Movies that can't be as cool as their poster art

I have actually seen this film and, even though I like it, nothing could live up to this great poster. That's one gorgeous image folks! I think I'll have to dig my old VHS out and watch this one again soon.

Summer review- Part the first

Although the Summer isn’t quite over yet at the local multi-plex I think its time for an overview (brief though it may be) of the movies. I caught a good number of films this blistering season and while there were some good things out there on the whole it wasn’t a great year. I’ve already posted about POSIDON and MISSION IMPOSSIBLE 3 both of which were OK without being at all memorable. Maybe that start should have warned me….

X-MEN 3- I refuse to call it X3- It’s the third X-MEN movie not the third movie entitled X. Easily the weakest of this ‘trilogy’ of movies. It should have been the crowning achievement but the loss of Bryan Singer made sure that just wasn’t gonna happen. The resultant film is good, a solid effort but it lacks the human touch of the first two and the feeling of competence behind the camera that Singer is capable of. Even with a hack director the story is still pretty damned good but I can’t help but feel that a better movie was possible- one that would have wrapped up things in a more satisfying and smart way. As it stands, X-MEN 3 felt like there were some things left out that might have improved the characterizations which are unfortunately paper thin. Perhaps a longer cut will be offered at some point on DVD. The actors did their best, I think, but were ill served by the weaknesses that might have been fixed with a more hands-on creator. More thought needs to be expended next time on character motivation and relationships. It’s easy to blow things up—it’s harder to make us care who might be blown up.

SUPERMAN RETURNS- This is what Bryan Singer jumped ship to make. Is it good? Yes. Is it great? Sadly, no. Superman returns from a five year absence to find Lois with a son, Lex loose and the world maybe not needing a Super Dude. There are a lot of great things in the film and overall I like it a good deal but there are problems. First, it is a bit TOO much of a re-hash of the first two Superman film from the 70’s. I know that this was done as a direct sequel to those to movies but there are a few too many copycat scenes here. The script even provides some good reasons for the scenes but they are still unnecessary. Don’t get me wrong- I liked the film but once again I felt like some vital pieces of the story had been left out of the picture. While sitting in the theater I thought there seemed to be gaps in the natural flow of the movie and afterwards a little online checking confirmed this. More than 25 minutes were trimmed to get it to a more marketable length. I’m sure we’ll get to se this missing material eventually but I’m beginning to dislike the fact that what I’m seeing theatrically often ISN’T the finished film as the creators want. Must we always wait for the Special Edition DVD to watch the full movie? Dammit! I would have loved the Krypton stuff, the new romantic relationship Ma Kent has, the scenes between Clark and his mother and anything else they had on tap. This stuff makes these movies richer for me and I don’t really care about the length. Oh- and for future reference—its time to retire Lex Luthor as the Superman villain of choice. Might I suggest Brainiac, The Parasite, Metallo, Toyman, Myzplytyk, Darksied or even Doomsday. There are a host of good Superman stories to tell. Luthor’s bizarre infatuation with real estate was good once but reusing it for this film was really pushing it.

PIRATES OF THE CARIBEAN: DEAD MAN’S CHEST- One of the best things about the first film was its mind bending desire to be gloriously complicated. It went completely against the standard Hollywood script for making a Summer Movie®. Too many characters, too many plotlines, too many mysterious questions and far too many strange things happening. After hearing a chorus of terrible reviews I was worried that the sequel was going to be awful. Imagine my surprise when it turned out to be the most entertaining ‘event’ film of the summer. Hysterical (in two senses of the word), eye-popping, beautiful, fast and wonderfully strange this is almost the opposite of what I’d have expected. No coasting on the good will of the audience here, folks. I could almost hear the filmmakers saying, “We have a new, bigger, weirder and more convoluted story to tell and we’re going to just go berserk.” I found the negative reviews to be truly funny reading afterwards. Sometimes it’s easy to spot the reviewer’s bias against a film and there were a lot of them with the knives out for PIRATES. I think a few of these reviews were written before they saw the film! I guess it was time to take Johnny Depp down a peg. Idiots. And this was the rare film that, although loooong, didn’t wear out its welcome before the credits rolled. This is what I go to the movies in the summer to see. Big, fun and funny. I cannot wait to see the third and final film next year. Chow Yun-Fat as a Singapore sea captain? I am there!

Planet of the Vampires (1965) poster art

This is easily the best poster art for the Mario Bava masterwork PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES that I have ever seen. I found this image a few months ago and was stunned that I'd never seen it before. Haunting and beautiful, this is the perfect artwork to entice folks to see this wonderfully spooky science fiction film. Or at least folks like me!

At times I think PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES is my favorite of Bava's movies. Mostly I think of DANGER:DIABOLIK as my favorite and THE MASK OF SATAN as the best but this movie really hits all my geeky buttons. Science fiction/horror/hot Italian babes/cool alien landscapes/possession/a derelit alien spacecraft with dead aliens. That's a lot of buttons! And the creepy score is great too.

I've watched the great MGM DVD of this more than 10 times over the past few years and since learning that the Italian DVD print is slightly longer I've been very tempted to buy it as well. The added bits are not supposed to be significant but.........

