This week's episode is Rocketship X-M (1950)
Discussed at length on Satellite News here.
musings and memories of movies, music, and other media
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Horrible Art, Artful Horror
More late-night cable viewing of some classic and not so classic horror films.
Caught the rest of Student Bodies (1981), predecessor to the self-aware horror-comedies of today (Scary Movie, Scream, etc.). Not really frightening at all, but brimming with very broad humor, in an Airplane! sort of mode.
Reviews:
28 Days Later (2002)
A masterpiece from Danny Boyle (Slumdog Millionaire, 127 Hours), that manages to be both humane and inhuman. It alternates between being a suspenseful survival thriller to a sad and touching drama of loss and family legacy, and back again, several times. It is very messy (both in it's gore and emotional range).
Some idiot online called it merely a remake of Dawn of the Dead and that's way off (for starters, none of Romero's films look half this good). However, a number of scenes from AMC's recent The Walking Dead mini-series are lifted straight from this.
Boyle's dynamic camera work and editing reminds me of the ADD-style of Edgar Wright but with more art, less winking at the audience. As this review of the BluRay from DVD Beaver notes however, the shot-on video look of the film does not translate well to HD. The smaller your screen the better it will look. But the sound design and score are excellent and should be played LOUD.
An "enhanced" trailer
Caught a bit of the H.G. Lewis minor-piece Color Me Blood Red (1965) on CKMT.
I own this as part of a Lewis box set of his influential schlock movies from the 60s. This a goofy bit of exploitation that is more silly than scary, about a frustrated artist who finds inspiration through murder. Barely watchable – not for it's gore but for it's ineptness.
The revamped Elvira show presented Mel Welles Lady Frankenstein (1971), a lurid attempt at a Hammer horror, mostly notable for the sexy daughter played by Rosalba Neri. The doctor himself is played by veteran actor Joseph Cotten, fallen far from his days with Hitchcock and Welles.
Some reviews:
Trailers and clip reels:
And for an entirely different kind of "body horror": the award-winning The Diving Bell & The Butterfly (2007), which was elegantly made, using every trick in the book to not be visually dull, considering the protagonist is completely paralyzed. Back in the Eighties I was not a fan of director Julian Schnabel's oversized construction/paintings, but as a film-maker his everything-but-the-kitchen-sink approach makes sense now, especially when grounded by such an emotionally wrenching story.
Caught a bit of Dark Mirror (2007) but it didn't make enough of an impression to say much about it, besides looking nice.
Also watched Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2008) with Rifftrax commentary. A confounding mess of a movie, reimagining Hitchcock's The Birds with even less-convincing special effects. The first half is mostly a goofy romantic fantasy where a software sales-nerd courts a supermodel, then it abruptly shifts gears when the poorly CGI'd birds start attacking the population of the Bay Area. Some very heavy-handed ecological themes make it seem as if this was a sincere statement by the director. Funny remarks from the riffing crew made this one bearable, reminding me at times of MST3K classics like Manos and The Killer Shrews.
Matt Singer of IFC gave it a thoughtful review here.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
MST3K S01E04 - Women of the Prehistoric Planet
Discussed at length on Satellite News here.
One of the better Season One episodes. Once available on DVD in Rhino's MST3K Volume 9, which is now sadly out-of-print. Despite it's low production number, it was actually the last one filmed for this season, and is Josh Weinstein's final appearance on MST as Tom Servo and mad scientist Dr. Erhardt.
MST3K Season One Ratings
Good news, over half of these have been officially released on DVD. Bad news, they're mostly from the weaker, front half of the season. If you're new to the show I wouldn't try one with less than a 3 star rating. Project Moon Base is your best bet.
* There were also 9 parts of the serial Radar Men From The Moon (Commando Cody) featured in front of these movies
Season One: The Comedy Channel (1989-90)
Stars Episode # - movie title
2 101- THE CRAWLING EYE +
1 102- THE ROBOT VS. THE AZTEC MUMMY *+
1 103- MAD MONSTER *+
3 104- WOMEN OF THE PREHISTORIC PLANET #
2 105- THE CORPSE VANISHES *+
3 106- THE CRAWLING HAND +
3 107- ROBOT MONSTER *+
3 108- THE SLIME PEOPLE *
4 109- PROJECT MOON BASE *+ (available March 2011)
4 110- ROBOT HOLOCAUST *
4 111- MOON ZERO TWO
5 112- UNTAMED YOUTH
4 113- THE BLACK SCORPION
+ Available on DVD or Netflix streaming
# Production number only: s/b end of season, i.e. #114. OOP on DVD
After a grading a few episodes I realized that I'm still "grading on a curve", i.e. giving higher marks than I probably should. But it's hard for me to keep all eleven seasons of this show in mind, especially as it changed so much over time. Maybe after I've rated all the seasons, I'll have more perspective, and some of these rankings will go down.
During KTMA/Season 0, I was being generous, as they are so obviously rough-drafts for the future series. In my thinking, since I can't vote for "zero" stars, a "1" is lowest and should be reserved for episodes I hate. But I didn't really hate any of these, so in most cases an original 2 star rating has been reduced to a 1, which means I endured it but am not clamoring to re-watch it anytime soon.
Still, if a movie was fun to watch, that in itself earned points from me, even if the riffing or host segments were sub-par. So these results may differ slightly from what I posted in my original comments over at the Satellite News Episode Guide; some are lower, others higher.
