weird

The Rocky Horror Picture Show

Video posted on by moviebloke

(UK/USA 1975)

“I, Robert Sabetto,
Pledge allegiance
To the lips
Of The Rocky Horror Picture Show
And to the decadence
For which it stands
One movie, under Richard O’Brien
With sensuous daydreams, erotic nightmares, and sins of the flesh for all.”

—The Rocky Pledge of Allegiance

Through high school and into college, a sure bet on a Saturday night was that two films would be playing at midnight: Pink Floyd’s The Wall and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Every. Damned. Weekend. In the case of Rocky Horror, it’s no wonder: dressing up, shouting at the screen, throwing shit around the theater, and acting and singing along to the movie is more fun than a burlesque science fiction gothic drag hoedown—essentially what it was. At some point during the ’90s, it stopped. I couldn’t resist catching Rocky Horror again with a group of friends when it played at a theater near me.

A movie version of Riff-Raff/Richard O’Brien’s stage musical, the story is silly—stupid, even: a newlywed couple, Brad Majors (Barry Bostwick) and Janet Weiss (Susan Sarandon), are forced off the road during a rainstorm. I love that Janet reads The Plain Dealer in the car. Anyway, they end up at the castle of mad scientist Dr. Frank-N-Furter (Tim Curry)—he’s just a sweet transvestite from transsexual Transylvania—who’s about to unveil his newest creation that took him just seven days to make: Rocky (Peter Hinwood), a gorgeous tan man with muscles and tight gold shorts. A strange journey of an evening tinged with sexual tension, motorcycles, and music and dance ensues.

The characters and costumes are iconic, and the songs are a campy blast. Watching it this time, I picked up on a sexy overtone that I was kind of surprised to see it retains. Bostwick exudes an adorably dorky charm that I’ve always liked. It’s impossible to picture anyone but Curry as Frank-N-Furter, but Mick Jagger was after the role (http://www.broadway.com/buzz/171159/happy-birthday-dear-rocky-38-freaky-facts-about-the-rocky-horror-picture-show/). Meat Loaf makes for an interesting cast member. And who doesn’t love Magenta (Patricia Quinn)?

The Rocky Horror Picture Show bombed when it was originally released, but an astute marketing person recognized its potential in a different format—the rest is history. It’s an okay movie, but what goes along with it makes it a truly unique experience. Audience participation is a concept created here, and nothing else ever will be—or can be—quite the same.

In 2005, the United States Library of Congress deemed The Rocky Horror Picture Show “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry (https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing/).

101 minutes
Rated R

(Music Box) C+

http://www.rockyhorror.com

 

IMG_7175

Aaaaaaaah!

Video posted on by moviebloke

(UK 2015)

What would life be like in the 21st Century if humans never evolved beyond apes? How would our human qualities, good and bad, play out? Are humans any different from other animals? Director/screenwriter/actor Steve Oram illustrates his answer to these deep questions with Aaaaaaaah!, a project that sounds fascinating on paper but turns out to be anything but.

Following a group of modern primates (Julian Barratt, Noel Fielding, Lucy Honigman, Tom Meeten, Oram, Julian Rhind-Tutt, and Toyah Willcox), Aaaaaaaah! is an hour and a half of grunting, fighting over food and mates, flashing body parts, openly masturbating and having sex, peeing and pooping on stuff, and generally establishing dominance with gratuitous gore peppered throughout. The plot, flimsy and hard to follow, isn’t funny, witty, engaging, interesting, or thought provoking. It’s terrible, like a bad inside joke I’m not a part of or an even worse art film. I couldn’t wait for this to end.

Aaaaaaaah! very well may be the worst movie I’ve ever seen. EVER. It fails on every single level. Waiting to enter the theater, I overheard someone in line behind me compare Oram to early John Waters and Andy Warhol. Um, no—those guys both had a wit that Oram lacks, at least from what I can tell here. A better title would have been Uuuuuuuugh! 

