Cosmopolis

(2012, Dir. by David Cronenberg.)

Yeah, I'll admit it - I kind of put Cosmopolis on the back burner when it came out. Cronenberg's last film, A Dangerous Method, left me a little disappointed, but the main reason I ignored this movie was because it starred that Twilight guy. Look, I'm on the internet a ton and I hear people talk and I've picked up that it's not cool to like Twilight - which is great, because I've never given the series much thought - but I should have poo-pooed that bias and seen Cosmopolis in the first place. 

And so it came to pass that I was in the video store last weekend and looked up at this strange trailer that was playing on one of the TVs in the store and was instantly like "WHOA, what the frank is that crazy looking, good looking movie?"  And the answer was Cosmopolis. And I remembered how good Cronenberg can be when he's good. I'm not saying I made a beeline across the store, but I definitely made it a priority and didn't go home without it. 

(I'm also not gonna lie about one other thing - the moment in that trailer when i went from "I kinda wanna see that crazy looking, good looking movie." to "I GOTTA see that crazy looking, good looking movie!" was when the trailer showed the name of Kevin Durand, known forever to me as 'The Goonest Looking Guy in The World" as one of the stars. That guy is awesome.)

Which brings us to me actually watching Cosmopolis, an experience that quickly became a great one. I'm not necessarily sure I can tell you the movie is a great one - I saw it like four days ago and it's still rolling around my head and bouncing off of questions, usually without finding answers - but I can tell you that it works on a purely bizarre plane of cinema where nothing makes sense and every next scene is a mystery. The plot, in its basest form, follows millionaire businessman Eric Packer (played by Pattinson) who sets off across the city in his bright white limousine to get a haircut. Sounds like a boring plot, no? Well, you're in luck because the city in question is in an unpredictable state of political and financial turmoil, which means there's a metaphorical bullseye on the lead's head - which becomes literal when threats on his life are received by his chief of security (the awesome Durand, who looks as goon as ever, even in a suit) and riots break out throughout the city.

As Packer makes his trip across the city, perched in an eerily throne-like back seat and surrounded by a rotating troupe of associates, doctors, and prostitutes the film occasionally resembles an incoherent crackbaby parented by Ferris Bueller's Day Off and David Fincher's The Game.  Packer interacts with those around him using stunted means of communication, having incredibly personal dialogues with others while using as few words as possible.  We learn a lot about the man - about everything from his business empire to his marriage to his prostate - while never really getting too close to feel like he's much of a human.

As such, the pale and uncomfortable Pattinson is actually a perfect fit for the lead role. The actor seems to be very aware of himself in the role and never flinches despite the bizarre things going on.  Growing up around football coaches, one of the lessons that has always stuck with me was that a consistent commitment to the cause and a "buy in" to the goal at hand is often much more important than talent - and I feel like that's where Cronenberg and Pattinson were working here. I'm sure that Cronenberg - who has had films focused on talents like James Woods, Jeremy Irons, and Viggo Mortenson - could get almost any actor he wanted to play a lead that is on screen for nearly every minute of this film - but the marriage between he and Pattinson is the marriage that the film needed. It's gutsy casting, but I think it pays off.

The film also brings an all-star supporting cast to the table, even if most appear for only one sequence. Notable names like Juliette Binoche, Jay Baruchel, Samantha Morton and Paul Giamatti show up for a sequence each, and each brings something useful and interesting to the discussion.  One of the more attention grabbing segments features Emily Hampshire as a business associate who meets with Packer as he's also getting an exam from his doctor, and this early film segment might be the first real clue that this journey is going to go off the rails as the day goes on. The two people who show up alongside Pattinson most often in the film are Durand and Sarah Gadon, who might be the film's most fascinating mystery as Packer's new wife and the object of his desires. She is - not coincidentally - one of the few reasons he ever leaves the controlled environment of the limousine, and the cold of the character when interacting with the equally distant lead character really fits perfectly within the film's odd tone.

I'm not going to sit here and try to make sense of the bizarre film - on one hand it's quite straight forward, on the other it's batcrap insane - because that's a task for someone much smarter and more eloquent than I am. But I am going to recommend Cosmopolis to those who are interested in abstract cinema, because what Cronenberg has put together here is certainly the right kind of cinematic trip. There's some rust around the edges and the film never really becomes profound, but it's ambitious and different and (most importantly) interesting.  This isn't quite Cronenberg at his best, but it's a step in the right direction and a movie that is worth thinking about.

Midnight Movie of the Week #163 - Halloween III: Season of the Witch

When I was a teenager, I hated Halloween III with a pretty solid passion. Or at least I said I did.  I think I always kind of enjoyed the completely nonsensical film, but I was a Michael Myers fanboy extraordinaire, and I was all "OH MY GOD, I can't believe they tried to make a Halloween movie without Michael! How dare they mess with the integrity of Halloween II! As if!"  I was kind of a mix between Alicia Silverstone in Clueless and WCW superstar Lance Storm at the time, because I used "As if!" and took things way too seriously. Then I kept getting older and I lightened up a bit.

Nowadays, I look at Halloween III: Season of the Witch and I just smile.  I don't have disdain, I don't even laugh at it. Because the thing that confused teenage me is one of the most perfectly abstract and ridiculously nightmarish horror movies out there. Sure, there are so many parts of it that don't make a lick of sense, but that's the beauty of Tommy Lee Wallace's bizarre addition to the Halloween franchise.

