Daily Archives: May 8, 2007

Bad Films, Good Laughs

Amusements

I thought I’d inaugurate a new category today, to catalogue film amusements both intentional and less so. This was inspired, in its own way, by a recent viewing of The Salon, in which a character laments the eminent domain struggle over a beauty shop by actually saying, “Doing hair kept me off the streets,” nevermind that the hair salon won’t actually be closing, it’s just being threatened with being moved. Good laugh, that one. Oh, and another inspiration as well was Lucky You, which features a moment where Debra Messing’s bit character randomly runs into an old African-American acquaintance, and asks if he’s still the gondola guy at Casino X, maybe the Excalibur. “No,” he replies with a sly grin. “Now I’m a Nubian slave at the Luxor.” A bit divisive, perhaps, but to have that much punch in a throwaway line in a Hollywood movie is rare — the irony of being paid to portray a slave, of course, and the further insinuation that it was a well-rewarded promotion from his previous position. Edgily well played, Curtis Hanson and Eric Roth…

Basically, though I’ll probably dump some other related stuff in it as well, including previous Wookie filings, this category will chiefly serve as a repository for all (which is to say, some) of the random, throwaway lines from mediocre films which catch my ear — all manner of pithy ripostes, improvised one-liners and earnestly misguided and thus howlingly funny entreaties that aren’t of the traditional comic punchline variety. Oh, to that end, I’m also reminded of Carrie-Anne Moss’ The Fifth Element-tweaking greeting to an orange vest-sporting Jeremy Piven upon his arrival in a scene in 2000’s The Crew: “What are you doing here — and why are you dressed like Bruce Willis?”

Man, this is fun.

Finally, while I’m sure I’d likely get some legal advice to the contrary, I don’t currently have a lot of faith in lawyers, so we’ll probably also launch a special deadbeats category soon, to keep tabs on the fine, fine folks who default on contracts and otherwise attempt to defraud writers. Good times…

Double Dare

Film Reviews

Grindhouse, but I was distracted by… umm, I’m going to say a naked woman. Riding an ostrich. How does that sound? At any rate, abridged and tweaked from its original run concurrent with the movie’s 2005 theatrical release comes this assessment of Amanda Micheli’s Double
Dare, a fascinating documentary look at the Hollywood stunt industry.

The movie unfolds through the eyes of two of its separate-but-equal participants — 60-plus
year-old Jeannie Epper, who doubled for Lynda Carter as Wonder Woman in the
1970s, and the aforementioned Bell (above right), a neophyte who landed the coveted job of doubling for Lucy
Lawless on Xena: Warrior Princess
when she was only 18. Plenty “insider documentaries” of this ilk
interweave behind-the-scenes footage and multiple interview subjects to
generally illuminating effect. But Double Dare
does so with a rare savvy, and has an extra layer of import in its joint looks
at both the here and now and yesteryear of its trade.

If you think Hollywood offers
dwindling options for actresses over 40, try landing stunt work when
approaching senior citizenhood. A grandmother of four (with a husband 20 years
younger, incidentally), Epper details the challenges of working without pads
(though the second season of Wonder Woman
they did finally impress upon producers the need for flat boots instead of the
wedge-heel go-go variety) and talks about how she doesn’t want to leave the
business. “I know my body,” she says simply. Yet even with stunts now
comprising more and more of typical Hollywood movies,
her gender and age bracket make almost every job a hustle. It’s no better
trying to line up work as a stunt coordinator, where again elements of the
old boys’ club come into play.

We meet Bell halfway
across the world in New Zealand,
and it’s not long before she must deal with the big life change of deciding
whether to leave her native country to continue her professional career in the
wake of the completion of Xena’s run.
(She does, in a little project called Kill
Bill.)

Spanning several years and including interviews with
filmmakers Steven Spielberg and Quentin Tarantino, actresses Lawless and
Carter, President of the Stuntmen’s Association Conrad Palmisano and many more
industry figures, Double Dare doesn’t
always do as crisp of a job of delineating the timeline of the events it
chronicles, but it does capture its pair coming together wonderfully and
naturally (at the World Stunt Awards ceremony in Los Angeles, where Gary Busey
makes a skeevy cameo). It’s there that a rich, casual mentorship between Epper
and Bell develops, and viewers reap the benefit of seeing a torch being passed,
though perhaps not in the way Epper might have envisioned it (we also see her
daughter Eurlyne, a fellow stuntwoman, cope with debilitating surgery).

