The makings of a disaster

LE FEAR 2: LE SEQUEL (2015)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Making a low-budget B monster movie is sure fun for anyone involved. Making or attempting to make a quality "film noir" horror movie with Z-grade amateurs is probably not much fun. Part of the hilarity of Jason Croot's "Le Fear 2: Le Sequel" is when you expect quality with a bigger budget...and you still get horse dung.

Carlos Revalos (Kyri Saphiris) is the incompetent filmmaker who is pitching to make a horror film that features vampires and presumably witch doctors. A South African executive producer (from Nollywood - Nigeria's answer to Hollywood) named Dirk Heinz (played by Andrew Tiernan) promises a huge 10 million dollar production deal as long as Carlos puts up 500,000 pounds of his own money. Aye, there is the rub. Why on earth does Carlos have to put up money for a proposed 10 million budget? Good question.

Enter Nollywood producer Efi (Seye Adelekan) who is some sort of hip, energized yet completely hopeless and clueless man that basically ruins the production. When Carlos asks for a studio set, he gets a used, smelly caravan vehicle. Props and FX master brings in Halloween decorations! An actress plays a vampire in ways that even Vampira would object to. Queenie (played with an edgy wickedness by Victoria Hopkins) is the sex-starved makeup artist who seduces the cinematographer and an actress. A lead actress (Denise Moreno) is nonplussed by the shoddiness of it all. "I want horror," screams Carlos consistently and all he gets are inflatable alien dolls and an Ed Wood-type inflatable UFO from a FX expert who supposedly worked on "Avatar"! When the lead actress angrily exits, a Japanese actress who can't speak a lick of English replaces her. A 35mm motion picture camera and a dolly are requested and all Efi brings to the table is nothing but an old 8mm camera.

There are many laughs and a few groans in "Le Fear II." For one, the appearance of the title of the film on occasion runs a little dry (maybe it should be introduced twice during its opening credits, the second time it can be shown in bigger letters as it was in Robert Altman's "Brewster McCloud"). I also think a little tightening of a couple scenes would help - there a few dry spells that do not elicit much laughter such as Queenie aiming incessantly for a quickie with the cinematographer (far funnier and titillating is Queenie seducing the vampire actress). Carlo's shocked face at the progress of the movie could be sustained longer periodically. Still, I love the freewheeling Efi whose very cluelessness (including his misunderstanding of the word "gremlin) ups the ante on laughs that had me in stitches throughout - he steals the movie singlehandedly.

This review of "Le Fear II" applies to a work-in-progress - the official date of release is not till April 2015. In terms of other movie-within-the-movie movies, "Le Fear II" is nothing new technically (aside from the shadiness of the South African producer and money man) but it is consistently smart and witty (it will be funnier to those who have participated in the making of grade Z schlock). 

Rebel without a cause

BOYS DON'T CRY (1999)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

(Originally viewed in 1999)

It is no secret that America has its share of homophobia and racism abounding in all corners of every state. I am sure in Falls City, Nebraska, it is no different. The girl who passed herself off as a boy named Brandon Teena probably knew that such homophobia existed but that did not stop him (I will refer to Brandon as a male) from being true to herself. And so commences the bristling, highly effective "Boys Don't Cry," a debut film by director Kimberly Peirce based on a true story. An incredibly mesmerizing film, Peirce certainly shows a gift for handling actors and raw emotions.

The highly magnetic Hilary Swank stars as Brandon Teena, formerly Teena Brandon, who moves to Falls City despite the hesitations and warnings from her cousin. Brandon makes fast friends in Falls City with some beer-swilling, truck-driving, pot-smoking young people. Two of them (Peter Saarsgard and Brendan Sexton III) are former jail buddies with nothing on their minds except drinking and putting their hands through flames. But there is one Brandon has his eye on - the dour-looking female teen who loves karaoke, Lana (Chloe Sevigny). She drinks heavily and works in a factory, but is immediately smitten by Brandon because he is so unlike any other males she has encountered in this dead-end town. Brandon respects her, and suddenly, Lana seems to overcome her sullenness and becomes full of life - as if a diamond had sprung and sparkled her sensibilities.

