Literal Witch Hunts

THE CRUCIBLE (1996)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Original review from 1996

 
Period films based on literary masterpieces range from the superior ("Age of
Innocence," "The Remains of the Day") to the detrimental ("The Scarlet
Letter"). "The Crucible" falls somewhere in between and, although it is not a
great film, it is certainly a passionate, powerful film that does justice to
Arthur Miller's spectacular 1953 play. Its power has not been diminished on the
big screen.

"The Crucible" is set during the 17th century when an array of witch hunts
began, mostly led by the teenage girls who were accused. Set in 1692, the movie
starts off with a devilish ceremony where a group of girls are ranting in the
woods of Salem, Massachusetts, performing an unholy ritual. Abigail (Winona
Ryder) is the master of ceremonies, and she drinks animal blood to destroy the
wife of the man she loves. This unholy practice is witnessed by Abigail's
uncle, Reverend Parris (Bruce Davison), and a witchcraft trial commences the
next day. And almost immediately, the accusations, denials and name-calling
begins - Abigail and the others decide to fool everyone into thinking that the
devil is visible, but visible only to them.

Numerous innocent townspeople are accused, including John Proctor (Daniel
Day-Lewis), a farmer who had a brief affair with Abigail and is now married to
his strictly devout wife, Elizabeth (Joan Allen). Abigail's form of revenge is
to accuse the reverent Elizabeth of witchcraft - at this point, any of these
girls can accuse anyone in town of witchcraft no matter how false the claims
may be (they go through extreme measures to prove them, too). The trials
continue and destroy many lives (mostly by hanging). Paul Scofield plays Judge
Danforth who overlooks the trials, and decides that if the accused confess to
their demonic ways, they will not be hanged. He presides over the trial with
doubts but is inclined to believe that demons of another kind have infiltrated
this town.

"The Crucible" is a startling, alert interpretation of the Miller play, which
should come as no surprise since Miller wrote the screenplay himself. The
performances by the young actresses are over-the-top but necessarily so, to
establish the lengths of their insane accusations. Winona Ryder is effectively
hateful as the angry, vengeful Abigail (a far cry from her role in "Little
Women"), a frail, demonic child ready to pounce. Daniel Day-Lewis is also
superb as the brave, decent Proctor who simultaneously finds his soul being
eaten away by Abigail and his love growing stronger for Elizabeth. Joan Allen
("Nixon") gives the most understated performance as the seemingly frigid
Elizabeth, and her final scene with Proctor is heartbreaking to witness. And
let's not forget the overpoweringly magnetic Paul Scofield ("Quiz Show"), a
delectable presence whenever he's on screen spouting his lines with gusto and
verve. Another Academy Award nomination is in order for this grand actor of the
cinema, in addition to the whole cast.

If "The Crucible" falls short of greatness, it is because director Nicholas
Hytner ("The Madness of King George") plunges us into a sea of excess right
from the start, giving us little time to catch up with the story or the
characters (Ryder's portrayal of Abigail is nutty and vicious from the
beginning). Still, this beautifully mounted version summons the rage, hatred
and madness of those rough times with knowing cinematic skill, and doesn't
commit the fatal flaw of becoming a static, filmed play.

I am Vengeance and I need a Monster

 PUMPKINHEAD (1988)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

It is shameful to contain a germ of a good idea for a horror flick and then reduce it to the level of a gross-out slasher picture. "Pumpkinhead" is not an exceedingly gory flick but it is not much more than the thinner-than-a-claw story about a monster seeking vengeance on a group of people who did "a bad thing." Before you start humming Chris Isaak's electrifying song, consider that this group did not do such a bad thing as much as not face the consequences of the mistakenly bad thing they did. Yeah, okay.

Let's consider the youthful camping group for a second. They ride in two separate vehicles, one has a wagon full of motorbikes. They arrive at Harleys' Grocery Store and start riding their bikes on some of the dirt trails. Harley's son (Matthew Hurley) chases the dog who chases the motorbikes and as the kid stands there, wondering if the dog might get accidentally struck, the kid gets struck and slowly dies. Everyone feels guilty for striking the child except for one. Joel (John D'Aquino) is the one who doesn't want to report the accident to the police because he is on probation for a similar accident. By the way, Joel has a change of heart and decides to go to the police - can this vengeance be stopped before it is enacted? I guess not when a witch puts on a spell,

Let's backtrack as we discover Harley himself (Lance Henriksen) the kid's dad, is furious about his son's death and seeks vengeance. First, he hopes the kid can be brought back to life by an actual witch living somewhere in the backwood swamps. Apparently, this is not possible but vengeance is. This requires the witch taking blood samples from Harley and his son and placing them into a cup. Next Harley must dig up a demon embryo buried in a hill at the cemetery and bring it to the witch, thus reanimating a monster that looks a little like the rawboned creature from "Alien." My question is why didn't Harley simply seek vengeance without going through all this superfluous nonsense - this whole monster plot seems like a lot of work.

