Collecting movies has been an obsession of mine since I was about 14. My dad had this awesome 8mm film collection of movies that I inherited. Before the days of the VCR I would watch flicks in the kitchen projected on the wall. Those films included Frankenstein, Dracula, Laural and Hardy, and Buster Keaton movies. Then our friend the VCR came along and boom things got crazy! The laser disc followed and I've been broke ever since. But some people ask me where I get all these movies from. The strange, the obscure, and whatnot. I am going to layout how you can build your own unique movie library in a cheap cost effective way.
Tuesday is the day you should know if you are going to be a true movie collector. That is the day new release movies are released to stores and on-line retailers. Back in the days before the Internet, there was not a good way to be prepared before you walked into the store unless you worked in a store. There were in-store papers that may have told you the big releases coming out, but now you can get all sorts of info on-line and have a battle plan before entering the store and limit your spending by knowing the score ahead of time.
I'm going to break this down into 3 sections:
1. Knowledge 2. Shopping 3. Hunting
I. KNOWLEDGE
If you want to save money before you step into the store you need Knowledge. Here is how to get it...
dvdempire.com is a great online store that pretty much catalogs EVERYTHING that is coming out. If you go to the main page and look over to the left under quick links and choose Future Releases. On that page under the bar you will see a bunch of dates. Those are weekly release dates. Click on each week to see what's coming out. There are usually about 60-100 dvd's released each week. It's nuts. Here you can sort through each upcoming week and see if there is anything interesting you might want. What I like to do is do this once a month, then each film i like I open up my Netflix queue and add each title I want. I don't always get them from Netflix but by adding them to your queue you can create a good list with dates so that you know when stuff YOU want is coming out. Then if you decide to buy it just take it off your queue after you buy it. Now if you don't use Netflix to rent movies, then just write em down or you can create a Wish List within DVD Empire to keep up with all the titles you are interested in.
If you are into the newest collecting sensation of High Def DVD, you can head over to High-Def Digest and Blu-Ray.com. Both of these sites are excellent. And both update numerous times daily on new releases. Both sites have an upcoming release section, so you can see by date what HD releases are coming out that you want to pick up. you can also use their price guides as to what the retail is and what its going for on say amazon.com. They also provide links to amazon, if you just have to have it right there. Not recommended...
Every Monday or Tuesday Harry Knowles of Austin's own movie site Aint it cool News writes his column of upcoming releases or things people have sent him that he may recommend. His column titled, Harry's DVD Picks and Peeks is usually the first story on the left side of the site where he writes his columns. I find it to be very helpful in finding new and things I didn't even know were coming out in the next few weeks.
The Sunday Paper
That's right spend a buck fity and grab a Sunday paper to get all the sales ads. Check out Best Buy, Frys, Circuit City, Target, and see what new releases on your list may have the best deal on them on Tuesday.
This is a fat dude, maybe in his 20's who watches more movies than anyone I know. Every week or so he goes through everyone he picked up whether online or in the store. It's hysterical and I am a steady viewer of this guy. I find little titles that may have been lost that he finds, that are great.
II. SHOPPING
Now that you are armed with knowledge, it's to time to get your game on. I'll tell you how I do it. First thing first is about saving money. You NEVER EVER pay retail for a DVD. If you do then you're not a good shopper, you're a sucker. Let's take a look at the damage you can do on foot:
1. Movie Trading Company
I always look at ways to refresh my current titles at home. A lot of times a new edition of a movie might come out of a movie I love. It could be a new transfer, a Blu-ray version or whatever. Now that I have my list of stuff coming out in the next few weeks or months, I can go through my existing collection and say well, I don't two copies of these or that. The new cut of this is coming out in a month so I don't need this 1998 dvd that's not even in widescreen. So what I do is pull everything I no longer need and put them in a bag and take them to MOVIE TRADING COMPANY. MTC as I like to call it, will give you cash for money, OR store credit. The prices on their new releases are not as cheap as Best Buy but if you opt for Store credit, you get more credit to use towards say a new release. For example, the other day Iron Man came out. Best Buy had the blu-ray for 26 or 27 bux. Movie trading was 30. I traded in about 5 VHS tapes, and 6 old dvds collecting dust on the shelf and wallah,I had it for 4 bux. Now you may say, well I don't have any movies to sell. Got any CD's? Any video games? They buy those too. And if you have no problem with buying used movies, this is the best place to do that.
Now there are times where i have nothing to spare on any given week, so I have to hit the stores.
2. Best Buy
This is pretty much the best place near where I live and normally have the cheapest deals on new release dvds. Keep in mind, after week one of a new release they go back to regular retail costs. So you have to keep up with what's new that you want or you will lose some cash in the long run. Again check your local paper for the sales fliers, or go online to see the same thing. Also if yo have spare time check and see what the on-line store price is compared to the store price. A few weeks back they had The Mist on blu in the store for 30 plus bucks, but online it was 22. I bought it online, then picked it up on the way home in store for no additional charge.
3. Walmart, Circuit City, and Target. The same principles above apply to these stores as well.
4. Frys
Frys is an odd place. There is no logical explanation for how they do stuff, you just roll with it. Usually the best way to check Frys is in the Friday paper. That's when they usually have their deals of the week that are decent. I check it online by using this dallas morning news LINK. They have a bunch of good deals on regular and High-Def titles. Particularly if you are stuck with an HD-DVD player, you can get some of those titles in the front of the store now for about 3 to 10 bux.
5. On-Line
I get a lot of stuff on-line, and let me tell you this is dangerous. There is so much more greatness out there in cyber space than in the stores, that its mind boggling, and can get you broke real quick. Here are some ways to lessen the blow if you will...
Amazon.com
This is still the best place to get a huge discount on new stuff and even old stuff. The database of titles they stock is crazy. Just signup for the mail list there and they will tell you all the deals on a daily basis. You can also purchase from Amazon.uk and other countries if you are looking for some foreign titles. They usually have great deals on High Def titles weekly that Best Buy and others can't come close to matching. DeepDiscount.com
I like this place a lot, and have ordered several things from them. They like amazon heavily discount dvd's. Shipping is usually a free deal, so thats something to consider.
Let's say you want to go beyond the typical every day dvd buying crap and start collecting films from other places in the world. First you will need a region free DVD player. There are all sorts of places to get those, and if anyone needs that info just email me. I would recommend getting an Oppo player! Google it. I buy a ton of stuff from HKFlix.com HKFLIX is mostly for Asian films, but once you search their store you can find a ton of stuff from Europe, and other countries. They have out of print stuff and rareities. You can also create a wish list on the site too. I have a rather large one there, that sadly will never ever be fully fulfilled!