I suppose I should back up and clarify, in case there are some uninitiated folks reading this: Yes, Halloween III is in no way a sequel to Halloween II, nor is it related to Halloween - although the 1978 film actually has a cameo in this film.  John Carpenter and Debra Hill, now producers to the series, would only agree to make a third film if it was not a direct follow up to the previous films, which led them to hire Hammer Films veteran Nigel Kneale to pen a new kind of thriller. Unfortunately for Kneale, and most likely the film's chances of being taken seriously, big budget producer Dino De Laurentiis wanted more blood and more gore, which resulted in Wallace scrambling to rewrite the script and Kneale removing his name from the film.

If you've seen the film and didn't know any of the information above - just like I did when I was younger - you would probably still figure out that all the cylinders weren't firing in the right rhythm as this film was made.  The plot can't be explained without spoiling many of the film's twists - so anyone who hasn't seen it and REALLY wants to be befuddled should probably stop reading now and come back later - because the film just seems weird before we learn about the killer Halloween masks and robohenchmen and possible connection to druid rituals and star worship.  (And when I say "star worship," I mean Ursa Major-style, not Bruce Willis-style.)  These developments in the plot only make the film weirder, and attempts to clean up the story are dismissed as the antagonist says things like "a great magician never explains."  It's a jumble of bad ideas, but it's a darn fun jumble.

The plot is all over the place, but it's not a big deal because the film has so much fun with it. Things are taken very seriously, as the musical score by Carpenter and Alan Howarth (which is seriously one of my favorite horror scores ever) pulsates throughout, keeping pace with the tension of the mysterious plot. The first act is full on murder mystery, and I can't imagine being in the audience with a blind eye when this one was released. This had to be a Psycho style shock to the audience, if not in quality then at least in ridiculousness, because there really isn't anything like this movie's plot out there. Considering it was billed as the follow-up to two of the prototypes for the slasher film - which had become a booming industry in the past five years - there had to be more than a few viewers completely taken by surprise when the mystical mask murder plot became evident.

For me, it's almost impossible to look at Halloween III and not think "What they heck were they thinking?"  But I'm so grateful that this mistake of a masterpiece was allowed to be.  As the film becomes a bizarre showdown between the overly manly Tom Atkins and the sardonic Don O'Herlihy, it becomes more and more noticeable that the talents involved in this film far outweigh the script's difficulties.  Halloween III doesn't make a ton of sense - heck, it's subtitled SEASON OF THE WITCH and the only witch is a Halloween mask - but it's a well made mess (by the way, it's also one of the best looking horror films of the '80s) with great actors and that musical score that alone is worth the price of admission. I see why young me hated it, and yet I see why new me recognizes that young me was a doofus. And I'm fine with that.

Sleep Tight

(2011, Dir. by Jaume Balaguero.)

Sleep Tight is a very simple thriller that makes itself great through very extraordinary methods.  The obsessed stalker subgenre has been an American favorite at times - particularly around the late '80s and early '90s - but this Spanish chiller dares to take risks that many filmmakers would avoid.  The result of those risks is a film that kind of blew my mind.

The story primarily follows two characters - Cesar (played by Luis Tosar), the concierge at a pretty decent apartment building; and Clara (played by Marta Etura) a twentysomething tenant who is young, beautiful, and the object of Cesar's lust.  In fact, we learn very quickly that Cesar spends most of his evenings hiding under Clara's bed and waiting until she's asleep and he can sedate her.

Now, I'm willing to bet that any female reader who just considered the possibility of a man hiding under their bed and waiting to pounce just freaked out. That's the natural, and probably correct, reaction to the premise.  Director Jaume Balaguero - who knows a bit about apartment based horror after co-directing the first two [REC] films - doesn't waste any time setting up Cesar's role as aggressor, and the first act of the film does more than enough to make us uncomfortable with the man. 

The thing about Sleep Tight - the thing that I think is truly amazing - is that it's not that easy to really hate Cesar. I feel awful saying that - I don't support stalking and raping, obviously - but Balaguero focuses almost all of the film's attention on Cesar, and the obsessed man is never painted as a one-note psychopath.  Many films of this sort add scenes that are entirely there to make us think the perpetrator is a total freak, but Sleep Tight takes Cesar's side in the story more often than you'd expect.  I couldn't help feeling like there were moments when Cesar was more like Cary Grant in To Catch a Thief than Anthony Perkins in Psycho, and I feel kind of crazy admitting that.

I won't say that I was rooting for the creeper, nor will I suggest that you should. But the real treat of Sleep Tight is that it doesn't settle for the simple approach to this story.  Cesar is a troubled man, not a representation of evil.  Clara isn't built up as the representation of everything that's good, either.  We have plenty of reasons to know that Cesar is a bad guy and Clara is a victim - the most obvious of which is common sense - but Balaguero knows how to create drama in any situation. I am still kind of shocked that I found myself worried about how Cesar would escape being found out in so many situations, but the film is so engaging that I just couldn't help it.

Sleep Tight will certainly go down as one of the most impressive and memorable horror films of recent years for me. It's got a truly Hitchcockian tone, a marvelous lead performance, and enough creepy moments to make most films of its type jealous.  Balaguero will be returning to the [REC] series soon to bring more hyperactive horror to us all, but Sleep Tight should put genre fans on notice that this is a filmmaker who can control a film in many different ways.  I've been thinking about it for days, and can't recommend it enough.

(P.S. - Why is everyone in Spain listening to music from America? Only thing that confused me about this flick.)

Midnight Movie of the Week #162 - Leviathan

Leviathan is a total rip off. I will get that out of the way now, because I've already made peace with it.  This is Alien, but underwater and mixed with a dose of The Thing. That's it. It's not a deep (well, it is underwater, but I meant the other kind of deep) movie, not a particularly well made movie, and arguably not even a good movie. But I still love it.

