What I Watched In June

It took Warner Brothers and DC Comics at least two decades too long to finally create a Wonder Woman feature film. Easily the most obviously commercial superhero idea for the cinema since 1989's BATMAN success and they couldn't be bothered to sit down and figure it out. I can guarantee you that even a bad Wonder Woman film would have made a boatload of cash and it seems that everyone not involved in the decision making process at Warners knew this. Madness.

The good news is that the new WONDER WOMAN (2017) is actually a very good film and easily one of the best of the year so far. For the backstory of the character they have chosen one of the more straightforward versions i.e. the one most people are vaguely familiar with from the old television series. The timeline is shifted to the first World War from the second which doesn't change anything important but adds a sense of nostalgia to the tale. Maybe it's just me but there have been so many films about WWII that having this one set in the earlier war makes it more interesting. It places the two American characters closer to the volatile period of the 1800's making their friendship all the more fascinating. Of course, it helps that Chief seems to be a sly presentation of Apache Chief from the old Super Friends cartoon and part of the pantheon of other gods Diana will meet in her time among men. I can't wait to see what they do with his character in future WW stories.

The only real problem I had with the film was that the story they tell is simply a retread of the story of the first Marvel Captain America film. The shift to WWI is a way to hide that fact but once you recognize the plot it's a little hard to not see the parallels - especially when the Steve Trevor third act exit kind of shoves it in your face. I've read a lot of bitching about the final battle between WW and Ares which I find to be silly. What did you expect a battle between a god and Wonder Woman to look like? This is a comic book film, after all. I'm very happy with this film and it just adds to my anticipation for the Justice League movie.

I often speculate about what the reaction to a particular film might have been if it were released in the age of the internet. Would fanboy rage have scuttled the success of certain films that were huge blockbusters in their day? My favorite pre-internet fan rage was the rage squeal heard around the world when it was announced that Michael Keaton had been cast as Batman back in the late 1980's. Comic book geeks reacted as if they had been kicked in the face by this choice and it wasn't until the dark edged film came out that they (mostly) shut up and enjoyed themselves. But now imagine that all those screaming fanboys had gone onto public forums and made a massive stink about their opinion. Imagine that those negative opinions had been out there for months and part of a large discussion/argument about this casting choice in which these people had spent a lot of time backing up their feelings with hundreds of words typed condemning the film sight unseen. Imagine the emotional investment these people would have in seeing this film fail so that they could be proven right.

Universal has been trying to find a way to bring their incredibly lucrative monster films back to big screens for years. The misbegotten Mummy films of Stephen Sommers were profitable but were much more copies of the Indiana Jones movies than anything resembling the dark tales of the classic 1930's and 40's. The 2010 WOLFMAN film was very good but it's graphic violence and dark tone put off enough of the audience that it didn't make enough money to spark sequels. 2014's DRACULA UNTOLD was an interesting attempt to start a new round of monster stories but it was a little too generic to fuel the interest needed for a franchise.

Now we have what is going to be the first in a series of big budget monster films and Universal has learned a couple of lessons from the franchise successes of the last decade. First, cast movie stars and second, set up your next movie in your current one. To those ends THE MUMMY (2017) stars Tom Cruise (cue fanboy rage) and Russell Crowe while making a larger universe of creatures central to the film's story.

Of course, Universal attempting to bring their monster ideas to the screen for a new generation has been met with the expected fan-rage. A huge subset of these people will not be happy with anything done to resurrect this idea so it doesn't really matter what is done, they will whine. But others actually give voice to the concern that the governing concept being used is too much of the action adventure mold rather than the horror genre. This complaint I can understand to a degree as I despised the Sommers Mummy films as the broadly comic action disasters they were. For me it would be important that - if we were not going to be allowed to have violent period werewolf films - that these new Universal films somehow manage to avoid the snarky childishness of the Sommers films.

I'm happy to report that THE MUMMY (2017) is a pretty darned fun modern day action adventure film with more than enough horror elements to push it into the dark area I was hoping to see. Tom Cruise plays his typical arrogant jerk who finds himself in the middle of a supernatural nightmare that gets him killed, resurrected and central to a plot that might destroy his soul. The film is well paced and lays out it's ideas very effectively introducing the darker concepts as it goes along. There is humor in the film but, although in one scene it teeters on the juvenile, I found it actually funny instead of cringe inducing. The movie borrows from past films I love (AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON, LIFEFORCE) but folds these steals into its story well enough for me enjoy them and not be annoyed. The introduction of Crowe's Jekyll character adds a nice tone of world building although I think the frequency with which he has to take his medication is terrifying. The mummy villainess is a wonderful creation both from the casting of the lovely Sofia Boutella and the visualizing of her powers being manifested. It is in these sequences that this movie makes its claim as a horror movie and I think it succeeds quite well.