After a while, I lost patience with "Pumpkinhead" and it began to numb me. These youths are not the brightest - they should have left town and let bygones be bygones. One after another of these dimwits are snatched by the creature while Harley's body convulses and he adopts red eyes like the Pumpkinhead. The creature is well-designed but the movie deserves to be buried in that hill with no chance of revival. Of course, I am late to this game since three sequels have come out since 1988.   

Robin and that Candy-Colored Clown

 BLUE VELVET (1986)

Reappraisal by Jerry Saravia

Of all of David Lynch's films, I find myself ranking "Blue Velvet" on a lower meter. It's a good, blazingly original film that is also wholly uneven, sometimes obscene and not nearly as tasteless as it has been regarded. I also find "Blue Velvet" to be underwhelming, as say compared to "Eraserhead" (his

greatest film) or "Lost Highway," at least in retrospect. It's just that the other Lynch films have themes that are more complex and disturbing than this perverse take on suburbia.

"Blue Velvet" was released back in 1986 and was highly controversial for its time, mainly due to graphic scenes of torture and sex perpetrated by its main antagonist, Frank Booth (Dennis Hopper). There was also much talk about the sequence where Isabella Rossellini (Ingrid Bergman's daughter) is naked and publicly embarrassed with teeth marks and cigarette burns covering her entire body. The sequence itself doesn't serve much purpose other than to shock and we don't know how she arrived at this state (we can surmise it has something to do with Frank). Rossellini also endures several beatings by Frank Booth as a helium-sniffing psycho, the helium of which prepares him to beat and rape Rossellini. There are also numerous close-up shots of ants and cockroaches littering the screen as if they are aware of something beyond our knowledge.

The story revolves around a murder mystery that is more or less explained involving a kidnapping of a child and Rossellini's husband suffering the loss of an appendage. Kyle MacLachlan plays Jeffrey, a college student visiting his picture-postcard hometown of Lumberton when, one day, he discovers a severed human ear on his usual walking path (hence, the loss of that appendage). He contacts the police and then decides to investigate on his own. This all leads to the apartment of a distraught singer, Dorothy Vallens (played by Rossellini), who is always singing "Blue Velvet" at a nightclub. Frank is the deranged psychopath who tortures her, and the scenes between the two of them are as startling and effective as any other scene in the film. As Jeffrey veers further into this S & M world with the help of a policeman's daughter, Sandy (Laura Dern), things get much weirder especially when Dean Stockwell shows up as Ben, a pale-faced, lipstick-wearing drug dealer who loves to sing Roy Orbison songs (Frank is a big fan of Orbison and Ben's suaveness). Both Stockwell and Hopper must hold the record for spouting more f-words on film than Eddie Murphy (at least back in 1986). 

"Blue Velvet" is a fascinating, intriguing film that still doesn't quite mark it close to greatness. The elements of the mystery seemed warped to me the first couple of times I've seen it but now it makes more sense - drug-dealing, murders and police corruption are self-evident here. The performances are mostly shouting matches, especially between Hopper and Rossellini, but they definitely shock to such a degree that you can't help but want to sympathize and care for Rossellini's Dorothy. I initially said years ago that Kyle MacLachlan and Laura Dern merely react than act but that is not true at all - they do have some ounce of chemistry together and they have more than one exquisitely subtle scene (the cafe scene is excellent, and I love Dern's reactions to Rossellini wrapping herself around MacLachlan). I still don't completely buy the movie's ending with a robin appearing at a window, nicely foreshadowed by Dern in an earlier scene, though I did like seeing the wasp in its beak. That gives the indication that ugliness is still around the corner of any suburban street, you just have look for it.

