Bland On the Run

Nashville(1975)

Starring: Robert Alterman Directed by: Lilly Taylor, Karol Kane, Ned Beatty, Waldo Carradine, Sissy Lu Spacey Rating: R Genre: Comedy/Drama Other: Music

Review "Blue Velvet" meets "The Ugly Coal Miner's Ugly Daughter" is this oddball concoction by director's director Alterman ("The Birdman of the Astrodome", "Hudson Goshawk Park"). The ensemble cast includes  Lilly Taylor ("Kill All The Men, All The Time"), Karol Kane ("My Tiny Sister's Tiny Hands"), Waldo Carradine ("Death Race 2012: L.A. or Bust") and Sissy Lu Spacey ("Carrie", "Walking Tall: The Minnie Pearl Story") as a Hootenany band invited to open at Woodstalk for Jimi Hendrix by drug-addled impresario Ned Beatty ("Crawling and Squealing") under the impression that they are helium-voiced blues yodelers "Canned Heat." What appears to be real concert footage alternates with handheld camera sequences during which each member in turn flashes back to the Esalen weekend where the group met for the first time around the rotting remains of an enormous sea elephant. Alterman seems to be saying that some actors can sing, and are sometimes depressed and that the very act of "acting" can be both boring and cathartic. My own experience as a thespian (an admittedly small part as the pimp "Diggety-Dog" on a early episode of "Baretta") confirms the insight (I spent three months curled inside of an empty hot tub abandoned in a vacant lot next to Jack Nicholson's place). Not for everyone, or maybe anyone, but this someone says "check it out."

I'm Going To Watch Forever

Fame (2009)

Starring: Judd Hirsch, Einstein Serious Directed by: Kevin Bacon Rating: PG-13 Genre: Drama Other: Dancing

Review Uplifting remake of Travolta 80's masterpiece "Stayin' Alive". Judd Hirsch ("King of the Gypsies", "King of the Gypsies 2: Gippin'") stars as curdmudeonly dancemaster with a wooden leg for tapping out the beats and a glass eye for spotting talent. Actor/Director Bacon brings home the bacon for mama here with a big old-fashioned barn-dance of a flick repleat with a dorky nerd who invents the boom box (Aussie stick-insect Einstein Serious), a beautiful girl with voice like an angel and a terrible secret (spoiler alert! the tiny, shriveled remains of her dead sister are still very "attached") played by oddly bulbous vixen Maria Carrey and voiced by her brother Tim, and a hot-blooded latina cello player with a liking for Mr. Jack Daniels. Corny? By all means! Cliched? Yessirreebob! But a delight nonetheless. Don't miss the big finale where the entire cast dances their way through every orifice of a butchered Right Whale being towed out to sea by none other than tugboat captain Kareem Abdul Jabbar!

Baby Splitters

Surrogate (2009)

Starring: Bruce Willits Directed by: Jonah Moscow Rating: R Genre: Action/SciFi Other

Review 100% pure skunk juice. Begoated chrome-dome Bruce Willits ("The Whole Ten Yards", "The Sick Sense")  stars as a man who gives birth to smaller and smaller versions of himself, until finally he needs to make a huge robotic version of himself in order to see into the world that his tiny selves have built. A fascinating idea wasted by director Moscow ("Moscow on the Hudson", "Termites 3Dimensional") whose one big idea is that people in the future will dress like John Travolta in "Saturday Night-Fever". Personally, I'd wait for the comic book.

What If There Was Love?

