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Monday, December 23, 2024

A THOUSAND WORDS

 
Publicity poster for A Thousand Words (© Brian Robbins/DreamWorks Pictures/Saturn Films/Varsity Pictures/Work After Midnight Films/Paramount Pictures – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

On 22 December 2024, I watched the bittersweet American fantasy/comedy movie A Thousand Words – a film that I might never have even known about, let alone watched, had it not been for my fortuitous finding a few weeks earlier at an English outdoor car boot sale of a discarded DVD case for this movie. Sadly, the disc itself was missing, but its back cover blurb so intrigued me that I purchased a disc for it online, and now, after watching it, I'm so glad I found that empty case and thereby learned of this delightful film's existence.

Directed by Brian Robbins, who was also one of its several co-producers (so too was American A-list actor Nicolas Cage), and released by Paramount Pictures in 2012 (although filmed in 2008), A Thousand Words stars motor-mouth mega-star Eddie Murphy in, incongruously, an almost silent lead role.

He plays brash literary agent Jack McCall, who originally displays an unassailable ability to talk people into doing whatever he wants, which has resulted in him becoming a thoroughly obnoxious egomaniac, oblivious to the needs of his wife Caroline (Kerry Washington) and their young son Tyler (Emanuel Ragsdale) to receive his love, and those of his co-workers to receive the courtesy and respect that they deserve – especially his youthful, perpetually put-upon and put-down literary assistant Aaron (Clark Duke), and his faithful valet (John Gatins) who harbours aspirations as an author that Jack brusquely waves away.

But when Jack tries to con a New Age guru named Dr Sinja (Cliff Curtis) into selling him the rights to his self-help book, events take a very mystical, mortifying turn.

A supernatural Bodhi tree possessing exactly 1000 leaves magically appears in Jack's garden, and Jack swiftly discovers that every word he speaks (or even writes down) results in a leaf dropping from the tree. Consulting Dr Sinja, Jack is horrified to learn that once the tree loses all of its leaves, both it and Jack will die (clearly this particular guru knows more about spirituality than botany, or he would have been aware that deciduous trees lose all their leaves every autumn/fall, but simply grow a new set the following spring!).

Anyway, much of the movie from then on focuses upon the hapless Jack becoming helplessly and hopelessly but always hilariously caught up in all manner of outlandishly bizarre situations as he frantically strives to communicate without speaking or writing. But ultimately it all proves too much – he finally loses his job, and his wife moves out of their home, taking their son with her. Moreover, due to various unavoidable instances where he has had no option but to speak, there are virtually no leaves left on the tree.

Despondent and desperate, Jack visits Dr Sinja again, who tells him that he has to seek deep inside himself to repair the relationship that has brought him the most pain in his life. Jack's mother Annie (Ruby Dee), whom he does love very much, has dementia, so he visits her at the care-home on her birthday, even though he knows that she will not recognise him, and will mistake him for her deceased husband Raymond, Jack's father, who walked out on them when Jack was only a child, leaving Jack feeling unloved by Raymond and resentful toward him ever afterwards.

Sure enough, his mother once again mistakes Jack for Raymond, telling him how she wishes that their son Jack would forgive him for walking out on them as she knows how much Jack was always loved by him, and that nothing is more important than family.

Never realising until now that his father had indeed loved him, Jack visits his grave and whispers outloud "I forgive you" – and at that same moment the last three leaves fall from the tree, and Jack falls unconscious to the ground. But does he die, or has he found redemption and salvation? Watch this very funny but also very poignant, moving movie and find out.

Some of you know that for many years my beloved little Mom was my only family, so when she passed away eleven years ago, so too did my entire family, and I've been alone ever since. Consequently, when Jack's Mom told him that nothing is more important than family, I began to shed too, just like the tree, except that it wasn't leaves that I was shedding.

Although not a Christmas-themed movie, A Thousand Words exudes a similar festive, feel-good glow, making it perfect viewing for this time of year. It promotes a very important message too: your words are powerful, so never waste them, or use them unkindly – always use them wisely, and kindly, make them count.

Worth mentioning, incidentally, is the notable number of major stars who were variously considered or auditioned for this movie's lead role of Jack McCall that ultimately went to Murphy – they include, for instance, Richard Ayoade, Ice Cube, Will Ferrell (also considered for the role of Dr Sinja), Jamie Foxx, Kevin Hart, Samuel L. Jackson, Chris Rock, Will Smith, and Wesley Snipes. Moreover, Queen Latifah and Jada Pinkett Smith were among those considered for the role of Caroline McCall that ultimately went to Kerry Washington.

