Good Bye Solo

The Gomorrah Must Be Crazy

Apparently the designer of the Criterion DVD cover for Gomorrah must be a big fan of The Gods Must Be Crazy. See below for a comparison.

We'll Always Have Paracinema...

I'm thrilled and honored to be included in the latest issue of Paracinema magazine. My article, "Boy to Men (And Back Again)" will be featured in their seventh issue along with pieces by Adam Protextor, Todd Garbarini, James Gracey, and many more.

Pick up the issue online or visit one of these fine brick & mortar retail shops.

Metro Times Reviews

Two new reviews up in the latest Metro Times:

Dead Girl
Sex with an attractive girl with no emotional strings attached? Sounds like what dreams are made of for many dudes — just look at Craigslist. If that hot girl was actually more room temperature and discovered bound in the basement of a mental hospital, this might present a problem for some dudes ... but not all. READ MORE

Adam Resurrected
Scenes are crosscut with 1961 Adam in Tel Aviv, where he's confined to a mental institution with other Holocaust survivors. This section shifts from Patch Adams bathos to Awakenings pathos (though Robin Williams is nowhere in sight). READ MORE

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The Return of Fox and the Ankh Man

It used to be that when a guy dropped out/got fired from the legendary rock band KISS that their replacement would adopt a new, made-up (maked-up?) persona to fit in with the "The Demon" "The Starchild" "The Spaceman" "The Catman" pantheon.

Those are the days of the past, apparently, as current (and long-time) members Eric Singer and Tommy Thayer have officially donned the greasepaint for the current incarnation of KISS. However, they're not portraying new "characters" but those of old. Back at the end of 2001, Singer put on the whiskers to become "The Catman" for the remaining gigs in the KISS Reunion Tour after Peter Criss left the road. A few months later Thayer donned the space suit to fill out the roster when Ace Frehley departed from the group again.

Since then it's been Singer and Thayer as "The Catman" and "The Spaceman." Had this been the early '80s, Singer and Thayer may have adopted new make-up designs. That was the case for drummer Eric Singer and guitarist Vinnie Vincent. These unfortunate musicians joined KISS when the idea of someone slapping on the Criss or Frehley make-up must have seemed distasteful. Or, perhaps, the characters had been so associated with Criss and Frehley than a switch-up would just be too odd. Regardless, Carr and Vincent endured the early days of their tenure in KISS as "The Fox" (originally "The Hawk") and "The Ankh Warrior". So, yeah, maybe Singer and Thayer just recycling Criss and Frehley's make-up is for the best.

Eric Carr as "The Hawk"

Eric Carr as "The Fox"

Vinnie Vincent as "The Ankh Warrior"

Surveillance: Movie Review

Surveillance (Jennifer Chambers Lynch, 2008)

Returning to the director’s chair after a fifteen year hiatus, Jennifer Chambers Lynch delivers a taut, albeit predictable, thriller. Surveillance would have felt more at home in the early ‘90s as a fast follow-up to her initial outing, Boxing Helena, as many of the characters feel as if they’ve been taken from her dad’s playbook. Corrupt cops and odd FBI agents populate Surveillance, as if they were refugees from the first act of David Lynch’s Fire Walk With Me. Viewers expecting the quirky charm of an Agent Chet Desmond (Chris Isaak) or grim humor of Sheriff Cable (Gary Bullock) will be sorely disappointed. Odd moments of humor crop up during Surveillance but they feel awkward and sloppily integrated with the film as a whole.

Surveillance opens with a murder followed by an investigation by a pair of FBI agents—Agents Anderson (Julia Ormond) and Hallaway (Bill Pullman). The narrative unfolds in a series of flashbacks as Anderson and Hallaway interview survivors of an attack by a pair of serial killers who recently slaughtered a family and Deputy Conrad (French Stewart). Apart from Captain Billings (Michael Ironside), local law enforcers prove troublesome: they’re a bunch of trigger-happy yahoos who enjoy terrorizing innocent travelers as they cut across the barren Western landscape. Conrad and his partner, Bennet (Kent Harper), love shooting out the tires of passing motorists and then playing upon their fears of authority with a sadistic game of good cop/bad cop.