But, of course, we live in the age of the internet. This film was judged BAD before it hit the screens and condemned to the scrapheap without a chance at big time success. I suppose that Universal's Dark Universe will limp along on momentum for at least on more film but fan-rage has done it's work again. We're long past the days when a film was judged on what it is instead of what a loud fanbase expects. Now we have to make up our minds about a movie before we see it and then, to avoid being called traitor, stick to that prejudgment regardless of anything else. THE MUMMY will become another in that long line of movies like THE WOLFMAN (2010) that finds it's audience years too late to matter while the fanboys go off in search of their next outrage to decry. After all, someone has to protect us from liking the wrong thing.   

THE LIST  

KILLER FISH (1979) - 7 (rewatch) 

WAX MASK (1997 )- 3 (rewatch) 

WONDER WOMAN (2017) - 9 

THE MUMMY (2017) - 7 

KILLER SNAKES (1974) - 3 

WHITE LINE FEVER (1975) - 7 (truckers vs big business) 

SANTO VS THE RIDERS OF TERROR (1970) - 4 (El Santo in the Old West fighting lepers and bandits) 

SCENE OF THE CRIME (1949) - 8 (excellent film noir) 

HERCULES, PRISONER OF EVIL (1964) - 5 (watched the Italian original version) 

LA BAMBOLA DI SATANA (1969) - 5 (Satan's Doll) (mediocre giallo in a castle)

FIRESTARTER (1984) - 4 (rewatch) 

THE ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN FABIAN (1951) - 6 (solid Errol Flynn/Vincent Price tale set in New Orleans) 

SUICIDE SQUAD (2016) - 7 (extended edition) 

SHADOW ON THE LAND (1968) - 6 (TV movie about a fascist America)

DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER (1971) - 7  (rewatch)

CREATURE WITH THE ATOM BRAIN (1955)- 6 (rewatch) 

UP FROM THE DEPTHS (1979) - 3 (terrible killer Corman produced giant fish film) 

PLEASURE CRUISE (1931) - 6 (fun little pre-code tale of infidelity) 

THE SECRET SIX (1931) - 6 (bootlegging gangsters - amazing cast!)

THE DOLL SQUAD (1973) - 5 

What I Watched In October

As you might expect, last month was a busy movie watching 31 days of Halloween with only a few non-horror or monster movies wedging themselves into view. Sadly one of them was ..... hold on. 

I have not been a big fan of the Abrams STAR TREK reboot films. The first was a sloppy mess with a script that seemed assembled in the dark from six separate story ideas. The only thing that saved it for most people is that Abrams knew the story was crap so he welded it together with FAST FAST FAST action to keep the audience from figuring out how stupidly constructed the damned thing was. Plot contrivance, thy name is STAR TREK (2009). The second film was just about as bad, heaping confused plotting and poorly thought out concepts (why are there spacecraft in a universe in which planet to planet teleportation is possible?) onto a story that makes every single character an idiot. Those two films made me sorry that the franchise was still limping along having such a public, embarrassing series of blunders. It was like watching a good friend crap their pants on stage in front of a packed house.

So now we have the third (and hopefully last) of these mistakes. There was hope for this one simply because it was written by an actual fan of Star Trek - there's a shocking idea! Abrams is on record as not being a fan of Trek and sadly his two films prove he didn't care to learn more than the surface details. Maybe 40 plus years of history was too daunting? Luckily a member of the cast was knowledgeable, talented and willing to try to save this mess of a reboot. Did he succeed?

Not in my opinion. I will admit that this is better than the first two. The story hangs together pretty well and manages to make sense well enough. The excellent cast does as good a job as they can given the material. The problems with this one are different but just as irritating though. Once again we have a character out for revenge against the Federation as if that were the only adventure that the Enterprise crew could EVER encounter. And, of course, we destroy the ship again as if that was somehow going to be impressive for the - what? - third time in the Trek feature films? There are other ways to maroon and isolate the cast but no one seems to be able to get those ideas past whatever committee approves bad plot concepts at Paramount.

Oh, to hell with it! This sucker was passable but overlong, over obvious and simply wasted its fine group of actors. By the time Kirk is running around on a motorcycle I was just wanting the thing to end already. Please - let there not be a fourth. 

After far too long Toho Studios has produced a new Japanese Godzilla film! SHIN GODZILLA (or Godzilla Resurgence) is a fantastic exercise in trying something fresh while still giving fans the badass monster destruction. This movie ignores all previous Big G films giving the audience a leg up on the sea of scrambling bureaucrats as they try to understand what is happening when this giant creature lurches out of the ocean and proceeds to accidentally level huge sections of Tokyo. After a while the googly-eyed thing slides back into the bay leaving the entire government with the task of stopping it if it returns. Of course, it does return, changed pissed and seemingly determined to raze th whole city if it can!  