After I posted a much shorter, preliminary version of this review of A Thousand Words on Facebook earlier today, one reader mentioned to me that the film currently holds a 0% critics approval rating on the movie review website Rotten Tomatoes (though it does also hold a 46% audience approval rating on there), which, quite frankly, is an absurd state of affairs. Having said that, I do tend to find that forums like those on Rotten Tomatoes and other sites that allow reviews to be posted by users tend to attract a disproportionate number of splenetic offerings, from deliberately provocative would-be critics trying to make a name for themselves, whereas more fair-minded users seem less incited or incentivized to post a review. This is a great shame, because it results in many perfectly good movies receiving unjustifiably low ratings, due to the pack-hunting feeding frenzy copycat approach that frequently occurs once a couple of bad reviews have been posted for a given film, with each subsequent reviewer attempting to outdo the previous ones in terms of the bile and venom that they can spill forth.

I personally feel that A Thousand Words is definitely one movie that has suffered from this. Now had it been The Adventures of Pluto Nash (click here to read my thoughts concerning this Eddie Murphy movie), I could have understood it more!

So whereas some professional critics dismissed A Thousand Words back in 2012 as formulaic and outdated, and more recent unprofessional ones have attacked it from all sides, I loved it (as is so often the case with films that critics have disparaged), and I'm sure that plenty of you will too if you get the chance to watch this film, and give it a chance when doing so.

If you would like to view an official trailer for A Thousand Words on YouTube, please click here.

Finally: to view a complete chronological listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE, and please click HERE to view a complete fully-clickable alphabetical listing of them.

 

Tuesday, December 17, 2024

FROM A MILLIONAIRESS AND A MILLION POUND NOTE TO A GOOD LOOKIN' BAKSHI MOVIE AND MORE!

 
My DVDs and video of some of the movies mini-reviewed by me here (photograph © Dr Karl Shuker – see photos of individual DVDs etc below for their films' respective credits)

Time for another collection of mini-reviews of movies watched by me of late – and just for a change none of them is a sci fi, fantasy, or musical movie (but there is an animated one!).

 

 
Publicity photograph for Cold Comfort Farm (© John Schlesinger/Thames Television/BBC – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

COLD COMFORT FARM

On 3 March 2024, I thoroughly enjoyed the eponymous British film version of the satirical Stella Gibbons novel Cold Comfort Farm, published in 1932. Directed by John Schlesinger, produced by Thames Television and the BBC, and released in 1995, it stars Kate Beckinsale as city-sophisticated but newly-orphaned young lady Flora Poste, who accepts an invitation to spend some time with her eccentric rural relatives the Starkadders on their ramshackle homestead Cold Comfort Farm, which is supposedly overshadowed by a family curse. And as if that were not off-putting enough, it is also ruled with a fist of iron by Great-Aunt Ada Doom (Sheila Burrell), who has lived a Miss Havishamesque existence cocooned inside her bedroom there for countless years after seeing "something nasty in the woodshed" when a child. It's up to prissy but prescient Flora to drag the Starkadders out of their crazy, gloom, doom (and Doom!)-laden existence into the modern era and enable them to fulfil their various long-harboured but hitherto-repressed ambitions. Packed with famous names, including Joanna Lumley (as Flora's ditzy high-society friend Mary Smiling), Eileen Atkins (dread-filled and dreadful Starkadder matriarch Judith), Rufus Sewell (lusty youngest Starkadder brother Seth), Ivan Kaye (diligent middle Starkadder brother Reuben), Ian McKellen (hellfire-preaching eldest Starkadder brother Amos), Stephen Fry (irritating upper-class twit Mybug), Miriam Margolyes (the Starkadders' helper Mrs Beetle), and Freddie Jones (the delightfully-named Adam Lambsbreath), this is a thoroughly delightful and very amusing movie watch that is guaranteed to cheer and charm even the most downbeat of viewers. Please click here to watch an official trailer for this movie on YouTube.

 

 
My official DVD of D.O.A. (© Rudolph Maté/Harry Popkin Productions/Cardinal Pictures/United Artists – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

D.O.A.

My movie watch on 3 November 2023 was a double-bill of 1950s b/w films, but that's where their similarities end. One of them was the sci fi comedy movie The Twonky, which I've already reviewed here. The other was the original film version of D.O.A. (its title's initials standing for Dead On Arrival). Directed by Rudolph Maté, and released in 1950 by United Artists, D.O.A. is a film noir mystery/thriller in which LA-based accountant and notary Frank Bigelow (played by Edmund O'Brien) is surreptitiously poisoned while visiting San Francisco. Moreover, the poison is lethal as there is no known antidote for it and will therefore kill him in a week, possibly less. So although Bigelow is presently still alive, he is already functionally murdered. Consequently, he decides to spend his final week alive tracking down his unknown killer and uncovering the cryptic reason why the latter has visited upon him this death sentence. With a compelling plot, full of twists and turns as well as a massive ongoing red herring, D.O.A. duly engaged my interest and attention throughout its 84 minutes running time. I own it on DVD, but please click here if you'd like to watch this entire movie free of charge on YouTube.