Pullman and Ormond provide a few entertaining moments. Hopefully Surveillance will serve to get Lynch reacquainted with filmmaking and provide better fare in the future.

Alien Trespass: Movie Review

Alien Trespass (R.W. Goodwin, 2009)

Eric McCormack stars as physicist Ted Lewis, a big brained scientist—you can tell because he smokes a pipe. After a UFO crashes in the Mojave, Ted becomes host to Urp, a space ranger with Klaatu’s fashion sense. He’s out to recapture the Ghota, a hungry space slug that may have been spawned from the same brood that gave us the evil vegetable overlord of It Conquered the World. Along with Ted/Urp, all of the familiar character tropes are on hand and the film plays out exactly as to be expected, hitting every beat.

Opening up with a newsreel that sets up Alien Trespass as a “lost film” from the ‘50s, viewers will find that R.W. Goodwin’s film is a faithful recreation of sci-fi films from the era. Unfortunately, the film is a little too faithful. Unlike other films over the last few decades that have spoofed Atomic Era creature features such as Invasion! (1999) and Lost Skeleton of Cadavra (2001), there’s no sense of subversiveness in this button-downed pastiche. It plays out as a faithful homage rather than any kind of parody, leaving viewers to question the necessity of this film. Why not stick to the classics instead?

Absurdistan: Movie Review

Aburdistan (Veit Helmer, 2008)

Rub a dub dub, there’s no water in the tub for the butcher, the baker, or the candlestick maker in Veit Helmer’s Absurdistan after the pipeline to the village stops working. Taking a cue from the Lysistrata playbook, the women of the village put the brakes on the lusty behavior of the men folk until the water flows again. Laziness, however, proves a greater force than lustiness, demonstrated by the myriad attempts the men make to get laid when there’s a nookie drought. At the heart of Absurdistan are Aya (Kristyna Malérová) and Temelko (Maximilian Mauff) two literally star-crossed lovers who are destined to conjugate for the first time during a cosmic conjunction.

Absurdistan shares the same light-hearted spirit and pure storytelling as director Veit Helmer’s 1999 film Tuvalu. The narrative plays out without need for dialogue with scenes often comprised of a simple setup and payoff. There are only a handful of spoken lines. The faces of the villagers do well enough to communicate their emotions. Maximilian Mauff frequently resembles Buster Keaton with his stoic, put- upon expression.

A simple story, yes, but Helmer and the cast make Absurdistan a sublime, silly love story.

The Mutant Chronicles: Movie Review

Mutant Chronicles (Simon Hunter, 2008)

Based on a Swedish role playing game, Mutant Chronicles feels like an epic tale whittled down to a “made for TV” length, sacrificing story and sense in an attempt to make a rip-roaring action film.

In its ponderous opening, the audience learns a whole lot of crap about how the world works in 2707. Suffice it to say, there’s a machine from outer space which makes men into “mutants” that look and act like zombies with spikes for arms. It’s up to cleric Brother Samuel (Ron Perlman) to put together a rag tag group of culturally diverse fighters to destroy the menace. He manages to gather his forces in a quick voice-over montage. The Dirty Dozen, it’s not. There are fewer folks and, other than Perlman, only two of them stand out.

Looking more like Christopher Lambert than ever, Thomas Jane turns in a passable performance as Mitch Hunter. He’s good with a gun, fair with a sword, and destined to save the world. Chipmunk-cheeked Devon Aoki tries her best as Valerie Duval to bring some backstory and motivation to the narrative. Alas, no matter how hard she tries there’s not much substance to be found in Mutant Chronicles.

Substance is in short supply but digital effects are plentiful. The film bears the over-processed look of films like Ultra Violet and Sin City; films created more in a computer than in nature. This doesn’t necessarily play well with the film’s retro-futuristic themes. Meanwhile, the script feels as if screenwriter Philip Eisner had to roll his twenty-sided die to figure out what would happen from one scene to the next. This flick will do double damage to your brain and may make your intelligence go down quite a few points. Roll again and hope for a better film.