyond your standard EPK to delve heavily into the film’s genesis and production. (Stephen King does not appear.) Sadly, however, this is yet another studio release that lacks a commentary with the directors, and in its place are strange and very brief narrative pieces where several of the flick’s major characters have their own unique nightmares about the burial ground. Finally, we do get the story of Timmy Baterman, but in a weird one-man show where Lithgow, in character, sits down and presents the story as a campfire tale to us, the audience. 

Far worse adaptations have come from Stephen King, and if you asked the man himself, even he would probably rank this new version of Pet Sematary above bonafide classic The Shining, an adaptation he never misses the chance to impugn. Even so, it’s ironic that Pet Sematary’s main conflict comes from “those damned Orinco trucks” speeding dangerously back and forth, being that this new version of the story is standing directly in the middle of the road.

Pet Sematary is now available on Blu-ray from Paramount Pictures.

[Reprinted from Daily Grindhouse.]

INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS (1978)

Within a window of three years during the late '70s/early '80s, the world would receive two of the greatest sci-fi remakes of all time. The latter would be John Carpenter's grisly and bleak monster opus The Thing, but preceding it would be Philip Kaufman's Invasion of the Body Snatchers, itself also an update of a 1950s classic. That both films would heavily lean on the idea of those you knew being taken over by an organism from another world, rendering your former society untrustworthy and even deadly, were reactionary from a previous decade of civil, governmental, and international unrest and distrust. While The Thing was much more about the inability to trust on the individual level, 1978's Invasion of the Body Snatchers was centered on the fear of the bigger picture. The original Invasion, as the best cinema does--especially horror--was a reflection of the times--namely communism. Whether or not the film satirized the idea of communist ideas spreading like a virus, or was in essence a legit warning that such an event were actually taking place, will likely always be up for debate, but make no mistake: communism was at the forefront of Don Siegel's original invasion. It's one of the main reasons that the classic film hasn't dated all that well.

In the America of the 1970s, especially San Francisco, everything was changing. By then, Americans had grown disillusioned and angry over its involvement in the Vietnam War, and by the Kent State shooting which directly resulted from its protests. They had learned, through the Watergate scandal, that their own politicians didn't have the heart of the people in their best interests. Americans began looking to themselves for the social change they so desperately wanted. Feminism was born out of this. Culture exploded into more intense explorations of art, music, and literature. The sexual revolution. All the things the people gave to themselves while they waited around for their government officials to do the right thing.

But all during these awakenings, the people couldn't shake the feeling that the world around them, in which they existed, wasn't capable of the same kind of change. It hovered in the sky above and surrounded them on the ground below. Societal and international unrest was something that could be counteracted with positive social movements, but couldn't be quelled by them. Try as the people did to lose themselves in the art scene, at book readings, or in mudrooms, reminders of an unstable world was a constant crushing weight that, finally, overtook them all. As Kaufman says in his audio commentary, the 1970s saw the birth of pop psychology, during which psychiatrists relied on hugs and positive reassurance that everything was all right. "But everything was not all right."

Critics have been willing to lavish on Kaufman's Invasion redux the kind of praise it deserves, but reticent to label it as superior to its predecessor, even though it absolutely is. Not only does the Kaufman version feel timeless, it had the balls to carry through with its iconically bleak ending, whereas the original had original star Kevin McCarthy (who cameos in this version as a street lunatic bellowing "they're here!") waking up in a hospital bed and being told, basically, "Don't worry, America solved the whole invading alien species thing while you were asleep." Kaufman's take is eerier, more intimate, and somehow grittier. The camera moves around the room like an antsy witness to all that is unfolding, going in close and low on those who, it seems, have already been duplicated and replaced. The ragtag group of individuals embark on the same kind of grassroots movement to fight back against the invading threat that they would have utilized for giving the people back their voice and their freedoms to be who they are.

There's also, somewhat satirically, an emphasis on making our characters as forthright as they are oblivious. There are multiple instances in which characters are mired in their own personal connections to the unexplained phenomena unfolding around them, leaving them lost in thought--even as they walk by people tearing down the streets as if in a panic and being chased by something, or looking out a window for the imminent threat, somehow not noticing trash trucks collecting large dried out husks and crushing them into clouds of dust. Our characters are looking so hard for the explanation for the conflict surrounding them that they are missing what's in front of their faces. It leaves you wondering just what Kaufman was trying to say.

Are we already doomed? By the time we realize what the threat is, will it be too late?

The way this Invasion concludes, perhaps we already known the answer.

When strictly considering staying power, Kaufman's Invasion will likely be considered the ultimate take on Jack Finney's original novel, even though I'm sure there will be more iterations down the road as the people's strained relationship with their government continues assuredly down the wrong road. Forty years later, Invasion of the Body Snatchers is still a relevant mortality tale. Much in the same way George A. Romero used the same zombie threat to explore different facets of a failing society, the invading threat of alien organisms duplicating the human race one member at a time will continue to be explored in different ways, but for the same reason.