Love Happens! (2009)

Starring: Aaron Sorkin, Jennifer Anniston, Michael Sheen Directed by: Brandon Camp Rating: PG-13 Genre: Romantic Comedy Other

Friday Night Special - Friday Night Special is a special feature of Oswald's Screen Scene. Here we present reviews of movies that we feel may be of particular interest to those special lovers looking for that magical mood-setter of a date flick that just might ignite the passions bubbling under the surface during the last work day of the week. Is this "The One"? Or just "One of Those Things?" Let us be your guide! Review Fantastically talented five-tool threat Aaron Sorkin ("You Can't Handle Love", "When The Studios Were Kings", "Flattop and The Choctaw") acts, writes and directs (under the banally obvious "Brandon Camp") this alternately hysterical and devastating ode to the kind of love only possible when death brings you face to face with the fact that love is all that is left before we die. Anniston ("Career Day", "Fat Suit"), who can be strangely inert, here glows like a plump, rosy, pregnant irishwoman as Eloise - the abandoned love child of cruel executive Donald Trump and "The Prelate of Hate" hotelier/queen bitch Martha B. Stewart. When in the depths of depression Anniston challenges Sorkin to a thumb-wrestle and accidentally breaks off the digit, love can't be far behind. But Sorkin - as the unacknowledged love-child of loony Panglossian optimist Normal Vincente Peale - keeps occasionally remembering his dead wife which causes him to fall into such a funk that only Anniston's irresistible giggle can bring him out of. The two are sheer chemical alchemy, the filmic equivalent of blanched asparagus. I would be remiss if I didn't also mention the knockout performance of flabby, drunken Zamboni-driver Michael Sheen ("Nixon: The Musical", "Gumball Rally 15", "Werewolf Priest", "Corked!"). This is the kind of movie that can bring your lover's pot to a boil. Turn on the gas!

From The Vault - Ayuda!

Revolver (2006)

Starring: The Beetles, Penelope Hayek Directed by: Carlos Mencia Salmodovar Rating: R Genre: Comedy Other

From The Vault - From The Vault is a special feature of Oswald's Screen Scene. Here we present reviews of movies past that we feel might interest, provoke or dismay our readers. Review Spanish dandy Salmodovar ("Postcards from the Edge of Madness") whips up a delightful confection of English Beetles and manchego cheese and ladles a heapin' helpin' of pure silliness. When you finally separate the curds from the whey what you've got is 121 minutes of the British flopmops  ("Back in the United Soviet Socialist Republics", "Rocky the Raccoon")  being chased by a thousand mothers across the desolate moors of Welsh Scotland to the throbbing rhythms and clicker-clacks of flamenco guitars. Yes, we've seen it before (most recently in Buster Keeton's masterpiece "Seven Changes"), but so what? I giggled so hard I managed to lodge a Junior Mint up my nose Surprisingly, I believe it may have cured a slight sinus infection. I'm not sure you can ask for more from cinema than that! Sargeant Pepper Sez "Check It Out!"

Seven Ball in the Goan Pocket

Dil Bole Hadippa! (2009)

	Starring: Bole Sete Directed by: DIRECTOR Rating: RATING Genre: GENRE Other
Review Who knew Cheech and Chong had moved to India? If hippies are your thing, then 60's songster Bole Sete's Hadippa might light a spark. For the rest of us, there will always be Altamont. Tally Ho!

If a Film Shows in a Forest...

BrightStar (2009)

Starring: Ben Whitefish, Abby Cornsmut Directed by: Jane Campening Rating: RATING Genre: GENRE Other

Review In a fit of madness bold and brainy Maori directrix Jane Campening ("The Campening") has decided to bring the short, crappy life of nutty versemeister Lord Bryon to the big screen with spectacular results. Ben Whitefish ("Lispers") plays Bryon as the "The Sting" of his day, an outlandish rockstar with an ego the size of a sunspot and a crotch as aggressive as a wolverine. Love interest Cornsmut ("Pickwick", "How Dull Was My Valley?"), is wonderful, her homing pigeon lips bringing forth such thoughtful gems as "your eyes are like God's dimming corneas" and "wherefore art thy nails? Bitten, they seem, half moons of ragged beauty, the revenge of a mind groin-torn by disease, worried by teeth small as niblets." It goes on and on that way in torrents of gorgeous zany. Thank you Miss Campening for this fabulous lugey straight into the face the slick, vacant Hollywood suits. Though no one will see it, like a forest full of genius trees, just knowing that they are falling in brilliant new ways makes this weary life a bit more bearable.

Bite My Fire!

