Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 3rd, 2007
Be afraid. Be very afraid, if you are even thinking about picking up this rather lame title. There is absolutely nothing redeeming about this film. The only way that Kill House has any chance of giving you nightmares is by putting you to sleep. If only I had been so lucky. Beth Dewey was the “mastermind” behind the whole thing. She wrote, directed, and acted as the killer in this piece of crap. Dewey ought to be arrested for grand larceny if even one person paid any real money for this picture. I would tell you som...thing about the plot, but there isn’t one. If anyone can tell me what in the heck this film was about, please let me know. Near as I can figure Sunny (Dewey) is some sociopath realtor. There is no rythme or reason for anything that happens anywhere in the film. It almost looks like they were pretty much making it up as they went along. I give Dewey an F as a director, an F as a writer, and an F- as an actress. At least Dewey appears to understand the low budget concept of: if you have nothing of value to say with your film, show lots of boobs and someone will watch it.
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Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 29th, 2007
As you might imagine, I am often asked for my opinion on the films I see. Inevitably I’m called upon to compare the film with some other work, which is at best quite unfair and at worst simply impossible to do. But I’ve gotten good at the game. So let us play it now. We’ll call Neverwas One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest meets Alice In Wonderland. Unfair, some might say, for they are actually the very same story. When you look at it carefully enough, they really are, although important differences do exist. My point i... all of this nonsense is this: There really is a razor fine line between insanity and fantasy. Neverwas blurs this distinction to an almost indefinable difference.
When Dr. Zack Riley (Eckhart) arrived at Millford Mental Health Institute, which once housed his father, he had no idea that his journey would take him full circle to a childhood he had been running from. Zack’s father (Nolte) was the author of a famous children’s story titled Neverwas. Zack has been running from Neverwas ever since. He changed his name and refused his inheritance of the book’s royalties. Here at Millford, Zack discovers a rather remarkable patient. Gabriel (McKellen) is not only intimately familiar with Neverwas and Zack himself, but claims to be her King. Zack finds himself confronted by a place he always believed came from his father’s imagination. It’s a wonderful story with an almost magical potential. Unfortunately this film takes too long to develop and never quite hits its stride. The film travels a trail of breadcrumbs laid out in such painstakingly slow motion that it is our patience and not our imagination that is finally put to the test. Writer/directors often commit the fatal sin of overcomplicating what often plays best in simpler terms. Joshua Michael Stern is guilty of it here. The film becomes too muddled, trying to show too much history and never trusting its audience enough to find their own way. You should know this IS NOT a children’s film.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 28th, 2007
Eddie Murphy has a ton of films under his belt. If you’re like most folks, his antics have long ago become tired and worn out. Come with me now to a time when Murphy was young and full of energy. Trading Places was really only Murphy’s second film after 48 hours. In Trading Places, we get vintage Eddie Murphy. You can tell he was still hungry. Today he simply calls too many performances in. Dan Aykroyd was also at a turning point in his own career. It hadn’t been too long since he lost his longtime partner Jim Belu...hi to a drug overdose. He was just learning to stand on his own. Put these two guys together today, and there’s not much chance you’d get the solid gold that was possible in 1983. Fortunately for us there is this DVD release of Trading Places, when both actors still felt they had something to prove. The cast was brilliant all the way around. Jamie Lee Curtis displayed her obvious assets for the first time in a film. Known mostly as a scream queen at that time, Curtis was a choice the studio was not at all happy with. The Wolf Man’s own Ralph Bellamy, along with fellow veteran actor Don Amechi, played the Duke brothers to perfection. Finally, Denholm Eliott added his own understated brilliance as Coleman, the butler.
