Movie review - "Navy Seals" (1990) **

 Legendary in its own way, forever screening on video and hotel TVs, mocked in Clerks, killed Lewis Teague's feature career, and Michael Biehn's attempt at stardom. Also helped kill Orion. A chaotic production, surprisingly so for what one would assume was a simple shoot em up. But it's a mess, full of plots and different films - a training film, a more authentic style movie, a boorish service comedy, (bein' hungover, playin' golf) clash between two heroes (uptight Biehn and more casual, way out Charlie Sheen), a hugely unrealistic plot where Biehn tries to get information out of journalist Joanne Whalley, endless missions, endless Arab bashing, a hackneyed funeral

Whalley has bad perm, Biehn's hair is bad too, there's always movement but no sense of momentum. Weird gear shifts - over the top melodrama when Dennis Haysbert is killed for instance, then it goes investigation with Biehen doing research on terrorists via Whalley (because "intelligence aren't doing their jobs" - it felt wrong, wrong, wrong, then there's hyuck hyuck military comedy, then strained drama about Charlie Sheen fitting in.

Teague really struggled as a director without a set script. I was disappointed to read of his behavious in Brenda Feigen's book - she accuses him of changing the script with his writer, yelling at her, losing control of the film, refusing to let her go on location (I think he did lose control of the film, Charlie Sheen and Michael Biehn said they rewrote the film). 

Watching his career he was better with a low budget and a good writer and a script that wasn't changed a lot.

Movie review - "Collision Course" (1989) **

 Buddy cop film with Jay Leno and Pat Morita - I would've greenlit that and it has a decent idea, with Morita investigating industrial espionage in Detroit. There's some interesting stuff about Detroit resentment of the Japanese car industry.

The funniest/best scenes are cultural and quirky: Leno getting drunk with Morita, and Morita going into a bar with toughs who talk about tariffs. I think the film needed to lean into culture clash bit more - Morita fits into Detroit too well if that makes sense.

Also Leno's character is a bit too sleazy - they should've just given him a girlfriend, made Morita the ladies' man. Look there's a lot of things that could've been done better - it does move, the leads are fun, Chris Sarandon and Tom Noonan are decent villains.

The original director was John Guillermin, who was replaced by Bob Clark who was replaced by Lewis Teague. Teague keeps the pace fast and light.

Movie review - "Dirty O'Neill" (1974) **

 Kind of the American Alvin Purple about a man irresistible to women - only he's played by Morgan Paull who is a good looking guy (he's the investigator shot at the beginning of  Blade Runner), and he's a cop, a former Vietnam vet in a small town who everyone wants to have sex with: the girls he coaches, random women on the street, waitresses. Many are played by familiar faces from 70s exploitation: Pat Anderson (the main girl, she looks uncomfortable getting nude at the end), Anitra Ford, Tara Strohmeiher.

The last act turns into an action film, quite well, when some toughs come into town. But the mix of tones is uneasy.  A comedy guy from Police Academy 2 is his mate.

Still the sheer unrelenting male fantasy-ness of it all, the gall, get some points. Co directed by Lewis Teague - I'm not sure how much he did.

Movie review - "Fighting Back" (1982) **

 Odd film. Part drama about the rise of a vigilante force - Italian-Americans in the city, dealing with blacks and politicians and crooks and mafia. Which is a potentially great story. But it also tries to be middle aged white man payback story, with Tom Skerritt attacked by black pimps, and crims, and smacking people around. It doesn't work.

Big reason is Skerritt, an accomplished actor who is simply miscast. I don't buy him as a frustrated Italian American or a secret hero. If they couldn't get Charles Bronson they needed some tubby middle age guy full of rage - Ben Gazzara, or someone.

Michael Sarrazin is Skerrit's cop friend. Patti Lupone is Skerrit's wife! Yaphet Kotto, who probably should've played the lead, steals the film as another vigilante fighter running a theatre workshopp.

Movie review - "Jewel of the Nile" (1985) **1/2

 Look, not a good movie, not a strong script, certainly it struggles in comparison with Romancing the Stone. Opportunities missed wholesale - they never came up with interesting things for Danny de Vito to do - and bright ideas not developed (the villain being a Joan Wilder superfan and using her plot ideas against her, the jewel being a guy).