Don't mistake that for me saying this movie is "so bad it's good", because anyone who knows me knows I don't have the bone that thinks that about horror movies in my body. Leviathan is popcorn sci-fi/horror, and it's basically the movie Alien would have been if everyone on set was cracking back beers and laughing and having a good time while just doing their thing. That's not a crack on Alien either, because that thing is a masterpiece of tension in cinema, it's just a commendation regarding what Leviathan has to offer.

So why is Leviathan so appealing to me? For starters, it has what I consider to be an all-star cast. No, these aren't the names that headline box office blockbusters, but the cast seems to be packed by folks who have consistently made great genre flicks better.  Peter "Robocop" Weller takes the lead as the captain of this undersea mining crew (reuniting with director George P. Cosmatos, who directed him in the fantastic Of Unknown Origin), and he's joined by stars of many of the 1980s' most memorable films. There's Richard Crenna of the Rambo films (the second of which was also directed by Cosmatos), Ernie Hudson (a bonafide Ghostbuster!), Amanda Pays of TV's The Flash, Daniel Stern (obligatory C.H.U.D. comment), Beverly Hills Cop's Lisa Eilbacher, and Hector Elizondo - who's been in stuff, but for some reason I just know him as Hector Elizondo.  Am I forgetting anyone? Why yes, I am - because we also have that evil wench Meg Foster - from Masters of the Universe and They Live(!) - as the humanized equivalent of Alien's "mother."

It's a relatively small part of the film, but I can't even begin to explain how much the interactions between Weller's worker bee and Foster's queen bee(-otch) make me smile. Foster is one of those performers who is forever on my "I want bad things to happen to them" list after her performance in They Live. I'm not saying she was a bad actress in that film, I'm saying the character she played was so hateable that I inherently hate any other character she plays.  And this character does a good job of earning that hate, while Weller benefits greatly from simply being on the other side of their interactions. And man...well, wait...I have to come back to this later.

As you may have guessed from my comparisons to films like Alien and The Thing, this isn't just a movie about a deep sea mining crew and the ice queen back on land. (By the way, it is IMPOSSIBLE for me to talk about Meg Foster and not use the term "ice queen" at least once. It's the eyes, they earn it.)  The simple version of the plot should look pretty familiar to genre fans - the crew finds a destroyed foreign ship which holds a bit of mystery and an unnatural force that soon is unleashed upon them and forces them to fight for survival. Like I said, it's not original. But the film does manage to have some unique moments of surprise and some fantastically gooey monster sequences (thanks to creature work by the legendary Stan Winston), even if it does seem like a series of "chestbuster" moments.

Most movies would lose a lot of steam by being so derivative, but Leviathan works because the cast is clearly having fun - one particular exchange between Foster and Hudson still makes me howl with laughter - and because Cosmatos keeps the film moving at a brisk pace that blocks our brain from noticing how ridiculous things are in the moment. It all builds to a truly manic finale, a sequence which adds new terrors, kills off a seemingly safe character for no reason, reintroduces an old terror, and promptly ends with one of the most unique moments in genre history. I'm not going to say that it's right, I'm just going to say that the first in person interaction between Foster and Weller's characters makes up for anything else wrong with the movie and gets me pumping my cheese-lovin' fists.  More serious movies wouldn't add the final touch that this film does, and many modern movies wouldn't get away with trying it.  Alas, Leviathan exists on its own terms, and the result is a film that is always entertaining in its own ways.

FMWL Indie Spotlight - Gut

(2012, Dir. by Elias.)

The snuff film is back with Gut, a psychological indie thriller that aims to draw us in with a deep focus on death.  It's not entirely successful in this regard, but it does leave an impression as a unique addition to the horror genre.

The film follows a family man, Tom, and his co-worker and friend Dan. The two men live a relatively boring life, working in a boring office and eating lunch in a boring diner and reminiscing about the good old days - which sound like they were boring except for watching horror movies. The thing is that Tom is Mr. Serious Married Man now and has little interest in those olden days, while Tom just wants to hang out and watch horror movies like Return of the Living Dead 3.

Since Tom is embracing the boring, the only way Dan can get his attention is by upping the stakes - which means he starts ordering gonzo horror flicks that seem to consist entirely of stomachs being cut open - and which also seem to look extremely real.  I'm not entirely sure this type of film appeals to me - then again, I have spent plenty of time watching YouTube videos of animals being vaporized by vehicles with friends - but Tom and Dan are soon enamored and trapped in the path of whoever makes these sadistic pieces of torture cinema.

The resulting events lead the characters into madness and violence, which you can bet makes their lives a little less boring. Along the way we learn that neither character is very wholesome - let alone very interesting - and we see their relationships with others quickly fall apart.  There's some commentary about the people who chase violent thrills to be had here, which is probably the best thing to focus on in the film. If you can avoid getting too caught up in the acting (Jason Vail, who plays Tom, is especially wooden) and pacing (plenty of shots seem to hold for far too long) and get caught up in the mysteries of what is going on and why it's having such a dramatic effect on these men, you might not mind checking out Gut.

I'm not sure the whole film works. It's raw, but it's raw in a bad "we're being way too deliberate" way and not a good "we're bucking trends and making our own rules" way. The idea is interesting, and it's one of those stories that could be fleshed out more with more interesting characters and more intrigue. Worst of all, the conclusion is incredibly disappointing, wrapping up with a previously teased confrontation that doesn't answer most of our questions. Part of that problem is on the actors - again, I just couldn't get past the stiff performance by Vail - but it's also a problem that the film gives us so much information and so little conclusion.

