Witchboard (1986)

Cheesy demonic 80s horror with freudian undertones 

You'd better know this typical horror slasher was made in the 80s by the Night of the Demons Director Kevin S. Tenney and has a cult following among 80s Horror fans. This review however is different - it talks a lot about the rather stupid plot, has plenty of spoilers  and a rather unusual Freudian commentary that's either gonna amuse or irritate you. 

Ok, so here it goes. Our Heroine Linda (the Whitesnake videos babe Tawny Kitaen), who has enormous hair, is caught in a love triangle between her current boyfriend Jim (Todd Allen) who looks a little like Dennis Quaid and ex-beau Brandon (Stephen Nichols), a sensitive 80s man who believes in spirits, cries a lot, and wears his shirts unbuttoned to the navel. 

One day, Brandon breaks out a ouija board at a party to converse with the departed, but the boorish Jim makes sarcastic comments about it until nobody can tolerate him. Jim considers becoming a believer when an aggravated spirit drops a slab of drywall on his Eddie-Van-Halen-alike construction worker buddy, but when his girlfriend takes to swearing he really starts to wonder what the fuck is going on. Brandon thinks the spirit is that of a ten-year-old boy named David but later on it appears David's time-sharing the ouija board with Malfeitor, a mass murderer. This madman is using Linda as a "portal." Linda becomes addicted to the ouija board and ends up succumbing to "progressive entrapment" she quits going to school and neglects her personal hygiene. 

Meanwhile, an irritating psychic is skewered on a sundial. Jim and Brandon are struck with barrels and fall into a lake. Linda locks herself in a room and sways back and forth violently. Finally Jim decides he's had enough of this and corners the possessed Linda. They fight for a while until a detective who always wanted to be a magician comes in wielding a gun and is promptly killed. Then it turns out Jim, not Linda, is the "portal" - unless Malfeitor is lying  so Jim shoots the ouija board and this fixes the problem. 

Okay, so the ouija board is the portal. Wait, who's the portal again? So the movie's a tad confusing, but it's good b-movie fun. There's a nice meta-fictive moment when Jim - exasperated with Brandon's don't-you-think-I-know-how-crazy-this-sounds insistence that Linda's on the road to demonic possession - says sarcastically, "so what you're telling me is that I'm married to Linda Blair". But it seems to me equal parts slasher movie and possession story since the offending entity here is a mad killer and not a demon of some sort. It's even a Reefer Madness-type angle, since much of the film is clumsily concerned with the pitfalls of obsessiveness and addiction. 

One can also argue that Jim's emotional coldness is "closed" and that Linda's excessive warmth and compassion is "open," and through the ordeal they endure they are, respectively, "opened up" and "closed off" to a "compromise point" - Jim becomes more sensitive, Linda more assertive although you can make a sound argument that Witchboard's writing is a little too scattered to convey this point seamlessly. Linda might be "open" but in a more Freudian sense she's pretty "closed" - chaste to a fault, she starts the movie in virginal white, refuses to have sex with Jim when he pisses her off, and doesn't cuss. Maybe this is because Witchboard combines the slasher and occult/possession stories. 

In slashers, the Final Girl is "closed" (chaste, rational, observant, proactive rather than reactive), which enables her to avoid being "penetrated" (i.e., punctured) by the killer. In possession stories, the possessee tends to be more "open" (intuitive, in tune with the spiritual realm, empathic, what have you), which makes her more vulnerable to other-worldly "penetration" (i.e., possession) and makes sure there's a story to be told. Although Jim is pretty clearly "opened," then, what Linda represents is far less clear since she has to bear the contradiction when the movie chooses to combine two horror sub-genres that are largely at odds with one another. 

Seeing is believing this classic horror 80s gem. Watch it and let us know what you think.

Pacific Heights 1990 Film Score - Hans Zimmer

JohnnyTwoToes recalls one of the early 90s' most notable film scores

1990's Tenant from Hell Thriller Pacific Heights is not one that most people remember as a 90s' classic. This underrated mystery starring Michael Keaton, Melanie Griffith, Mathew Modine & directed by the Oscar winning John Schlesinger (Midnight Cowboy) only received a lukewarm reception from critics and audiences when it was released. 

This film however marked the debut of Michael Keaton into the foray of 'the villain' realm as up until this point he had played likable buffoons and all around good guys and German-born Composer Hans Zimmer moving into new musical territory. 

Zimmer scored a slew of big films in the late 80's and early 1990 and garnered a lot of attention including Oscar nominations with scores for Rainman, Black Rain (two of my personal favorites), Driving Miss Daisy, Bird On A Wire and Days of Thunder. Pacific Heights was an under-the-radar film and the score that was released is in four movements from Varese Sarabande. 

As the film is structured, so is the score. Movement one starts with a mysterious crescendo of chords and that blossom into a bouncy piece featuring saxophonist Gene Cipriano and vocalist Carmen Twilley. Uses of the Zimmer staple percussion, an added mandolin played by Jim Matheos and lovely piano work by Mike Lang (who has worked with John Carpenter on some of his scores) make the first movement a fitting start; creepy and unnerving. Walt Fowler adds some nourish tones with his muted trumpet for the end of Movement One into Movement Two and throughout, while Chuck Domanico has some cool bass sprinkled in as well. Movement Two starts with Lang's soft piano as the music gives way to Zimmer's more acoustical side with some woodwinds and some additional horns conducted by Shirley Walker. 

Pacific Heights continues to combine all of these elements throughout the entire album. It is constructed as a film only here, it is without the visuals. Zimmer shows his diverse side in Movement Three with a nod to the far east with the introduction to the film's wise character, Toshio Watanabe played by the always reliable Mako, who is the first one to really suspect Mr. Hayes is trouble. Zimmer really cuts it loose for Movements Three and Four as the heroes really begin to uncover what Hayes is all about. The score does not follow a specific pattern but, therein is its charm. As in the film, the score slows up to allow us to soak up the beautiful and quiet moments but Zimmer, who can do action as well as anyone can, knows when to ramp up the action. 

