Powwow Highway

Jonathan Wacks, 1989 (8.2*)
This is a funny modern Native American film that also has some points to make about the survival of N.A. traditions in the modern era, and how some manage to walk with a foot in two different eras.

A Martinez (born Adolph) plays Buddy Red Bow, struggling against persecution and greedy capitalist developers to keep his people independent on a Cheyenne Reservation in Montana. His friend Philbert (Ed Farmer), follows and espouses Native American wisdom and lore wherever he find it, sometimes on tv or in the movies. His war pony, is a beat-up, barely running Buick.

Buddy's sister Bonnie (Joanelle Nadine Romero) has been arrested in Santa Fe, so much of this movie involves a road trip from Montana to New Mexico as he and Philbert set off to look after kids and get her out of jail (one way or another). Philbert's faith challenges Buddy's cynical and sometimes violent view of the world.

This film really deals with the realities and dreams of being Cheyenne in the modern, techology controlled US, and manages to make us laugh along the way. As road trip films go, it’s one of the best. As films about modern Native American life, it's one of a handful of must-see films, along with Smoke Signals (1998).

Read more...

Stop Making Sense

Jonathan Demme, 1984 (9.2*)
I guess it helps to be a fan of the rock band Talking Heads to really enjoy this concert documentary, but for any fan of concert filmmaking, this will also be a treat. There have been other good concert films, like Martin Scorsese’s The Last Waltz, documenting The Band’s last concert, but for me this one went a little more over the top.

When I saw this in the theater, there were people dancing in the aisles, and the crowd was a huge range of ages. I was already a fan of the band, so for me it was an unexpected treat that I felt like I was also at this concert at the Pantages Theater in L.A., shot over three nights.

The band had just been a more intellectual punk rock band than most, led by the cerebral lead singer-songwriter David Byrne, known as much for his out-of-sync gyrations as much as songs. Then they added two former members of the Funkadelic-Parliament funk bands, Bernie Worrell (keyboards) and Alex Weir (guitar, vocals) and suddenly discovered rhythm, notably from the James Brown school of funk grooves. This suddenly rejuvenated the band and it’s obvious in this concert; they’re now a fusion of musical influences working together to create something unique. My own favorite here is near the end, “Cross-Eyed and Painless”, and I can’t imagine it without the P-funk connection. Of course there’s the hits, “Burning Down the House” and “Psycho Killer”, but just as good are “This Must Be the Place” and “I Get Wild/Wild Gravity”.

Ironically, Byrne is now best known for wearing the big suit around this era. On a live tv interview (Letterman?), Byrne said "a friend told me 'onstage, you're bigger than life', so I said 'oh, then I need a really big suit'"

If you’re just interested in good rock concert films as well, this is one of the best ever (maybe the best) - along with The Police “Synchronicity Concert” (a live concert, unedited, from the Omni in Atlanta, Ga), and the all-time classic, Woodstock (1970) which did it’s best to record both highlights of three days of concerts and also document the event itself. For these reasons, it will likely forever remain the ultimate rock concert film.

Demme is best known for directing the Oscar®-winning best picture The Silence of the Lambs (1991), for which he also won a directing Oscar®. Demme is currently the 78th ranked director on our top ranked 1000 films compendium of all polls, with 4 titles in the top 1000, with Silence of the Lambs his top-ranked at #47 all-time.

See the full list of top ranked 100 directors here: Top Ranked 100 Directors, 2011 Edition

Read more...

A Great Wall

Peter Wang, 1986 (8.7*)
The first American movie filmed in mainland China is a comedy of culture clashes. A Chinese-American computer worker in California , director Peter Wang, quits his job in a dispute, then takes his family to visit distant relatives in Beijing, China.

Of course, the Americans are now thoroughly westernized Chinese-Americans, so the family they visit in China is pretty much Old World by comparison. The bewilderment and confusion of host and guest alike stem from the language barrier for one, and again when confronted by peculiar foreign customs.