I loved this film more than I thought I would. The radical rethink of this entry is not to start over from scratch but to show just how difficult it would be to get all the governmental necessities in place to get ANYTHING of the magnitude needed for this threat set in motion. Endless meetings in dozens of conference rooms are used to show how much work it really is to get things done in a modern bureaucracy. These scenes could have been incredibly boring (as they have been in some older giant monster films) but the filmmakers here aren't just padding the movie's running time with these scenes. These sequences are in place to humorously poke fun at Japanese society, it's norms and the stodgy ways that things have to get done to keep from breaking decorum. And to keep the tone light these often minutes long dialog scenes are edited at lightening speed, jumping from speaker to speaker, changing angles and refusing to allow the film to feel slow. I was laughing with this film even while I was struggling to read all the subtitles onscreen as things moved at super speed. Damn, I wish I spoke Japanese!

But, of course, no one comes to a Godzilla film to see humans dealing with supply and shipping problems. No, we come to see giant monster action and WOW does this movie deliver! The effects work is astonishing and a brilliant use of both practical and CGI magic to make every single shot seem as realistic as possible. There is so much detail in the shots with every action and it's consequences violently displayed that this often felt like a completely new way to imagine the kaiju film. I was thrilled, amused and totally entertained!

THE LIST

ZOLTAN, HOUND OF DRACULA (1978) - 3 (rewatch)

SPASMS (1983) - 6 (pretty insane giant snake story)

TRACK OF THE VAMPIRE (1966) - 5 (padded, slightly silly patch job from Corman)

DR.BLACK, MR HYDE (1976)- 5

STAR TREK BEYOND (2016) - 5

HILLBILLIES IN A HAUNTED HOUSE (1967) - 3 (terrible film but good music)

DEEP IN THE WOODS (2000) - 7 (rewatch)

THE BLACK CAT (1981) - 7 (rewatch)

SILENT HOUSE (2011) - 7 (well done horror thriller)

GHOST STORY (1981) - 7 (good but not as good as the book)

WE ARE STILL HERE (2015) - 9 (excellent haunted house tale)

SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE (1982) - 6 (well done little slasher)

BOOGEYMAN 2 (2007) - 6 (becomes a slasher but not bad at all) 

HORROR RISES FROM THE TOMB (1972) - 8 (rewatch)

DEMONS 2 (1986) - 7 (rewatch)

SHIN GODZILLA (2016) - 9

VOODOO MAN (1944) - 5 (rewatch)

FRANKENSTEIN (1931) - 9 (rewatch)

HALLOWEEN II (1981) - 7 (rewatch)

WE ARE STILL HERE (2015) - 9 (rewatch)

YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN (1974) -10 (rewatch)

PHANTASM (1979) - 8 (rewatch)

COUNT DRACULA'S GREAT LOVE (1973) - 7 (rewatch)

PHANTASM:RAVAGER (2016) - 5

IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE (1953) - 7 (rewatch)

HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH (1983) - 8 (rewatch)

TRICK 'R' TREAT (2007) - 9 (rewatch)

PERKINS' 14 (2009) - 4 (good idea undermined by bad acting and sloppy scripting)

RiffTrax - CARNIVAL OF SOULS (1962) - 8 (film is an 8 - RiffTrax version was an 8 as well)

FRIDAY THE 13TH (2009) - 4 (rewatch) (empty, dull, well photographer blah)

STUNG (2015)- 8 (excellent giant bug film with great characters)

BLAIR WITCH (2016) - 5 (good idea - mediocre execution)

THE X FROM OUTER SPACE (1967) - 3 (rewatch)

SCOOBY DOO AND THE LEGEND OF THE VAMPIRE (2003) - 6 (pretty good Australian adventure for the team)

CHILD'S PLAY 3 (1991) - 6

SATAN'S LITTLE HELPER (2004) - 3 (weakly done Halloween set slasher)

MANHATTAN BABY (1982) - 7 (rewatch)

SAVAGE WEEKEND (1979) -4 (part backwoods slasher, part softcore sex film)

TRICK OR TREATS (1982)- 5 (tormented babysitter/evil kid/escaped psycho blend) 

What I Watched in August

As someone on record as a big fan of MAN OF STEEL and the much derided BATMAN V SUPERMAN it's fair to assume that I was quite excited to see DC Comic's newest cinematic effort. I figure I had better enjoy this run of darker superhero films while they last because the general bitching about their more adult nature will eventually destroy them. Sadly it appears that the frantic worrying about this has already hit the series with SUICIDE SQUAD. I was extremely excited when I learned that David Ayer was making this film because his WWII tank film FURY was an unexpected surprise. Dark, realistic and unflinching in its treatment of it's characters it was as if the film was calculated to show the hidden truths underneath all those great war movies of the past. I hoped that Ayer was going to turn that creative eye toward superheroes and from what I can tell that is what he did. Then the second guessing happened and we end up with this.

