Reviews

I remember reading an interview with director Hara in which he explained that he wanted to turn the clearly unbalanced veteran Kenzo Okuzaki (ominously missing a pinky, which is never explained) into a "action hero" by putting him into situations guaranteed to set him off. Okuzaki believes himself to be an instrument of divine punishment as he attempts to get to the bottom of both the executions of a pair of privates after the war had ended, and the murder and cannibalization of an unpopular officer. In some ways this movie is a fascinating (and weird) look into Japanese society, in which Okuzaki spends ten minutes profusely apologizing to a man he wants to interview for intruding before throwing him to the ground and slapping him for his lack of honesty (which in turn leads to a cringe-inducing but funny moment in which Okuzaki is smothered by the man's neighbors and punched and he turns to the cameras and screams "stop shooting! can't you see I'm being beaten up here?" not much of an action hero anymore). One member of the execution party spends what seems like an eternity changing his stories before admitting to his role in the execution, but claiming he didn't shoot because he had a defective bullet! Some of Okuzaki's targets are quite forthright and honest, others lie in a completely unconvincing manner, some come across as rather pathetic. The main "villain" is the officer who ordered the execution yet denies being present. Yet for all this, there is no commentary, and the reasons given for the executions range from desertion to cannibalization (the sister of one of the executed men is convinced of a vast conspiracy by the officers on New Guinea to keep their cannibalization secret by killing these two privates who would have otherwise spilled the beans), but were probably just another act of brutality in a spectacularly brutal war. Throughout Okuzaki rants and raves and is disarmingly (and bizarrely) forthright about his crimes (shooting BBs at and spreading pornographic pamphlets of Emperor Hirohito, plotting to kill a former Prime Minister, and the actual murder of a real-estate broker in the 50s). He comes across as one-third fanatic, one-third bully, and one-third psychotic, and the conclusion of the film is completely unbelievable, buy wholly in line with what we've seen in the previous two hours. Yet for all of Okuzaki's madness, Hara's skillful manipulation of reality gives the film a veneer of a lone-wolf detective story, as Okuzaki prods and beats the truth (or make that "truth") out of the various broken down veterans he falls upon. Incredible.

I guess it's so rare to see a mature movie now that critics go crazy over them when they do show up. This is an actor's movie, and as such is very mannered and has very "actorly" performances. Not big Oscar moments, but this-is-my-scene-dammit ones. That said, the actors are all very good, especially Tom Wilkinson, who's character never seems sure how to express what he is feeling.

Personally, I liked William Mapother's performance the most. It was the one performance that seemed "lived in", and Mapother was able, in only a couple of scenes, to suggest, by simple physicality, the history of his character. He's a loser who peaked in High School, has a goofy young man's hair cut and dye job, walks with his chest stuck out, and is angry at a world that he feels owes him something. At the same time, he loves his family, but is pushed over the edge when his wife takes up with the sort of thing that will always get to a guy like him: a young college kid from a good family. The scene after he kills Frank and sits down at the table, absolutely stunned at what he did, was, to me, the most striking shot in the film: here's a guy who has taken life as it comes to him, and the awful crime he commits is no different, he doesn't plan on killing anybody, he just does it, and tries to weasel out of it, the same way he tried to weasel his way back into his ex-wife's life, and succeeded, if briefly.

After watching the movie I thought the end was strange, in the way that Mapother's character seems so disinterested in making his case. He seems passive, feeble. But it was excellent-a guy like that won't try to run away, or fight, he's basically a coward in the end. When he's shot, he just falls down, as if he knew it was coming, but had convinced himself it wouldn't. I see that Mapother is Tom Cruise's cousin, and has only been really seriously acting for a few years now, he certainly has more charisma that his cousin, and I hope that he can land himself some good meaty roles in the future, since he has the perfect face to be a sort of twisted, everyman character actor.