Gut has plenty of problems but, as I said in the opening, it at least leaves an impression. The snuff-ish sequences are definitely unsettling, and the sequences that surround them - as we watch the male characters become increasingly enamored in them - provoke a lot of thought. The whole product isn't fantastic, but it at least has moments that show a lot of promise. I'd be fascinated to see what writer/director Elias has up his sleeve in the future, because Gut feels like a starting point for an intelligent horror director's career - if he can get the right people around him.  Gut is worth keeping an eye out for if you're a fan of human horror, but to me it ended up as more of an interesting attempt than a winning success.

For more info on Gut, head on over to the official site or Facebook page.  The film is available for rent on plenty of platforms, details of which you can find at those links.

FMWL Indie Spotlight - Nicky

(2012, Dir. by Dom Portalla.)

I first encountered the work of Dom Portalla and Ken Flott, the men behind the short feature Nicky, in the fall of 2010.  Portalla had directed the ambitious low-budget thriller The Darkness Within (which came to me via longtime friend of FMWL Cortez the Killer over at the rockin' Planet of Terror), which featured a key side performance by the attention grabbing Flott.  It was a good little film that piqued my interest in the folks at Door Eleven Productions, and that interest has thankfully led me to a pretty fantastic short film today.

As a bit of an obsessive nerd, I remember a lot of weird things that I hear on the internet. Back when I was checking out that flick, I remember a tweet or interview or podcast or something featuring Portalla where he was talking about some kind of difficulty with the film's story and was resigned to admit something like "Thankfully, we had Flott."  I remember being taken aback by the frankness of the director, who seemed unwavering in his confidence that this man was a one-of-a-kind talent.  Seeing what they've done now, it's easy for me to understand why.

Which brings us to Nicky, which is directed by Portalla, based on a short story by Flott, and co-written by the duo.  Look at the poster and you will literally see three lines of credits that feature only these two names, plus Flott as the top billed member of the cast.This is by no means a two man show entirely - the 30 minute short has more characters and settings than you'd expect based on its length - but it is a showcase for Flott, who moves through the film and commands our attention at every turn.

The story follows Flott as a nameless man who is searching for his little brother, Nicky, who vanished years ago without a trace.  We learn a lot about the man through an inner monologue that plays as narration - not to mention his brief conversations with his unconventional best friend - and it's not hard to see where the plot is going as we watch this man move through his life. But, as he did in The Darkness Within, Flott demands our attention and makes the character fascinating.

His journey goes to dark places, which makes Nicky a trip down an unsettling rabbit hole. There's violence and there's foul language and there's even the obvious statement about human trafficking, but there are also some truly unsettling moments that go beyond the expected. The appearances of young Charles Everett Tacker as the title character - usually accompanied by a beautiful score by Danielle Samson - add an air of mystery to the film and push us to that great spot where we're not quite sure what to believe. The end result of these scenes will surely be some conversation about what happened or didn't happen, what was "real" or "not real".

Nicky is an impressive piece of filmmaking. It's put together well by Portalla, well acted by Flott and company, and - most importantly - unique and engaging.  It left me wanting more - it's easy to see this story blown up to feature status with all the questions that remain and the characters that are being established - but it also left me satisfied with what it is. The Darkness Within seemed like a fun diversion, the kind of flick a bunch of talented friends make when they're just seeing what they can do.  Nicky seems like the next step in the evolution of Portalla and company as filmmakers, and I'm willing to guess that anyone who meets Nicky won't soon forget it.

For more information on Nicky and Door Eleven Productions, make sure to head over to their official site or hit the film up on Facebook. And, of course, check out the trailer below.

Midnight Movie of the Week #161 - The Driver

There are about two things in the world cooler than a '70s car chase movie. I'm not sure what those two things are, but there can't be more than two of them.  Among the coolest of those cool things is an early effort from Walter Hill - the man behind The Warriors, Streets of Fire, and plenty of other totally tubular flicks that I love - known simply as The Driver.  This thing is somewhere between Hitchcock and Fast and the Furious on the continuum of action cinema, working on one hand as a twisty high concept thriller and on the other as a showcase for car stunts and high-speed pursuits.  Most interestingly, at least to me, is that it's also a film with no names.

Ryan O'Neal stars as the title character, which is exactly how his character is credited.  He plays that brand of anti-hero/criminal who doesn't hurt good people that we've seen plenty of times in these kind of movies - the most obvious comparison for most modern viewers is to that flick Drive with Ryan Gosling - a guy who also doesn't ask for details and doesn't fall for a trap easily. He's more of a construct than a character, like the cowboy heroes of pulp westerns gone by, because he operates by a set of principles in everything he does.

The film is meticulous as it reminds us of the character's nameless purity, never stooping to self-referential lows like many modern action flicks do.  You know how a Jason Statham character likes to spout off pre-rehearsed quips about his rules and what he never does? That's not The Driver's game.  Sure, the idea branches off of what Hill's script established here (though this is in no way the first film to pull the detached control monger as hero card), but The Driver is notable because it doesn't allow the lead to preach his code of ethics to the viewer.  O'Neal was apparently a big deal in the '70s, but I wasn't there and I don't really "get" his appeal as an actor.  I'm tempted to say that the actor can be one of the film's biggest flaws during the moments that might suggest character development and require him to speak or emote, but at the same time the actor's skill for monotone and ability to hold a vapid expression while the character is in the middle of high risk situations is one of the film's greatest strengths. You could assume that the casting decision was made for this benefit, and that makes it feel like a slightly genius move by Hill and company.