The first 45 minutes are a chopped up mess that shows that too many bosses were allowed in the editor's room. The film has a lot of story to tell us but it's as if there was no final choice made on exactly how to present things. The tales of the various characters get thrown into a blender and almost randomly shown to us through a series of flashbacks. That eventually makes it difficult to know when what we are witnessing is actually happening. It feels like the filmmakers had no confidence that we'd have the patience for all this character stuff and so contrived to just spasm-edit it all into an info dump. That was a mistake. A second error was the slash editing of rock tunes into the soundtrack almost randomly. Just as I started to get a handle on what the hell was going on suddenly another everybody-knows-this-one rock song blared out of the screen telling me I should smile now. No, no, no, no! I realize that the film is trying to use each song as an identifier for each character but it does not work that way. One might have been effective, maybe even two but when you get to three we all get it and we're looking for the mute button.

But..... once the plot begins to move, we know the villains of the piece, the Joker's plan to grab Harley comes together and all Hell breaks loose I enjoyed the rest of the film. In fact, if there is ever a re-edit of this thing that gives us more of the character introductions, smoothes out the choppy editing and gets us into the rhythm of the story faster it might be a damned good movie instead of an OK effort robbed of it's possible glory. You can see the dark, funny beauty of the original vision peeking out from around the corners where it was shoved. Stop second guessing a film  - once it's made leave it alone!

My original plan was to get drunk and then go see INDEPENDENCE DAY: RESURGENCE (2016). The film had finally appeared (for a single week) at the $2 theater and I could think of few things more fun than an inebriated viewing of a Roland Emmerich film. He and his team of talent-negative morons have never mastered the fine art of making good or even passable films so you always know the movie will suck in surprising ways. The first INDEPENDENCE DAY is still my benchmark for awful science fiction scriptwriting. I remember watching that mess on the big screen and wondering just how such a stupid script could be green lit for millions of dollars. It was so dumb I suspected it had been written by a third grader who rushed though the project to get out onto the playground. But it got made and made a zillion dollars so now we have this crap - an even dumber retread of the same idiotic idea only new! It is, of course, loud and packed with explosions none of which have any weight or relevance. Every plot point is telegraphed, every surprise obvious, every situation clichéd and all the dialog is pedantic. The film is dull, stupid and insulting. When I hear people bitching about big summer blockbusters THIS is what I picture and I like big summer blockbusters. Can't someone make Emmerich stop? Please. I wish I had actually followed my plan and gotten drunk. 

I had no real interest in seeing this new version of THE JUNGLE BOOK (2016) but I'm glad I checked it out. It's a sharp and often touching retelling of the classic tale with state of the art CGI bringing the animals to life quite well. The bright, detailed visualization of the jungle is gorgeous always capable of seeming both welcoming and dangerous. The young actor playing Mowgli is good and the entire tale feels well paced with little wasted narrative that isn't built into the story effectively. All the voice work is excellent and they even managed to work in the greatest Disney song of all time (in my grinning opinion) The Bare Necessities! Good job on every count. 

THE LIST 

THE BEES (1978) - 2 (rewatch)

BEACH PARTY (1963) - 4 (silly AIP musical comedy)

SUICIDE SQUAD  (2016) - 6 (first half's a mess but it finally finds its feet)

EMBRYO (1976) - 6 (interesting science fiction tale with Rock Hudson)

PASSPORT TO  SUEZ (1943) - 6 (solid Lone Wolf film that steals several plot elements from CASABLANCA)

SANTO VS. DR. DEATH (1973) - 8

DEPALMA (2016) - 7 (not so much a documentary as a feature length interview)

THE 'BURBS (1989) - 6 (rewatch)

BLACK TORMENT (1964)- 6 (solid gothic mystery)

CRY_WOLF (2005) - 7 (rewatch) (solid murder mystery with a great end scene)

A CANDLE FOR THE DEVIL (1973)- 7 (rewatch)

THE TRIAL OF SERGEANT RUTLEDGE (1960) - 6 (solid late period John Ford western)

KISS KISS, KILL KILL (1966) - 7 (fun Euro-spy adventure)

DARK ALIBI (1946) - 5 (not bad Charlie Chan mystery)

INDEPENDENCE DAY: RESURGENCE (2016)- 2 (worse than the original?)

BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE (2016) - 9 (ultimate edition)

THE PHANTOM OF PARIS (1931)- 6 (good Gaston Leroux adaptation)

BLACK SABBATH (1963) - 9 (rewatch of the Italian version)

THE JUNGLE BOOK (2016) - 8

DESIGN FOR LIVING (1933) - 7 (amusing but too light)

FIRST MAN INTO SPACE (1959) - 5

THE OUTSIDER (2013) - 8 (documentary about Antonio Margheriti) 

What I Watched in July

July was a busy month with much travel and fun to be had but I still felt the pull of the theater. THE LEGEND OF TARZAN is a fine attempt at getting a film closer to the original character Edgar Rice Burroughs imagined. I think the film is well cast and the historical story they chose for the plot is fascinating. My only real complaints are that Tarzan needed more to do in the story and that some of the humor felt a bit out of place. Some of this I ascribe to the choice of Sam Jackson in a pivotal role. It seems that as the years go on filmmakers want to have Jackson in their movie instead of having the man play a character. The moments when it feels like Jackson the actor is onscreen instead of the character he is playing took me out of the film. The rest was lovely and I would love to see this Tarzan and Jan return for more adventures. It won't happen, but I can dream.