But it has its compensations. It's bright, colourful, moves along, there's action and some funny gags, the location work in Africa is stunning, and most of all Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner have chemistry off the charts.

I remember seeing it at the movies - the audience loved it laughed at everything. Dumb climax, and all that.

Movie review - "Alligator" (1981) ***

 Not from Roger Corman or Avco Embassy but with graduates of the Corman school - director Lewis Teague and writer John Sayles. It's fast paced and witty. The alligator looks terrible and fake. The film gets by on Teague's unpretentious handling, a fine cast - Forster is always fun as a weary cop, Robin Riker sweet as a croc expert,Dean Jagger has a great late career role as a slimy politcian, Henry Silva almost steals the show as an extravagant hunter (they should've kept him alive). They kill a kid as Sayles did in Piranha - the good old days.

But the alligator looks stupid. Never once is it convincing.

Movie review - "Lady in Red" (1979) ***1/2 (re-watching)

 Quentin Tarantino gushes about this script. It's a good script, smart... it's a John Sayles script... not amazing. Maybe the full length once was. Pamela Sue Martin is very cute and I'm sure it I'd grown up with her on Nancy Drew the nude scenes would have blown my mind. She is likeable and gorgeous but doesn't quite carry the lead. They offered it to Angie Dickinson who would've been too old... but she really would've nailed it.

Classy cast - Louise Fletcher, Robert Conrad, Chrs Lloyd. Dillinger is in it a very small bit, and there's a whole other section to go. Too cut about to be effective really and only occasionally livens are pure exploitaiton - the final car chase - but as a smart 30s gangster film it's good.

Movie review - "Hollywood Boulevard" (1976) *** (re-watching)

 I've seen this a lot. I have such affection for it.

Random thoughts

- the rape sequence is very unpleasant but it does show Candice Rialson to be genuinely traumatised by it. And later on when watching the film at the drive in she's traumatised again. And then is almost raped again in a scene played for comedy

- likewise in the scene where Tara Strohmeier is shot dead it has a real impact - ditto when Rita George is killed

- the love for movies is so endearing, the injokes, the names, the cut in footage, the whole vibe.

- the drive in sequence drags and isn't fun - rape played for gags isn't great

- the camraderie between the three girls is very lively and a shame there isn't more

- the romance between Jeffrey Kramer and Rialson is sweet

- the ace in the hole were the actors - everyone is good,Rialson is wonderful, Kramer amiable, but Mary Woronov and Paul Barrel are the stand outs. I really liked Rita George too she's very pretty and competent I'm surprised she didn't have more of a career

- sometimes the exploitation is awkward (the wet T shirt scene), other times offensive (the rape sequence), other times very effective (the producer in bed with two girls, the three girls lying around topless) - I know Dante and Arkush didn't have their hearts in exploitaiton but they could do it well (eg slasher scene)

- the basic mystery is fine with clever leading that we think the killer is Kramer

Movie review - "Hollywood Boulevard" (1976) *** (re-watching)

 Fun, breezy, energetic, especially in the first half. The second half isn't as good. There's two really unpleasant rape sequences - one where Candice Rialson is being filmed, the other where a drive in operator has a go. This is not fun. There's the murder of Tara Strohmeier which feels nasty because she's such a warm person and she's so terrified and dies bloody - it's an effective slasher sequence I admit it just felt mean spirited.

Candice Rialson is splended, Strohmeier is great too and I also liked Rita George as the third girl. Jeffrey Kramer is an affable romantic lead but the breakouts are Paul Bartel and Mary Woronov. Dick Miller is solid as always and there's fun turns from people like Jonathan Kaplan.

Its love for filmmaking is so endearing that its faults are forgiven.

Movie review - "Lady in Red" (1979) *** (re-watching)

The story of John Dillinger's last girlfriend played by Pamela Sue Martin... that actually only forms a small part of the film which is really a rise and fall type saga of a 30s gal along the lines of the story of movie Jean Harlow or Barbara Stanwyck would appear in during the 1930s. Pamele Sue Martin has the role of a life time - so much acting - and she does very well, she's gorgeous and likeable.