An odd one in Milligan's filmography, this was one of the few "real" movies he attempted. By "real" I mean less concerned with stagy, screaming, off-Broadway plots (let's face it, Milligan at his best, at least by the standards of his own movies). This is an eccentric vampire film unlike any other. Very similar to "Guru, the Mad Monk", it is one of the few Milligan films to feature a dominant performance by a lead actor (Gavin Reed, one of the more professional actors Milligan worked with) with no scheming, bitchy females in sight. Not quite as slow as some of Milligan's other British-era films, it moves along at a nice clip, and the final vampire/cannibal feast manages, at moments, to be atmospheric (though the annoying use of inappropriate stock music is a distraction). The internet is interesting, I first saw a Milligan movie when I was 12, "The Rats are Coming, the Werewolves Are Here", and have been, well, interested in Milligan ever since. While I'm sure the recent Millgan biography has introduced more people to him, thanks to the internet I now know that, judging by some of the reactions to his films, there are at least 25 other people on Earth who appreciate Milligan as I do. Kind of neat.

Another one of Franco's amazing Eurocine productions. It has all of the trademarks of this period of Franco's career: (and for Franco, a "period" usually adds up to about 20 movies) no name actors (save the occasional Howard Vernon appearance), virtually no dialog, or, at least, bizarre dubbing that seems like it is made of scraps from other dubbing sessions, strange, soporific scenes that doodle about for five or ten minutes then end abruptly, only to lead to another soporific scene that lasts five or ten minutes, and so on. Basically think of a normal movie in which all of the plot is trimmed out, yet, the movie has the same running time as a "normal" film. In place of plot there are ritualistically repeated scenes, in this case, pieces of tin with swastikas painted on them, spider webs, dirt moving, and nice looking desert vistas. The zombie attacks are what you would expect, ten minutes of badly made up extras with their mouths open veeeeeeery slowly strolling around while distorted wind sound effects play. Despite moving at the rate of continental drift, the zombies manage to sneak up on people none-the-less and devour them, which means that, if you are a sexy lady, they bite your ass, and if you are a dude, they sort of half bite, half strangle you. To pad the scant running time there is pointless WWII footage lifted from another movie, intercut with an actor from this movie pointing his gun and pretending to shoot while doing dramatic dives and spins from behind palm trees. One "zombie" is obviously a paper mache head held up with a stick, watching the scene were somebody holds the head while somebody else holds the hands, and they pretend to strangle an extra made me laugh out loud. I dozed off twice and was awakened by either the loud distorted wind noises or the dubbed screaming. The ending is great:

Antonio Mayans: Did you find what you were looking for?

Gay French Guy: I mostly found myself.

What that has to do with zombie attacks and lost Nazi gold I'm not sure. I am sure of the fact that it is hilarious to watch as the Gay French Guy gets his little Suzuki jeep-thing stuck in the sand during the last shot. I can almost hear Franco screaming: "Will you hurry it up? I've got three more movies to film this week!" Oh, and the Morrocian music is actually pretty good.

The "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" franchise had already been run into the ground long ago through indifferently made sequels (though Tobe Hooper's 1986 effort isn't as bad as generally implied), and now this atrocious thing. Hopefully the original filmmakers made some money off of this garbage. Whereas the original was a creepy, uneasy film with a crazed, nightmarish ending (and memorable final shot), this one is a stupid, clichéd, irritating and unpleasant mess. Whereas the killings in the original were generally quick, the remake features one long scene after another of people running from the chainsaw wielding villain, or running into people who are obviously in on the whole murderous enterprise. There is no tension, no suspense. The heroine is an 80s cliché: the good girl who won't take drugs, and even stops off at the end to save a little baby. The other characters are idiotic prettyboys/girls and southern stereotypes. The uncanny thing about the original film is that killing and eating people was simply the lifestyle of the family, in this one there seems to be some sort of vague "revenge against the world" plot (Leatherface suffers from some sort of skin disease, rather than just being a freak who likes to wear skins), and I can't recall cannibalism being mentioned once.

The violence in the original was implied rather than shown, certainly for budgetary purposes, but that also lends itself to the overall atmosphere of the film. Here we have not one, but two scenes of the same character trying to lift himself up off of a meat hook that he as been skewered on. The filmmakers saw they could not craft a frightening, smartly made horror film, so they just stooped to making a tedious gore one. At least it all leads into the most obviously derivative ending in some time, a "Blair Witch" bastardization that almost has to be seen to actually be believed (not quite as good as the "Carrie"-like ending to "Pieces", where a seemingly dead character reaches up and rips a chunk out of the hero's crotch!). Once again Hollywood, thanks for another worthless remake, have fun with your dwindling box office receipts.