While O'Neal's driver is kept to few words and fewer emotions, the film draws us in completely with the always enjoyable Bruce Dern as The Detective, the primary adversary to the driver.  While dialogue is very limited for our criminal - in fact, a fantastic opening sequence runs over 15 minutes before he speaks - Dern's work as the cop is quite the opposite.  He spouts out his knowledge - mostly from those kind of assumptions that cops always seem to get right in these movies - about the driver often, most effectively when the characters meet.  Dern has always had that kind of sly angst mixed with his everyday appearance, and hearing him tell the driver things like "sad songs ain't sellin' this year" is more than enough to advance their feud through the film. Dern can do pissed-off but in control as well as anyone can, and it's safe to say that the film's conflict would go nowhere without his wonderful performance.

Of course, there always needs to be a girl in these situations, and Hill manages to put two of the most attention grabbing female performers of the era into the mix here.  The stunning Isabelle Adjani, with her dark hair and eyes the size of Kansas, is what the credits refer to as The Player, while Ronee Blakely - known to most horror fans for her drunkenly fascinating performance in A Nightmare on Elm Street - is The Connection.  Adjani gets plenty of screen time as the kind of yin to the driver's kind of yang, while Blakely's supporting turn is key to the film's final heist and leads to one of the film's most artistic and grabbing moments at the end of her final scene.  These characters seem like they walked right out of a '50s film noir offering, and they team up with the rest of the bit players to give the film a poetic depth that pushes the film above simple car chases and cops-and-robbers cliches. Nothing here is groundbreaking or unique - the fact that all of the characters can be summed up by their role in the plot is not a joke, it's a truth - but there's a good chance the viewer will be impressed with how well the parts of the puzzle all fit together.

The Driver is one of Hill's most abstract and cinematic works, the kind of straightforward, no frills action film that only could have existed in the 1970s.  It would make a fantastic double bill with John Carpenter's second film - the gang war epic Assault on Precinct 13, because both films seem like a case of a director showing off how much he can do with the simplest of ideas.  Hill would rise to greater commercial success in the following years - The Warriors opened a year later, and he soon was behind the camera for bigger projects - but The Driver remains as a cool piece of the '70s that's worth revisiting. In cinema, less is often more, and The Driver reminds us of how true that statement can be.

Midnight Movie of the Week #160 - The Brides of Dracula

Hammer Films' Dracula tales are most remembered as vehicles for Christopher Lee, so some people are surprised to find out that the first sequel to Horror of Dracula was a film in which Dracula is already dead, Lee did not appear, and a rather unintimidating little man named Baron Meinster serves as the main masculine vampire. Alas, it's all true. The film in question is Hammer's 1960 vampi-rama The Brides of Dracula, in which Peter Cushing picks up where the 1958 film left off and takes on a new vampire threat, none of whom are actually wed to the Count.

The film primarily follows the exploits of a French babe schoolteacher named Marianne (played by Yvonne Monlaur, who is actually the daughter of a Russian count), who takes a job in the Transylvanian countryside (because, well, WHO WOULDN'T?) and ends up spending the night in a big old castle where a mother has her son chained up by the ankle. To some that might seem like a relatively normal night in Transylvania - I've seen enough horror flicks to know someone is always chained up to something - but the pure and innocent Marianne is pretty freaked out and this, along with the craziness of the house's servant (Freda Jackson, getting to play what's basically a female version of Renfield!), convinces Marianne that she's safer booking it through the forest than staying the night.

And that's when the hero returns in the form of Doctor Van Helsing, as played by the great Peter Cushing. Cushing would play "Van Helsing" five times for Hammer, but it's worth noting that he actually portrayed three different characters in five different films in three different timelines during his time with Hammer. This is (at least in Hammer's universe) the only continuation of the "original" version of Cushing asVan Helsing, while his performances in the Dracula films of the 1970s are relatives of this character. So, next time someone tells you Cushing played Van Helsing five times, you can prove them wrong by saying he only played this Van Helsing twice. Isn't that a great feeling?

Now back to the film, which strikes me as one of Hammer's more beautiful vampire films.  The sets are pretty recognizable - we must remember that this was a relatively low budget studio and they did reuse plenty of their sets and props - but there's something vibrant and wonderful about their presentation by director Terence Fisher here.  Horror of Dracula was not a dull film from a visual standpoint, but it seems Fisher attempted to cover up some of this film's issues with a little more color and a lot of feminine beauty. That's not a bad choice for a film that loses Christopher Lee and gains a looker like Monlaur, and the director's vision of the film helps The Brides of Dracula keep our attention for 85 minutes.

The tone of the film loses much of the romanticism that carried Hammer's first Dracula endeavor, and The Brides of Dracula certainly feels like a cheesy spin-off at times. A few of the sequences with the vampire women - especially the ones in which they interact with Jackson's manic servant/familiar - play out in bizarre fashion, yet the film strides forward with confidence that the viewer will forgive some of the sillier bits.  There are moments when the film could have lost me - like an unconventional scene in which Van Helsing deals with a bite wound to his own neck - but there's something to be said for this film's slightly random, slightly nightmarish approach to Marianne and Van Helsing's battle against evil.

The Brides of Dracula isn't the most dramatic vampire film from Hammer studios, and it's not even close to being the most unique.  But it's an abstract vampire tale that hits me as a perfect diversion, a new chapter in a familiar story that enhances my appreciation of Fisher as a filmmaker, Cushing as an actor, and the whole of Hammer Studios as a titan of terror. The Brides of Dracula is widely forgotten, but it deserves more attention for its place in horror history and its unique relationship to the studio's other Dracula films.