The best laughs come from the point of view of the People's republic, such as students reciting Lincoln's Gettysburg Address in unique English, or an elderly man coping with an electric blanket presented as a gift (and of course with a different current requirement), people debating fallacies about Americans as if factual, just like U.S. disinformation about other nations. This is all good-natured fun, with something to learn on both sides, and the benefit of it all going to the audience.

It’s a crime that less than 1000 people have rated this film at IMDB, it’s an excellent comedy, an excellent American film, and an excellent foreign language film, all three together in one.

Read more...

A Fish Called Wanda

Charles Crichton (and uncredited John Cleese), 1988 (8.5*)
A sparkling comedic cast help push this heist satire over the top into rarified waters. There aren’t many crime comedies worth watching more than once, this is one of them.

John Cleese (of Monty Python and Fawlty Towers fame) plays a judge who falls for the wiles of American con-artist Jamie Lee Curtis, who seduces him to order help pull a con on some British partners in crime (without Cleese’s knowledge). Her supposed brother, but partner in crime, is brilliantly played to mucho laughs by an Oscar®-winning Kevin Kline. He is really her dumb boyfriend, whose recurring line is “Don’t call me stupid!”, because he is the proverbial knot-on-a-log thick.

They enlist the aid of inside man Ken, played by another former Python member Michael Palin, with a wonderful stutter (“Ka-ka-ka-Ken!”), who’s a doting owner of an overloved pet fish named Wanda, hence the title. Yes, there's often offensive humor in this, but it's still sedate compared to Python, no gushing arteries or chunk hurling here.

Some of the best stuff to come from the Python group, likely because the Jones-Gilliam silliness is tempered by the veteran direction of master British director Charles Crichton, who directed the classic The Lavender Hill Mob (1951) bw.

Read more...

True Love

Nancy Savoca, 1989 (8.0*)
Grand Jury Prize, Sundance
This is a small story with no pretensions, and not really any action either, just a story of two Italian Americans in the last few days leading up to their wedding. Ron Eldard plays a typical male, who'd rather go out drinking with his buddies "one last time" (that becomes again and again) than prep for the wedding. Annabella Sciorra steals the acting kudos as his fiance, who begins to suspect that he may be getting cold feet the closer the actual day gets. I really enjoyed her performance in this, she's an underrated Italian beauty in my opinion. Eldard is usually better (always later, this was early in his career), especially in the war film When Trumpets Fade; he just doesn't seem very Italian here (blond hair didn't help) - where was John Turturro I wonder?

This is likely going to be more enjoyable for women than men, the men are fairly weak characters, the women stronger ones (heck, that's kinda accurate for life, isn't it?). It also makes a few assumptions about this particular ethnic culture being a little familiar with viewers, which it really should be.

Presented as a 'comedy', that's not really accurate (that scene on the dvd is staged, it's not even in the film!) - it's a drama about love, marriage, and personal commitment, filmed with affection and humor, but the entire slant of the film is a serious look at what makes families and happy (and unhappy) couples, as there are all types around the betrothed. Personally I liked Savoca's non-judgmental approach, and how she showed relationships affected by jobs and the church as well, which felt very accurate based on my own experiences.

Some say "slice of life" is a phrase that kills movies - if it does for you, then this won't be your cup of tea, but otherwise this is another good film by a female director, and one with nothing untasteful. Imagine an Italian-American film with no bloodshed, no sex, no bathroom humor! What the heck happened here?

This small indie romance impressed the critics and festival juries more than the fans at IMDB, who only rate it 6.1, but it's much better than that. Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance (and four awards overall) and the Grand Prize at the USA Film Festival, and a nominee for three Indie Spirit Awards: Best Feature, Nancy Savoca for best director, and Annabella Sciorra for best lead actress.

Read more...

