Whatever Happened to Baby Em?

Enhancing Clichés and Opening Pandora’s Hasidic Box

By Morgan P Salvo

Good Lord, another Exorcism movie and with the tagline “based on true events”? Holy crap the only thing worse is a haunted house movie with the same claim to fame. Yet The Possession achieves the near impossible in that it makes us care for the two central characters Clyde (Jeffery Dean Morgan) and Emily “Em”  (Natasha Calis). This hasn’t happened since the original Exorcist where we sat on the edge of our seat out of concern for Ellen Burstyn, Linda Blair and Jason Miller.

Filmmakers who choose this subgenre cannot escape the inherent generic formula. All they can do is embellish on a tired old tale. Most of the time it’s done with smoke and mirrors: overdone special effects and /or piling on the bone snapping, contorting and gallons of gory blood oozing. Here Danish Director Bornedal (Nightwatch, Just Another Love Story) brings some nice ambient tricks to the table while setting a somber mood amidst the stereotypical shenanigans and exploring what the hell is going on with Emily and the box. But yes, there are a slew of special effects, like a hand in the larynx, swarms of moths either in the air or dive-bombing into mouths, droopy eyes rolling around while turning white, an insanely stupid MRI scene, oh, and wind - it seems all exorcism movies come with their own wind. Plus the possessed always have to barf up something, if not green pea soup or blood than some kind of insect, in this case moths.

The thin plot mildly thickens as basketball coach Clyde, saddened by divorce, tries to keep it all together with his weekend visits with his daughters (Calis and Madison Davenport) while dealing with his over-bitchy wife (Kyra Sedgwick) and her anal new boyfriend (Grant Show). Things are okay until Clyde buys Em a box at a garage sale. Then this flick can’t make up its mind if it’s a demonic box story, possession movie or a new installment of Hellraiser, but it wants to be Jewish more than anything. So following in the footsteps of The Unborn, soon we’re in Little Jerusalem, New York and the yarmulkes are flying.

The story is actually based on the article “Jinx in a Box” about a small wooden cabinet that went up for auction on EBay containing two locks of hair, one granite slab, one dried rosebud, one goblet, two wheat pennies, one candlestick and of course a “dybbuk," (literally translated: a dislocated spirit) popular in Yiddish folklore. The seller said the box was haunted and had caused bad luck and weird paranormal stunts. The prologue of the Coen Brothers’ A Serious Man covered this facet of Jewish folklore, as did Gary Oldman’s Rabbi in The Unborn. Of course the Coens’ version was more entertaining than this entire flick and much shorter. We get it --- evil possession is not just delegated to Catholicism. Jews can have demons, too.

The Possession covers all the demonic bases and leaves plenty of room for pathos and emoting by the actors, except for maybe Jewish hip hop musician Matisyahu who looks like he doesn’t know where he is the entire time. And thanks to the performances of Morgan and Calis we experience their pain, sorrow and fear. Sedgwick on the other hand over acts every nuance she can wring out of the tepid script, and my personal favorite was the brief encounter with the principal who obviously comes from the “you-gotta-look-like-a-principal” casting company.

Hokey throughout, there are glimpses of The Shining and The Omen and a great horror movie soundtrack yet too many fades to black. The overworked lines “Em’s not here” and “Noooo…take me instead!” are actually uttered.

I get the feeling that there’s no good way to end one of these flicks and this one is no exception. Possession’s climax is a rush job exorcism in the basement of a working hospital where they make a ton of noise with caterwauling incantations, wind howling and little girls screaming. Where the hell is hospital security?

Even though Possession has all the makings of a disaster, it never veers toward campy or “so-bad-it’s-good”, but rather falls into this bland category of “I’ve seen worse”. So I have to say, no harm no foul. This flick plays out with such conviction that it’s hard to fault it even if it is an exorcism movie.  

