George Miller directs Jack Nicholson, Cher and Susan Sarandon in this black comedy where three single witches start dating a “horny, little devil.”
Comedy was so big in the Eighties that a relatively dry and adult work of literature could get a few big names attached to it and suddenly find itself adapted into a kinky blockbuster extravaganza. Too mature and sophisticated for me as a kid, I’d still concede it doesn’t really take shape until the SFX showcase second half. The sex comedy is dated and subtle but the rollercoaster of demonic bad behaviour that eventually sprouts from it is well worth sticking around for. Jack is wonderful here but it is fair to say he only really generates heat in his one-on-one moments with Sarandon. Cher is not a great screen presence but the supporting cast which includes Michelle Pfeiffer, Richard Jenkins and a very game Veronica Cartwright ably carry the film.
Ira Sachs directs Isabelle Huppert, Brendan Gleeson and Marisa Tomei in this ensemble drama where a family assemble around their dying actress mother in a Portuguese seaside town.
Was this commissioned by the Sintra tourist board to show off their pleasant locale? Or as a tax shelter dodge by movie loving capitalists? Whatever the reason for this terminally half hearted production, all the impressive acting talent assembled look uncommitted and listless. Huppert in particular cannot hide her boredom during certain scenes.
Spike Lee directs John Leguizamo, Adrien Brody and Mira Sorvino in this period drama following a community of Italian-Americans the summer their streets are terrorised by serial killer David Berkowitz.
Being a big Spike Lee fan I remember this being a jolting disappointment at the cinema. Lee has such little affection or respect for these characters – they shriek, harangue and attack each other. None of the pastoral sense of community from Do The Right Thing or Crooklyn exists here. Lee’s assessment of white people under existential pressures and in sexual flux is as damning as it is grinding. You just don’t want to be in anyone within the ensemble’s company for a prolonged time… and seemingly their subplots and hang ups get stuck in a narrative rut for what plays like FOREVER. The Son of Sam hysteria is more a framing device than a thread of reality explored with any impact… the few scenes where we witness Berkowitz’ day to day life often drift into unintended parody.
Henri-Georges Clouzot and Serge Bromberg direct Henri-Georges Clouzot, Romy Schneider and Serge Reggiani in this lost film documentary where a film historian assembles the remaining footage and explores the troubled production of the French master’s unfinished film.
Contains some stunning test footage of beautiful Romy Schneider – experimenting with colour, make-up, symmetry, fabrics, movement and geometry. And you get a rough discombobulated sketch of the narrative of the intended film. So much so that it felt very familiar. I knew I had seen this story before? One thing this documentary of “a lost classic” fails to mention is Claude Chabrol did produce the very same script in the 1990s with Emmanuelle Beart. That L’Enfer can’t have been that obscure a release as I saw it as a teenage with only minimal access to arthouse cinema!? Why pretend that does not exist? So this project is wonderful to look at, but does struggle to find new or relevant ground after the one hour mark.
John Woo directs Jean-Claude Van Damme, Lance Henriksen and Yancy Butler in this action thriller where a squad of mercenaries are hunting the homeless in New Orleans for sport.
A celebration of everything unique and everything naff about JCVD (though I don’t actually remember him doing his trademark splits here). He surfs a motorbike blasting a gun, flies through a warehouse of Mardi Gras floats with a shotgun in his hand, bites the rattle off a snake. An orgy of petrol, bullets and confetti. Easily his best movie. Woo’s first Hollywood studio project might have been forged under fire (Sam Raimi was hired as a substitute director on location and permanently poised to takeover if the suits lost faith in the master, the edit was taken over from him by the star) but the second half is brimming with the hyper-stylised high octane action you’d expect. It benefits from a memorable villain in Henriksen and in general has some amusing OTT swagger to it. A Friday Night Highlight.
Allan Moyle directs Christian Slater, Samantha Mathis and Annie Ross in this teen movie where a shy new kid at school is also a foul mouthed but inspirational anonymous pirate radio DJ by night.
