VOD

SHOOT ‘EM UP (2007)

April 3, 2021

(VOD) I’ll preface this entry by saying: this is not a great film, but it is a gonzo film.

SHOOT ‘EM UP came out at the tail end of the early naughts stream of batshitcrazy action films — films that dispensed with anything like plot or narrative and just immediately leapt into a bunch of crazy stunts — which popped around the time of THE TRANSPORTER, then hit a high note with CRANK, then ended around the time that SHOOT ‘EM UP and CRANK 2 was released, when more gritty vengeance action came back into vogue. (I’m no action film expert, so my apologies if I’m painting this time with broad strokes.)

This is a film where the lead, Smith (Clive Owen), is introduced sitting on a bench, chomping away at a ridiculously large carrot Bugs Bunny-style, watches a pregnant woman in dire straits, clothed in The Bride yellow, walk down an alley. Smith sees a man gleefully follow her, brandishing a gun with a grin.

I’m going to leave the rest of the scene here because, while I’ve previously tried to type it out, it’s too dense. I will say: this is probably the first gunshot umbilical cord removal ever seen on film. Also, ingenious use an oil pan, and showcases that even carrots can be a deadly weapon.

It only escalates from there.

While this was filmed in the mid-naughts, it’s really a 80s cartoonish action film that is self-aware, and somehow got a number of amazing actors: the previously mentioned Clive Owens (probably only here because of CHILDREN OF MEN), Paul Giamatti (clearly loving his role), and Monica Bellucci, who probably should’ve bowed out because there’s not enough for her here, but she still gives it her all.

It’s a very dumb, very masculine action film, but cripes, the set-pieces are divine. Again, it’s not great, but it’s deliciously gonzo.

BUG (2006)

April 2, 2021

(epix/VOD) One of the few screenings I was able to catch last year before lockdown was a special 35mm screening of William Friedkin’s BUG, featuring actor Michael Shannon and writer Tracy Letts for a post-film discussion. Before both became relatively big names, they worked together on Letts’ lurid, often horrific, small town stage plays, such as BUG and KILLER JOE. Both film adaptations arguably wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for Friedkin as, according to Letts, Friedkin hounded him to adapt BUG after seeing it on the stage, and Friedkin also volunteered to take on KILLER JOE, requiring that Letts write the screenplay for each film.

A quick summary: Agnes (Ashley Judd) is a troubled waitress who works at a gay bar in a small Oklahoma town who drinks and snorts away her loneliness. One night she meets a fresh face, Peter (Michael Shannon), who reluctantly says he’s a freshly discharged solider. The two get to bonding, and before long he’s crashing in her ramshackle hotel room. What follows is an expertly balanced grimy, disturbing tale about abuse, paranoia, mental illness, and co-dependence.

While I’d previously seen BUG a few times via DVD, and several years later I’d attend a production of it at Steppenwolf — Letts and wife Carrie Coon are members, and Coon played Agnes in that production — nothing compares to seeing a print of it in a sold out theater full of fans and fans who dragged their unknowing friends to it.

Friedkin ramps up the claustrophobia, leans more on the characters’ perspectives, and tightens the screws with some manic editing and montage work, making it far more effective on a big screen than viewing at home. Also, when watching a film as gonzo as BUG, the audience’s emotions roil through the theater, amplifying some of the more absurd moments the film throws at you. At the screening, after a particularly confusing array of images and sound that are followed by relative silence, someone simply shouted out ‘WHAT THE FUCK’ and the theater burst out laughing because how the hell else do you react to BUG?

Sadly, chances to view BUG under my 2020 conditions don’t roll around too often, so don’t wait as it plays just as fucked up on a small screen. Arguably, thanks to being in lockdown, the horror of it may play more effectively when one watches at home after a year of lockdown.

There’s a trailer and, while it doesn’t ruin anything exactly, it’s best to go in knowing as little as possible.

SLEIGHT (2016)

March 30, 2021

(Netflix/VOD)? Like LOVE & BASKETBALL, SLEIGHT also exits at the end of March so, sadly, you don’t have much time to watch it for free, but it’s definitely worth a digital rental fee.

J.D. Dillard seems to specialize in delightfully overstuffed films. SLEIGHT is about a young drug dealer named Bo (Jacob Latimore) that gets in way over his head with supplier Angelo (a somewhat ill-fitting Dulé Hill), but he’s also a street magician who idolizes Houdini, and he also has a crazy superhuman magnetic implant that allows him to pull off some amazing stunts. As he says in the film: “Anyone can learn a trick. Doing something no one else is willing to do makes you a magician.”

It also namedrops West Covina (yeah, I hear you fellow CRAZY EX-GIRLFRIEND fans) and features Cameron Esposito in a supporting role.

While it’s undeniably high-concept, Dillard keeps matters grounded. Bo’s magnetic powers are slowplayed, lending the film a far more human air than you’d expect, which is what I appreciate the most about the movie. Dillard could’ve cranked this up to 11 and I’m sure it would have been an entertaining film, but he did the opposite and it’s far more interesting because of that choice.