The 1970s has long been heralded as the greatest decade for film, giving birth to a cinematic movement known as the paranoid thriller, which includes titles like The Conversation, All the President's Men, and The French Connection. Included in this lineup is Philip Kaufman's Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which is not just a worthy contribution to the paranoia movement, but also an excellent sci-fi tale of immense fear and suspense, a call for social awareness, and finally, a superior remake of a groundbreaking predecessor. It's the kind of horror story that will live on through the ages, and like Richard Matheson's "I Am Legend," will be retold every so often to reflect the current times, though it's likely none of them will ever be as successful as Philip Kaufman's take.

WISH UPON (2017)

Wish Upon feels like it should have seen release somewhere in the late ‘90s, where more fantastical teen thrillers like The Craft, The Faculty, and Disturbing Behavior were hitting theaters. There’s a certain novelty to it that, if nothing else, offers it its own identity in a crowded genre calendar. That Wish Upon also serves as the ultimate morality tale, heavily inspired by the immortal short story The Monkey’s Paw, too, helps it to stand off from the rest.

Otherwise, Wish Upon is woeful and inept to the point of accidental amusement, and you’ve got to hand it to the screenplay for being filled with such random bits that don’t really lead anywhere and offer any explanation. Joey King’s Clare is still haunted by the suicide of her mother a decade before, and with King consistently doing solid work in some popcorn favorites (The Conjuring, White House Down), the audience likes her because she’s a likable and spunky lead. She’s, rightfully, the foundation of Wish Upon, and her talents are a good start to a pic that otherwise goes amusingly off the track, and which introduces so many befuddling elements.

Like:

Why does Clare’s father (Ryan Phillippe) trash-pick professionally instead of just getting a job? 

Why does his passion for the saxophone never amount to anything? 

Why doesn’t their next door neighbor (an utterly wasted Sherilyn Fenn) seem to mind at all that she lives directly across the street from a family who has let their lawn grow over with weeds and is covered sky high in piles of trash?

Why is Jerry O’Connell in this for a ten-second cameo where he does nothing but scream?

What’s with the casual prejudice, like having the gay teen boy at a slumber party sleep on the floor half-in/half-out of the closet, or a scene in which Clare bribes a Chinese girl with “wontons”?

As Clare makes increasingly selfish and stupid wishes even after it’s established that they not only come true but KILL ANOTHER PERSON, are we supposed to be screaming “YOU MORON” at the screen?

Wish Upon entertains, there’s no doubt about that, and though it lacks the more interesting directorial flair that John R. Leonetti brought to Annabelle (even if he was borrowing from James Wan), the story at least keeps you engaged in a “how badly is Clare going to fuck up her life?” kind of way.

If nothing else, please watch this for the twist ending, which I imagine was supposed to be very shocking and very sad, but instead results in instant hilarity.

If you have a bratty teen son or daughter who needs a reality check, maybe you could make a case for ever finding a useful reason for Wish Upon. Or, if you were looking for unintentional amusement (or if you’ve always wanted to see Ryan Phillippe pretend to play the saxophone), you could do a lot worse. 

US (2019)

At this point, Jordan Peele is only two films into a career as a director, and already he’s successfully established his own brand – as easily, or even more easily than M. Night Shymalan did when he debuted with The Sixth Sense all those years ago. Effortlessly, Peele has established what a Jordan Peele film looks like, feels like, and what it’s about. This branding, of sorts, becomes apparent as early as the opening credits for his newest film, Us, over which plays an unusual, vocal-driven piece by composer Michael Abels. However, Peele isn’t interested in regurgitating his race-based runaway film debut, Get Out. This time around, despite a similar satirical look at American culture as it pertains to wealth disparities as well as its “work hard/play hard” mentality, Us’s story is more comfortable rooting itself in a higher-concept, almost Twilight Zone-inspired environment. What that means is US more comfortably resides in the horror genre, which, I would think, makes it a bit more accessible to viewers put off by his race-driven debut.

Get Out, while injecting a healthy amount of humor into the horror, is an angry film. Though the anger is well-disguised, it delved heavily into matters regarding racism, and more specifically, cultural appropriation. Us packs more of a visceral punch, leaning more on violence and gore gags than Get Out did, but without rendering it as strictly pulpy but ultimately empty horror. Us has every bit a purpose as Get Out, but it strives toward different goals in presenting that purpose to the audience. 

If you’ve seen Us and delved into the subtext contained within, by now, you’ve likely seen interviews with Peele in which he breaks down the film’s most mooted line of dialogue: when Adelaide Wilson (Lupita Nyong’o) asks her family’s terrifying doppelgangers who they are, her shadow double, named Red, replies simply, “We’re Americans.” What may sound like an abstract answer is a pretty blunt statement from Peele about the origin of his screen monsters. They don’t hail from a distant land, or planet, or another dimension. They are flesh and blood and they exist in the same country as “normal” Americans. They just happen to exist below it instead of on its surface. (I’m assuming that the title Us is a play on “the U.S.”)