(Tower City Cinemas) F

Cleveland International Film Festival

http://lincolnfilmstudios.co.uk/LINCOLN_STUDIOS/Welcome.html

2001: A Space Odyssey

Video posted on by moviebloke

(USA/UK 1968)

I expected a long, slow, laborious, and arty history of mankind extending into the near future—well, near for the late Sixties but already a decade past now—set to Classical music, with lots of scenery from outer space and little or no plot. Think of an elaborate promotional video for space travel—that’s what I anticipated. Fortunately, Stanley Kubrick was more sophisticated than that.

2001: A Space Odyssey is a cool film. After a silly opening segment that involves a group of apes, a monolith, and the birth of tools, the story jumps ahead two million years or so to the 21st Century. In the second segment, Dr. Floyd (William Sylvester) shuts down colleages asking questions about a coverup on his way to a space station to investigate an artifact discovered in a pit: it’s a monolith just like the one that sent the aforementioned apes into a frenzy. A third—and the best—segment involves two astronauts (Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood) on a mission to Jupiter controlled by a computer named HAL. HAL is making mistakes, exhibiting jealousy and vindictiveness, and being generally creepy—a little too human. The final segment is a tripped out time warp for David, one of the aforementioned astronauts. And there’s that monolith again, this time inside a goofy Italian Renaissance inspired bedroom with a glowing dancefloor.

It’s total sci fi, but 2001: A Space Odyssey is clever in ways that allow it to transcend the genre. Kubrick’s vision of the future is not only elegant but remarkably smart and accurate. Humans are still human, but technology is everywhere. Despite the appearance of defunct companies like Pan Am and Howard Johnson’s, his characters use tablets, video conferencing, flat screen TVs, and plastic credit cards. There’s a coffee bar and acronyms for unidentified things called “ATM,” “COM,” and “HIB.” Furnishings and clothing look a little different in a realistic way. The story is open to many interpretations, none of which Kubrick ever debunked. He left a lot of fodder for discussion. I see why it’s on many “best of” lists.

I saw a restored version that included an overture and an intermission. The latter broke up what probably would’ve verged on too long for me.

In 1991, the United States Library of Congress deemed 2001: A Space Odyssey “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry (https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing/).

(Music Box) A

Music Box Theatre 70mm Festival

http://www.filmsite.org/twot.html

Vertigo

Video posted on by moviebloke

(USA 1958)

I’m probably in the minority when I say that I found Vertigo stupid. The story, complicated and intricate as it is, takes a long time to get going; once it does, it’s so fanciful that it’s not believable. The movie is longer than it needs to be. Plus, the ending—I can only assume it’s supposed to be dramatic and impactful—comes off as silly; in fact, Aaron and I turned to each other at the same time and rolled our eyes.

All of this said, it doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy the film. I did, actually—very much. There’s a lot to like here.

James Stewart is Scottie Ferguson, a cop forced to sit on the sidelines after a bout with vertigo while chasing a criminal across a bunch of rooftops nearly kills him. A wealthy former classmate, Galvin Elster (Tom Helmore), seeks him out and convinces him to act as a personal investigator; it seems Galvin’s wife, Madeleine (Kim Novak), is possessed by her dead Mexican grandmother. She’s hot (even if she’s not one bit Mexican), and Scottie falls for her. Hard. It’s not long before he’s personally involved, wandering through northern California in her car with her. She opens up to him, he takes the bait, and he loses her. Or so it appears.

Vertigo is certainly a beautiful looking film. The interior sets are gorgeous. The exterior shots of late 1950s San Francisco are stunning, and considering how the city would change a decade later makes them all the more precious. The wardrobe choices are classic yet snappy. The restored version I saw was crisp and vivd. An ominous yet mesmerizing score by Bernard Herrmann takes Vertigo to an even higher place—no pun intended.

