Jeers, mate!

CROCODILE DUNDEE IN LOS ANGELES (2001)

Reviewed By Jerry Saravia

 

Eddie Murphy made this movie in 1984. It was called "Beverly Hills Cop," an uneven, fitfully funny fish-out-of-water action-comedy. Paul Hogan did his bit in the original "Crocodile Dundee" in 1986, and then returned for a mildly entertaining sequel in 1988. Considering both Dundee movies scored well at the box-office, it is amazing it has taken a whole decade to make a sequel so bereft of anything remotely comic.

Paul Hogan once again returns as the formidable crocodile hunter, Mick Dundee, who still remains naive about the world and pop culture (though the latter is not a bad thing to be naive about). He still resides in the Subaru Outback, though he is unable to catch a crocodile. He is also still living with Sue (Linda Kozlowski), the Newsday journalist, though they are not legally married. They do have a son who worries about razorbacks. So far, not too bad. That is until the filmmakers decide to take the family out to the big city, yet again. The reason? Sue has a job in L.A. at her father's bureau. Whoa! Her assignment is to investigate a movie studio that is making sequels to "Lethal Agent" though they are all financial disasters - sort of what Paramount is doing with Crocodile Dundee. Is the sequel business a front for something else? Of course, and Mick Dundee does all the hard work while Sue sits behind the desk. Meanwhile, we have product placements for the Paramount tour and Wendy's. There are also one-note, thinly veiled jokes about Mike Tyson and meditating, coffee enemas and George Hamilton, gay bars, Hispanic gangs, cartoonish villains, Tom Cruise, Mel Gibson, and chimps that can't follow directions on a movie set. Using a chimp in a movie sequel is the cry of DESPERATION. Lest we not forget that there are a few women in the movie who find Mick attractive, though he remains naive about their suggestive remarks. How's this for a different kind of sequel - the setting is the Outback where Mick decides whether or not to legally marry Sue while fending off alluring women's advances from his tours, as well as training his son in the secrets of the wilderness? Not funny? Well, then you can see why a return to this shallow character was not a great idea in the first place.

Like its once charismatic star, "Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles" is the equivalent of a flatline.

I can't shoot it like Hitchcock

THE KEY TO RESERVA (2007)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

"I can't shoot it the way I would. Can I shoot it as Hitchcock? I don't think so. So who will I shoot it as?" - Martin Scorsese

Thus begins the one of the most unique commercials I have ever seen - an ad for Freixenet Cava wine. What is interesting is that director Martin Scorsese is not as focused on the wine as he is on the approach of doing a Hitchcock filmmaking style for an unfinished fictitious script. The script is only 3 pages long and it deals with a Hitchcock hero (Simon Baker) searching for a key that opens a box of wine that holds top secret information in its cork. The setting is a concert hall where the conductor and orchestra perform Bernard Herrmann's classic theme from "North By Northwest." One of the violinists (Christopher Denham, who later appeared in Scorsese's "Shutter Island") spots our hero in the theatre box and leaves to strangle him. Chaos erupts as Herrmann's music builds with more and more intensity. Homages to classic shots and compositions from Hitch's films abound, though Scorsese's touch is not evident (excepting the pull-back shot of the concert hall which reminded me of "Age of Innocence"). Of course, this is precisely the point and it asks the tough questions about a filmmaker with a distinctive style imitating another - can it be done and should it? At the end, Scorsese even flirts with the notion of completing Erich Von Stroheim's "Greed" (Scorsese himself would never attempt to complete someone else's work, despite this commercial which may be his first jokey, postmodernist approach to another master director. Only the adaptation of Joseph Conrad's novel "Nostromo" comes to mind - a film that would have been directed by David Lean who died during pre-production. Scorsese had been attached to direct it at one point but it is doubtful he would have shot as Lean would have).

"The Key to Reserva" will make most Hitchcock aficionados giddy with spot-on references to "The Birds," "Notorious," "Saboteur" and "Dial M for Murder" and "North By Northwest." Simon Baker even resembles Farley Granger from "Rope" and "Strangers on a Train," not to mention the casting of Kelli O'Hara in the Grace Kelly/Eva Marie Saint role and Michael Stuhlbarg as the James-Mason-type villain who clearly wants Baker's character killed. Mostly, "The Key to Reserva" is Scorsese having a ball trying to adopt a style that has been filtered through in his own work. Now about those stills from "Greed"...