Brandon has a troubled past to contend with, however, and it inevitably catches up with him. He has robbed, cheated and lied but all for a positive cause in a way, to stay true to himself. Brandon wants to do away with girlish sensibilities - he cuts his hair short and places a sock in between his legs. And he gets away with it! He asks girls out in roller-skating rinks and treats them like queens. Lana is the latest girl to be comforted by Brandon, and even if there is the danger of her finding out what his real gender is, we know she will still love him.

"Boys Don't Cry" has two magnificent performances that will touch the heart and rivet the soul. Hilary Swank is clearly amazing in that she looks like a boy and we respond to her as such - her beaming smile glows and makes Brandon that much more sympathetic a character. We know there is an inevitable tragedy he will face, and so the tension builds because Brandon means well and is harmless.

Chloe Sevigny also undergoes a miraculous transformation, from her binge drinking habits and dourness to a pleasing beauty with an angelic face waiting to be loved. Ever since her dramatic turns in "Kids" and "Trees Lounge," I have fallen in love with Chloe - her presence evokes compassion, much like the late Audrey Hepburn. It is a quality unheard of in most young actresses today, but Chloe has it down pat.

"Boys Don't Cry" is raw and painful, and is not intended for general audiences, but those who can deal with the subject matter will be rewarded with the performances of Swank and Sevigny. They embody the film with sweetness and raw, naked emotion - their relationship is as real as any love story I have seen of late. If I have any complaints about the film, it is only that I wished to see how Brandon tried to adapt from day-to-day as a boy - there is one scene where he has to buy tampons but ,otherwise, he seems to be able to deal with the situation remarkably well. Still, director Peirce knows that the heart of the film is Brandon, the rebel without a cause. His only concern is to have a sex operation and to live with Lana in Memphis. He has ambitions and dreams ("You hallucinate 24 hours a day," says one character about Brandon) but his main focus is to be free and to live. The fact that he couldn't is what makes "Boys Don't Cry" such a moving, poetic experience.

Broken Axel

BEVERLY HILLS COP III (1994)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
(Originally viewed in 1994)

"Beverly Hills Cop" is an idea that could run dry quickly, witness the hideously awful "Lethal Weapon 4" which nearly destroyed the credibility of its own series. How many times can you see Axel Foley bluff his way out of any situation in Beverly Hills? Wouldn't the entire Los Angeles area have made him into a media hero by now with his motormouth skills, not to mention his mingling with Hugh Hefner at the Playboy Mansion in "Beverly Hills Cop II"? The third time is not the charm in this tired, listless though infrequently and mildly diverting sequel. The public wasn't buying it anymore either since they did not attend. Wise move. Of course, I did attend when I saw it in a theater back in May, 1994.

Eddie Murphy is back again as Axel Foley, the smart-aleck Detroit detective who laughs louder than anyone else in the United States. This time, his Inspector Todd (Gil Hill) is killed in the opening sequence, which involves some uninspired business with the FBI and chop shops. Foley is mad and wants to find the killers so, well, he puts on his Detroit Lions jacket and is back in business in Beverly Hills. Judge Reinhold returns as Billy Rosewood as does Bronson Pinchot in a brief cameo as Serge, now selling home-equipped artillery! Taggart (John Ashton) and the police chief Bogomil (Ronny Cox) are conspicuously missing. Oh, yes, whatever happened to Paul Reiser?

Something seemed wrong from the start. It is unusual for a "Beverly Hills Cop" movie to have Axel barely bluffing, but it is true. In fact, he is actually a pretty harmless, sensitive guy who buys a ticket into an amusement park called Wonderworld rather than bluffing his way into getting it free. The amusement park concept, as written by Steven E. de Souza, is dull at best, as are the cardboard villains. It doesn't have an ounce of suspense or surprise in it. We are left with Foley horsing around with costumed characters and donning a bunny costume for laughs! Ha! Ha! And the killers are using Wonderworld as a front for counterfeiting money! Wow! A great concept indeed!