In Movement Four Zimmer's score has a theme, so to speak, of determination for our heroes, as they uncover more plans of the evil Hayes. When Zimmer punches it, the score is frightful and chilling and one of his better scores. It is a nice mix of electronics mostly with some orchestral arrangements and the other players, here really compliment this score and enhance a familiar but effective film.

If you want piece of 90's film scores with elements of power electronics and modern classical, this is the original motion picture soundtrack that you must be listening to. Besides, Hans Zimmer currently in the limelight  again for his Interstellar score never disappoints.

Non-Stop (2014)

JohnnyTwoToes reviews this tense airborne thriller

After seeing a string of rather disappointing films, FINALLY Non-Stop lifted my spirits. It is cliched but enjoyable garbage in a good way in all the ways Pompeii and I, Frankenstein were not. 

Liam Neeson plays a US air marshall named Bill Marks and he has seen better days. A borderline alcoholic, a failed marriage and all of the necessary disappointments that are required of this character. Neeson wears it well, too. While on a transatlantic non-stop flight from New York to London, Marks receives texts to his phone that state the other passengers will start meeting the grim reaper if $150 million dollars is not deposited into an account of the terrorists choosing. The rest of the film is how Marks finds out who it is.

Non-Stop is a different take on Neeson's Taken action persona and although this film is ludicrous it is never the less fun to watch. Juame Collet-Serra, who directed Neeson in the 2011 film Unknown, directs again here and they both keep the tension palpable and Neeson's performance is convincing. 

There is an attention to detail in Non-Stop which was kind of neat. Whenever, Neeson and the terrorist send texts back and forth, the viewer sees them type but they have tweaked it by showing they both have spell check. It brought a chuckle from me. They might be crazy but at least they don't need to worry about how to spell. Logically, this makes sense and might not seem like a big deal, but it is this attention to the smaller details that made this film work for me. 

Clearly, Neeson carries Non-Stop, but the script and story written by John W. Richardson, Christopher Roach and Ryan Engle, bristles with a series of twists and turns that I never saw coming. The plane is populated with your standard characters but the acting is solid from even the smallest of parts so that the story sells and I believed the dire situation. Julianne Moore is Jen, the female interest who does not seem to know what she believes. Is Marks crazy? Is the situation out of his control? She is dubious of Marks and Moore's performance is convincingly effective.

John Ottman's score is an amalgamation of electronics, percussion and orchestral arrangements, keeps the pressure on and is well worth the purchase. All in all, Non-Stop is enjoyable thanks largely to Neeson's focused performance, a fine supporting cast, decent script, solid direction and a great score. NOT coming soon to a plane near you, is Non-Stop. It is available on DVD and ON DEMAND. The soundtrack is available on CD and download. Non-Stop-***1/2 out of 4

Now You See Me (2013)

JohnnyTwoToes reviews this preposterously shallow but fun caper thriller

The one thing you don't want to do is try to follow the plot in Now You See Me (2013), because you will not be able to do it. This is french director Louis Leterrier's sixth film in a mostly hit and miss career as a director. The only three films he has directed that I have enjoyed at all are Jet Li's Unleashed from 2005 formerly entitled Danny The Dog, mildly, Transporter 2 and his best film to date, The Incredible Hulk (here comes the hate mail). I thoroughly despised the Clash Of The Titans remake and was even more stunned with its sequel. 

Now You See Me is a clever and fun mix of magic, humor and action but it goes so far over the top that by film's end I just could not take it seriously. This is a film that has a wink but it does want you to believe the story. How they expect you to believe it is beyond me. The film has a dream cast with Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, the simply stunning Isla Fisher and Dave Franco as 'the Four Horsemen' illusionists. They are the hottest magic show in Vegas and for their latest feats they rob banks. Or do they? 

When the FBI becomes involved (even though I have no idea of how they could get involved),here is no real evidence that could prove ANYTHING about a bank robbery, but okay I will for the sake of argument give you that. Mark Ruffalo is the lead SAC of catching the Four Horsemen and he is aided by the lovely Melanie Laurent who is a 'desk jockey' getting her first big case. Throw in Michael Caine as the group's underwriter and Morgan Freeman as the man who spills the beans on how magicians ply their trade (basically debunks them) and you have a fairly fun movie. 

Where the film goes wrong is that is spends so much time creating the world of magic in such a flamboyant way, that there is no credible way of taking this film seriously. The scenes where they want you to believe in the magic are immediately debunked by the magicians themselves, so what they were trying to do is anybodies guess. Then there is a whole subplot about the magicians try to get into the EYE which is like the Holy Grail for magicians. None of that made any sense and it plays into the climax which does not make a bit of sense. 

The cast is well played out, though. Eisenberg as the leader, Daniel is a fast talking and smart individual who dares the FBI to come after them. Isla Fisher is the gorgeous Henley who can immerse herself into a tank of water, shackled to the floor of the tank with only 60 seconds to free herself or another tank above with Piranhas will drop into the tank below. Dave Franco plays Jack and man who can either bend a spoon or pick your pocket depending on who you are and the most interesting character, Merritt the Mentalist played by the very busy Woody Harrelson. These four are great on screen. They have chemistry and and fun to watch. Michael Caine is in a small but important role, however I do wish they had spent more time developing his character and Morgan Freeman is slithery as the man who hates magicians and makes tons of money off of telling all of their secrets on DVDs. Ruffalo and Laurent make a good team and how much do you wanna bet they hook up by the end of the film? 

