Review of INTO THE WOODS

INTO THE WOODS

This movie blends four classical fairy tales into a musical mélange that is a treat to watch. A reasonably accurate version of Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk, Rapunzel, and Little Red Riding Hood, is all joined together by a new tale of the barren baker and his wife. This couple is childless because an ugly old witch (Meryl Streep), furious that the baker's father stole greens from her garden, cursed the house with infertility. However, she's willing to remove the curse if the two bring her "the cow as white as milk, the cape as red as blood, the hair as yellow as corn, and the slipper as pure as gold."

Red Riding Hood has the cape, and Rapunzel has the hair. In this version, Jack's cow is milky white and Cinderella's slipper is of gold. Though the path is strewn with obstacles, the baker and his wife finally get all four of the required objects (Rapunzel's hair doesn't work, but they find a substitute) and feed them to the cow who promptly gives milk that makes the witch young and beautiful.

The witch keeps her promise, and the baker's wife promptly becomes nine months pregnant. Cinderella and Rapunzel get their princes, Jack is rich from the gold he stole from the giant, and the-girl-who-is-called-by-her-clothing gets a nice, new wolf-skin coat. (What will they call her now?) So everyone lives happily ever after. Right?

Wrong. The second half takes a distinctly darker tone, and that's the whole point of the movie. Even when the situation seems ideal, life brings surprises.

The movie is taken from the play of the same name by Stephen Sondheim, and follows the same general plot line. The play was written in 1987 at the height of the AIDs epidemic, and may be a metaphor for that tragedy. The movie, a 2014 Disney production when AIDs is more controllable, is much less edgy. (The wolf in the play, for example, is half naked with an erect penis. Not so Johnny Depp.)

All in all, it's the movie is wonderful entertainment. The music, the plot, and the acting are outstanding. As a workout movie, it should get your pulse up to a run. I give it ++++

By the way, DVD's for both the movie and the original play are available.

Review of FROM DUSK TO DAWN

FROM DUSK TO DAWN - first season.

 2014 series, horror, fantasy, mythology, vampires,

A beautiful young woman is running through the jungle with dark-skinned natives in pursuit. They catch her and throw her into a pit full of snakes, one of which, in a don't-tell-me-this-isn't-Freudian shot, plunges itself deep into her wide open mouth.

The scene shifts to two Texas Rangers, rookie FREDDIE GONZALES and his mentor, EARL MCGRAW. They walk up to a convenience store out in the desert, but unfortunately, brothers SETH and RICHIE GEKKO, who have just robbed a bank and killed some people, are inside. Seth is sort of a nice guy. He describes himself as a thief, not a killer, and, in fact, he does not kill people, at least not for the hell of it. Richie, on the other hand, is a total nutcase.

Seth tells the store clerk not to let the ranchers know he and his brother are there. The ranchers enter, and Earl says he wants to 'drain the lizard'. When he returns from the bathroom, Richie, convinced that 'drain the lizard' was a code to the rangers, starts shooting. Earl is mortally wounded, and with his dying breath, tells Freddie to kill the Gekko brothers. Freddie agrees. He will pursue the brothers no matter what the cost - his career, his life, and even his family's life. And it may very well come to that.

Though the title and the first scene suggest supernatural, the rest of the pilot episode doesn't show it. True, Richie hears voices and sees weird images, but he's so crazy, you don't have to consider paranormal. But in the second episode, vampires appear, and in the third episode, the snake lady is explained.

There is only one clear shot of naked breasts, which is strange because a lot of the action takes place in a bar called the Titty Twister. Maybe they felt that unlimited murder, torture and blood was okay for kiddies, but bare boobs?  No way.

The series is an elaboration of the movie, From Dusk to Dawn and, like the movie, is violent, interesting, and without a lot of repetition. On the whole it grabs your interest. Another season is planned, and I'll probably watch it. I give it ++++. It will get your pulse up to a run.

Review of HAVEN

HAVEN - episodes 1-4

2010, supernatural, paranormal, mystery, Steven King,

AUDREY PARKER is an respected, workaholic FBI agent. When a killer, JONAS LESTER escapes from prison and goes to his home town of HAVEN, Audrey's boss sends her there to apprehend him. But Jonas turns up dead, thrown off of a cliff by some powerful, mysterious force. Audrey forms a somewhat uneasy alliance, with NATHAN WOURNOS a local cop who suffers from an inability to feel pain (and is thus subject to multiple injuries, though Nathan himself seems healthy.) The two investigate Jonas' death. Various suspects are checked and exonerated. One in particular, DUKE CROCKER, is a quirky character for whom Nathan has an intense, unexplained dislike, but at one point he saves Audrey's life, so he can't be the bad guy.