An illustrated history of the show at Tom's Temple of MST3K Stuff
http://www.mst3ktemple.com/season1.html
Below: from 104 – one of the best host segments of the season. Also the first (and last) song(s) to appear on the show. Later seasons will feature many more…
Below: from 104 – one of the best host segments of the season. Also the first (and last) song(s) to appear on the show. Later seasons will feature many more…
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Catch-up (57 Varieties)
A number of factors have converged, allowing me to enjoy my cable/DVR/HDTV set-up at home.
• Work has been slow, allowing me more free time to indulge in my favorite animal passion of staying up nights and sleeping during the day. I developed this (unfortunate) habit in junior high when I had an early morning newspaper route that I found was more easily done if I stayed awake until 5 AM, did the work, then slept it off afterwards, much to my parents' chagrin. Turns out these post-midnight hours are also prime time for web-surfing and passive TV-watching.
• SF Sketchfest is over: I haven't gone out that often in many years. While I enjoyed the forced socialization, it has been a relief to return to my monastic man-cave.
• Oddly simultaneous with being out of the house so much, my brand new TV finally died. I'd had problems with it out of the box (HINT: don't ever have a high-end electronic device shipped to you from out-of-state) but it did work OK for while. Then it finally crapped out, but being under warranty for a new purchase, Samsung sent an repairman to fix it (Ovi from www.tekniton.com). Nearly didn't happen, as the part they replaced didn't fix the problem, but miraculously they had a new "power board" (intended for another customer) in the van and were able to get my TV operational again, better than ever. He assured me that all HDTV brands have their issues, so I left the experience cursing no-one (but myself, for not just picking one up at my local Best Buy and paying the sales tax – would have saved me weeks of annoyance).
• No new movies. Having kept up pretty well with 2010 and Oscar contenders, there has been a lack of anything new I really wanted to see in theaters. (This is only half true, as SFIndiefest started right after the comedy orgy, but I couldn't bring myself to travel across town to see the films We Are What We Are, Machete Maidens Unleashed, and The Last Circus). Will likely have to wait for them on video…
But I have managed to catch up on a bunch of stuff on my DVR and cable. In addition to quadrupling my collection of the music of one Les Baxter.
Kind of half-watched a bunch of movies on Showtime, as I'm planning to cancel my subscription this month. I have perhaps TOO many viewing options these days so I want to cut back on unnecessary distractions/expenses, but I liked what I saw…
Half-watched:
Permanent Record (feat. Keanu Reeves, Michelle Meyrink - teen suicide drama, better than expected) A review here http://chucksconnection.com/permanent.html
Student Bodies (feat. Kristen Riter - horror comedy, dumb fun) http://houseofselfindulgence.blogspot.com/2008/11/student-bodies-mickey-rose-1981.html
George Washington (pretty great)
Hello Again (awful comedy, D.O.A.)
Louie Bluie (brilliant doco) Review from my new favorite site DVD Beaver. They recently gave a strong recommendation for the Japanese anime Summer Wars which I also loved, with some nice screen captures.
Fully seen:
Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976) (fun)
Inception (w/ Rifftrax commentary) (excellent takedown of this enjoyable but bombastic movie)
I've been catching up on the IFC repeats of comedy shows from the 1990's. Mr. Show and The Larry Sanders Show have been a delight. College dorm-based Undeclared is all new to me (good, but not as profound as it's predecessor Freaks and Geeks), but The Ben Stiller Show continues to be a disappointment. Am continually reminded of why I don't like him, and find his success a bit baffling. But between Stiller and Sanders reruns, I'm getting lots of vintage Janeane Garofalo cuteness; pre-weight loss, tattoos, glasses, politics.
And Sanders/Shandling consistently had good looking women as his co-stars and guests.
Am also enjoying IFC's new comedy series Onion News Network and Portlandia, which are both very polished and look great in HD.
I realize now the irony of my previous poo-pooing the price of subscribing to HBO, as both Mr. Show & Larry Sanders were originally aired on that channel. It was mostly me being financially destitute during the 1990's that kept me from seeing those series during their initial runs. The Sopranos & Deadwood are also favorites of mine, but I only caught up with them via Netflix years later.
Also, the CDR features on IFC have not been all that amazing so far. No slight on host Scott Aukerman, but I expected more, for no real reason. Still, it gives me an excuse to tune in to some quality comedy programming. Sarah Silverman ripped him good during her Larry Sanders intro…
Sarah: HA! It's amazing that you work in comedy… you make a living doing something you're terrible at.
Hot Fuzz (2007) Netflix Blu-Ray rental
Feelin' fuzzy… I didn't love this. Does that make me a bad film geek? Even watched it again with the commentary a few days later, and was still unconvinced. I felt the same way after starting the British series Spaced, which Edgar Wright also directed - took me a few episodes to fully get into it. I enjoyed his recent Scott Pilgrim movie a great deal, but find his ADD film-making style a bit off-putting. Not being a die-hard action movie fan, the reliance on references and homages are un-engaging. I'm either too smart or too dumb for this. Still, Scott Pilgrim should have been an Oscar nominee for either Editing or Visual Effects. I fully acknowledge the man's talent, I just didn't love Hot Fuzz.
Also very much enjoying the often abstract animated gifs of iconic cinema moments found at these two sites:
http://iwdrm.tumblr.com (from where the image at the top of this post came)
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