Now You See Me is fun, I will give it that but the film would have been better served to make the magic a little more believable thus insuring the plot to be taken more seriously. The script by Ed Solomon, Boaz Yakin and Edward Ricourt (with the story by Yakin and Ricourt) seems to spend so much time on the extravagant and elaborate setup that I never really came to know the back round of the Four Horsemen. In 10 minutes they go from street hustling to Vegas and the finale is so preposterous that I caught myself laughing out loud. There is a dizzying amount of flash and pizzazz with the magic, yet, the characters are so thin that they are nothing more than plot gimmicks. Brian Tyler's orchestral score, however, is a thunderous achievement and worthy of purchasing on Amazon or wherever soundtracks are still sold. 

Being a box office success, there is a sequel planned with everyone returning from the director to the main cast. Maybe they can answer some questions posed in the first film. Let's hope they can tone down the sensationalism and simply go for sensational. Now You See Me is a 'one and you're done' type of film with the real magic missing. You can enjoy it once and then move on to something else. Now You See Me-**1/2

Score of the Month - Limitless (2011) by Paul Leonard-Morgan

JohnnyTwoToes revisits what was one of 2011's best film scores

2011 and 2012 brought two great scores from the BAFTA winning newcomer Scottish film score composer Paul Leonard-Morgan; 2011's Limitless and Dredd in 2012. Both feature Morgan with a mostly synthesized score and both films were inherently terrific films, as well, enhanced by his brilliant scores. Limitless with its sci-fi overtones was by far one of the best new scores by a new composer I have ever heard. 

For those who haven't seen it yet, Limitless tells the story of a writer (Bradley Cooper) with a bad case of writer's block who discovers a magic pill that he can take that will unlock all of his brain's power and help him accomplish incredible feats. Only problem is when you crash you really crash and it is not long before all of the wrong people want what Eddie (Cooper) has. 

The film was clever and intriguing and Morgan's score is an energetic and toe tapping blend of percussion and synths. At about 55 minutes of music, it is safe to say that this has most of the music actually used in the film. Starting out with 'Opening' where Eddie stands precariously on a ledge of his New York City apartment wondering how he got to this point, Morgan uses a wonderful theme that he sprinkles throughout the score. It is a six or seven note motif used in brilliant form for not just 'Opening' but my personal favorite tracks with 'Trading Up', 'Trashed Hotel', 'Hiring Eddie' and 'Happy Pills' where he infuses an array of electronics and synthesized percussion. If you are exercising, these are tracks to jam to. 

'Psyched' starts with Eddie's frustration with his writer's block until he meets up with Vernon who gives him the pills. 'Eddie Knows What To Do' is a beautifully floating track as Eddie starts to feel the power of the pills take effect and his brain starts to burst out with ideas. It continues with 'Trippy' as the power of the pills seem to bring back even the most minute memories even from his college days. 'I Still Love You' is another sublime track as Eddie tries to patch things up with his girlfriend, Lindy (Abbie Cornish). She agrees to give him a second chance. 

'Limitless' is the title track that shows Eddie on the fast track making friends in all the right places in finance and the stock market and 'Coming Up' continues with Eddie's success, but Eddie starts to see there is something wrong as he is almost out of pills. He also garners the attention of a hot babe who later turns up dead, a Russian loan shark and a man referred to as Tancoat and the music turns to the staccato and pulse pounding percussion as Eddie is chased by the loan shark and Tancoat. For Eddie, though there is no stopping him; onward and upward. 

'The Walk Home' is a nice but short track that is when Eddie starts to realize he is coming down and 'Down The Hatch' continues with the down side of the addiction. The remainder of the album has a nice mix of hard pulsating and driving themes for 'Escaping Tancoat' and 'Lindy Chase' and the softer and more sublime tracks especially 'Van Loon', the billionaire business man who is dangerous to Eddie in ways Eddie has yet to learn and 'Lindy Leaves Eddie' when Lindy fears her own life is now in danger. 'Phone Tap' is a chilling track as the Eddie realizes the walls have not only sprouted ears but they are closing in on him, as well. 

There is not one track that is wrong on this album. It is a happy and bouncy score that works on all levels. Be it soft or strong, pop or new wave, Limitless is an engrossing score and it will pull you in as will the film. Up until this point, I had never heard music by Paul Leonard-Morgan and although he had scored a few films (mostly shorts and Scottish documentaries), he had almost exclusively scored television shows most notably the British show, MI-5 also known as Spooks (which is available and highly recommended from Amazon and iTunes). Now he is on the fast track with two knockout scores for two of their respective year's films for Dredd and Limitless. Both are available from Amazon and iTunes for download. Morgan's most recent release is the John Cusack CIA action Thriller - The Numbers Station (2013). Know more on his official website.

Prisoners (2013)

JohnnyTwoToes praises this dark, superbly acted crime thriller. 

Having worked in retail for the last eight years or so, I am always struck by how seemingly good parents and good people seem to lose sight of their children when they enter a store to do a little shopping. Sometimes the children wander off carelessly, yes, but I am amazed at how easily parents seem to get so entranced by the stuff on the shelves that they forget to keep their own children safe. Granted Prisoners (2013) tells the story differently than parents who shop.The idea is the same. Losing a child to an abductor, regardless of the situation is downright terrifying.

Prisoners is not for the squeamish and child abduction is not easy to handle. Trust me when I say this, you will want to hold your children close. Prisoners starts with the very first frame as a general sense of foreboding sets in as the camera slowly zooms in on a tree during a cold, rainy Thanksgiving day. 

The Dover family (Hugh Jackman and Maria Bello) and their children walk across the street for a nice Thanksgiving dinner with their dear friends, the Birches (Terence Howard and Viola Davis). After a filling meal the older children plant themselves in front of the television downstairs while the youngest two girls go look for one the girls lost whistle. After a period of time the two little girls have vanished without a trace. The only suspect is a young man (Paul Dano) who owns a camper the girls were seen playing on earlier until the older brother of one of the girls shoos them off. The cop investigating the disappearance of the two girls (one girl from the Dover family and one girl from the Birch family) is a Detective Loki (yes, Loki) played remarkably well by Jake Gyllenhaal. 