This is where you get the real crazy ass shit. I'm talking stuff you're parents warned yo not to look at. No, it's not porn, but it's the stuff in the back of the Fangoria magazine that you were like where in the hell did that come out? But its more than that, I have found quite a bit of rare things from over seas that I didn't know was even out. Movies on HD that are not out here for example, or in SD for that matter. Lots of good stuff here, things you may have seen as a kid but totally forgot about it. However the one down side to this site, is its very expensive. I don't know why, but I guess since the stuff is hard to get and keep in stock they make you pay for it. This site is for serious cinefiles only.
III. HUNTING
Borders
Borders is expensive as shit. Let's be honest here. I don't go here much because of that, but if you want to find a store that has obscure and arty farty movies that you can face to face look through this is a good place to maybe find something and go home and order it from some other place. There is a way to get a good deal here, that I discovered thanks to my wife. She is in the Borders card club thing, and every week they send her a 40 or 50 % off coupon. I have used these before on some blu-rays. After they throw the tax back on its maybe slightly cheaper than Best Buy prices.
Half Price Books
Yesterday, I was in the mood for some obscure shopping and stopped in to see what was up. I found a movie that I have been looking for for a long time called The Exterminator from 1980 on VHS for 3 bux. I also picked up Peter Jackson's King Kong on HD-DVD for 7 bux. Not bad. You can also sell your old stuff here as well. Although they don't pay as much anymore. So if you are looking for things that are out of print, Half Price is a cheap place to start before you go online and blow a wad at Xploitation Cinema. And I love digging around at these stores. The other day I found the original Star Wars soundtrack on LP with a mini poster still in it for 5 bux. Another great score for nothing.
One other thing I want to recommend before I post out of this bitch. And that is organizing your collection. Don't be sloppy. get a good bookshelf, and make your library shine. Also there is some awesome software out there to catalog your stuff. I'm a Mac guy and I use some software called DVDPedia. It logs in everything you get and even reads bar codes of the dvds you buy with the camera on my laptop. Its amazing. You can search any actor, title, or whatever with this thing. It's too good. It does cost 15 bux I think, but its very much worth it. It even creates a website for your titles so you can share it with your buds on-line. You can get it HERE.
So that pretty much sums up how I created my dvd collection. Hopefully someday in the near future, we can get rid of physical media all together and have a digital collection, but for now the quality and hard drive space just has not got there yet, but like music it will. And then I won't have to buy bookcases anymore!!!
If you use sites like BitTorrent to download movies, remember it's cool that you can rip off the system and all but watching a Divx encoded flick recorded with a handicam at the theater is no way to experience a movie. You're cheating yourself and the makers of the movie. Wait 3 months and get the damn thing on DVD!
The movie, Iron Man came out yesterday on DVD/Blu, and I finally got a chance to check it out after missing it this summer. Iron Man was one of those comics I never read at all. I think my introduction to Iron Man was probably cartoons. So going into it, I really have no attachments as to what was correct or incorrect in accordance with the comics. having said that I think that made me like film that much more.
In the first of many adventures, weapons and tech billionaire Tony Stark is the victim of his own weapons programs. He escapes his captives by building an iron suit then has a change of heart about where his weapons are going to and how they are being used. He begins work on a high tech suit that will fight against the world he helped to pollute. Iron man was always somewhat derivative of Batman to me, but here director Jon Favreau sets things in reality and makes the character of Tony Stark seem like a real person. Robert Downy Jr. does a great Tony Stark. He's arrogant and reckless. Even in his tests on the suit he is willing to almost kill himself to get that suit working right. The only thing in the movie that asks you to suspend your disbelieve is the level of tech he posses. But that's all fun and geeky.
Some faults I did have with the movie... I thought Tony should have had more tragedy as a result of his weapons than what happened. And I don't mean to innocent every day people but to himself. It just kind of seemed like he got captured, got a private cell, and got to make a robot, then busted out and was all mad cause they killed some dude he spent a few weeks with. But that's a minor quip. I thought Gweneth Paltrow was fine, but nothing great. I think they could have cast someone more feisty. She seems like a push over. Jeff Bridges and Terrence "pimp" Howard were equally good. Although was it just me or did the end remind you of Robocop 2? (Grassy Noll theory)
After watching it I thought "man, that was really fun", and reminded me of an 80's movie. The movie was not tricked up with fancy camera moves and editing, it was a good old fashioned and classically crafted tale. And I think you have to give that credit to director Jon Favreau. His direction is restrained and focused. For instance if someone like say Michael Bay did this, you would never know what was happening during a fight. Favreau probably grew up watching Donner's Superman and old Episodes of the Hulk. This movie could have come out in the 70's and 80's. This is the first fully financed film from Marvel Studios. And I love the film universe they are currently creating with intersecting characters just like the comics.
The Blu-ray disc has a ton of special features and an almost feature length documentary on the making of the film. You can tell everyone wanted to make a great film and were very dedicated in doing so. Oh and check out this great bonus feature from the dvd courtesy of The Onion... It's funny as hell.
The day physical media is dead will be a sad one, but a happy day for people like me who hate the space it takes up. I mean let's face it, the serious movie collector only has so much space before we start to look like obsessed maniacs. Film prints, VHS, Laser Discs, DVD's, Blu-Rays. It's all crazy space taking stuff. I love the DVR (aka Tivo) I have the one in my living room cram packed with my favorite movies in HD. Whenever i want something, its a click away. No getting up grabbing the disc waiting 10 minutes for my already ancient blu-ray player to load up. So I am a huge proponent of getting rid of physical media as soon as possible. In fact my brother in law has a nice PC media center. When HD catches up to downloads, it's over Johnny...
So with that in mind, I was excited that Michael Moore's new feature length documentary, "Slacker Uprising" would be released as a digital download and for free no less. Plus it was on Blip.tv which I used for one of my own films. Blip and Vimeo are really blowing YouTube away in terms of quality HD streaming video. Streaming digital distribution is catching up. Anyway I watched the film in HD streaming and had a few hickups but after a while it was pretty seamless. Unfortunatly the film itself is no so good. This is why it's free. The documentary is not like Moore's others. (i have not seen Sicko yet) Moore usually has some sort of point. It may be very left wingish but he tries to make a point and check the system. In Slacker, its pretty much just him going to colleges in 04 trying to lure huge stadiums of kids to vote for Kerry. Michael Moore has become very much about Michael Moore recetnly and that's sad. The man has a gift for documentary filmmaking, but this film is really boring and serves no purpose. Its filled out with performances by Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine, REM, Eddie Veder, etc. all telling kids how they have to vote to get the evil Bush devil out of office. Now it would have been cool had that worked, but it didn't! So not only is the end a known thing from minute one, but it's even more depressing right now. And maybe that was the point, but I found this one to be very self serving to Moore. Moore is very predictable now, the edge is gone.