Throughout the episode, strange happenings are noted. Audrey is almost killed by a sudden earthquake and is struck by lightning during an unexpected hailstorm. One of the suspects in Jonas' death disappears in a mysterious fog. Audrey, an orphan, finds an old newspaper with a picture of the COLORADO KID, a woman who looks suspiciously like Audrey and who might be her mother. Mention is made of an era in the town's history called THE TROUBLES, which the suggestion that these troubles might have returned.

Hey - something paranormal has to be going on.  Right?

In each of the first four chapters, Audrey and Nathan investigate and resolve a violent supernatural incident provoked by someone who didn't know (at least at first) that they were responsible, and Duke is usually involved in the investigation.  Small clues are dropped as to Audrey's unknown past, the nature of the 'troubles' plaguing the town, and the antagonism between Duke and Nathan, but these take up only a few minutes.

In short, the episodes are predictable.

Nathan's inability to feel pain is an interesting characteristic, but the writers haven't done anything with it, so I wonder why they throw it in. Likewise Audrey's workaholism.

 

The series was inspired by a story, The Colorado Kid, by Steven King. The first installment is the best because you don't know what's going on. Afterwards, it's too much repetition of the same basic theme to keep your interest. I rate it +++.  It will get your pulse up to a jog.

Review of THE CROW - SALVATION

THE CROW-SALVATION

released  2000, revenge, fantasy, supernatural, police corruption
 

 ALEX CORVIS (Eric Mabius), has been falsely convicted of brutally murdering his girlfriend, LAUREN RANDALL. He spends his last hour playing chess with a friend while a guard berates him for not having his lawyer harangue the governor. People outside the prison are calling for his death, Lauren's family hopes they'll get closure, and a CROW flies over the prison. The guards walk Alex to the execution room, and strap him in the electric chair. He proclaims his love for Lauren and his innocence, the guards attach a metal mask to his face, and the executioner throws the switch. But there is a lightning flash on the jail, and Alex convulses for a long time before his head slumps over.

Wheeling the corpse away, guards comment on how his face was messed up from the electrical burns. But when they leave him in a room, he moves a finger, then sits up. His face heals, though with facial scars like K.I.S.S. makeup. The crow leads him out of the prison and to the police evidence room where he discovers that specific corrupt cops were responsible both for his being framed and for Lauren's murder. Then it's just a matter of tracking down those cops one by one, letting them scream in horror at seeing him back from the dead, and then killing them violently. Each one up the line sees the one beneath get his due and knows what is coming. But the head bad-guy presents a special challenge...

This is the third movie in the series. The plots are almost identical--a man and someone he loves is unjustly killed, he is resurrected, and, with the aid of a crow, gets revenge on his enemies. This one is probably the best because you feel the most sympathy for the guy before he dies, and so exult with satisfaction when he wastes the malefactors.  

Alex's last name, Corvis, means 'crows' in Latin. That's the most subtle part of the film. Plotholes abound and the characters are all two dimensional. The movie is almost entirely made up of one scene of outraged vengeance after another. There is no instructive message or spiritual insight. But it's a great movie for working out. I give it +++++. It will get your pulse up to a sprint. The other Crow movies are also worthwhile for working out, but after a while the repetition gets tiresome.

Review of COOL WORLD

COOL WORLD - 1992

 FRANK HARRIS (Brad Pitt), a recently discharged WWII veteran, is taking his mother for a motorcycle ride when a car runs into them and she is killed. A scientist, DR. VINCENT WHISKERS in COOL WORLD sees the accident through an interdimensional portal.

Cool world is a parallel universe in which the inhabitants are cartoons (“DOODLES”), a fountain pen is a dangerous weapon because it can suck the ink from a character, and sex between doodles and “NOIDS”, (humans) is strictly forbidden because it could destroy both the real world and the cartoon world. Whiskers plans to teleport into the real world, but a mishap occurs and Frank is transported to Cool World.