Loki is a determined man who has never failed on a case. Gyllenhaal plays Loki differently than others would have. He is a hero, no doubt but it is referenced in the film he has grown up as a ward of the state for a while in a boys home that was not to pleasant. He is smart but odd, sporting what seems to be prison tatts and facial tics that suggest he is a man dealing with his own pain in life. After, the suspect, Alex Jones (Dano) is released for lack of evidence, Keller Dover (Jackman) takes it upon himself to get Jones to tell him where the little girls are. 

I will not say anything more to ruin it, but let us just say that Dover will not rest until he gets what he needs out of Jones. I do not have kids, so I can't say I know how it would feel to have my child abducted. However, ANYBODY who has children who watches this film will never let their kids out of their sight. Jackman's Keller Dover is an accomplished man with his own contracting business, great family and tells his son, "Pray for the best. Prepare for the worst." Keller is a man who has his basement filled with supplies if the worst happens, except nothing he has could prepare him for what they endure. 

Jackman's performance is superb as a man who is usually in control of his destiny, but now teeters on the brink of despair, madness and of helplessness. He starts to drink, again and when he fills in Franklin to his plans for Jones, chaos seems to ensue. Hugh Jackman is now a established bonafide star, thanks to the X-men franchise, so it was only a matter of time before we saw him REALLY spread his acting chops and he shows it style with Prisoners. There is Oscar talk for him and deservedly so. 

Everyone has their own way of dealing with anguish is this film and the acting by everyone is fantastic. Nothing is oversold and the emotions of rage, anger and hopelessness ring true with each performance. Aaron Guzikowski's script is effectively simple. Mr. Guzikowski knows he does not need to push the material with pointless and gratuitous monologues. He is smart to keep the story as tangible to the viewer as possible, by simply implying this could happen to ANYBODY with children. 

Prisoners is also a very effective thriller as director Denis Villeneuve amps up the tension as the days go by without a single lead on the whereabouts of the girls. We know time is running out for them so for the viewer we too,feel the parents agony. Melissa Leo is chillingly effective as Alex's seemingly long suffering mother who has lost her own children and Johann Johannsson's score is quietly somber which adds to the sense of dread. 

This is a long film (about 2 and 35 minutes) but that will hardly matter, as you will be glued to the screen for every minute and you will be cemented to your seat even to the very last frame. Prisoners is a smart, atmospheric,and riveting film about appreciating who and what you have and how in the blink of an eye it can be taken from you. It does a good job of showing how it affects the relationships with your own family and friends and how it changes everything and everyone around you. It begs the question, "How far would go to get back someone you love?" Hopefully, none of us will ever have to ask that question.Prisoners-**** out of 4

The Killing Joke

An impressive 15 minute Short film experience!

The Killing Joke directed by the talented Sebastian Lopez and scored by the enigmatic Colin Devlin, the frontman of my fav band - the Devlins is a 15 minute suspense/fiction short film about a mysterious woman that finds a red balloon tied up to a curious little box on an eery derelict street. Using classic elements of suspense, awesome color tones and working within a seventies aesthetic, 'The Killing Joke' is an action packed film that pays homage to some of the horror movies from that era. Watch it now and share!

Oblivion (2013)

A predictable post-apocalyptic big budget scifi flick

Oblivion (2013) is the second mainstream, big budget film from newcomer director Joseph Kosinski. His first was the relatively appealing "reimagined" sequel to 1982's Tron, with Tron: Legacy(2010). It was a decently re-engineered sequel and had enough imagination of its own to be worth watching. 

Oblivion seems cut from the same cloth only it it recycles too many elements from other, better science fiction films that I came away kind of empty. It is not an awful film and there is a lot I did admire in it, but at the end of the day, we have seen this before and better, elsewhere. 

Tom Cruise following up the overrated Jack Reacher (2012), playing another Jack, a ballsy tech repairman who has remained on Earth after it has been decimated by an alien invasion. "We won the war, but lost the planet," is the cliched explanation we get from Jack. Now the survivors are on Titan, one of Saturn's moons while the 'Tets' harvest and create new drinking water for the remaining humans on Titan. Jack is Tech 49, whose job it is to protect the and fix the drones who scour the earth protecting the Tets from Scavs (faceless Mad Max wannabes) whose sole reason for living is to destroy the Tets. 

Jack lives with his "eyes on" tech and now live in girlfriend, Vika (played by the lovely British actress Andrea Riseborough). They live in a lovely see through penthouse that sits far above the clouds but seems to be precariously based on unstable rocks below. It seems the Scavs could place some powerful explosives on the ground and bring the whole house down. Problems solved. But never mind. Jack seems to have a recurring dream that he is in New York with a woman he thinks he does not know and they are somehow connected, he is just not sure how. 

As we have seen from the previews, Morgan Freeman enters the story, puffing on cigars and waxing about how Jack is the answer to everyone's problems, only stupid Jack does not know what is painfully obvious to everyone, even the viewers. Oblivion does have a lot going for it. The acting is polished and Cruise has yet to give a bad performance in any role. He carries the bulk of this film and for the few scenes he is in, Morgan Freeman is always the consummate professional. The real gem I fell in love with was the Andrea Riseborough who is positively radiant recently seen in Welcome to the Punch (2013). Not only is she sexy but she has a personality that enticing and a figure to match. She is smart, crafty and yet still maintains a vulnerability that makes all the more appealing, and her chemistry with Cruise's Jack is well done. 

The problem I started having with Oblivion is that it starts well and up until the beginning of the final act I was into what was happening on screen, I was interested in the characters, cared about what happened to them and the story seemed to be gaining some steam but then it runs out of steam and the final act of the film fails crushingly dull. 

There are way too many references to other films from other genres that Oblivion seems to borrow from; Total Recall (original version), Planet Of The Apes(1968), a dash of the Matrix are just a few that come to mind. That is a shame since the script by Karl Gajdusek, Michael Arndt (listed inexplicably as Michael deBruyn) and Joseph Kosinski (which based the script from his own graphic novel) seems to have great ideas but nowhere to go with them. 