Empire of the Sun

Steven Spielberg, 1987 (8.3*)
Memorial Day War-a-thon film #19
Based on the autobiographical novel of British science fiction author J.G. Ballard, this is the wartime story of a British boy named Jim, played by a young Christian Bale, caught in Shanghai when the Japanese invade, eventually ending up in a Japanese POW camp, along with some other families and some American deserters, led by John Malkovich. The Americans befriend Jim and he becomes a flunkie, or employee, of them - really more like a hired servant - they are black marketeers and live better than other prisoners.

This has some unforgettable scenes - one a collection of British possessions rotting in a large outdoor field. My favorite is a flyer in a P-38 going past Jim on a watchtower in slow motion as Jim waves at the pilot in the middle of wartime action. Much of this actually happened to author Ballard when he was this age, he spent part of his youth growing up in a Japanese camp for captured Brits.

11 wins out of 24 nominations, incl. 6 Oscar nominations with no wins.. some wins were for cinematography, director, actor Christian Bale..

Read more...

Gallipoli

Peter Weir, Australia, 1981 (7.8*)
Memorial Day War-a-thon film #17
Two sprinters from Ausralia, played by Mel Gibson and Marc Lee, are sent to the Gallipoli campaign in World War One, as battlefield runners, the speedy who carry messages between military commanders in days before radios and easier communication.

If you don't know the history of this battle, I won't spoil it here, but the battle footage is well done, fairly realistic (and without CGI). The main themes of the film will hit you like a brick wall at the film's conclusion, and they are the universal themes of all wars: on the whole, they are a futile exercise, but in some individual cases, heroes may rise from among average men and attain at least a moment of timeless glory.

Winner of 9 awards, 20 nominations, including 8 Australia Film Institute awards (Film, Director, Actor for Gibson, Supporting actor for Bill Hunter, Screenplay, Cinematography, Sound, Film Editing) - it didn't win any international awards, just Australian.Dur

Another in a line of excellent Peter Weir films, which include Fearless (my favorite), Witness, Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Last Wave, The Mosquito Coast, The Year of Living Dangerously, The Dead Poets Society, The Truman Show and Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World.

Read more...

Glory

Edward Zwick, 1989 (8.4*)
Memorial Day WAR-a-Thon Film #11
A pretty realistic civil war film with some real battle action, which places this in a handful of films that actually combined the two. This tells the true story of the all-black army unit that fought for the Union in the Civil War, led by white officer (naturally) Robert Gould Shaw, played by Matthew Broderick, who first has to fight prejudice within his own army.

The story follows the 54th Massachusetts from it's initial days until their first major action in the war in 1963. Denzel Washington won his first Oscar® this, for supporting actor, as a cynical yet heroic soldier. Morgan Freeman also has a supporting part. James Horner contributed a nice music score, as usual.

Even though most characters in the film were composites except for Shaw, Glory was based on a screenplay written by American screenwriter Kevin Jarre, which was based on two books:
(1) One Gallant Rush: Robert Gould Shaw and His Brave Black Regiment (1989) by Peter Burchard, a novel that itself was based on letters written by Robert Gould Shaw, the colonel in command of the all-black 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, which entered the American Civil War in 1863
(2) Lay This Laurel (1973), a photographic tribute to the Civil War sculpture of Augustus Saint-Gaudens

Winner of 12 awards out of 19 nominations, and three Oscars®: sound, cinematography, supporting actor.

Read more...

The Killing Fields

Roland Joffe, 1984 (8.2*)
Memorial Day War-a-thon Film #10
A western journalist, Sam Waterston, is trapped in Cambodia as the Vietnam war is winding down, but as Pol Pot's regime is beginning to massacre two million civilians in a 'cleansing' of that nations undesirables. He struggles to get out himself but will also not abandon his assistant and friend from Cambodia. This closely mirrored the story of co-star Haing S. Ngor, who was awarded with an Oscar® for basically playing his own life out onscreen.

