The Resident 2011 Antti Jokinen

Looks like I fell into the Straight to DVD trap again.  It's my fault.  I thought, "It's a dollar at Redbox!  It's by the new Hammer Studios!  I love the old Hammer movies!  It can't be that bad!"  When will I learn?  Sigh.....

The world's most famous transexual, Hilary Swank, stars as a woman(!) ER doctor who needs a new place.  She(?) finds one in a building that's owned by Jeffrey Dean Morgan and his grandfather, Christopher Lee.  That's right,  Christopher Lee!  In a new Hammer Studios movie!  See?  It can't be that bad!  But it is!

It's not long before Hillary Swank and Jeffrey Dean Morgan start their little neighborly fling.  Then someone gets cold feet, and someone loses it.  Since this movie is called The Resident and not The Landlord, you'd think the nutty one would me Mr/Mrs Swank, but no!  It's the other guy.  He's nuts!  He's a peeper!  He drugs her!  He hides under her bed!  Creepy!

Not really.  Hillary Swank takes her clothes off a lot.  That's creepy.  Jeffrey Dean Morgan does a really good job in this movie being pervy, but it's still not good.  Stupid Straight to DVD curse.  I hate you.

The Sorcerer's Apprentice 2010 Jon Turteltaub

Oh, how I wish I was 8 years old.  Because if I was 8 years old, I would absolutely LOVE this movie.  I'm not 8 anymore, so it wasn't the greatest movie of all time to me ( that would be Jaws).  It's pretty entertaining, though.  The special effects are extremely well done.  Nicolas Cage is phoning it in for the most part.  Jay Baruchel - welcome to character roles for the rest of your life.  Too nerdy for the masses.  And Alfred Molina, you make every movie better, you really do.

So Jay Baruchel plays a guy named Dave.  Dave is a student at NYU, and he's working on an experiiment involving Nikolai Tesla's theories about electricity.  Dave loves this girl, but he's too painfully awkward to ask her out.  She's gorgeous, of course.  Now if only Dave can muster the courage to ask her out, she'll totally say yes, since she'll see how unbelievably awesome Dave is when he wows her with his Dave-ness.

Then Nicolas Cage and Alfred Molina get released from an urn, look up Dave - he's supposed to have a doll with the evil sorceress Morgana Le Fay in it - and fight for the doll.  Nicolas Cage is also trying to release Monica Bellucci from the doll, because she's Monica Bellucci.  Lots of special effects ensue.

It's a Disney movie, so it's pretty lame in parts.  I mean, it is based on the Fantasia Mickey Mouse cartoon, so you can't expect too much.  If you were to compare this movie and the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie, they're pretty much equally entertaining.  Johnny Depp's performance gives Pirates the edge, but if you have young children who need to be entertained, you could do a lot worse than The Sorcerer's Apprentice.  Haunted Mansion, anyone?

The Incredible Melting Man 1977 William Sachs

When I was about 10 or 11 years old, I read Fangoria magazine a lot.  Sometimes they would put fold-out posters on the back of the covers highlighting some monster or other.  It was usually pretty gory and I loved it.  My favorite one was from a movie I'd never even heard of before:  The Incredible Melting Man.  It was the grossest thing I'd ever seen.  My 10 year old brain couldn't comprehend how awesome that movie must be.  I promised myself right then and there that one day I'd watch that movie and my life would never be the same.

Well, now I've watched that movie, and my life's gonna pretty much be the same.  It's too bad, too, because the makeup effects for the Melting Man are pretty fantastic.  They're fantastic because they were done by Rick Baker, way before he made the gorillas in those mists, or Eddie Murphy the only actor in an Eddie Murphy movie.

The plot of the movie goes like this:  Astronauts up in space get bombarded by cosmic rays, one survives, becomes super strong, homicidal, and more than a little bit melty.  It's explained by his doctor, Dr. Ted, "The more he melts, the stronger he gets!"  In scientific terms, Dr. Ted means that Melting Man's strength is inversely proportional to his weight.  Lose weight - get stronger.  Looks like all those anorexics and bulimics are on to something!

It's not that Melting Man is averse to eating.  In fact, he loves to hunt and kill his own food.  It's just that his food consists of people, mostly.  He doesn't eat a lot, but he knows what he likes - old people, fishermen, nurses, old neighbors, kids, pretty much anyone who's not melting will do.



My name's Steve & I like long walks on the
beach, star-gazing, and murder.

 When Steve the Melting Man is out terrorizing the countryside, he comes across an empty house.  Who lives there?  If you said Academy award-winning director Jonathan Demme and the girl who played Ruby in the original Hills Have Eyes movie, you'd be one of the 15 people who'd seen this movie before!  Cheater.  If you've seen The Hills Have Eyes, then you can also guess who gives Melty Steve a taste of his own medicine!

It's off to the power plant for ol' Steve, because that's just what monsters do.  By this point, he's pretty melted, so he's super-strong because of that scientific formula I mentioned earlier.  You'd think that the cops would realize that he's MELTING, so after he MELTS, he's not gonna be a problem anymore, but no!  You know cops.  They can't leave a murdering fugitive alone to drown in his own juices - they've gotta take him in.  Probably for questioning.  Fingerprints are out of the question.

Is it too much to say that things end badly for all concerned?  Steve, Dr, Ted, Dr, Ted's wife, the Chief of Police, anyone who watches this - they all just sorta wished they'd stayed home and watched That's Incredible! instead.  That Fran Tarkenton sure could play football.

Lord of the Flies 1963 Peter Brook

Hey, I've got an idea!  Let's crash a planeload of British schoolboys on a deserted island and watch them devolve into brutish savages!  Awesome!  Wait - I know how to make it even better!  How?  Let's make a movie of it!  Totally!  Who likes books anyway?  Stupid readers! Pictures are better!

Well, this is the original movie.  It was made with nonprofessional actor kids in Puerto Rico.  Unsurprisingly, only one of the kids went on to have a real career as an actor, and it was the kid who plays Ralph, the last bastion of British society.  Everybody else seems to have gone the way of poor Piggy - struck in the head by the cold, hard reality of being a child actor - nobody wants you when you're not cute anymore.

Actually, the other thing I was thinking about while I watched this was how much this story has entered into our everyday consciousness.  Deep, huh?  If you think about it, even Harry Potter is a version of Lord of the Flies.  Look at Harry, dark haired, sensible, kind, civilized like Ralph.  Look at Draco Malfoy.  He's blond, aggressive, and prone to fascistic evil like Jack.  Ron Weasely starts out life as a character like Piggy.  Think about it.  You know I'm right.

The movie looks a lot like Michael Apted's Up series, but in the jungle.  You could replace some of the members of that movie series in here, too.  Look - it's Neil as Simon!  Since everyone knows the story, there's lots of fun games that can be played while watching this movie.