For whatever strange reason I cannot comprehend, I still liked "Blue Velvet" because nobody has ever produced or directed anything like it prior to its release. There isn't anything you can easily compare it to. It has moments of horror but it is not a horror film. It has moments of humor but it is definitely not a comedy. It has noir trappings (writer Barry Gifford, who later worked with Lynch on "Wild at Heart" and "Lost Highway," called it phlegm noir) but it is not quite noir at all. It has the ants as a metaphor of what is buried deep in our society that remains a secret (The policeman's reactions to the severed ear and Jeffrey's discoveries seem to yield something unsavory about him). It is definitely Lynch's wildest endeavor (at least at that time) and, somehow, strangely compelling.

Buzz is back in a topical slasher

 TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (2022)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

After close to 50 years of Leatherface, it is hard to distinguish one sequel from the other. I've seen the first two "Massacre" films and "The Return of the Chainsaw Massacre" and then the 2003 remake. I am not sure why I bothered since the only sequel that seems to match the feverish pace of the original shocker was "Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2," and that is only because the original director Tobe Hooper helmed it. This new film supposedly ignores all the sequels after the original. I suppose that is why it is titled "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" leaving out the "The" yet not splitting chain from saw but I digress.

A bus load of entrepreneurs have bought a ghost town in South Texas called Harlow. These are the current Generation Z'ers who think nothing of converting a town in Texas to a gentrified business marketplace full of eateries, comic books and anything you might find in a strip mall. There is Sarah Yarkin as Melody, one of two San Francisco chefs from a cooking show who drags her sister, Lila (Elsie Fisher, looking like Bud Cort's daughter), a survivor of a school shooting, to this town. There is also enthusiastic Dante (Jacob Latimore), the other chef who might have misplaced the deed to this town, and his fiancee (Nell Hudson) whom you know will be roadkill. An older woman living at an orphanage (Alice Krige) is forced out by these entrepreneurs (oh, let's not forget there is a torn Confederate flag on a pole) and she calls Dante a, well, you get the idea since he's black. Leatherface himself (Mark Burnham) is living upstairs in this building and when the old woman dies during a seizure, you know the chainsaw will be buzzing soon enough and someone's skin is needed for a face mask.

I was never bored by this new entry in the Leatherface Chronicles and some of it is gruesome fun (the bus massacre is bloody as hell and does not leave out one exposed entrail). I wanted Melody and Lila to leave this godforsaken ghost town and so that is the level of involvement I had with this movie. We also get the brief return of Sarah Hardesty (Olwen Fouéré replacing the late Marilyn Burns), the lone survivor of the original film who is ready for vengeance (apparently she's been wanting to kill Leatherface all this time and she skins pigs, though for a nanosecond I thought she was skinning a human corpse). 

In the end, this just felt like a gory slasher movie rather than anything approaching the level of the first two Massacres. There is no real intensity, no feverish pitch, nothing here to remind us of that claustrophobic 1974 nightmare which is among the greatest horror films of all time. The ending mimics the original with some minor differences yet without, dare I say, balletic grace. Leatherface still knows how to use that saw and pound somebody's head into mashed potatoes. He is not perplexed by cell phones, self-driving vehicles or cancel culture - he just want things to remain as they once were like that tiny Confederate flag.   

Inert heist and an inert Nick Nolte

THE GOOD THIEF (2002)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

"The Good Thief" has all the elements for a superbly stylish, character-driven
Neil Jordan flick. It's got Nick Nolte, a jazzy score and beautiful Parisian
locations. It's got the right mood and the atmosphere of a noir/heist picture.
What it doesn't have is soul, the key ingredient to many of Jordan's films.

Nolte plays Bob, a retired burglar who has his own house and plays at the
roulette tables whenever he is bored. He is also something of a heroin addict
and his tired eyes indicate a man who has lived too much and needs to settle
down. He rescues a 17-year-old Russian prostitute (Nutsa Kukhiani) from having
to further degrade herself, but he is unsure what to do with her (she is a
heroin user as well). After undergoing detox treatment (which he recovers from
rather quickly), Bob takes on one last heist involving priceless art from a
casino in Monte Carlo. Of course, everyone assumes that Bob is going to rob the
casino of its money, or is he? Meanwhile, Bob has to elude Roger (Tcheky
Karyo), a relentless detective who knows Bob is up to his old games thanks to a
snitch.