Jack and Diane

(2012, Dir. by Bradley Rust Gray.)

A remake in name only of the John Cougar Mellencamp classic (OK, it's not related to the song, but you ALL were thinking it), Jack and Diane is one of those films that just left me shaking my head in confusion. That doesn't mean it's a bad movie, per say, it just means that it's one of those movies that made me stare at the screen and shout things like "WHO ARE YOU?" as I tried to figure out its intentions.

The title characters, despite your preconceived notions, are two teenage girls who quickly and abruptly fall in love during late summer in the city. It's all well and good, except for the disapproving families and the fact that Diane is going away to school in two weeks and - oh yeah - the fact that Diane might also be a werewolf.

Now, if you're like me, you just heard the word werewolf and got really excited. That happened to me when I heard about the movie, I admit it.  There was a time and a place - probably Italy in the early '70s - when abstract and surreal lesbian werewolves were probably a thing. But this one is a far, far cry from what that movie would have been like, because this is actually just one of those teens who are hip and different movies that indie filmmakers love to make these days.

(By the way, I was totally throwing crap against the wall on that "abstract and surreal lesbian werewolves in the '70s in Italy", but the good thing is that you can put "surreal", "lesbian" and "Italian" together with almost anything and throw it into a computer and you'll probably find a movie that actually existed. They're like RSTLNE on Wheel of Fortune when it comes to European horror.)

Anyway, back to Jack and Diane, which the viewer will quickly realize is not really a werewolf film by werewolf film standards.  It's a dramatic love story that does all those dramatic love story things - like making the characters madly in love even though they've said seven words to each other or showing how awkward it is for them to actually express themselves to their beloved even though they TOTALLY love them - while randomly flashing some genetic animations and some bloody noses and a few random attacks from a pop-up monster that never really matters in the plot. I'm probably being a little harsh as I lay this out there, but the folks that are reading this are generally the people like me who are going to jump at the word werewolf and get excited, but unfortunately for them this is a movie where you can't take the world werewolf literally.

Now, of course, the movie's not bad just because it's a slow moving infatuation love story.  Jack and Diane is kept afloat by a good performance by rising star Juno Temple - who rocked one out of the park when last seen in William Friedkin's bizarre Killer Joe - as the unsure and monstrously unstable Diane.  She carries the film as she weighs her desires against her innocence, even if her beau - the tomboy Jack, as played by Riley Keough - is a little more difficult for the viewer to relate to. All of the supporting performances - including a sexually charged cameo by former pop star Kylie Minogue (hey, if my choices are "former pop star" or "co-star of Bio-Dome" I'm going to use the least offensive one) - aren't noteworthy, which probably helps bring out Temple's star more. Unfortunately, she can't carry the whole film to great heights on her own.

Most disappointingly, Jack and Diane just never seems to muster up anything of importance in its plot or in its message. When you consider that the romance is as deep as a Twilight film and the monster metaphors are as hollow as a jack-o-lantern, you're left with the realization that Jack and Diane doesn't really muster up anything of relevance. A good lead performance, an adequate co-star, 12 seconds of monster action, and a hip indie soundtrack do not a movie make.  Jack and Diane is an interesting failure - but it's a failure nonetheless.

Midnight Movie of the Week #159 - In the Mouth of Madness

The last time I mentioned In the Mouth of Madness on this here site, I said something like "It's about time we recognize this as one of Carpenter's classics."  I'm not sure I wasn't talking myself there.  Carpenter's always been my favorite post-Hitchcock topic when it comes to genre cinema, and I've never denied the fact that this film is a fascinating piece of horror. But there's always been something about the film that's kept me from listing it alongside my favorite films by the director - and I have no idea what that something is or if that something should exist. So, since it was freakin' John Carpenter's BIRTHDAY(!) this week, let's investigate.

Released in 1994, In the Mouth of Madness was only Carpenter's second film of the 1990s (following the studio misfire Memoirs of an Invisible Man) and is probably the last pure horror film Carpenter made until 2010's The Ward sixteen years later.  And pure horror might be an understatement when it comes to In the Mouth of Madness, because the film manages to pay heed to the two most loved horror writers of all-time - H.P. Lovecraft and Stephen King - while creating an apocalyptic world that's all Carpenter's own.

Sam Neill stars as a skeptical insurance investigator who's hired (by Charlton Heston, BTW) to look into the disappearance of horror author Sutter Cane, an enigmatic writer whose fiction has caused a bit of psychosis in his "less stable readers." His job leads him to the fictional small town Hobb's End, in which strange things like mutant killer children and tentacled beasts are only some of the tricks that Cane - played by Jurgen Prochnow - has up his sleeve. What follows is a lot of Neill screaming and a lot of bizarre special effects. And that sounds like it could be a bad thing, but it is completely not.

This is one of the rare Carpenter films that doesn't have the director (or one of his pseudonyms) given a writing credit, but unlike Memoirs of an Invisible Man before it you can still feel the stamp of the director throughout the story. In fact, many have labeled this as the third installment in Carpenter's 'Apocalypse Trilogy' - following influence of The Thing and Prince of Darkness - thanks to the increasingly pessimistic tone of each film. Like the other two films, In the Mouth of Madness unleashes an evil force that can not easily be seen or classified; which is also a force of evil that has the power to take over the human mind.  Many of Carpenter's earlier/great films hide their evils behind "things" - a gang, a shape, some fog, a car, etc. - but you could probably argue that this is his most abstract representation of evil outside of The Thing.