However I am excited that Moore decided to use this method to release his film, and I hope other filmmakers do the same. You can watch SLACKER UPRISING by clicking HERE.
The days of a movie really blowing my mind don't happen much anymore. It's rare. I was doing some research on a a new Kung-Fu top ten fights blog entry and I was looking into what the status of Tony Jaa's new film Ong Bak 2 was when I saw that director Prachya Pinkaew had a rift with Jaa and went out and made a new movie with a female martial artist Nicharee “Jeeja” Vismistananda called "Chocolate". (For the sake of my fingers typing we will refer to her as Jeeja... ) So I found a copy of it, and holy smokes, Jeeja is for real! SHE BLEW MY FRIGGIN MIND!
The fight scenes are nothing short of breathtaking. The stunts and fighting are things we can't do here in the States folks. People get hurt for real. When they get kicked in the head with a block of ice and fall off of a building they really get kicked in the head with a block of ice and fall off of a building. For real. The version I saw had no subs, so I ordered a new one from HKFLIX and it should be here in time for Kung-Fu Night next week in the Clappatorium. I can't say the rest of the movie is as good as the fighting, but it does not really matter. Check out this trailer for Chocolate. Jeeja is my new love...
I've logged a lot of films recently, and I've been having a blast. It's great to get caught up on some movies I have been missing. Sadly, no trips to the cinema. What has happened to me? Am I destined for home video hell? On with the madness.... THE FORBIDDEN KINGDOM
Based on the legendary Chinese tale of the Monkey King, this movie reminded me of Ronnie Yu's attempt at U.S. kung-foolery called Warriors of Virtue. Like that movie this one is aimed more or less at kids, but its at least fun and stars two of the biggest kung-fu stars of all time, the great Jackie Chan and the great Jet Li. Anyone that knows me really well, knows I am (or used to be) a Hong Kong movie expert. At one time in my younger days I had a massive collection of Asian films. Well in 97, lots of things changed, I got a job and Hong Kong was handed from the Brits back over to the Commies. And pirating of movies became rampant. The former two things really took the local HK film biz into a tailspin. Quality suffered and most of the big stars like Jet, Jackie, and directors like Woo and Yu moved over here to make bad versions of their HK work.
Back in the 90's a Jackie vs. Jet movie was oft rumored to be happening, but behind the scenes it was known that the two did really care for each other. In fact Jet made a movie about a Jackie Chan type actor who was know for doing his own stunts but never actually did them. And the director of that film was Wong Jing who made City Hunter with Chan and didn't get along with JC. So suffice to say they were not exactly on good terms... Flash forward about 15 years later and we have a Monkey King movie directed by a round eye, Rob Minkoff.
Honestly, I enjoyed the film as light as it was. But in all honesty its for kids, and its not the crazy ass Jackie vs. Jet movie I dreamed about. The fight scenes between the two is really fun though, and it is very cool to see Jackie's Drunken boxing style vs. Jet's Wushu style. And unlike most US/HK crossovers, its a long fight. So its more than a tease, its a good long fight that will satisfy most people. And to be a reverse racist here, the worst element of the movie is the white kid, whose eyes the story is told. The story is basic, kid finds ancient monkey king staff and is transported back in time to become a kung-fu master in a few days while Jackie and jet fight/team up in the end to fight some bad guys.
Now the other big problem I had with this movie was this: DO NOT F WITH "The Bride With White Hair" EVER. One of the bad guys or chicks I should say is a total ripoff of the Bridget Lin from Bride with Hair movie. One of my favorite HK films of all time. Its a great character, but it does not fit here and comes off as a fanboy dream gone horribly wrong. We know The Bride is a cool movie don't disrespect it like that. Change the hair color at least!
I think this film is fun for two main reasons: Jackie and Jet. Both play dual roles int he movie. Jackie plays a 100 year old man that rents kung-fu movies, and Jet gets to play the Monkey King. I think Jet's Monkey King was pretty good. So it's worth the view if you like those guys, just don't think you're getting Fist of Legend or Drunken Master II or anything.
INTO THE WILD
A really great film, that I assume like the book (which my wife has read) makes you think about whats it all about. Life in society that is. Into the Wild is about a kid, Chris from a somewhat broken home that decides after college he will ditch all material things and just walk/hitchhike his way to Alaska. Played by Emile Hirsch, his goal is to live off the land as much as he can. He may take a small job here or there, but just enough to get him to the next point on his journey. It would seem that he is rebelling against his parents most of the time, but I would have liked the film to have touched more on his relationship with his parents. The idea of his journey that Chris has is understood. Everyone at some point in their life may want to just drop out of society and get as far away from the modern world as possible, but here the reasons are very vague and somewhat stereotypical. (in a movie world that is) Having said that this movie is about the journey and maybe director Sean Penn wanted us to fill in those holes ourselves as we ride along with him.
Along the way Chris meets Kathleen Keener who acts as a sort of a Mom away from home to him. He also gets a job on a farm working for Vince Vaughn and meets an older man, Hal Holbrook who lost his son and sees Chris as a temporary substitute. Based on a true story, I found a lot about Chris I saw in myself, and I think anyone watching it will, but Chris acted on it, and didn't look back. He's like a runaway that ran away after he finished college. I won't spoil the end of the movie, but its handled really well and what I liked about the movie more than anything it doesn't try to preach down to you. It presents things as they are, and its up to you to make those judgements about Chris. The Eddie Veder soundtrack can grate on you after a while, but other than that, highly recommended viewing.
SPEED RACER
I told Amy this, this morning about my review of this so called "film". Now technically speaking aside, If you took a shit on a shit, you would produce something greater than the live action Speed Racer movie film... Nothing more to say on that. However, technically speaking it looks awesome. So, to sum up its like looking in a toilet after you took a shit and saying wow, that's a nice looking piece of shit.