The Possession

Starring Jeffery Dean Morgan, Kyra Sedgwick, Madison Davenport, Natasha Calis, Grant Show, Matisyahu

Directed by Ole Bornedal

Rated PG-13

2 Stars

Tripping Down Jeremy Lane

 What made Renner famous

By Morgan P Salvo

As we all know (unless you live in a cave) The Bourne Legacy opened this week with Jeremy Renner taking over the reins from Matt Damon under the guise (or tagline) of “There was never just one…” The dude that caught our eye with his mesmerizing performances in Hurt Locker followed by The Town, both of which got him nominated for Oscars, traveled down a ragged indie flick road before catapulting into Bourne territory. If you’re like me some of these  movies you knew before hand going into the Hurt Locker while others will merely make you go—“oh yeah that was him!” His ability to blend in and still stand out is an acting trait rarely seen but when he has to turn it up, watch out. Here are some of the flicks Jeremy Renner did before he got famous.

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

Great movie great performances all around but Renner’s introspective supporting role as a cousin of James and one of the more moral-minded members of the notorious James Gang proves pivotal in this pensive drama.

 

Dahmer

Renner accomplishes the impossible here by making us feel sympathy for Jeffery Dahmer. His complex portrayal of the infamous serial killer is stellar in this strange dreamlike biopic. While this is not by any means a great flick the levels of pain, torment, mental anguish and even sick humor come through just by Renner’s mere facial expressions of dark loneliness. You have to wonder where Renner draws his inspiration from here. He pulls you deep into his inner angst and somehow, don’t ask me, you feel you know where he’s coming from. Brilliant.

A Little Trip to Heaven

A husband (Renner) and wife (Julia Stiles) tangle with an insurance adjuster (Forest Whitaker) over her dead brother's million-dollar insurance policy in Baltasar Kormákur’s (Contraband/Jar City) decent weirdly paced thriller. Renner steals the show as a sadistic creep and from the smattering of Renner’s scenes he proves a force to be reckoned with.

 

Swat

This little teaser for his upcoming action flicks which personally I think he should avoid, after all, his generic performances in Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol or The Avengers prove to be paycheck flicks. Here he caught audience’s attention opposite Colin Farrell and Samuel L Jackson playing an ousted member of the Los Angeles Police Department's S.W.A.T team. The movie is a mess.

North Country

Renner inhabits the role of an iron mine supervisor who is a sexist boss that conspires against a female mine worker's (Charlize Theron) attempts to stop sexual harassment at work. You completely believe in his bigotry no problem.

 

28 Days Later

 In the post-apocalyptic horror sequel to the Zombie flick where they haul ass, Renner plays a US Army military dude that keeps our attention through his WTF plight running and shooting zombies. It’s debatable whether his character is an asshole or not.

 

The Heart is Deceitful Above all Things

Director Asia Argento’s sadomasochistic take on life, love, death, sex and motherhood… Renner steals the one big scene he’s in--- OK I have to admit it! I forgot he was even in this and I don’t remember what he did---saw it once and have it on the shelf to see again but I KNOW he was awesome OK?

TOTALLY HONORABLE MENTIONS:

 

Must-View Verhoeven: Painting the Dutch director by numbers

I decided that even though director Paul Verhoeven has now returned to his Dutch roots his visually stunning array of movies need to be divided into four definitive categories.

1) When Verhoeven was still Dutch and still good:

The Fourth Man,

This crazy, surreal, very cool movie is about life, death and sex. Jeroen Krabbé plays a man who has visions of impending danger and begins an affair with a mysterious woman, (Renée Soutendijk) who may lead him to his doom.

Soldier of Orange

 Offering the first glimpse of a young Rutger Hauer, this is an excellent film about the horrors of war. A character-driven story about Germans invading the Netherlands and a group of six university friends caught up in the events that follow. Also starring Jeroen Krabbé.

2) Absolute classics: 

RoboCop

 This overtly sadistic robotic ¾ robot ¼ cop action flick doesn’t skimp on the high octane chase scenes, coke snorting, and sex scenes not to mention bullets flying, guts spewing, blood spraying and slime oozing.  Kurtwood Smith goes directly to best brutal villain of the year (perhaps ever). My first reaction was “how are they going to top this?”  