The visuals of the film are however stunning. Every shot is crisply clear and looks like a David Lean film. The picturesque panoramas are things I could look at for hours. Therein is the problem. We should be focused on the film instead of lingering on the cinematography. I will also send out kudos the score by M83, Anthony Gonzalez and Joseph Trapanese. Kosinski has an ear for great score music composers. He did for Tron Legacy when he hired the French music duo named Daft Punk and he has done it again with M83, Anthony Gonzalez and Joseph Trapanese. It has been called 'Tron-ish' and it does have a feel and a vibe of Daft Punk but it is its own creation and a grand one it is. 

Oblivion is not awful, but it is not great. Maybe being a Tom Cruise film, our expectations are way too high that what it really offers. It has a lot a effective elements that do work but you just can't shake that "been there, seen that" cliched feeling. Oblivion-**1/2 out of 4. JohnnyTwoToes

The Eyes of Laura Mars (1978)

Not your usual movie review

The 70s Horror Suspense Thriller Hyperdrama directed by the late Irvin Kershner, (the guy who also directed Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, Never Say Never Again and Robocop 2)

Starring the premier and overfamous Hyper-dramatic (yeah) Actress of the 1970s - FAYE DUNAWAY "I'm (SIGH!) alright." MURDER, SUSPENSE and A 70s SOUNDTRACK FROM AN ACTUAL 70s MOVIE! RETRO-WOW! 

See perverted Raul Julia leaping on women, Tommy Lee Jones say: "I LOVE you. I LOVE you."too funny to be sexy but good try, Tommy! 

Retro Commercials in inopportune spots, "Plop Plop Fiz Fiz..." 

An over-long, misleading plot trail 70s style! "Gee, he's not the killer after all. No wonder the movie didn't end 15 minutes ago!" (can't believe John Carpenter wrote this)

And a bad case of shamelessly letting your girlfriend, Barbra Streisand, sing the tortured and irrelevant theme song. "WHAAAAAAAAT is it about You" You go, Jon Peters (the producer)! 

A MURDER SUSPENSE DRAMA WITH LOTS OF LAUGHS

JADED ARTIST THEMES and 

NO SEX SCENES, NO VIOLENCE

(I saw more violence from Bette Davis in Agatha Christie's Murder On The Nile) but please still watch it - its considered the first Hollywood (American) movie to try the Giallo genre and was also a big box office hit!

Sinister (2012)

JohnnyTwoToes highly recommends this superbly crafted horror chiller

Scott Derrickson seems to be carving out a career in horror films and if Sinister (2012) is any indication he will be an A list director very soon. With no less than four films and all belonging to the science fiction/horror genre and one of them being the retooling of Steven Spielberg's classic Poltergeist (slated for a release in 2016). A busy camper!

Sinister stars Ethan Hawke as a down and out crime book writer who has moved his family into a "inexplicably cheap house". Since he still has yet to sell his previous home they are on a strapped budget, so he works out of his home office. He specializes in real life crimes, some unsolved and some he helps to solve. He had a big hit with one of his books, but has failed to successfully repeat it. 

His wife (Juliet Rylance) is supportive but dubious of their present relocation. "Please just tell me we are not living two doors down from a suspected serial killer." " We're not", Elliston (Hawke) responds. They are living IN the house of a suspected former serial killer. So I guess he wasn't lying. 

We meet the family of Ellison and THANK GOD they don't dwell on the everyday happenings of the family like so many films do to an annoyance. We get it. They are a family and they love each other, thank you. Now can we start scaring the shit out of some people, now? 

Since you find this out in the first 10 minutes of the film I have ruined nothing. Upon placing some boxes up in the attic, Ellison sees a box lying in the middle of the floor, in an otherwise EMPTY attic, that has a several reels of Super 8 films and a projector. After setting up the projector, he delves into the films. What he finds on each reel I will not describe so you will have to watch. 

Scott Derrickson and co-writer C. Robert Cargill have crafted a superb horror film with no nudity, hardly that much cursing and virtually no gore. It is a PG-13 film that relies on the old adage that less is more and it does this extremely well. The use of lighting (or lack thereof) and the reliance of Hawke's performance propels this film and never lets if get bogged down in procedures. 

Sinister is Scott Derrickson's first big hit and a very effective supernatural horror thriller. Unlike his previous hit The Exorcism of Emily Rose (2005), Sinister is not based on any facts but is one of the creepiest films I have ever seen and, for me it ranks up there with The Exorcist. Yeah, the read it right!

Sinister is a potboiler that builds and builds and it does so quietly and without flashy visuals and CGI nonsense. It relies on Hawke's superb performance as he starts to unravel the mystery which he learns is MUCH more than he originally thought. He pursues the truth further much to the chagrin of the local Sheriff played by a much slimmer looking Fred Thompson. One of the sheriff's deputies that is a little star struck does help Ellison but between the two of them they uncover far more than they bargained for. 

Sinister will not be liked by everyone, as it does take its time but, for me it was very effective in building the suspense and Derrickson knows how and where to place the cameras for maximum creepiness. His use of shadows and ambient sounds ratchet up the tension and Hawke's decent into drink and obsessiveness really pulls the viewers in. 

Christopher Young's score is mix of orchestral chords with bumps and thuds of percussion with some vocal strains thrown in for good measure, suggesting something otherworldly is at hand. There is also a quiet piano that tinkles in the background with a Hammond organ and Theremin that will send shivers down your spine. There are two versions of the score. One is the release that is available from Amazon but there is a longer version that is a promotional copy, if you can find it. It is worth it but just don't listen to it at night by yourself. It will freak you out. 