EXILED
I love Johnny To movies. He has made so many great ones over the years and is probably the best HK director working today. Maybe because he stayed put while everyone else moved to the US after 97. I dunno. But he continues to crank out great comedies and gangster movies year after year. I recently saw his Election dualigy, which was really good. Here a gang of 5 childhood friends who are all gangsters in rival gangs show up for a reunion of sorts. However one of the men has a hit on him by a big gang boss. Two of the guys are there to kill him, and the other two are there to protect him. After a crazy opening gun battle they all agree to work together to save their fellow brother who now has a wife and small baby depending on him. Anthony Wong is the main star while the greatness of Simon Yam shows up as the Big Boss wanting the job done. Fantastic drama mixed with ever greater choreographed gun battles. To is still on top of his game. His newer gangster films have found this rhythm of silence and sudden out bursts of violence that really get to you. It's a return to 90's Hong Kong gangster classics!
Werner Herzog is like heroin. Once you get into one of his films, you must have more. His narrative films are pretty similar to his documentary work. Experimental. I really dug his last narrative, Rescue Dawn with Christian bale, and I didn't think I would. Grizzly Man was a tour de force in my book as far as documentaries go. And King of Kong is on par with that one as well. I had the opportunity to watch his newest documentary, Encounters at the End of the World. This film looks at a place called Antarctica. Who lives there, and why. It was all shot and sound recorded by Herzog himself and one other crew member, cinematographer Peter Zeitlinger. They got a plane to Antarctica with no plan, other than they had 7 weeks to make a documentary about something.
What they find there is a group of people and animals mind you all drawn to a similar need. Through the course of the film, that need seems to be nature. What is it, and how does it adapt in these circumstances. A lot of the people there may be labeled extremists but most them are scientists trying to figure out the many mysteries of Earth. The underwater footage is breathtaking. In fact the footage there is what drew Herzog to go there in the first place. This is not the most focused documentary mind you, but is the bravest in quite some time. Any fan of Herzog knows he will do almost anything for his art. And as long as that spirit is alive, his films will continue to resonate with a passion that few other filmmakers dare to undertake.
BIGGER STRONGER FASTER
The next doc on the slater for me was Bigger Stronger Faster. This doc is from new filmmaker Chris Bell and details the wild world of steroid use in America starting around the later 70's until today. Bell uses his own family of brothers to anchor the story on a personal level. All three brothers were obsessed with Hulk Hogan, Arnold, Sly and the 80's tough American stereotype. So naturally they all went into wrestling and body building. And each has or still is using "the juice". Amongst his own story Bell carefully weaves all the other steroid drama from baseball to Wrestling and even does a great job analyzing all those 80's action flicks from Sly and Arnold and how those films really influenced my generation into thinking bigger was better. Regardless of the price you or your loved ones might pay because of that perception.
I thought the film did a great job from minute one in telling this mini-epic that stemmed from 80's action movies and wrestling and continues on today with no end in sight. The documentary gives a fair look at what steroids actually are thanks to the fact that the fimmakers own brothers are active users of the stuff. So in way I guess this film is very much in the style of Super Size Me, because the maker is really in the world he is examining. And it's quite fun to watch his journey. I may be slightly biased in my review because I am the same ages of the subjects here, and I completely understood where the idol worship came from. Who didn't want to work out and wear black shades and drive Brigette Nielson around after seeing the genius of Stallone's Cobra? These guys took it to the next level. Highly recommended.
The love that I have for WWII movies has increased through the years. Any docs about Nazis, odd things in the field during the war are really grabbing me these days. I would highly recommend renting The Counterfeiters. I'm pretty sure this won a Best Picture Oscar for Foreign Film last year. It's a really amazing true story about how the Nazi's during WWII rounded up a group of Jewish artists and printers in a concentration camp and made them make counterfeit bills for all the other countries so that it would drive the value of that countries currency down during the war. It was called Operation Bernhard at the time.
The main focus of the film is master Jewish countefieter Salomon Sorowitsch, played perfect by Karl Markovics. He then meets the other counterfeiters in the camp ala Dirty Dozen. The performances are spot on as is the writing and directing by Stefan Ruzowitzky. The only other film I had seen by Ruzowitzky was the horror movie Anatomy. This is a major upgrade for him. Operation Bernhard was the largest counterfeiting outfit of all time. I am a WWII and Nazi movie nut, so if you like those kind of flicks, this is a welcome addition to the genre.
The urge to write up a Death Wish retrospective has been strong in me. However, with time limited these days I happened upon a reviewer, Vern at AICN that has his own SITE and has done a great job of writing up the genius of Bronson's five epic vigilante films. So I'm gonna totally rip Vern off and re-post his reviews here. If you love B-movies please check out vern's site, I highly recommend it! I know it's a horrible thing to do, but I don't think I could do it much better than Vern did.
I also want to recommend a great book that's oput called Bronson's Loose! The Making of the Death Wish Films by Paul Talbot. I'm in the middle of reading it now, and its a great read. You can BUY it here at Amazon.
DEATH WISH
After enjoying recent DEATH WISH ripoffs and spinoffs like DEATH SENTENCE and THE BRAVE ONE, I thought it would be a good time to revisit the source, and to see those sequels I never got around to watching. (By the source I mean the first Charles Bronson movie and not the book by Brian Garfield, which is apparently similar but clearly anti-vigilante in the end - that's why he wrote the sequel Death Sentence, because he was so mad about the DEATH WISH movie.)
Charles Bronson plays Paul Kersey, New York architect, happily married father, "bleeding heart liberal," Korean War veteran with conscientious objector status. A cool guy. Then one day a gang of hoodlums (including Jeff Goldblum in his first movie role) follow Paul's wife and daughter home from the grocery store and rape them. Mrs. Kersey dies and the daughter is so traumatized she's hospitalized in a near catatonic state.
Paul's annoying son-in-law (who calls him "dad" way too much for comfort) convinces Paul to take an opportunity to go work on a project in Tucson to get away from it all. Hanging out with ranchers he ends up going to the gun range, where he gets a condescending lecture about how the city wouldn't be so violent if everybody had guns like out here. When he leaves they give him a gun as a gift. So, uh, that might end up being used for something. Who knows?
Of course Kersey ends up in a one man war against crime, going out late at night waiting for people to try to mug him so he can shoot them with his new gun. It makes him feel good. Strangely, he never ends up tracking down or even trying to track down the dudes who attacked his family. Since this was the start of the urban vigilante formula it hadn't yet occurred to them that that was a good way to make the story satisfying. Or maybe they just knew it was unrealistic. That didn't become a part of the formula until part 2.
Obviously nobody likes bullies, and this was at a time when crime was fairly rampant in alot of major cities, so it hit a chord with alot of people. Anybody who ever gets fucked over fantasizes about getting revenge. But the manipulation of the movie is pretty blatant, the way it openly states that Kersey is a "bleeding heart liberal" and basically says that all his values were wrong and now he knows since his wife was killed.
