Searching and reclaiming the dream

 SUGAR TOWN (1999)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

A cinephile recently asked what movie do I wish there was a sequel to. I thought of some mainstream efforts and I also thought of small, independent films that either slipped by the radar or were successful at the box-office and became sleeper hits. 1991's largely forgotten "Late for Dinner" is one smaller film that came to mind. The other one would be 1999's "Sugar Town" and they both share one intrinsic quality that begs for continuation - they end prematurely.

Largely set in the fringes of the L.A. music industry scene, "Sugar Town" evolves in odd ways that I did not anticipate. Actual rock and roll singers are on board for this multi-character mosaic such as John Taylor from Duran Duran as a rock star guitarist with giggling groupies constantly barricading his home. He lives with his low-grade horror scream queen wife (Rosanna Arquette) who is offered the dubious film role of playing Christina Ricci's mother. Taylor is trying to form a new band and get a record produced yet sexual favors may be a prerequisite on the part of the singer (Michael Des Barres from Power Station) who has a proclivity for younger, nubile women. Let's not forget John Doe, an actual rock, punk, country and folk musician (he was brilliant in 1995's "Georgia"), as a roadie with a pig farm, a pregnant wife (Lucinda Jenney) and three kids and he's struggling to put food on the table. Doe has the added hindrance of his returning brother (Richmond Arquette), a reformed drug addict who has the hots for his wife. I do not want to neglect the mention of Martin Kemp from Spandau Ballet in a largely blink-and-you'll-miss-him role. 

Then there is the always nuanced work of Ally Sheedy as Liz, a Hollywood production designer who is having a tough time finding a reasonable man to date. One date is a well-known music producer who has nothing to say about her looks, or much of anything else (he's the one trying to get Taylor's band a contract). Another date foolishly expects her to use her connections to get a client list for his massage therapy practice! To top it all off, Sheedy's recently hired housekeeper, Gwen (Jade Gordon), is stealing her jewelry, and also wants to become a rock and roll singer. Gwen pays 300 dollars to a rock and roll writer who is always high yet this woman has no real moral or ethical ground - she'll do just about anything to get ahead.

"Sugar Town" is not flawless in its cross-section of one group of characters to another, and a couple are only of passing interest (Doe's pregnant wife and his brother seem more like distractions). Sheedy plays the most well-rounded character though why they made her into a movie production designer instead of a concert promoter or something akin to music is a mystery. The film is most successful in showing the difficulties of attaining or holding on to a dream, and that helps builds the poignancy. Music is in their souls yet it is interesting how little music is actually played in the film. Directors/writers Allison Anders and Kurt Voss aim for a low-key approach and nothing here is heightened for any dramatic effect. "Sugar Town" is often sweet-tempered and affecting and by the time it reached the finishing line (especially the memorable pairing of Michael Des Barres and Beverly D'Angelo), I wanted more. 

Eddie Murphy's Toilet-Humored Family Business

 NUTTY PROFESSOR II: THE KLUMPS (2000)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
Original Review from December 19th, 2001

What has happened to Eddie Murphy? Here is a man who prided himself on raw humor with an intent to poke and nudge his head at everyone, from women to homosexuals to Michael Jackson to his own family. It is a probably a sign of the times that

his act is now considered politically incorrect. Murphy has now become the improbable star of family comedies, possibly because he is married and has children. "Bowfinger" at least seemed to point in a new direction but "Nutty Professor II" is as lowbrow and as keen on flatulence as one might expect.
Whereas the first film focused on the obese Sherman Klump and his paranoia about his sexually potent alter ego, this sequel offers nothing but flatulence. If all five writers can pass for comedy nowadays are flatulent jokes and anal rape by a hamster then I must be behind the times.

This time, Sherman Klump (Eddie Murphy) is about to marry a sweet, always smiling professor,
Denise (Janet Jackson), who loves the man for his intelligence and warmth. Lately, though, Sherman has been seeing and feeling his alter ego, Buddy Love (also played by Murphy), inside him. Buddy Love is ready to burst out of Sherman to such an extent that poor old Sherman says the most unflattering, sexually provocative statements to his Denise instead of proposing to her. To put an end
to Buddy Love, Sherman works on eliminating the DNA sequence that contains Buddy. Buddy is eliminated but it causes Sherman to become dumb and dumber by the minute. But what will he tell his bride-to-be? And how will he win a grant for 150 million dollars for his newfound youth formula if he can't even explain the science behind it? And what's with Buddy Love regenerating from a pool of
liquid and a single strand of dog hair? The latter joke was funnier in "Hot Shots! Part Deux."