This is a true story written by a journalist, so the effort was made to film this in a journalistic style. This is not for the squeamish, as rather than soldiers, innocent civilians are often the target of this war. This makes a nice companion piece with Oliver Stone's Vietnam films, Platoon, and Heaven and Earth.

winner of 26 awards out of 44 nominations, including 3 Oscars® for supporting actor (Ngor), cinematography, editing. The film lost best picture to Amadeus that year.

Read more...

Breaker Morant

Bruce Beresford, Australia, 1980 (8.8*)
Memorial Day War-athon #2
This the story of a war-time court martial, and is based on true events during the closing stages of the Second Boer War (1899-1902). The officers are members of a mostly Australian unit called the Bushveldt Carbineers, created to fight the Boer commandos by employing their own tactics against them.

The charge is that the three men involved here committed murder by executing captured Boers, and also perhaps executed a civilian non-combatant. Their defense is that they were acting in accordance with standing orders, because the operational nature of the Carbineers would be hampered by having to keep prisoners under guard. Also, anyone escaping would be able to give their location and other information. Naturally, these are verbal orders only, so it's all based on heresay.

The British command sees the incident as a chance to give morale to the Boer side, embarassing their side, so command clearly wishes to portray the three protagonists as rogue elements and sacrifice them for political expediency. Similar to Kubricks Paths of Glory, this film examines the military practice of high command often sacrificing subordinates to cover for their own failures and indiscretions, in this case violating international accords by executing prisoners of war. Through the trial, we get the see the story told as flashbacks during witness testimony.

The overall quality of this film is impeccable, as is the cast - five were nominated for Australian Film Institute (AFI, equivalent of our academy awards) awards for acting: Jack Thompson, Bryan Brown won (for lead and supporting respectively), also nominated were Edward Woodward, Lewis Fitz-Gerald, and Charles 'Bud' Tingwell.

Winner of 12 awards, including 10 AFI awards, it's only 3 AFI losses were to other actors in the same film. This is both a powerful war film and a gripping legal film with a courtroom trial.

Read more...

A Town Like Alice

David Stephens, 1980 (9.5*)
A group of British women are taken prisoner by the Japanese in Malaya during WW2, and, as it's against their honor to imprison them, they force them on an endless march to nowhere. Jean Paget, wonderfully played by Helen Morse, takes charge and provides the strength that keeps some alive, while many die as not all are fit enough for a forced march.

At one point, they meet a young Australian soldier, Joe Harman (Bryan Brown in a star-making performance), and the two become friends. He tries to help the women, and as a result they are separated by their brutal captors and the man is tortured for showing simple human compassion.

After the war, the two seek each other out to continue to explore the feelings they once had that were sparked during a time of crisis, which they were unable to explore due to the wartime situation. This time, they are separated by half the globe, as Jean is back in civilized England, and Joe is ranching in the middle of the Australian outback.

This is based on a popular best-seller by author Nevil Shute (On the Beach), and that novel was based on true events. This is a romance of epic proportions, beautifully filmed by the BBC (for Masterpiece Theater) in a five-hour mini-series in six parts, which gave the novel the proper amount of length and detail. This is much better seen in one sitting than broken up over weeks. Winner of 6 awards

For my money, this is a much better (and less soapy) romance than Gone With the Wind; this is about self-sacrifice for others, not self-centered gratification. The only other romantic epic that's even comparable is the BBC (Masterpiece Theater) miniseries Brideshead Revisited, from the Evelyn Waugh novel, ironically released the same year, winner of 11 awards, 28 nominations, seven BAFTAs. You should also enjoy the underrated epic romance Australia, from Baz Luhrmann, starring Hugh Jackman and Nicole Kidman, a film so large that it's a western and a war film.

Note: The title refers to the desert oasis of Alice Springs , the only green spot in the middle of the huge Australian desert due to a natural spring. This has a rating of 8.1 at IMDB (good enough for the all-time top 250), but only has 452 user ratings - that's unreal for one of the best films ever made, and one of the best 10 miniseries ever made for tv.