Double Dare also
assays the lurking familial and relationship tension of its subjects lives
(particularly Epper’s), as well as confronting in a frank but not overly
dramatic or forced fashion what it means to be a woman in such a masculinized
trade (we see Epper and a friend consulting for liposuction and plastic
surgery). Documentaries of this type — a light into a world holding its own
native interest — are often only morsels of entertainment for the more
voyeuristic of cinephiles, but Micheli — who received a Student Academy Award
for her first film, Just for the Ride
— shows a palpable and deft touch with narrative construction that marks her as
a natural born filmmaker and her movie as an engaging, outside-the-box treat.
For more information, visit the film’s still-active web site by clicking here. (Balcony Releasing, unrated, 81 minutes)

War: Loose Grooves

Blu-ray/DVD Reviews


“Low Rider” was of course the song that first keyed me into
War, one of the more popular funk groups of the 1970s. A soundtrack staple, the
song achieved pop cultural lastingness via heavy rotation on TV shows, movies (including Dazed and Confused) and
classic rock radio, but it doesn’t really do War’s full canon justice. The
group was, after all, one of the most eclectic of its era, freely melding soul,
Latin, jazz, blues, reggae and rock influences into an effortlessly funky
whole.

The concert DVD Loose
Grooves, shot by Jeffrey Kruger during an April, 1980 show at the Civic
Center Theatre in Halifax, England,
perfectly illustrates the above description. Faithful versions of big hits like
“Low Rider” and “Cisco Kid” stand alongside extended instrumental improvisations,
presenting a picture of a rangy, musically gifted band able to adapt its sound
for different environments. Animals frontman Eric Burdon was War’s first lead
singer, but he gave way to guitarist/vocalist Howard Scott, who sings here. Most
of the group’s original members, though, were still with the band in 1980,
including drummer Harold Brown, keyboardist and co-lead vocalist Lonnie Jordan,
harmonica player Lee Oskar and maestro percussionist Papa Dee Allen. They’re joined
on stage by drummer Ron Mammon, multi-instrumentalist Pat Rizzo and bassist
Luther Rabb.

Running a brisk 51 minutes, this title shortchanges a number
of songs included herein, presenting only a snippet of “Spill the Wine,” the
group’s first real hit, and other tunes. If the medleys were better known or
smoothly integrated, this tack might work, but the transitions come across as
abrupt and less than artful. In addition to the funky “Low Rider,” other highlights
include “Gypsy Man,” “I’ll Be Around” and “Me and Baby Brother.” One of War’s
other radio hits, “Why Can’t We Be Friends?,” pops up in encore form, giving me
shuddering memories of Lethal Weapon IV.

Presented on a region-free disc and housed in a regular Amray
case, Loose Grooves comes with an
uncompressed, two-channel, linear PCM audio track — which captures the show in
only so-so fashion — and a transfer that does little to mitigate the poor source
lighting of the original concert. Granted, one doesn’t expect tip-top audio-visual
clarity from older shows like these, but this fair-warning disclaimer makes
this title worth a look chiefly for big-time fans of the band. There are
unfortunately no supplemental extras included herein. C+ (Concert) C- (Disc)

Lucky You

Film Reviews

Lucky You was going to get annihilated at the
box office this weekend was a foregone conclusion, opening as it did at
2,525 venues against Spider-Man 3, which played on more than
10,000 screens at 4,250 locations. Still, the scale of the sacrificial
slaughter was relatively astounding. Mega-blockbuster run-off these days apparently suffers from a bone-dry tributary. Spider-Man 3, of course, posted new record numbers this past weekend, opening to $150 million. Lucky You, meanwhile, rang up a meager $2.5 million, debuting in sixth place, below the sophomore-week runs of The Invisible and Next, as well as slightly more stalwart holdovers like Disturbia and Fracture.

A Las Vegas-set poker drama of coded glances and emphatic table taps directed by Curtis Hanson (L.A. Confidential, Wonder Boys), Lucky You suffers from co-writer Eric Roth’s terribly dull and
ambling screenplay, and doesn’t have enough energy to sustain itself even as a
sub-cultural curio. To follow or focus on a character devoid of much
big-picture ambition is fine, and achievable. But the rousting of cardsharp Huck (Eric Bana) from
personal stasis feels both overly plotted and still lacking. And the
picture’s romance is a complete non-starter; it’s not so much that Bana and Drew Barrymore lack any chemistry as that their characters have no reason to be
together. Barrymore’s would-be singer Billie is a complete cipher, leaving the actress to cycle
through her familiar catalogue of coy, relatable-girl affectations. For the full review, from FilmStew, click here.