Total Recall                                                 

 

Arnold goes to Mars…or does he? In this sci-fi mind-bender all stops are pulled out to deliver goods in a hectic race against time. This neat little twist and turns of events and its crazy-ass vivid colors and over-the-top state of the arts (for the time) special effects are superb. This movie will make you laugh again and again providing that you watch it more than once. And you should.

 3) So bad they’re good enough to have cult followings: 

                                                                                                        

Basic Instinct

  Famous for the Sharon Stone leg crossing scene this movie is so lame it boggles the mind. This insipid badly envisioned sells out thriller careens through sex and whodunit ice pick murders while Michael Douglas acts all flustered, hot and bothered and Stone sucks the air out of every room by being vampish . The teaming with screenwriter Joe Eszterhas (who had his heyday in the 90s) has a lot to do with Verhoeven’s decline.

Showgirls

 Speaking of sex, Verhoeven/ Eszterhas pull out all the stops in soap operatic nudie fest boasting perhaps maybe the most topless women in any move at one time I liked this movie from the very start due to its’ blatant campiness and ensuing absolute moronic drama. I was laughing at this atrocity immediately. It took the cult worshipping public forever to catch up.

 4) Franchised:

 Starship Troopers

 Hey you cannot go wrong with demolishing cockroaches from space in this super gory shoot ‘em up. Interspersed is a super sappy love story.

Other credits include Hollow Man, The Black Book, Flesh and Blood and Spetters

                                                                                   

                   

Rotten to the Core

Total Recall Picks and lifts form the original but goes nowhere fast, really fast

by Morgan P Salvo

Just like main hero Douglas Quaid (Colin Farrell) Total Recall has a ton of problems. Quaid has a boring rut of a life and wants a change...some action. This flick is all about the action but has no substance and subsequently gives a boring take on a really cool idea. But the film’s main flaw lies in the filmmakers’ public announcement that this not a remake but a version that is more true to the story by Philip K. Dick.

Dick was around to help write the original screenplay based on his short story “We can remember it for you wholesale”. NOW I have to read it because of the two diverse treatments of this tale of a factory worker bored with his life who goes to the mind-bending world of REKAL where they give you any scenario fantasy you want, to take your mind off things and perhaps entertain yourself for a few days with some awesome memories. What could possibly go wrong? Quaid goes for the double agent spy fantasy and bam before the treatment is complete something goes awry and faster than you can say Schwarzenegger he is embroiled in murder, espionage, suspense double crosses, hailing bullets and car chases. You know… spy stuff.

We all know going in that this film is all about the special effects and the mind twisting adventure that is bestowed upon our hero. The Google Earth beginning shows us what’s left of population is in Great Britain and The Colony (Australia). Plot wise Recall is the same big mess that director Paul Verhoeven gave us in 1990. Mars as fantasyland has just been replaced by “the future” where workers toil away at earth’s core which I guess is just as hot and maddening as the angry red planet.

And like the original throughout the whole movie we are supposed to be guessing if we’re viewing the fantasy or reality. The original did a nice job bouncing that concept around but perhaps because of my knowledge the old version ruined most of the fun of the twists and turns but the ending is where it really falters. A weak hint at deciphering your own interpretation is not as much fun as the blatant ridiculousness of the first. The Blade Runner looking world is cool at least. It really looked like we just got transported to the Ridley Scott masterpiece. Recall is in the red light district and an upgraded three breasted hooker is back if only for a glimpse. Where most of the problem of this movie is that while a great looking generic action flick, it retains none of the K Dick wit and insight nor the roller coaster ride of Verhoeven’s flick.

Director Len Wiseman‘s credits include Live Free or Die Hard, Underworld and Underworld: Evolution. He starts his flick at madcap pursuit and quickly falls short while the antagonist is  running and jumping acrobatically to verandas landings and rooftops to stand utterly still in stagnation only to regurgitate stereo typical formulaic drivel. The best part by far is the hover cars. I saw an impressive special on how they did that and it was far more compelling than this flick. The Fast and Furious stunt team basically did all the driving in real cars as technicians green-screened the rest out. Wiseman wisely uses Kate Beckinsale’s action movie prowess again here. And I must say, I could watch two hours of almost anything starring Kate Beckinsale and Jessica Biel even when they offer no skimpy outfits.