Being made in a more sexist era the portrayals of his wife and daughter are pretty embarrassing to look at now. Obviously an attack like this is deeply scarring but the wife seems to die of fear and the daughter quickly reverts to the mental state of a little girl. She's even that way years later in part 2. It's reinforcing this fantasy for the Tucson ranchers that women are helpless little fragile waifs and that a man's primary job in life is to violently protect them from other predators.
If the movie wanted to really make the vigilantism argument credibly it wouldn't have to stack the deck the way it does, with the hoodlums being these silly cartoons who run around hooting and giggling and randomly attacking people for fun. If that's the way the filmatists see street crime then you gotta figure they're just paranoid, they wet their pants every time they see a longhair or a black guy, then run home and tell their friends they just barely dodged a gang rape. This movie definitely exploits our basest and most paranoid instincts. (I mean jesus, check this out.)
But you know what? I still dig this movie. Bronson is so good at these type of characters that I accept him more like he's a real guy who went a little crazy in a bad circumstances than as thinly veiled audience manipulating right wing fantasy time. So I forgive him. And for such exploitation the filmatism is pretty classy. The elegant and sometimes funky score by Herbie Hancock goes a long way toward making it work. Apparently director Michael Winner's girlfriend gave him the Headhunters album and convinced him to get Herbie. Good job Michael Winner's girlfriend at the time(aka Maria from Sesame Street).
And although the movie seems to be coming out on the side of vigilantism, you gotta acknowledge that there is some ambiguity there, the way at the end Kersey has completely lost it and he starts spouting cliches from the western stunt show he saw earlier. To me it seems to be saying that what he's doing is at least in part inspired by that blatantly fake world - rehearsed, lipsynched, acted out for tourists. And maybe that's why he takes his chance to leave New York instead of dying or committing suicide like alot of people would after a crazy rampage like that. Maybe that's why he doesn't really have a death wish.
DEATH WISH II
For the first DEATH WISH sequel we trade down from Dino DiLaurentiis to Golan and Globus producing. Apparently Menahem Golan almost directed, but Bronson wouldn't do it unless they got Michael Winner back. I bet he said "why get a loser when you can get a Winner?" Anyway we caught a lucky break there. I guess Winner must've broken up with Maria from SESAME STREET by this time so Herbie Hancock was out. Instead he got one of his neighbors to score, a neighbor who happened to be Jimmy Page. I was worried but there's only guitar soloing on the beginning and end credits, the rest is standard old school score, not cheesy '80s keyboards and rockin guitars and shit. So I'm not gonna complain.
It's 1982 now, 8 years later, but they say it's 4 years later. (The magic of cinema.) Paul Kersey lives in L.A. now. His adventures in Chicago (portrayed in the book Death Sentence) are ignored. He's still an architect, h has a new girlfriend (Jill Ireland) and he's moved his daughter to a hospital in California. She's still so traumatized she doesn't speak.
His life seems happy but then he has a run-in with some weirdos in the park. They steal his wallet so he chases one of them down and beats him up in an alley. Very satisfying, but too bad his driver's license was up to date. They go to his house, rape his housekeeper, hit him over the head with a crowbar, kidnap his daughter, then rape his daughter until she kills herself.
One time a guy at the DMV scolded me for not updating my address after I moved, and he said if the police were looking for me they'd go to the old address. I said that was a pretty good case for not updating your address, and DEATH WISH II is another one. If Paul was still carrying around his Illinois driver's license his daughter and maid would still be alive. And those thugs would be wandering around Chicago trying to find him.
This story raises a few questions. In DEATH WISH, Kersey's vigilantism was said to lower the crime rate in New York City. And it inspired other people to stand up for themselves and fight off muggers. But did that last? And is he gonna hafta travel the world to lower crime rates everywhere else, because L.A. of 1982 seems way worse than New York of '74. How's he ever gonna keep up? He's not Santa Claus. The hoodlums here are even less human and more violent than Jeff Goldblum's crowd. They just run around grabbinb people. They giggle and stick their tongues out and swing around like monkeys. Then occasionally they just set up a boombox and dance badly to shitty guitar rock.
A word of warning: the rape scenes in this one are much longer and more graphic, almost headed toward I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE territory. In the Jeff Goldblum future-respected-actor-playing-rapist slot we have Laurence Fishburne as "Cutter", wearing sunglasses like Levar Burton on Star Trek. I read that the U.K. cut has some of that stuff censored but I wouldn't mind. I get the idea.
I always wondered why in DEATH WISH all he needed was a gun. Wasn't he ever gonna get mugged by somebody with more than a switchblade? In II that escalation has taken place, so he does get in shootouts. These guys are pretty pickpockets and crazy rapists, but they trade a bag of coke for machine guns from the mob. Shit is getting crazy out there.
The simplistic approach to issues continues. People Kersey hes call him a hero and refuse to give a description to angry cops who seems to care more about busting him than other criminals. Alot of sticking it to the man goes on in these movies. Jill Ireland's character is very interested in criminal rehabilitation, Kersey kind of plays along and you're probaly supposed to think "isn't it cute, women don't know what they're talking about." An anti-death penalty senator is made to look naive by only giving him one weak sentence to explain his stance.
But since Kersey's tracking down the specific guys who did the crime this time it's hard to get too mad at him. And his methods are extra badass - he calls himself Kimball, wears a knit cap and rents a rathole to use as his headquarters, his hall of urban justice. Meanwhile he's trying to act normal whenever his lady shows up. He keeps having to hide guns or hope she doesn't notice the blood pouring out of his sleeve. For his last kill he has to use her connections and a fake doctor ID to get into a mental hospital where the guy gets locked up for rehabilitation. The craziest part is Kersey proposes to her and plans it so that running off to Acapulco will also be his post-murder-spree getaway. Not too romantic. That's kind of in the same category as Homer Simpson buying Marge a bowling ball with his name on it for her birthday.
There's some pretty good violence. Laurence Fishburne has the best death - he tries to hold up his precious boombox to shield himself from bullets - it gets shot in half in time to see the bullet hit him in the face. But actually my favorite part of the movie is earlier, when Kersey is not yet on the warpath because he's only had his wallet stolen. He doesn't have a gun but he beats the guy up. The guy tries to stab him, he catches the blade in a cardboard box and disarms him. He gives him a few pounds but the guy turns out not to have his wallet, so he tosses his knife over a tall fence. Schmuck.