Jumping ahead forty-seven years, we meet JACK DEEBS, a prisoner (he killed his wife's lover) who is being released. While in jail he had gotten inspiration to write a comic strip about Cool World, which he thinks is his own original creation. Drawing one of the characters in particular, the shixalicious HOLLI WOULD (Kim Basinger), has helped maintain his sanity while in jail.

When he gets home, lights flash off and on and Jack is drawn into Cool World to meet Holli. She is sex-personified, a beauty, but most of the rest of Cool world is chaotic, ugly, and violent, though, since the inhabitants are cartoons, no one gets hurt by the violence. Holli tells Jack she wants to go to the real world and feel reality. To that end, she seduces him and, in some pretty good morphing, becomes human.  Thus, the prime directive—no sex between noids and doodles—has been broken and the basic fabric of both realities endangered...

The plot is often silly, the animation is primitive, and the characters poorly developed. But the movie has a certain charm. Holli’s eroticism, though without nipples or pubes, is a pleasant stimulus for working out (at least for guys). Of interest, when she becomes human, she is no longer shixalicious. In one sequence, she flashes between her voluptuous form and a clown suggesting that preoccupation with sex is in itself not real, but rather something to be relegated to the world of cartoons and other fantasies.

At any rate, it helped my workout. I rate it as ++++. It should get your pulse up to a run.

IRON MAN THREE

2014, superhero, fantasy, adventure,

At a New Year's Eve party in 1999, the future Iron Man TONY STARK (Robert Downey Jr), meets an entrepreneur, ALDRICH KILLIAN, who asks for Tony’s support. Tony agrees to meet him on the roof under the fireworks, but instead spends the night with MAYA HANSEN, the inventor of EXTREMIS, a treatment to regenerate lost limbs. However, Extremis has some, ah, strange side effects.

Fast forward several years, and a terrorist called MANDARIN who looks suspiciously like Osama Bin Ladin is setting off bombs in American cities. Officialdom has no clue as to who Mandarin is, how he is setting off the bombs, or even what kind of bombs he uses. Tony tells COLONEL JAMES RHODES he can help the government find Mandarin, but Rhodes rebuffs him.

Tony then issues a public challenge to the Mandarin. Maya Hansen visits Tony's Malibu mansion under the disapproving eyes of Tony's current girlfriend, PEPPER POTTS (hey-I didn’t name her). Maya tells Tony she thinks her boss, Aldrich Killian, is supporting the Mandarin. At that point helicopter gunships attack and destroy Tony’s house. Tony, Pepper, and Hansen manage to escape, but JARVIS, Tony's artificial intelligence robot, sends Tony via his latest Iron Man suit across the country to Tennessee, where the robot thinks the Mandarin is located. Tony's suit, damaged in a crash landing, no longer works and his only help is a ten-year-old boy, HARLEY.

Then matters get complicated.

Did I mention, Tony is also suffering panic attacks from when he fought off aliens in New York?

Plenty of good action sequences and unexpected plot twists, but one of the best aspects of the flick is Tony’s continued one liners. Whether people are about to beat the shit out of him or he’s arguing with Pepper, he always has a snide rejoinder which is so inappropriate as to be funny. Yes, the science is bogus, and yes, there is no character development except at the end where he suddenly conquers his anxieties, but so what. The dialogue is snappy and the pace is good. The only part I really didn’t like was the callous way he treats the boy, Harley.

All in all, this is a fun movie, definitely better than the first of the series.  I give it ++++.  It should get your pulse up to a run. Downey is vacillating on to still another sequel, but if he agrees, I’ll watch that also.

Review of STARDUST

STARDUST

2007 Fantasy, comedy, adventure

The town of WALL is in most respects an ordinary English village of the 1800s, but it has one distinction--a stone wall that separates it from the magical kingdom of STORMHOLD. This barrier has a gap that is guarded night and day. DUNSTAN THORN, an adventurous youth, insists there is nothing more than a field on the other side, tricks the guard, and sneaks through the gap into Stormhold. There he indeed finds many wonderful and magical sights. The most enchanting is a beautiful woman named UNA, who is actually a princess kept enslaved by a mean witch, DITCHWATER SAL. Una sells Dunstan a glass snowdrop in return for a kiss. Then she takes him inside the witch's wagon to collect further payment. Dunstan returns home and nine months later finds on his doorstep a basket with a baby boy, TRISTAN.