It's the summer and therefore the perfect time for a shark movie! Luckily we have a winner this year and not another useless Sharknado waste of time. THE SHALLOWS is a tight, effective shark vs. human tale that plays out very well from start to finish. The setup is clear, clever and easily makes us sympathetic to the main character. Actress Blake Lively is excellent in the role and the film never has her act in an idiotic way to create tension. She is placed in a terrible situation in a manner that could not have been foreseen and she handles each new problem with intelligence and skills. I was surprised by the smart way the film is written and directed and recommend this to anyone in the mood for a tense, exciting 'animal attacks' movie.

I'd love it if the new GHOSTBUSTERS was good - I might even have some fun with it if it were bad.-  But it turns out to just be pretty damned 'meh'. I cannot figure out what the hell happened here. I think all four of the lead actresses are very funny ladies but only two of them are really given anything funny to do. Those two - Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones  - are often damned funny but they are the only legitimate laughs the film can manage. For some reason it was decided to give the incredibly talented Kristen Wiig the role of straight man which effectively sidelines the brilliant comedienne from the beginning. Why in the name of funny would you do that? Ugh! There are moments of interest and McKinnon certainly gets to shine as the slightly crazed brain of the team but the only things I really remember weeks later are the cameos. Those were fun even if they just occasionally goosed a flat script that needed a lot more laughs. Maybe it's not a good idea to rope your talented cast too tightly to a so-so script.

Defying all cinematic logic THE PURGE films just get more entertaining with each new entry. The latest is a slam-bang action/horror ride that brings back Frank Grillo's character from the previous movie as he now works to protect the only American politician brave enough to stand for ending the annual Purge Night. Of course, the powers that be can't allow this Senator's movement to gain steam so they arrange to have her and her fellow travelers taken out in this year's event. The movie turns into a chase film that ends in by linking the Senator to an underground group with a plan to take out some one percenters themselves. This is exactly the way a good exploitation film should be made - tense, fast, nasty and layered with a harsh social message you'd have to be blind to miss. Roger Corman would be proud!


THE LIST
THE LEGEND OF TARZAN (2016) - 7

HIGH SCOOL HELLCATS (1958) - 6 (female high school delinquents)

THE 300 SPARTANS (1962) - 7 (a little stiff but good telling of the Greek story)

THUNDERBALL (1965) - 7 (rewatch)

THE SHALLOWS (2016) - 8

IT WAS A COLOSSAL TEENAGE MOVIE MACHINE: THE AMERICAN INTERNATIONAL PICTURES STORY (2015) - 9 (excellent documentary)

HOWLING III: THE MARSUPIALS (1987) - 2 (you only thought 2 was bad!)

EL LATIGO (a.k.a. THE WHIP) (1978)- 6 (Mexican pseudo-Zorro adventure)

EL LATIGO CONTRA SATANS (1979)- 6 (basically  Zorro vs. Satan)

DESTROY ALL MONSTERS (1968) - 8 (woo hoo!)

BLACK MAGIC (1949) - 8 (Orson Wells as Cagliostro)

BEWARE, MY LOVELY (1952) - 7 (tense, one location suspense tale)

THE LAST DINOSAUR (1977) - 3 (just embarrassing)

JUST DESSERTS (2007) - 9 (rewatch) (brilliant CREEPSHOW doc)

GHOSTBUSTERS (2016)- 5 (not terrible but not good either)

R.O.T.O.R. (1987) - 2 (so bad it hurts and padded out to 90 endless minutes!)

DIABOLICAL SHUDDER (1972)- 6 (creepy cult goings-on in a modern day castle)

THE PURGE: ELECTION YEAR (2016) - 8 (best one yet)

THE BABYSITTER (1980) - 6 (well done TV movie thriller)

JAWS (1975) - 10 (rewatch)

JAWS 2 (1977) - 7

SUBMISSION OF A WOMAN (1992) - 5 (too long and fairly flat tale of a stalker tormenting a lady)

MANIAC COP (1988) - 7 (rewatch)

Brief Thoughts - JAWS 2 (1978)

After having avoided it for decades this past week I finally sat down and watched Jaws 2. The sad truth is that I have seen Jaws 3 several times because in my teenage years it was an HBO staple and therefore unavoidable. I still chuckle at the inanities in that third film but I feel no desire to revisit it. With Jaws 2 I stayed away completely because I just assumed that it was terrible. After all, Jaws was such an amazingly well done popcorn film - so entertaining, so energetic, so well-crafted, so well acted and just so good on every level that there was no way any sequel could possibly measure up. And now that I've seen the film I was right. Jaws 2 is nowhere near as good as the first film. But it's also not a terrible film. In fact, it's a pretty good film and that was a surprise. The director smartly chooses to ape Spielberg's style to match the look and feel of the previous film but I do think that the first hour could have been trimmed down a little to move things along. I enjoyed the last hour or so of the film and was impressed with the structuring of the suspense as well as the pacing. Jaws 2 isn't a great film but it's a solid thriller and I'm glad I finally caught it.