Then when he goes back to the ladies he doesn't even tell them what happened. He just claims he can't buy ice cream because he forgot his wallet. That's Paul Kersey for you.
DEATH WISH 3
Well, L.A. didn't work out too hot for Paul Kersey. Might as well head home. So Part 3's opening credits show Kersey taking a bus back into New York City, looking out the window to the tune of the most in-your–face, half cheesy/half cool blast of white-man's-keyboard-rock meets jazz-fusion-'80s-cop-movie-establishing-shot-of-the-city theme this side of HARD BOILED. Jimmy Page is back in the composer's chair and comes up with a pretty weird and experimental sound more often than he comes up with the crappy guitar noodling you usually got after LETHAL WEAPON came out. He's still no Herbie Hancock, but he'll do.
Director Michael Winner returns for his last at-bat in the DEATH WISH series, but you immediately gotta wonder what the hell's up because this feels nothing like his other DEATH WISHes. I'm honestly not sure if it's a deliberate artistic choice or a sudden case of not giving a shit, but he has completely removed whatever traces there were of subtlety, thoughtfulness, ambiguity, class or elegance, not to mention realism. It looks cheaper, plays out more clunky and seems to have been made all in a week or so with no time to prepare or to stop to take a breath. And that's exactly why it's the most popular of the sequels. This movie is pretty fuckin nuts.
The first two took questionable morality and made it go down easier with execution that's just a little smarter than the material. No time for that in III. The writing and editing both go for a sometimes hilarious bluntness and minimalism. No beating around the bush. No time to set up or explain things, no time to set a mood, to develop an idea, to linger on anything at all. For example a scene will start with some place already on fire - why bother to show how this starts? Let's just skip to the burning. Maybe the funniest example is the lawyer who Kersey strikes up a relationship with during a few scenes. They start to see each other and before you have time to catch your breathe Kersey has left her in the car for a moment, the bad guys have punched her out, put the car in neutral and rolled it down the hill where it crashed and exploded. And Kersey is pissed but I don't think he 0ever mentions her again. The movie's saying, "yeah yeah yeah, revenge, etc. You get the idea, I'm not gonna blow a bunch of smoke up your ass about it."
In the opening Paul comes to visit a Korean War buddy (who cares why?) moments after a bunch of punks have broken in and killed the poor guy. Then a whole bunch of cops show up and arrest Paul. One cop knows he was The Vigilante so he tells him he can go if he continues killing "creeps." As a reader named Drew B. pointed out to me, "Eastwood shoots 'Punks,' and Bronson shoots 'Creeps.'" Anyway now the story doesn't have to deal with much secretiveness or cops trying to catch him. Just him shooting muggers.
The villains are your standard young white guys with chains and vests. Their leader Manny Fraker has a reverse mohawk and they all paint two lines on their foreheads in his honor. He's a weird looking dude with a good lawyer who, after his first meeting with Kersey, offers to kill a little old lady in his honor. But you can tell underneath the bluster he's a huge nerd. He sounds like such a weiner when he gets on the phone to call in some biker gang reinforcements. "Manny Fraker here..."
The Jeff Goldblum/Laurence Fishburne slot I guess this time would be filled by Alex Winter as "Hermosa." I mean he's mainly known as Bill or Ted (I never remember which one) but I still respect him for directing a movie nobody else knows about called FEVER.
The creeps seem to make up 99% of the neighborhood's population. There are a handful of elderly people or women who live there but if they go outside they're always surprised by a purse-snatching or a gang rape. If they stay inside the creeps climb in the window. So Kersey starts setting booby traps such as a bed of nails on the floor by his window or a plank that swings up and takes a guy's front teeth out. Sadly these traps always go off off screen.
Alot of the movie is Kersey happening to walk around the corner as a crime occurs, then he chases them down and shoots them. He uses a gun designed for African big game hunting, and later a machine gun his late buddy Charlie saved after the war and a rocket launcher he uses to blow Manny Fraker through the side of his apartment. (He ain't getting his deposit back.) The escalation is justified by the rioting creeps who just start blowing up cars, lighting people on fire and hiding on the roofs shooting at any citizen they spot. (More proof that Kersey's vigilantism did not lower New York's crime rate in the long run.)
The battle is painted broadly as a war between old people and young people. About the only time cops ever get involved is when they falsely arrest Kersey or when they come to take guns away from elderly people. (The right wing propaganda is at its all time clumsiest.) It seems like no cops give a shit about the crime at all except the one guy who gives so much of a shit that he secretely authorizes Kersey to execute all criminals on sight. I mean look, Kersey's a good guy, I trust him. But this brings up some constitional issues, in my opinion. Some due process and what not. I'm not sure I'm comfortable with this.
But this is a hell of a movie. You can't watch it and not get a little giddy. Whether its stripping down of the cliches DEATH WISH created was intentional or not is something that will require further study. Jim Blanton of Fantasmo Cult Cinema Explosion tipped me off to a book called Bronson's Loose! The Making of the Death Wish Films by Paul Talbot. I couldn't find it at the local book stores so I had to order it. As soon as I get it I'm gonna skip to the chapter on part 3 to find out what the hell was the thinking on this one. It seems like the movie that every violent parody of violent action movies in the '80s was directly based on. By normal standards of filmatism it's the worst of the series, but judged by raw force and entertainment value it's the best after part 1.
If you like your action raw, ridiculous and completely ignorant, DEATH WISH 3 is a must-see.
DEATH WISH 4: THE CRACKDOWN
For part 3 Michael Winner stripped DEATH WISH down to its crudest elements. There was nowhere further to go within. So for THE CRACKDOWN new director J. Lee Thompson (GUNS OF THE NAVARONE, the last two PLANET OF THE APES movies, THE EVIL THAT MEN DO, tons of other shit) dresses it back up again. You know this right away from the opening which contains suspense, mood, atmosphere, build, surprise, and symbolism, all forbidden by part 3's strict DOGME style rules.
Kersey is an architect again, and has a family again - another reporter girlfriend with a teenage daughter he regards as his own daughter (we know this because he says "I regard her as if she were my own daughter.") Oh jesus, not more gang rape, right?
Well, we're in luck. Kersey's regarded-as-daughter dies not from an attack but from a cocaine overdose. Kersey follows her boyfriend to the video arcade/roller rink, sees him confront and get stabbed by their dealer, ends up shooting him so his body falls and gets shocked by the top of the bumper car rink.