She starts off in a farm, accidentally takes part in a robbery (cameo from Mary Woronov), winds up in prison, gets out to work as a hooker. Act two is Dillinger interlude - Martin becomes passive not knowing he's a crook. Act three she becomes a gangster.

The exploitation elements are kind of undercut by John Sayle's social realism - Martin has sex with some dodgy guy at the start but it's bad, and has sex as a hooker later on to a guy who says "call me daddy" and it's quite blunt and depressing. It's good drama, mind, I'm just explaining my theory of why it didn't do well at the box office... whereas the gals in Big Bad Mama loved having sex and had a good ole time. Martin does have good sex with gangsters played by Robert Forster and Robert Conrad, mind.

A lot of it is really depressing - a black female prostitute is viciously killed by a client (Chris Lloyd).

I'm sure it had a New World low budget but the production values are high.

The story has a made it up as it goes along feel... more like a novel. She's a prostitute... she's in prison ... she's with Dillinger. Sayles felt it was shot too slowly... it's on 93 minutes but maybe it needed to be 80.

 

Movie review - "Cat's Eye" (1985) **1/2

I have a fondness for this film because I saw it at the cinema when a kid. I thought then what I do now - it's a patchy half-success with good moments. The device used to cobble the stories together - a cat coming to the rescue - is kind of weird but has a charm, in part because there are so few cat heroes in films.

The stories are all strong - but the first two are very different in tone to the last. "Quitters Inc" is very good - it was great on the page - helped with a cast that includes James Woods and Alan King. I was thrown to see Drew Barrymore as Woods' daughter, who is meant to be disabled (she seems fine); it was fun to see James Rebhorn in the cast and Mary D'Arcy was sweet as Woods' wife.

"The Ledge" benefits from a strong cast, including Robert Hays (why didn't he become a bigger star?) and especially Kenneth McMillan who is terrifying as a mafia style boss. I felt maybe this one was too jokey - the terror of going around a ledge wasn't really nailed; Lewis Teague always had a lot of pace and action in his films but this one perhaps could've used more suspense. And what happened to Mike Starr's hoodlum character? Wasn't he meant to be hanging around McMillan?

"General" is a fun fantasy adventure with some excellent troll work. But it's very different from the others in tone because its fantasy - whereas the others were more realistic. The concept of "General" actually could have made a feature on it's own - it probably raises too many questions as a short (why are the trolls there, why are they doing it, etc). It sightly throws out the film. But it has a strong cast - Barrymore, Candy Clark, James Naughton (their house is elaborate - everyone in this film has a lot of money) and the cat.

Movie review - "Avalanche" (1978) **1/2

You can't blame AIP and Roger Corman for being a little annoyed at the cycle of disaster movies - for years they'd been the ones doing exploitation, then along come the studios having a go at schlocky product, with studio production values. And because it was the studios, with extra financial resources, they couldn't compete.

Accordingly, both AIP and Corman waited a while before dipping their toes in disaster water, and neither did that well out of it - AIP with Meteor, Corman's New World with this. This doesn't have a great reputation but I kind of liked it.

It helps in that the cast includes Rock Hudson, Mia Farrow and Robert Forster - all three are strong actors, elevating the material. The support cast is decent too - and for all the New World cheapness, it does have impressive production values: the alpine setting, scenes of skiing and skating and chairlifts, and the avalanche stuff is done with quick fire editing.

They get around the budget restrictions by having lots of one and two handers - a man and boy stuck up a chair lift, Rock Hudson's mum and an associate trapped. Apparently the film was meant to have a bigger budget and it was cut... I felt it would have worked better had they gone in knowing it was going to be low budget and scripted accordingly. The script doesn't feel quite up to it - its written to be on a large canvas (the opening of a resort), but can't deliver on the promise. And it's a shame John Sayles couldn't have had a go - I feel he would've liked it, with the novelty of the alpine setting, and an ecology message. There were a lot of frustrating loose ends - I wish Hudson had more of a comeuppance and Farrow had more to do, the plot about bribery seemed to be forgotten.