Oh! And as a bonus thrill I noticed from the advertising art that this is the film that put one of the great movie catchphrases into the vernacular - 'Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water'. That and a zillion half-assed humorous variations got worn out by people for years after the film was a dim memory.  

What I Watched in August

Ahh, the films of Summer! I do enjoy getting in out of the heat to munch popcorn and bask in the glow of a big action film and therefore MISSION IMPOSSIBLE: ROGUE NATION got my money. I was not a fan of the first two installments of this film series but the last three have been pretty clever spy thrillers with this one keeping the batting average moving in the right direction. I was a little disappointed that there were a couple of flatly unbelievable moments - Cruise being flung into the plane when the door finally opens - but the tone and pace were spot on with nice turns from all involved. It's nice to have Alec Baldwin aboard as the government's jerk in residence with his future in the next film being a fun reversal. As usual with these kinds of movies I enjoy the less explosive action sequences the most and the motorcycle/car chase present here is fantastic. I think that Cruise and the director's previous film JACK REACHER was much better but I'm glad to see the pair working together well in a film of larger budget. Sharp, fast and clever are the kinds of words that should be used when describing this kind of movie and this team has a handle on those things.

I have come to terms with the fact that there may never be a good film made from the Fantastic Four comic book characters. There have been three separate attempts spread over four films trying to bring this team to the big screen and by pure crappy luck they have gotten the worst of it each time. This time should have been the one that finally got things right but whether because of studio micromanaging or creative incompetence (reports vary) we now have another massive failure. It's a crying shame. There are flashes of a damned good idea here and there throughout this film that gave me the occasional hope that the movie would straighten out and begin to pull itself together but it never happens. The best example for me is when the team plus Victor Von Doom finally succeed in travelling to the Negative Zone - uh, I mean Planet Zero (?). This is a well done sequence and the visualization of the alien world is remarkable. But then the film stops dead so that the group can climb down a cliff to look at cracks in the ground and boredom strikes. In fact, boredom is this film's default setting! The pacing is awful throughout the running time with the story seeming to just get moving before hitting a wall repeatedly. I don't mind reimaging the classic characters but don't bore me! How in the Hell do you make this film and manage to BORE me? Damn!

To be honest, there are some good scenes that work to keep the film from being a complete flush and the actors do a very good job of selling what they are given but it ends up not mattering. This is a total mess. The only hope is that 20th Century Fox lets Marvel have these characters back and in a few years- after the stink has dissipated - yet another attempt can be made. This just shouldn't be that hard.

I'd love to get into a deeper discussion about writer/director/actor Joel Edgerton's well made thriller THE GIFT but I don't want to take any of the surprises away from potential viewers. This a film that could have easily been just another of the 'yuppies in peril' stories that Hollywood pumped out in 1990's like the whole town was working under a court order but Edgerton has constructed a clever twist or two. Indeed, he might even have pulled off the near impossible quadruple twist ending if my count is accurate. Just settle in and let Edgerton and his fine cast of talented actors spin this yarn and suck you in. Good stuff!

And now for the best surprise of the month. I'm a fan of the 1960's TV series The Man From UNCLE but I came to the show only in recent years. I never caught it in reruns as a kid so I have little familiarity with it as a nostalgic touchstone and only see it as a pretty damned good spy adventure. I had moderate expectations of this new film adaptation of the series because I have enjoyed the director's previous films and liked what I saw of the casting. When I learned that they were making it a 1960's period piece I became more interested and then the first trailer sealed the deal. Wow!

Let me say that I'm aware that the film hasn't done very well financially and I think that is a damned shame as THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. is one of my favorite movies of the year so far! This is a well written, well paced Cold War thriller that feels like a movie made in 1963 without drawing ostentatious attention to the ways that it does so. The sets, costumes, cars, locations and even the hairstyles are period appropriate in ways that make it seem as if the filmmakers studied the first three Bond films and refused to use anything that couldn't be spotted in them. To make things even more impressive the film also gets the characters and their attitudes accurate to the period. This is something that is often glossed over in the rare instances when a modern movie is set in the past as, more often than not, the characters are more modern in their mindsets and mores than they should be. Not here. These are Cold War warriors and their conflicts are real as are their personality quirks which also ring true to the time period. I know this attention to detail must have been a driving concern for the creators and I applaud them for it but it is this firm refusal to break period that probably made it fall flat for younger audiences. As I said to a friend who also admires the movie, "It might not please the under thirty crowd. It only has one explosion! What would Michael Bay think?" And did I forget to mention the excellent score? Wow! This is a great spy thriller and I hope they somehow find a way to keep this creative team together and make a sequel. This is the kind of Summer movie I love! 

