Goon.

Review #1693: Goon.

Cast: 

Seann William Scott (Doug "The Thug" Glatt), Liev Schreiber (Ross "The Boss" Rhea), Alison Pill (Eva), Jay Baruchel (Pat), Marc-André Grondin (Xavier Laflamme), Eugene Levy (Dr. Glatt), David Paetkau (Ira Glatt), Kim Coates (Coach Ronnie Hortense), Richard Clarkin (Gord Ogilvey), Jonathan Cherry (Marco "Belchie" Belchior), Ricky Mabe (John Stevenson), Georges Laraque (Huntington), Curt Keilback (Rod McCaudry), and Larry Woo (Park Kim) Directed by Michael Dowse.

Review: 

There is plenty to go around when it comes to hockey, the good and bad. Referees, dubious team management, the feasibility of a sport that can be wracked with head injuries, and the innate ability of bad timing within television broadcasting. But, I imagine there is something interesting to say about the role of the goon, an enforcer that is tasked with responding to violent play in kind. On the one hand, one doesn't really want to see their guy get decked out and potentially suffer short-term injuries or even worse in the future. On the other hand, the violence is what one can dig when it comes to seeing goons take one out on each other for the good of their team. There are plenty of examples to list, such as Slap Shot (1977) with the Hanson Brothers (played by real-life hockey players Jeff Carlson, Steve Carlson and Dave Hanson). Of course, there is also the case of enforcer John Scott, a beneficiary of voting for the NHL All-Star Game (via fan online voting, which as a fan I deem embarrassing for all leagues despite doing it anyway, mostly for baseball), or infamous enforcers like Marty McSorley and Todd Bertuzzi, but the real life inspiration for this film comes from the exploits of Doug "The Hammer" Smith, who co-wrote Goon: The True Story of an Unlikely Journey into Minor League Hockey with Adam Frattasio. Smith played for seven teams over the course of six seasons after being encouraged by Frattasio to try enforcing after boxing with the Golden Gloves; Jay Baruchel and Evan Goldberg (who you might recognize as the co-writer of films such as Superbad (2007) with Seth Rogen) wrote the screenplay for the film, one mostly shot in the province of Manitoba, and it seems appropriate to have a Canadian at the helm for director with Michael Dowse, directing his fifth feature (his most notable feature was likely his first with FUBAR (2002), a cult hit shot in digital).

So, here we are with a hockey movie for folks who want a few raunchy chuckles while seeing quite a few fights and blood to spare from the ol' hockey game. Strangely enough, this was not actually a hit with audiences upon initial release (making just barely half of its $12 million budget), but it became a bit of a hit with video releases that ended up with a sequel being greenlit in Goon: Last of the Enforcers (2017). There is probably a small comparison to be made to films like Slap Shot or Superbad (2007). I guess this can be a compliment, despite the fact that what we have here is a warmly crude average movie. It is probably the strangest example of a movie that is so earnest in its attempts at balancing heart and grimey charm. When it comes to "Canadian nice", I'd say this is a pretty good example of it, at least for a movie featuring a guy who finds his calling in beating folks up on the ice rink. Look, I care about what I see here, but I don't feel that I care enough beyond just saying it is okay - I think it is the cult hit effect, where if one hears about the notices, the expectations sometimes just won't meet the (loose) reality. The best things about the movie are Scott and Schreiber, really, and that generally will result in a good thing if one is up for it (because the journey is what matters most), and I guess it is interesting enough as a sports movie to go with some chuckles for a mild 92 minute movie. Scott plays the lead role with earnest curiosity that rolls with a film parading clichés as one might expect without being swept into staleness, friendly to what goes on around him. Schreiber provides a useful contrast within the theatrical ice-hitman in careful brooding interest amidst the fights. Pill serves fine with her offbeat chemistry when paired with Scott, which works alright for small moments off the ice. Baruchel gets to play the loudmouth, which might prove familiar for those who follow a sport intently (in theory). Grondin eventually ekes a few interesting moments, although really it is Coates as the blathering coach that generates the most interest (again though, sometimes the cliché roles work the best). As a whole, the hockey action is fine, the comedy and the atmosphere prove fine, the fighting is relatively reliable, and yet here I am wondering why I didn't really think of it as anything pretty good. It is as inevitable as when one watches Slap Shot, but somehow there is something more involving in that film that I can't quite quantify. Maybe it is the sensibility of the filmmaker (George Roy Gill vs Dowse), or maybe it is something more, but when it comes to hockey movies, there are a few good ones one can sport out and consider for fun. In that regard, Goon makes for a useful experience to sit around with, hearty enough in sticking its love letter to a hockey goon fit for the Canadian flavor.

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.

Ah yes, the Stanley Cup is upon us once again. Tampa Bay, Montreal. Easy choice: Go Habs.

U.S. Marshals.

Review #1692: U.S. Marshals.

Cast: 

Tommy Lee Jones (Sam Gerard), Wesley Snipes (Mark J. Sheridan / Mark Roberts / Mark Warren), Robert Downey Jr (John Royce), Joe Pantoliano (Cosmo Renfro), Daniel Roebuck (Bobby Biggs), Tom Wood (Noah Newman), LaTanya Richardson (Savannah Cooper), Irène Jacob (Marie Bineaux), Kate Nelligan (Catherine Walsh), Patrick Malahide (Bertram Lamb), Rick Snyder (Frank Barrows), and Michael Paul Chan (Xiang Chen) Directed by Stuart Baird.

Review:

Do you remember The Fugitive? A long time ago, I was first introduced to it by the 1993 film, one of a string of adaptations of familiar television shows that have been quite prevalent over the past few decades. The original series had ran for four seasons from 1963 to 1967 involving the chase of an escaped convict (an innocent victim of blind justice) that goes from place to place trying to clear his name while an lieutenant bound to enforce the law is keen on catching him. The show was created by Roy Huggins (whose previous successes included Maverick, which also saw a film adaptation in the mid 1990s) with Quinn Martin producing the show; supposedly the idea for the show was based on the real-life trial of Sam Sheppard, who was convicted but subsequently acquitted of the murder of his wife, although Huggins denied this (at any rate, Victor Hugo's 1862 novel Les Misérables is likely the most evident inspiration). Oh, and it happened to be one of the first notable series finales ever broadcast on television, but that's besides the point. The reason I mention all of this is to provide context for when a film adaptation of the show eventually came to pass, one that modified details within an attempt at making a thriller capped by one big stunt (with a train, what else?). It did its own interpretation of the main two characters that retained a good deal of the claustrophobic feel of the series that works in character-driven drama with plenty of shots of Chicago that seemed distinct and useful when compared to the anthology premises used by the show. It wasn't a perfect movie by any means (since it inadvertently captured the fuzzy resolution of trying to cap a thriller with shaky explanations that the show also had), but it certainly received enough notice from folks to stand well among its time, even after nearly three decades. One of the benefactors from that success was Tommy Lee Jones, who won an Academy Award for his performance in that film; if you remember correctly, Jones spent screen time either paired with an elusive Ford or paired with the folks on the hunt for him that ranged from Joe Pantoliano to Johnny Lee Davenport (i.e. a supporting cast of five), and most of that supporting cast returns here. As with this film, Huggins served as one of the executive producers, while John Pogue served as screenwriter.