A tongue-in-cheek martial-arts classic

ENTER THE DRAGON (1973)

An appreciation by Jerry Saravia

It is strange to think that the late Bruce Lee just hit his international Hollywood mark with "Enter the Dragon" and never lived to see his legacy. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage at the tender age of 32 back in 1973. He was gone way too soon yet none of that diminishes the impact of one of the finest martial-arts flicks of all time, the one and only "Enter the Dragon." It is a comic-book movie, a sort of Chinese James Bond but with none of the gadget gimmicks. In this case, Bruce Lee plays Lee, a Shaolin Temple fighter who enters an epic martial-arts tournament by a most evil yet charming Mr. Han (Shih Kien).

Lee is not the only fighter entering the competition in some remote island where guns are not allowed. John Saxon is Roper, a gambler and con-man who is pretty good with his fists even when evading some mob muscle while playing golf. The late Jim Kelly is Williams, the one with the huge afro who admonishes Han for acting like a villain from a comic-book. Roper and Williams are old friends who want to party and get the girls. Lee merely has a mission unbeknownst to anyone - to find evidence of women OD'ing and left to die off the shores of Han's island. Naturally, Lee also has a vendetta against one of Han's prized fighters, O'Harra with a nasty facial scar (Bob Wall), though I will not reveal what that vendetta is.

"Enter the Dragon" has many classic sequences that are pretty much iconic in the action-adventure realm as well. Bruce Lee's fight sequences are legendary, especially fighting with nunchakus, flip-kicking or delivering flying kicks in slow-motion (the flip kick is not actually performed by Lee but by his double, though Lee had planned to incorporate gymnastics into his Jeet Kune Do style). He steals the show from everyone (though as former film critic Danny Peary once said, you kinda wish Lee had shared at least one moment with Williams).  Still even a scene-stealer like Lee can't take away from the charms of John Saxon or Jim Kelly. Saxon has many crowd-pleasing moments (and he has great chemistry with the wonderful Ahna Capri as Han's assistant) but it is Jim Kelly and his sarcastic asides to Han that elevate the tension of a most unwelcome island where guards are killed if they do not protect the island's deep dark secrets. Kelly's Williams also has a funny flashback to some racist cops who can't allow a black man to travel to Hawaii - it has a racial charge and its denouement had audiences cheering back when I saw the film in theaters in 1978. And when Saxon's Roper fights the rough and vicious Bolo (Bolo Yeung), it is electrically charged escapism, particularly the segue to hundreds of minions fighting our heroes in what must have been hellish staging by director Robert Clouse and Bruce Lee, who choreographed all the fights.

Also noteworthy is the Hall of Mirrors climax, nicely echoing a similarly startling moment from Orson Welles' "The Lady From Shanghai." It is thrilling and nail-biting entertainment with Han's claws dominating the sequence as he tries to tear apart Lee. Lee also has a slow-motion scream in close-up where he destroys one fighter during a tournament - it has to be seen to be believed and it is positively chilling.

A vastly entertaining martial-arts action picture, "Enter the Dragon" can infrequently get silly and a little unbelievable (watch Lee fly from the ground up to the top of a tree branch) but it is tongue-in-cheek without getting too goofy. At once humorous, graceful and full of some truly hypnotic fight sequences that seemingly last an eternity (Angela Mao as Lee's sister has a very intense fight sequence with dozens of fighters that lasts a good five minutes), this is the best of the ensemble martial-arts action pics, a precursor to Clouse's own "Force Five" and others of its ilk where the director hoped he would reignite that "Dragon" feel (Clouse never managed to make lightning strike twice). It is the catlike Bruce Lee, though, who shows what a charismatic fighter and electrifying screen presence he really was. We'll never know, after doing four action pics and the incomplete "Game of Death," where Bruce Lee's career would have taken him. "Enter the Dragon" is a great hint.