Even if you’re not interested in subtext (and Peele’s films are designed to be at least engaging and thrilling if you’re not), Us still packs a hell of a horror wallop. The opening sequence in which a young Adelaide wanders off from her drunken father and across a nighttime beach with a lightning-infused sky behind her feels wrong, but we don’t yet know why. And once she ends up in an isolated carnival house of mirrors where she encounters her equally young double for the first time, it’s unnerving, but again, without relying on anything obviously scary. And as for the doppelgangers’ first long-shot appearance, forget it: it’s fucking eerie, especially when Adelaide asks her husband, Gabe (Winston Duke), what’s out in the yard of their vacation home, and he responds, in total befuddlement, “It’s…a family.”

Putting the horror aside, Us is also unexpectedly poignant and beautiful at times, especially during the final act when Adelaide has her final encounter with her subterranean double, and in an unexpected moment of connection between them, Red tells Adelaide, “If it weren't for you, I never would've danced at all.” In spite of the horror we’ve seen Red and her brood inflict upon Adelaide and her family over the course of Us, we’re still taken aback by this moment of…what is it? Empathy? Understanding? Appreciation? Maybe resentment, as Adelaide dancing on the surface of the earth was the thing that made Red realize just how empty her existence really is?

And, lastly, there’s the humor. As expected, based on Peele’s comedy beginnings and the light touch he administered throughout Get Out, Us also manages to be very funny at times, with Winston Duke’s Gabe stealing nearly every scene he’s in. Tim Heidecker, from the insane Tim And Eric’s Awesome Show, Great Job, and Elizabeth Moss (Mad Men), appear as friends of the Wilson family, which leads to some amusing exchanges between the two, getting a lot of morbid mileage from what appears to be a near-loveless marriage. (That their vacation home is much more opulent than the Wilsons’ is a sly comment on wealth disparity.)

Us is absolutely no sophomore slump. Every bit as worthy as Peele’s celebrated and critically adored debut, and perhaps better, Us is horrific, poignant, and somehow hilarious, solidifying Peele’s place as a fresh new voice in the genre. Whether or nor you’re on board with Peele’s approach to the genre, his is a voice that the genre desperately needs right now, if nothing more than to remind critics and audiences that the genre is capable of so much more than what we often get -- more importantly: that it’s just as deserving of the celebration and conversation as more mainstream genres. 

[Reprinted from the Daily Grindhouse.]

BLU-RAY REVIEW: BLUE VELVET (1986) [CRITERION COLLECTION]

Filmmakers come and go, and while some of them manage to make some fantastic films, very few are lucky to have a style—something that makes their names and their films synonymous with each other—something that, if you’ve seen previous films from that same director in the past, you’ll immediately recognize as being part of his or her oeuvre. One of these filmmakers, absolutely, is David Lynch.

1986’s Blue Velvet almost serves as a precursor or a spiritual prequel/pilot to his most well-known work, Twin Peaks. After all, both are about the discovery of a dead body (in Blue Velvet’s case, an ear) leading its lead investigator (in both cases, a gentle Kyle MacLachlan) down a rabbit hole of depravity, surreality, and total quirkiness. Both take place in small towns whose economies are driven by the lumber industry, both boast a small charming diner where young lovers meet and conspire, and both even feature its hero investigator oddly and enthusiastically commenting on his drink of choice.  (“Man I like Heineken. Do you like Heineken?”) 

If you’re familiar with Lynch’s filmography, you’ll know that he is capable of offering a very broad approach to filmmaking. He’s done straightforward, accessible, and even mainstream films like 1980’s The Elephant Man or the Disney-financed true-life tale The Straight Story, all the way across the spectrum to the downright experimental and nearly inaccessible Inland Empire. Blue Velvet falls somewhere in the middle of the accessibility scale. The plot, while existing in a strange landscape filled with stranger characters and even stranger motivations, is straightforward. If you’re paying attention, you remain keenly aware of the plot and its various machinations. Blue Velvet isn’t one of Lynch’s vehicles where you turn to look at your movie-watching partner and admit, as the credits are rolling, that you have no idea what’s transpired those previous two hours. 

Having said that, Blue Velvet is still absolutely an acquired taste. The plot is easy to follow, but that doesn’t make the film easy to watch, which mostly (but not fully) has to do with Dennis Hopper’s astonishingly unhinged performance as crime boss/sexual deviant/rapist/murderer Frank Booth. Lynch and Hopper, in cahoots, created one of cinema’s most unseemly, discomforting, psychotic characters. Booth, sucking back on an ammonia nitrate tank, can either slither across the screen, or come barreling across like a wrecking ball gone rogue. (Hopper shares an amusing anecdote in an interview featured in this release that details how he’d suggested to Lynch that Booth be sucking on ammonia nitrate, rather than the originally intended helium, as the former has chemicals that can alter the mind. Helium does nothing for a body’s biology rather than giving its user a high-pitched cartoon voice, and Hopper recollects thinking, “David Lynch is out of his mind,” realizing after the fact that using helium would have made Frank Booth even crazier.) There aren’t enough synonyms in the world to convey Booth’s sociopathy and Hopper’s dedication to bringing him to life, making him as terrifying as possible. 