Are you surprised that this movie came out five years after the success of The Fugitive? Or is the real surprise the fact that this "spinoff" was even created at all? Nay, the true surprise is how average the movie is, a movie that is blandly unnecessary yet never infuriating enough to stop watching (if only because of the folks involved). In other words, if you've seen one movie about a fugitive on the run, watch The Fugitive. You could replace Jones and his character with any kind of generic hero and probably not lose much when it comes to entertainment value (incidentally, Stuart Baird had served as the editor on a variety of action films that ranged from Lethal Weapon (1987) to Demolition Man (1993) before debuting as director with Executive Decision in 1996). The movie builds on the idea of "innocent man on the run" in trying to add a conspiracy aspect to it that results in a very muddled movie that takes quite a while to really do anything of circumstance, and we are talking about a 131 minute movie. When one starts talking about innocent fugitives who are also former CIA operatives after we see him nearly get taken down by zip guns hidden in a prison plane, the brain starts to check out. The performances are relatively fine, in that the main group of Marshals roll with the clichés without turning into complete cardboard (i.e. you don't groan at the banter). However, Snipes certainly suffers the most when it comes to having to deal with the muddled focus, contrasting oddly with Jones in the levels of interest despite having (on paper) more to work with in terms of people to bounce off than Ford had to do in the first film (i.e. Jacob, although she is merely just okay here), and yet it still feels a bit hollow. I like Jones just fine for this film, but he clearly had better material to work with before, in that there isn't anything that really stands to interest a newcomer or one familiar with the first one. Of course, if one likes seeing Jones or Snipes as actors, one could be fine with what they see anyway, since bad movies with a favorite actor can theoretically still be interesting to view (for example, there are folks who probably can stomach Blade: Trinity for Snipes just as I remind myself of the amusement I share in thinking about Volcano (1997) with Jones in its monumental amusement factor). Downey has described this as one of his worst filming experiences, going so far as to call it "the worst action movie of all time", one that depressed him and made him rather be in prison than wake up on the set of it again. It likely doesn't help that he seems a bit miscast here, and we are talking about a movie that barely has that much energy to go with in the first place. Really though, a great deal of the movie could be summed up as "on paper", in that the idea of a film about folks pursuing people on the run could on paper be interesting, or maybe the idea of seeing where a guy like Gerald goes after having spent considerable time catching one innocent fugitive goes (on paper). Instead, one gets a mild movie that seems to have the odors of studio notes, where the demand to try and top the stunts that captured attention before go hand in hand with trying to wring originality out of familiar pulp. The swinging stunt onto a passing train is likely the most notable scene from the movie (the plane crash is a close second, but yeah), and if it is taken as just a movie for distraction without taking too much into its middling middle-ness, it might prove inoffensive enough to see once. As a whole, it is an unnecessary spinoff that doesn't equally doesn't do much to spin on what had been done years before while serving average in every other aspect that will either mean a movie one will pass on seeing or find to be a mild curiosity on a long boring night.

Overall, I give it 6 out of 10 stars.

Surf's Up.

Review #1691: Surf's Up.

Cast: 

Shia LaBeouf (Cody Maverick), Jeff Bridges (Zeke "Big Z/Geek" Topanga), Zooey Deschanel (Lani Aliikai), Jon Heder (Chicken Joe), Mario Cantone (Mikey Abromowitz), James Woods (Reggie Belafonte), Diedrich Bader (Tank "The Shredder" Evans), Dana Belben (Edna Maverick), Brian Posehn (Glen Maverick), with Kelly Slater and Rob Machado (themselves) Directed by Ash Brannon and Chris Buck (#579 - Frozen)

Review: 

Truthfully, I don't know anything about surfing. I have spent more combined time at a water park than at the beach, and I say this as someone who barely travels to begin with, but I imagine that there is quite the interesting time one could have spending a summer with waves and time to ride (If I had viewed something like The Endless Summer (1966), the originator of the travelling surf craze, I probably would have said the exact same thing). Naturally, we have a surf movie involving penguins. Welp, there were quite a few penguin-themed movies to come out in such a short span with each other, whether as a nature-documentary in March of the Penguins (2005) or with Happy Feet (2006, which started development after this one had started). The last one is interesting to note, because that film and this one include motion capture within its animation; Surf's Up has a look of a hand-held documentary because of motion capture that was done of the movement of a camera operator, and it is probably interesting to note that the voices of the "film crew" chronicling said adventures are of the two directors in Ash Brannon and Chris Buck. Each had studied in character animation at California Institute of the Arts (Buck, eleven years older, was first), and both eventually did teaching there (Brannon was Buck's student for a time). Buck worked for Disney in the animation department on a few films (ranging from animator to character design to supervisor) before he directed his first film with Tarzan (1999). Brannon did work for both Disney and Pixar, which included serving as a co-director with Toy Story 2 (1999). At any rate, this is the second feature to come from Sony Pictures Animation, which had announced this film as being in development when the studio was established in 2002.

The screenplay was written by Don Rhymer, Ash Brannon, Chris Buck, and Chris Jenkins, while the story was written by Jenkins and Christian Darren. Look at it this way: at least the cast was recorded together, so this isn't just a brand movie with talking animals that reeks of complete corporate product. The film wasn't quite a great success with audiences, but one can only imagine how when you make a film for $100 million, although a direct-to-video sequel would be made with Surf's Up 2: WaveMania (guess what that is about) a decade later. The attempts at a laidback atmosphere within a "camera crew" really can't sustain itself fully for an 85 minute movie, but it proves to be an okay movie when it comes to casual amusement in doing the fundamentals in engaging the audience without ringing their heads with anything obnoxious or any blatant clichés. In other words, it may be by-the-numbers, but it does these things just fine for a movie with surfing penguins (if you can watch one where they sing, surfing isn't too off). LaBeouf proves worthy in making a readily generic lead story come around with a little bit of charm, talking to the audience with enough reach that we don't keep our eyes on something else (namely some nice looking waves) for too long. Truthfully, the most casually interesting presence is probably Bridges, abiding with calm composition that only comes from an offbeat mentor. Deschanel comes and goes in attempts at zippy charm to act with LaBeouf, which doesn't really go very far, really. Heder, apparently picked when the producers saw him in Napoleon Dynamite (I'll take a rain check on that), strolls along with a hint of amusement when it comes to trying to be more casual than the film, which I guess proves okay for brief moments. Woods gets to have his best impression of "speaking to the manager" for moments that I chuckle at pretty well. Bader gets to channel some insecure bravado for a few interesting moments to chuckle at, which I find just fine to cap a movie with some resemblance of enjoyment when it comes to learning "lessons" about enjoying the wave and the folks around oneself. Yes, it's a movie about surfing and penguins, and it is exactly as average as you could expect, which means that at least it didn't have a chance to be a complete grab in cynicism, which I guess means that this could prove a decent time for a night in the summer.

