Hot Mess In The Shade. irst of all, too many songs. Like the emperor summing up Mozart in AMADEUS: “Too many notes.” Well, Hot In The Shade does not have “too many notes” – that would be Animalize – but it seems like producers Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons crammed every sticky-sweet, trashy-funk, dirty-glam, sweaty-shoed cockrocker they could find into … Read More
CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS
Comedy is easy, getting murdered is easier. How does Woody Allen get away with murder? Allen writes and directs CRIMES AND MISDEMANORS, and let’s the murderer get away with it – as long as the murderer comes to a reconciliation with himself! By all accounts, isn’t that the most important realization that any human could have? It’s in all the … Read More
THE DECLINE OF WESTERN CIVILIZATION PART II: THE METAL YEARS
The Rise of Aquanetted Civilization: The Ladyboy Years. Rebellion, ambition, rock and roll, passion, lust… hair. Director Penelope Spheeris turns up the volume in her chronicle of the hedonistic 1980’s Southern Californian rock scene in THE DECLINE OF WESTERN CIVILIZATION PART II: THE METAL YEARS. (We need to be precise about this rockumentary’s focus because it does only represent a … Read More
THE ABYSS
Underwater Flying Objects. He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you. — Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 146 (1886). James Cameron‘s parable about humans in an alien environment (at the bottom of the sea) close-encountering … Read More
LEVIATHAN
Levia-Thin. Three words describe LEVIATHAN: Alien, Abyss, Thing. LEVIATHAN is their deformed lust-child. That’s Ridley Scott’s ALIEN (1979), about a team of researchers in space encountering an alien presence; James Cameron’s THE ABYSS (1989), about a team of researchers on the ocean floor encountering an alien presence; John Carpenter’s THE THING (1982), about a team of researchers in the Arctic … Read More
THE KILLER
If you can see past the bullets… Give a guy a gun, he thinks he’s Superman. Give him two and he thinks he’s God. — John Woo’s HARD BOILED. Some call John Woo‘s THE KILLER the pinnacle of balletic, bulletic, action art. Well, it’s a pinnacle all right – of something. Not really a ballet, unless you count the hundreds … Read More
STAR TREK V: THE FINAL FRONTIER
The Final Affront Here. Shatner directs! Oh, what a marvelous disaster! From Shatner’s book, Star Trek Movie Memories, we read about Shatner’s grandiloquent vision for the greatest TREK adventure of all – the search for God Itself! The Final Frontier! We learn of the hordes of barbarians at the gate, of the ten Rock Men finale; of the sweeping alien … Read More
BATMAN
Part Noir, Part Comicbook, All Knight. Who knew MR. MOM could make such an awe-inspiring, vigilante crimefighter? With gadgets formulated from watching Martha Stewart, a cape hewn from a reconditioned wooby and an unsurpassed knowledge of daytime soaps, Michael Keaton squeezed his distinctive lip structure into that sacred cowl and surprised everyone to become the Sean Connery of Batmen. Arguably … Read More
EDDIE AND THE CRUISERS II: EDDIE LIVES!
Rock And Roll IS Dead! Morose Eddie’s back! EDDIE AND THE CRUISERS II: EDDIE LIVES! finds the “legendary” (snigger) singer-songwriter of Eddie & The Cruisers, morose Eddie Wilson (Michael Pare), “in disguise” as morose Joe West, assembling another band of hokey bandguy stereotypes and thrilling us with another cache of songs which you might mistake for Macy’s muzak reel, or … Read More