It really is a good movie.  Probably the best movie version of the story we'll ever have.  If you're not tired of the story by now, you should definitely give this version a watch.

The American 2010 Anton Corbijn

I really liked Hanna.  Then I saw this movie.  This is the grown up version of Hanna.  It makes Hanna look like a smart comic book movie.  A smart movie, but still a comic book movie.  The American is a movie for adults, and Hanna is for kids in high school AP classes.

George Clooney is the guy who supplies weapons to assassins.  Sometimes he might assassinate people, too.  At the beginning of the movie, he's in Dalarna, Sweden.  Then some assassins show up and he has to leave.  Before you can say "Get your ass to Mars", he gets his ass to Italy.  There he builds a rifle for a future assassination, meets a gorgeous prostitute, and hides out from the bad guys after him.  His weakness is beautiful women.  Will it be his undoing?  Hmmmm.

If you've seen any of Jean-Pierre Melville's gangster movies from the '60's, you'll definitely see what they were going for in this film.  There's lots of walks down deserted streets and shots of driving in the countryside, waiting for something to happen.  There's not a ton of action in this movie - like I said, it's not a comic book movie.  I can see why it wasn't a big hit.  People have been trained to expect an explosion every few minutes, not a few minutes of conversation.  No one watches scenes of a craftsman practicing his craft.  It's a shame, because the scenes of Clooney building the rifle, making the suppressor, and the explosive bullets are fascinating.

Every single shot in this movie is beautiful.  Every set is immaculate.  Every film reference is cleverly done.  Why didn't people flock to this movie?  Have people really become that simple?  That's a shame.  This movie is fantastic and deserves to be seen by everyone.

Yes Man 2008 Peyton Reed

I had gotten really tired of Jim Carrey and his whole Jim Carrey-ness.  As a result, I hadn't seen a Jim Carrey movie in  a very long time.  Then I watched I Love You, Phillip Morris.  That movie was fantastic enough to make me go back and see what I've been missing.  Not to the extreme of The Number 23, but at least to give this movie a chance.

Jim Carrey plays a man who says "no" all the time.  His friends are starting to hate him and he's getting lonely.  Then he goes to a self help seminar and learns to say "yes" to everything.  He does and hijinks ensue.   It's a pretty funny movie, and I feel a little bad about waiting so long to see OOOHHH MY GOD!!!! ZOOEY DESCHANEL IS IN THIS!  WHY????  DOES SHE HAVE TO RUIN EVERYTHING?  WHY?  WHY DOES SHIE SING IN EVERYTHING?  WHY DOES HER VOICE SOUND LIKE A GOOSE HONKING?  WHY?  WHY?  WHY?

Actually, she's not that bad or annoying in this.  Everyone seems subdued next to Jim Carrey.  It's a completely average time waster.  If you grew up on '80's comedies like I did, the last bit will remind you of films like Liscense to Drive & Like Father, Like Son, but in a good way.  But Zooey Deschanel does sing - which sucks - but then so does everyone else in this movie, so her crappy voice is diluted.  Other than that, it's pretty entertaining.

Mr. Vampire 1985 Ricky Lau

Hey look!  It's classic character alert!  Say hello to the unibrowed Taoist priest.  He fights hopping vampires with the help of his two disciples.  That's right.  Hopping vampires.  They hop because they have rigor mortis.  They also have their own style of kung fu, with a pretty intense kung fu grip.  If they bite you, you're done for.  If they stab you with their long vampire nails, you're done for.  Unless you have a large supply of uncooked sticky rice to stand on.  That clears up a bad case of vampirirsm.

There's also a soul sucking ghost on the loose looking for a victim.  She finds the unibrowed priest's disciple, and proceeds to feast on him night after night, a full two years before the Chinese Ghost Story films.  It's up to the unibrowed priest to save his disciple, banish the ghost, fight the vampires, and be all around awesome.  There's lots of speeded up fights, wirework, and cheap latex special effects.  It's pretty awesome.  Pretty much the only thing that's questionable about this movie is the instances of animal sacrifice.  I can't say for sure that they didn't kill them - it's not Cannibal Holocaust, but it was a little surprising   I wouldn't say that you shouldn't watch this movie because of 5 seconds of film, just be aware and close your eyes if it bothers you.  Otherwise, this movie is extremely entertaining - even if you're not a kung fu fan or a foreign movie fan, you should check it out.

The Warrior (aka Jaka Sembung) 1981 Sisworo Gautama Putra

All hail the Indonesian Schwarzenegger!  Barry Prima is back and he's fighting mad in The Warrior!  This movie is based on a 1960's Indonesian comic strip "Jaka Sembung".  Barry plays Jaka Sembung and what he wants more than anything is to rid his country of the Dutch colonists.  Too bad all the Dutch want is to rid their new lands of Jaka Sembung.  Oooohhhh - there's gonna be a fight!

And there is one, too.  There's lots of them, in fact.  This being an Indonesian movie, there's also plenty of sorcerers and mystics doing battle as well.  The Dutch have hired two of the toughest mystics to take on Jaka and all the natives.  They've even hired a man who can break a bull's neck with his bare hands!  Poor Jaka is only helped out by his Islamic beliefs and a kindly old sorcerer who helps out when things get really bad.

They get so bad for Jaka that the middle section of the film should be called "The Passion of Barry Prima".  He's getting it from all sides - and not in a good way.  He's captured, beaten, whipped, crucified, and blinded - all because he fights for freedom!  Damn you, Dutch Imperialists! It's a good thing he's super manly!

Would you guess this man had just been crucified?
I told you he's tough!

It's also a good thing that kindly, old sorcerer is around since Jaka needs all the help he can get. The main sorcerer bad guy type can disengage his limbs, including his head, and use them all independently in his fights with Jaka.  When's Jaka gonna catch a break?  Maybe he's so badass, he doesn't need to!  Well, except for his sorcerer buddy - that guy helps.

It all builds up to a big raid on the Dutch fortress and a final fight with the evil head sorcerer.  Will Jaka and the villagers prevail?  Watch and find out! (....there's a ton of sequels to this movie, so, yeah, they pretty much prevail - but watch it anyway, it's totally fun....)

This DVD from Mondo Macabro is loaded.  You get an interview with the writer, an interview with the head of Rapi Films (the studio that produced this movie), Barry Prima bio, the trailer, more trailers, the Mondo Macabro trailer (Love the music!) and some other good stuff.  If you liked The Demon Sword or 80's Hong Kong movies, you should definitely check this out.

