David Schmoeller directs Paul Le Mat, William Hickey and Irene Miracle in this horror where a bunch of magicians in a deserted hotel are killed off by murderous puppets who don’t need a master to come to life.
Charles Band cheapo. The horny, draggy middle act doesn’t make a lick of sense but after an hour we finally get some more puppet action. For the five minutes the puppets are on the rampage the movie fulfils the videoshop rental brief.
Howard Hawks directs Cary Grant, Ann Sheridan and Marion Marshall in this wartime romantic comedy where a French officer marries a female US lieutenant and promptly discovers American military bureaucracy has no space for him.
More fun when it was a mismatched bickering pair, who you know will fall for each other, larking about in the ruins of Germany on a road trip. The second half of the film is the meat of the story. With Grant’s prig having to tie himself into knots trying to pass through bureaucratic loopholes. Eventually he ends in drag but it isn’t always worth the increasingly samey samey journey.
Hayao Miyazaki directs Mayumi Tanaka, Keiko Yokozawa and Kotoe Hatsui in the Studio Ghibli animated fantasy adventure about an orphan from a mining village who rescues a princess who fell from the sky.
As often happens now I had a strong feeling of déjà vu when watching this for what should have been the first time. According to Wikipedia there was a truncated version floating around U.K. terrestrial telly long before anyone over here even knew what a Ghibli was. The iron giant centurion robots definitely felt familiar. Steampunk pirates. Magical stones. The mystical joy of flying. Just an epic romp with a perfect blend of romance, adventure and dream. Set the bar really high early doors for every other Miyazaki. Lush fluid freedom.
Tony Scott directs Keira Knightley, Mickey Rourke and Edgar Ramirez in this true crime thriller based on the real life of Domino Harvey, an English socialite turned unlikely East Coast bounty hunter.
You can definitely tell what attracted Scott to his subject. Yet he goes for his most frenetic, garish setting of the house style he experimented with after Man On Fire. And I have a lot of time for Knightley but in 2005 she wasn’t quite the movie star she is now. At this early stage of her career, posh cut glass accent aside, she feels miscast. The plot is a crime caper like True Romance but darting back and forth chronologically like a subpar Tarantino rip-off. There is decent stuff here (Rourke for one) just not enough of it.
Amy Holden Jones directs Michele Michaels, Robin Stille and Michael Villella in this slasher where the killer stalks the young guests of a slumber party.
Colourful. Self-aware. Feminist. Much nudity and cheesecake. Good kills, lots of ‘em. Unpredictable final girl. The creepy killer doesn’t wear a mask. The men and boys are incompetent, also off putting. Some of the girls have complex hidden relationships that are hinted at. More fun than it should be.
6
Perfect Double Bill: The Slumber Party Massacre II (1987)
Stuart Rosenberg directs Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward and Melanie Griffiths in this detective thriller where a PI travels to Louisiana to help an old flame being blackmailed.
A belated sequel to Harper, a flick that I’ve never seen. But Newman’s much later Twilight could easily be part of this series in all but name. The bulk of The Drowning Pool is very cool, very chill. Newman acting real suave when meeting heavies, cops and suspects, driving every lady he crosses paths with wild with unrequited passion. It would be very watchable if it were just that. Jaws’ Murray Hamilton makes for an oily Big Bad and jailbait Melanie is all kinds of fun. But there are two stand-out set pieces. One a car jacking by a swamp feels like a shocking lurch into pure horror and then there is the big sustained titular drowning pool escape. My jam.
Doug Liman directs Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie and Vince Vaughn in this romcom actioner where sexy two assassins get married to each other without revealing their day jobs.
Glossy but cobbled together from obvious reshoots and unfulfilled subplots. Essentially trailer moments lingered on as they have nowhere to go. No one’s finest hour but it is passable. The action in the second half is a lot more full on than you’d expect but does become one note by the actual finale. Has Jolie ever starred in a genuinely great movie?
Balding, tubby and prone to hammy acting. Just so cool and so watchable. Nobody does it like Jack! I have also revisited Batman and Wolf as part of this mini-season. What a blast!
Carnal Knowledge (1971)
Mike Nichols directs Jack Nicholson, Art Garfunkel and Candice Bergen in this dark drama chronicling the lifelong sexual development of two men who meet and become friends in college.
A difficult work of cinema. Two reprehensible men treat women like objects and each other like shit over their entire adulthood. The scenes feel disconnected, cold and patience testing. In many ways Nichols straight faced satire of the sexual revolution, as seen from the view point of those who benefited the most without changing at all, is an abrasive corrupting watch. Jack’s dystopian delivery of the “Ballbusters on Parade” slideshow of past conquests is the stand out moment.