When Prince Struts

PURPLE RAIN (1984)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

"Purple Rain" is one of those movies I recall seeing but have little recollection of anything substantial. I know I saw it on cable back in the 1980's and recall the scenes by the lake with the strutting Prince and the curvaceous Apollonia taking her clothes off. I also remember the concert sequences, the song "When Doves Cry" played as an MTV video (an excerpt I can recall was played on the TV special "Sneak Previews" back when Jeffrey Lyons and Neal Gabler were the critics), and Morris Day dumping a woman literally in a trash bin. Seeing the movie again recently, I can say it is flashy and watchable but also listless and uninvolving. The music sounds great but there is nothing else to groove to.

Prince is the Kid, a rising musician in Minneapolis who plays at a local club. His songs of late have disappointed the regular club customers, mostly because he is playing to himself. The club owner tells Kid not to be like his father, another musician who failed to harness his talent. The group that really plays to the crowd is the Time with Morris Day (playing himself) as the playboyish, strutting, preening lead singer. His song "Jungle Love" is electrifying, exciting and sexual, as well as other pop songs he plays to the crowd. The Kid does not cater to the crowds the same way - he is too concerned with his own traumas to care. The Kid doesn't just have his own ego-inflating persona to deal with - he also has an abusive, emotionally shattered father who beats up his white mother. But there is some measure of hope when the Kid meets Apollonia, a nineteen-year-old singer with huge aspirations. They start having an affair and when the Kid makes her undress and beats her, we see him imitating his father. By the end of the film, things will go back to normal.

"Purple Rain" has its best moments dealing with the Kid's band, especially the two backup singers, Wendy and Lisa (playing essentially themselves). Wendy often writes her own songs and wants Kid to hear them and play them live. Kid merely mocks them with a hand puppet. I also enjoyed Morris Day's interludes with his assistant as they look for sexy dancers in their act. Clarence Williams III scores a realistic, tough performance as Kid's long-suffering father who keeps unperformed lyrics in the basement of their house. Beyond that, "Purple Rain" is empty and lackluster in the dramatic department. Prince may have presence on stage but in close-up, he looks like a weeping Liberace with big eyes and bright outfits. There is no real energy in his performance - he merely stares stupefyingly into empty space. Apollonia is barely given much to do outside of singing and appearing like a sexual creature in lingerie and black outfits.

The musical stage acts are well-choreographed and titillating - they keep your eyes and ears glued to the screen. Most of the movie is an MTV video and, on that level, it has a kinetic charm that is hypnotic. I still say that Morris Day should have had the lead role - he is more alive than anyone else in the entire movie.

He's a tedious grump, Mr. Grinch

HOW THE GRINCH STOLE CHRISTMAS (2000)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

The pure enjoyment of any of Dr. Seuss' books is the heartfelt magic he brought to them, including "Cat in the Hat" or even good old Grinch. Chuck Jones's animated classic short from 1966 certainly had that in spades. Ron Howard's dull live-action version is a bland, overstuffed souffle, more likely to make you yawn than laugh. I've always been skeptical about a live-action version of the story since the animated short always did it so well in such a short running time. At 102 minutes, director Ron Howard is plowing all over the map with nothing to say.

Jim Carrey is the Grinch, the lovable, sneaky, clever, furry, green-eyed being who lives atop Mount Crumpit, essentially an elf-shoe shaped peak atop garbage mountain overlooking Whoville. The Grinch hates Christmas, and he hates all the cheery Who denizens who live in Whoville (they even hold an annual Holiday Cheermeister award). The Whos live for Christmas, and they love to shop for gifts spending copious amounts of money (is there a message here about consumerism in America?) The Grinch hates these people so much that he takes a maniacal glee in trying to destroy their holiday spirit. In fact, I almost agreed with the Grinch's mean efforts. These Whos are joyless, frenetic people with pig snouts and no personality, and the flashback on how the Grinch became such a grouch entitles him to far more sympathy than probably intended.