The List

THE THREAT (1949)- 7 (solid little crime thriller)

THE ATTICUS INSTITUTE (2015)- 7 (supernatural thriller)

COPPER CANYON (1950)- 7 (Technicolor western with Ray Milland and Hedy Lamarr)

ELEVATOR TO THE GALLOWS (1958)- 8 (French crime thriller)

STEEL DAWN (1987)- 6 (not bad little post-apocalypse film)

THE GUEST (2014) - 8 (very well done action/suspense film)

CROSS COUNTRY CRUISE (1934)- 6 (fun Pre-Code road trip/romance/drama)

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE: ROUGE NATION (2015)- 7

BIRDMAN (2014)- 9 (amazing piece of magical realism)

BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT (1956)- 7 (Lang's twisty murder tale)

FANTASTIC FOUR (2015) - 3 (missed again)

BARQUERO (1970)- 7 (western with Lee Van Cleef, Warren Oates, Forrest Tucker and Mariette Hartley!)

ROTTWEILER (2004)- 4

PLANETA BUR (1962)- 8 (fascinating Russian SF)

YOU'RE NEXT (2011)- 8 (rewatch)

THE QUILLER MEMORANDUM (1966)- 9 (excellent realistic spy adventure)

THE MAZE RUNNER (2014)- 7

CREEP (2014)- 6 (interesting two character horror film)

THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU (1996)- 7 (rewatch)

THE DROP (2014)- 9 (excellent crime tale/character study)

LOCKE (2013)- 8 (brilliant single character play with Tom Hardy)

THE GIFT (2015)- 8 (yuppies in peril thriller but with a twist or two)

THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. (2015) - 9

INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS (2013)- 7 (sad character study)

TAKE A HARD RIDE (1975)- 8 (rewatch)

PREDESTINATION (2014)- 9 (rewatch) (even better the second time)

THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY (1945)- 8

THE WITCH (1954) - 6 (pretty good Mexican horror/revenge tale) 

What I Watched in July

Last month I caught the much maligned new Terminator film TERMINATOR: GENISYS and I really enjoyed it. I'm not sure what all the bitching was about other than it NOT being as good as the first two films in the series and did anyone expect that? I consider this new film to be the third best of the run and a major step up from the poorly written TERMINATOR: SALAVATION from a couple of years back. At least this one had a decent story and didn't feel like it was assembled from a bunch of notes leftover after a boardroom meeting.

GENISYS works best when it's playing with what we remember from the first couple of movies while twisting those events into new shapes. I was fearful that the spoiler heavy trailers had given too many plot points away for the film to really surprise me but I was happy to be wrong on this count. I like that we get to revisit the beginning of this story and view it from different angles. It gives the film a retro but fresh feel that felt correct each time that the film shifted into an alteration of known events. Cool! And the cast, with one exception, was very good. Schwarzsenegger finally looks comfortable onscreen again after his dalliance with politics; Emilia Clarke shows that she may have a career after Game of Thrones ends and Jason Clarke handles the toughest role very well moving from hero to antagonist with skill. It is only the hunky (?) new Kyle Reese (Jai Courtney) that fails to register much screen charisma often seeming more robotic and stiff than Arnold's T-100. Don't get me wrong- he's not bad enough to ruin the film and he's much better than Salvation's pathetic human shaped black hole Sam Worthington, but he isn't much more than serviceable. Good film, though. Hope they make the proposed sequel.

ANT-MAN might have seemed like Marvel's biggest gamble to date but honestly that was GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY. The ANT-MAN story they have chosen to tell onscreen is probably the perfect one as it gives the studio space to have an original 'classic' Ant-Man with adventures that can be told in the future as well as the new guy who seems poised to join the Avengers pretty soon. Once again they have struck the near-perfect balance of action, character, suspense and humor that keeps these films from feeling stale or stupid. I know they will eventually screw up and make one that I don't enjoy but so far the track record is astonishing. Now I just want the Wasp to make her debut and Giant-Man to put in an appearance and we'll be set. Think I'll mosey on down to Milgrom street and see what's what! 

WEB OF THE SPIDER (1971)- 8 (rewatch)

SORCERESS (1982)- 3 (rewatch) (terrible but fun)

BATTLE FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES (1973)- 6 (rewatch)

LEVIATHAN (1989) - 3 (rewatch)

TERMINATOR: GENISYS (2015)- 7

PROMETHEUS (2012)- 8 (rewatch)

CORNERED (1945)- 8 (excellent Noir with Dick Powell)

CHERRY 2000 (1987)- 6

THE FACE BEHIND THE MASK (1941)- 6 (Noir with Peter Lorre)

THE GOLDEN BAT (1966)- 7 (over the top Japanese silliness)

CONTAMINATION (1980)- 3 (rewatch)

DOCTOR JUSTICE (1975)- 8 (wow!)