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.

Footloose.

Review #1690: Footloose.

Cast: 

Kevin Bacon (Ren McCormack), Lori Singer (Ariel Moore), Dianne Wiest (Vi Moore), John Lithgow (Rev. Shaw Moore), Chris Penn (Willard Hewitt), Sarah Jessica Parker (Rusty), John Laughlin (Woody), Elizabeth Gorcey (Wendy Jo), Frances Lee McCain (Ethel McCormack), Jim Youngs (Chuck Cranston), and Timothy Scott (Andy Beamis) Directed by Herbert Ross (#244 - The Sunshine Boys and #1455 - The Goodbye Girl)

Review: 

It it hard to say a movie is inevitable. And yet, this is one of the most obvious movies that one will ever glare at in their lives, not so much because it is memorably great or terrible, but because one just has the feeling that they will watch it at some point in time. This is a long and dull way of saying I knew I would have to do this movie because I once had to practice dancing to the title song of this movie for a sweet sixteen birthday party...nine years ago. Trust me, time has not withered the memory of having to hear that Kenny Loggins song over and over again, and I say this as someone who digs the singer, even for a movie that is inferior to other movies with Loggins doing the lead song (well, there is Caddyshack II, but pretend that doesn't exist). You may be interested to know that the film was written by Dean Pitchford, who had won an Academy Award for his song-writing with the title song to Fame (1980). He had been inspired by a news story he had heard in 1979 that involved Elmore City, Oklahoma, a town that had just eliminated a ban on dancing that lasted 80 years. He would ultimately co-write ten of the thirteen songs present in the soundtrack, which included singers such as Loggins, Bonnie Tyler, and Sammy Hager. Strangely, the first director in mind to direct this movie was Michael Cimino (fresh off the production fiasco of Heaven's Gate (1980), if you remember). No, seriously, he was hired in 1983 before filming was to start. This occurred due to stalled negotiations with Herbert Ross (a director familiar with dance since he had done choreography on films and Broadway before taking on directing in 1969), but the demands that Cimino would put on pre-production ended up in his dismissal. Specifically, he wanted $250,000 for the script to be re-written in order to make it darker (as quoted by a producer, who stated that they wanted to make entertainment, and it probably doesn't help to go over a budget when you have just $7.5 million to spend). I will admit that while The Deer Hunter (1978) wasn't exactly a great favorite of mine, I would certainly have been interested to see just what Cimino would have done with his type of polish involved instead of what we received instead.

So yeah, I guess this is a movie for the teens. At least I think so, if one wants to have a movie filled with a grab-bag of 80s songs like a music video (the jury's out on pairing Bonnie Tyler's "Holding Out for a Hero" with a game of chicken with tractors), or maybe it's supposed to be a teen drama, filled with oddballs that have to deal with the terrible task of no dancing or rock music in a small town with a gymnast for a lead character. Or maybe it is the classic teenage hokum movie (small town folks, let me know if you've ever seen a truck with deer antlers on it). Teenagers doing bits of gymnastics in a warehouse? Sure, go ahead, and add a secret place full of graffiti of forbidden words put there by kids that even includes a daredevil who likes pulling dumb stunts like standing on the train tracks with a train ahead (that opening stunt is a crock, because I actually thought that would be the impetus for the whole "dancing/rock music leads to debauchery and maybe death", just look at that car...nah, it just gets told to us later). By the time folks start to think about burning books, my eyes were already on their fifth cycle of rolling (how the focus goes from rejecting an offer to do a prom to books in the library are harming the children is up to you). At least the parents don't start to use the mountains in the background (filmed in Utah, where else?) for watchtowers. Technically speaking, there is an interesting drama that is just begging to play itself out (albeit one with maybe four or five actors present, not the handful here), but even Saturday Night Fever (1977) manages to dance circles around this movie, and the weirdest thing is that both movies have pretty good performances from the lead actor. Clearly the movie has made an interesting fit for some folks when it comes to its era and mood, but it just didn't click with me. I never really found much to care about in its attempts at balancing music and its plot, because it all reaches with the depth of a marshmallow, equating to a book report about why folks should be allowed to express themselves (in other words, Saturday Night Fever wasn't merely a disco movie, and Footloose isn't merely anything). Bacon (whose first prominent film role was with Diner two years prior alongside a handful of stage work) is the best presence in the movie, mostly because he handles everything with composed charisma. In a movie where he has to play the fish-out-of-water from Chicago that deals with odd yokels and friends with dance, he makes sure to play it on key, because he sells what needs to happen on his end with no trouble because of his energy. Singer fares less than great, probably because the whole daredevil attitude is probably the most interesting thing about her character, and we are talking about someone who gets to share time with Bacon and Lithgow, which means one gets to be overshadowed twice. Wiest has a few moments to share with Lithgow that compliments the adult perspective of trying to deal with a growing adolescent. Lithgow is the other side of the interesting coin, devout in his composure that acts like a parent of a community, which naturally has to shift in layers for 110 minutes (albeit not a complete 180), which works okay. Penn plays a sturdy folksy relief character (one who can't dance, but come on, that hasn't stopped dummies like me from trying) - he soon would become better known with comic / tough roles, and this is a moderately curious early role for him. This was the second film role for Parker (familiar with theater and television from a young age); those brief moments on screen are enough for a positive sentence, for what it is worth. As a whole, Footloose is cheese that has the kind of polish that can satisfy those who find its sweet spot to their liking, whether because of the music, the charm of its lead (or Lithgow), one that has a little bit of what counts in expressing oneself that might just prove enough in entertainment. I can't endorse it, but I also can't stop one from having the curiosity to seek what all the fuss is about.

Overall, I give it 6 out of 10 stars.

W.W. and the Dixie Dancekings.

Review #1689: W.W. and the Dixie Dancekings.