"Beverly Hills Cop III" is directed with static energy by John Landis, a director responsible for more disasters than any other director. The comedy relief is so haphazard and dryly written that, at best, it elicits only a few chuckles (opening chop shop scene cueing Supremes' "Come See About Me" and Axel's verbal exchanges with Inspector Todd come off best). The action scenes are badly edited and constructed (look at the pitiful scene where Eddie is hanging around a Ferris wheel or one of the final shootouts towards the end where the killers shoot literally on autopilot). The movie eschews comedy for action and plenty of shootouts but little else. They could have cast Wesley Snipes instead of Murphy and nobody would notice the difference. We want to see Eddie Murphy firing off rounds of humor, not ammunition. 

Supercharged, action man Axel

BEVERLY HILLS COP II (1987)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Eddie Murphy was riding high back in 1987. He was one of the biggest stars in the world, turning in big box-office dollars with the original "Beverly Hills Cop," "The Golden Child," "48 HRS.," and "Trading Places." Murphy could do no wrong, and this rip-roaring, extremely loud sequel to "Beverly Hills Cop" was no exception. It reunited him with the two "supercops" from the original, John Ashton as the heavy-set Taggart and Judge Reinhold as the naive Billy Rosewood. Naturally, Murphy was at the center of the film, spouting jokes and obscenities galore. Something changed, though, and most critics picked up on it. Murphy was loud and irreverent as always, but there was a meaner edge and a sexist attitude that was standoffish to say the least.

"Cop II" begins with an L.A. jewelry robbery that is as loud and overdone as expected from the team of Jerry Bruckheimer and Don Simpson. Then we flash to the city of Detroit with Eddie back as Axel Foley, preening for the camera as he wears an expensive suit, drives a Ferrari, and goes deep, deep undercover trying to infiltrate a credit card scam! This raises the ire of returnee Inspector Todd (played by real-life Detroit police inspector Gilbert Hill) who is paying for Axel's expenses despite the fact that no arrests have been made. Before you know it, Axel (in a contrived scene) discovers that his good friend, Lieutenant Bogomil (Ronny Cox), has been shot by someone from the Alphabet Team who have committed a string of Alphabet robberies in L.A., including one in the opening sequence. So Axel decides to go to Beverly Hills, comfort Bogomil and his stunning blonde daughter (Alice Adair), and help solve the crimes with the reluctant Taggart and the giddy Rosewood.

When first glimpsed, "Beverly Hills Cop II" might be seen as a great movie if seen with the right audience, but it hardly qualifies on second viewing. For one, there are far too many inconsistencies, including the fact that Axel is friends with Taggart, Rosewood and Bogomil (the very same people who were ready to put him in jail in the original). Plus, Axel seems to get away with too much, including an improbable scene where he talks his way into the Playboy Mansion. Unlikely. The original was more clever by allowing scenes such as Axel using racism and a supposed Rolling Stone cover story to get inside a ritzy hotel. And how about the ridiculous scene where he talks a construction crew into leaving the house they are remodeling, thus allowing Axel to stay in a house in Beverly Hills for free, complete with a jacuzzi and a slippery swimming pool!

There is an underlying sexist edge to the film, which lead to Eddie's extremely raw, fitfully funny concert film "Raw" the very same year. Every comment made by Axel in the movie feels sexist. Consider the scene where he admires the long, shaven legs of Brigitte Nielsen during shooting practice. Or the deplorable Playboy Mansion scene. Or how he feels stiffed about paying seven dollars for a coke when he could get blown for the same amount of money. Axel's clever witticisms from the original are still there but a meanness has also taken over, as if Axel only sees women as sex objects. I only wish the writers took advantage and expanded the character's horizons to accommodate such sexual attitudes. All we learn about Foley in this movie is that he was a little thief when he was a kid, nothing more.