And Soon the Darkness 2010 Marcos Efron

Sometimes I watch these Direct to Video movies because I get tricked by the cover.  I saw that and I thought " I know it's DTV, but it doesn't look too bad.  That girl was in Cloverfield.  I loved Cloverfield!  Look, there's that Amber Heard girl.  She did All the Boys Love Mandy Lane.  And Karl Urban = he's not so bad...How bad could it be?"  Well, it's not Syfy channel terrible, so there's that....

Amber Heard and Odette Yustman are on a bicycle trip through Argentina.  Amber Heard is the more responsible one.  Odette Yustman has made her passport into an "assport" with a cleverly placed sticker.  Who's in more danger of being taken?  Amber Heard is more polite.  Odette Yustman is whiny.  At the bar, Amber Heard is shy, while Odette Yustman sings the Divynls hit "I Touch Myself" for the locals - and Karl Urban who happens to be there.  Then.....

SHE GETS TAKEN!

Let this be a lesson, dumb Americans.  Don't be a dumb American.  You're not nearly as cute, funny, or interesting as your bestie says you are.  Sometimes you're completely annoying.  You are in someone else's country, and you are annoying the ENTIRE country with your braying stupidity.  Guess what happens next?  You get took.

Which leaves your bff having to hunt the countryside for you with strange Karl Urban, and he might be BAD!  You are not a good friend, dumb American.  Now you've pissed off the only person in the entire country who is looking for you.  That's selfish.  And if you thought for a second how all the people at home on their couches would feel when they watch your friend going from one badly set up "suspense" moment to another, you might think twice about being the center of attention.  Because through your dumb Americanness, you have managed to alienate everyone in Argentina and America.  No one cares if you're found.  Not me, not my girlfriend, not Amber Heard, or even sketchy Karl Urban.  It's a good thing your bicycle adventure was shot extremely well, because if it had looked like a regular DTV movie, I might have just turned it off right away....or at least after all the bikini parts....but you get what I'm saying.

It's a good looking, dumb movie about good looking, dumb Americans getting what they deserve from native Spanish speaking people.  I don't feel bad for them and neither should you.  When will I learn that DTV movies aren't that good?  Oh well, maybe next time....

When Time Ran Out... 1980 James Goldstone

Here it is - the last disaster movie of the 70's.  It's fitting that it stars a great big volcano, since after this one, disaster movies were dormant for a good long time.  There's a brand new hotel in Hawaii, just outside an active volcano.  James Franciscus, sans beard, is the geologist in charge of making sure the volcano doesn't blow everything up.  He's married to William Holden's daughter, and William Holden and Paul Newman are the hotel investors.  They can make him rich, so he lies about the danger.  Plus, Barbara Carrera works there, and if they shut down the hotel, then James Franciscus won't be able to continue his illicit relationship with her.  He'd rather jeopardize the saftey of hundreds of people than give up his action on the side.  He's the bad guy.

In addition to those stars of the 70's, this film also has Jacqueline Bisset, who's two-timing William Holden with Paul Newman, Ernest Borgnine as a cop, Red Buttons as his prey, Edward Albert as one of the help, Burgess Meredith as an old-time vaudeville/circus performer, Pat Morita as a bar owner who organizes cockfights, and a post-football pre-Webster Alex Karras as Paul Newman's bodyguard.  It's all set up pretty well, it's just that when the volcano does go, it looks more like a volcano you'd have made on your kitchen table for 7th grade science tha a real volcano.  It does explode with about an hour left, which is nice, because then you can start to play the "Who's gonna die?" guessing game pretty early.

Every time I watch one of these movies, I get that warm, fuzzy feeling.  I know all of the cliches, I know who's gonna die, I even know the theme songs in some occasions, so when I get the chance to see a new one, like this or The Hindenburg, it's a good day.  I'm a little sad that I don't have any of the old ones left to discover, but if my last classic disaster movie has improvised high wire walking on a destroyed bridge to save the last few stragglers, then so be it.  That roman candle volcano in the back is a celebration of this genre.  It's a pretty fitting way to go out, after all.

The Guardian 1990 William Friedkin

Maybe a druid snatched your baby!  Let me explain.  There's this druid lady going around and posing as a nanny so she can snatch up babies and feed them to this big tree in the woods.  No shit.  It's also very poorly written, directed, edited, and acted.  Why hadn't I seen this before?  It's amazing.

I'd been meaning to watch this for years, but I kept getting distracted by other things.  Thank god for Netflix Instant or I'd probably never have seen this masterpiece of awfulness.  It is entertaining, though.  You just have to remind yourself that it contains a completely batshit crazy ending.  Because it does.  Does it ever...

If you've seen Lair of the White Worm, then you'll recognize the role of the druid nanny.  It's played by Jenny Seagrove, since Amanda Donohoe must have been busy.  Dwier Brown ( Kevin Costner's dad in Field of Dreams) plays the baby daddy, all the while looking and acting exactly like Eric Bana and Carey Lowell (Mrs. Richard Gere) plays the mother.  She looks exactly like Michelle Meyrink in Real Genius (Jordan, the hyper "Are you peeing?"girl).  The whole movie looks like it was shot by the Miami Vice TV crew.  The special effects are of the latex and fake blood variety, which is nice.  I kind of miss those effects these days.

If you're a fan of bad movies, you should watch this.  If you're a fan of fake blood and latex effects, you should watch this.  If you're a fan of spectacularly crazy, over the top endings, you should watch this.  Just be patient.  It's all worth it.

Your Highness 2011 David Gordon Green

Okay, so I really liked The Foot Fist Way.  I really like Eastbound and Down.  I absolutely loved Pineapple Express and Observe and Report.  Maybe that's why this movie was a disappointment.  My expectations must have been too high.  I even grew up in the middle of the '80's sword and sorcery boom they're making fun of.  I get the jokes.  Why isn't it that funny?

Maybe it's Zooey Deschanel.  That's probably it.  I seem to have an allergic reaction to her whenever she's in a movie.  And good god, if she sings in a movie in her honking goose voice like (500) Days of Summer, then my whole world goes red with rage and I want to destroy everything to just MAKE IT STOP!  But then I thought "Well, she's the damsel in distress.  She won't have a lot to do.  She'll be harmless...."  I was wrong!  She sings! Why does she have to ruin everything?  I get it, Zooey Deschanel.  You're an indie-pop singer/actress multi-talented-super-hyphenate.  You have that inde-pop band She & Him (oooh, clever grammar!) with that other indie-pop guy, and so who wouldn't want to hear your indie-popness?

I'll tell you....

NO ONE wants to hear your indie-popness in their swords n' sorcery stoner comedy.  Thank you, James Franco, for being as impressed with Zooey Deschanel's "talent" in this movie as you were with Anne Hathaway's "talent" at the Oscars, and treating her musical interlude with as much respect as it deserved.