"The Good Thief" has a promising start yet the rest of the movie is the
equivalent of a run-down automobile - it spurts and starts and then dies down.
One can assume that Bob is the focus of the story but there are so many
tangents that nothing becomes clear as to whom we should or shouldn't care
about. The drowsy prostitute is introduced as a heavy heroin user and, later,
she is a made-up, pristine-looking woman accompanying Bob to the casino -
Kukhiani would look at home in a James Bond flick. There are also secondary
characters who exist merely as backdrop scenery - one of them is responsible
for a murder that is treated so matter-of-factly that I barely cared myself.
And when Ralph Fiennes appears as an art broker, we catch a glimmer of
liveliness and playfulness that is sinfully missing from the rest of the movie.
A shame that Fiennes appears in only two scenes.

Writer-director Jordan does show flashes of human interest in Bob but it is
largely an underwritten role. Only Nick Nolte, the king of mentally exhausted
antiheroes, gives the character some measure of gravity. In the end, we are
never sure what to think of Bob or any character or the big heist. We see the
teen prostitute's former pimp and other guys hanging around Bob, including an
alarms expert, not to mention a couple of twins and, oh, there is the snitch.
But the movie never invests much time in any of these characters.
Scenes have no shape or fluidity - sometimes Jordan and his editor, Tony
Lawson, inject a freeze-frame at the end of almost every sequence. I am a
sucker for making editing obvious if it has thematic or character-related
relevance - here, it just seems inappropriate and distracting. 

From the same man who brought us the wonderful human dramas that were 

"Mona Lisa" and "The Crying Game," this movie is so antiseptic, it needs 

a shot of adrenaline. There are two things to enjoy in "The Good Thief" - Nick

 Nolte and the moody photography. Nolte is at the top of his game and works 

wonders with his limited role - he just brings it alive in ways perhaps unintended 

(okay, his trademark near-mumble helps). As for director Neil Jordan, he certainly

 knows how to make a movie. There is enough flash in the noirish shadows and 

excellent camerawork (including one strangely canted angle) for ten movies. But 

it really is all flash and no style - the substance isn't there to support anything on the
screen. It is like watching the most inert heist film ever made - it looks
great but it is meaningless.

Your Friendly Neighborhood Green Ogre

 SHREK (2001)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Viewed on January 25th, 2002

In ninety minutes, "Shrek" offers more laughs and giddy pleasures than most
movies of late do at that twice that length. It is a wondrous, comical animated
adventure that satirizes fairy tales and wears its heart on its sleeve without
ever winking too far to remind us that it is all a joke.

Shrek (voiced by Mike Myers) is a giant ogre living in isolation in his own
dwelling - a swamp. He wants nothing to do with anybody and scares as many
people to keep away as he can. But his isolation is disrupted by all creatures
great and small from a nearby kingdom, the kingdom of Lord Farquaad (voiced by
John Lithgow). The creatures are all characters from our favorite fairy tales,
including Pinocchio, the Big, Bad Wolf, the Three Little Pigs, a tomb carrying
Snow White led by the seven dwarves, Tinkerbell and many others. They have been
banished from Farquaad's kingdom yet Shrek does not wish to hang on to any of
them, or provide housing for that matter. Shrek voices his complaints to
Farquaad, accompanied by a talkative donkey named Donkey (voiced by Eddie
Murphy). In response, Farquaad proposes a mission to Shrek: bring his
bride-to-be Princess Fiona back from a dragon's lair and he will allow the
creatures to come back to his kingdom.

After she is thrillingly rescued by Shrek and Donkey from the fire-breathing
dragon, Princess Fiona (voiced by Cameron Diaz) turns out to be quite a charmer
- she is resilient, open-minded, funny and can deliver "Matrix"-like kung-fu
kicks. This woman appeals to Shrek but he would not dare admit it. Donkey knows
there is love in the air and pushes the green ogre to pursue her to his heart's
content. All Shrek can tell Donkey is to shut up.

"Shrek" is an undeniable pleasure from beginning to end. It is chock full of
great lines, numerous references to other movies, and is always exciting and
entertaining. Not a single moment is wasted, and the computer animation is quite
a marvel to witness. Every character seems to occupy a real time and place and
are as realistically conveyed as any animated film I have seen (excepting
"Monsters, Inc."). The movie is so wicked, clever, and imaginative that one may
forget what it really lacks: inspiration. "Shrek" is not so much an original
fairy tale as it is a spin on them - it mocks legends, ogres, and just about
every tale ever told by your parents during bedtime. Although it is cleverly and
wittily told, it does not quite find its own identity. "Shrek" feels like a
hodgepodge of fairy tale cliches, sometimes poking fun at them but mostly
placing credence on the notion that beauty can be found in any creature,
especially an ogre. Though it delivers its theme with some degree of surprise,
it nonetheless feels too simple-minded for its own good.