Having said that, there is some decent drama with Hudson trying to woo back his ex Farrow, who is attracted to Forster. There's a pants man skier, chasing after everyone; a suicidal skater (knocked off by snow has she goes to kill herself - this was very effective); a moving sequence of a kid and adult stuck up a chair lift. The acting as mentioned is good, and the pace is lively. Mia Farrow, very pretty, has enjoyable chemistry with Forster - both seem to genuinely like each other.

No classic but not as bad as it's reputation.

Script review – “Alligator” (1980) by John Sayles

Funny, clever monster script from Sayles, reminiscent of Piranha, although this wasn't done for New World: like that earlier script it was rewritten by Sayles, has a great monster who's been genetically engineered due to the baddies (in this case a genetic company who test on animals), there's some bright satire (of corporations, hunters), the heroic duo is an older washed up guy (in this case a cop who has a reputation for losing partners) and a spunky young girl. It's logical, bright and fun - I say "fun" even though Sayles has the alligator munching on a young kid. (Come to think of it, in Piranha he wasn't afraid to kill off likeable characters either). It's a shame he got rid of the big hunter so quickly - and a bit convenient the big party where the alligator goes berko at the end belongs to the evil corporation. But a solid, strong script.

Movie review – “Cujo” (1983) ***

Steven King has since admitted he wrote the novel of Cujo while completed wacked on cocaine, and as a result can’t remember anything about it – even though he likes the result. It’s a very simple, basic story – a dog becomes rabid and terrorises and mother and her child in her car. 

They do it as a slow burn, using lots of character stuff in the first half – mum (Dee Wallace, fresh off ET) is having an affair (with Chris Stone, Wallace’s real-life husband), so hubby, who’s having job troubles, gets jacked off. Well acted, particularly by Wallace as a flawed super-mom and Danny Pintauro as her kid, who is very good at acting terrified. The dog stuff is full on action at the end – mostly Stone and Pintauro stuck in a car. No awesomely great twists or anything – it’s not Duel – but it’s got strong atmosphere and believability. Probably director Lewis Teague’s best film.

The DVD has an interesting commentary by Teague, where he talks about getting the film (King wanted him after seeing Alligator although another director came in before Teague got it); the fact it rained a lot despite wanting to be set during a heatwave; most of the money came from a company in Salt Lake City and a lot of Mormons worked on it; the studio who released the film requested that it be trimmed to get to the dog attack stuff quicker but test screenings resulted in proving this was less effective. Teague sounds like a likeable, down-to-earth chap – he kind of vanished as a features director after the 90s.

Movie review – “Cockfighter” (1974) **

Roger Corman likes to give this film as an example as a New World film that didn’t take off at the box office. It’s a disingenuous answer in a way because this has become a cult film: the director was Monte Hellman, who worked with Corman on and off throughout his career.

The milieu alone ensures this is always maintains some level of interest; Warren Oates plays a cockfighter who has taken a vow of silence until he’s made it to the top. It starts with his bird losing a fight against Harry Dean Stanton. Then we flashback to him losing another fight against Harry Dean Stanton, then in sports movie tradition he sets about on the road to the top. He gets money to buy a new rooster, gets a trainer (Richard Schull), starts playing smaller gigs, ignores the love of a good woman, builds up to the big game.

Interesting cast: there’s also Troy Donahue (looking dishevelled and pudgy), Millie Perkins, Ed Begley Jnr and Steve Railsback. It was shot by Nelstor Almendros and edited by Lewis Teague and has an evocative atmosphere. But the film was problems – the muteness of the hero becomes irritating (although they use narration; it limits the character’s ability to interact with others, which hurts for a lead). The narrative lacks urgency – it becomes boring. And the big problem, which Corman didn’t realise until the film came out - who cares about cockfighters? Or Oates’ character?