That said, it reads like Dillard was setting this up as a franchise, with Bo becoming some sort of Tesla-ish force of nature, but that never happened. Instead, he went on to write and direct the similarly high-concept SWEETHEART, and is now working on a STAR WARS film.

QUEEN & SLIM (2019)

March 29, 2021

(VOD) Fuck everyone that said this film was style over substance. Every scene here exists for a reason, and -just happens to be- stylishly shot.

Yes, this can be called a Black Bonnie & Clyde film. (Hell, it’s called out in the trailer linked below.) It’s the story of two strangers — Slim (Daniel Kaluuya) and Queen (Jodie Turner-Smith), magnetically thrust together, immediately pegged as criminals as they try to escape an unjust system while working their way through America by car for freedom.

The film runs the emotional gamut: it’s cruel, hard, emotional, romantic, sad, heartbreaking, violent, and worth your time.

PLAYTIME (1967)

March 27, 2021

(Criterion/kanopy/VOD) One of the first screenings I attended upon moving to Chicago was for Jacques Tati’s MR. HULOT’S HOLIDAY at the Music Box Theatre. Sadly, it was in their sidecar theater and, if you think that room is ramshackle now, you should’ve seen it in the 90s. It was a matinee and, while I’d seen it before — I was introduced to Tati and MR. HULOT’S HOLIDAY back when I was a Purdue student — I couldn’t wait to see it in a proper theater, even if the screen wasn’t much larger that one in a college classroom.

Sadly, in a predictably Tati-esque manner, the print burned and tore apart no less than twenty minutes into the film. So it goes.

But! I’m here to extoll Tati’s PLAYTIME, both his greatest film, and also the film that would doom him. Before PLAYTIME, he was a celebrated physical comedian who had directed several very visually clever and humorous movies, including MR. HULOT’s HOLIDAY. PLAYTIME was to be his magnum opus, and he sunk all of his money into a number of dazzlingly huge sets, all constructed to fuel his vision of satirizing modern urban architecture and mode of living.

The end result was an absolute marvel. At the risk of sounding pretentious, it’s pure cinema, each frame densely packed with revelations, but never overwhelming the viewer. It’s a marvelous onion of a work, one where you’ll see something new with each and every screening, jam-packed with gags, either with the blocking, a flourish of color, someone’s line of sight, but the film is always in complete command when it needs to draw your attention to one of the few plot-related setups.

I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve watched it. It’s one of the few films I’ll always make a point to catch when it comes to town. It’s an utter delight — one of a handful of films I consider ‘perfect’ — which is why it’s so sad that production overruns bankrupted Tati, then the film flopped upon release, and he never quite recovered from its failure.

LOVE & BASKETBALL (2000)

March 25, 2021

(HBO MAX/VOD) First things first: it leaves HBO MAX at the end of the month (March 2021) so, watch it while you can!

LOVE & BASKETBALL, written and directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood (THE OLD GUARD, BEYOND THE LIGHTS) is just perfect. Absolutely perfect. The opening scene, introducing us to young tomboy Monica and her future life-long love/combatant Quincy is perfect, even down to Monica sustaining a scar due to a heated game. The following scene, where Quincy is reprimanded by his parents not for saying ‘shit’, but for saying ‘can’t’ is perfect. The fact that Monica owns her scar, and the film never portrays her as an ugly monster, is perfect.

This is a film where the script is so lovingly overworked — overworked in the way that you know the author was like ‘I have one shot. I’m going to cram everything I want to say into this.’ — that you can’t help but laugh when it becomes a bit too predictable, such as a scene where Monica is taken out to a local dance with a college student. Her suitor asks: “Can I take your coat?” and she responds, straight-faced: “Oh, you’re cold?” And it still works!

I’d love to discuss the film in full, but if I did so we’d be here for days so, I’ll simply say: this is one of the best romantic dramas simply because Monica and Quincy start off with a mutual respect for each others’ talents, and that is a goddamn rare thing in fictional romances. They see each other as equals, and butt heads as equals. Even when they’re falling out of each other’s orbits, they still respect each other and are life-long friends. You simply don’t see that in modern romantic films.

The penultimate scene is astounding. “Double or nothing.”

Again, going to point you towards Caroline Siede’s notes about the film.

Trailer (although it’s kind of awful):

EATING RAOUL (1982)

March 23, 2021

(HBO MAX/Criterion/VOD) While film seems to be endlessly fragmenting when it comes to genre, some genres seem to have completely fallen off the map, such as the satirical sex farce, which is the closest genre I can think of for EATING RAOUL.