The selling point of this movie is the Klumps, Sherman's flatulent family who delight in gorging food at "all you can eat" restaurants. There is Grandma Klump, Klump's mother and father, his surly brother, his overweight nephew, and all they do is eat and talk about sex and impotence. That is it. No attempt is
made to make these people more than stereotypes and part of the charm of the original "Nutty Professor" was how little we saw of them (the famous flatulent dinner scene was as over-the-top as a family comedy can get). But the movie goes overboard giving these characters so much screen time and so little to do except make sexual references galore. A little of Grandma Klump goes a long way
(including an astoundingly awful jacuzzi scene), as do the trite bedroom shenanigans between Mama and Papa Klump. True, they are all played brilliantly by Eddie Murphy and the special-effects of having them all together in certain shots is seamless. But the humor is about as far down the toilet drain as one
can imagine and not particularly funny either.

The biggest laughs I had, as correctly indicated by Internet Movie Critic James Berardinelli, are the brief outtakes that follow the movie. I also enjoyed Buddy Love's antics in the bathroom, which I will not go into detail explaining. That is approximately less than five minutes of laughs in a 1 hour and forty minute movie. Need I say more? There, I just saved you one hour and forty minutes.

Harley Quinn sprinkles glitter in overstuffed Squad

 SUICIDE SQUAD (2016)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

No matter what movie she is in or how it is geared to audiences - Margot Robbie stands out. Okay, she is not the only actor to stand out in the wicked "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" and she shared equally stirring time with Alisson Janney in the garishly entertaining "I, Tonya." Robbie reigns with glee and sheer manic power in the disappointingly thin "Suicide Squad" only because her performance, though seemingly trimmed as is everyone else's role, has gargantuan-sized fire and passion written all over it. "What? I got a hickey or something?," she asks during several shoot-them-up scenarios. That is the overall problem with "Suicide Squad" - too many shootouts, too much CGI spectacle and too little character investment. Yet Robbie's Harley Quinn - we love yah, you sick demented girl!

The set-up has promise yet even that is so frantically cut and short-circuited that it never breathes through its relatively thin story. Robbie is Harley Quinn, a complete madhouse of a woman who licks the bars of her cell and flings herself violently against it - she is Joker's ashen-faced girlfriend. Will Smith is Deadshot, a professional assassin who is aware that his young daughter knows what he does for a living (he is later caught by Batman, played in a quick-as-a-flash cameo by Ben Affleck). There's also Jai Courtney as Captain Boomerang who occasionally throws one; Killer Croc (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), a reptilian metahuman who emits more grunts than words; the literally fiery metahuman known as Chato Santana / El Diablo (Jay Hernandez) who has certain regrets regarding his dead family; Karen Fukuhara as Tatsu Yamashiro/Katana who is deadly with a sword that carries her husband's soul (she is not a criminal), and there is an archaeologist (Cara Delevingne) who becomes some sort of a super witch (The witch can go a long way towards tedium). Essentially we have bad guys summoned by Viola Davis as an amoral government official who is good at making threats and is quite efficient at shooting and killing people at random. The team is known as Task Force X and they have to destroy the witch - failure in this mission can result in death for the team of bad guys.  

"Suicide Squad" is too anxiety-ridden from the start with too many fast millisecond cuts, too many quick introductions with too many characters, and it is too eager to keep its mojo of relentless shootouts going. When the film settles down from all the noise during a bar scene, we learn a bit about our villains such as El Diablo's past as a former L.A. gang member. I also enjoyed some of the backstory involving Deadshot and his devotion to his daughter yet much of this is truncated. Only Robbie's Harley Quinn is somewhat three-dimensional by comparison - she has a memorably giddy wickedness that blows away all the competition including the underwhelming Jared Leto's ultra-punk tattooed version of the Joker. Director David Ayer (who also wrote this) and editor John Gilroy keep cutting away too often from the character interaction. The action scenes are an eyeful towards the climax yet the rest of the action was mediocre at best - nothing here was nearly as astounding as Nolan's Batman trilogy (or for that matter, "Batman v. Superman"). "Suicide Squad" resembles a movie that somebody fast-forwarded through, leaving its motley crew of supervillains in the dust. 