Normally, Lynch likes to dangle clues in front of the viewer, allowing them to piece together the story—if not Lynch’s own intention for his story, then at least enough for the viewer to forge his or her own interpretation. Blue Velvet’s opening moments take care of this handily, leaving no room for debate: opening shots of a quaint and charming town, a smiling and waving fireman with his faithful station house Dalmatian at his side, and just behind him, rows of picket fences and perfect blooming roses. But the camera doesn’t stop there, at surface level—instead, it dives deep beneath the grass where those roses grow until coming up on a horde of subterranean insects clawing and climbing over each other, filmed in icky close-up, giving them beastly proportions. Beneath perfect suburban sprawl, Lynch posits, lies its seamy underbelly. 

In fact, compared to head scratchers Lost Highway and Mulholland Dr, neither of which offer an easy path to at least one interpretation, Blue Velvet is seemingly about so many things: it’s a sobering and exaggerated look at fear of commitment, a skewering look at suburbanism, and even a comment on sexual domination. In ways that go beyond the physical, its three primary leads are all guilty of rape in their own way: Jeffrey’s insertion of himself into Dorothy’s life and the extended sequence during which he spies on her from her closet as she suffers a sexual attrack; Dorothy’s subsequent discovery of him and their near-sex scene that she administers at knife point; and most obviously, Frank Booth’s perceived ownership of Dorothy’s body to satisfy his most depraved needs. Everyone is looking to everyone else to fulfill their own unhealthy desires, some of whom simply want it, while others seem to think they need it. Jeffrey looks to Dorothy to satisfy his fantasies that go beyond boring suburban sweetness (Laura Dern’s character, in effect), Dorothy looks to Jeffrey for comfort, and Booth, well…Booth is out of his mind, and wants simple, animalistic satisfaction. 

MGM, back when its home video division gave a damn, previously released Blue Velvet to Blu-ray for its 25th anniversary with commendable results. However, eight years later, the Criterion Collection have given this Lynch favorite a stunning upgrade in every sense. The PQ on this release is staggering—near perfect and crisp, but without sacrificing any of Lynch’s typically hazy, soft, and dreamlike environments. Criterion wisely ported over MGM’s 70-minute retrospective, “Blue Velvet Revisited,”which offers a staggering amount of information on the production. Nearly every major cast and crew member are on hand, including archival VHS-era interviews with Lynch. The newly produced featurette, “It’s a Strange World,” catches up with a few crew members, including props master Shaw Burney (who claims credit for Dean Stockwell’s utility light karaoke microphone), and Steadicam operator Dan Kneece, who recalls with discernible wonder how Blue Velvet was not just an opportunity to collaborate with the director, but that it was the first of many over the years; Kneece has shot nearly every single one of Lynch’s features since then. Rounding out the special features are an interview with frequent Lynch composer and unexpectedly Bronx-accented Angelo Baddalamenti; “Test Chart” - vintage test footage; “The Lost Footage” - a collection of deleted scenes and alternate takes; and “Room to Dream” – an audio recording of Lynch reading from his recently released memoir.  

If this reviewer’s words carry any weight at all, then Blue Velvet is Lynch’s masterpiece along with Lost Highway, and this new release from the Criterion Collection is the easiest recommended upgrade in the world. Besting its previous incarnation in every way, Blue Velvet continues to live on in the way that it deserves, and joins its colleagues Eraserhead and Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me in the famed Criterion Collection closet.

[Reprinted from Daily Grindhouse.]

THE INCIDENT (1967)

There is a very real psychological phenomenon known as the bystander effect, which deduces that the more people present during an event which would normally require intervention to diffuse a violent or traumatic conflict, the less likely that anyone will do so. Basically, if two people witness something where intervention would be necessary, those two are more likely to intervene than if ten or fifteen people were at the same scene. The idea is that the feeling of responsibility for coming to someone’s aid becomes dispersed amongst all those who are present, and with everyone waiting for another individual to make the attempt, no one ultimately will. (Yay mankind!)

The Incident, which plays out as a bleak and uncomfortable combination of 12 Angry Men and The Taking of Pelham 123, is a cinematic embodiment of this phenomenon and a fascinating character study about fear, anger, racism, and loneliness. Like a Frank Weegee photograph come to life, the black and white photography not only captures the seediness and despair of a late ‘60s-era New York, it also provides every single character with an implied backstory about his or her experiences. Before they end up on that fateful subway train for an excruciating real-time 45-minute ride, we meet every single character. None of them are at particular high points in their lives: many are angry; some are victimized by their husband or wife or lover; some are excruciatingly lonely and looking for intimacy; and some are in a bad way and need help from someone waiting for them on the other side of that subway train ride. These characters bring their backstories and personalities to that subway ride and colors how they will react to the conflict unfolding within. 