Read more...

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

Steven Spielberg, 1989 (8.5*)
After the critical flop of the second in the series, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, not very many people were likely waiting for the third. Perhaps in order to boost interest, Spielberg added Sean Connery to the cast as the father of Harrison Ford, which seems a bit of an age stretch to me, Connery's not that old is he?

But the two's comedic chemistry helped add a little spark to this entry, which also brought back more religious mysticism, in this case the "Holy Grail". Often speculated about, and if it's even a real object or a metaphysical analogy, this film defines it as the cup Jesus drank from at the last supper, which supposedly gave it immortal powers, similar to a fountain of youth concept.

Dad joins Junior in a search for the cup before the Nazis can find it; after all, we don't want Der Fuehrer to have everlasting immortality on earth, do we? Joining the search is a blond Germanic beauty, Alison Doody [photo below] who may or may not be a double agent, who of course dazzles Indiana as well.

There are some nice twists to the legend, and also some intellectual puzzles involved, but this adventure maintains the high standard of pace and action set by the original entry, Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), which single-handedly revived the "Saturday matinee" style of adventure films for kids. They mind-blowing climax was actually filmed in the hidden ancient ruins of Petra, Jordan, which is a canyon cleft in the desert, almost invisible from above.

Currently ranked No. 107 on the IMDB 250. Winner of one Oscar®, for sound effects, 5 awards total.

Quote: "We named the dog Indiana"

Read more...

The King of Comedy

Martin Scorsese, 1982 (8.6*)
One of the most underrated of Scorsese's films. Robert De Niro plays Rupert Pupkin, a frustrated standup comic. (and with De Niro playing him, he's one of the creepiest standups ever) He wants to hit the big time, but seems to never get past the open mike level. He thinks if he just gets a few minutes on a major late night show, his natural comedic talent will carry him in a meteoric rise into stardom.

He tries to get a spot on a show hosted by Jerry Lewis, but never really gets a chance without any type of resume or a name agent. Harassing and stalking Lewis puts him off even more, so Pupkin decides that if he kidnaps the host and holds him for ransom, with the bounty being a five-minute spot on the show to do a standup routine, then he can break into the big time due to public acclaim.

Remarkably, Jerry Lewis actually shows some dramatic acting skills in this; I'd have to say it's his best dramatic acting that I've seen. So does comedienne Sandra Bernhard as a friend of De Niro's who becomes his willing accomplice in this plot. Just the very idea of this shows the type of half-cocked individual Rupert Pupkin is; he's just one gun shy of being Travis Bickle in Scorsese's Taxi Driver.

This is one of the more unusual crime films, as well as one of Scorsese's most unique. It's not a guns firing, blood on the wall kind of crime film - it's an almost too realistic, borderline psychotic type of crime, which has become all too real in the modern era.

This didn't go totally unnoticed, at least in Europe: the screenplay by Paul D. Zimmerman won a BAFTA award; Sandra Bernhard won a National Society of  Film Critics award for supporting actress, and the film won a London Film Critics award for best picture and was nominated for a Palm d'Or at Cannes. Awards page at IMDB

Read more...

Blue Velvet

David Lynch, 1986 (7.7*)
A naive suburban teen, played by Kyle MacLachlan in a breakthrough performance, finds a severed human ear in a field near his house. After going to the police, he decides to do a little amateur investigating on his own, to the chagrin of his girlfriend Laura Dern (who doesn't have much to do here other than act astonished). He uncovers a sinister local underworld revolving around sultry lounge singer Isabella Rossellini, whose signature song is the film's title.

It turns out that even though married, she is persued by drug-huffing and freaky Dennis Hopper, who has more than a few screws loose in this film, even compared to his normal dysfunctionality. Her rejections of his disgusting affections have led to the seamy big city underbelly that Kyle has stumbled upon.