Cast: 

Burt Reynolds (W.W. Bright), Conny Van Dyke (Dixie), Jerry Reed (Wayne), Ned Beatty (Country Bull Jenkins), James Hampton (Junior), Don Williams (Leroy), Rick Hurst (Butterball), Mel Tillis (GOB), Furry Lewis (Uncle Furry), and Art Carney (Deacon John Wesley Gore) Directed by John G. Avildsen (#003 - Rocky and #895 - Rocky V)

Review: 

"...turned out wrong but it made a lot of money. It was supposed to be a special, warm and lovely little film. It was important that we not make fun of the people in Nashville as opposed to Nashville (1975). It wasn't that kind of movie. It was a bouquet to Nashville. But I got into a lot of fights with the director." - Burt Reynolds.

"The thing that the film taught me was that I could do something that I had no passion for, that my mechanics were such that I could make it work. There's some satisfaction to that." - John G. Avildsen

There aren't that many films out there where you could describe it as a stepping stone for better films for both its main star and director. Dick Richards was initially thought of in mind for director in 1972, but this did not come to pass (Reynolds would work with him fourteen years later with Heat), but a new director soon came about. This was the ninth feature film for John G. Avildsen, who had specialized in making low-budget movies with plenty of preparation involved that worked with production companies that ranged from the Cannon Group to Troma Entertainment, and it is Joe (1970) that stood out among his early work. The film that rocketed him all the way, however, was the film that followed this movie the next year, which was also a low-budget affair (starring an actor who auditioned for this film) that miraculously became one of the most iconic sports movies ever made in Rocky (1976). As for Reynolds...well, I am stretching this a bit, because he already was a star with stuff such as Deliverance (1972), White Lightning (1973), and The Longest Yard (1974) after a sea of low-budget affairs in television and film. But if one saw this film and Smokey and the Bandit (1977) back-to-back, one might get the impression one was a stepping stone for the other (incidentally, the director for that film in Hal Needham was the stunt coordinator for this feature). Granted, the focus is a smooth-talking conman who likes to specialize in robbing a specific gas station brand (while giving some of the loot to the poor sucker who finds themselves looking at his weapon) but finds himself in need of a good alibi that finds one with a travelling country music band while driving a (modified) Oldsmobile Rocket 88...really the one thing that seems more noticeable between the lovable showoffs in each film is a more interesting presence for both the feminine lead and the authority foil (of course there is also more of Jerry Reed in one of them, so there's also that). As one would like to note, Avildsen and Reynolds (who helped pick the director because of a good word from Jack Lemmon, who won an Academy Award with Avildsen's previous film, Save the Tiger) did not get along with each other during production, as Reynolds described him later as a "picky, arrogant little man", while Avildsen called the movie "one of the most unhappy experiences of my movie career", bemoaning that he did not have the knack of getting what he wanted and satisfying Reynolds; Avildsen was concerned about getting work done in carefully rehearsed details but Reynolds liked to have fun with his entourage of good ol' boys while favoring a loose style of filmmaking (i.e. not a complicated storyboard of sketched out scenes, as argued by Reynolds in his autobiography). The result is a curious venture of comedy that might be thought of as a loose mixed bag, but at least both seemed to have found something to like the film.

Apparently the script by Thomas Rickman would be tinkered extensively for production. He displayed his disgust by asking to write the novelization for the film (one might joke, but I remember reading a novelization of Fantastic Four as a kid), and the only reason one might even know this is because Quentin Tarantino was inspired by what he saw in the novel as compared to the film (which "literally offended" him) to start writing his own screenplays. Welp, differences can always be apparent when it comes to taste, because I found this to be a pretty decent movie. It isn't a great one for either its star or director, but being a stepping stone for better pastures is not a terrible thing when one has enough fun seeing it all play out. It's a silly light movie, filled with bits of Nashville in the singing department with a decent execution of comedy that is buoyed mostly because of the presence of Reynolds (who had a share of hits and misses with films that relied mostly on him, as evidenced by films like the Bandit series). He has the easygoing charm one could see on the stuff that made him a household name (whether that was films or the talk show circuit), which helps a bit that starts with the casual robberies that take hold from time to time. Van Dyke is okay, but she seems more interesting within the music group than with any small attempts at chemistry with Reynolds. The film features the acting debut of Jerry Reed, an Atlanta native that reportedly aspired to be a star in Nashville as a child, and the end result was a lengthy career in country music and it only makes sense to see a country star dabble into the world of acting; Reed would appear in a handful of films with his friend Reynolds (who he directed the following year with Gator). Reynolds may have all the elusive charm, but Reed helps to compliment him the best in actual chemistry, even when they have a brief fight scene. Others who were involved in music included Van Dyke alongside Williams, Lewis and Tillis, although Hampton probably sticks out a bit among the music players in the peanut gallery. Beatty was in his sixth film role (he also starred in Nashville the same year as this film), and one gets to see him for about two to three scenes, but I appreciate his candor when it comes to playing the trick between a legendary singer and the image besides the singing, and it is easy to see why Beatty had such an interesting career in character acting. And then of course there is Carney, making small appearances as the devout authority foil...honestly, he either should have had more time with Reynolds or should have just been cut from the film, because his stone-faced attempts at...something are very okay at best (while I have been all about stepping stones in this review, this was actually the first film role for Carney after winning an Academy Award for Harry and Tonto).

As a whole, what we have is a film befuddled in someway by what it wants to tell in a tale of adventure and romance that likely needed a bit more spark when it comes to being more than a Southern road movie. If one has a liking for Reynolds or the other good ol' folks, however, you will find yourself just fine with what happens here, even if it isn't exactly remembered as one of the best for either Avildsen or Reynolds. It's an average affair with a few chuckles and a little bit of light action that works in some way for whomever happens to encounter it.

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.

Alien vs. Predator.

Review #1688: Alien vs. Predator.

Cast: 

Sanaa Lathan (Alexa "Lex" Woods), Raoul Bova (Professor Sebastian De Rosa), Lance Henriksen (Charles Bishop Weyland), Ewen Bremner (Dr. Graeme Miller), Colin Salmon (Maxwell Stafford), Tommy Flanagan (Mark Verheiden), Carsten Norgaard (Rusten Quinn), Joseph Rye (Joe Connors), Agathe de La Boulaye (Adele Rousseau), Sam Troughton (Thomas Parks), Petr Jákl (Stone), Liz May Brice (The Supervisor), Karima Adebibe (Sacrificial Maiden), with Tom Woodruff Jr (The Alien / "Grid") and Ian Whyte (The Predator / "Scar") Directed by Paul W. S. Anderson (#1670 - Mortal Kombat)

Review: 