 

 
Publicity poster for Help! (© Richard Lester/Walter Shenson Films/Subafilms/United Artists – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

HELP!

My movie watch on 2 July 2024 was Help! – the 'classic' Beatles movie that I'd never previously viewed but had lately purchased in video format. Directed by Richard Lester, and released in 1965 by United Artists, it's all about a Kali-worshipping death cult heavily into human sacrifice who need a precious ring currently (and aptly) being worn by Ringo to place on the finger of their next victim – who may well be Ringo himself if he can't remove the tenaciously-attached item of jewellery from his finger! All manner of madcap chases and pursuits duly ensue, as the ring is being sought not only by the cult's maniacal head priest Clang (played by Leo McKern) but also by megalomaniacal mad scientist (is there any other sort??) Professor Foot (Victor Spinetti) and his clot of a cohort Algernon (Roy Kinnear). And yes, this movie is indeed every bit as barmy as it sounds, albeit imho not necessarily in a good way, filled as it is with disjointed nonsense and deadpan humour that was more dead and panned than humorous. Perhaps the most amazing thing about this movie, I feel, is that someone somewhere somehow felt that it was a good idea at the time. They clearly needed Help! The Beatles choosing to become musicians rather than actors was definitely music's gain – and acting's too! Please click here to watch an official trailer for this movie on YouTube.

 

 
My official big-box video of Hey Good Lookin' (© Ralph Bakshi/Bakshi Productions/Warner Bros – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

HEY GOOD LOOKIN'

After rewatching the live-action/animation mash-up movie Cool World a few days earlier (click here for my full review of that movie), on 6 July 2024 I rewatched another film conceived and directed by Ralphi Bakshi, this time the fully-animated flick Hey Good Lookin', released in 1982 by Warner Bros after an earlier 1970s version that had been a previous attempt by Bakshi to create a live-action/animation mash-up movie had remained (and still remains) unreleased (but click here to view a very rare promo for it, showing how the four principal animated characters interacted with the live-action world that they inhabited in this earlier version). Set mostly in early 1950s Brooklyn, NYC, its central characters are Vinnie, the cool but cowardly Fonzie-lookalike leader of a greaser gang named The Stompers, and his aptly-named psychotic sidekick Crazy, and culminates in a violent rumble between the Stompers and rival gang the Chaplains, earning the movie an 18 certificate. It contains very slick animation throughout, and is accompanied by some excellent foot-tapping rock'n'roll songs (including the title number), but I found none of the characters in it to be even remotely likeable. I had previously watched this movie only once, about 30 years previously, soon after buying it as a big-box VHS video (pictured here), and which is what I watched again five months ago in July (though I do now own it on DVD too), and experienced a mystifying 'false memory' moment. I would have sworn that during the rumble, Vinnie turns ugly and stabs someone to death, yet watching it this second time, on the same video that I'd watched it on before, no such event takes place. On the contrary, Vinnie cowers behind a car and leaves his gang to do all the fighting. Very curious indeed – a veritable Mandela Effect instance, perhaps (click here for details of what may be another animated film-related Mandela Effect experience of mine, and here for a very famous non-animated movie example of this phenomenon), or just a bad memory on my part? You decide! Please click here to watch an official trailer for this movie on YouTube.

 

 
My complementary promo full-length movie DVD of The Millionairess given by London's Daily Express newspaper – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

THE MILLIONAIRESS

My movie watch on 9 July 2024 was the British rom-com film The Millionairess. Directed by Anthony Asquith, inspired by the eponymous play by George Bernard Shaw, and released in 1960 by 20th Century Fox, it stars Italian screen goddess Sophia Loren (Ava Gardner had been Fox's first choice) as Epifania Pererge, the egocentric wealth-obsessed richest woman in the world, and iconic British comic actor Peter Sellers as Dr Ahmed el Kabir, the wealth-indifferent selfless Indian doctor whom she is determined to ensnare as her husband. Several other famous British thespians appeared in supporting roles, such as Alastair Sim, Alfie Bass, Miriam Karlin, Dennis Price, and Graham Stark. Even so, I have to confess that I found it to be nowhere near as funny as I'd been led to believe, probably due to the highly unpleasant, brattish nature of Loren's character, making it very difficult to warm to her. Earlier plans to film Shaw's play with Katharine Hepburn and Alec Guinness in the leading roles never came to fruition. Worth noting, incidentally, is that contrary to numerous claims, the hit Loren/Sellers song 'Goodness Gracious Me' (click here to listen to it on YouTube with scenes from the movie), in which they feature as their characters from this movie (and which contains dialogue from one particular scene in it in which he is medically examining her), never actually appears in the film. It was meant to, but the producers changed their minds about including it, and it was instead released separately, as a means of publicising the film, which it did very effectively as this song went on to become a smash hit in the UK music singles chart. Please click here if you would like to watch this entire movie free of charge on YouTube.