Fast forward eighteen years. The nameless king of Stormhold is on his death bed, and his living sons gather around him. This is a bit awkward, since the king himself had killed all his own brothers to secure the throne for himself. His sons murdered some of their siblings, but have been so inefficient, four have survived. How is the king to choose between them?  He takes the royal ruby from around his neck, and throws it up into the sky. The child who retrieves it will be king. The surviving brothers (now three) set out on the quest.

Unfortunately, the ruby hits a star who is then knocked down to Earth where she is seen to be a beautiful woman named YVAINE.

Tristan, a lowly shop boy in Wall, is hopelessly in love with a beautiful twit, VICTORIA. As the two watch the star fall, she promises to marry him if he gets the celestial object for her. So, like his father, Tristan tricks the guard at the wall and enters Stormhold to search for Yvenne to show to Victoria.

In addition, three old and ugly witches see the star fall. They also want her, though their intent is not benign. They want to cut out her heart and eat it so as to have youth and beauty.

Who will get the girl-ruby (the connection between them isn't clear)? The wicked witches? The murderous princes? Or sweet, naive Tristan? The race is on, and a glorious romp it is, with magical inns, unicorns, and a flying ship captained by a transvestite pirate named SHAKESPEARE (he shakes a spear).

It's easy to guess who will win the race, but how will they do it? The screenwriter uses all sorts of funny twists to keep you guessing. As an exercise movie, this will get your pulse to a jog, so I give it +++. In terms of plain enjoyment, it will make you laugh and is a lot of fun.

Review of HEAVY METAL 2000

HEAVY METAL 2000

Animation, Fantasy. Violence. Released 2000 

A hoarse narrator states that in the depths of space lies a green crystal. It is an artifact from the ancient and cruel race, the ARAKACIANS, long since destroyed, and will lead the finder to the Fountain of Immortality. There's a catch: whoever touches it will go crazy. TYLER, a miner on an asteroid, finds the crystal and, not having heard the narrator, picks it up and becomes stark, raving bonkers. He kills his partner and takes over the spaceship.

First stop is the planet EDEN, whose inhabitants have H2O-475, the immortality fluid, inside them (but not enough to make them immortal). This makes them young and beautiful. KERRIE is an example. We meet her in the shower in the first of all too few completely gratuitous tit-shots. Tyler and his men kill almost all of the Edenites to drain this wonderful fluid for their use, but Kerrie is spared. Tyler has other plans for her--snicker, snicker. Also, Kerrie's sister, JULIE, survives the carnage, and vows revenge.

Julie follows Tyler to a bar in NEO CALCUTTA, and a vicious fight erupts, much to the dismay of the bar's owner. At the end, Tyler is near death, but--oh no--he swigs some of the H2O-475 he stole from Eden, and is miraculously restored to perfect health. How can Julie kill him? She follows him to the planet of OROBORIS, where the well of immortality lies. There, she meets a stone man, ZEEK, and an Obi-wan like figure, Odin. But will they be able to stop Tyler from getting to the well and then enslaving the galaxy?

Some of the jokes are truly puerile. When Julie is about to land on Neo Calcutta, she is given approach coordinates of A-N-U-S-6-3-7-0, and later, a visa number U-R-F-U-K-D-8-8-1. Also, the film has a lot of Star-Wars imagery, which is sort of funny.

There is a significant moral question that could have been discussed. Tyler was probably a normal guy before he touched the crystal, and he had no reason to suspect its powers. So should he be held responsible for his horrendous actions afterwards or is he innocent? However, this is not a movie to delve into deep philosophical issues.

This is a sequel to HEAVY METAL, and those who liked the original will probably like this. It has the same crude animation, one theme instead of several short episodes, much less eroticism (though the armor Julie wears at the end is really hot), and somewhat less humor. Still, it is an amusing film and should get your pulse up to a job. I give it +++.

Review of DOMINION

DOMINION (Episode 1-6)

Fantasy, apocalyptic, angels, savior, supernatural, chosen one

ALEX LANNON, is a soldier on patrol outside the walls of the fortified city VEGA (formerly Los Vegas).  Inside a casino, he finds three creatures with eyes as black as a billiard 8-ball. These are lower angels, (known as 8-BALLS) who, in the recent war against humanity, have taken over human bodies because they didn't have bodies of their own. Alex kills one, and one escapes. When Alex returns to the city, he is admonished by MICHAEL, the one archangel who helped humanity in the way.