But what am I arguing about? "Shrek" is fun for the whole family (though some of
it may be a bit crude and wicked for the tots). And for major laughs, you can't
get better than the cynical Shrek and the comically droll Donkey arguing back
and forth. I was left smiling and in good spirits from the sheer number of
shrewdly written gags and one-liners. In terms of animation and characterization
in this workable genre, "Shrek" is simply real movie magic at work.

Breasts feel like sandbags

 THE 40 YEAR OLD-VIRGIN (2005)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Original review from 2006

I suppose it was only a matter of time before we saw a

comedy with a title like "40 Year Old Virgin." Though this

comedy has a few misses, it does score some direct hits

at the funny bone and it has a truly likable lead character.

Steve Carell is Andy, a 40-year-old virgin who works in

the stockroom of an electronics store. His weekends are

none too exciting, relegated to mostly making egg salad

sandwiches ("I just forgot the bread.") One day, some

staff workers invite Andy to a poker game where they

spend more time discussing sex than actually playing

(though Andy is a poker expert since he plays it online).

To the group's dismay, they discover that Andy has no

real sexual experience since he has no key details to

outline an experience (his giveaway line is stating that

breasts feel like sandbags). Thus, his co-workers are

now intent on getting him laid.

The helpful co-workers include David (Paul Rudd), who

is still pining for his ex-girlfriend and has issues over

singer Michael McDonald; Jay (Romany Malco) who's

sexually confident and takes pride on his appearance;

and Cal (Seth Rogen), who wears a Sonic Youth shirt

and declares that getting women drunk can lead to sex.

None of these guys prove very helpful to Andy, especially

after a frightfully painful chest-hair waxing scene. Then

there is Andy's first date, a disastrous encounter with a

drunk (Leslie Mann) who vomits in his face. Another

potential date follows with a younger woman, Beth

(Elizabeth Banks), who works at a bookstore and whom

Andy smoothly lays sexual innuendoes on with the flair of

a playboy. But the woman whom Andy feels connected

to is Trish (Catherine Keener), an Ebay store owner and

a divorced mother and grandmother! Yes, no spoiler alert

needed here, this Trish will be Andy's true love. Now if he

would only admit his virginity...

Critics have not admitted this but "40 Year Old-Virgin" is

really a romantic comedy with profanity and sexual

suggestions galore. This is the story of a man who is

looking for the ideal woman to marry and then have sex with.

Yes, we can believe he's had failed sexual dalliances

before, but he is really a Puritan model for abstinence.

I am a bit disappointed that the writers (including director

Judd Apatow and Carrell who co-scripted) didn't delve more

into his daily habits. Andy is an avid toy and action-figure

collector, watches "Survivor," rides a bicycle to work and

tries to make egg salad sandwiches, but there is precious

little insight into what makes him tick. He is a virgin and he

wants the right woman to settle down with, but why does

he keep women at arm's length? Fear of women, fear of

commitment or, wait a minute, fear of his virginity? Or

maybe he hopes the right woman will understand his sexual

status and want to settle down anyway? Either way, more

insight would've been nice.

Most of the movie contains scenes of Andy's co-workers

commingling by one-upping each other with graphic insults

or speaking about sex in graphic detail (one such

discussion involves the opening phrase: "Know how I know

you're gay..."). One memorably funny scene involves Andy's

boss (Jane Lynch) who suggests becoming sex buddies

("I'll haunt your dreams.") Still, despite occasionally

tickling the funny bone, most of these scenes seem like

filler when they don't directly involve Andy. I would have

liked more scenes of Andy at home, living his life the best

he can with the knowledge he is a virgin.

I enjoyed "40 Year Old Virgin" overall though it is far too

long (the version I saw was 133 minutes). The last

sequence, which involves a song-and-dance performance

of "Age of Aquarius," is certainly far more tolerable than

the song-and-dance routine at the end of "Hitch" (Question:

did "Shrek" begin this whole finale-has-to-end-with-needless-song

performance shtick?) Carrell and Keener have appealing

chemistry and the whole cast performs up to par. But with

a juicy concept and major star in the making like Carrell,

I expected more.