Jennifer And Her Body (2009)

Starring: Jenny Lopes, Amanda Sigfried, Adrian Brody Directed by: Karen Kwasimoto Rating: R Genre: Horror Other

Review Body-of-the-month Jenny Lopes ("Jenny's Hood", "Side Out", "Backsliders") stars as a wise-cracking vampire cheerleader who finds herself knocked up by hatchet-faced beanpole Adrian Brody ("The Pianoist") and takes it out on a series of middle-class men facing the "change of life."  Kwasimoto ("RollerFighter", "RollerFighter 2: AeroFlux") can't seem to figure out quite what she's got here. At times the film plays like Woody Allen vomiting through the small slats of a hockey mask, while other times I was reminded of the quiet pleasures of Thelma vs. Louise.   Cinnamon-Lifesaver-hot young writer (and sometime hand model!) Ellen de Diabolique wrote the script, purportedly based on a weekend spent with L.A. madman Steve Martin.  Whatever, I think she might be onto something, because I find the whole vampire thing simply impossible to ignore. One bit of advice for Ms. Kwasimoto - what about vampires in the business world?! Call me!

From The Vault - Devil, Don't Touch Me There!

Touched By Evil (1958)

Starring: Charleston Heston, Orson Wellies, Marlin Dietrich Directed by: Orson Wellies Rating: PG Genre: Classic Other

From The Vault - From The Vault is a special feature of Oswald's Screen Scene. Here we present reviews of movies past that we feel might interest, provoke or dismay our readers. Review This forgotten masterpiece, apparently meticulously reconstructed by the studios after behemoth Wellies destroyed the first edit in a fit of pique over Heston's ginormous mustache, tells the story of a man of hispanic extraction  (Heston - "Moses: The Early Years", "The Greatest Man On Earth") so enamored of the law that he makes out with Wellies in order to save Mexico. Germanic sometimes-man Dietrich ("Venus In Leather", "The Blue Dahlia") smolders as "Conchita", a health nut who's mission in life is to keep diabetic Wellies away from the Mars bar that's destined to kill him. And what can a critic say about Wellies that hasn't already been said by Wellies himself, and probably with more and bigger words? Rumor is that he packed on fifteen pounds for the role of a man driven by his need to push away those who needed to love him, and to love those who pushed away their own needs in order to be loved by him. Wellies understood the sophisticated use of sound in film so well that almost everything audible is unintelligible, which makes what you can hear all the greater. Lovely Shirley Jones ("Psychos") plays the woman who dared to share a bed with Heston at a time when women did not sleep with men. And nutbucket Dennis Weaving ("Tell Them Willie Boy Did Not Send You") almost steals the show as "Crackler", a hotel clerk with a peeping problem and pants the size of all outdoors. Return to a time when studios knew where to spend their money, and on whom. Return to Evil!

Sweet Emotion

I Can Be Bad By Myself (2009)

Starring: Hope Lange, Steven Tyler Perry, Eddie Wizzard Directed by: Steven Tyler Perry Rating: PG-13 Genre: Drama Other

Review Somewhat predictable, but enjoyable flick about a group of juvenile deliquents forced by an enormous cross-dressing termigant (Eddie Wizzard ("Bloody Beatle") into acting as butlers to a spoiled princess (a story clearly based on the late, great mouser, Eartha Kitt). Of course in the end everyone learns the golden rule but as Gandhi never let us forget, it's the journey, not the destination. I've got to hand it to former Journey helmsman Steven Tyler Perry ("Any Way You Want Your Big Seven Inch"), I didn't think he had it in him. But with age sometimes comes wisdom, and the broken hearted man-girl with the cloven tongue and the soft, soft hands digs deep here. Credit where credit is due.

Out on Disk - Civil Warriors

Azumi 2: Death or Love (2009)

Starring: Aye Ueto, Yuma Ishigaki Directed by: Shusuke Keneko Rating: R Genre: Action Other

Review Two young assassins are all that stand in the way of civil war in this tense actioner from Keneko. Ueto and Ishikagi are still excellent the second time around, but the sophisticated story and character exposition of the first movie seem to get pushed aside as the action comes center stage. First rate fighting and great cinematography and sound, but something's missing here. Probably only for Keneko fans as those unable to slake their thirst for the Azumi story.