The war started when GOD, whom the angels call FATHER, disappeared some years back. The archangel GABRIEL, Michael's brother, decided that humans were the cause, and so tried to kill everyone on Earth. Thanks mainly to Michael, Gabriel's forces are now severely weakened, but are still a threat.

The city of Vega itself is a hotbed of intrigue and politics. GENERAL EDWARD REISEN, having directed the war that defeated Gabriel's angels, is the main powerbroker, and seems to be a generally sincere person. CONSUL DAVID WHELE is Edward's main opponent, and is primarily interested in his own welfare. CLAIR REISEN is Edward's daughter, and is almost too noble to be realistic. Edward has ordered Clair to marry David's son, WILLIAM so the two competing factions of the city can unite, but Claire is reluctant, partly because she loves Alex, and partly because William is slime (though how bad he is doesn't become clear right away.) Throw in a competing city, HELENA (formerly La Jolla) where women rule, a predicted savior of humanity, and a few other elements, and you have most of the ingredients for the stew.

Archangel Michel(played by Tom Wisdom) is to me the most interesting character.   He projects a poise and self-control that is, well, angelic. Gabriel, on the other hand, is just like a human jerk.



Like many series, there's titillation but no tits. What bugs me are scenes where a man and woman have just had sex, but when she sits up, she covers her breasts with a sheet. Really?  Like he's never seen her before?

There's some good stuff here, especially for people who like supernatural stories. The pilot episode is the best (no surprise there), but the following episodes are also good. There's lot of physical and verbal confrontations--angel-angel, angel-human, human-human--and several ongoing and competing themes from episode to episode. You know Gabriel won't destroy humanity, but why did God leave, and will he come back?  Who will Clair marry?  Will David take over the city?

I give this series  +++.  While working out, it will get your pulse up to at least a jog.

Review of HEAVY METAL

HEAVY METAL

heavy metal, graphic novel, animation nudity, 1981

A spaceship in low Earth orbit opens its bay door and out comes…a 1969 Corvette. Astronaut GRIMALDI drives/pilots the car to a safe landing in the desert, and with this bit of nonsense the film begins. Grimaldi opens a case he brought to show his the-year old daughter a green sphere, but the sphere disintegrates him, identifies itself as the LOC-NAR, the 'sum of all evils,' and forces the terrified girl to look inside it and see vignettes of what bad things it has done.

The first vignette is typical. A cab driver, HARRY CANYON, picks up a young shixalicious (my contribution to the English language) woman who is fleeing RUDNICK, a gangster who had killed her father while trying to get the Loc-Nar from him. Harry takes the girl back to his apartment for safety, and that night, instead of staying on the couch, she undresses and crawls into bed with him. It turns out the girl has try Loc-Nar, and decides to sell it to Rudnick and split the proceeds with Harry. But when Rudnick takes Loc-Nar out of its case, he disintegrates. The girl then says she wants to keep the money for herself, but Harry has a disintegrator specifically for fares who try to stiff him, and he uses it on her.

What? It doesn't make any sense? Don't worry about it. It isn't supposed to. It's just something to watch and let your mind be carried along with the absurdities.

The movie is an animated adaptation of the graphic novel of the same name. While the music is heavy metal, it's not so loud as to break your eardrums, and, in fact, fits nicely with the story, such as it is. The animation is primitive by today's standards, but that just adds to the charm and keeps you from trying to take it seriously.  There's lots of bizarre aliens, unrealistic blood and gore, and big breasted women with perky nipples and occasional glimpses of pubic hair, though no outright pornography. Hay, I like it.

The movie was largely panned when released, but afterwards became somewhat of a cult classic (like the ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW). I enjoyed it, and plan to see the sequel HEAVY METAL 2008.  The combination of humor and action kept me interested and entertained. It's no cinematic masterpiece, but as a workout movie, it will get your pulse up to a run.  I give it ++++.