 

 
My official DVD of The Million Pound Note (© Ronald Neame/J. Arthur Rank Organisation/Group Film Productions/General Film Distributors – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

THE MILLION POUND NOTE

On 10 July 2024, my movie watch was, like The Millionairess that I viewed on the previous evening (see mini-review above), a classic but nowadays not so famous British comedy film – The Million Pound Note (aka Man With A Million), which was directed by Ronald Neame, released in 1954 by General Film Distributors, and based upon a Mark Twain story. Set in the late 1800s, it stars Gregory Peck as Henry Adams, a penniless jobless American stranded in London who is presented by two wealthy gamblers with a genuine one million pound banknote, to see whether he can last a month without spending any of it yet still prosper simply by the respectability that possessing it brings to him, or whether he will need to spend at least some of it in order to survive. Henry finds the former prospect to be the one that works very well for him, at least to begin with, but matters become ever more complex, farcical, and hilarious as the month progresses. A host of famous British stars feature in this film, not least of whom are Joyce Grenfell, Wildfrid Hyde-White, Bryan Forbes, Laurence Naismith, Joan Hickson, and Hugh Griffith. Sumptuous decor, sparkling dialogue, and with Joyce Grenfell as a delightfully dotty duchess, how could any such movie possibly go wrong? And it doesn't – it's a total joy throughout. I vaguely remember watching this movie just once before, at least 50 years ago in b/w on TV when I was a teenager, but I had scarcely remembered it at all except for its title, so it was like watching a totally new film when I played my recently-purchased DVD of it. Please click here to watch this movie in its entirety free of charge on YouTube.

Finally: to view a complete chronological listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE, and please click HERE to view a complete fully-clickable alphabetical listing of them.

 
Screen-shot from the original unreleased 1970s live-action/animation mash-up version of Hey Good Lookin' (© Ralph Bakshi/Bakshi Productions/Warner Bros – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)


Wednesday, November 27, 2024

THE GIANT CLAW, AND SO MUCH MORE! MINI-REVIEWING ANOTHER SIX SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY MOVIES

 
Publicity poster for The Giant Claw (© Fred F. Sears/Clover Productions/Columbia Pictures – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

Here are another half-dozen mini-reviews of science fiction and fantasy movies that I've watched of late, or very late!

 

 
Another two publicity posters for The Giant Claw (© Fred F. Sears/Clover Productions/Columbia Pictures – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

THE GIANT CLAW

On 19 July 2023, after a mere 64 years since first showing my face in this weird world of ours, I finally watched (in the shape of a very decent colorized version) that classic 'so bad that it's good' 1957 monster movie The Giant Claw, directed (and also narrated) by Fred F. Sears, and released by Columbia Pictures. To be fair, the actual storyline (gigantic alien bird from an antimatter galaxy attacks and destroys numerous military aircraft over North America) and acting (lead star was Jeff Morrow, as civil aeronautical engineer Mitch MacAfee) are decent enough for a 1950s B-movie of this genre. Instead, the problem lies almost entirely with its metaphorical elephant in the drawing room or, to be more literal, its giant bird in the skyline! Owner of this movie's titular talon(s), the bargain-basement model bird utilised is not just fowl but foul – it resembles the kind of tawdry, rubber-necked, bent-beaked ultra-cheapo 'prize' that you might find yourself taking home (or dropping into the nearest garbage bin) after successfully shooting a series of floating plastic ducks at a downtown funfair! Once it makes its first appearance, any hope of taking the movie even remotely seriously thereafter is entirely lost, its mad glazed gaze staring into the camera through a pair of enormous white ping-pong ball-like eyes, and its scrawny plumage recalling an irredeemably clapped-out feather duster! In other words, The Giant Claw is precisely the kind of monstrously crazy creature feature that I just had to review here in my movie blog, especially as I'd previously read so much about it (Morrow confessed in an interview, for instance, that he had crept incognito into a cinema screening this film at its premiere and was so ashamed at the laughter and jeers that arose from the audience each time that the bird appeared on screen that he lost no time in creeping back out in case someone recognised him!; and Ray Harryhausen had originally been selected to create the bird but the movie's budget was so low that they had to use a cut-price alternative model creator in Mexico City instead). And now, finally, I've actually viewed it in all its horrendous glory. A total turkey that's strictly for the birds? Please click here to watch an official trailer for this movie on YouTube and decide for yourselves! Or click here if you'd like to watch free of charge on YouTube the entire colorized movie version that I watched on there.