Films that need a DVD release! (Another series)

A few years ago I decided to scratch an itch I’d had since childhood sightings of the big omnibus editions and finally read a Doc Savage novel. Encouraged in this by friends Jack Daves & Randy Fox I picked up a few in a used book store and have been reading them ever since. At first I read them as I could get them but at Randy’s suggestion I’m now going thought them in publication order. This is fascinating as you can watch the Doc Savage ethos slowly evolve. In the first few stories Doc was much less interested in rehabilitation with real bullets flying and necks being snapped! Later stories have him refusing to kill criminals and inventing a surgical ‘cure’ for the bad men he encounters.

The Savage books are wonderful Hero Pulps that exhibit all the strengths and weaknesses of that genre. I recommend them to curious readers with only one caveat- they are addictive and may lead to even more outrageous Pulp characters like WWI pilot/spy G-8 or the bloodthirsty vigilante The Spider! Don’t say you haven’t been warned!

As far as the George Pal film- I feel much kinder to it than I used to even though its second half feels impoverished and rushed. My first viewing of it in my teens resulted in shrugged shoulders with the only lingering after effect being the itch to read the books. The regrettable camp feel is always going to anger me but the cast is pretty good with Ely doing a fine job. I must admit that if a nice DVD was available I’d pick it up- especially if there were some nice extra goodies covering the history of the character.

I know, I know--- But I can dream.

Movies that can't be as cool as their poster art

Once again- there just ain't no way! One of the slew of bloody barbarian movies that paraded through cinemas in the wake of CONAN's huge box office take. Director Umberto Lenzi is usually much better with crime films than anything else but with character names like Ela, Isa, Vood, Rag and Tog I'm going to have to see this one. Hopefully brain-bashing violence is on tap to make my viewing more interesting.

TARZAN- Love & Hate

I’ve been a fan of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ most famous creation since I was a boy. Like many other kids with an appetite for adventure fiction I read the first of the Tarzan novels and fell in love with the stories of the orphaned nobleman raised by gorillas in the African jungle. His adventures fighting predatory beasts, harassing Arab poachers, finding the occasional lost city and battling nefarious bad guys seeking various treasures thrilled me page after page. It’s because I loved the Tarzan of ERB that I could hardly stand the Tarzan of Hollywood.

In the books Tarzan is of noble British blood and by the end of the first novel he is aware of his lineage and has reclaimed his title as Lord Greystoke. Possessing a great intellect as well as amazing physical ability he speaks several languages, is able to mix well in society and is easily the master of his life. ERB’s character chooses to live in Africa with his wife and family on a sprawling jungle plantation with his sworn Waziri tribesmen nearby. ERB’s character was a man to be reckoned with and feared as much for his cleverness as his knife.

When as a young lad I was able to finally see the 1932 film TARZAN OF THE APES I expected to see something close to the definitive screen version of my beloved jungle man. After all- this movie was hailed as the best Tarzan film ever made. I was sorely disappointed! Who was this monosyllabic moron calling himself Tarzan? He didn’t seem bright enough to hold two thoughts in succession much less reason or think. I suspect that Tarzan as played by Johnny Weissmuller would have had trouble negotiating a stoplight regardless of his facility with knife or vine. His inability to form complete sentences even after being around Jane for years pointed to a severe metal deficiency that appalled and finally disgusted me. I caught one of the later films in the series a year or so after seeing the first and could not believe they still had him acting like an idiot. If the dumb ass can’t dope out a spoken language he hears ever day of his life then he’s too damned stupid to be anyone’s hero! So, I decided to stick with reading an occasional original novel for my Jungle Man fix and avoided any other of Hollywood’s attempts to destroy one of fictions great characters.

But then came my college years and a group of friends with similar interests as myself. Among them was a fellow who also loved ERB’s Tarzan but had come to terms with the Weissmuller Tarzan. Pointing out that the books were always going to be around for fans to read he slowly convinced me that the Hollywood version had its good points as well. True- it had more than its fair share of idiotic elements but the films were fun entertainments and worth enjoying as what they were intended to be. No, they’re not the ‘real’ Tarzan and ERB fans may grit their teeth at the knowledge that this is how 99% of folks think of him.

And Hollywood giveth with one hand while it smacketh with the other. I honestly doubt if Tarzan would be as famous and well known if not for the hugely popular Weissmuller films. Perhaps the character endures because the black & white images from these films were absorbed into the brains of a generation or two of children hungry for adventure in the trees? Maybe one of the biggest reasons the original 24 Tarzan novels never go out of print is that young boys are curious for more of the jungle man’s tales than the films can provide?

It’s true that because of the Weissmuller Tarzan films the chances of an accurate adaptation ever being done are nearly zero. But I’ve made my peace with Hollywood’s version of Lord Greystoke. I’m watching those old films with great joy now as they come out on DVD in sets. And I’m even looking forward to each movie with anticipation. In my 30s I’m finally getting that feeling a lot of boys had sitting in a darkened theater or curled up in front of the TV for an afternoon matinee. The thrill of watching a Jungle Man swing though the trees, wrestle lions and kill crocodiles as I wonder what will happen next is wondrful. The books are better, but that’s almost always the case, isn’t it.

Films that can't be as cool as their poster art (an occasional series)

I submit to you that there is no way this film can be even close to as fantastic as its amazing poster. Directed by Amando Ossorio of BLIND DEAD fame and starring Ray Milland I must eventually see it, of course. But there is no way it is even a fraction as good as this artwork would have me believe.