In fact, it's the film's willingness to shift through different visions of evil that is most fascinating to me. The first major madness in the film comes from an ax toting maniac (who we later find out was Cane's agent), but the film then seems to allow terror to seep into all areas if the main character's life. Throughout his wonderfully hammy performance, we see Neill deal with everything from zomified nightmares to visual and auditory hallucinations, consistently blurring the line between reality and what can only be described as Hell. There are some truly random moments - like one involving the color blue - that wouldn't work in a lesser film. But Carpenter's ability to tell a story and Neill's approach to the skeptic-driven-crazy role go a long way toward making the film feel so full of evil.

There's a comic undertone throughout the film - supported by Neill's grandiose performance and the increasingly uncommon series of twists - that makes it hard to see In the Mouth of Madness as a truly "scary" piece of horror.  If anything, the film's tone probably endears the film more to horror fans than anyone else because, like many other horror successes of the 1990s, the film is a horror movie about horror stories. I think the tone might be a big part of why I've never loved this film as much as I do The Thing (which never stops being serious for a second) or Prince of Darkness (which compliments its own wacky plot with a straight face that never wavers).  And yet, every time I see the final scenes of In the Mouth of Madness I am reminded just how vast and terrible the film's idea would be in a real world society. No one will ever mistake this film for a cautionary tale about human horror, but a more open minded viewer who loves to speculate in "what if"s as much as the characters here do - should have a lot of fun with one of Carpenter's unsung successes.

Midnight Movie of the Week #158 - Venom

If you're like me, you've probably seen a lot of hammy performances in snake-centric horror movies. But there's a chance you haven't seen the most talented cast to ever ham their way through a snake flick, the cast assembled by maligned horror legend Tobe Hooper for Venom - a film that he quit directing early in production.  So, we can add this one to the list of horror films that Hooper "kind of" directed, can't we?

Pieced together by British director Piers Haggard in Hooper's absence, Venom is a film whose existence is completely bizarre.  You can probably recognize that thanks to the premise, in which a bunch of kidnappers (Klaus Kinski, Susan George, and Oliver Reed) take a young boy as a hostage without knowing that the boy happens to be carrying a deadly Black Mamba snake. That snake is soon released into the house where they are holding said hostage, and that's just the icing on the cake for how weird this movie can be.

For starters, there's the cast of wonderful European genre stars that has been thrown together haphazardly.  It's been reported that Kinski and Reed, known as two of the most volatile men in cinema history, feuded with each other throughout filming. Some of the arguments between their characters on screen feel a little too real, and stare downs between the sinister and cold Kinski and the loud and booming Reed often feel quite uncomfortable, even from the comfort of a distant living room.  Kinski may have had some reason to be angry during filming, as he took the lead here over an offer to play a villain role in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Most reports say this was a monetary choice by the actor, but Kinski also wrote in his autobiography that the script for Raiders was "moronically shitty." Most actors would probably want that choice back, especially when they instead chose a movie whose own trailer proclaims it to be about "the kidnap that became a murder that became a siege that became a deathtrap." (Seriously, click play on that trailer at the bottom here. Outstanding.)

Also appearing in the film, in his final big screen role, is Sterling Hayden as the kidnapped boy's grandfather. Hayden, a veteran of no less than The Godfather and Dr. Strangelove (and Kubrick's The Killing, my personal favorite of his films), kind of looks like that grandpa from Silent Night, Deadly Night who ended up being the face of Chessmaster at this point in his career. Still, he's a good actor who adds a bit of pathos to the film while playing the "cool" grandpa to our animal loving kid.  It's good to see him going toe to toe with the villains one last time; in fact, the film in general plays best when these powerful actors - also joined by Excalibur's Nicol Williamson as a police officer dealing with the kidnapping - are playing off each other. There's far more shouting than any movie deserves, and these actors seem to relish the opportunity to make the angriest kidnappers-and-a-snake movie of all-time.

You could argue that this cast and this kidnapping plot would be fascinating enough - though you can see that the production was a bit of a trainwreck at times - even without the real and deadly Black Mamba slithering about the set.  Haggard was actually quoted as saying that the snake was "the nicest person on set" - another damning comment on this production - but it's still the twist on the normal crime film recipe that makes Venom so random and unique.  You won't find a lot of chills thanks to the snake's presence, but the film's wacky personality creates plenty of tension as we realize a strike could at any moment make these angry men yell even more loudly at each other. (And its probably telling that the noted alcoholic Reed, who yells louder than anyone else in the film, gets his biggest scare when the snake is hiding in a liquor cabinet.)

Venom is more of a curio than a classic, but fans of the actors involved and animals run amok films for grown ups of the late '70s should have a lot of fun with it. If nothing else, it's an excuse to consider what it would have been like if Kinski was Dustin Hoffman in Dog Day Afternoon - and to wonder if the bizarre German actor would have called that script bad names too. Venom is the kind of "big talent in a little movie" production that I just love, and despite some obvious flaws it's still a blast to watch.

Crawlspace

(2013, Dir. by Justin Dix.)

A bizarre mixture of gore and the supernatural, Crawlspace is a film that wants to be profound without ever stepping off the gas pedal.  The film is packed full of screaming and gun shots and an oppressive musical score, and the whole thing just felt abrasive to me as it went on.  This is a real shame, considering the film's intriguing set up.

Crawlspace follows a group of soldiers who are sent in to a military base in the Australian desert, a base in which we find there are few survivors to be rescued and a mess of dead bodies in the (you guessed it) crawlspace between sciencey examination rooms.  The most important of the survivors is (naturally) a woman, and we soon learn that she's got some unique powers that are more than meets the eye.