She's actually not in the movie much, that Zooey Deschanel, so why doesn't it work when she's not ruining it?  Maybe because sword and sorcery movies were already lame laughfests by themselves.  If you don't beleive me, just go watch Jack Hill's Sorceress.  It's a good try by everyone in this movie, and there are a couple of funny parts - even a few that aren't in the trailer! - but it's just not that good of a movie.  Way to ruin it for everyone, Zooey Deschanel.

The Hindenburg 1975 Robert Wise

I love disaster movies.  I never even knew this movie existed, so I was quite happy when it showed up on Netflix Instant.  A disaster movie based on an actual disaster?  Yes, please!  But then I watched it....

George C. Scott stars as Ritter, a Nazi pilot.  He's been singled out by Goebbels to ride along on the Hindenburg as a security officer.  There's a letter stating that the Hindenburg will be bombed and Ritter has to find and stop the fiendish plot.  That's right - this movie's about a Nazi officer foiling a mad bomber.   He's not a real staunch supporter of Hitler and his crew though, so that makes him a loveable good guy.  He's a kinder, gentler Nazi who's out to save lives.  Root for the Nazi!

While we're all rooting for the Nazi, the other stock characters board the ship.  Look - there's Anne Bancroft!  And Burgess Meredith!  And that guy from Benson!  Plus assorted little kids and a dog.  All on the Hindenburg....all doomed to die.

But wait!  Not everybody died on the Hindenburg!  No, really!  So will the good hearted Nazi find the bomb and save everyone?  Was there really a bomb or was it just pilot error?  Does it matter?  When's the disaster in this disaster movie gonna happen?  Not for a while, because the Hindenburg is pretty slow.  While we wait let's admire the wonderful set design of the interior of the death blimp.  It looks pretty fantastic - very 2001 - and those are actually the best parts of the movie.

It's not exactly giving anything away to say that the Hindenburg goes down in flames.  I did like how they worked in some newsreel footage of the actual crash, and I also liked how the film went from color to black and white to allow for this.  What I didn't like was that the entire movie is 2 hours of set up for 5 minutes of destruction, but it's based on a real event, so what can you do?  Well, if you're in the mood for a disaster movie, you could watch The Poseidon Adventure instead.  If you're in the mood for an old timey star studded event movie full of people who went on to be "special guest stars", this is the movie for you.

Priest 2011 Scott Stewart

Let me ask you something.  Do you like westerns?  What about The Searchers?  I know that when I sit around thinking about The Searchers, my thoughts definitely turn to things like "What would make that movie better?"  Invariably, I come to the conclusion that vampires would definitely make it better.  Everybody's used to Scar and the Indians by now.  Vampires, that's where it's at.  But not soulful, snappy dresser vampires.  I'm thinking more along the lines of eyeless, Descent style monsters that scrabble around and rip your throat out.

And cowboys as heroes?  Tired.  How about it all takes place in a 1984 style future where the Church runs everything, including training people to be Church Warrior Priests to hunt down the Indians...I mean vampires.  But it's only 1984 in the city.  Once you get outside into the Forbidden Zone, it becomes the Old West.  With vampires.  And kung fu Warrior Priests.

Like The Searchers, the vampires attack a homestead, kill the people, steal the niece of the badass priest, and he vows revenge.  Her boyfriend sheriff type tags along, of course, and they go hunting.  Paul Bettany, the Priest, even says that he'll kill his niece if she's "infected".

It was at this point that I started to wonder just how slavish this movie would be towards The Searchers.  Thankfully, not much more.  Karl Urban shows up as a human/vampire mix - an Old West Wesley Snipes - and proceeds to steal the movie right out from under everyone else.  The showdown on the train between the Priest and Black Hat (imaginative!) is pretty fun, as long as you can overlook all the stealing from better movies.

This movie is fine, in it's own way.  It's completely derivative.  It's mindless and fun.  You'll forget you saw it within a few days, but you'll remember having some stupid fun.  And for a summer movie, that's about all you can ask.  Well, that and air conditioning.

Requiescant (aka Kill and Pray) 1967 Carlo Lizzani

If you're like me, the title of this movie is just a big question mark.  What does it mean?  How do you pronounce it?  What's going on?  It's Latin.  It comes from the phrase "Requiescat in pace", better known as "Rest in Peace".  Make sense now?  The main character's name is a version of "Rest in Peace"!  Awesome!  Bad guys everywhere look out!

Requiescant (Lou Castel, Fists in the Pocket) is the only survivor of the Mexican people who lived around San Antonio/  When he was a small child, they all met at a fort outside of town to celebrate peace between the Mexicans and Americans.  So what do the Americans, led by former Confederate soldier William Bellows Ferguson (Mark Damon, Johnny Oro), do?  They turn a machine gun on the Mexicans and kill them all, except little Requiescant.

He's saved by a traveling preacher and his family, and raised as their son.  One day their daughter Princy runs away to see the world and Requiescant heads off to find her.  This brings him into conflict with the evil Ferguson and his gang, and the surrounding Mexicans just looking for someone to help them get San Antonio back.

This movie has everything - gunfights, lynchings, hookers with a heart of gold, and an underdog hero who just happens to be a crack shot, and the great Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini (Salo).  He plays Reverend Juan and his whole life is dedicated to eradicating Ferguson and retaking San Antonio for the Mexicans.

It also has a lot of quirky touches, too.  Requiescant rides his horse backwards sometimes and he spurs him on with a cast iron frying pan instead of a whip.  Ferguson likes to refer to himself in the third person when he berates his servants and friends.  He's also quite the fancy dresser.  Check out his pancake makeup and Dracula cape that he wears for the final showdown.  He's one of the great Spaghetti Western villians.  It's also interesting that he happens to look like Christopher McDonald, Shooter McGavin from Happy Gilmore.  So if you're not a huge fan of Italian Westers, you could always quote lines from that movie or take a shot whenever he refers to himself in the third person.  You'll be loaded 15 minutes in.

Otherwise, if you do like Spaghettis, you should definitely check this out.  It's on a double feature DVD from Wild East.  It comes with the movie Dead Men Don't Count, also starring Mark Damon, along with trailers, photo galleries, and an interview with Mark Damon himself, discussing these films.

Dead Men Don't Count (aka Cry for Revenge) 1968 Rafael Romero Marchent

Most Spaghetti Westerns seem to be about one man, alone, taking on entire towns full of thugs in order to set something right (i.e. Django, Fistful of Dollars, The Great Silence). It's not often that there are two like-minded gunfighters who join forces to rid a town of it's evildoers.  If there are two protagonists, one usually antagonizes the other protagonizer (see For A Few Dollars More, The Mercenary).  It's rare to have an Italian western that's actually a buddy picture, but that's the case here.