7
The Departed (2006)
Martin Scorsese directs Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon and Jack Nicholson in this undercover thriller where both the cops and gangsters deeply embed moles into their rival organisations.
Scorsese going back to the crime flick well finally bagged him an Oscar. This sprawling bad taste remake of the tight Hong Kong thriller Infernal Affairs is a fascinating grab bag of moments and performances. Jack is full fat OTT. There’s a lot of implied baggage about sexual impotency. Marky Mark gives us his one truly fantastic acting turn as the foul mouthed aggressive cop who handles DiCaprio’s drowning undercover. Yeah… there are way too many rat and mole reveals in the final act but this ain’t much concerned with restraint or subtlety. Scorsese’s punk instincts and joy at making one for them (however the fuck he likes) shines through.
9
The Pledge (2001)
Sean Penn directs Jack Nicholson, Patricia Clarkson and Aaron Eckhart in this thriller where a retiring police officer cannot give up investigating the child murder he does not feel was solved on his last day of work.
The underrated, under seen and overlooked gem of Nicolson’s late career. A truly bleak thriller where Jack’s detective become so obsessed keeping his promise to grieving parents that he cannot see his sanity slipping or his morality be warped. The final third sees him set another little girl up as bait for potential serial sex killer. And that plot twist is nowhere near as disturbing as Aaron Eckhart’s handsy seduction of his mentally incompetent suspect played by someone very famous. The Pledge can feel like a conveyor belt of actorly cameos at times. Some of them heart breaking (Mickey Rourke), some of them nutty (Benicio Del Toro’s man child nonce). This is Jack’s show. He dials back all his movie star cool, his magnetic confidence and turns in a complex lead performance that relies on none of his strengths, feels in opposition to all his movie star magic.
8
The Shooting (1966)
Monte Hellman directs Warren Oates, Millie Perkins and Jack Nicholson in this indie western where four strangers ride across a desert to oblivion.
Jack doesn’t appear for the first hour of this existential revenge western that he also produced. When he does he is pretty memorable as the dandy dressed killer who has been on their trail from the start. Oates knows he is on a road to nowhere, resigned to his fate but as uncertain as we are as to why we are on it and who is responsible. We only get obtuse flashes as to the death of the rest of his camp and it is implied he might be the one to have killed his fellow gang members. Millie Perkins is just as enigmatic as the young woman paying them to track yet another killer. She has shades of the lead of True Grit only there is no softening here, no innocence left. You’d need to be in the right mood to appreciate this but it is ultimately worth the puzzling journey.
6
Prizzi’s Honor (1985)
John Huston directs Jack Nicholson, Kathleen Turner and Angelica Huston in this mafia romcom where two assassins fall for each other.
I found this boring when I watched it as a teenager and interminable as an adult giving it a second chance. Everything moves three beats too slow to be funny and the skewering of The Godfather is directionless. Angelica Huston fills a wonderfully dark character, as the conniving daughter-in-waiting Maerose, but she’s barely in it.
A trashy favourite from my teen years. This leans into the drama for much of the runtime then turns absolutely nightmarish for the last third. Most yuppie-in-peril potboilers pull their punches but this one goes full thrusters in its glee in obliterating Kurt Russell’s gentile existence. While we are waiting for everything to go to shit there are disturbing yet classy set pieces. The igniting incident is a convincing home invasion. The ride along sequence has shades of the then very contemporary Rodney King assault, so much so they had to edit the violence down. There is a top sex scene that turns creepy on a dime. All this is hard candy to suck on until the main event. Ray Liotta’s cop goes total psycho and it is a demented delight. Exactly how I want to spend my Saturday night, this held up particularly well on revisit.
M. Night Shyamalan directs Josh Hartnett, Ariel Donoghue and Hayley Mills in this thriller where a serial killer gets wind of an elaborate sting to catch him at the concert he is attending with his daughter.
This and Smile 2 are going to be studied as Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour era cinema. Live Aid might have been a cultural touchstone for a generation but it never inspired two genre movies while it was still happening. As a thriller this unravels in the third act. We spiral too far away from the hook, there are too many plot holes or false moves and the entire lengthy finale relies on an acting performance that is very flat. As a one watcher though, Trap is a tense hoot. Hartnett is having a blast modulating from bottled up ingenuity to friendly creep. You do fully enter Hartnett’s The Butcher / loving dad’s mindset. You root for him and enjoy every sneaky little cat-and-mouse victory. It kinda is a reverse Die Hard. The concert setting is well realised, even the original songs (written and performed by Shyamalan’s daughter) convince. Untethered from reality and funny as fuck, I don’t want to be down on Trap but it has as many problems as qualities.
Bobby Carroll's Movie Diary 