Beautiful romantic bore

THE LOVE LETTER (1999)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

I would pick "The Love Letter" as the worst romantic comedy ever made if it hadn't been for the exquisite photography. This is a beautiful bad movie and, even if remarkable images are sometimes a good reason to see a film, something of some substance should support said images. There is more substance in the substance-free short film "Mothlight" by the late avante-garde filmmaker, Stan Brakhage, than anything inthe "The Love Letter."

Kate Capshaw is Helen, a divorced bookstore owner living in a New England picture-postcard town. She has no real social life, mostly jogs, and is envious of others who go on dates including her best friend, Janet (Ellen DeGeneres). One day, Helen finds a love letter and assumes it is for her eyes. She thinks her 20-year-old employee at the bookstore wrote it, and thus a short courtship ensues. But then
Helen imagines every person she comes in contact with is reading lines from the letter. And there is Tom Selleck, minus his mustache, as a fireman and Helen's former high-school flame. And the letter gets passed around to the different townsfolk, and blah, blah, blah.

Capshaw seems too restrained and bored for this kind of material - she was far more dynamic in "Windy City" and "A Little Sex" than here. Tom Selleck merely shows up and smiles with that familiar grin. Ellen DeGeneres is wasted as the comic relief, though nothing she says is remotely funny. Julianne Nicholson as another young bookstore employee fares better but her role is severely trimmed.

"The Love Letter" has some astounding photography - it works as an advertisement for New England's fishing docks. As a movie, it has no sense of romance and is devoid of humor or drama or any reason for its existence. Just visit New England instead.

Robert Evans' life is far juicier than draggy doco

 THE KID STAYS IN THE PICTURE (2002)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Original Review from 2003

Robert Evans is a man whose incredible experience in Hollywood is worth listening to. He is the producer of quality film classics like "The Godfather" films, "Chinatown" and "Rosemary's Baby." He also produced the quintessentially sappy love story known, plainly enough, as "Love Story." Evans also had his own downward slide with drivel like "Sliver" and the disastrously expensive production of "The
Cotton Club." With such a list of hits and misses, I was expecting a glorious and sardonic look at a producer who was as much a gambler as anyone else had any right to be (anyone who is the subject of an animated cartoon can't be all bad). But the documentary "The Kid Stays in the Picture" glosses over so many details of such a rich, animated life that I found I knew less about Evans than I had before.

The film is told in chronological order as it spins tales of Evans and his days as an actor in the Hollywood industry. We discover that the film's title originates with legendary producer Darryl Zanuck, who supported the actor's performance as a bullfighter in an adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises." Most of the cast of that film, including Eddie Albert, object to Evans but Zanuck came to the Mexican locations and said with tantalizing clarity, "The kid stays in the picture." After that film, Evans saw no promise in the acting zone, considering he was vilified for a film called "The Fiend
Who Walked the West." Inspired by Zanuck's own hardnosed style, Evans saw a future as a producer for Paramount Pictures and begat a string of hits unparalleled in most others of his ilk. One of the best stories involves Francis Ford Coppola's dubious talent on the set of "The Godfather" - Evans
smelled a disaster in dailies and asked Coppola if the meat of the film was sitting in his kitchen. Also noteworthy is Evans' support of Roman Polanski during the making of "Rosemary's Baby" - if Polanski was fired, then Evans would walk. There is also the story of Evans' own marriage to his "Love Story"
leading lady, Ali McGraw, and how their commitment was destroyed by her love for Steve McQueen, who co-starred with her in "The Getaway."