Well, we have now moved into the next phase for two separate film franchises, and it's interesting to consider how it affected the quality of each over the prevailing next few years. Alien (1979), if you recall, was a series of four films that had four distinct visions of people being terrorized in space (each starring Sigourney Weaver), whether involving a gradual build in terror like the first film, or a segue into action-horror with the sequel, or whatever the idea was supposed to be for the third and fourth movies. Predator (1987) is a different story (written by Jim and John Thomas). The first one was pure sci-fi action, one carried by Arnold Schwarzenegger and other folks generating bravado for a well-done experience. I honestly can't really remember the second film, which either might mean it is due for a re-consideration, or it just means that it was forgettable enough to have killed further attempts more sequels about the predator and its hunt. Both franchises would also see follow-ups come in the years that followed this (Alien went to the past while Predator had two films released eight years apart that had soldiers banding together to take down modified predators). To be technical, the inspiration for doing a crossover came first within comic books, because a series was done that crossed the two franchises that was released in 1989 by Dark Horse Comics; further stories would be released by the company over the next two decades that also involved video games (of course there was also a tease in the aforementioned Predator 2). Got all that? Good, because you get a crossover between the two franchises with people that are seemingly designed to just get gobbled up for fodder while involving temples hidden in Antarctica. Anderson was responsible for the screenplay while co-writing the story with Ronald Shusett and Dan O'Bannon (writers of the story for Alien). 

Maybe the only ringing endorsement of the film that means anything is from James Cameron, who described it as the third best film of the Alien movies. Of course he initially thought the idea was akin to Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (which irked him enough to where he had stopped trying to do a script for a potential fifth film), so take that for what it is worth. Besides, Alien: Resurrection (1997) might actually be more interesting, comprised of goofy narrative decisions to go with hyper-extended acting/acting choices. There are two reasons to probably see the movie: seeing the fight sequences to override a thin plot, and Henriksen show up for nearly an hour. Of course I am talking about the unrated version when it comes to said violence, because why would you watch the original (PG-13 rated) version? The original lasted 101 minutes, while this version has an increased runtime of eight minutes, which adds little moments of story (like an opening in 1904 Antarctica) alongside shots of CGI blood added in to certain shots. In that sense, the action sequences are fairly decent, since one is mostly looking at performers at work and not too much CGI wrangling that makes for useful grimy moments. Lathan does okay here, in that everyone around her is a wax figure waiting to be melted down, which is very okay for the obvious final leftover. Bremner and his instantly-doomed presence (uh huh, take photos before you get started with the mission) is probably the only other presence to note, because face it, you are sort of chuckling when it comes to dinner time for the creatures in the dreary pyramid. Henriksen is cut and dry in what is needed in a spot designed for a familiar presence, one that you know exactly where it is going to go but enjoy because it is a reliable actor involved.

The comparison to the aforementioned Frankenstein crossover is interesting, but perhaps a more apt comparison would be Freddy vs. Jason (2003), which also took a number of years to finally do a monster mash that involved character you couldn't remember if they wore name tags before being vanquished (of course that movie also fudged with basic qualities such as geography, so there's that). Man is this a bleary movie to watch. Making a movie that lives to the title really isn't a high bar to clear, but you have to be kidding with this, right? The aforementioned Predator movie may be a macho extravaganza, but one always has the feeling of excitement when it comes to the actual action that just never hits with this feature; conversely, there are no moments that reach the level of Aliens (1986) when it comes to ripping tension in action with the creatures, probably because there isn't a single moment of shock when it comes to building camaraderie between its characters before the terror hits (i.e. there isn't a Hicks parallel one is curious to see again). I guess it really depends on what one is desiring for a movie about predators that gave humans pyramids to build while doing a hunt every century to take down Xenomorphs with human hosts - and they have the perfect solution if they end up as losers. At least the idea to have a focus on a predator for longer than a few minutes is interesting, but the cynic in me thinks a film that just features predators and Xenomorphs without much dialogue might be a better experience (in that I would endorse it driving other folks nuts). Overall, it is a movie that rides hard on how much one really wants to see monsters fight with the bare minimum involved that obviously found a favoring with the audience it wanted to warrant a sequel with Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem three years later. So yeah, it is incredibly average, but it might be good to doze off too before the creatures wake you up. Oh well...

Overall, I give it 6 out of 10 stars.

O. Henry's Full House.

Review #1687: O. Henry's Full House.

Cast:

Charles Laughton (Soapy, segment "The Cop and the Anthem"), Dale Robertson (Barney Woods, segment "The Clarion Call"), Anne Baxter (Joanna Goodwin, segment "The Last Leaf"), Fred Allen (Samuel Brown, segment "The Ransom of Red Chief"), Jeanne Crain (Della Young, segment "The Gift of the Magi"), Marilyn Monroe (Streetwalker, segment "The Cop and the Anthem"), Richard Widmark (Johnny Kernan, segment "The Clarion Call"), Jean Peters (Susan Goodwin, segment "The Last Leaf"), Oscar Levant (William Smith, segment "The Ransom of Red Chief"), Farley Granger (Jim Young, segment "The Gift of the Magi"), David Wayne (Horace, segment "The Cop and the Anthem"), Richard Rober (Chief of Detectives, segment "The Clarion Call"), Gregory Ratoff (Behrman, segment "The Last Leaf"), Lee Aaker (J.B. Dorset, segment "The Ransom of Red Chief"), Richard Garrick (Doctor, segment "The Last Leaf"), Fred Kelsey (Mr. Schultz / Santa Claus, segment "The Gift of the Magi"), with John Steinbeck as narrator. Directed by Henry Koster (#1607 - Harvey), Henry Hathaway (#1314 - True Grit), Jean Negulesco (#1380 - Phone Call from a Stranger), Howard Hawks (#951 - The Big Sleep, #1352 - His Girl Friday, and #1399 - Rio Bravo), and Henry King.

Review: 

There have been a number of anthology movies to have come around the corner in film, whether in horror, a unified theme (such as a city like Tales of Manhattan (1942), released by 20th Century Fox), or in trying to bring short stories to the screen, and O. Henry's Full House is merely in the middle of a regular era for this kind of movie, with one early example being If I Had a Million (1932). Another example is Quartet (1948), which adapted four stories by the writer W. Somerset Maugham while having him appear from time to time to talk about them. The success of that film inspired two follow-up films in Trio (1950) and Encore (1951) and 20th Century Fox evidently wanted to play on that success with adapting short stories for one film, with O. Henry selected. Actually, they had wanted to do a film based on the writer in 1943, and a film of "The Gift of the Magi" in 1945 was thought of before fizzing out. The writer (born William Sydney Porter, who lived from 1862 to 1910) was a North Carolina native but found his success when he moved to New York (which he called "Bagdad-on-the-Subway") in 1902. He wrote over 300 stories, which generally were known for their wit and their clever endings; one of his most well-known stories was "The Caballero's Way" (1907), which was adapted by Fox for In Old Arizona (1928), and short films based on his works had been done as early as 1909. Left with needing someone to introduce the stories, Fox went to John Steinbeck (a Pulitzer Prize winner and future Nobel laureate in Literature), known for novels such as The Grapes of Wrath (1939), East of Eden (1952), and various other works - this was the first and only film appearance for Steinbeck. 