 

 
A couple of publicity posters for The Hidden (© Jack Sholder/Heron Communications, Inc./Mega Entertainment/New Line Cinema – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

THE HIDDEN

On 25 October 2024, I finally watched a classic 1980s sci fi movie that I'd long intended to see – The Hidden. Directed by Jack Sholder and released in 1987 by New Line Cinema, it's all about an evil half-insect/half-slug alien that physically occupies a human host to make him/her do its violent will, thereby turning its victim into a homicidal killer before exiting when the host is killed by police etc, and then surreptitiously entering a new human host. Its ultimate goal is to enter and control the next President of the USA, but on its trail is an indefatigable alien law enforcer in the human guise of fake FBI agent Lloyd Gallagher (played by Kyle MacLachlan), assisted by cynical LAPD cop Detective Tom Beck (Michael Nouri), who for much of the film has no idea what on Earth (literally!) is happening. He is particularly perplexed as to why hitherto law-abiding citizens are abruptly turning into mass murderers, until Gallagher eventually has no option but to tell him the jaw-dropping truth. The Hidden is a very tense, thrilling movie that kept me on the edge of my seat throughout, thereby fully justifying this claim as made in one of its posters included here, culminating in a literally explosive climax that at long last publicly exposes the alien villain in its revolting true form to an astonished, horrified human audience, followed by a most unexpected but very moving, touching finale. Highly recommended!! A follow-up film, The Hidden II, was released in 1993, in which it is revealed that the bug/slug alien from the original movie had secretly laid some eggs before being killed, and these are now beginning to hatch – uh-oh… I'll have to seek out this sequel and watch it at some stage. Meanwhile, please click here to watch an official trailer for the original movie on YouTube.

 

 
A publicity poster and an official VHS video of Curse of the Crystal Eye (© John Tornatore/New Horizons – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

CURSE OF THE CRYSTAL EYE

My movie watch on 27 March 2024 was Curse of the Crystal Eye. Directed by Joe Tornatore and released in 1991 by New Horizons, this is one of a seemingly countless number of action/adventure movies spawned by other studios in the wake of Paramount's immensely-successful Indiana Jones blockbusters, in which a rebel character seeks ancient treasure and faces untold life-threatening challenges during his daring quest. In this particular offering, the rebel in question is ex-mercenary Luke Ward (played by Jameson Parker), who is gifted a sizeable priceless crystal that acts as an eye to guide him and his romantic-interest sidekick, namely diplomat's daughter Vickie Philips (Cynthia Payne in her final big-screen role), to the fabled long-hidden treasure of none other than Arabian Nights thief-leader Ali Baba. And guess what? Before you can say "Open Sesame", he and Vickie plus their back-up team of brawny mercenaries duly find the cave in which the ancient temple containing the treasure is concealed – but this is just the beginning, as the cave does not relinquish its splendorous contents quite so easily. Nor are they alone and unchallenged in their mission to relieve the cave of said contents... Curse of the Crystal Eye is an innocuous and mildly entertaining but instantly-forgettable adventure flick that passes 90 minutes' worth of time during a rainy spring afternoon or chilly winter evening, but signally lacks the much-vaunted fiery dragons promised in its publicity material. Shucks! Please click here to watch an official trailer for this movie on YouTube, or click here to watch the entire movie on there, free of charge..

 

 
French publicity poster for Pitch Black plus this movie's alien life-form the bioraptor (© David Twohy/Grammercy Pictures/Interscope Communications/Universal Pictures – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

PITCH BLACK

On 11 August 2024, I watched the sci fi movie Pitch Black, directed by David Twohy and released in 2000 by Universal Pictures. Pitch Black is the first entry in the Chronicles of Riddick film franchise, and it stars Vin Diesel as dangerous, taciturn, and thoroughly enigmatic criminal Richard Riddick. He is one of several passengers to survive the crash-landing of their space-craft on a mysterious desert planet seemingly devoid of all life forms – until an eclipse blocks out its suns. Then the terrifying bioraptors emerge from their caves – very large winged horrors that slaughter most of the passengers as they bid desperately to survive these nocturnal nightmares. A reluctant Riddick decides to help the other passengers, equipped as he is with specially-modified eyes that now possess perfect night vision – very useful during an eclipse where darkness brings forth monstrous entities of the murderous kind, Mercifully, however, these killer creatures are physically wounded by bright light, so the passengers strive frantically to equip themselves with any kind of light source (even capturing tiny bioluminescent creatures inside transparent glass jars to use as living lanterns – these creatures are actually the bioraptors' larvae), and pray that the eclipse will only be of short duration. The bioraptors are superbly designed, totally alien in form, and are seen clearly enough (even in dark scenes), frequently enough, and long enough for my interest to be maintained throughout. So much so, in fact, that I now intend to watch the other three entries (one of which is actually an animated featurette) presently in this series, with a fifth due out in 2025. Very enjoyable. Please click here to watch an official trailer for this movie on YouTube.