Anthony Steffen and Mark Damon play bounty hunting brothers Fred and Johnny Dalton.  They like to roam from town to town with their handfuls of wanted posters, killing bad guys and collecting their meager bounties.  When they come across the town of Blackstone, Arizona, they run afoul of the sheriff Bob Watson.  He gives them a day to get out of town, the guys agree, but of course things come up and the town needs to be set right.

I wish that Anthony Steffen and Mark Damon were able to make more buddy pictures.  You can tell they're having a blast making this.  It's just a shame that this movie is so run of the mill.  There are a few nice moments, like the Dalton brothers approaching every situation with a statement like "..just like Abilene?" and then shooting up the never ending supply of bad guys.

There's also an interesting subplot concerning the town's leading citizen, Steve Rogers (Captain America, hah!) and his wife.  She gave up her son as a baby to be with the rich Rogers, and Johnny Dalton just might be her long lost son.

The tone of this movie is a little too jokey for me, but once I got used to it, I had fun.  These guys might not be Terence Hill and Bud Spencer, but they do okay.

The DVD is a double feature by Wild East, a company that specializes in limited editions of Spaghetti Westerns.  As such, this is probably the best this movie will ever look.  Extras include a photo gallery and an interview with Mark Damon, who became quite the movie producer after his stint in westerns ended.  The other movie included on this DVD is called Kill and Pray.  It also stars Mark Damon, this time as the bad guy, and it's defiinitely worth watching.

Hanna 2011 Joe Wright

I put off seeing this movie for a while.  I thought the trailer was fantastic, but I thought there was no way the movie could live up to it.  Besides, they give away the whole thing in the trailer, don't they?  Nope.  This movie is awesome.  I spent most of my time in the theater thrilled that I was watching a movie as uncompromising and balls out as this one.

This movie concerns a young girl named Hanna (Saoirse Ronan, Atonement) who lives with her father (Eric Bana, Hulk) near then North Pole.  She knows nothing of the outside world, except what her father taught her.  Plus, he's trained her to be a kick ass assassin (but not in the way that Nicholas Cage taught his annoying daughter in the excruciatingly stupid Kick Ass) so one day the can take down her family's big bad wolf, Marissa Wiegler (Cate Blanchett, Elizabeth).

One day, she decides she's ready.  Dad disappears with instructions to meet up in Germany.  The CIA comes busting in and snatches Hanna up.  This is where the fun starts.  It becomes one long chase, with Hanna desperately trying to meet her father in an abandoned amusement park dedicated to the Brothers Grimm.  Whoever found this place or designed it is amazing.  The whole movie, in fact, looks like one big fairy tale, with their house by the North Pole, the amusement park, the German club where Marissa recruits a scary German guy and his cohorts to hunt Hanna down - it's all fantastic.  There's even a nod to Jean-Jacques Beineix's film Diva worked into this movie.

I never would have expected this kind of movie from the same guy that directed Atonement and The Soloist, but maybe he was just as tired of directing sensitive period dramas and uplifing human stories as most people are of seeing them.  It was especially nice to see a movie that doesn't cheat it's ending or sugarcoat it for the audience.  It did seem, though, that this movie was edited down from it's original version in order to obtain a PG-13, but it doesn't matter.  It was kind of nice that not everything was spelled out.  So pay attention when you go see this and you'll have one of the best times at the movies this year.

Black Death 2010 Christopher Smith

I guess it's been long enough since Monty Python and the Holy Grail.  Now people are finally ready for a serious movie about the Plague.  Unlike The Seventh Seal or The Virgin Spring, though, this one's in color!  Now you can see all of the black boils and seeping wounds just like in real life!  Feel the filthiness come off the screen and into your lap!  Good times.

In this one, Sean Bean leads a God appointed task force to find villages that don't have the plague and wipe out the witches and devils that live there, so all the good God fearing people can get the plague like God wants them to.  He and his team are good at their jobs, but not so good at directions, so they stop at a local abbey and ask for a monk to lead them to this super remote witch village in order to pillage, kill and spread God's word and disease.  But of course, things don't always go as planned, even when you're on God's side.

This movie is pretty good.  There are a few shots that echo Virgin Spring & Seventh Seal, but nothing as obvious as playing chess with Death.  The heathens are appropriately creepy and enticing, and God's chosen knights aren't exactly the most pious bunch of executioners.  The deaths are gory and inventive.  Maybe it's just me, but I always like to see a good drawing and quartering (at least I hope it's not just me...that would be weird....)   Anyway, if you're in the mood for a medieval drama that's full of death and squalor, this is the movie for you.  It's not even very funny, at least intentionally.

Black Lightning 2009 Dmitriy Kiselev & Aleksandr Voytinskiy

Here we have a heartwarming story about a boy and his first car.  There's a movie about a boy and his first car that I love, and that's Christine.  This is not that kind of movie.  First of all, it's Russian, so instead of a Plymouth Fury, Dima there gets a Volga, an old Soviet car.  Secondly, unlike poor Arnie's vengeful cherry red death machine, Dima's car is a jet black, rocket fueled hero car.  Well, it's not a hero car, really, but Dima is a good guy, so he has hero tendencies and that pretty much makes his car a good guy.

This is a very interesting movie because it's obviously influenced by American movies of the 1980's, namely Back to the Future.  Everyone in the movie dresses and acts like they just came out of 1985.  They have all the modern amenities - even IPhones - but everyone in the movie seems so black and white you can't help but root for the good guys and sneer at the baddies.

The first Spider-Man movie is another obvious inspiration.  You don't have to strain your brain to figure out what has to happen before our hero learns that with a great flying car comes great responsibility.  It's time to stop using that car for fast flower deliveries and concentrate on helping people in need.  And maybe get the girl, too.  And stop the evil tycoon from drilling into the bedrock below Moscow to get at some diamonds so the whole city doesn't collapse into a big sinkhole.  Passing your Economics test, too.  Don't forget that, hero with the flying car.  Just make sure you wear your black hoodie, so none of the news cameras can capture your face.  That's a lot for a kid with his first car to remember, don't ya think?

It all sounds a little hokey and corny, and it is.  But it's also totally fun.  The special effects aren't the greatest - you won't believe a car can fly - but that's not the point.  If you had fun going to big summer blockbusters when you were a kid, you'll like this movie.  If you would use your flying car to save a pedestrian from falling icicles (It's Russia.  It's cold), you'll like this movie.  It's a good family movie. It's just a good movie. Period.