Director Larry Peerce and writer Nicholas Baehr made a very New York film that is not complimentary of New York. Every single character is in a bad way; no one is happy. People aren’t just being victimized by two hoods on a train (with two audacious and excruciating performances by Martin Sheen and Tony Musante); they’re being victimized within their relationships, or by society at large, or by their own lives or desires. And on that subway train, some riders speak out against their harassers, begging them or even ordering them to stop. But some don’t. Some ride in silence, shying away from their harassers or even falling for their mock empathy. How some of these riders react to their torturers mirror how they reacted to their own partners before stepping onto that train. Likewise, those riders who exerted dominance over their own partners were soon dominated by one of the two hoods. It’s bloodcurdling yet fascinating to watch unfold — like a car wreck on the side of the road, only the audience sees it unfold in real time.

As the tension on the train car increases, the audience wants it to stop — would, also, like some of its characters, beg for it to stop. And an idea begins to creep in that there are a handful of young and able-bodied men on that train who could easily, if working together, disarm the two punks. But no one ever has that idea. Sure, as one after another they are victimized and terrorized, they trade awkward glances to other riders with pleading eyes, hoping for someone to intervene. But no one does. Everyone cowers, even behind those making empty threats to call the police — somehow, on a subway train, traveling 60 miles an hour.

For those who have never before experienced The Incident, it sneaks up on you like a sucker punch to the gut, sending you to your knees. It’s ugly, and bleak, and very cynical, and when it’s over, you walk away feeling as if you, yourself, were on that same subway train. There is very little physical violence used, beyond the very opening and the very closing of the film; throughout, however, it’s very psychologically violent, and doesn’t make for an easy watch. 

Those with strong stomachs and an affinity for challenging cinema need to ride this train. Those who don’t need the reminder that in this world it’s every man for himself need to get off at the next stop.

The Incident is now available on Blu-ray from Twilight Time.

LEPRECHAUN RETURNS (2018)

Despite rampaging through dozens of horror franchises over this long and broken life, I can’t say the Leprechaun franchise was ever one of them. Having seen and shrugged at the first film a couple times, I only ever saw bits and pieces of the next two sequels before stopping for the sake of my health. Unregrettably, I never followed Warwick Davis to space, or to the hood, or…back 2 tha hood. Except for the Puppet Master series, I’ve never cared less for a long-running horror fiasco. 

With the series being softly rebooted several years ago (for television), and with Davis declining to return to the role for personal reasons, it seemed like the franchise was on its way into further obscurity. Still, with the announcement of the latest entry in this series, titled Leprechaun Returns, there was one thing about the production keeping my interest: director Steve Kostanski, one of several members of filmmaking/comedy troupe Astron-6. So far, these Canadian gents have been responsible for the horror comedies Father's Day, a send-up of satanic sex thrillers from the ‘70s, and The Editor, also a send-up, this time of the giallo sub-genre…and also from the ‘70s. To each production, they brought their appreciation for genre filmmaking (and its history), their absurd sense of humor, and—my favorite—their preference for practical effects over CGI. Kostanski served as director for both of those films, along with The Void, the troupe’s crowd-funded, non-comedic horror flick that served as an homage to the likes of Clive Barker and H.P. Lovecraft. Though I’ve remained ambivalent regarding the Leprechaun franchise for equally as long as I’ve known of its existence, I opted to give it a spin to see what Kostanski could bring to the pint-sized table. 

While I can’t say this is a flick I’d ever watch again, I fully admit to having a better time with it than I expected. After all, Kostanski was riding solo, not bringing any of his troupe members along for the ride, nor did he originate the screenplay (as that duty went to Ash Vs. Evil Dead screenwriter Suzanne Keilly). Despite that, Leprechaun Returns boasts a fairly consistent and dependable sense of humor, some of which rides an air of self-awareness with respect to the genre, the series specifically, and current culture at large. (Once you “get” the joke that a bunch of college students are trying to turn a small soon-to-be sorority house “green” (hey, like a leprechaun!), you will groan groan groan.)

Taking a page from the likes of Halloween ’18, Neill Blomkamp’s abandoned Alien 3, and the forthcoming Terminator: Dark Fate, Leprechaun Returns delouses the entire series and serves as a direct sequel to the very first Jennifer Aniston-having flick. Generally, this approach can bother series loyalists (to this day, fans are still hoping for a new entry in the Halloween series that directly continues the events of 1995’s Curse Of Michael Myers --  I’m sure Paul Rudd is achingly awaiting that call), but at this point it’s doubtful even the most die-hard Leprechaun fan is worried about such richly accumulated lore being discarded in exchange for a clean break. Solidifying this “direct sequel” approach is the return of Mark Holton, reprising his role of the slow-witted Ozzie along with a small reappearance by Jennifer Aniston…sort of. In addition, the original set—a house in the middle of a sandy nowhere—has been faithfully rebuilt.