I would compare this film to an equally efficient Insidious only Sinister is hair creepier. Finally Hollywood is getting back to real horror films and with Scott Derrickson directing, he could be to horror like Wes Craven was back in the 80's. Sinister-***1/2

Side Effects (2013)

JohnnyTwoToes is in love with this intriguing thriller

Steven Soderbergh is about the only filmmaker I have ever seen to direct no less than six films in less than two years and most of them, good films that warrant a watch. The list you ask? Okay real quick: The Last Time I Saw Michael Gregg, Contagion, Haywire, Magic Mike, Side Effects and Behind The Candelabra. I have seen all of'em except the first film (The Last Time I Saw Michael Gregg), which honestly I have never even heard of, (apparently it is out of Australia). 

Of all the films above, Side Effects stands out and for good reason. It is a slowly effective pot boiler about a mentally disturbed woman named Emily Taylor under psychiatric care whose mental state seems to unravel with the release of her imprisoned husband Martin (Channing Tatum in an unusual casting - seen also in Magic Mike). It's not that he is a bad sort. He has been in prison for insider trading and before incarceration they were living the high life. Now that he has been in, Emily has been reduced to a modest apartment with a little money but nothing more. She works for an ad agency but her mind is starting to buckle under all of the strain from life itself. 

After a failed suicide attempt, she is admitted to a psychiatrist, Dr. Jonathan Banks (a fantastic Jude Law). He starts her on some prescription meds that he has a sample of named Ablixa. Emily starts to sleepwalk and do some VERY strange things. When she lands in trouble with the law for a crime she may or may not have committed while under the influence of Ablixa, suspicion falls to Dr. Banks for his prescribing Ablixa to start with. That is all I can say without spoiling Side Effects. 

Side Effects is an effective urban drama, not flashy or abrasive - taking the science of mental instability, diagnosis and treatment with respect without becoming cheap or tawdry. Soderbergh does not feel the need to assault the viewer with odd or strange camera effects so common in a lot of films these days. He has a great script by Scott Burns to work with and these characters are all smart and well written. They behave out of natural instincts not forced storytelling and what happens to them is believable. 

Let's say, I cared what happened to all of them; even Emily's arrogantly bitchy former psychiatrist played with icy coolness that you could store meat in by Catherine Zeta Jones. Law's Dr. Banks is a good doctor, who cares about his patients even to the detriment of his marriage. What happens in Dr, Banks' life after Emily's crimes is handled effectively and subtlety and not overdone. 

Soderbergh is a masterful director who knows how to construct an delicate subject as in Side Effects. He takes his time and lets this film build and build until the true intentions of all involved remedy the situation; believably and with dire consequences for some - the final act you will have to pay attention to because you will not see it coming. Side Effects will not appeal to all of you as it does take its sweet time in unfolding, but if you have the patience and time, you'll love the finale.

Thomas Newman provides another stand out score with his music also being quiet but it pulsates enough to keep the film moving. His use of an orchestra, electronics and his choice of an eclectic array of odd instruments make Side Effects creepy and interesting. This composer is in my top five of all time and he has never disappointed me. If you have the means, get the soundtrack. 

Steven Soderbergh has stated that he wants to retire and after his busy schedule I don't blame him. Hopefully, this is just the exhaustion talking and after a rest with NO ABLIXA he will return. This is a director that keeps getting better with each film, takes chances and usually comes out on top. Not many directors can make that claim so , my plea to Mr. Soderbergh, PLEASE DO NOT RETIRE. Side Effects-***1/2 out of 4

Red Lights (2012)

JohnnyTwoToes asks how much do you want to believe?

In spite of a head lining Sundance Film Festival premiere in January and the presence of top-billed stars, Red Lights (2012) is a largely unheard of film that came and went earlier this year and that too, fairly quickly. Ignore the bad press, it is too bad because you may have missed a real treat, until now. 

Red Lights is the story of a two academic doctors, Margaret Matheson (Sigourney Weaver) and Tom Buckley(Cillian Murphy) who travel the country debunking and exposing fraudulent mediums, psychics and other paranormal charlatans. Matheson is especially cynical due to personal tragedies, whereas, Tom is cynical but has more of an open mind. He WANTS to believe, but so far he has not seen anything that makes him a convert to the para-psychological phenomenon. 

As Red Lights opens the two are investigating a home where it was claimed the ghost of a family member still haunts. After it is explained this place and it inhabitants are frauds, the two doctors hear of the great Simon Silver (Robert DeNiro) coming out of retirement. 

Simon Silver is world renowned psychic whose last performance ended in tragedy when one of his most ardent critics died of a heart attack. Somehow, Silver is all about show and has used the tragedy to celebrate his return, in a matter of speaking. Tom is adamant about investigating Silver, but Matheson is unwilling and would rather spar with her fellow alumni Paul Shackleton (Toby Jones) over funding for their college departments. Tom begins an affair with an attractive student Sally Owen (Elizabeth Olsen) who later becomes an intern for Tom and Matheson. Later, Tom begins his own investigation of Silver with dire consequences. 

Red Lights was written and directed by relative newcomer Rodrigo Cortes as this is only his third feature length film. His previous 2 releases include the similarly themed paranormal mystery Apartment 143 (2011) which he wrote and the Ryan Reynolds claustrophobic starrer - Buried (2010) which he directed but with Red Lights he thrusts himself to the top with an excellent and superbly crafted thriller. This film intrigued me from start to finish where nothing is as it seems and the adage 'be careful what you wish for', you might just get it; even the truth. 

Cortes has indeed done his homework for this film (apparently, he spent 18 months just researching the subject and writing the screenplay). He seems to know a lot of the ins and outs of how the the con-men are able to get a leg up on their subjects. Also, how susceptible we all are if we give in too easily to hope and answers that we look for to ease our own pain and anguish for our own personal tragedies. 

Red Lights is brilliantly acted by its four main stars. Each character seems to be involved for their own reasons but it is the tension between Murphy and DeNiro are at loggerheads. Is Silver a fake or can he do what he says he can? Is he an enigma? Or is he just like all the rest of the flim-flam artists? Olsen is sweetly naive and has no idea what she is in for when Tom and Simon go at it. 