The film's second half deals with Evans' darker days during the 1980's, involving murder and financial and legal setbacks. His handling of the costly overruns on Coppola's "The Cotton Club" resulted in legal action, leading nowhere. The film was a bloated disaster with no idea of what kind of film it
wanted to be. The same film produced the murder of someone who helped finance it - Evans' name was linked though he was never charged with anything. And then there was the onslaught of drugs and near-suicide attempts before deciding to be admitted to a mental hospital. Evans lost his extravagant home and his job. How he gets back into the swing of things is often sad and illuminating (particularly convincing Nicholson to get his home back from a French millionaire).

Unfortunately, as clever as the editing is (the still photos seem to come alive three-dimensionally), "The Kid Stays in the Picture" never fully understands the man in question. Robert Evans himself narrates his life story and, though I understand he suffered a recent stroke, he often seems to be mumbling his way
through the film. I like how he mimics the different characters' he has encountered in his life, but I felt there wasn't much here to involve or engage me. Evans seems disinterested in his own life, perhaps having lived through it and having told it countless times. A different narrator would have been nice.
And since Evans is telling his side of the story, it would have been worthwhile if he had criticized it - mentioning "Love Story" in the same breath with "The Godfather" seems criminal. Interviews or voice-overs (even mimicked ones) with Coppola and Mia Farrow might have offered some real insight.

"The Kid Stays in the Picture" is draggy and inert, often mimicking the way Evans delivers his narration. Such a juicy, extravagant life deserves a shot of adrenaline.

JAWS with a fatalistic edge

OPEN WATER (2003)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Originally viewed in 2004

We know that independent horror films ("28 Days Later," "Blair Witch Project") are always more terrifying and realistic than the standard Hollywood horror picture. "Open Water" is the latest independent horror film that could be seen as riffing on some of the primal scares of Steven Spielberg's "Jaws." The difference is that "Open Water" does something rather unique that is rarely seen in recent horror pictures - it shows the hopeless nature of a dangerous

situation where survival is unlikely.

The film begins with a couple ready to go on vacation. They are Susan (Blanchard Ryan), who runs her business with cell phones and a laptop, and Daniel (Daniel Travis), her boyfriend. Their vacation consists mainly of scuba diving, but first we get to know them a little when they arrive at their hotel.

Daniel wants sex but Susan is not in the mood - judging from this scene, it is clear that Susan is stronger than Daniel. The next day, the couple embark early aboard a boat full of curious scuba divers. After Daniel and Susan spend some time underwater observing an eel, they come to the surface to discover that their boat is gone! They have been stranded in the middle of the ocean. What do

they do? Occasionally, a boat or two can be seen in the horizon but Daniel decides not to swim to it. Both are bitten by jellyfish. Then they discover a shark or two, glimpsed by the random fin in the water. Unfortunately, they stay in the water overnight, drifting many miles from where they were left behind.

Their boat has forgotten them, and now they have to brave more sharks, jellyfish, and lethargy. At one point, Susan wakes up from having fallen asleep only to discover that Daniel is nowhere to be found! Will they ever be found? How long can they drift without food or water?

"Open Water" is based on true events that took place in Australia (and many other similar events I am sure). Don't expect "Open Water" to be a modern-day "Jaws" because sharks, despite their sense of menace throughout, are not the focus of this story. This story is about survival in the lonely, open horizon of the ocean with two people who just have their scuba diving outfits to keep

them afloat and not much else. The film is dependent on a situation to make it work, and it often does. Susan wants to swim to the boats they often see in the horizon, yet Daniel would rather wave his arms for help. Susan drinks the water and gets sick. Daniel gets his leg bitten by a shark. Both Susan and Daniel start to turn on each other, blaming each other for going on this trip when they could have gone elsewhere. I liked the admittance of Susan that Daniel always wants to do things different than anyone else, like observing an eel for a longer time than necessary.

In terms of a feverish intensity based on dread and hopelessness, "Open Water" has it all and will instill an uncontrollable unease. In many ways, "Open Water" reminds me of "The Blair Witch Project" in its minimalist look and its simplicity (both shot on digital video). This is not the kind of film where

false alarms and pulse-pounding music remind one to be scared. In fact, there are no special-effects in the film and the highlights, seeing an occasional shark or a lightning storm that illuminates our protagonists, are all performed and directed as it actually happened (the sharks, by the way, are very real).