Review of IN THE FLESH - season two

IN THE FLESH - second season

Discrimination, prejudice, rabble rousers, Nazi, persecution, zombies, living dead, undead, fantasy, released 2014

In the year 2009, an unprecedented event occurred: thousands of dead people reanimated, clawed their way out of their graves, and wandered the countryside in a rabid state, killing untold numbers of normal humans. In response, society formed groups like the HVF (HUMAN VOLUNTEER FORCE) to kill these 'rotters'. However, scientists developed a medication, neurotryptaline, that could restore these "PARTIALLY DECEASED SYNDROME (PDS) sufferers to their previous personalities and to sanity. Their skin was pasty and their eyes bizarre, but with makeup and contact lenses, they could assume a normal appearance and, after a few months rehabilitation, could return to society.

The problem was a society that did not accept them. The returnees found segregation, graffiti, and pervasive hatred reminiscent of segregation in the USA or persecution in Nazi Germany.
The basic premise is ridiculous, but the story is fantasy, not science fiction so the writers can legitimately ask for willing suspension of disbelief.  The strength of this series is not in the PDS phenomenon itself, but in the characters and their relationships. Were there such a thing as a partially dead syndrome, this is how people, both normal and zombies, would react. The episodes are thus powerful and gripping.

Characters continued from the first season include KIEREN WALKER, the protagonist, a shy, youth who committed suicide and his friend, AMY DYER, an irrepressible young woman who died of leukemia. JEM WALKER, Kieren's sister, had been an active member of the HVF and has great difficulty adjusting to the fact that her brother is one of the people she wanted to kill. This season introduces two new characters: SIMON MONROE is a PDS sufferer active in the UNDEAD LIBERATION ARMY (ULA) which fights the discrimination, at times with counterproductive tactics and MAXINE MARTIN. Maxine is admirably played by Wunmi Mosakua, is an attractive (though overweight), pleasant seeming woman with the soul of a Nazi in her chilling and callous disregard for the PDS sufferers who, when they are treated, are people just like she is.

The second series has less irony and more intensity than the first season. The interactions between these people, both alive and dead, are fascinating, and the parallels between their problems and the real problems in society make the story even more captivating. The first few episodes of the series are the best, and I rate them as +++++.  They will get your pulse up to a sprint.

ORPHAN BLACK is also in its second season, and Tatiana Maslany does her usual excellent job of portraying the various clones, but there are too many new characters and plot threads. The series is collapsing under its own weight. Season one was better. I give season two +++. It will get your pulse up to a jog.

Review of Boondock Saints

BOONDOCK SAINTS

 CONNER and MURPHY MACMANUS, religious Irish American brothers in Boston, listen to their priest preach against the indifference shown to Kitty Genovese's murder, and take the sermon to heart. Later, while they're celebrating St. Paddy's day in an Irish pub, Russian mobsters barge in, announce that their bosses have bought the pub and that everyone must leave at once. A fight breaks out, with the gangsters getting the worst of it. The next day, the thugs try to get revenge, but brothers Connor and Murphy end up killing them, albeit in self-defense.

Since mobsters are involved, an FBI agent, PAUL SMECKER, is assigned to the case. He puts on earbuds and wanders around the crime scene while waving his hands in time to operatic music. Then, like Sherlock Holmes (or Adrian Monk), he assembles clues no one else notices and recreates the case.

The brothers turn themselves in and confess the killings, but Smecker tells them they acted in self-defense and have not committed any crime. Everyone in their community regards them as heroes, and they conclude they have a mission from God to rid Boston of evil men. And there are plenty of evil men for them to remove. A wave of murders sweeps Boston, but since all the victims are criminals, the public doesn't know whether to grieve or cheer. Smecker identifies the brothers as the perpetuators of the killings, but he also can't decide whether to arrest them or not...

The movie asks a basic question: when is violence justified? Like Dexter, the MacManus brothers (along with their Italian friend, ROCCO) kill mass murderers, and in the process become mass murderers themselves. The question is easier to ask than answer.

One aspect of the movie was unnecessary. Smecker waving his hands in time to the music in a vaguely effeminate way shows him as a brilliant and eccentric cop, an interesting picture. But when he appears in bed with a guy, we see the hand-waving is just another gay stereotype.

This movie will get your heart beating and make the minutes fly while you're working out.  I give it +++++.  It will get your pulse up to a sprint.