Weaver is given top billing just after Cillian Murphy, but this is really Murphy and DeNiro tearing up the screen. Red Lights is a smart, intelligent and entertaining thriller and thankfully, it is now available on DVD. Red Lights - ***1/2 out of 4.

The Blair Witch Project (1999)

Recalling the Original 'Found Footage' Horror Pioneer

"In October of 1994, three student filmmakers disappeared in the woods near Burkittsville, Maryland while shooting a documentary. A year later their footage was found." Those are the opening words of the independent Horror cult hit of 1999 The Blair Witch Project. A horror film is probably the easiest type of film to make, and the hardest to make right. This one belongs to the latter!

For all the horror films I've seen (and on occasion enjoyed) only a few live in my nightmares, and those are the ones I respect. The Exorcist, with its suggestions of the babbling, malignant chaos slithering under the surface of human personality, comes to me sometimes when I'm trying to sleep. Day of the Dead, and to a different degree, Dawn of the Dead invades a disproportionate number of my nightmares, with the stink and rot encroaching, approaching, and unstoppable. 

Those films were joined by The Blair Witch Project, an experience - not just a film - of ever -tightening, suffocating dread and terror. The film shot primarily on video, with some black and white 16mm footage, is ostensibly the footage that was recovered a year after the disappearance of the three student filmmakers, director Heather Donahue, her cinematographer Josh, and her sound guy Mike. 

They are heading into the woods to explore the myth of the so-called Blair Witch, whose legend has been linked to several horrible killings and other sorts of weirdness. Soon enough, the three find themselves lost in the woods, with personality conflicts mounting, and with ever-stranger terrors coming to visit them late at night. The tension that builds is almost unbearable, as we, like they, come to dread the approaching nightfall and what it may bring. 

The fear these fine young actors display is very authentic, helped along no doubt by the improvisational guerrilla style of the shoot (directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez basically sent the actors out in the woods with minimal instructions, few provisions, and then came around at night to set up scares for them). 

If I have anything negative to say about the film, it might be that the three seem at times a little too intrepid. There wouldn't be a way in hell you could have gotten me out of my tent after that first night. But that's a small complaint in comparison to what you usually get in the genre, and besides, when a film's this good, I'll forgive a lot more than that. 

When I say "now", I'm going to talk a little about the film's progression to its ending, and the ending itself. I'll be very general, so you should be safe to read it, but if you STILL haven't seen the movie, and you're a viewer like me who doesn't want the slightest hint of a clue, you might want to stop reading NOW. 

The dilemma for the filmmakers with the way this picture is structured is that there are only so many ways it can end. Eventually, the cameras have to stop rolling. Does that mean provide some sort of big bang for the end, which would almost certainly be a disappointment considering the buildup, or else handle it more honestly, in which case it would sort of peter out? 

But this problem is solved ingeniously, with a final shot that's a brilliantly subtle shocker - so subtle, actually, that most of the post-movie conversation I heard was people explaining the last shot to their friends and dates. The Blair Witch Project was a reminder that there are still some great things going on in American cinema. It's indeed scary as hell. Kerry Douglas Dye

The Raven (2012)

JohnnyTwoToes finds this tell tale thriller disappointing!

If you have ever read any of Edgar Allan Poe's writings, you would agree that he was a gifted writer of the morose and the macabre. I have found only H.P. Lovecraft's writings to be more darkly demonic that Poe's. Poe at least enjoyed some of what life had to offer; the love of a woman and booze. Plenty and plenty of booze. 

As the film, The Raven opens we are told that Poe's last three days alive were sketchy at best and no one seems to know how his death came about on October 7, 1849. All we are told is that he was something of a sleuth assisting the local police in finding a serial killer using Poe's own writing to commit murder. This movie expands on that premise!

John Cusack plays Poe and for the most part he does the best he can. But I could not help to wonder if maybe he was miscast. He certainly LOOKS like Poe, but there seemed to be something missing for me to really buy Cusack as the tortured writer. John Cusack is a fine actor and one of my favorites. I think the script written by Ben Livingston and Hannah Shakespeare is so scatter-shot that after a while I began to piece together the mystery and had figured out who the killer was about halfway into the film. 

There is a strong cast to support Cusack though. They include the awesome Brendan Gleeson as the father of Poe's fiance, Emily who is taken by the killer. Alice Eve plays Emily and she is decent enough but, again it seems that the script is underwritten in its character so that everyone seems to be trying too hard to sell the story. 

I found myself wanting to go back and watch Murder By Decree. A great film about Jack The Ripper and Sherlock Holmes with Christopher Plummer as Holmes. The Raven only made me want to watch other films that were better. 

Is then The Raven a bad film? No but it is a lifeless one as uninteresting characters plod through a muddled serial killer plot we have seen done before and better. Director James McTeigue has some moments where the film works particularly when Luke Evans as Detective Fields is on screen. Fields seems to like Poe, regardless of Poe's nonsense. Poe spends most of the film broke and blathering about, yet Fields seems to understand Poe's problems and sympathizes with him. But, overall I was disappointed with The Raven. At the film's end we know nothing more about Poe and his brilliance other than what we have been spoon fed in literature class. The Raven-** out of 4.

Memento (2000)

Decrypting Christopher Nolan's Breakthrough Thriller

Watching Memento is like doing a particularly tough Sunday Times crossword puzzle. It offers an elegantly structured mystery that’s meaty enough to keep you chewing on it for most of its running time. It’s unpredictable, sleek, and gives its characters some nice, punchy lines to throw at each other. But it’s also a relatively heartless film, so caught up in its plot details that its final resolution doesn’t leave much of a mark. It’s a film that leaves you saying “Wow” and “So what?” at the same time. 