Being an Alfred Hitchcock film, there’s more to Vertigo than meets the eye. Symbolism is all over: tunnels, flowers, birds, towers, stairs, heights, the color green. It’s not hard to find articles, scholarly and not, that analyze the many themes here: desire, death, reality, appearances, power, the past, the damsel in distress. All this aside, I can sum up the message I got out of Vertigo in five words: “don’t think with your dick.” The interactions between Scotty and both Midge (Barbara Bel Geddes) and Madeleine are sexually charged and tinged with danger. Vertigo is hypnotic, mysterious, psychological, and suspenseful even if it’s not exactly what I would call a thriller.

It takes some work to get through, but Vertigo ultimately proves to be a treat despite its flaws. After almost 60 years, it’s still breathtaking and weird. It’s easy to see why at least one so-called authority named it “the greatest film of all time” (http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-19078948). Hitchcock influenced many, but Vertigo immediately called to my mind David Lynch; I see traces of it throughout his work, and its influence on him specifically is undeniable.

In 1989, the United States Library of Congress deemed Vertigo “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry (https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing/).

(Music Box) A-

Music Box Theatre 70mm Festival

The Overnight

Video posted on by moviebloke

(USA 2015)

Sex can be a funny topic with loads of material. The Overnight, a limited independent release from last summer, seems like a little gem. It opens promisingly with Taylor Schilling (Orange is the New Black) and Adam Scott (Parks and Recreation) in what just might be hands down (but not off) the most pathetic sex scene ever. It’s really funny, and gets us off to a good start. Sadly, the momentum doesn’t last long.

The couple just moved from Seattle to Los Angeles, and doesn’t know anyone. While at the park with their son, they meet Kurt (Jason Schwartzman), a goofy ageing hipster who sells water coolers by day and who we later learn also paints close up portraits of assholes—as in, anuses—and sells videos of his wife, Charlotte (Judith Godrèche), online. Kurt invites the couple over for a “play date” for their boys (he and Charlotte have a son the same age) that ends up looking more and more like a play date for the adults once the kids are asleep.

I wanted to like The Overnight, but I didn’t. It shows a few flickers of light: the characters are thrust into some palpably uncomfortable situations, including a weird penis dance by the pool (they’re prosthetics) and an even weirder hand job. One of the last scenes actually gets sexy for a hot moment. Unfortunately, though, the whole thing goes limp early on; the story never takes off and the situations just aren’t that wild. Sure, there’s full frontal nudity (albeit prosthetics), but there’s nothing edgy or clever about it. The problem is the writing: Patrick Brice either ran out of ideas or didn’t know where to go with the story. Intentionally or not, the wrap up puts out a moral position that rings, um, judgmental. I didn’t find The Overnight fresh or funny; I found it unimaginative and tedious the more it went on.

(Home via iTunes) C-

http://theovernight-movie.com

 

 

Don Verdean

Video posted on by moviebloke

(USA 2015)

Some movies are hilarious and even endearing because of their silliness. Take, for example, Napoleon Dynamite by Jared and Jerusha Hess. Other movies are just plain stupid. Don Verdean, also written by Team Hess and directed by Jared, is the latter. Too bad, because the premise has potential: Verdean (Sam Rockwell) is a “biblical archeologist” hellbent on proving Christianity—apparently through science. When he accepts a patronage of sorts from aggressive Tony Lazarus (Danny McBride), founder of an evangelical church named after himself, Verdean is slowly sucked into a big fat lie that spirals out of control. He goes along with it for the purported not to mention dubious aim of “inspiring” faith. Needless to say, things get sticky.

There are some funny moments here, like an Israeli police officer (Yaniv Moyal) reading Verdean the riot act for digging in the desert without a permit; a cringeworthy date between Verdean’s assistant, Carol (Amy Ryan), and his Israeli guide, Boax (Jemaine Clement); and ex-hooker Mrs. Lazarus (Leslie Bibb) performing an outrageous ditty about not ending up like Lot’s wife. Ryan plays Carol with the right balance of sweetness and tragedy, and Will Forte as Pastor Fontaine, former Satan worshipper and Lazarus’s nemesis, is a breath of comic fresh air. Everything else– the story, the execution, even the acting– falls flat. Clement is a terrible Jew, and his weird French-sounding accent is fucking annoying. The jokes are not funny, the characters are tiresome, and the story gets old fast. Don Verdean feels like a lame ripoff of Christopher Guest (Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show). Easter mass is more entertaining than this. Yawn.