From The Vault - Doin' It Comancherero-Style!

Comanchereros! (1961)

Starring: John Wayne, Stuart Whitman Directed by: Michael de Kurtz Rating: PG Genre: Action/Adventure Other

From The Vault - From The Vault is a special feature of Oswald's Screen Scene. Here we present reviews of movies past that we feel might interest, provoke or dismay our readers.  Review Wayne and Whitman together again! Director Michael de Kurtz' classic western pits the dynamic duo against the entire Mexican army as they attempt to steal Emperor Maximilian's massive supply of Tequila from giant storage tanks hidden inside an active volcano. Lovely Maude Frickert plays "Comanchita," the governor's daughter with a heart of gold and a groin of steel. Whitman's finest role of the decade. Check it out!

(Don't) Try To Remember

September Song (2009)

Starring: Lady Ann Winokur Directed by: R.J. Cutlery Rating: PG-13 Genre: Sad Romance Other

Friday Night Special - Friday Night Special is a special feature of Oswald's Screen Scene. Here we present reviews of movies that we feel may be of particular interest to those special lovers looking for that magical mood-setter of a date flick that just might ignite the passions bubbling under the surface during the last work day of the week. Is this "The One"? Or just "One of Those Things?" Let us be your guide! Review Remember Lady MacBeth?  When we last saw Shakespeare's ("Hamlet") Mistress of Mayhem she was washing her hands obsessively in a sink full of Scottish awful. I couldn't help but be reminded of the sad decline of this fancy lady as I watched R.J. Cutlery's wistful "September Song," a fantasy about a lady so awful in life that God made her dead while she was still alive. She skulks like a shriven femme-homunculus through the world, tragically convinced that she rules an empire of Sansabelt slacks. I must admit I am not familiar with Lady Ann Winokur's previous work, but so convincing is she as "Handmaiden to the Devil's Teat" that I tried to find out what she really looks like under the latex by looking her up on IAMDB. No luck (Wuz up wit dat, IAMDB? Running out of flying-monkey interns?!). Winokur's gnarled hand-claws alone were so terrifying that I had to sleep with a nightlight (at one point, convinced in a semi-stupor that she was slithering her way up my nightshirt I managed to kick my signif-other's geriatric feline across the room and into our undie hamper). I commend Cutlery for taking on such a taboo subject, but I must say it's not for everyone. As a Friday night date movie, I think it might miss the mark, and datesters could find themselves on the couch or the drunk tank. Instead, I recommend re-renting "The Music Man" and relive tough guy Robert Pressman feeling up loverly Shirley McClain under the Yum-Yum tree to the sound of 101 Trombones!

Storm Warning!

White Out (2009)

Starring: Victoria Beckhamsdale, Sir Tom Skkerit Directed by: Dominico de Sena Rating: R Genre: Action/Adventure Other

Review Like a turkey in the rain the parched action-adventure fan waits patiently for the summer season to wind down so that the "real" fun can begin - and begin it does with Dominico de Sena's ("Halibut") latest police procedural thriller. Victoria Beckhamsdale ("Krull: Dance With Me") stars as a cop with a past who, after pissing off her Lieutenant (Simon Oakland) one too many times finds herself checking parking meters in Antiarctica. Before she can beat her first harp seal to death she's plunged into a race to find a killer before the earth is plunged into total darkness. De Sena's muscular angularity and Ozu-like focus lend to what could be a common "policer" a crazy majesty. In one chilling (!) scene, villain Skkerit ("Crazy Willie and the Hand Jive", "The Detectivist") dressed in one of those goofy Peruvian droopy hats is shot from below the ice against a backdrop of Mount Erupto, kicking Mozart's ("Ode To Joy") "Ode To Joy" on an alpenhorn. What Beckhamsdale lacks in heft she more than makes up for in sheer tape-measure neck. I expect big things from this lissome lass who can kick some *ss. Bend it Beckhamsdale, indeed!