Movie review - "The Lady in Red" (1979) ***

A film best remembered today because the screenplay was written by John Sayles during his exploitation phase. Sayles never wrote down to his audience though and despite the boobs and violence this is a terrific taunt little film which tells the saga of Polly Franklin (Pamela Sue Martin), a farm girl turned prostitute turned girlfriend of John Dillinger (Robert Conrad) - she was there the night he was shot. The film builds up to that event - I thought she would be Dillinger's partner in crime or something but she doesn't even know his true identity (which was true) and has given up prostitution by the time he comes along. Their scenes are mostly romantic - of the "I just want to move to California" variety.

Dillinger actually isn't in the film that much - beforehand most of the screen time is devoted to Franklin's various adventures, mostly her having a hard time: being seduced by a newspaper man, going to work in a sweat shop (run by Dick Miller), becoming a ten cents a dancer, going to gaol (where the bitch guard I think was the fat lady in Porkys), turning hooker, then giving it up and becoming a waitress. It's a Roger Corman film for New World but there are superior production values. Most of the skin is seen in the brothel.

Martin is an engaging, feisty lead, very sympathetic. Conrad adds dash and verve as Dillinger, and Louise Fletcher is ideal as the woman who betrays him.

 

The film has a structural flaw - it goes fine until Dillinger's death (the most exciting sequence): but then had a whole other sequence where Hamilton and some friends rob a bank and it all goes wrong; Sayles sets it up as best he can by only using characters we've met before hand, and tying up a whole bunch of lose ends in this bit (eg Christopher Lloyd's vicious mafioso) - but it still seems like an add-on just to get our hero on a crime spree. And when it all goes badly a lot of sympathetic characters get killed, not to mention a whole bunch of innocent people - which leaves a slightly sour after taste. Brisk direction from Lewis Teague.

Movie review - "Shannon's Deal" (1989) ***

Short lived television series created by John Sayles, about a former high flying corporate lawyer (Jamey Sheridan) who has had a break down and is trying to piece his life back together. This excellent pilot sees him take on a number of cases, the main one being a person busted for smuggling drugs into the country with possible government involvement. He also romances a lawyer and a journalist. Some smart writing, good performances (Sheridan is an interesting actor, a solid leading man who never quote made it), a non cop out ending where Shannon faces the interests of his client vs the interests of society. Directed by Lewis Teague, who directed several of Sayles' exploitation films.

Movie review - "Death Race 2000" (1975) ***1/2

Anarchic, free-wheeling futuristic action road movie that is heaps of fun. Set in the future where America has become a dictatorship and the masses are entertained by a race that involves drivers driving across country and running people over.

There are five drivers (and their navigators) including David Carridine (a good solid anti-hero performance), Sylvester Stallone (very funny), Mary Woronov, Martin Cove and the gorgeous Roberta Collins. The equally stunning Simone Griffeth plays Carradine's navigator, who is also a revolutionary.

Some really off the wall humour - co-writer was Charles Griffith and the film bares his influence. He complained that producer Roger Corman cut out a lot of the laughs but there are plenty there - because most of the movie takes place within fast driving cars the film feels fast paced, and there are some good stunts.

Apart from the action there is also some patented gratuitous New World nudity (courtesy of Griffeth, Collins and Woronv - talk about score). Exceedingly good fun, subversive and wild. Came out the same year as Rollerball and has inspired heaps of imitations, such as Cannonball (1976) and The Running Man (1988). Director Paul Bartel has a cameo. Lewis Teague, who worked on the crew, plays the matador who gets run over and John Landis plays a mechanic.

The DVD has a commentary from Roger Corman and Mary Woronov works very well; unlike some actors who do commentary (eg “it was cold that day”) Woronov is smart and funny. Corman is also fun; he’s always talking about how low the budget as and ways they saved money. He also says he did a lot of the driving and rarely mentions Chuck Griffith at all, who co-wrote it and surely contributed a lot to the insane humour (he only mentions that Griffith added some dialogue). He also says that the film was always meant to be comedy which Griffith and Bartel have denied – but Corman was not averse to black humour throughout his career

Note on Charles Griffith – it was pointed out to me recently that the Paul Bartel-Mary Woronov comedy Eating Raoul used the same structure as Little Shop of Horrors and Bucket of Blood. Obviously the definitive black comedy template.