Review of RIPD

RIPD

NICK WALKER, is a decent guy.  He's a loving husband to his wife, JULIA, and a good cop. Usually. One day, he and his partner, BOBBY, find gold in a house they've raided and they keep the gold for themselves instead of turning it in as evidence. But Nick is basically honest and regrets his actions, so he tells Bobby he intends to return his share of the gold, but he won't tell on Bobby, so Bobby can keep his own share. Bobby seems to acquiesce, but during a raid on another criminal's hideout, Bobby shoots Nick in the face and kills him.

Nick never returned the gold (never mind that he didn't have the chance), so he's judged a dirty cop and, instead of heaven, he's sent to the RIPD, the Rest in Peace Department. There, police officers like him are sent to track down 'deadoes,' people who have already died but have somehow managed to stay on Earth where they cause all sorts of problems. Nick is made a junior partner to ROYCEPHUS "ROY" PULSIPHER, a rootin, tootin, marshal from the old west. Together, they hunt down deadoes who are disguised as normal humans. Hint: talking to a deadoe about Indian food will make him pop into his normal monstrous appearance.

It turns out that Bobby, Nick's murderer, is a deadoe. He and others plan to use the stolen gold to create a staff of Jericho, an artifact to let the dead to return to Earth en masse and ruin the world. Worse, Bobby wants to use Nick's wife, Julia, as a human sacrifice to activate the staff.  Still worse, Nick and partner Roy have been taken off the case and are told the 'celestial review board' might recommend erasure for the two...

Certainly enough to cause suspense, at least in theory.

This movie has more plot flaws and clichés than a dog has places to pee, but so what? It's a parody--at least, that's how I see it. Granted, it doesn't always work. The shoot-out on main-street and the buildings crashing while people scream aren't ridiculous enough to laugh at. On the other hand, Indian food unmasking ghosts (you wonder what happens to people from India) and fat deadoes bouncing off buildings and cackling evilly made me laugh. As a workout film, RIPD has enough get your pulse up to a run.  I give it ++++.

Review of INGLORIOUS BASTERDS

INGLORIOUS BASTERDS

This alternate history account of WWII starts in 1941 with a French farmer PERRIER LAPADITE watching with trepidation an approaching vehicle. His concern is justified. The visitor is HANS LANDA, a Nazi who equates murdering Jews with killing rats.  Landa orders Lapadite to reveal the location of a Jewish family, the Dreyfus's.  Lapadite at first says the family escaped the country, but when Landa threatens to take his daughters to be sex slaves for the Nazis, Lapadite gives up and points to the floor. The Jews are hiding in the crawlspace. Landa's soldiers pepper the floor with bullets, killing everyone in the Dreyfus family except for one daughter, Shoshanna, who manages to run away. Landa watches her leave and laughs.

Switch to 1944, when American Lieutenant ALDO RAINE (Brad Pitt) recruits eight Jewish soldiers, the Inglorious Basterds, for a mission behind enemy lines.  They ambush a German squad, and, when the squad's sergeant refuses to give them information, one of Raine's men, DONNY DONOWITZ, a big guy nicknamed 'the bear Jew,' beats the sergeant to death with a baseball bat. Only one of the Germans survives the ambush. Raine carves a swastika into his forehead both to scar him forever and also to warn Hitler that Raine's men mean business.

Shoshanna, using a pseudonym, now runs a movie theater in Paris. She learns that Goebbels, Hitler and other high level Nazis will be attending her cinema to see a propaganda film, and, with her lover, concocts a plan.  At the same time, the Basterds also plan at attack on the cinema...

No spoilers.

The plot is a lot more complicated than the details above, but it's all laid out in a clear fashion that's easy to follow. Seeing Jews beat the crap out of Nazis is a lot of fun, and the ending, though just alternate history, is exquisitely satisfying.

One plot flaw is that Raine, the leader of the Jewish band, himself is apparently not Jewish. Actor Brad Pitt certainly doesn't make a convincing Jew (he's not Jewish in real life). But this is not major.

All in all, this is a riveting and exciting movie that will often get your pulse up to a sprint.  I give it +++++.

Review of THE MUSIC MAN

THE MUSIC MAN - 1962

The Music Man is a, satirical romantic musical comedy, and it works on all of these genres.

PROFESSOR HAROLD HILL (Robert Preston) has a nice little con going.  He sells band instruments and uniforms to children in small towns and promises the parents that by continually humming music, for example, Beethoven's Minuet in G, the kids will learn to play. After the equipment arrives and before the first band rehearsal, he collects the rest of the money and skips town, leaving the parents to the sad discovery that band equipment does not automatically create a band. 