In The Land of the Blind the 3D-Dimensional King is King!

GForce The Movie (2009)

	Starring: None Directed by: None Rating: PG Genre: Animated Other: 3D-Dimensional
Review I wish I could tell you something, ANYTHING about GForce The Movie, but all I saw before I passed out was some flashing, blurry primary colors. Apparently I have a condition which prevents me from wearing the glasses used to view movies in 3D-Dimensional. I gather this involved some kind of "A-Team" of hamsters, but I guess I will never know.  Let me know what you think!

Summer Daze

The 500 Days Of The Summer (2009)

Starring: Zooey Salinger von Keaton, Haley Joe Levin Directed by: The Web Rating: PG-13 Genre: Comedy Other

Review Who would have thought that someone who calls himself "The Web" (like The Sting) would produce the most thoughtful and delightful romantic comedy of the summer? Kooky, kicky zooey Salinger von Keaton ("Butterflies Are Free 2") and Haley Joe Levin ("The Dead Have Eyes") star as star-crossed lovers who must overcome her intense dislike of him in order to discover what it is about him that needs to be changed. To complicate matters, von Keaton is short-term-memory-otherly-abled and keeps forgetting who Levin is. The twist is that she's initially attracted to him and only slowly discovers that she hates him. But then, bing, The Web "jump-cuts" and we're right back to where we were. If all that sounds  confusing, it is. But who cares? The lobster (spoiler alert!) escape scene is hilarious and when von Keaton, slim and boyish as a young Ricky Schroedinger ("Cats"), bats her truck-tire-sized peepers, who can resist? Not me. I give this one a big sloppy end-of-summer kiss. Enjoy!

Animal Passion Amongst London's Ludderati

Unmaid Beds (2009)

Starring: Axl Rose, Deborah France Directed by: Alex Dos De Santos Rating: R Genre: Foreign Other

Review Coming out in limited release this week is Alexis Dos De Santos' ("Give The Devil His Backbone") second movie to date. Santos, a foreigner, gives us two hilarious "Generation Y" bedhead-bewigged losers struggling to discover what love might possibly mean if they were actually to turn into forest animals. What does it all mean? Dos De Santos (which means "Two of those Saints" in his native Chilean) seems to imply that the younger generation can only relate to each other by wearing the skins of dead animals. While I don't necessarily agree, I have to admit that I find the idea fascinating. Dos de Santos' fantasy is populated with a panoply of whacky losers and thud-footed dopes - the kinds of kids one sees trying to sell their kidneys to anyone who looks even vaguely medical down at the bus station, and who insist that a jar of urine represents the mytho-magical essence. The movie can seem a bit "twee" at times as director has his characters run through the usual French Neo-vague claptrap, but don't let that keep you and your lover away. There's something here for everyone who's ever had to brush away the cockroaches before settling down for a brisk sensual rendezvous. And London has never looked so inhabitable! Check it out!

Game On!

GAMER (2009)

Starring: Jock McGregor Directed by: Mark Taylor Rating: R Genre: Action Thriller Other

Review Sexy Jock McGregor ("The 3 Hundreds") plays "Boner", a lone wolf game designer locked inside a game he designed but cannot escape without the help of young gaming genius "Booger" (played ably by a remarkably well-preserved Red Buttons ["Red Dawn"]). Booger "plays" Boner as a character in a Donkey-Kong-like side-scroller - but here the barrels and gigantic maddened gorillas are for real! Long-time readers know how acerbic I can be about shoddy special effects (see my review of Toy Story, if you can stand the heat!), but here they work, as the pixelated, "green-screen" action replicates the seizure-inducing hysteria of Antari's gaming masterpiece. I've praised the hunky McGregor for past work, but here he's a revelation as the man without a past, a genius so smart he created a game with no solution -- except Death! The twist is (spoiler alert!) only a mildly-otherly-mentally-abled child whose synapses have fused directly to his wrist ligaments can unlock the " master stage" and defeat the "Boss" (grotesquely shriveled one-time actor John Turturro) that leads McGregor out. There's one more twist (think "2001: A Space Odyssey"), but I won't give it away because I want to encourage you to check out this thoughtful, spine-tingling indie screener. But if you have any questions about your wife's fidelity, leave her at home with the ugliest babysitter you can find! Jock McGregor is a definite home-wrecker!