So let us recap the stories one by one in the order shown (oddly enough, bad screenings involving the Hawks-directed story led to it being removed before it was formally released), which runs at 117 minutes. The first is "The Cop and the Anthem", which was written by Lamar Trotti with direction by Henry Koster. It involves an eccentric on the streets that has plans to spend the cold winter in jail. Laughton is right at home with a role that requires a bit of quizzical timing and an astute sense of self that he plays right to what is needed for those twenty-ish minutes. Monroe is technically in the film as a star, in that she is there for a minute to exchange with Laughton (since the character believes that harassment will help his jail case), which goes fine, while Wayne tags along at times. Technically this is the story with the clearest ending seen coming (well, there is Magi, but come on), but it is a solid A-/B+ kind of story to get it all going. "The Clarion Call" was written by Richard L. Breen while directed by Henry Hathaway, involving a detective in debt to a friend-turned-murderer. It reunites Hathaway and Widmark, who worked on Kiss of Death (1947) to a tremendous debut for the latter actor; he essentially is reprising his role from that film for this one, which was reportedly inspired by the character of The Joker from the Batman comics. Strangely enough, Widmark's performance would influence Frank Gorshin when it came time to play The Riddler in Batman (1966-1968), which seems evident with the laugh uttered by Widmark when we first hear him. He seems to overshadow Robertson, who makes for a decent detective when it comes to wrapping away his guilt in a small cat-and-mouse game with the dangerously playful Widmark. Overall, it is a fairly solid B kind of segment.

"The Last Leaf" was written by Ivan Goff and Ben Robers and directed by Jean Negulseco. Here, we have a story about a lady who believes she will die when the last leaf falls off a tree near her bed. Honestly, the highlight is probably Ratoff, who was actually both an actor and director in his time, and he plays the eccentric artist with fair gusto to counter the dour stuff needed by Baxter and Peters. I think the twist here works better than the ones done in the last two, but a B+ grade seems fairly warranted here in its useful pacing. "The Ransom of Red Chief" was written by Ben Hecht, Nunnally Johnson and Charles Lederer while directed by Howard Hawks (Johnson wanted his name off the script, which was re-written by Hecht and Lederer at the request of Hawks because it was originally written by Johnson with Clifton Webb and William Demarest in mind for stars). To be honest, I fail to see exactly why this was thought of as the clunker among the five, because it is quite amusing, featuring two radio mainstays with Allan and Levant, who play bumbling kidnappers of a snotty kid. It's a chuckler that one will be quite familiar with, because I'm sure most of us have seen/experienced taking care of someone who enjoys taking things into their own hands, whether with a bear or other means, which ultimately means a B- grade. "The Gift of the Magi" was written by Walter Bullock while directed by Henry King. It is likely the most famous of the five stories, and it is probably washed in sentimentality as the aforementioned Leaf story ripe for the spirit of Christmas. You've probably read this story at least once (probably in high school), and it ultimately is a decent if not completely heartwarming tale that we all see coming. Crain and Granger are a decent pair to go along with what is needed in balancing selfless nature without falling into the trap of pap. It is a solid B episode, not exactly the weakest story, and it closes the film out just fine in encapsulating the feel of what the movie yearns to show in generating interesting characters to go with plots that go with useful turns that make for a fairly solid anthology film on the whole. It serves as an interesting piece in depicting an author's work onto film, efficient in what needs to be shown for any viewer curious enough for it.

Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.

Pump Up the Volume.

Review #1686: Pump Up the Volume.

Cast: 

Christian Slater (Mark Hunter), Samantha Mathis (Nora Diniro), Mimi Kennedy (Marla Hunter), Scott Paulin (Brian Hunter), Cheryl Pollak (Paige Woodward), Annie Ross (Principal Loretta Creswood), Ahmet Zappa (Jaime), Billy Morrissette (Mazz Mazzilli), Seth Green (Joey), Robert Schenkkan (David Deaver), Ellen Greene (Jan Emerson), Andy Romano (Mr. Murdock), Anthony Lucero (Malcolm Kaiser), Lala Sloatman (Janie), and James Hampton (Arthur Watts) Written and Directed by Allan Moyle.

Review: 

“[Pump Up the Volume] is my favorite movie I’ve ever done. … It wasn’t a typical high school movie, and it really did get into some of the darker, more gruesome details of what it’s actually like to be a teenager in high school.” - Christian Slater

“I don’t know how to make a good movie, but I know how to make a bad movie, and that’s try to appeal to everybody.” — Allan Moyle

There are quite a few things one can be hard-pressed to admit when it comes to looking back on films like this from the era of the 1990s. Movies involving teenagers and angst or life seemed to take on a new phase that were different from ones made by John Hughes, even if there were a few outliers like Heathers (1988), which featured Christian Slater. Of course, the hard-pressed truth is that film is actually quite inferior in its teenage angst angle than this film, which actually manages to do better in every aspect from characterization (and actually sticking to it!) to music to gracing the ending (each move to the logical point one might see coming, but it seems more right with this). I kid you not, each film also would inspire a musical production. Each failed at the box office, but Heathers has had the cult following befitting an exploitation movie (at least the one it may or may not have ripped off) while Pump Up the Volume isn't even readily available on many release outlets (owing to music licensing). So be it. Besides, this film has the real angle of aiming for a message about free speech alongside its angle about finding one's voice as a teenager in a weird world that makes it an underrated gem. It is funny to consider that it came out from a director who had meant to stay retired. Allan Moyle was born in Shawinigan, Quebec, Canada. Moyle had a classmate in his high school that had an amateur printing press that would be used for offbeat papers to spread around school; the student took his own life, and it affected Moyle. In fact, the original script that Moyle wrote for what would be this film revolved around a pirate DJ saying that he will end it all with his final broadcast (...or will he?). Moyle had gotten into film writing with Montreal Main (1974) and directing with The Rubber Gun (1977). Times Square (1980) was his second effort, but the meddling of producer Robert Stigwood (who seemed to have aspirations for another film success like Saturday Night Fever) to the final cut meant that Moyle would swear off directing for a decade. Moyle wanted to only do writing, but it was the meeting with a producer in Sandy Stern that proved a key to directing again (he had grown up with radio shaping his teenage years). He saw the fairly green script by Moyle and brought himself to work on re-writing the script (mainly in that there wasn't an ending) for a year. At any rate, the film eventually found a production company with New Line Cinema, and the experience spent by Moyle and Stern was reportedly very cooperative (of course Moyle has often noted that he did not generally get to use his more experimental tendencies with his films).