The sexist edge also feels tampered with, to some degree. In the original, Murphy had a good rapport with Lisa Elibacher, though they never developed a relationship beyond friendship, presumably because she is white and Foley does not see her as a sexual object. Same with this sequel where Murphy knows how to comfort Bogomil's white daughter and gets to kiss her on the cheek two or three times but no relationship develops. If this seems like a silly argument, consider "The Pelican Brief" as one of many examples in Hollywood history. In that film, Denzel Washington has a friendship with Julia Roberts but it never develops into anything else (though it did in the book).

Now for the pluses in "Beverly Hills Cop II." The movie begins with a superb title sequence where the song "Shakedown" by Bob Seger plays in the soundtrack. There are a few choice Murphy put downs and one-liners, as expected, and his gargantuan laugh is as loud and Dolby-ized as one can imagine. Also, Murphy still has good chemistry with Ashton and Reinhold, though their scenes do lack the pungent wit and camaraderie of the original. There is also an early appearance by Chris Rock as a whiny valet.

There is no doubt that the film is entertaining but it resembles more of a Rambo action piece than the comedy that one would hope for. The villains are left on the sidelines and the plot is far too confusing to care about (why would robbers plot their crimes with the use of coordinates?) The movie is loud (as are all Bruckheimer/Simpson productions), insanely high-pitched, occasionally funny, definitely sexist, profane at times, but also as evocative of the indulgences and decadence of the 1980's as any film of that period.

Axel Foley bluffs his way thru town

BEVERLY HILLS COP (1984)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

"Beverly Hills Cop" is a highly entertaining, derivative and messy picture - it is an action comedy but the emphasis on the action at certain points negates the comic potential. Eddie Murphy, however, steals the movie easily and shows his talent far outweighs the average cop picture, playing the Detroit cop Axel Foley who bends the rules to his advantage.

Axel Foley (Murphy) had failed to bust an illegal cigarette-selling business in an opening chase scene that sets the pace of the rest of the movie. Axel's old friend and ex-partner in crime (James Russo) comes to town, hiding from a nefarious businessman who is in the bearer bonds and cocaine business. The crux of the movie is Axel's need to apprehend the killers with the help of the Beverly Hills police department. He does not play by the rules but the BH boys do. This causes a conflict of interests but I think you can see where the film is going. It is an action comedy in the strictest sense of the word, but somehow very uneven. The comedy does not flow easily or smoothly with the action scenes, especially the final shootout that seems to come from a different movie entirely. There is some humor there with the bumbling Rosewood and Taggart team but a bloody climax undermines the comedy and goes too far. Ever since I first saw the film in 1984, I felt the ending was crude and unnecessary.

But that is the problem. Is this a comedy or an action picture? Roger Ebert famously declared the fusion of the two genres as suspect and unworkable. The screenplay by Daniel Petrie (which was shockingly nominated for an Oscar) is at its best when we see Eddie at its center, acting drunk and foolish to nail a suspected robber at a nightclub or, in general, bluffing his way out of any Beverly Hills establishment and showing the rich, glamorous denizens of the ritzy town who is the boss. That is what I remember best about "Beverly Hills Cop." The lazily written, mediocre cops and cocaine dealers stuff is something you would see in any "Starsky and Hutch" show (Steven Berkoff is hardly a one-dimensional villain and performs ably and above the mediocrity). Had the film focused on Eddie's attempts to mingle and bluff his way through Beverly Hills and completely ditched the screenplay, then it might have been a real winner.

Martin Brest directs as well as he can, but he later proved to make a more amiable and entertaining action-comedy in the classic "Midnight Run" four years later. "Beverly Hills Cop" was a solid start for Eddie Murphy and it showed his comedic talent skillfully. I just sense that it could have been so much more.