Black Swan 2010 Darren Aronofsky

I don't know why it took me so long to see this movie.  I really wanted to, I just never got around to it.  Well, now I have.  It's not as shocking as I'd been led to believe, but it is really good.  Nina Sayers (Natalie Portman, Closer) is an emotionally fragile ballerina who gets the lead role in the new production of Swan Lake.  The ballet company's artistic director (Vincent Cassel, Irreversible) isn't quite sure she can handle it, her mother (Barbara Hershey, The Stunt Man) treats her like a 12 year old, and a new girl (Mila Kunis, Forgetting Sarah Marshall) might be trying to take it all away from poor Nina. 

So of course she starts to lose her shit.

It all looks fantastic.  There were times where I thought, "Oh no, it's just gonna be a chick version of Fight Club....." and I was a little discouraged.  But no!  I was happily wrong.  And Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis are really good in it, and not just because they have a drunken night of lesboliciousness - that could happen to anyone - but I was actually wondering just what the hell was going on in terms of what was real or not.  You're never quite sure what's up with Mila Kunis and Natalie Portman actually makes you care about her walking trainwreck of a character.

So I say you should see Black Swan.  I'm probably the only one who hasn't seen it, but whatever.  It's really good, and it's about ballerinas.  So there.  Now why can't every chick flick be this good?

Fast Five 2011 Justin Lin

How is it possible that the fifth film in a series is any good?  Even stupid good?  That just doesn't happen.  Except for here.  This movie is good.  Stupid good, but still good.  They brought back everybody!  And I mean EVERYBODY!  Well, except for Lucas Black and Lil" Bow Wow, but c'mon... Why would they all want to be in another Fast and Furious movie?  Because they're dumb fun, that's why. 

So what's behind this latest version of Smash-em Up Derby?  Not street racing, that's for sure.  There's only one street race setup like in the other movies and it's treated like a throwaway.  For this one, everybody's on the run and being all criminal-like to survive.  They're in Rio de Janeiro and get double crossed by worse Brazillian criminals.  That causes the Feds to come to Rio looking for them, which means they have both the Feds and Brazillian criminals after them.  Will American Criminality rise to the occasion?  Or will American Justice save the day?  Or will Brazillian criminals beat both elements of American culture into the ground?

On the American Criminal side, we have Dominic Toretto (Mark "Vin Diesel" Vincent, Saving Private Ryan), Brian O'Conner (Paul Walker, Monster in the Closet), and little sis Mia Toretto (Jordana Brewster, The Faculty), along with people from the other movies - Part 2 (Chris "Ludacris" Bridges, Crash and Tyrese Gibson, That Coke Commercial Where He Sang The Jingle On The Bus), Part 3 (Sung Kang, Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift), and Part 4 (Who cares?).  They want to even the score with the Brazillian crime boss (Joaquim de Almeida, Desperado) who doublecrossed them by stealing all his money.

On the American Law side, we have Luke Hobbs (Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Wrestlemania 13), head of the Feds charged with bringing in all the bad car racers.  He has a rookie Brazillian cop with him as translator, and a bunch of heavily armed interchangeable Federal Officers that are there to be killed.

On the Brazillian Crime side, there's the crime lord and his City of God thugs.  Everyone in the Rio favelas has a gun and they're shooting at everybody.

It gets a little too talky sometimes - nobody comes to these movies to see Vin Diesel or Paul Walker act, for god's sake!  But then the car chases start and it becomes awesome.  The final heist/chase sequence is the best thing in the history of these movies.  Seriously, go see it for that alone. It is sort of funny to see The Rock act everyone else off the screen.  But it's also a stroke of genius to change these movies up from street racing to Gearhead Mission Impossible.  I'll definitely go see the next one, even if it means I have to see Vin Diesel emote.  It's all worth it.

Thor 2011 Kenneth Branagh

Look out!  Here comes Thor with his big hammer to knock everybody upside their heads and take your money!  You should let him, too, because this movie isn't half bad.  This Australian TV star is Thor and Natalie Portman is his human love interest.  Well, sure.  It's like this - Up in Asgard a long time ago, Odin (Anthony Hopkins) and the Asgardians went to war against King Laufey (Colm Feore) and the Ice People.  Asgard won, Odin lost an eye, and little Thor and his brother Loki grew up hearing tales of the horrible Ice People, and their horrible icey ways.  So, naturally, when the Ice People break into Asgard and try to take back the source of their power, a now grown Thor and Loki and all their friends want revenge.

Because preemptive strikes are a bad idea everywhere, Thor is banished to Earth for his misdeeds.  There he has to learn to be a better person.  Awwwww.  It all works because the guy they cast as Thor, Chris Hemsworth, is an Australian, and therefore is born with the genes that allow you to be a charming asshole.  Basically, Thor is a frat guy who has to learn that just because he's a member of the best fraternity on campus, he can't always be a douche.  And Natalie Portman's on hand as the cute smart girl who secretly likes big, muscley douches.  Stellan Skarsgaard's there too, because he is Swedish, which is close to Norway, so he can explain Norse mythology to the audience.

If you know anything about Norse mytholgy, or at least the Marvel Comics version of it, you'll know that Loki is also known as the Trickster, because he lies a lot.  A lot.  All the time.  So he's a bad guy.  As such, he is played by a skinny British guy (Tom Hiddleston) with just the right amount of snivel and sneer.   Anthony Hopkins is perfect as Odin, but Rene Russo as Thor's mom, and Tadanobu Asano (Ichi the Killer, and tons of other great Japanese movies) as one of his friends, are completely wasted.  Asano only gets 7 lines of dialogue in the entire movie!  6, if you don't count the pivotal "We should go!", he utters at the beginning of the movie.  It's a shame.

There's also a couple of Marvel nods in there as well, since they're trying to build a Marvel Movie World.  Clark Gregg returns as Agent Coulson of SHIELD, Stan Lee (of course) has an imaginative cameo, and one of the future Avengers shows up as well.

But enough about the cast....is it an interesting story?  Pretty much.  The action scenes are kind of jumbled sometimes, and there might be a few too many longing looks between the leads, but otherwise, it's pretty great.  I was surprised that I was actually more interested in what was going on at Asgard sometimes, but if it's between that and watching Thor cook eggs, I'll take palace intrigue anytime.

I would say that this movie isn't as much fun as the first Iron Man, but it's miles ahead of X-Men Origins:Wolverine.  I just hope that after all this buildup, Joss Whedon and his singular brand of semi-clever smarm doesn't screw it all up with The Avengers.  So go see and enjoy Thor now, before your memory of it is forever ruined by a TV hack with delusions of grandeur.

Lorna the Exorcist 1974 Jess Franco

In all my years of watching movies, I'd never seen a Jess Franco movie.  That's sort of amazing since he's closing in on 200 films for his career.  You'd think I would have stumbled upon one sooner or later.  Nope.  I probably would have never seen one of his movies if not for all the good things I'd heard about this one.  Well, maybe not good things, but reviews that were filled with words like "shocking!", "transgressive!", and "must be seen to be believed!"  So I had to see for myself.