Honestly, I am curious to what would have happened if the idea of the film had come around a decade later. Heck, if this was 2021, we might see a lead character that probably does a podcast in a shed. Teenagers not being taken seriously isn't exactly a new one, but Moyle has made a movie where self-awareness is a curse for the young or old when not being taken seriously. Of course, any soundtrack that has Leonard Cohen is on the money. Sure, folks might be more interested in hearing Sonic Youth or Beastie Boys, but there is generally a song for everyone when it comes to something that resonates with the beat of the film without feeling pre-packaged. So basically, it is a movie with plenty of chutzpah that is backed up by the presences of its actors. Slater is the easiest standout, because he is basically playing two sides of the coin of a performer in the persona that reflects against the one behind said voice. The rebel voice on the radio might not seem like a hard job to do, but eventually finds it to not just be a bit for easy crude jokes, because it gets balanced with the quieter man in the daylight (i.e. soft-spoken) that hits right at home for the supposed Generation X crowd (after all, how many movies are there existing to admire the 60s when compared to ones that tell the 60s to go stuff it?). In other words, it proves quite fit for the crowd at large without alienation or pap detected in those monologues. When it comes to that exchange involving someone troubled about how serious they are about a life-or-death decision, it still strikes a chord, one that is relevant to our day in its striking tone. Following along is Mathis, making her film debut (she had dabbled in television for two years). There is a certain kind of spark to her performance that is inviting in curiosity that goes quite well with Slater in interesting passion (of course it also can read as an offshoot of the figure/fan dynamic). Pollak and Morrissette stand out well among the teen-folk, whether that means in a preppie that lets it all it out or a punk kid having fun away from school. Kennedy and Paulin make for worthy parental figures for what is needed - well meaning without being caricatures, while Ross plays the adversarial adult figure with worthy patronizing charm; incidentally, the other standout figure is Hampton, who has a brief role in the end as an FCC man under siege by teenagers that is quite amusing. As a whole, the ending is probably the one thing that keeps it from really being a great movie (really what can one do when having kids on the run from the FCC?), but in a changing tide of teen movies, it sure packed a fun wallop. It is the kind of movie that would sneer at you for calling it ripe for the teenage vision of a new era, but there is something to enjoy for everyone in an experience that is generally aware of what it wants to say for 105 minutes with a cast and crew that seem ripe at home for a worthy gem of the era.

Overall, I give it 9 out of 10 stars.

The Deadly Companions.

Review #1685: The Deadly Companions.

Cast: 

Maureen O'Hara (Kit Tilden), Brian Keith (Yellowleg), Steve Cochran (Billy Keplinger), Chill Wills (Turk), Strother Martin (Parson), Will Wright (Doctor Acton), Jim O'Hara (Cal, General Store), Peter O'Crotty (Mayor of Hila City), and Billy Vaughan (Mead Tildon Jr) Directed by Sam Peckinpah (#590 - Ride the High Country, #591 - The Wild Bunch, #944 - Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, and #1439 - Straw Dogs)

Review: 

"It wasn’t the best deal in the world: I wanted to make a picture and this guy wanted to push me around. The script needed lots of work, but I’d get told to go back in my corner. Brian knew we were in trouble, so between us we tried to give the thing some dramatic sense. The result was that all of his scenes worked, while all of hers were dead. I found out about producers, all right."

Would you believe that this is the directorial debut of Sam Peckinpah? One might find themselves in for a bit of a surprise with how the film career of this esteemed director began, because it started in the realm that he was already quite familiar with: the western. In the sixty years that has followed the film's release, it is likely the least known of his fourteen directorial efforts for the man soon to be known as "Bloody Sam". One doesn't have to repeat themselves in describing the background of one of the most polarizing directors to come out of the Western landscape to just say that he was a man who lived on his own terms, hard but fierce in his vision that matched a Marine background and a childhood spent on the ranch. When asked what type of movies he liked, he once stated that the only movies he wanted to like are his own movies, one that detested every good filmmaker (of course, Peckinpah also stated that Ross Hunter was his idol because he matched the innocuous directors he didn't detest, so there's that). The Fresno native had drifted between film and television in minor but key roles before getting into the writing circuit in 1955 with Gunsmoke, the definitive television series of the Western that ran for 20 years. At any rate, Peckinpah wrote the gamut in the era of the Western television series (Have Gun - Will Travel, The Rifleman, Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theatre, you get the idea), and he even submitted a script that would be cobbled together into One-Eyed Jacks (released the same year as this film and one that Peckinpah blamed Brando for messing it up). However, it all came to a head with a show that he would create with The Westerner in 1960, which came from an episode that Peckinpah had directed and written for the aforementioned Theatre show (essentially serving as a pilot). The show starred Brian Keith, who dabbled in television alongside character roles in film (interestingly, his most famous roles wound up being family affairs with The Parent Trap (1960) and Family Affair (1966-71)). He would direct six of the episodes while also writing for five of them. The series would last thirteen episodes (two months), killed due to bad ratings, but he received good notices for his efforts (when recommended for Ride the High Country, the producer watched the show and liked what he saw). At any rate, it was the good word that Keith put in for him that helped the 36-year old Peckinpah when it came time for the production of this film. Enter O'Hara. This was a family affair for O'Hara, since her brother Charles B. Fitzsimmons served as producer. He was the younger brother of O'Hara (who in that Hollywood tradition had gone another name) that dabbled in acting for a decade after having studied law and acting in the theatre in his native country before deciding to go into producing, with this being his debut. The source material used for the film was a novel called Yellowleg by A. S. Fleischman (he was born Avron Zalmon Fleischman before changing his name to Albert Sidney Fleischman), for which Flesichman adapted to the screen himself. He was familiar with Hollywood ever since his work Blood Alley (1955) was turned into a film, for which he wrote for. Technically this is an adaptation, as the novel had been written during pre-production, selling hundreds of thousands of copies in a few months.