Evil Elvis sideburns does a slasher routine

THE DARK HALF (1993)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Periodically haunting and somewhat watchable, "The Dark Half" is only a mild disappointment from the Stephen King pit of adapted horror novels. It is a schizophrenic picture, partly slasher and partly a character study. The slasher mentality dominates the second act, while the first act does a good job of establishing its rhythm and its main character, a writer using a pseudonym that makes him more marketable than his actual name. Good idea, insufficient depth.

Thad Beaumont (Timothy Hutton) is the writer living in Maine, married to a strong, devoted woman (Amy Madigan, perfect casting), and making ends meet by teaching creative writing at a college. Thad's pseudonymous novels have been discovered by a blackmailer who wants cash or he will out Thad. Thad decides to stage a mock burial of his pseudonym, thus also closing the lid on his main character, Machine, an evil, leather-bound dude with Elvis sideburns who seems to have emerged from the Coens' "Raising Arizona" with a propensity for slashing people with a razor. Naturally, the mock burial causes problems for Machine, who is actually a living, breathing being materialized out of the novels and seeking vengeance by killing everyone who knows Thad. There is a novel twist revolving around Thad and Machine that I will not disclose.

For ambience and a feverish sense of mood (complemented by the occasional use of Elvis' song "Are You Lonesome Tonight?"), "The Dark Half" maintains a sense of unrelenting gloom and doom (hey, it is George A. Romero at the wheel here). Unfortunately, a lot of the film has the standard slasher fare that feels out of context with the theme of duality and an artist's obligation to move on beyond schlock commercialized novels and segue to "real" novels that have something to say (the kind that don't sell). Hutton does a good job of playing both the nonplussed writer and the demonic rock and roll killer from the novels but I sense the depth has been left out of the screenplay. Aside from losing all of Thad's friends and acquaintances to a rampaging killer, the movie never toys with the differences between fiction and reality and Machine (who calls himself George Stark, Thad's pseudonym) is left to be nothing but a cartoonish psycho from dime-store novels. When even Amy Madigan and the do-gooder cop (Michael Rooker) do not seem alarmed by millions of sparrows that would've frightened Hitchcock (not to mention the sight of a decomposing, bandaged killer), then the filmmakers have lost me and my interest. "The Dark Half" is often disquieting and entrancing but it lacks any significant purpose.

Dante's crazed, cartoonish 'burbs tale

SMALL SOLDIERS (1998)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

(Originally reviewed in 1998)

"Small Soldiers" is director Joe Dante doing his latest Gremlins confection and it's mean-spirited fun, once the movie gets its engines rolling.

"Small Soldiers" stars Gregory Smith and Kirsten Dunst as two MUCH TOO CUTE kids with raging hormones who end up battling various reanimated toy soldiers. Chip Hazard (voiced by the typically gruffly Tommy Lee Jones) leads this platoon of robot action figures, and they are equipped to kill rival toys called Gorgonites, led by their soft-spoken leader, Archer (voiced by Frank Langella).

"Small Soldiers" begins badly with a lame introduction about how these toys are created and who their target audience is. The business meetings are led by Denis Leary as a rich tycoon, but all these scenes are unnecessary. What if we never knew how these soldiers were created or what their purpose was? Some things are better left to the imagination.

Once the movie shift gears to suburbia where the toys are sent, it gets better and better with inventive gags and superbly staged cartoonish mayhem. Two of my favorite examples: Chip Hazard searching for the human characters in a helicopter with Wagner's "Ride of the Valkieres" playing in the background, and the Barbie-like dolls who are brought to life in Bride of Frankenstein fashion (complete with the original score) and uttering lines such as, "She's gone postal."

"Small Soldiers" is light fun and frequently funny, though not at the same breath as "Gremlins." It says something about 90's kiddie fantasies, though, when the toy soldiers and monsters are more three-dimensional than the thin human characters on display here, including the late Phil Hartman as an obnoxious neighbor.