And now I have.  And I'm not sure why I liked it so much.  Or why I want to see more of his films ASAP.  It's cheap, grimy, and more than a little bit sleazy, but that's not why I like it, or why it's so interesting.  The story's basically an old fairy tale - guy down on his luck is promised huge sums of wealth if he hands over his unborn daughter to a witch on her 18th birthday.  No, really.  The movie starts just before the girl's birthday.  Her father receives a call instructing him that the witch is here to honor her part of the bargain.  That's it.  Why is it good?  I don't know.  Is it the acting?  Not really.  How about the fact that Lorna the witch looks like Candy Darling after a 3 day coke binge?  No, but it's interesting....


Witches draw on eyebrows just like your grandma

Maybe it's the jazzy new age guitar noodling on the soundtrack?  No, but even that fits the otherworldly drream vibe of this movie.  Is it the spectacular modern architecture?  Let's just say that if you liked Hiroshi Teshjgahara's Antonio Gaudi or Jim Jarmusch's Limits of Control, you'll find plenty to like here.  If architecture isn't your thing, there's always the hardcore lesbian scenes.  That's right.  Full on hardcore.  But it's in the service of the story, so it's ok.  This was also around the time of porno chic, when people thought that hardcore sex was going to be a more regular component of movies.  It's a little off putting at first, but it's not nearly as jarring as in the Swedish movie Thriller.

Here comes the power transference!

Somehow all of those things come together and make a movie that is definitely more than the sum of it's parts.  It's definitely worth watching, and if you do, I'm sure you'll come back to it again and again, sort of like the recurring dream you've had since you were five about the spooky house with the trap doors and disappearing exits.

The DVD by Mondo Macabro for this film is spectacular.  The film looks as good as it ever will, and there's plenty of extra features as well.  Cast bios, two seperate interviews with Stephen Thrower (author of the fantastic Nightmare USA) about Jess Franco and Lorna, respectively, as well as an interview with the editor of the film make round out the disc. 

Pufnstuf 1970 Hollingsworth Morse

When I was a little kid I saw some reruns of the H.R. Pufnstuf TV series and I thought for years that it was just some vivid nightmare.  Fast forward about 15 years, and one night on Nick at Nite there was a Sid and Marty Krofft marathon.  I watched because I always loved Land of the Lost, but imagine my surprise when my old nightmare monster showed up.  Because of all that, I love H.R. Pufnstuf.  I had heard about a feature length movie, but I never figured I'd get a chance to see it.  I even bought the new DVD set of the TV show in hopes that the movie would be an extra.  No dice.  Once again, Netflix Instant answers my movie prayers. and the movie is awesome.

It starts with a retelling of the opening titles of the TV show, except now you see just how Jimmy ends up with his magic flute.  Seems someone was a little late to band practice and was kicked out for his lateness.  What would you do if you were kicked out of your favorite afterschool activity?  Head into the woods, of course.  Since it's a kid's movie, they cut the scene out where Jimmy eats some 'shrooms, but in a few minutes, he's tripping balls and his flute is talking to him.  Oh look, there's a nice talking boat to take us for a ride!  There's a witch and a vulture!  Jump out!  Wash ashore on Living Island!  What is that?  A dragon?  He's the mayor!  With a southern accent!  I'm really thirsty!!!

It seems that the island's resident witch, Witchiepoo, wants Freddy the talking flute, so everyone has to stop her from getting it.  Plus, the yearly witch convention is being held at her castle, so she really, really, REALLY needs that flute to impress her boss (Martha Raye) and show up her rival Witch Hazel (Mama Cass).

Everybody from the show - Dr Blinky, Stupid Bat, Orson and Seymour, even the Hippy Tree, are here.  Some of the voices are changed, like Orson the Vulture, and even Pufnstuf, but it doesn't really matter.  I was too busy enjoying the completely inane songs ("Zap the World", "Living Island", and the Mama Cass showstopper "Different") and speculating on when Jack Wild just completely lost it in his real life.  He's very talented, I guess, but he was 18 years old, a millionaire, and on one of the most drug influenced TV shows of all time.  No wonder he became a mess.  Look at Gary Coleman - and he never had to dance with a dragon and a talking flute!

Whatever.  This movie is awesome.  Show it to all of your kids all the time.  And buy the DVD of the TV show, as well.  You can never have too much Pufnstuf.

Scream 4 2011 Wes Craven

Scream 4.  What?  Exactly.

It's not terrible, this new Scream movie.  It's just completely unnecessary.  I was kind of excited to see this movie, because I'm sick of all the Saw movies and their clones.  There's even a nice joke at the beginning of this one making fun of the Saw movies and their general lameness.  But then it goes downhill.

While I was watching this, I was wondering why some of the horror remakes work really well and some don't.  This isn't technically a remake, but, c'mon, it's been 11 years since the last one.  Do you even remember anything about Scream 3?  I remember going to see it and thinking it was okay, but that's about it.  So why is something like the newest Friday the 13th fun, and this movie is not?

Wait, I know why - Friday the 13th took everything people liked about those movies the first time and came up with new and inventive ways of reminding people how much fun it all was.  Scream 4 takes everything people liked about those movies, and says "Look!  Here it is again!  You love Neve Campbell!  Look, she's still alive!  Look at Courtney Cox and David Arquette!  Remember they got married in the movie and in real life!  Here they are!  Here's Ghostface!  It's all the same!  Yay!"

But about 15 minutes into it, I remembered exactly why Neve Campbell never did anything else.  There she is - looking the same and acting the same.  Perpetually wet eyes, a scruched up face, and a hitch in your voice works al ot better when you're supposed to be 17, not 34.  Courtney Cox walks around like she's the new Demi Moore, and everyone should be amazed at how good she looks  Only David Arquette seems to be trying.  His Dewey is a little more subdued now that he's chief of police.

As for the new kids, pick a TV show, and I'm sure one of the kids from that show is in this movie.  And most of them make Skeet Ulrich and Matthew Lillard look talented.  I even missed Jamie Kennedy.  His Randy has been replaced by 2 movie nerds who run the school's "Cinema Club", since video stores are basically extinct, and between the both of them, they have about half a pulse.  The only new character who seems halfway human is Sydney's publicist - she wrote a book on her experiences - how original - played by Allison Brie.  Of course, just when she starts making sense to the leftover characters, Ghostface comes callng.

This movie has a chance to end pretty spectacularly, but it doesn't have the courage of it's convictions.  Instead of ending in a way that would empasize the whole "New Rules" angle in the trailers, it chickens out and ends in a more recognizable way.  It's an ok ending, it's just disappointing because it could have been so much better.  I would have happily lined up for Scream 5 instead of waiting for the rental.  Maybe I'm being a little too hard on this movie.  After all, it's so "meta", it doesn't even realize how "meta" it is, and like any bad stand-up comedian, no one associated with this movie realizes that everyone gets the joke....it's just not funny anymore.