Trading Places was originally written as a vehicle for Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor. That team had had great success with a few films already, and it was felt they were the only ones capable of pulling off this kind of a film. I’m not sure how that might have worked. Certainly it still might have been a funny outing, but somehow I think everything worked out for the best. Trading places broke many conventions of the time. The black and white stereotypes were a concern, as were other elements. Having a hooker play such a pivotal role was questioned. The studio even expressed some problems with the fate of Mr. Beaks. A little gorilla love went a long way toward the poetic justice these kinds of villians often require. John Landis stood his ground the entire time, refusing to budge. Remove any of these elements, and who knows what we might have ended up with.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 28th, 2007
I’ll admit it. I was taken in by The Life and Hard Times of Guy Terrifico, for about five minutes. I’m not a follower of the country music scene, so it didn’t really bother me that I had never heard of Guy Terrifico before. The box art explained he came and went in the early 70’s, when I was just a kid myself, so none of this was the least bit suspicious to me at all. The film opens believably enough with Kris Kristofferson on stage dedicating his next song to this Guy Terrifico. When we get to that first interview... however, I was getting mighty suspicious. Now I might not be no Jim Rockford, but I am as Italian as Columbo, so I started to sense that something was not quite right here. I instantly paused the film and began to research Guy Terrifico. You know what I came up with? You guessed it. There never was a Guy Terrifico. I was watching This Is Spinal Tap country style. I guess that just got me off on the wrong start with this film. And I’ll freely admit now I might have enjoyed this a whole lot more if I had known going in what I was watching. That’s why I loved Spinal Tap but have a bit of a cold feeling for Guy. You might consider I just wrecked the film for you, but trust me, I might just have saved you some frustration.
The story of Guy Terrifico is too bizarre to be true, which of course it isn’t. It seems that good ol’ guy was an outlaw and heavy drug addict for most of his short life. His big break came when he hit the Canadian lotto for $8 million Canadian (That’s about $2.36 in American). As his widow tells us: “It took care of our drug problem. Getting drugs just wasn’t any problem at all after that”. Through interviews and “archive” footage we are given the ridicules story of Guy all the way to his mysterious death. But did Guy actually die that night on stage? The film leads us to believe not. Most of the folks being interviewed look like they’re making this stuff up as they go along. Where Spinal Tap looked real enough to work, Guy Terrifico always appears to be just one step beyond the realm of reality. Even such stars as Kristofferson and Merle Haggard couldn’t carry the weight of this farce. While the jokes are long on telling and short on laughs, the film actually does sport a few really good musical performances.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 27th, 2007
It was the final hours of the Civil War, and incompetent Captain Parmenter (Ken Berry) gave off a sneeze and sent his men in the wrong direction. By sheer luck the enemy was there and forced to retreat, making Parmenter a hero of sorts. His reward was to be placed in command of the frontier outpost Fort Courage. And that’s the set-up for F Troop. In the first season this story was told in the opening credits, but these were cut short for season two and beyond. Westerns have not traditionally been good fodder for co...edy. F Troop is the exception. But what made F Troop funny had little to do with the setting. What gave F Troop is long standing following was the cast of characters and the actors who brilliantly portrayed them. Ken Berry had a natural wit about him that brought him long success even after F Troop. He is most likely better known today for his stint in Mama’s Family. He was originally a dancer, which gave him an uncommon grace in the physical comedy that was so much a mainstay of F Troop. When you think of Forrest Tucker, you don’t necessarily think of comedy. With his run on Gunsmoke, Tucker was best known for his tough guy roles. His intimidating stature made him a natural, and he appeared on such favorites as Wagon Train and Daniel Boone. Still, to many fans he will always be the rough and tumble Sergeant O’Rourke on F Troop. His boisterous voice was instantly recognizable to the show’s legion of fans. The trio of stars is completed with Larry Storch as the naïve Corporal Agarn. The natural chemistry between these three accounted for the vast majority of the show’s success. Let’s face it the writing here was 1940’s vaudeville slapstick translated for television audiences 20 years later.