This version is much more like how they took Deathrace 2000, a superb campy hilarious colorful grade z drive-in movie classic and turned it into DEATHRACE staring Jason Statham. This Total Recall strips away the psychedelic romp in Mars that was Verhoeven’s   genius. Guilty of being too generic this flick is absolutely devoid of humor. While there are some intentional and not-so-intentional laughs throughout, like a stash of futuristic Obama money and Bryan Cranston spewing poorly written villain lines while sporting a really bad hair-hat. Even with the metal detector scene as the exact same plump woman homage from the original only serves as an in-joke for cinephiles like me. I knew I was going to miss Michael Ironside’s character, the military leader in botched pursuit of Quaid. Here he has been replaced by a slew of robotic Star War Troopers.

The main problem with making a “based on” is causing curiosity as to its intentions. Is it emulation or sacrilege? Like the recent “non-remake” of Straw Dogs if I hadn’t seen the first would I like the second? Now that two movies have posed this question the answer is easy…no I don’t.

And like the “it’s-not-a-remake” fantasy world the filmmakers live in they also steal lines straight from the first one which is a dead give away that they are blatantly ripping off the original merely  masking their attempt by high tech wizardry. Which brings me to another question; this is the supersonic future, why are they shooting bullets? Where are the damn lasers?

When all the futuristic smoke clears we are left with the memory of a decaying society and planet with a couple of heroes and hope. Meanwhile I shall return to my newly envisioned corporation called “Selektive Memory” and have all elements of Total Recall wiped clean except for hover cars Jessica Biel and Kate Beckinsale. 

 

Total Recall

Starring Colin Farrell, Kate Beckinsale, Bokeem Woodbine, Bryan Cranston, Jessica Biel

Directed by Len Wiseman

Rated PG-13

2 stars

Love Him or Hate Him...

 Here's three must-see Oliver Stone flicks

  U-Turn 

Sean Penn, Jennifer Lopez, Billy Bob Thornton Powers Booth and Nick Nolte

.A dark comedy with badass soap opera tendencies, U-turn tells the tale of one mishap after another. A corrupt sheriff, in a dysfunctional little town keeps drifter Penn stuck in psychotic limbo. He kills time enticed by the alluring femme fatale in this Twilight Zone-like messed up little flick that’s like a combination of the Postman Always Rings Twice and Red Rock West.  This one of Stone’s most overlooked flicks. A perfect desert film noir boasting some of the best cameos ever! Check out Billy Bob’s grease monkey. This flick is also famous for driving a wedge between Stone and Penn’s relationship that is vile to put it mildly. Neither has a kind word for each other to this day

Natural Born Killers   

Woody Harrelson, Juliette Lewis, Robert Downey Jr., Tommy Lee Jones and Tom Sizemore

The quintessential commentary of violence in the media as serial killers Mickey and Mallory Knox become folk heroes and legends thanks to reality TV and the media’s warped overblown power. Written by Quentin Tarantino, Stone’s psychedelic onslaught of sex, violence and the media’s propaganda machine is satirized to the point of desensitization and overload. Stone’s vision uses every camera trick in the book, different film stock, quadruple soundtracks and insanely paced editing. Through Stone’s never-ending adherence to Native American mysticism he skewers consumerism, superficiality, mediocrity, and banality within the media and pop culture.  Plus every single actor chews up the scenery every chance they get.

 Scarface

 Al Pacino, Michelle Pfeiffer, Steven Bauer 
Who hasn’t seen this expletive laden masterpiece? Scarface is the all-encompassing saga of Cuban immigrant Tony Montana who takes over a drug cartel while succumbing to greed. This Stone penned cult classic directed by Brian DePalma is the ultimate sprawling violent gangster movie. Scarface almost reinvents the “so bad it’s good” category from the bloody chainsaw scene to the riveting shoot outs to the terrible Cuban accents unevenly spewed by Al Pacino, Stephen Bauer and Robert Loggia while coke sniffing Michelle Pfeiffer looks nice and wrecked…a laugh riot from beginning to end. One of the most quoted movies of all times--do I really have to say “Say hello to my little friend” here? Point of interest: as I left the theater the first time, I was like “who wrote this, a ten year old kid?” Nope, just the always immature Oliver Stone and that’s when he’s the most fun

.