(Gene Siskel Film Center) D

http://lionsgatepremiere.com/donverdean

In the Basement [Im keller]

Video posted on by moviebloke

(Austria 2014)

Ulrich Seidl’s In the Basement begins from an interesting idea: a documentary about all the strange things people do in their basements. Sign me up! In actuality, however, it’s a rather boring film. The subjects– an amateur opera singer who runs a firing range in his basement, a weird old lady who keeps ugly dolls she treats like real babies in her basement, a hunter of exotic animals who hangs their stuffed heads in his basement, a collector of Nazi memorabilia with a shrine in his basement, a masochistic woman who helps battered women by day but likes to be spanked by night in her basement, to name just a few– are drab and more pathetic than compelling. I found only two interludes intriguing: a dom/slave couple (the slave licks everything in the bathroom and on his mistress clean) and a homely gigolo who boasts of his ejaculatory prowess. My impression leaving the theater: “Really?” Overall, a snooze.

(Gene Siskel Film Center) D

http://strandreleasing.com/films/in-the-basement/

A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence

Posted on by moviebloke

(Sweden 2014)

It’s sad when the previews show the best part of a film. More a series of sketches strung together like clunky Christmas lights, Pigeon makes the not-so-grand point that life is long and dull and full of drudgery, and everyone goes through the same bullshit. The sentiment is promising, and I love the brand of dark, offbeat humor that pervades this film. The overall look works well: drab, empty long shots emphasize the mood.

It had its moments, but Pigeon never got off the ground for me: it was, well, long and dull and full of drudgery, repeating the same jokes ad infinitum. What a disappointment. Maybe I just don’t get Swedish humor—if such a thing exists.

(Gene Siskel Film Center) D-

 http://www.magpictures.com/apigeon/

Spirited Away [Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi] [千と千尋の神隠し]

Video posted on by moviebloke

(USA/Japan 2001)

Fandango’s short and sweet synopsis says all you need to know about the plot here: “Lost in a forest, a 10-year-old girl meets animals, ghosts, and weird creatures.” Weird, indeed. A twisted story with some grotesque imagery sure to stay with me forever, like Chihiro’s parents turning into pigs, that bizarre nose and wart on Yubaba, the coal-toting soot things, the stink ghost, and No Face. Charming in the way that only Japanimation is, I enjoyed this one, to a point. It lost me about two thirds in, and reminded me why I am not into epic fantasies or science fiction.

Hayao Miyazaki tells a good story and gives us really strong characters in Spirited Away, but I don’t need to see it again. Ever.

(Gene Siskel Film Center) C+

http://movies.disney.com/spirited-away

The World’s Largest Ball of Twine

Video posted on by moviebloke

(USA 2015)

Only in America can something like a ball of twine serve as a point of pride and a heated contest that continues after 50 years. But that’s exactly what it was for Francis Johnson of Darwin, Minnesota, and Frank Stoeber of Cawker City, Kansas, as the two competed in the “Battle of the Balls” for the prestigious title of “World’s Largest Ball of Twine.”

Trivial but amusing. I can relate to a schlep to Nowhere for no other purpose than the goofy thrill of seeing some bizarre roadside attraction like the world’s tallest thermometer (done it) or prairie dog (have not). I expected a more interesting execution of the story, though. The World’s Largest Ball of Twine does a nice job getting behind its subject matter—it just turns out that its subject matter isn’t all that interesting. Side note: the graphics looked cheap and gimmicky; intentional or not, this detracted from the experience.

(St. Anthony Main) C-

Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival

http://prod3.agileticketing.net/WebSales/pages/info.aspx?evtinfo=123046~36893ed1-b0b9-423c-bbab-90f22d0aeafe&