The film has no visual imagination whatsoever. Every shot is in close-up and it makes all the surroundings feel cramped and busy. The production design and art direction is washed-out at best with little sense of space or even any vivid colors - Whoville is so dully imagined that it reminded me of the colorless world from Barry Levinson's atrocious "Toys." No wonder the Grinch is so grumpy - his messy, dank domicile has more character and personality than anything in Whoville.

Jim Carrey is fairly tolerable but his manic brand of humor and one-liners robs the film of any heart or soul and quickly proves tedious after awhile - I will say his final scene where he realizes what Christmas is really about proves what a good actor Carrey can be. Christine Baranski as Martha May Whovier, the Grinch's former childhood love, delivers a little pizazz but she hardly snares much screen time. Taylor Momsen as Cindy Lou Who, the only citizen who believes the Grinch is not as mean as he may look, has some tender moments, but most of the cast seems lost in the film's frenzied style.

What was needed for "The Grinch" was the impressive imaginings of Tim Burton considering he created the story of the fabulous "Nightmare Before Christmas" back in 1993, a more comical take on the nature of Christmas. The original "Grinch" had style, flair and a sense of magic. This modernized version feels cold and dreary, like a soiled stocking left outside of Grinch's Mount Crumpit home.

No charm in this stinky snake tale

CURSE II: THE BITE (1989)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

A young couple (J. Eddie Peck, Jill Schoelen) travel through 100 miles of snakes in the desert road. Along the way, they meet gas station attendants with shotguns and snake-like mutated dogs, Jamie Farr as a Brooklyn traveling salesman/doctor, and some rattlesnake that cries like a baby and eventually bites the hand of Schoelen's boyfriend. Of course, this sounds like a throwback to those atomic monster pics from the 1950's, though not nearly as thrilling and far more yucky.

"Curse II: The Bite" is an in-name only sequel that shares no resemblance to the yuckier 1987 horror flick, "The Curse" (which had precious little to do with its literary inspiration, H.P. Lovecraft). This movie is a heck of a lot better than that horrifically misguided 1987 flick yet what we have in store folks is certainly much ado about nothing. A snake bite leads the tall J. Eddie to have a bandaged hand for most of the movie's running time but rather than showing how it affects him physically and emotionally, he just looks merely constipated throughout. In one scene, he punches dearest Jill Schoelen in the face at a New Mexico bar - one can assume it is because he is jealous that she is dancing with another guy which J. Eddie presumably allows. This snake is protruding through Peck's hand and it has a life of its own but, aside from the bar scene, all that snake wants to do is kill everyone it comes in contact with, or does it? It kills one cop, and lets an irate sheriff with a bandaged nose (Bo Svenson, of all people) off the hook by merely whacking him in the head! It kills a nurse by thrusting itself in her mouth, but it lets Jamie Farr go since he faints. What kind of snake is this?

Jill Schoelen in Curse II: The Bite

Jamie Farr comes off best in this movie as the pseudo-doctor who is trying to locate the couple thru CB radio after realizing he gave J. Eddie the wrong antidote. J. Eddie Peck is a pleasing presence but he grows more unlikable as the movie progresses (I guess a few living snakes in your body, courtesy of creature effects guru Screaming Mad George, can lead to a rotten mood). For example, J. Eddie promises he would never hit Jill, then smacks her, then makes love to her in a dark barn with shafts of light peering through (one of the least erotic lovemaking scenes in film history). The underrated Jill Schoelen is always a pleasant diversion and she not only gets to play guitar and sing a song, but she also shows she is nobody's property (of course, she does succumb to her Snake Eyes pal after he massages her, um, lower extremities).

"Curse II: The Bite" is not the worst of its kind but it is resolutely cheesy horror that never quite establishes the menace that needs to be destroyed. Once the movie spirals into an absurd contrivance with some religious folk and an insanely overlong climax, it is easy to tune out from this mess. For Jill Schoelen fans, it is worthwhile getting through its story lulls and slow pacing because her presence shines so brightly. As for the rest of you, there is nothing charming about this stinky snake tale.