 

 
Three publicity posters for Synchronic (© Justin Benson/Aaron Moorhead/XYZ Films/Patriot Pictures/Rustic Films/Well Go USA Entertainment - – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

SYNCHRONIC

My movie watch on 8 May 2024 was the sci fi thriller Synchronic. Directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead (Benson also wrote and co-produced it), and released in 2019 by Well Go USA Entertainment, it stars Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan as New Orleans paramedics Steve and Dennis. They are also best friends, and are dealing with a series of grisly deaths linked to a mysterious new designer drug after which this movie is named. When Dennis's teenage daughter Brianna vanishes without trace, however, Steve learns from the drug's guilt-ridden creator its top-secret but shocking unexpected side-effect. Whereas adults with a calcified pineal gland who take a tablet of Synchronic can visualise the past and appear in it as ghost-like entities that can be injured or even killed there but physically remain in the present, youngsters with a non-calcified pineal who take a tablet are bodily transported into the past, and without a second tablet they are stuck there, forever! Steve has recently learnt that he has a pineal cancer, which has prevented his pineal gland from calcifying – and so, unlike most adults, if he takes a Synchronic tablet he can actually visit the past physically. Consequently, he uses a stash of tablets to search for Brianna in the past, but will be find her before his stash runs out, especially as Synchronic's creator has meanwhile bought up every available supply of it and destroyed them all before committing suicide? The film would have been interesting were it not so remorselessly bleak, and dark – in every sense. Not only was it overwhelmingly depressing, but also it seemed to have been shot almost entirely at night, filling the screen with shadows and near pitch-black vistas for far too much of its 102-minute running time. Even when Steve visited the past it was almost always at night. Did the studio forget to pay their electricity bill, I wonder? Synchronic offers an unusual premise, certainly, and provides a very poignant ending, but overall it was far too depressing for my tastes. Please click here to watch an official trailer for this movie on YouTube.

 

 
Two publicity posters for The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (© Henry Levin/George Pal/George Pal Productions/Avernus Productions/MGM – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF THE BROTHERS GRIMM

On 12 April 2024, I sought out and, after owning it for many years, finally watched my sell-thru video of the classic 1960s fantasy movie The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm, which was co-directed by Henry Levin and George Pal (with Pal also producing it), and also extensively featured marionettes created by Pal for the fairytale segments. Filmed in spectacular curved-screen Cinerama, and released in 1962 by MGM, it is basically a largely imaginary, highly romanticised history of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, the two 19th-Century German brothers who famously collected and chronicled many of their homeland's traditional folktales. In the present movie, however, only Wilhelm (played by Laurence Harvey) is portrayed in this way, with Jacob (Karlheinz Böhm) presented as a highbrow law scholar who initially has neither time nor patience for his brother's fairytales, but is eventually won over to his cause, helping Wilhelm with his collating and preserving of them in published book form. Interspersed between the film's biographical storyline are three of their collected fairytales – 'The Dancing Princess' (a constricted version of 'The 12 Dancing Princesses'), 'The Cobbler and the Elves', and 'The Singing Bone', the latter two featuring some wonderful Pal puppetry/stop-motion animation, especially the dragon in 'The Singing Bone', and all three of them are sumptuously staged. A host of famous names also appear, including Russ Tamblyn, Barbara Eden, Jim Backus, Terry-Thomas, Claire Bloom, Martita Hunt, and Yvette Mimieux. This is a delightful movie very reminiscent in execution and whimsical treatment of its two sibling subjects' lives of the 1952 movie musical Hans Christian Andersen with regard to its own titular storyteller (played by Danny Kaye). Grimm by name but certainly not grim by nature, The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm is definitely a fun-filled, thoroughly enchanting film for all the family to enjoy. Please click here to watch an official trailer for this movie on YouTube.

Finally: to view a complete chronological listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE, and please click HERE to view a complete fully-clickable alphabetical listing of them.

 
George Pal's stop-motion dragon model from The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (© Henry Levin/George Pal/George Pal Productions/Avernus Productions/MGM – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

Sunday, November 24, 2024

FANTASIA AND THE MANDELA EFFECT? RECALLING A PERPLEXING MOVIE MYSTERY FROM MY CHILDHOOD

 
The first of two publicity posters for Fantasia that remind me of the mystifying enie-containing example that I am certain I saw back in the late 1960s (© Walt Disney Productions/RKO Radio Pictures – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

Just for a change, today's Shuker In MovieLand is not a movie (or TV show) review, but is instead a recollection of a movie mystery that has persistently perplexed me ever since I experienced it back in childhood during the late 1960s. So I've decided to document it here, in case any of my blog's readers can assist me in finally solving it.