Batman: Under the Red Hood 2010 Brandon Vietti

Hey, it's a straight to video animated Batman movie!  Why would I bother watching it?

1.  It's short
2.  I like Batman
3.  I used to read loads of comics

So there.  This movie concerns a new criminal called the Red Hood, who's taking over Gotham City's crime syndicates.  He seems to know a lot about Batman and he reminds Batman of the second Robin, Jason Todd. 

But Jason Todd is dead.

He was blown up in a warehouse by the Joker.  How do I know this?  Because it was the storyline in Batman when I was about 12 years old.  There was even a 900 number that you could call and cast your vote as to whether Jason Todd would live or die. 

Did I call it and cast my vote?

I was 12!

OF COURSE I CAST MY VOTE!!!  I CAST MY VOTE TO KILL HIM!!!  IT COST 50 CENTS AND I CAUGHT HELL FROM MY PARENTS FOR DOING IT, BUT IT WAS WORTH IT!!!

....and apparently he's been brought back from the dead.  So...I have to see how and why.  It cost me 50 cents and a grounding, which may not seem like much now, but at the time it was crushing.  And is that really what we want to teach America's youth?  That your vote doesn't count?  I don't think so, Judd from MTV's Real World San Francisco - don't think I didn't recognize your name in the credits - I don't think so at all.

Judd from the Real World has actually written a fairly entertaining little movie, actually.  Jason Todd did die (so my vote did count) and he was brought back to life (because this is a comic book story - a male soap opera) because no one ever really dies in the comics.  Once I got over my memories of being grounded and missing out on seeing Twins in the theater, I was fairly entertained.  Bravo, Judd from the Real World.  Bravo.

Mystics in Bali 1981 H. Tjut Djalil

I had heard about this movie for years and I finally got around to watching it.  To say it was worth the wait is a massive understatement.  I'm just happy this movie exists and I have the privilege of watching some tourist's detatched head roam the countryside in search of blood.

It's actually looking for a certain type of blood, but we'll get to that later.  Mystics in Bali concerns a woman named Cathy, who is traveling around the world researching all the different branches of black magic for a book she's writing.  Her local guide/boyfriend Mahendra arranges a meeting with the Queen of the Leyaks, the local witch.  It's no surprise that the Queen of the Leyaks has plans for Cathy - and her disembodied head.

The Leyak Queen needs blood, see?  It makes her younger and more beautiful, and she needs someone to get it for her.  She trains Cathy in Leyak black magic - changing into different animals, mostly, and after a while she takes control of Cathy's head to go feed on newborn babies.



Woo Hoo!  Guts vampire!

 Yep.  Newborn babies.  And in one of the more spectacular scenes, babies in the process of being delivered.  Cathy's head, spinal column, and guts fly in through an open window (it's the jungle - it's hot) and chow down.  When she's full, she returns to the Queen of the Leyak and gives her the blood.  Then she wakes up the next morning unaware, but with a strange stomach ache.

Meanwhile, Mahendra is getting a little worried about all the time Cathy is spending with the Leyak Queen, so he enlists his uncle's help in trying to free Cathy from the evil witch.  Surprisingly, though, he's not at all fazed when a character vomits up 2 live mice!  He just asks if they feel better!

It all leads up to a big magical showdown, with animated bolts of power flying everywhere.  Can Cathy be saved?  Can this movie get any more disgusting?  Aren't guts vampires awesome?!!  This movie rules.

The DVD comes with a trailer,  and a little history essay concerning the film.  There's even an essay on how to become a leyak yourself, but it comes with the prerequisite " Don't try this at home" warning.  Sadly, no one knows what became of the actress who played Cathy.  She was just a German tourist who got convinced to stay a while and be in her one and only movie.  And what a movie it is!

The Visitor 1980 Giulio Paradisi

Quick - what do John Huston, Franco Nero, Mel Ferrer, Glenn Ford, Shelley Winters, Lance Henriksen, and Sam Peckinpah have in common?  They all gotta eat.  There's really no other reason to explain why they're all in this movie.  Well, Lance Henriksen was young, so he was probably happy to get the job, but everyone else should have known better.  Plus, you'd think the movie would be more entertaining than it is simply because of that cast.  It's only after the movie starts that you realize the two leads are actually Joanne Nail from Switchblade Sisters and a little girl named Paige Conner, who went on to fame and fortune in the immortal Fast Food - The Movie.

John Huston plays the Polishly named Jerzy Colsowicz.  He lives in space with Franco Nero and a room full of little kids who seem to be monks in training.  Franco Nero has a blond fright wig and a beard and talks to this roomful of rapt children like he's Jesus.  So maybe he is.  He tells a story about a prison ship and the escape of a prisoner named Sateen, who proceeded to mate with thousands of women all over the galaxy before he was caught.  That means that John Huston has to travel around the galaxy gathering up all of Sateen's demon spawn children.  Then John Huston tells Space Jesus Franco Nero that he's found another one - this time in Atlanta.

That 's the first five minutes.  This movie is crazy convoluted.  It's basically an Exorcist rip off, but with absolutely fantastic cinematography and a really awesome soundtrack.  The cinematographer also shot The Garden of the Finzi-Continis and Brother Sun, Sister Moon and the composer had some of his music "borrowed" for Quentin Tarantio's Death Proof.  It's a pretty well done movie, actually.  It's just ridiculous in so many ways.  John Huston takes up residence on the roof of a skyscraper in downtown Atlanta with a team of about 10 bald tracksuit wearing space monks.  Shelley Winters is the new housekeeper.  Lance Henriksen owns a basketball team, the Atlanta Rebels, and one of the first evil things the little girl does is make a basketball explode in the final seconds of a game so his team wins.  Evil.  Sam Peckinpah and Mel Ferrer play doctors - one good and one evil, and Glenn Ford plays a detective who probably just wants to be wished into the cornfield at this point.

Since John Huston is from space, he's not really an exorcist, per se.  It's a good thing he brought along his space birds, though.  According to this movie, space birds are excellent at driving out evil spirits - much better than a scolding from Shelley Winters.  Or a showdown at the mall ice rink.

This movie must be seen to be believed.  It's not as fun as I was hoping, but it's still worth watching, if only for it's weirdness.  It's available on DVD from a company called Code Red.  Apparently, they're going out of business sometime this summer, so get it while you can.  The DVD comes with interviews and a pretty awesome trailer that played at Cannes, also 2 commentaries where Joanne Nail and Paige Conner discuss their characters' motivations, which is good for a laugh or two as well.