Taking over for Aniston is Taylor Spreitler, who plays Lila…the daughter of Aniston’s character from the first film. Normally these sorts of moves are rife for eye rolls (the latest entry in the Tremors series, A Cold Day In Hell, pulls a similar move by introducing the daughter of Kevin Bacon’s character), but with Leprechaun, I’ll allow it, because this franchise exists within its own rules when it comes to suspension of disbelief. It also helps to create tension among the cast once Lila confesses within fifteen minutes of movie time that her mother was insane…but that she’s also seen a tiny leprechaun stalking around, so maybe her mother wasn’t insane. Spreitler isn’t your typical “final girl.” While she satisfies the requirements of being somewhat of a loner, not interested in the same kind of debauchery of her friends, and the only one with a backstory that offers her some additional characterization, she’s also keenly aware of how absurd their threat has become—especially once a familiar face returns to offer her some ghostly help. Leprechaun Returns frequently comments on the genre and overwrought movie making, nearly surrendering to certain tropes that we expect to see in movies of this type before noting—literally out loud—that, in fact, certain things are actually terrible ideas. It’s not exactly Scream-caliber commentary, but it’s appreciated all the same, and Spreitler offers the kind of dry delivery that’s required to drive this meta-approach home.

Linden Porco takes over for long-time series presence Warwick Davis and also for pro wrestler Dylan Postl, who appeared in 2014’s Leprechaun: Origins. Under all the heavy make-up (the Leprechaun gets an eerie makeover with a more Krueger-esque approach), and his voice disguised by a thick Irish brogue (and all the terrible puns), Porco seamlessly transitions into the role. Series die-hards will know the difference, but the more casual horror fan will neither notice nor care. 

The real star of the flick is the reliance on practical effects. Except for a fiery third act and some very slight digital addendums used for touch-ups, Leprechaun Returns’ effects are done practically, bloodily, and very gooily. Despite having debuted on television for Sy Fy (a video release wasn’t even planned until the fans demanded one), the flick is gruesome and gives most theatrically released slasher flicks a run for its pot o’ gold. Kostanski’s background proves this was a purposeful choice, along with his amusing nods to other horror properties (there’s a Jaws nod that is both stupid and charming). 

Leprechaun Returns isn’t enough of a triumph to cause a wild reversal and convert me to series loyalism, but I’m glad I watched it. It was good for a handful of laughs, a bigger handful of bloody carnage, and despite not being a fan of this series, the nods to the original still manage to work on that nostalgic level. Franchise fans will likely enjoy this, along with non-fans who still enjoy a bawdy, bloody, and broad good time.

[Reprinted from The Daily Grindhouse.]

HOLE IN THE GROUND (2019)

The evil kid sub-genre has been kicking it at least since 1956’s The Bad Seed, but was certainly most popularized following the release of The Omen in 1976. Richard Donner’s anti-Christ fable is still considered one of the all-time greats released during film’s pinnacle of the 1970s, having inspired three sequels, a remake, and a short-lived television series. Ever since then, most evil kid flicks have taken its page from The Omen just a little, and in some situations more than others, it absolutely shows.

I say over and over that I don’t care how many times you repackage the same horror concepts and tropes. So long as your flick is well made, lacks pretension, and adds just a twist of freshness, I’m on board. (For example, I adore The Conjuring, even though it tells one of the most derivative stories possible in the genre.) And that’s where The Hole in the Ground comes in. 

Possibly based on the short story “The Samhain Feis” by Peter Tremayne, about a woman and her young son escaping a miserable husband/father to a cottage in Ireland where the son becomes possessed (maybe) by an ancient spirit, director Lee Cronin makes his feature directorial debut in this familiar but well-made supernatural tale. As noted, it treads similar ground to Tremayne’s short story, although now instead of an American woman traveling to Ireland with her son, it’s Sarah O’Neill (Seána Kerslake, who looks like a combination Rebecca Hall/Ellie Kemper) locating a quiet, out-of-the-way place in her native Ireland to take a moment out and raise her son in peace. (All we know is that there’s bad blood directed at the family’s patriarch, but we never find out what, and he never appears on screen.) While doing some exploring, Sarah discovers an unnaturally large crater in the woods behind her house and steers her son, Chris (James Quinn Markey), away from it. But whatever dark forces dwell in those woods/that crater won’t take no for an answer and soon take control of young Chris, pitting Sarah in a helpless and hopeless situation and leaving her to figure it out on her own. 

While The Hole in the Ground is familiar, Cronin, who writes as well as directs, establishes a fair pace while skillfully slipping in scenes to unnerve or even terrify his audience. Sarah catches small glimpses of her son acting in ways very unlike him, or very unlike that of your normal human being, and this begins to mount, with each instance becoming more disturbing and presenting Chris as increasingly less like her little boy. Cronin, also, very smartly directs young Markey to play Chris as off rather than downright creepy or evil from the word go, allowing the audience to wonder if perhaps Sarah is just undergoing some undue stress from her recent separation. Markey never outright acts evil, in the same way that The Omen’s little Harvey Stevens mostly just placed a little boy, which ironically causes him to come across even more off-putting. Additionally, Game Of Thrones’ James Cosmo appears in a supporting role as a mourning father still getting over the loss of his own child, and who, as you might expect, provides most of the film’s exposition. 