Almost exactly five years ago to the day, on 22 November 2019, I experienced a potential Mandela Effect moment (click here for another, very famous/infamous movie-related example (Kazaam) featuring this mysterious phenomenon – and also featuring a genie!!) – i.e. discovering that I was totally unable to locate something that until now I had always been absolutely certain had definitely existed.

It concerns Walt Disney's 1940 movie masterpiece Fantasia, a multi-directorial fusion of classical music and classic animation.

Back in the late 1960s, when I was 8 or 9 years old, Fantasia was shown in my little English home town's exceedingly small one-screen cinema, but for one day only, and which, to my great frustration, just so happened to be a school day. Happily, however, knowing how much I (as a massive Disney animation fan) had always wanted to see this film and that this might well be my only chance to do so for some years (back in those far-distant pre-video/DVD/internet times, Disney movies were only viewable every so many years when they were periodically re-released by Disney to cinemas), Mom made sure that we went to see it that evening, and I thoroughly enjoyed it, especially as I'd read so much about it down through the years as a child.

 
My two official Walt Disney figurines of Hyacinth the Hippo, one of the incongruous ballet dancers featured in the hilarious Dance of the Hours segment (which also happens to be my favourite segment) from Fantasia; the left-hand figurine actually pirouettes when you wind her up! (figurines © Walt Disney Studios / photo (© Dr Karl Shuker)

All of this therefore made one aspect particularly puzzling for me. The cinema in question (now long gone) had a very large vertical display window looking out onto the street in which a publicity poster would always be placed in order to advertise to passers-by the movie being shown at that particular time. I can still well remember the official Disney-supplied publicity poster for Fantasia that had been placed there on that single day when this movie was being shown at this cinema.

It consisted of a dark background (a deep midnight blue, as I recall) edged by a collection of characters from this movie's several individual segments, including Mickey Mouse as the Sorcerer's Apprentice, various nature entities from The Nutcracker, some mythological creatures from Pastoral, assorted balletic animals from Dance of the Hours...and (about halfway down the poster's right-hand edge) a blue genie!

Needless to say, as a well-informed Disney fan I knew full well that no genie, blue or otherwise, featured anywhere in Fantasia, a fact amply reinforced by the unequivocal non-appearance of any such entity in this movie's screening that I watched at cinema that evening, so its inclusion in the poster always perplexed me – and even more so when, over 20 years later, I viewed the 1992 animated Disney movie Aladdin and realised to my great surprise that the Robin-Williams-voiced blue genie featuring in it bore more than a passing resemblance to that out-of-place version I'd always remembered so clearly from that late-1960s Fantasia cinema poster!

And so it was that on 22 November 2019, when for some unknown reason the memory of this curious movie poster from my young days long ago popped into my head once again, I decided to track it down online, as I would like to have a picture of it on file, if only as a fondly-recalled memento of my childhood. But could I find it? Not a chance!

 
The blue genie from Disney's 1992 animated movie Aladdin (© John Musker/Ron Clements/Walt Disney Feature Animation/Buena Vista Pictures Distribition – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

I did find two different Fantasia posters that both recalled to various extents the one that I had seen back in the 196os – one of them opens this current blog post of mine, and the other one closes it – except of course that neither of them contains the elusive blue genie.

So then, when viewing this poster on that fateful evening in the late 1960s when I watched the movie at the cinema, did I momentarily enter a parallel dimension in which such a poster truly existed? This is the dramatic explanation that the Mandela Effect proposes in cases like this.

The less radical alternative explanation is that I only thought I'd seen a genie on that poster. The problem with this notion, however, is that as a keen birdwatcher from the earliest of ages, my powers of accurate observation were already well-trained by then, so I would not have mistaken some other character on that poster for a genie, especially as I already knew all of them, being very familiar with this film from reading so much about it beforehand, as already noted here. Moreover, there is no other character in Fantasia that looks anything remotely like a genie anyway.

Consequently, my mystery of the seemingly non-existent yet tenaciously-remembered Fantasia genie remains unresolved. So, does anyone else who was a child of the 1960s recall seeing a genie-containing Fantasia poster? Or has anyone ever encountered a picture of such a poster online? If so, I'd love to see your comments below!

Finally: to view a complete chronological listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE, and please click HERE to view a complete fully-clickable alphabetical listing of them.