RIVER CITY, IOWA, he hears, is an especially hard sell, so there he goes. First step--manufacture a need.  A new pool hall gives him the opportunity.  He climbs on a soapbox and rouses the townspeople with a brisk, rhythmic patter:

 

      You've got trouble, my friends, right here in River City,
      With a capitol T and that rhymes with P and that stands for pool...

 Soon the whole town is worried about how:

       …libertine men and scarlet women, and ragtime, shameless music,

      will grab your son, your daughter in the arms of the jungle animal instinct,

      masssteria, friends, the idle brain is the devil's playground.

 Lucky for the town, Harold has a solution to the problem.

      A band will do it, my friends, oh yes, I said a boys' band, do you hear me? 
      River City's gotta have a boys' band and I mean she needs it today.
      Well, Professor Harold Hill's on hand, River City's gonna have a boys' band,
      as sure as the Lord made little green apples, and that band's gonna be in uniform...

But Harold runs into a problem. He is attracted to the MARIAN THE LIBRARIAN, who advocates "dirty books, Chaucer, Rabelais, BALLzac."  After an incredibly gross attempt to woo her, he falls in love with her, and when the time comes for him to leave, he's reluctant.  Meanwhile, the townspeople are preparing the tar and feathers…

This movie can be summed up in two words--Robert Preston. His boundless energy and personality as he dashes about and distracts everyone from realizing that his promises are empty fluff are the best part of the film.  In addition, the music is wonderful, the dancing is energetic, the characters memorable, and the plot absurdly funny.

 The movie was 'updated' in 2003 to reflect modern 'sensibilities.'   I suspect someone thought Harold Hill's rants were serious--a mistake. The original movie is a parody, and whatever sensibilities the revision is supposed to correct can not make up for the lack of Robert Preston.

If you saw this film decades ago, you'll can enjoy it again.  If you never saw it, you have a treat in store for you. It's a superb movie. As a workout movie, it does have slow spots, but will still get your pulse up to a jog.  I give it +++.

Review of LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS

Little Shop of Horrors

SEYMOUR KRELBERN, quintessential nebbich, sings of how he was ‘an orphan, a child of the streets’, when he was taken in by Mr. MUSHNIK, owner of a flower shop in the slums – skid row.  Mushnik fed, clothed him, and in general exploited him. Now a young man, Seymour is in love with his coworker, Audrey, but, while she thinks he’s sweet, she already has a boyfriend, a sadistic dentist, ORIN. The dream of both Seymour’s Audrey is someday to escape from skid row. That seems unlikely. Business is poor and everyone in the shop is depressed.

Seymour’s hobby is strange plants. One day, he buys an unidentifiable plant with a bulbous head that mysteriously appears right after an unexpected solar eclipse. Suddenly people flock to Mushnik’s shop to buy flowers, money pours in, and Seymour even gets requests for interviews from radio stations and newspapers. But there is a catch. The plant—named Audrey 2—won’t grow with plant food. The only substance that will keep it healthy, as Seymour discovers when he cuts his finger, is human blood.

The shop does well, and so does Seymour, in spite of sore fingers. The plant grows rapidly, but has the disconcerting habit of falling over on its side when it wants more food. Seymour tells it he doesn’t have enough, and to his astonishment, the plant says, “Feed me,” and sings about how it is responsible for all the good things that have been happening.

 “What do you want me to do? Kill somebody?” Seymour asks.  At this point, the dentist roars up on his motorcycle and beats up Seymour’s beloved Audrey.

“A lot of folks deserve to die,” sings the plant, and Seymour agrees. He ends up feeding both Orin and Mushnik to the plant, but when the plant, who, it turns out, is an alien, “a mean, green mother from outer space, tries to eat Audrey, Seymour rescues her.  Then the plant tries to eat him…

This film is a musical comedy, not any kind of horror flick, and it is well done. From the opening shot, which looks like a view of distant stars and nebulae (but isn’t) to the end (no spoilers), it is engaging and fun. The three chorus girls, dressed in elaborate finery in the midst of skid row shabbiness, are delightful. The music is delightful, and the plot, crazy though it is, does draw you in.

This movie is delightful entertainment. As a workout film, it will get your pulse up to a run.   I give it ++++.