F Troop has had its fair share of controversy over the years. Fortunately the 1960’s public was not so sensitive to stereotypes, or the show might never have been made. Much has been made of the show’s portrayal of the American Indians, of course today more politically correctly referred to as Native Americans. The characters were bumbling savages with the combined intellect of an insect. One might take offense if not that the American soldiers stationed at Fort Courage were portrayed in exactly the same way. This was never anything more than mindless comedy intended to elicit a laugh or two or thirty. That it did.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 27th, 2007
Mission Impossible didn’t really enter into its by now famous format until this, the second season. The IMF team was run by Daniel Briggs, played by Steven Hill. Hill was never really happy and left after the first season, citing a refusal to work on the Sabbath as his reason for leaving. While Hill was never bad in the role, his departure was our gain. Peter Graves immediately stepped up as the iconic Mr. Phelps, and Mission Impossible as we know it was born. I should add a word of caution and say this is really ...othing like the films which have become big budget vehicles for Tom Cruise over the last decade or so. This was not an explosive f/x or stunt driven show. The team managed their impossible missions with cunning and guile. The team was necessarily eclectic in nature. It featured Martin Landau in his signature role of Rollin Hand. Hand was very much akin to Martin Ross and his role in The Wild Wild West. He was a master of disguise. He could imitate almost anyone in very short order. Barney Collier was the gadget man, played by Greg Morris. Cinnamon Carter was the model and the team’s chief seductress and was played by Landau’s real life wife Barbara Bain. Finally, the muscle was supplied by Willy Armitage, played by brute Peter Lupus. Together they took on missions that the government could not be officially a part of. They were always admonished that should they be caught “the secretary would disavow any knowledge” of them. Usually they were sent somewhere to put some evil mastermind out of business. Their tactics ranged from scams to outright theft. Sometimes they were a rescue team while other times they would infiltrate a group of bad guys. There were certainly cold war elements to the whole thing.The openning segment of each episode was television history. A hidden tape recorder would give Phelps his assignment with the warning that the recording would self-destruct in 5 seconds. The tape and usually the recorder as well went up in a puff of smoke leading to the famous fuse and theme. Before we knew it we were off to save the world one week at a time.
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Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 20th, 2007
I’m not sure exactly what I expected going into this film, but whatever it was, the film I saw could not have been farther from it. What Bridge to Terabithia is, is a little hard to explain. It’s certainly a children’s fantasy, but not in the style most popular today with franchises like Harry Potter and Narnia. This film is actually wonderfully understated. It centers on two children who are misfits of a sort. Like many kids they feel alien in the world around them. They are at that awkward age where they are gett...ng too old for childishness but are still too young for the adult world. The only option left to them is to create a world where not only do they fit in but rule with confidence. Terabithia is indeed populated with the traditional fantasy elements, but here these things blend in with the real world around them. It is a place firmly imbedded in their imaginations, a world let out only in snippets at a time. The film is never overwhelmed with an f/x laden image that fails to satisfy on any complete level. They immerse themselves in the battle of good and evil in Terabithia, but everything there is strongly connected with the lives they are actually living in the mundane world of reality. The film also goes down a path that will be unexpected, and that I will not spoil for you now. Like all classic Disney, Bridge To Terabithia is loaded with the obligatory life lessons. Concepts like friendship and standing up for yourself abound. Disney understands that less can often be more, and that understanding makes this a far more rewarding film to watch. There are moments when the film does bog itself down and move somewhat slowly. If I think so, I’m sure the kiddies will be even more aware. The film dips its toe into Christianity a bit. Most of this is directly from the Katherine Paterson novel. Fantasy and reality can often be so intertwined here that you will never quite know where one ends and the other begins until you are already fully there.
Another fine Disney tradition is the performances they have consistently gotten from child actors. Bridge To Terabithia is no exception. Jess, played by Josh Hutcherson, is the understated character. Hutcherson does a fine job of portraying the changes that come over his character. When we first meet Josh, he is shy and turned well within himself. He gets picked on at school, and his Dad seems to favor his younger sister. Once he warms up to new student Leslie, he begins to open up and finally finds things to get excited about. AnnaSophia Robb is equally good as Leslie. Leslie’s character doesn’t change quite so much. Still, it is Leslie who must bring out Jess. It is her imagination that first gives birth to Terabithia. Robb plays her with a tremendous amount of energy.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 20th, 2007
"Oh Bother"A.A. Milne was quite an eclectic writer. He wrote murder mysteries that even appeared on Alfred Hitchcock Presents. From that fertile mind would also come a place known as the 100 Acre Wood. In that select place some of literature’s finest characters had the greatest adventures any boy could imagine. And adventures are certainly no fun on your own. Young Christopher Robin was joined by Piglet, Tigger, Owl, Rabbit, Eeyore, and, of course, Winnie-The-Pooh. Who didn’t fall in love with that silly old bear... Winnie-The-Pooh. OK, so maybe Dahmer or Bundy might have been exceptions. Still, anyone growing up in the last 30-40 years who isn’t a psychopath has had a love affair with Winnie-The-Pooh, all stuffed with fluff.