The admirable thing about this sequel is that the only punk or "creep" in the whole movie is the guy who gives the cops a description of Kersey's car after the arcade/roller rink shooting. Kersey goes after the organized crime figures who get rich off of the drugs that killed that girl. So finally the class conflict of DEATH WISH is reversed. It's not this well-to-do architect going after poor people who dress funny. It's Kersey vs. rich guys who wear suits and live in mansions or penthouse condos. And to enter their world he pretends to be the help, sneaking into a party as part of the catering staff, or pretending to be a worker at the drug front fishpacking plant.
This secret agent business wasn't his idea. A rich guy recruited him. He knows about Kersey's vigilante activities, claims his daughter was killed by drugs too, sort of forces/convinces Kersey to go after the kingpins. He gives Kersey intel (you hear it as narration) and supplies his equipment: sniper rifles, bombs, bugs, uzis, rocket launchers. Everything he needs for a crackdown.
So it's a series of missions and the feel is kind of more THE MECHANIC than DEATH WISH. You start to wonder how he got so fuckin badass just from shooting muggers and being a medic in the Korean war. He does things that usually require a special ops backstory, like in the great scene where he tries to escape the fish plant with about 80-100 working stiffs coming after him. Somehow the comparitive slickness makes it seem more reasonable than part 3, but at times it's just as ridiculous.
He also has a couple great one-liners. My favorite is when a gangster finds him in his kitchen, asks him what he's doing there and he says he was gonna make a sandwich.
About the music, let me say this: the saxophone is a proud instrument. In jazz and funk it can steal the show. John Coltrane used it to channel the planets and the love supreme. Maceo Parker made it funkier than a fat man's ass on a hot day on the bus. But in rock music and especially in action movie it is rarely dignified. This includes HARD BOILED. That may be one of the greatest action movies of all time, and playing the soprano saxophone may fulfill Tequila's need for pre-babyholding badass juxtaposition, but that David Sanborn/Kenny G smooth jazz sound doesn't cut it in my opinion. THE CRACKDOWN uses that type of saxophone sometimes, dating the movie. But I forgive it. In a strange way it's kind of comforting, reminding you of a time when even a lesser action movie, a part 4, could be pretty good.
I know THE CRACKDOWN is not one of the more popular entries in the series, but I like it. I think they were smart to have Kersey's strategy finally progress. Going after the heads of the gangs seems more likely to have an effect than going after street punks (although to be fair Bronson and Michael Winner had already shown this tactic as ineffective 15 years earlier in THE STONE KILLER). It also has a fun thriller structure (even if the twist is pretty easy to see coming) and lots of enjoyable action scenes. Keep it up, Kersey.
DEATH WISH V: THE FACE OF DEATH
This one finishes off the series, it's a goodbye to Paul Kersey and to Charles Bronson for those who aren't gonna watch the three FAMILY OF COPS movies (the only thing he made after this). I've read that Bronson had Alzheimer's, but he seems completely with it and in good shape.
The year is 1994, Paul has another girlfriend with another daughter. Like part 4 they don't get mugged or raped, but like all DEATH WISH movies they're in serious danger. This time Paul runs afoul of the Irish mafia, specifically his girlfriend's crazy ex-husband Tommy O'Shea (Michael Parks, aka Sherriff Earl McGraw from FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, KILL BILL and both GRINDHOUSE movies). We find out Paul is in witness protection now, not on the run, and he calls an old friend at the D.A.'s office (Saul Rubinek) to help him with O'Shea. But of course that makes things worse, so Paul finds himself sneaking around picking off mobsters. It occurs to me that makes it kind of like a slasher movie where you root for the slasher. Oh well.
This installment's strength is its colorful characters. Parks is a great villain, very eccentric, making odd faces, mumbling to himself, sinisterly amused by some joke even his own men aren't in on. And he kills a mannequin, for which he will suffer dearly.
The other most memorable character is Robert Joy (the guy with the burned face in LAND OF THE DEAD) as Freddy Flakes, a schizophrenic hitman who is introduced in drag, is obsessed with security, and suffers from severe dandruff. (Seriously, they make a huge deal about his dandruff.) Paul goes after him with a radio control soccer ball. So we are pretty far away from the tone of part 1 at this point.
The soccer ball scene is great, but my favorite is when Kersey poisons a mobster's connoli in a restaraunt. As the guy is violently choking to death Paul comes over with a big smile on his face and asks if something is wrong. His delight is hilarious.
This is a fun movie, but honestly it feels more like it should be a new Charles Bronson character than another Paul Kersey adventure. The other sequels have more purpose in the overall series. Part 2 is a rehash, a first attempt at continuing the story. Part 3 takes that story to its logical conclusion, showing how ridiculous it is. Part 4 ups the ante, shows him graduating from petty street thugs to higher level criminals behind the conditions that make those guys proliferate. But this one doesn't progress at all. It's mobsters again but with a more personal connection again.
I might be alone on this one, but I enjoyed this entire series. I'm not sure if there's another series with 5 movies and I enjoyed all 5 in their own way. This is a miracle of exploitation filmmaking.
And looking back over these 5 movies - god damn, poor Paul Kersey. His wife was killed, his daughter raped into catatonia. Then his housekeeper was raped and killed, his daughter kidnapped and raped and impaled in an escape/suicide. His war buddy was murdered, his neighbors killed trying to do something about it, his new girlfriend blown up. His next girlfriend's daughter O.D.'d, then she herself was shot to death. Then the girlfriend after that had her face slashed and fell to her death. I mean, this guy should stop talking to other people. Too dangerous. In a way this is a happy ending to the series, because the daughter is still alive at the end. We never have to find out what horrible thing happened to her.
The climax takes place at the dead girlfriend's clothes factory, which hopefully was shut down by OSHA afterwards. They have an open pool of acid, a machine that can grind a man into meat, a machine that plastic wraps a guy. I mean it's just not safe.
At the end Kersey struts away and, his back turned to the camera, says to contact him if you need any help, then it freezes. He looks so confident and so content. Nobody to avenge (except Jeff Goldblum and the other creeps from part 1). This is a good way to remember Kersey and Bronson. He's inside a factory, but he's pretty much riding off into the sunset. And you know what Paul? I'll take you up on that. I will contact you if I need any help.
This review should be for all the Superhero movies this summer, but alas I have not seen all of them. I have not seen Hancock or Iron Man yet. Hellboy 2, Hulk 2, and The Dark Knight I have seen. So this will be a mash up of sorts. Given that all three of these films are the second chapter in their respective series let's begin with the giant elephant in the room, Chris Nolan's The Dark Knight. Being a HUGE DC Comics fan and an even bigger fan of Batman Begins I had high expectations for this, and man was I happy. I think the thing that I like best going in was that this film felt like a natural continuation of the first film. The themes setup in Begins pay off nicely in Knight. If you edited the two films together you wouldn't know the difference. Much like Superman: The Movie and Superman II.