One thing that frustrates me about just about every film’s page on Wikipedia is somebody has been allowed to write; “The movie is now considered a cult film.” The unsuccessful, the weird, the hyper-popular, the forgotten. They can’t all be ‘cult movies’ just because somebody rewatches themselves. Christian Slater is no longer a fashionable star… he had a fine decade long stint as “the teen Jack Nicholson”… made some fantastic films and some cute movies and was pretty memorable in all of them. And he has carried on working in a perfectly respectable regularity once the heat switched off on his career. True Romance and Heathers would be the releases of his that have retained and evolved their initial popularity but I’d say Pump Up the Volume is his finest acting role and best candidate for cult revival. It has just faded from availability in spite of being pretty fantastic. DVD copies change hands for high fees on EBay, it has never to my knowledge been available on a streaming service in the UK. Yet it has so many strengths. A witty script with real edge. A red hot debut from Samantha Mathis who has thermonuclear chemistry with her lead. A genuinely cool soundtrack featuring Leonard Cohen, The Pixies, Beastie Boys and The Descendents. A sense of rebellion and sincerity lacking from even your John Hughes and Cameron Crowe flicks. Allan Moyle is the unsung hero of my generation’s youth cinema. Times Square, this and Empire Records is an unofficial trilogy that will mean something special to film fans of a certain age. He seems attuned to how important music is to communal cohesion and discourse among kids, the fact that the hopeful already see how rigged the system they are growing up into is. His style and voice is more akin to novelists like Douglas Coupland or Jonathan Lethem than the big teen movie auteurs. Pump Up the Volume won’t change your life but it has an attitude, a philosophy and a value system that still feels rare within the genre. The ending is a little rushed and abrupt, squandering the potential of everything coming to a big head as promised. That quibble aside, if you can find the right frequency, here is a film ripe for cult re-evaluation and resurrection. Hornier than a ten peckered owl, to boot.
Davis Guggenheim directs James Marsden, Lena Headey and Norman Reedus in this youth drama where three students spread a rumour around campus that spirals out of control… for reasons.
Takes place in a miasma of extreme wealth where nobody behaves like human beings. There’s a twist in the tale but why you’d care about anything that happens before it is whipped out at close of play is anyone’s guess?
Danny Boyle directs Ewan McGregor, Cameron Diaz and Holly Hunter in this fantasy romance crime comedy where two angels must make an accidental kidnapper and a ruthless CEO’s daughter fall in love.
Like Oasis’ third album or Caffrey’s Irish Ale here is something I loved as a teenager that the adult world mocked… and as an adult now…. I can kinda see their point. So much looser than Shallow Grave and so much more wishy washy than Trainspotting it’s kinda obvious why ALLO was considered a stumble for Boyle. He gets a little too seduced by the great American setting and Hollywood stars. Doing nothing particularly interesting with any of these strength but ape the Coen Brothers. Yet the Coens are deceptively precise and technically honed. Boyle’s cinema works best as colour blast emotional journeys. Sensational montages. A rush of feelings rather than a procession of targeted tricks. So he’s lost outside his wheelhouse… a jumble of Cinema du Look scenes drowning in a moribund plot and thin concept. McGregor hasn’t yet found his star power. What felt scrappy and cocky in Scotland feels half hearted and overwhelmed in the badlands. Cameron Diaz shines though, pulling their scenes together into some sort of shape just through her sheer glamour. Holly Hunter equally manages to convert something that is quite trite on paper into a far more eye catching turn. I’ll admit now A Life Less Ordinary ain’t a great film but the soundtrack is full of forgotten bangers and the Britpop-py energy it has to it means you are never bored even when you really, really should be. Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be.
Fred C. Newmeyer and Sam Taylor directs Harold Lloyd, Mildred Davis and Bill Strother in this slapstick comedy where a hapless department store clerk finds himself climbing all 13 storeys of the building’s exterior in an ill advised publicity stunt.
Iconic for a very good reason… nearly all the gags and stunts retain their reactive power a century down the line. Lloyd’s scraggly daftie is a bit wittier than Laurel & Hardy, earthier than Chaplin and modern than Keaton. The movie has similar sensibilities to peak Adam Sandler… generous ensemble work, the underdog in romantic chaos. Lloyd is a winning presence, constantly trying to trick or outpace the system. Fake It Until You Make It: The Movie.
Francis Lee directs Kate Winslet, Saoirse Ronan and Gemma Jones in this period romance where real life palaeontologist Mary Anning looks after and falls for a grieving rich man’s wife.
A cold film where the intimate moments are heightened tactile encounters. A muddy rock being carried. A fossil being scraped. A new hat that shares the spiral pattern of an ammonite in the stitching. I liked the restraint of most of it. But I loved the pent up thrill of eventually seeing Ladybird ride Rose from Titanic’s face. I’m only human and this worked just as grandly as an acting showcase for two of my favourite stars as it did lesbian cottage core slash fic with two of my favourite stars. A fine movie.
Bobby Carroll's Movie Diary 