I had seen Dumont's "Humanite", involving a retarded police detective who investigates crimes by running around a field screaming and grabbing suspects and sniffing them. I didn't think Mr. Dumont could possibly surpass that monument to slobbering pretentiousness, but, lo-and-behold, he manages just that with this film. An obnoxious, metrosexual, sensitive photographer and his dumb bitchy girlfriend head into the American desert to scout locations. They fornicate like rabbits and argue, which sets up the first hour and forty minutes of the movie. They argue, then go at it, then argue again, and go at it. Finally they are chased down by some yahoos, and the metrosexual is raped by the most French looking American desert rat I've ever seen. Metrosexual then snaps and stabs his dumb broad girlfriend to death and kills himself (or something). The metrosexual and his rapist drive gigantic American gas guzzling beasts (a Hummer, and a Ford F-250), I suppose that means something. I doubt a guy who drives around in a truck that's probably worth $50-60,000 would drive around the desert looking for Hummers to ram and drivers to rape, but then again what do I know about the desert or anything, please, Mr. Dumont, educate me.

So then we have a meaningless allegory about two idiots driving around the beautiful desert, arguing and screwing. The metrosexual has idiot woman drive his Hummer (SYMBOL) and she scratches it, he gets mad, then lets her continue to drive it. Idiot woman sees some dogs in front of a trailer, leans out the window trying to get them to follow her (good God, who has never seen a dog before?!), and metrosexual runs one over, and idiot woman gets mad. Watching this movie is like watching someone try to build a house of cards in hurricane. Did I mention the sex? Everybody screams and cries and makes bizarre faces during sex, even the man-rapist at the end. The "horrific" violence isn't there, yes, the ending is a surprise, but only because it comes out of left field. Mr. Dumont makes movies about paint drying then ends it with somebody getting gut shot. Its ART!!

Like many of the reviewers here, I grew up with the "Star Wars" movies and was enthralled by them. Of course, looking back, I can see their defects: the clunky writing, stagy dramatics, the weird mishmash of acting styles, and so on, but there is an attraction to the movies even today. As much as I wanted to love the last of the "Star Wars" movies, I cannot embrace it completely. It has the same problems as the previous ones: lifeless dialog, non actors and non acting, and a triumph of computer graphics over any human engagement or emotion. The difference this time is that things have been pumped up to an almost operatic excess, but without the rigid underpinnings that would make it work. Hayden Christensen's Darth Vader remains the same as his Anakin Skywalker, a lumpen, petulant crybaby who's transformation into Vader is so unconvincing as to be laughable. Lucas' own misstep here, I think, is to fall back on the lame love story between Skywalker and Amidala; Skywalker is more interesting in his moments of hubris and arrogance (Christensen's petulance comes off more convincingly here), than in his stilted, grade school "all we need is our love" scenes with Natalie Portman, who is as much a non-actor as Christensen is. The scene of Vader (now possessing James Earl Jones' iconic voice) screaming "noooo!" in slow motion shows that Lucas did not pay nearly enough attention to the quality of his script as he claimed he did, or those who surround him are as bereft of dramatic judgment as he is (honestly, were any of you out there moved by that hokey moment?). That said, the computer effects are impressive, there is no doubt about that, the fight scenes are excellent, especially the concluding Vader/Kenobi duel (at least when no one is talking or attempting to emote, though Kenobi's final words to Vader are effective). Lucas is to be congratulated for not tip toeing around Vader's transformation into a cruel figure, he slaughters little children, his friends and allies, and even nearly kills his own wife. These scenes work simply because the innate dramatic intensity of the scenes (the the weight of the entire series) come to the forefront, rather than the unconvincing dramatic chops of his leads. The fact that a good portion of the movie is fighting, flying, and killing is what, in my mind, rates it as high as it does, these scenes are excellent in their own right. If only Lucas' ego hadn't gotten in the way, and he turned the script over to a writer of talent!