HANNAH, QUEEN OF THE VAMPIRES (1973)- 6

NIGHTCRAWLER (2014)- 8

THEY CAME FROM BEYOND SPACE (1967)- 6 (low budget British SF)

IT'S A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD (1964)- 7 (197 minute version)

THE BRIBE (1949)- 8 (excellent Noir with an excellent cast)

LOST SOUL:The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley's Island of Dr. Moreau (2014)- 9 (excellent documentary)

ELVIS COSTELLO: MYSTERY DANCE (2014) - 8

ANT-MAN  (2015)- 8

STRANGE BREW (1983)- 7 (rewatch)

NEIGHBORS (1981)- 9 (rewatch)

THE SHOW (1927)- 8 (fantastic silent from Tod Browning)

EXORCIST II: THE HERETIC (1977)- 7 (rewatch) 

What I Watched in August

Three visits to the theater last month with the undisputed highlight being my favorite film of the year so far GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY. I've given my thoughts on that film already HERE so I'll talk a bit about the other two movies.

I was very pleased by the much delayed sequel SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR. I see that it has not done very well at the box office and that is a shame. I enjoyed this one almost as much as I did the first one with the only downside this time being the loss of the shock of the new that the visual style had in 2005. Since I've read the comics that the various stories in the film are adapted from I can't say that I was surprised by the various twists and turns presented but I was happy that the filmmakers and especially the cast were able to give every nasty turn a smart spin. I was also impressed once again with actress Eva Green who just continues to prove how great she can be onscreen. I was stunned by how easily she slipped into the Femme Fatale role and also how comfortable she appeared with the long stretches of her scenes that required her to be nude. Between this performance and her amazing work in the Showtime series Penny Dreadful she is fast becoming one of the most underrated thespians currently working in film.

I also went out with the teenager to catch the latest action epic EXPENDABLES 3. I have been on record as hating the first film of this series and enjoying the much better directed second film. With this one things seem to be in solid hands again and although the movie is never rooted in a believable reality that we might recognize as Planet Earth it is a very fun action tale. This being a film with a script by Stallone there are problems, of course. The middle section in which Stallone puts together a younger mercenary team is a mistake for the most part. The reason for the new team is dumb and not in a good way. The young guns are mostly forgettable but Kelsey Grammer as Sly's guide to assembling a more disposable group is very good and the introduction of Antonio Banderas is fantastic. Through sheer force of motor-mouthed personality Banderas adds some real zest to the show that no one else seems able to accomplish. The best news is this film marks the return to the big screen of (raging loon) Mel Gibson in the big bad role. As much as I may dislike Mr. Gibson's personal beliefs about race, religion and how to treat women I have to admit that he is remarkable onscreen. He is able to breath real menace into the often (let's be kind) basic dialog and he milks every bit of juice out of the villainous situations he has to play with. He doesn't quite top the excellence of the second film's bad guy performance from Jean-Claude Van Damme but Gibson is very entertaining and proves why he was always such a pleasure to watch onscreen. I wonder what the fourth film will draw on for its villain.

SANTO VS THE ZOMBIES (1961)- 7 (Haitian zombies - not flesh eaters)

NOSFERATU (1979)- 7 (rewatch)

GODZILLA VS KING GHIDORA (1991)- 7 (rewatch)

FRAKENSTEIN'S ARMY (2013)- 4

SANTO & BLUE DEMON AGAINST THE MONSTERS (1970)- 4 (terribly sloppy but goofy fun -Santo isn't as much fun for me in color)

RAGEWAR (a.k.a. THE DUNGEONMASTER) (1984)- 3 (terrible Charles Band attempt to employ every FX team he could get to work cheap)

THE CROSS OF THE DEVIL (1975)- 7 (rewatch)

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (2014)- 10

GODZILLA VS MOTHRA (1992)- 7 (rewatch)

KICK-ASS 2 (2013)- 7

SANTO VS THE STRANGLER (1965)- 5 (rewatch)

THE BLACK PIT OF DR. M (1959)- 8 (rewatch)

GODZILLA VS GIGAN (1972)- 4 (bad but fun - very colorful kids film)

THE SPY IN BLACK (1939)- 8 (excellent British WWI spy tale)

THE HANGOVER PART III (2013)- 6 (glad the series ended on an OK note)

BLACKFISH (2013)- 8 (heartbreaking documentary)

HAUNTER (2013)- 9 (excellent ghost story variation)

SANTO VS BLUE DEMON IN ATLANTIS (1970)- 6 (fun color Santo spy adventure - but there was no Atlantis at all!)

SILENT RAGE (1982)- 4 (terrible but entertaining horror/cop film with Chuck Norris)

ALL MONSTERS ATTACK (1971) - 3 (rewatch) a.k.a. GODZILLA'S REVENGE

SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR (2014)- 8

THE QUIET ONES (2014)- 8 (well done ghostly story from the new Hammer)

THE CRATER LAKE MONSTER (1977)- 5

THE EXPENDABLES 3 (2014)- 7 (rarely believable but very fun)

CELLAR DWELLER (1988)- 5 (not bad monster movie)

SON OF BATMAN (2014)- 8 (well done animated adaptation)

SWEET SUGAR (1972)- 4 (terrible women in prison tale but a lot of weird fun)