Natural Stoned Killers

 Stoners versus cartel in fragmented cartoon

By Morgan P Salvo

Just because Oliver Stone makes movies look cool doesn’t mean he always makes cool movies. Savages falls somewhere in between cool and ludicrous. Okay let’s just say it has it moments. Depicting overtly dark secrecy to over-the-top camp, Savages delivers a cartoonish vision of a deadly violent subject matter.

When Stone isn’t making some valiant statement in a lavish production (JFK or Wall Street) he tears his style down to fit his concept of bare minimum. Here he dishes out a pretty standard story about drug dealing and a hostage situation, but doesn’t make us believe much of anything through the black and white to color storytelling, non linear editing and different film stock.

The plot focuses on a pair of drug dealers: two stoners who have been friends forever. One’s a botanist genius Ben (Aaron Johnson) the other a military dude Chon (Taylor Kitsch) doing tour after tour in Afghanistan. They make the best weed on the planet (smuggled in from Afghanistan) and have built up an empire that on one hand does good deeds like helping out Africa and supplying medical marijuana but on the other hand supports dirty drug dealers. They both love and live with “O” (Blake Lively) the chick who loves them both right back and whose story we get to hear recanted. They all reside in Laguna Beach CA in a blissful love triangle made in heaven, that is until the evil drug cartel in Mexico wants a piece of the action. O is kidnapped to get Ben and Chon to comply with their demands.What they are asking for is equivalent to having a Ben and Jerry aisle in Wal-Mart  It’s easy to comprehend the bad guys won’t play fair. The stoners do not go for the plan and the cartel reciprocates by resorting to… umm… savagery and violence.

There’s no doubt as to why Stone made this pic as it centers on the ramifications of cannabis, a favorite indulgence of his. Stone has a way to suck you in with mood and color but he’s frustrating because just when you think his morality is going one way he stumps you. This happened with his bio-pics W and Nixon: you expected him to ream them a new one from his political leanings but instead he was sympathetic to their plights. In this case with blood spewing ultra-violence Stone paints his easel with stupidity instead of insight. There are a ton of messages to read into this mess of a movie, like while a war rages in the Middle East there’s an even bigger one at home, and the war on drugs isn’t a war at all it’s just police and political corruption, but the main implication is no one can be trusted as evidenced by the double dealing, backstabbing and requisite graphic depiction of blood guts torture and mayhem. We’re all familiar with the term “we don’t negotiate with terrorists” and yet that’s all the characters in this movie seem to do.

The best thing to say about Stone is he gets great performances out of his actors (he even got one out of Tom Cruise in Born on the Fourth of July), and Savages is no exception.

Performance wise it’s a gold mine and the best reason to watch this flick.  Benicio Del Toro takes on one of his more entertainingly funny roles as a crazed hit-man who runs a Mexican landscaping cleanup crew, and should change his last name to Del Evil or Del Knucklehead depending on the scene. It’s hard to look at the portly Travolta the same since the tabloid massage accusations but he’s a great whiny slime-ball. Selma Hayek is at her diabolical nuttiest as the wicked witch with a black heart of gold. Then there’s Kitsch, who besides having a really bad last name, is unrecognizable from his last outing as John Carter. Blake Lively is, well, Blake Lively and finally gets a lot of screen time even if she doesn’t take off her top. But Aaron Johnson is the guy to watch in all movies from now on. I didn’t even put it together till way later that this is the same guy from Kick-Ass! and Nowhere Boy (playing John Lennon) - this dude is a true chameleon.

Savages’ underlying message of “If you can’t beat ’em join ’em” is clear but the generic storyline and ending is a huge let down even though there are three finales, which lets the first one off the hook and that’s a good thing because it was god-awful.  But never fear, stick with it as the film ends on a high note—pun intended. After all the smoke clears in this never confusing, easily established flick we are left pondering “was that good or just about the worst thing I’ve ever seen?” Maybe it’s implied to smoke a strong strain of weed similar what the dealers grow and forget this movie ever happened. 