There are many unsettling scenes in this, beginning with a closeup of the fly-covered ear in the films opening scene, but it gets far worse than that. In a way, this is like watching a film of car wrecks and high school catfights - you are disgusted but somehow oddly attracted, thinking what the hell is coming next? This film is not for the squeamish, but innovative director David Lynch (Eraserhead, Twin Peaks, Mulholland Drive) has put his own personal stamp on crime films and has created an updated noir style for the new millenium.

This is now considered a cult classic, yet only has a rating of 7.8 at IMDB and 75/100 from Metacritics, so it's a film that is often discussed yet not universally praised. Like most Lynch films, your own feelings may vary widely, as he often wavers between brilliance and depravity. This is a film that could be accurately rated as both over-the-top pretentious garbage and as a uniquely different crime classic. There's a lot more unsettling disgust here than true romance (I felt embarassed for Isabella Rossellini and the demands placed on her performance), yet it's a film that won't go away, and despite my less than stellar rating, it's a must-see for die-hard fans of crime films.

One thing is certain: I'll never be able to hear this song again without this film bubbling up from the subconscious.

Read more...

The Executioner's Song

Lawrence Schiller, 1982 (8.7*)

Tommy Lee Jones made himself a star (and won an Emmy for lead actor) when he played convicted murderer Gary Gilmore in this lengthy tv-film that examines his crimes, his past, his incarceration on death row, and his legal fight to have Utah carry out his execution.

Using only facts from this well-publicized case, and based on Norman Mailer's Pulitzer prize winning book, this is as close to documentary as a dramatic re-enactment can get. It even contains the negotiations with Gilmore with rights to the book and this very film that resulted. Roseanna Arquette also became a star for her portrayal of Gilmore's girlfriend. Together, the two young actors make Gilmore's story an engrossing and human one, though admittedly, I found his homicides to be too baffling to comprehend. The cast also includes Christine Lahti and Eli Wallach.

Together with Dead Man Walking, and In Cold Blood, these make a definitive film trilogy on the subject of capital punishment, and each is based on a true murder case.

[Note: only 600+ people have rated this at IMDB! Mailer's book won a Pulitzer, and the film was up for five Emmys; Arquette and Mailer were also nominated - it's only wins were for Tommy Lee Jones as actor and for sound]

Read more...

Full Metal Jacket

Stanley Kubrick, 1987 (8.8*)
This film of the Vietnam war era is in two distinct parts. In the first, a group of Marine recruits are punished in basic training by real army vet R. Lee Ermey as Sgt. Hartman. Vincent D'Onofrio is an overweight and slow recruit who becomes the target of everyone's ire, with unforeseen consequences. This half of the film is pretty basic, and goes on far too long.

The second part follows one of those recuits, Matthew Modine as Pvt. Joker, who now covers the war for the Stars and Stripes military newspaper. His squad is sent into the harrowing streets of Hue during the Tet offensive. This half of the film is much better than the first, which is similar to The D.I. with Jack Webb. The photojournalistic approach works really well with a city war controlled by snipers. There's some terrific war footage here, as well as some riveting and tense scenes.

You're made to feel like a part of this squad from the beginning, so in that regard it's one of the more realistic war films. I would have loved to have seen more of Vietnam and a lot less of basic training, and it would have perhaps been a perfect war film.

Read more...

Some Kind of Wonderful

Howard Deutch, 1987 (8.5*)
One of the best sophmoric love stories ever, it's reputation seems to have grown with age. Pretty boy Eric Stoltz has a crush on unattainable and popular Lea Thompson (the mom in Back to the Future), while his best platonic friend Mary Stuart Masterson hides her real feelings from her guy, fearing she may drive him away if she openly displays affection. She actually agrees to chauffeur him on his first date with Thompson.

I'm not sure exactly what it is about this film, but I think it's Masterson's performance that has the audience pulling for her the entire film, while in reality all of us guys fell for the glamour of the high school cheerleader type babes and secretly wanted them instead of our true friends who loved us in spite of ourselves.