Disposably Witchy findings

BOOK OF SHADOWS: BLAIR WITCH 2 (2000)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

(Original review from 2000 screening)

Perhaps I am overindulgent in my praise but I still think "The Blair Witch Project" is one of the best horror films of the last twenty years. Although the film may not have been completely original, its approach certainly was. Primarily shot on video and 16mm black-and-white film, it had the look and feel of an extremely low-budget feature that could have been made by anyone with a camcorder and a computer. The difference with "Blair" as opposed to other independent horror flicks, such as "The Evil Dead" and "Halloween," is that it did not feel like a movie - it sort of transpired before our eyes in practically documentary fashion. Now we have a sequel, "Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2," that commits the error of most other shopworn sequels - it has gore, sex, loud heavy metal music, and a host of ghostly manifestations right out of 1999's "The Haunting." The original suggested the menace of evil. This "Blair" leaves precious little to the imagination, though we can be thankful that there is still no visible witch.

"Blair Witch 2" begins promisingly enough. There is a nifty prologue set in the town of Burkittsville where the "Blair Witch" mania has spun out of control, and the local citizens speak out on how they have dealt with it. The local sheriff reassures the "Blair" fans that there is no witch in the town or in the woods. But then things go wrong. A mental asylum is shown as a flashback of where Jeffrey Donovan, a former patient, was abused by the doctors and guards. Once Jeffrey is released, he organizes a Blair Witch Hunt, which is a tour of the Black Hills woods where the original movie took place. Jeffrey finds four other willing participants for his tour through the magic of the Internet. They include: Kim Director, a telekinetic goth chick (resembling a pale Heather Donahue) who found the movie to be cool; Erica Leerhsen, a sensitive Wiccan obsessed with spreading the good word about witches; and a couple (Stephen Barker Turner and Tristen Skyler) involved in writing a book on the Blair Witch. Together they camp out in the woods where they find misplaced trees and another wandering tour group. After a wild night of drugs and heavy Jack Daniels boozing, they find out the next day that the cameras are all gone, except for the tapes, and all the research from the Blair authors is shredded. What happened during that night? And what is it with all the bloody witch markings on their bodies? And who killed that rival tour group at Coffin Rock?

At this point, the film begins to get a little more intriguing in the investigation of the tapes that were set up in the cameras to record their nighttime activities. The group's intent is to discover what happened to them, and what they find is quite grisly and decadent to say the least. Unfortunately, director Joe Berlinger (acclaimed documentarian of films such as "Paradise Lost" and "Brother's Keeper") throws in everything to the mix except the witch. We get milisecond shock cuts in the form of flashforwards, relentlessly repeated montages of stabbings and dripping blood, ghostly manifestations of the Burkittsville children killed long ago by the witch, naked bodies dancing and cavorting in the woods, some sexual byplay between Erica and Stephen, and so on. Although it is not as overdone as your basic slasher cum horror flick sequel, it feels like a bastardization of everything the original "Blair Witch" did so well.

Another problem are the characters who feel like they had been recycled from the "Scream" mix (Marilyn Manson's song "Disposable Teens" gives a hint of what's to come). With the sole exception of the goth chick, all the characters are unmemorable and bland to say the least - they scream, shout and argue but they hardly have much in the way of personality. Heather, Mike and Josh were annoying too but they had gobs of humanity, wit and sympathy - everything this cast lacks. The pregnant Tristen Skyler, who should be the most sympathetic of the bunch, comes across as the most unlikable - she even dreams of killing her newborn! If we cannot care about the characters, then we care less if there is a witch inducing a group hypnosis on this bunch.

The concept of this film is fascinating - it assumes the original was just a film and that this group is out to perhaps debunk the myth. Although the ending is gripping, it lacks the emotional subtext of the original. There are some good Heather Donahue jokes, a nod to Frederick Wiseman's excellent documentary, "Titicut Follies," and some occasionally tense scenes but this is mostly a lifeless, perfunctory affair. It's obvious that nobody could have made a decent sequel to a phenomenon like "The Blair Witch Project," a horror film that only comes around once in a blue moon. There is sound advice from Randy in "Scream 2" that the filmmakers should listen to - 'Sequels suck. They are inferior films. The horror genre was destroyed by them'. Sounds just about right.