The idea behind the film - that this government testing facility was a training ground for weapons of psychic warfare - is far more interesting than the bombastic method with which it's presented.  Though it's not based on any specific truth, the film's insinuation that governments may try to harness preternatural powers like mind control is no myth.  There are plenty of reports of "psychic warfare" in the real world, taking place everywhere from Nazi Germany to the modern United States.  You know that scene at the beginning of Ghostbusters where Bill Murray tries to get the nerd and the hot girl to guess shapes on cards? That stuff really happens, and the government spends millions on it so they can build a force of psychics to get an edge on the Russians or whoever else they don't like.  For serious.  Read The Dead Roam The Earth, which I just reviewed a bit ago, and there's a whole chapter on it.  Or just Google "psychic warfare" or "remote viewing" and look at some of the crazy stuff out there.  (And, if you're an American, remember that your taxes are paying for it.)

Crawlspace taps into this and goes a little further, as the woman at the center of the plot - Eve, played by Amber Clayton - is capable of a little more than just clairvoyance. The most interesting parts of the film come in the final act as Eve's abilities are tested and challenged, both by the overseeing scientists and the crew of soldiers that have come to save them, particularly one man who she may or may not have had a previous relationship with.  Clayton is a stand out when she's empowered in the role, and there are plenty of memorable moments dealing with her abilities as the film builds to its finale.

Unfortunately, most everything else in the film feels muddled. The crew of soldiers seems like a direct photocopy of the kind of characters we've seen in plenty of films since Aliens, and the science side of the plot offers little of interest outside of the ideas regarding psychic warfare.  The film is packed full of violence and there's rarely a lull in the action, but I got tired of this rather quickly. The film doesn't look like anything special either, with the crawlspace's lighting not creating any mood and some special effects failing to impress at all.

Crawlspace is a perfectly fine way to waste 90 minutes if you're looking for shouting, action, and a dose of science fiction, and I don't think the film does anything too poorly. But it also doesn't really seem to stand out much, aside from the few great moments in Clayton's performance. Crawlspace is a high concept genre hybrid that has plenty of great thoughts, I just wish it had done a little more with a few of them.

Crawlspace is currently available on VOD and in select theaters via our friends over at IFC Midnight. Feel free to check out more about the film over at their site or on Facebook, and don't forget to check out the trailer below.

Midnight Movie of the Week #157 - Night Tide

There's no better way to start the new year than with a love story. At least, that's what I might say if I was the sentimental sort. Nah, the best way to start the new year in The Mike's world would primarily involve good football and good nachos. But I didn't have those this year, which brings us back to the love story. Don't worry Mom, it's not my love story. It's a love story between a young Dennis Hopper and a mermaid.

Yes, you read that last sentence right.  A young sailor played Dennis Hopper falls in love with a sideshow mermaid in Night Tide, a brooding and mysterious melodrama from 1961.  Directed by Curtis Harrington, the film is a poetic black-and-white tale that feels a little like the original Carnival of Souls when it draws us into the quiet world of this lonely young soul. The film's setting also draws parallels to that horror classic - the love interest, Mora the Mermaid, lives in an apartment on top of a merry-go-round on the Santa Monica pier - but the tone of this film seems to be less aggressive than most horror films.  You know how the mediums in horror movies always can feel whether or not a spirit is malevolent or benevolent? This movie's the benevolent one.

Dennis Hopper wasn't quite the Dennis Hopper that movie buffs know and love yet - in fact, it would be a full TWENTY-FIVE YEARS before the role in Blue Velvet that he's probably most infamous for - and it's weird to see him as this young, normal, and (dare I say it) innocent man.  Hopper had been around, on both the big and little screen, for almost a decade (most notably appearing in two of James Dean's three films in supporting roles) when he took the lead role here, but there still isn't a lot here that would make someone guess that he would become the scenery chewing force of nature that built his Hollywood legacy. But when you look at the film as someone who knows Dennis Hopper's later works, it's easy to see why he adds to this film as the lovestruck lead. The whole film has a kind of taboo feeling to it, and it's easy to see Dennis Hopper as the guy who might be vulnerable to the bizarre.

Speaking of that bizarre plot, the film's story primarily deals with the young man's quest to determine if his love interest is our is not actually a mythical creature. As Hopper's character wanders around the film, we realize that the supporting characters seem to hold the keys to the film's mystery. They are led by the drunken captain who found Mora on a tropical island, a fortune teller who hangs out around the seaside carnival, and a mysterious woman in black who seems to haunt Mora and her new lover. The film is very meticulous as it shows us how each of these people may or may not have information on this mermaid woman, and each interaction between them and the sailor leaves us with questions about where the film will go next.

I've mostly talked around Mora instead of about her thus far, which kind of sums up her role in the film. The character is played well by Linda Lawson, who manages to give Mora the exotic beauty that is advertised at her show while also getting us to buy in to the idea that she is a tortured soul. The first hour of the film doesn't offer a lot of actions that would make us worry about Mora or her suitor, but the actress' tone of voice and dream-like manner of moving through scenes - paired with a musical score that seems to bleed drama into the film - had me caught up in their tale from the start.

The final half hour of the film ramps up the tension considerably, and it can be a little difficult to keep track of where the film is going.  The plot's developments remind a little bit of Hitchcock - there are moments that could be seen as twists on Vertigo and Psycho here - but it's also clear that Harrington wanted to ground his film in a macabre place when he references Edgar Allan Poe with an on-screen passage. The film never reaches the heights that these two legends of storytelling did - few filmmakers ever have - but the mood still makes it a unique and captivating film. I find myself unable to look away from Night Tide, and I think any patient viewer with a taste for cinematic oddities will have the same excellent problem.