My one major gripe is the introduction of the two characters, Susan and Daniel. The mini-DV camera shows close-ups of their faces and close-ups of them in their house and car - there is no room here for angles or composed shots that show normal domesticity. Compare the shot of their car leaving suburbia with the similar opening shot in Steven Spielberg's "Duel" and you'll wish that the writer-director, Chris Kentis, had opted for inventive visuals - a contrast between the ocean and the couple's house would have been nice. If nothing else, Kentis knows how to scare you in and out of the water.

Despite a short running time, one too many wild party montages, and a nudity shot that will probably get more discussion than deserved, "Open Water" succeeds in getting your nerves fried and your juices flowing. So the next time you go scuba diving, be sure they do a head count.

Courage to Create is life or death

 ART SCHOOL CONFIDENTIAL (2006)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

In the mid 90's, I attended University of the Arts, an art school in Philly, and one of my most distinct memories was taking a drawing class. Not only did we have nude models to sketch, we also had to judge our works in front of the class and offer our insights. Insights ran from tepid to just plain dumb because how does one account for the meaning behind an assigned Picasso attempt to a painting that features a lot of brushstrokes in the Jackson Pollock manner? My major was not drawing but Filmmaking with a 16mm Bolex camera. Watching "Art School Confidential" brought all those memories back and I will say on record that "Art School Confidential" is the most accurate picture of art school you will probably ever see. If it had stayed focused on that alone along with its adrift protagonist, I might have declared it Terry Zwigoff's newest masterpiece. A subplot kind of ruins such high marks despite what it is trying to say versus what it actually says. 

Jerome (Max Minghella) is the adrift protagonist, an excellent sketch artist who can make his profiles come alive through subtle nuances and a deep understanding of the human body and facial characteristics. In other words, the students in the drawing class do not care for him or his accurate insights into other people's work. The students seems to favor non-traditional and non-specific over nuance and style, as in one student's painting of a car on a canvas that could've been painted by a three-year-old. Oh, yes, the lack of clear dimensional characteristics give it some apparent heft. Ugh, I don't think such paintings would've been even attempted by any of the students when I went but maybe things have spiraled since the 90's (and of course of this is slightly satirical though not by much). 

Jerome probably should have walked out of this school, a fictional one named Strathmore, in the first ten minutes of this movie but he is eager to become "the greatest artist of the 21st century." He is also eager to please Audrey (Sophia Myles), a nude model who is supposedly interested in any guy that attracts attention with alleged artistic merit. That guy would be the one who painted the car, Jonah (Matt Keeslar), who is actually an undercover police officer and attracts attention including from the professor (John Malkovich, a fabulous performance).

When "Art School Confidential" sticks to the mechanics and close observation of the art school world, it is both hilarious and kind of sad. We know there are people who go to art school who have no talent along with teachers who may have even less. The details of what is considered art and how one goes above and beyond kissing a teacher's ass - how to get their work shown in a hallway gallery or a gallery across the street from the school (known as Broadway Bob's) that at least serves great coffee - are all richly layered and acute observations. It is only when the film dovetails to an investigation on the Strathmore Strangler who is killing university students that the film falls a little apart. And when the film shifts to gleaning insight from what separates the art from the artist, I found that the insight needed to be made yet the approach by way of this silly subplot crushes the film a tad.

"Art School Confidential" has fairly persuasive performances by Max Minghella, Sophia Myles and John Malkovich, not to mention colorful support from Steve Buscemi as Broadway Bob and Ethan Suplee as an anxious filmmaker who has to find his personal side. I read a comment from an anonymous user that the Strathmore Strangler is necessary to the story because art school is about life and death and being strangled by it. I think all this is covered beautifully by writer Daniel Clowes and director Zwigoff without the intrusion of a killer subplot. Let's just say that a tragic accident makes us question Jerome's inclinations if not his morality yielding consequences that don't make sense - suffice to say, it did not need to be there. "Art School Confidential" is 3/4 of a great film and one quarter of it is as one art student puts it: "Has the singularity of outsider art, though the conscious rejection of spatial dynamics could only come from an intimacy with the conventions of picture-making." Something like that.