This time Batman is fighting the Joker played by the late Heath Ledger. Ledger is spot on as the Joker, although this is a variation on the character. A lot of people have said this is just like the comic. No it's not. Stop with that. The Joker in the comics is much more maniacal at times than Ledger. In fact I thought Ledger could have dug even deeper, but then we are not talking about a summer PG-13 movie anymore are we? Nolan pushes the rating as far as it can go here. This Joker is something Batman has created. He is the afterbirth of Batman Begins. he is the Yin to the Yang. In other words they cannot exist without each other, and would serve no purpose other than to balance the other out. That is what this movie is all about. You can't be a Cowboy if there are no Indians. In this film Batman has to deal with not only his own split identity issues from Begins, but all the loons lining up to take a shot at taking the Sheriff out. Yummy Batman stuff! Writer/Director Nolan gets it, that's why it works.
The other characters also play a big part of the story. The Harvey Dent/Two-Face character has never been my favorite character in the Batman world, but here he works pretty well. Aaron Eckhart's Harvey Dent represents what Batman would be if Batman was legal and political. But as we all know with Politics, compromises must be made to get things done, and in the Dark Knight we are told that playing by the rules may seem cool, it rarely and unfortunately does not work in a city as dirty and insane as Gotham. As Dent is transformed into Two Face, he becomes a fusion of the Joker and Batman, which as we all know would drive one insane. Which if looked at carefully represents a horrific view of our political system in action these days.
Now these are all things I took away from the film, you may disagree, but I felt the drama, action, and subtext made for wonderfully rich and multi-layered film. This is a great film that is now the number two money making film of all time. In all my life I never thought i would see a comic book movie make this much bank. Ah these are good times indeed if you grew up reading comics and dreaming of seeing them on a big screen.
HELLBOY II: THE GOLDEN ARMY
Next up is Hellboy Dos: The Golden Army. the first Hellboy was a guilty pleasure for me. It has gotten better on each viewing for me. And Del Toro is on of the few amazing artists working in film today. I was much hyped for H2. And I have to say as much as I enjoyed it I thought it was too much in the final analysis. The film starts off on rather awkward note of a pre-teen Hellboy learning of the Golden Army with his father played by John Hurt again from Part 1. Eventually the Army is unleashed and Hellboy and his Superhero sidekicks must fend off the Army from taking over the world.
I love the character and his relationship with Liz the flame woman, and I LOVE Abe Sapian. He is by far the best thing about Hellboy for me. This time they get a German guy in suit who is actually all gas. He is a great and welcome addition. These are all great and fun as hell but where the movie started to where me down was that every single character in this movie is a monster of some sort and I mean everyone but Jeffery Tambor. It's monster overkill! There is the Star Wars cantina city like Mos Eisly that is full of monsters. But every plot point leads them to a new monster that tries to be more over the top crazy than the last. And it's cool shit don't get me wrong, but they all look like they came out of the casting all for his last film Pan's Labryinth. That film had a great blend of human/monster. This is all monster.
Ron Pearlman does another great job as the big red kid. and the ending fight between him and the kung-fu fighting albino guy is breathtaking. I'm looking forward to part 3 but that might be a decade away with Del Toro making The Hobbit movies. Someday the baby will be awoken again.
THE INCREDIBLE HULK
The Incredible Hulk (aka Hulk 2) Going in I was thinking this was a complete reboot of the Hulk, but it actually is a coy sequel to Ang Lee's film without ripping it a new one. I really enjoyed Ang Lee's hulk, but like Superman returns I can understand why it pissed some people off. Most people criticize those films for too much talking and not enough smashing shit up. Well we have smashing now. Hulk smashes! This is the non-thinking man's Hulk movie, and I enjoyed it. It was really quite comforting to see how they left Bruce Banner where they left him in Hulk 1 and started from there, just replacing the actors by showing them in a recap of events from film 1. Kind of helped you ease into the new actors.
This time Banner is trying to cure himself while not being caught by Col. Ross, now played by William Hurt. (An odd casting choice but it works somehow) Hurt wants to find out what makes the jolly green giant tick and after obtaining some DNA from him he creates a super G.I. Joe played by Tim Roth in a great villain role. Roth sees the Hulk not as a job but as a challenge. He really relishes the opportunity to knock heads with this guy and once he OD's on Hulkroids and becomes the film's main baddie creature Abomination it is on for real. The fights are great. I mean yeah you can see it's still CGI effects, but they are fun and once you let that go, this film is pure comic book fun. Norton makes a great banner on par with Bill Bixby, who makes a great cameo in a really creative way as does Lou Ferringo. In fact, Lou's is really funny and well done.
On a side note I LOVE how Marvel is handling the way their movies are made. Iron Man has a cameo by Nick Fury, Iron Man has a cameo in Hulk and Captain America's shield makes an cameo in Iron Man. The plan is to merge all these heroes into one badass Avengers movie in 2012. That would be sweet!!!!!!! If only DC could do this...I would be in heaven.
So is this the greatest super hero summer of all time. It is. And I still have not seen Iron Man, and I can't explain why! Go see all of these films if you are a lover of comic book movies. You can't go wrong any of them.
I was in Beijing after the big Gold metal win by Shawn Johnston last night and actually ran into her at a local grocery store. She was nice enough to snap a pic with me before running off to her interview with Bob Costas. Congrats Shawn!
Friend and local fillmmaker, James M. Johnston just did a short documentary called, "A Conversation with Jerry Horton" for the West and Clear website. It's about a woman that might potentially lose her house to the eminent domain powers of Chesapeake Energy. Really cool piece from JMJ....
My friend and fellow filmmaker Jon Keeyes and co-star of "Seventy-8" Susanna Gibb are trying to get a film going called Angela's Body.
Caught between the death of her son and a new pregnancy, a dramatic and emotional story of mental illness unfolds as the mother, Angela Gray, spirals out of control through postpartum psychosis that results in depression, self-mutilation, attempted suicide and even graver tragedies.
They recently shot some footage and I edited that for them as a promotional trailer. They are hoping to raise the funds to make the film. So if you know of anyone who might want to front the bill let them know! Here is a LINK to the myspace page where you can get in contact with Jon or Susana. Here is the trailer...