 
The second of two publicity posters for Fantasia that remind me of the mystifying enie-containing example that I am certain I saw back in the late 1960s (© Walt Disney Productions/RKO Radio Pictures – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

Saturday, November 9, 2024

GUNS AKIMBO

 
Two versions of Guns Akimbo, the left-hand DVD containing the full, uncut 18-Certificate version, the DVD on the right containing the slightly cut 15-Certificate version (© Jason Lei Howden/Occupant Entertainment/Four Knights Film/Maze Pictures/Cutting Edge/The Electric Shadow Company/Umedia/Ingenious Media/WS Filmproduktion/Deutscher Filmforderfonds/FilmFernsehrFonds Bayern/Hyperion Entertainment/New Zealand Film Commission/Saban Films/Altitude Film Distribution/Leonine Distribution/Madman Entertainment – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

My film watch on 16 October 2024 was Guns Akimbo, as recommended recently to me by a fellow movie fan on Facebook.

Directed and written by Jason Lei Howden, released jointly in 2019 by Saban Films (in North America), Altitude Film Distribution (UK), Leonine Distribution (Germany and Austria), and Madman Entertainment (Australia and New Zealand), and filmed in Germany and New Zealand, Guns Akimbo is basically an action-packed but relentlessly-violent dark comedy/sci fi/crime thriller on steroids, and set in an alternative near future.

It stars Daniel Radcliffe, in a role (albeit still as the hero) about as far removed from his Harry Potter movies as it is possible to imagine – and then some! (Although his character in Horns – click here to read my review of that movie – may run it a close second!) But don't take my word for all of this – here's what IMDb has to say about Guns Akimbo via a very succinct but accurate summary of its veritable rollercoaster of a plot:

Miles [played by Daniel Radcliffe] is stuck in a dead-end programming job. Still in love with his ex-girlfriend Nova [Natasha Liu Bordizzo], he spends his waking hours between pining for her and scouring the internet as a social-justice troll, cowardly leaving anonymous insults to those who post objectionable content online. Meanwhile a cyber-gang, called Skizm, is running an ultra-violent game across his city, in which violent criminals fight to the death for the entertainment of an online audience of millions. Miles feels safe and secure insulting the sick audience of this game, but soon finds himself abducted and thrust into the game, forced to fight with an insane, gun-crazed, escaped lunatic [a female assassin named Nix, played by Samara Weaving]. His only tools, but also his biggest handicap, are the two huge pistols that have been literally bolted onto his hands. Initially, Miles's lifetime of running from his problems pays off as he – barely – manages to elude his seemingly unstoppable opponent, but when Nova's life is threatened unless he takes an active part in the game, he must finally stop running and overcome his fears to fight for the girl he loves.

Scorching along at a blistering pace that never pauses for a second all through its 90-odd-minute action-pummelling running time, peppered with as many bullets as there are expletives – and there are innumerable expletives – the movie itself plays like a maximum-speed computer video game, which in essence is what its plot is, but a game featuring real people in a real-life setting who suffer real-life deaths.

And if you're wondering how all of that can possibly happen so brazenly, in full view of the police yet unchallenged by them, it's because they are well and truly ensconced in Skism's cash-cached pocket. So Miles can expect no help from them.

Guns Akimbo is not my usual kind of movie, but it is so outrageously OTT, and it also greatly benefits from Radcliffe's very successful combining of non-stop frenetic action with black but broad comedy. This very effectively lightens what otherwise would be an unrelenting bloodfest, albeit one of a graphic comic-book nature rather than anything even remotely realistic (thankfully!), boasting as it does a body count of uncountable, unaccountable proportions.

It also sports a pumping soundtrack, including rocking tracks by the likes of Iggy Pop, Rick James, and Cypress Hill, plus two superb pounding cover versions by American industrial metal band 3Teeth. One of these is of British glam rock band The Sweet's smash hit single 'Ballroom Blitz', and the other one is of Dead Or Alive's classic UK #1 single 'You Spin Me Round (Like A Record)'.

In short, Guns Akimbo is certainly a movie that moves, in top gear and beyond at all times, so my attention and interest never flagged even for an instant throughout it. Consequently, action/crime-thriller fans and computer video game geeks alike will love it, I'm sure – as, albeit very unexpectedly, did I!

Last but not least: Nix has named her much-used pistol Kindness, and has also written along its side this seemingly odd name for a death-dealing weapon – until of course you suddenly realise that when she is shooting people dead with it, she is quite literally killing them with Kindness! Quality!

Of the two Guns Akimbo DVDs whose photos open this movie review, I own and watched the version depicted on the right, i.e. the slightly edited 15-Certificate one, and that was immensely violent – how much more so, therefore, was the uncut 18-Certificate version depicted on the left?! The mind boggles!

Anyway, if you'd like to immerse yourself albeit briefly in Skism's played-for-real killer computer game of death within which Miles finds himself lethally trapped and unceasingly targeted by his Kindness-wielding nemesis Nix, please click here and here to watch a couple of truly explosive official Guns Akimbo trailers on YouTube.

Also: to view a complete chronological listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE, and please click HERE to view a complete fully-clickable alphabetical listing of them.