The Hole in the Ground isn’t going to win any awards for originality, but, as usual, A24 knows what they want from the horror genre, and it’s just one more solid acquisition for one of the most respected indie film distributors in the land. 

[Reprinted from The Daily Grindhouse.]

THE 'BATMAN' SERIES (1989-1995)

Try to picture this, you young whippersnappers: there was once an era in Hollywood’s long reign when superhero movies hardly ever came out. I’m talking…hardly ever. If you Google “1990s superhero movies,” you’ll see peculiar results like Darkman, Orgazmo, (something called The Meteor Man), and even Jim Carrey’s The Mask, but as far as pure, undistilled, “guy puts on costume and fights bad guy in costume” comic book originals, this era was a wasteland. 

When 1989’s Batman came out, directed by Tim Burton, who at that time was fresh-faced and still worth a damn, it was an event. These days, that concept is a little hard to appreciate—especially in the superhero genre, since 800 fuckbillion superhero movies get released per year (a scientifically accurate figure, by the way). For perspective, once Matt Reeves’ The Batman is released (assuming in 2020), we will have seen three different actors take on the role of Batman in a span of eight years. However, Michael Keaton took on the role after a 23-year span between theatrical endeavors – Adam West had been the previous Batman back during the days when Batman was a goofball property and featured a lot of dancing. Burton’s relaunch of Batman, which was designed to actually embody the character as presented in the comics, was the movie to see. And man…everyone did. I was five years old at that time, but I ended up in a theater watching it all unfold, even if I had no idea what was happening (and even though it was NOT appropriate for a five-year-old. It had skeletons!). During its initial theatrical release, it pulled in $412 million at the box office, which, in today’s monies, comes to $850 million. (By comparison, Batman Begins made $375 million upon release, adjusted to $491 million.) To this day, Batman is the iconic superhero of the landscape, for many different reasons: because of the very varied ways he’s been brought successfully to the big and small screen, because of Christopher Nolan’s mind-bogglingly successful Dark Knight trilogy (the terrible Dark Knight Rises notwithstanding), and because Batman simply is the face of the superhero movement. 

It’s said that every generation who experiences decade-spanning franchises have their own version of a character, depending on which actor it was who brought that character to life. I exist in a sort of no-man’s land of broken rules in that regard. My James Bond is Daniel Craig, but my Batman, despite Christian Bale having taken on the role during the same era when Craig was running across rooftops and sweating profusely, will always be Michael Keaton (with a hat tip toward voice actor Kevin Conroy re: Batman: The Animated Series). Also, in spite of the radical evolution that technology and special effects have undergone in cinema over the last 30 years, as well as an adhering to the gritty and super-serious, Burton’s Batman, in my eyes, is the quintessential way to present that character – dark, yes, but not gritty, and not super-serious. (I’ll forgive the Prince soundtrack. Meddlin’ studios gonna meddle.) As for the actual production, the use of models and miniatures, stop motion effects, gigantic matte paintings, and drawn-on visual effects were the kinds of rudimentary tricks that channeled that kind of raw imagination tantamount to pitting Batman figures against Joker figures as a child. It reinforces the notion that we’re existing in a pure fantasyland. Maybe, in a move almost foretelling Nolan’s ultra-realistic take, Burton seemed to say, “Let’s not take this so seriously.” (When the Joker removes a handgun from his pants with a barrel longer than an elephant gun, you…kinda get that impression -- a far cry from Nolan’s Joker shooting a cop point blank with a shotgun as the soundtrack whines at you.) And lordy, that score by Danny Elfman is one of the best of all time; except for Indiana Jones or the aforementioned James Bond, I can’t think of a character who has a better theme song. It even carried over to Batman: The Animated Series, which premiered on television between Batman Returns and Batman Forever. (When a movie can give you chills, but all that’s happening is the Batmobile driving through a leaf-strewn road at night, you’ll know that’s the power of a tremendous musical score.)

As for Batman himself, this is a dark character, and though Nolan tried profusely, he could never quite resurrect that darkness, instead relying on depressing melancholy. Though he deserves the accolades for trying to plant the character in as realistic a setting as possible, asking and answering the question, “What would Batman and Gotham City look like if they were real?,” his trilogy never managed to tap into the same kind of gothic darkness that embodied that character and that fictional city. And then we have Burton’s marriage of time—cars and fashions suggest a 1930s aesthetic, yet the setting is evidently present day, due to the presence of modern devices like televisions and boom boxes (along with contradicting cars and fashions). Burton’s Batman not only exists in its own fictional city, but in its own fictional time period.

Largely inspired by the writing of H.P. Lovecraft, tropes of film noir, and gothic features from the 1920s and ‘30s, Burton’s Batman is a wonderland of moviemaking. And there’s a reason why so many of its scenes have become iconic, the best being the scene with a recently transformed Jack Napier (Jack Nicholson) glimpsing his new face in the mirror and laughing, creepily and unhinged, as he stumbles out of a basement surgical room. In a PG-13 superhero movie, it’s still one of the scariest fucking scenes ever committed to film. 