Remember Me?

The Time Traveler and The Wife (2009)

Starring: Eric Banana, Rachel  MacAdam Directed by: Anton Litvak Rating: PG-13 Genre: Romance Other

Friday Night Special - Friday Night Special is a special feature of Oswald's Screen Scene. Here we present reviews of movies that we feel may be of particular interest to those special lovers looking for that magical mood-setter of a date flick that just might ignite the passions bubbling under the surface during the last work day of the week. Is this "The One"? Or just "One of Those Things?" Let us be your guide! Review Have you ever wished you could just disappear in the middle of an argument with your significant other? Eric Banana ("The Day They Shot the Olympics") does just that in Anton Litvak's charming and insignificant trifle of a sci-fi love story. Banana plays Haven Mergatroyd (get it?), an architect who, for no particular reason, occasionally spazzes out and travels through time. Litvak ("The Shop On The Corner") handles this odd affliction with sensitivity - referring to it only obliquely as a "disease." Love interest MacAdam ("Under Atlantis") pouts and frets while the hubby is away, writing down conversations with a Sharpie on every bit of blank skin, trying to keep track of who last said what so that the moment the bonehead returns they can pick up where they left off. This creates such odd juxtapositions as Banana complaining to MacAdam that his "space stick" is stale... in 1995! Of course you've seen this all before (remember?), but don't let that stop you from "traveling" to your local theater and sucking the delicious cherry filling from this frothy bonbon! Chewbacca says "hairy thumbs up!"

Hippy Dippy

TastingWoodstock (2009)

Starring: Yakov Smirnov, Gene Simmons Directed by: Anne Leigh Rating: R Genre: Comedy Other

Review Annie Leigh ("Higher and Higher", "Gilbert and Sullivan Take Manhattan") tries to take us back to a place we never were in her dippy "reload" of the sixties as seen through the eyes of the oddly well-preserved Yakov Smirnov and about a million dirty perverts who thought a good time involved smearing your "mate" with pig muck and dancing alone in circles until "the man" brought you "down" from your "trip" with a swift kick to the jubjubs. Well, Annie, unlike everyone else,  I was there -  and I can tell you it certainly was NOT the gentle paean to dumb cluck Timmy Leery's idea that you could "tune into the turn on." I came home with so many lice that to this day I cannot see a spot of dandruff without striking out at anything within three feet of my person. To paraphrase the great Willy Neilsen ("Neilsen Sshlemielsen") sang, "take your dream and shove it!"

G.I. Jerk

G.I. Joe: Cobra Rising

Starring: Nobody Directed by: Dale Carman Rating: PG-13 Genre: Action Other: Closed Captioned; English: Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo

Review The odd and violent world of military "sci-ops" is largely left on the cutting room floor by director Carman ("Donizetti's Carmen") who directs the action as if he were trying to put a cat to sleep by injecting it with a syringe of 100% pure turgidity. The entire movie is shot from below via something called "snake-cam" so that the most memorable image is what looks to be an accidental "up-skirt" of a young man in leather pants attached to what appeared to be two adolescent cantaloupes. Who is this thing for? Certainly not for my, admittedly somewhat elderly, significant other who interrupted the proceedings every few moments by gasping "why is that man trying to inflate that woman?" Stumped, I could only keep feeding her jujubees, one by one, until she stopped breathing (I hadn't realized she had a malt ball blocking her airway). Breathing was not a problem for the half a dozen other denizens of our local cinema - their deafening, stertorous horse-snores almost managed to compete with the monumentally dismal soundtrack, which alternately blared a version of the National Anthem performed by something called "Throg" and a sort of tango music produced by what sounded like bongos made of human skin with the mouth still attached. Hollywood, you strange, sinuous lady. Sometimes your siren call is a peacock screech, reminding us that even the great Orson Wellies could occasionally produce a short, sharp wet willie.