This is a mature film, usually described as thoughtful and perceptive, in spite of the high school subjects, and rises far above the pack of typical John Hughes films like Breakfast Club and Pretty in Pink. It's endured for two decades now, and is often mentioned as a favorite romance by people today.

Read more...

Silkwood

Mike Nichols, 1983 (8.3*)
This film is based on a true story and a mystery that has never really been solved. A metallurgy worker named Karen Silkwood (Meryl Streep) begins to notice many safety violations at her Kerr-McGhee nuclear plant, some involving exposing workers to radioactive material. She begins to file complaints and instead of conditions being made safer, she begins to get harassed and threatened as a result. She is contaminated, perhaps on purpose, as are other workers at the plant.

Cher and Kurt Russell play her roommates with credible performances. Cher, Streep, and Nichols were all nominated for Oscars, and Cher won a Golden Globe for supporting actress. With the threat of a possible meltdown looming in Japan, and the question of nuclear plant safety now on the front burner worldwide, this will be an important film to re-watch for many viewers.

Her story has been the subject of an A&E documentary, this film by famed director Mike Nichols, and many other smaller news stories. Her story has been shown to kids in school. The end result is that the nuclear plant was shut down a year later, and many lives in Oklahoma were likely saved as a result. Her story proves that U.S. corporations value the bottom line above people's lives, as if anyone doubted that in light of recent economic developments; in fact, just a few individuals value their own wealth more than the well-being of the nation or even the world.

At IMDB, it's only been rated by 5000+ fans, which is miniscule for such an important film. It always amazes me how when a film gets a couple of decades old, the public entirely loses interest, while in terms of geological time this is not even one second in the history of the earth.

Read more...

Gorky Park

Michael Apted, 1983 (8.1*)
A homicidal puzzle turns into a Cold War mystery in this entertaining spy thriller. William Hurt plays a Russian detective, who is baffled by three bodies discovered in Moscow's public Gorky Park, which have had their faces removed to prevent identification.

In the course of his investigation he discovers that the upper levels of government are stonewalling his efforts - it seems that he may have uncovered an uncomfortable conspiracy. He crosses paths with mysterious American businessman Lee Marvin, who has a few skeletons in his closet, even if he's not responsible for these murders. Joanna Pacula provides the proper eye candy and romantic interest, while Brian Dennehy provides his particular brand of homicidal bravado (he was a real assassin in Vietnam, often killing targets with a knife).

Maybe not a bona fide classic, but still a better mystery than most that are filmed nowdays, and one with some unique and unforgettable images, especially toward the film's climax. If you enjoy all these new forensic investigative police drama, here's one that takes place in Russia, and in a large-budget film with a couple of previous Oscar® winners in Hurt and Marvin.

Read more...

Poltergeist

Tobe Hooper, 1982 (8.5*)
"They're here!"
Produced by Steven Spielberg, with special effects from the Industrial Light and Magic studio, this is one of the most effective ghost stories ever filmed. Coming on the heels of Star Wars and Close Encounters, the same production values went into this tale of a suburban nightmare in which a little girl, played by Heather O'Rourke, along with the family dog, senses the attempts of contacts from "the beyond".

Pot-smoking parents Craig T. Nelson and Jobeth Williams are skeptical and confused at first but thanks to a miraculous display of kitchen chair stacking, both become aware that something supernatural may be present in an otherwise normal and boring household.

This may get a little over the top toward the latter stages with a lengthy ending, but it's still a bone-chilling excursion into the unknown. Add the fact that over 70% of Americans surveyed feel that they've been contacted by deceased loved ones, and that eerily two cast members died shortly after the film's release (O'Rourke died, and Dominique Dunne, the older daughter here, was murdered by an ex-bf), this story strikes a familiar and credible nerve in most people.

Read more...