The easiest thing to get out of the way is that this is widely available to watch because it is in the public domain, because the copyright notice was somehow not put onto the film. Making sure to find a good quality copy is always key, so imagine how that feels for a Western. The next thing to say is that this was one of the few films the director would make where he had no say in the writing (a process he was quoted later as hating) or final cut privilege. O'Hara, the last surviving actress of the cast, noted in her autobiography about the strange time she had with the director, calling him "one of the strangest and most objectionable people I had ever worked with." It certainly seems like the kind of unassuming kind of movie to think about briefly in the careers of its main stars and group, but one might find something worth diving into when it comes to a movie that is fairly solid in building a tense little thriller with a quartet not usually put together like this for the kind of film seen in its day. This is of course a film that involves a trip to bury a child in native territory that died because of a failed bank robbery. Peckinpah was quoted as loving outsiders, ones that are independent to the frontier, a sort of "weakness for losers on a grand scale", if you will. There are shades of that present within what you see from each of the four main actors to focus on, whether that means a man with quiet guilt and a ulterior motive, or a deserter with grand delusions, or a offbeat gunslinger, or a widow that is stubborn enough to persist through to the end goal. For a film that was basically a low-budget O'Hara + Keith vehicle, the latter seems to have a bit more to do when it comes to generating presence beyond something you might read in a short novel, but each do what they need to do as the main duo that spend quite a bit of time with each other. Wills was a regular character presence for numerous years, but it is interesting to see him with a adversarial role here, one that has odd designs for an army of his own to go with Freedonia, but he still seems like a good threat when paired with the showy Cochran (who made just three more movies before his life was cut short at the age of 48 in 1965), who makes for a worthy ooze presence. It doesn't play for any obvious clichés when it comes to adversaries (whether threats from internal strife or natives), so one shouldn't expect any sort of fantastical movements or rapid pacing. It takes its 93 minutes carefully for a look into the lives of flawed people in the West that Peckinpah would hone to greater results within his career. It may not be a great understated gem, but it certainly merits a look into what makes a director come into their own, if not at least before one goes on to see just what Sam Peckinpah could do when he had the freedom to tell the story he wanted to show. 

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.

Creature from the Haunted Sea.

Review #1684: Creature from the Haunted Sea.

Cast: 

Antony Carbone (Renzo Capetto), Betsy Jones-Moreland (Mary-Belle Monahan), Robert Towne (Sparks Moran / Agent XK150 / Narrator), Beach Dickerson (Pete Peterson Jr), Robert Bean (Happy Jack Monahan), Esther Sandoval (Porcina Perez), Sonia Noemí González (Mango Perez), Edmundo Rivera Álvarez (General Tostada), Terry Nevin (Colonel Cabeza Grande), Blanquita Romero (Carmelita Rodriguez), and Jaclyn Hellman (Agent XK-120) Produced and Directed by Roger Corman (#368 - The Little Shop of Horrors, #684 - It Conquered the World, #852 - The Terror, #931 - Not of This Earth, #1007 - Attack of the Crab Monsters, #1039 - Five Guns West, #1042 - War of the Satellites, #1136 - Gas-s-s-s, #1147 - X: The Man with the X-ray Eyes, #1186 - A Bucket of Blood, #1423 - The Wild Angels, #1425 - The St. Valentine's Day Massacre, and #1674 - Machine-Gun Kelly)

Review: 

In his autobiography How I Made a Hundred Movies in Hollywood And Never Lost a Dime, Corman briefly talked about the movie, one that came about when in production for filming Last Woman on Earth and Battle of Blood Island (he directed the former while producing the latter), and it should also be mentioned that money for this film came from stuff left that wasn't used for The Wild Ride (1960). This movie and the aforementioned Earth film share the same trio of actors of stars with Carbone, Jones-Moreland, and Towne. He discovered that there were tax incentives available for "manufacturing" in Puerto Rico, which included moviemaking. During the two-week shoot for the aforementioned Earth film, he contacted Charles B. Griffith about making him a script. Charles B. Griffith had written the scripts for a variety of films for Corman, such as Naked Paradise (1957) and Beast from Haunted Cave (1959), and this film has a few similarities to those; he was told to make a comedy-horror movie ripe for filming, complete with having a week to do it, although Corman dictated the ending (incidentally, each film had one day of preproduction). Believe it or not, he actually intended to have a small part in the film, telling Griffith to write a small part with Happy Jack; Griffith responded by making a part with mood swings that Corman noticed he couldn't do, so he gave it to a performer that had worked on one of Corman's productions in Robert Bean (he also got to play the Creature), one that was used for animal noises while also being the boom mic operator.

The movie begins with probably the most interesting moment with an animation sequence directed by Monte Hellman (who coincidentally was the director of Beast from Haunted Cave), one of the numerous folks who collaborated with Corman that gave them a start in filmmaking. So yes, Puerto Rico is doubling for Cuba, and the plot involves a gambler helping exiled Cubans with getting a fortune of gold out of the country before his crew plans to take down the group with a cover story of a mythical monster. Somewhere in all of that is an American secret agent that narrates the movie that falls in with the group and fails to do anything of importance because he bumbles in a crush on one of the criminals while others fall in with the natives. Technically, since the movie never seems like a real movie at any point, this should be interesting. Honestly though, its energy level really matches The Fast and the Furious (1954) in true average value. Carbone might sound like Humphrey Bogart, but it doesn't make him seem anything other than mildly bemused to be standing with a semi-comedy/thriller. Jones-Moreland thought it sounded better as just a takeoff on what Corman had done before, but she felt it got lost somewhere in the middle, and she is quoted as wishing she had never heard of it. That is more words to use for her than the performance, which is just okay. Robert Towne (future writer of films such as Chinatown) stars as one of the actors, although he is credited as Edward Wain. He had first met Roger Corman when each were in an acting class together (taught by Jeff Corey); never one to miss giving a chance to untested individuals, Towne wrote for Corman with the film Last Woman on Earth in 1960 (he would also write for Corman with The Tomb of Ligeia four years later). The costs for bringing him along with the actors would have meant Towne would need to be hired as an actor by Corman, so he did so, taking the trip to Puerto Rico. Technically speaking, he reminds me of a fluky parody of a noir character, but he isn't exactly Don Adams, if you know what I mean. At least Bean gets to make a bunch of noises. The language gags (i.e., look up some of the phrases translated from Spanish to English) are okay, but there isn't exactly anything particularly big to standout for fun.

The costume was designed by Beach Dickerson, which was assembled from a collection of helmets, a wetsuit, moss, Brillo pads, tennis & ping-pong balls, pipe-cleaner claws, and oilcloth that came out to $150. Honestly, the only reason to really see the movie is to see just how amusing the costume ultimately turns out, even though you really don't see it much in 75 minutes of run-time. I wonder if it would be a better movie in terms of "laughs" if you saw the monster more. It isn't exactly that funny of a movie anyway, so one might as well just take amusement at the dopey prop, but there is a lack of focus here that reminds one of more interesting times with films like Attack of the Crab Monsters (1957), A Bucket of Blood (1959) or the obvious one in The Little Shop of Horrors (1960; at least no one will try to make an inferior musical this time around). Somehow, the advertising failed the movie, because it promoted the thriller aspects more so than the comedy, but Corman is the ultimate chameleon filmmaker, honing to the tastes of what seems like a good idea, whether that involves the works of Edgar Allan Poe or producing other varied works. The movie isn't good at any real consistent point, but folks wanting to watch a silly Corman product will not mind too much, as long as they are patient enough to go through some flaky comedy to get to its monster.

Overall, I give it 6 out of 10 stars.