Often when a company gets the rights to such classic characters they end up doing more harm than good, particularly if they include some quite radical changes to the beloved material. Walt Disney was first introduced to the stories after seeing his own children delighted by their adventures. His quick mind told him that this English story needed to be more formally introduced to American children. It took several years for the versions of these characters to evolve into what we so instantly recognize today. The original characters were quite different from these uniquely Disney inventions. I know the folks at Disney claim they stayed very true to the originals, but that simply isn’t true. Today the characters are recognized all over the world more in their Disney incarnations. More than the drawings, the voices of these characters have become very distinctive with those of us who grew up with them. Jim Cummings has done the voice of Pooh for years, but it was Sterling Holloway who originated the voice for these feature pieces. Paul Winchell gave us his giddy Tigger voice for over 40 years now. John Fiedler supplied the shy stuttering Piglet. These last two voice actors died just one day apart in June of 2005.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 20th, 2007
Since its release first as a Dan Brown novel and then as a less successful film, The DaVinci Code has stirred up more than its fair share of hornet’s nests. What most folks seem to be forgetting is that the stuff was fiction. Brown NEVER claims to be offering a secret look inside the workings of the Catholic Church. So why do we need this investigation? The self-professed documentary isn’t really a look at the story at all. It’s merely a lot of real wackos trying to fill our heads with their claptrap conspiracy the...ries and new definitions for Christianity. This will not appeal to fans of the film, unless you are one of those who think Brown was really on to something. I have no problem with these beliefs. If that’s what you want to believe, go ahead. I do have a problem getting sucked into this craziness in the guise of having something to do with a film I might have enjoyed. Susan Sarandon attempts to hold the whole thing together but can’t seem to save this sinking ship.
The problem, as I see it, is how thin the line is for some folks between fact and fiction. It shouldn’t really come as such a surprise when one looks at how much news time today is dedicated to the likes of Paris Hilton or Anna Nicole Smith. In recent years we’ve lost men who have been President of the United States and got far less attention than has Smith. Are we that far gone as a society? Watching this makes me wonder. With that much attention on celebrity, is it any wonder we start to believe almost anything we’re told, even in a work of fiction? Oliver Stone has made a living trotting out conspiracy theories knowing he can beat the conspiracy nuts into a frenzy. This gets good PR for his films, but does it serve us as a society? I’ve already said more than this thing deserves. Just say no.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 19th, 2007
Marvel Comics has certainly enjoyed a renaissance of late. There can be no question that this entire run of comic heroes on screen began with Spider-Man. Even the recent DC reimaginings might not have gotten this second chance without everyone’s favorite web slinger, or at least the gobs of money that franchise has pulled in. While none of these recent comic films have come close to the success of Spider-Man, the studios are determined to keep the trend alive and well. That translates to great news for us. The most...recent development of this success is that lesser known comic heroes are starting to emerge on film. Ghost Rider is not quite as known around the world but is not without its loyal following. Nicholas Cage happens to be among the Ghost Rider faithful. We’re talking about a guy so into the comic scene that he named his son Jor-El (Superman). Cage, it appears, has wanted to do Ghost Rider for almost as long as he’s been acting. This unusually high level of passion for a character plays to the film’s advantage. He believes in the role and thus becomes Ghost Rider with an uncanny ease.
The Ghost Rider character has evolved more over the years than perhaps any other comic icon. The story and the character himself have gone through many significant changes. The film pays homage to a ton of this history by including elements of many of those comic runs. The writers combined some of the best elements from the whole to create a world and character that is unique, yet quite true to the spirit of the Ghost Rider. The basic story remains relatively faithful to some aspect of the story’s varied history while allowing the film to have its own distinct look and tale. Here a young Johnny Blaze discovers that his father is dying of lung cancer. Together father and son have a motorbike daredevil show. He is approached by an ominous stranger who offers to heal his father’s ailment in return for, you guessed it, his soul. I know what you’re thinking. “Boy have we seen that one a thousand times before. Believe it or not this story has a remarkable twist to the old story. Of course, the deal’s a rip-off and Johnny gets exactly what he wants but not really what he wants. It’s that old fine print stuff again. The twist is that our old devilish friend has a more complicated fate in store for Johnny. When called upon he must ride his bike as the flaming skulled Ghost Rider to do the Devil’s bid. In this film the spectral rider is called upon to collect a powerful contract , which is also goal of some rather nasty elemental bad guys. It’s a royal battle to control Hell, and Blaze is right in the middle of it.