Memento is built around Guy Pearce’s alert performance as Leonard Shelby, an insurance investigator whose wife was raped and murdered in the couple’s house one night. Leonard received a brutal head injury in the attack, and it’s robbed him of his short-term memory, leaving him incapable of forming a memory of anything that’s happened since the moment of his wife’s death. Unable to understand what he’s doing for more than a few minutes at a time, he’s built his life around the one image that still has any meaning for him: his wife’s lifeless expression. 

He’s determined to find her killer and avenge her murder, but he has to keep in mind all the myriad clues he’s uncovered—a tough nut for someone stuck in the present tense. Nor does it help that he’s surrounded by people whose loyalties keep shifting from moment to moment: the shady and sarcastic Teddy (Joe Pantoliano); Natalie (Carrie-Ann Moss), a jaded bartender whose drug-dealing boyfriend has gone missing; and Burt (Mark Boone, Jr.), the raffish manager of the motel where Leonard lives. Leonard keeps his facts straight the only way he can. He snaps pictures of everyone he has dealings with, and gives each photo a caption indicating the level of trust he should feel for each person. (These captions are subject to heavy revision.) A chronic note-taker, his motel room is strewn with written reminders of everything he must bear in mind. And the most important facts in his life—the things he believes to be certainties about his wife’s assailant—he tattoos onto his body so that he can reacquaint himself with the case on a moment to moment basis. 

Mysteries by nature have a poison pill built into them. The very things that make a good mystery interesting—the inexplicable events, the incongruous clues—have a surrealistic hit that’s almost always undercut when the humdrum explanation comes out. Usually we’re told in a few breathless lines of dialogue near the end that the physical laws of nature have been turned upside down, and the rules of human behavior inverted, all because some money grubber was trying to run a con. 

It’s a letdown when the mysteries of the universe are so easily explained away by a shabby inheritance, a roll of microfilm, a kilo of uncut heroin. How do you satisfactorily explain vanishing footprints, or a body that has India ink in its veins? How do you keep escapist whimsy from falling apart in its last fifteen minutes? 

Nolan knows all this, and he’s done what he can to mitigate the problem. Memento’s kicker is that it reveals Leonard’s story to us in reverse, beginning with the death of a major character and working backwards in time, scene by scene, towards the attack on Leonard and his wife. At the same time, running against the grain of the main narrative, is a flashback told in linear fashion about the target of one of Leonard’s old insurance fraud investigations. This man (Stephen Tobolowsky, who’s making a career of popping up in surprising places) suffers from the same malady as Leonard, and his story revolves around the grief felt by his wife (Harriet Harris, in the film’s best performance) over losing the man she once loved. As Memento moves towards its conclusion, this sub-narrative casts an increasingly longer shadow over Leonard Shelby’s dilemma, until the two stories converge on an unexpected plane. 

Using the reverse narrative displaces the focus from Leonard’s banal quest for vengeance, so that the pedestrian concern of “Who killed Mrs. Shelby?” never overwhelms the movie. It makes room for such commonsensical paradoxes as Natalie’s observation “Even if you get revenge…you’re not even going to know that it happened,” and adds a melancholy, transitory flavor to Leonard’s relationships. (Even the people who don’t like him are distressed when he keeps forgetting who they are.) It also forces us to view the movie’s events through Leonard’s eyes: when a scene opens with him sitting on a toilet with a bottle of booze in his hand, we have no more idea than he does how he came to be there. We’re constantly waiting for the end of the next scene to understand the one that we’re watching, and the movie’s novelty—seeing how Leonard Shelby came by the scars, clothes, and even the haircut that he first appears in—lies in its graphic demonstration of the (reversed) axiom: “If a gun is fired in the first act, then it must appear in the third act.” 

Memento probably merits neither the scorn it’s sure to receive from people turned off by its hype or paper-thin characters, nor the wild praise it’s already receiving for its unconventional narrative. It’s not close to being a Chinatown or The Third Man, but it’s good enough to help tide us over until the next great mystery comes along. That said, if it offers all the pleasures of a tough crossword puzzle, its rewards run not that much deeper. Near the end of its run, “Seinfeld” broadcast a episode that told its story in reverse chronology, and in 23 brilliant minutes seemed to exhaust the device as it (unlike Memento) moved from obscurity to clarity. Absent the bloodletting, and with only George Costanza’s sexual pride at stake, the show revealed the idea for what it is: a lark. Tom Block

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The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999)

A Stellar Waste of a Talented Cast

There are so many problems with the Talented Mr Ripley - it is hard to know where to begin. Everything that director Anthony Minghella did right in The English Patient (1996) he managed to undo in this film.The running time of the English Patient was just around three hours and, in that time, Minghella wove a tapestry of complex characters doomed by circumstance. In Ripley he never gets to the point. 

What drives Tom Ripley? is he just a sociopath for any reason? is Minghella trying to show us how a simple lie can force the hand of the purveyor? All are interesting questions that receive nary an explanation, but by far the most interesting question is why waste an incredibly talented cast in such a disjointed film? 

With the exception of Jude Law’s performance, the cast is utterly wasted in totally undeveloped characters who just pass time on the screen - pass time indeed at a running time of just about two and a half hours. The poor pacing of the film caused it to drag more and more, making it seem as though the film would never end... and when it did there was no real resolution and, for lack of a better phrase, no point. 

Mr. Ripley was, without a doubt, the largest waste of a cast I have ever seen, squandering the abilities of such wonderful actors as Philip Seymour Hoffman, Cate Blanchet, Gwyneth Paltrow, James Rebhorn and Philip Baker Hall, but the largest contribution to the worthlessness of the film was Matt Damon’s performance as Ripley. With no character development he had nothing to do at all except look senseless. 

The subplot of the characters homosexuality was largely untouched (with the exception of a few fleeting glances) and the character’s inability to make decisions about what is affecting his life is totally ignored. It is unfortunate that the film does not live up to the spectacular source material (novel by Patricia Highsmith) or the first film version (1964’s plein soleil or purple noon), but more than anything else, the true tragedy is the time and energy wasted on such a mediocre, untalented and pointless film. Anderson TW

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