Burton not only wasn’t fazed by some of the criticism levied his way regarding the previous film’s gothic darkness and despair, he seemed to be driven by the 2010s’ anachronism of “hold my beer,” dialing up that same darkness and despair into his masterpiece Batman Returns. Keaton returns, and joining him are Michelle Pfeiffer and Danny DeVito’s still-ultimate takes on Catwoman and the Penguin, respectively. For a film that opens with a baby being thrown in a river in the dead of snowy winter (by father Paul Reubens!), Burton was once again saying, “Hang on – you’re not off the hook yet.” It also boasts Burton’s love for classic horror, naming one of his villains Max Schreck (Christopher Walken), the actor who played Count Orlok in 1922’s Nosferatu. (Future Leatherface and dog-hoarder Andrew Bryniarski plays his son). Burton also plays Selena Kyle’s transformation scene very subtly eerie: after Schreck throws her from her apartment window and she splats onto the snow-covered ground, she appears quite dead…and then a pack of stray cats come by and begin nibbling on her body, chewing hard enough on her fingers to draw blood. Was she simply stunned from the fall and awakes from the tiny teeth gnawing on her flesh, or did her spirit animals literally bring her back to life? Either way is equally acceptable in Burton’s world (although this would make his version of Catwoman the first ever zombie superhero). 

Following Burton’s departure from the series after his bow of Batman Returns, the remaining two installments fell under the tutelage of markedly different filmmaker Joel Schumacher, who dabbled in equally dark but less flamboyant features and had just enjoyed some critical raves for his first John Grisham adaptation, The Client.

For those even vaguely aware of the trajectory of the Batman series, most are aware that this is where the first dip in quality manifests. Almost everything about Batman Forever feels very different from what’s come before: Val Kilmer takes over for Keaton, gone is the bleached art deco and replaced with overbearing neon, and the villains (Tommy Lee Jones, replacing Billy Dee Williams, and Jim Carrey as Two-Face and the Riddler, respectively) are severely over the top. Even the composer is different, with Elliot Goldenthal taking over for Elfman.

On paper, casting Kilmer as the new Batman was a great idea; the actor had just come off the successful Tombstone where he drew raves for his performance as Doc Holiday—a character with mythical proportions whom one could argue was the superhero of the Wild West. Perhaps under a different director, Kilmer might have offered a different performance, but under Schumacher, who doesn’t seem suited for mega-budgeted productions, his performance seems somehow both antsy and flat.

Nicole Kidman, who plays the terribly named Chase Meridian (seriously?) seems to be along for the ride, going through the motions while seemingly knowing she doesn’t belong in this kind of big budget nonsense. (That she follows up on Michelle Pfeiffer doesn’t do her any favors.)

Capping off the Batman quadrilogy is Batman & Robin, easily the worst of the series, and the second entry in which the actor playing the villain receives top billing over the actor playing the titular hero (after Jack Nicholson’s trumping of Michael Keaton’s credit). Everything about this production seems to confirm what Schumacher has never missed a chance to disclose in the years following the sequel’s release: the studio was more interested in marketing a new line of glowing, neon Batman toys than making a coherent, actually good feature. And it shows.

After the studio balked at Kilmer’s demands for an increase in salary, he was shown the door, and in entered George Clooney, who at that point was pretty much known for ER and a handful of movies no one saw. Clooney has the dubious honor of having played the worst Batman to date, somehow ruining a character’s mystique and tragic aura more than Adam West ever did, and it’s not because he appears in the worst-yet Batman film, but because you can see he’s totally in it for the money and exposure.

As for the final product, there’s nothing I can say about it that hasn’t already been said: it’s dreadful, garish, and immature film -- the most distilled definition of studio product. Once Batman pulls out his own Batman credit card (which has an expiration date of FOREVER), and your arch villain (played by an all-in Arnold Schwarzenegger) rattles off his 37th pun about cold or ice, you just know you’re existing in the wasteland of nonsensical, big-budget tripe that Hollywood thought audiences wanted at the time. (It features some solid pre-breakup Smashing Pumpkins tracks, however – written specifically for this goofball movie.)

Following Batman & Robin’s release, and its critical condemnation across the board, the studio wasn’t keen on rushing another into production, so the theatrical arm of the franchise was dead in the water until Christopher Nolan came along to revitalize it ten years later with 2005’s Batman Begins.

And the rest is history.

The past couple years have been great for Batman aficionados. A new standalone film, The Batman, is gearing up for production from well-established filmmaker Matt Reeves (Cloverfield, War for the Planet of the Apes), Batman: The Animated Series enjoyed a complete, definitive Blu-ray release, and the original series that started it all has made its 4K debut. Whoever your generation’s Batman is, it’s a pretty good time to be a fan in general.

[Reprinted from Daily Grindhouse.]