 

Savages

Starring Aaron Johnson, Blake Lively, Taylor Kitsch, Salma Hayek, Benicio Del Toro
Directed by Oliver Stone

Rated R

2 ½ stars

The South Shall Rise Again

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter mixes History and fantasy and fails miserably

 

By Morgan P Salvo

The craziest thing about this movie is the film doesn’t live up to the campiness conveyed by the title. Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter is so deadly serious that it should be absolutely ashamed of itself. It’s as if the history channel morphed with a bad action movie and the now standard Matrix-like effects. Sure there’s blood spraying and wild wire work acrobatic fight choreography but this dang kung fu kickery in the hands of a huge influential and total historical figure is a trend that has got to stop. The “what if” theory requires so much suspending of disbelief, that it literally defies description. What’s with this Hollywood trend to rewrite history by putting real people of influence in completely farfetched scenarios like the recent Raven where Edgar Allan Poe helps fight crime? I just don’t get it.

In case you haven’t guessed, this move would like you to believe (really believe) that while Honest Abe (Benjamin Walker) was out there learning the law and stumping for politics he was also hacking, slicing and dicing evil bloodsuckers.

According to a dairy left by Lincoln, his mom was killed by a vampire and he swore revenge. Luckily a vampire Guardian angel (Dominic Cooper) mentors him in a kind of Obi-Wan Kenobi meets Karate Kid in a True Blood kind of way. We are also treated to Rocky-like training including an axe spinning montage and nuggets of wisdom dished out like “real powers comes from truth not hatred”. This is possibly one of the biggest travesties ever to hit the big screen. The only problem is that it’s kind of fun to watch thanks to director Timur Bekmambetov.

So what we get is a boring rendition of Lincoln’s life with all the elementary school trimmings including meeting wife Mary Todd (Elizabeth Winstead hot off The Thing remake) the Lincoln/Douglass debates, slavery, his presidency, The Civil War and finally the ending of Mary beckoning “Come Abraham  we’ll be late for the theater”. While Abe is struggling with his dark secret of being a fierce killer of dark undead entities, the filmmakers are busy trying to intertwine slave trading with vampire evil.  It’s as if the filmmakers decided to spruce up Redford’s just as dumb and lifeless tale of Lincoln’s assassination conspiracy (The Conspirator) by adding the juicy concept that perhaps there was more than meets the gouged out eye.

Then there’s the vampire thing. This part stretches the imagination to the snapping point. Without any explanation, vampire hunting involves killing not by staking but decapitation. Firewood-splitting Abe goes on an axe wielding mission to rid the world of vampires, one by one, sometimes ten by ten. The legend of Paul Bunyan & the Blue Ox is more believable. Plus anyone who knows anything about vampires will be aghast at the liberties taken with their legend. Like why the hell do they survive in daylight and why on earth would they ride horses around when they can easily fly in fast motion wherever they want?

Even more ludicrously, through weird sepia tones and washed out colors to convey the saga more “historically” like the film is faded from time, the serious tone employed is even more mind numbing. This flick plays out all wrong. Culminating in Gettysburg ALVH thinks it is pulling out all the stops by cramming Roadrunner cartoons, Buster Keaton antics and good old fashioned serial cliff hangers into one movie. It’s like taking one hyper creative idea and making mincemeat out of it. This flick just becomes more indulgent in absurdity. Just when I say to myself at least they’re not depicting the South as bloodthirsty bloodsucking ghouls, BAM there are confederate soldiers baring bloody fangs.

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter is a highly original idea that falls prey to unoriginal conventions. Unfortunately producer Tim Burton and director Bekmambetov clearly had a vision of what they wanted to convey but somehow the delivery is overwrought with loopholes and mishaps. Far too serious for its own good, this movie screams out for cheesy laughs of which it is totally devoid.. So much for history…

 

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

Starring Benjamin Walker, Dominic Cooper, Rufus Sewell, Anthony Mackie Mary Elizabeth Winstead

Directed by Timur Bekmambetov

Rated R