As the trailer below details, EATING RAOUL is a very conflicted picture that tries to have its cake and eat it too, and mostly succeeds because of its absurdity. It’s about a comically straight-laced couple, Paul & Mary, a.k.a. Mr. And Mrs. Bland, a wine snob (character actor and director of DEATH RACE 2000 Paul Bartel) and a nurse (the distinctive horror character actor Mary Woronov), both of whom retire at night in twin beds, the former hugging a plush wine bottle, the latter clutching a number of stuffed animals. They live in an apartment complex full of swingers, and their American Dream is to own their own restaurant. While they found the perfect spot for their restaurant, someone’s about to grab it unless they’re able to pony up the cash, and quick.

So, they come to the conclusion that most modern America comes to: let’s kill and rob the deviants, one-by-one. They choose to do so with the symbol of American domesticity: the frying pan. Eventually they enlist the help of Raoul (Robert Beltran), a ‘hot-blooded emotional, crazy Chicano’ (their words — not mine) who, while turning the bodies into dog food for extra cash, also woos Mrs. Bland.

No, it’s not a subtle film, but the script is whipsmart:

“Mary, I just killed a man.”

“He was a man, honey. Now he’s just a bag of garbage.”

It’s a crazy script, and a crazy film and, while I don’t think it completely succeeds, it’s extremely audacious and entertaining. Frankly, I’m growing tired of capitalist satire being couched in miserable horror films that barely elicit a laugh.

THE MAXX (1995)

March 22, 2021

(VOD/DVD) THE MAXX was a short-lived animated adaptation of Sam Keith’s comic book featured in MTV’s similarly short-lived ODDITIES block and, to this day, remains one of the most faithful — and most intriguing — comic book adaptations ever.

THE MAXX is about a spandex-clad vagrant (The Maxx) who believes himself to be the protector of Julie Winters, a complicated social worker who is being tormented by a man known as Mr. Gone. The Maxx sometimes slips into another realm known as The Outback, where he’s a noble warrior instead of a homeless man in a purple suit. If it sounds slightly ridiculous, well, -comics-, but it’s essentially a hard-boiled vehicle to explore repression and trauma.

While the narrative and characters would be interesting enough on its own, what really makes the series stand out is how it adapted Keith’s extremely stylized artwork and layouts to TV: they essentially ripped the panels from his comic, and -then- animated them. Occasionally they throw in some CGI or live action video footage, but the majority of it is exactly what you would have seen and read in the first twelve issues of the comics. Amazingly, instead of feeling like a hollow recreation, it feels vibrant and thrilling and often even funny.

If Keith’s comic were a lesser work, it might not have translated so well to bizarro late-night 15-minute programming, but instead it feels fresh and audacious, even today. There’s never been anything that looks or feels like THE MAXX, and it’s unlikely there ever will be.

You can watch all 13 episodes in around three hours. It used to be stream via MTV.com (albeit as a very poor transfer) but it’s now it’s only available to purchase via DVD or the usual VOD outlets. However, resourceful folks can find episodes through Vimeo (but you didn’t hear that from me).

DETECTIVE PIKACHU (2019)

March 21, 2021

(VOD) Now wait, hear me out:

  • It’s a visual marvel that WAS SHOT ON FILM on because Oscar-nominated cinematographer John Mathieson wanted it to look like BLADE RUNNER, and I’d argue that he succeeded
  • It reminds me of Jim Henson’s DOG CITY — a childhood favorite of mine — in that it’s family-friendly noir, but still damn smart. (That said: not nearly as much of a spoof, but very close to one.)
  • It’s darker than you’d expect and has better character development than necessary
  • I have only played POKEMON SNAP and had no proper pre-existing knowledge of the characters or the world and I still loved it
  • It’s worth watching just for the closing reveal
  • I’m short on time today, hence these bullet points

BROADCAST NEWS (1987)

March 20, 2021

(HBO MAX/VOD) I watch BROADCAST NEWS about every five years, and every time my appreciation for it grows. I love how adults are posited more like immature teens, but still have to tackle serious issues like balancing their career and their personal desires; I love how the newsroom was brutally portrayed; I marvel at the unsure balancing of the love triangle; Jane Craig’s character is still a breath of fresh air, and how Holly Hunter absolutely nails her very distinct blend of determination, confidence, and anxiety; oh, how stellar the camerawork is, and the exactly attention paid to each edit.

My most recent viewing was by far the most special. Not only did I nab tickets to see it at TCM Fest 2017 so I finally managed to see it on a big screen — and with a bigger audience than my traditional audience of one — not only did Ben Mankiewicz lead a discussion with director James L. Brooks about the film, but co-star Albert Brooks was the surprise guest! Given how reluctant Brooks is to join in anything that comes close to an interview event, I was stunned to see him join James L. Brooks on stage, and I couldn’t have been happier to see -and- hear these two giants of dramatic and romantic comedy discuss this magnificent work.

I’d like to recommend Caroline Seide’s relatively recent article on BROADCAST NEWS — it’s part of her AV Club series ‘When Romance Met Comedy’ — as it’s a finely detailed examination as to why the film works so well, why it resonated then, and why it still holds up.