First and foremost, I love, love, love the score to this film.It’s all shrieking strings and discordant base that calls attention to itself in the best way possible.
In a 2017 That has lost us acclaimed directors such as George Romero and Jonathasn Demme, it is rewarding to know that such talented visionaries will live on in a new generation of filmmakers.
Jonathan Holbrook’s 2016 straight to Vod and DVD film THE TALL MEN, quickly ratchets him onto the short list of directors to be on the lookout for. THE TALL MEN, seemingly a updating and fleshing out of his earlier CUSTOMER 152, is for me on every level a bold, new, frenetic, biting, horror satire.
Like NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD it is straight up horror, but also like that movie it is a pitch dark commentary that runs underneath, that addresses issues and pitfalls that are all too relevant to viewers today.
Brilliantly performed by all involved, especially the lead whose spasaming quirks, completely rivet.Add to that assured, strange and disturbing direction, visceral, effective editing, and a galvanizing score, and a surprisingly smart and assured script, you have a film that mates the strangeness of David Lynch to the paranoia of Hitchcock.
Along with other criminally unknown straight to VOD films such as EVIL INSIDE and DEVOURED this film, THE TALL MEN, is a gem waiting to be heralded.
Some Times you wonder how what is seemingly obvious is utterly lost on people in positions of power.
VALERIAN movie? Great concept on paper , great visuals, the leads are as interesting as watching paint dry. I would not in a million years have chosen those two people to helm that movie. They have no visual interest.
The latest Universal bomb in THE MUMMY, completely predictable. White Egyptians, unless they are Boris Karloff, just never a good idea.
Casting and visuals and chemistry is still a HUGE part of what makes a film or show work and why it is dead on arrival.
It is one reason the JUSTICE LEAGUE movie is despite everything they are trying to course correct and do right, can’t fix intrinsic issues they have done wrong. The comic book decided to put CYBORG in the comic, not because he is a good character, but because he hit three demographics they throught would make for both multiple diversity streams and good merchandising. He was a Black crippled robot.
TRANSFORMERS has proven that robots sell, all day long. On top of that being able to add a character of color to the blindingly white DC universe, ticks that box, and making him a cripple, ticks the handicapped audience. A lucrative and growing segment condsidering how many young men and women this country sends overseas to mutilate and get mutilated.
Here is the issue though. It doesn’t make sense for CYBORG to be in the Justice League, beyond tokenism and a blatant money grab.
From a story point it makes NO SENSE in the comics, and it makes no sense in the movies. I’m all for characters of color toning down the lilly whitness of the Justice League, but not awful characters. The JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED cartoon has shown a great character of color that deserves to be in the Justice League and works great in the Justice League… John Stewart, The Green Lantern, And you know what, he also has kick ass powers and is more than a walking toaster. The late great Dwayne McDuffie made John Stewart a great character, and the Justice League a great AND diverse team without sacrificing quality or common sense. They were great BECAUSE of that diversity and love that Dwayne imbued that series with, that made it great.
Greatness is a thing that seldoms gets said in the same sentence as JUSTICE LEAGUE. Unlike the AVENGERS that has a few notable stories you can hand people to sell them on these characters for live action movies, most notably Mark Millar’s THE ULTIMATES followed by Steve Englehart’s, Gerry Conway’s, Jim Shooter’s and Kurt Busiek’s runs; the JUSTICE LEAGUE has very little that holds up, or is of appeal to a movie going audience. Outside of deconstructive and apocalyptic stories, the twilight of the Gods type mythology such as KINGDOM COME, and some Morrison work, there are almost no great JUSTICE LEAGUE comic stories. The best the JUSTICE LEAGUE has ever been is in the McDugffie helmed cartoon.
The current comic and the current movie unfortunately, has learned nothing from the late McDuffie’s lead.
Add to that the Cyborg and Flash costumes are crap (didn’t you learn anything from the GREEN LANTERN train-wreck about CGI costumes) and you have a movie that could have been great, crippled by by people who are going to lose dollars to save pennies. People ignorant or uncaring of the part visual chemistry plays in whether a thing works or not.
And that brings us back to Star Trek.
Looking at the cast photo of Star Trek Discovery… that cast has no visual interest, no chemistry. The same issue suffered by THE ENTERPRISE cast, and to a lesser degree the VOYAGER cast. There was no joy or interst or chemistry in this combination of people.
Watching the latest STAR TREK DISCOVERY Trailer, I find the trailer interesting, however the jury is out on whether that translates into good. There was no excitement in that trailer, a bunch of uninteresting looking people, no visual chemistry or excitement to them, and a general air of uninterst and lack of joy in the whole.
You are in effing space, that should be awe-inspiring to the cast and to the viewer. But all that comes across in that trailer is how dreary everything is. The one male lead, who I know to be a good actor, he perhaps has never been the most rousing actor, and whether lead or not, you need somone immediately that grabs your eye, and you can say, yep, here is a hero or man of action, or somone who can command a screen and command the attention of viewers. Without a doubt great scenery chewing actors is the hallmark of great Star Trek, whether it is William Shatner, or Leonard Nimoy or Patrick Stewart or Johnathan Fraker or Avery Brooks or Michael Dorn.
The star of this series, is a lead actress, and she is clearly charismatic, but you can’t act in a bubble, without that chemistry of clicking actors around you and fun plots, it is just dreariness. And that’s what came across in the trailer… dreariness.
And a lot of changes for change sake.
The change to the Kilngons… strikes me as… foolhardy at best.THE NEXT GENERATION hit a home run in being able to make an interesting but crude visual race of the Kilingons… better. Not just better, but a rousing transcendent success. The way the Original Serieshit a home run with the Vulcans and the Romulans, the Next Generation hit that Home Run with the Klingons.
You don’t fix what isn’t broken. And in this case DISCOVERY’s redesign of the Klingons just seems change for change sake, that tears down a success, and what could have been an easy inroad to the series for fans craving the popular Klingons, becomes instead a detriment.
Just poor, poor thinking.
Along with that the idea of trying to make American audiences pay to see this series that initially needs as much groundswell of support it can get, is just idiocy. Out of the gate you set an antagonistic relationship between show and audience.
I will, needless to say, not be paying for this show, no more than I had any intest in paying to see VALERIAN or THE MUMMY.
But I will keep abreast of it through online reviews and podcasts, and I hope it can prove me wrong. But if Paramount stick to the visuals and that tone and that cast, that seems clearly set in stone for the first year….you may have an interesting SciFi show, but you arguably wont have a good show, and you definitely won’t have a great Star trek show.
Paramount instued of suing the AXANAR fan film, should have gone with that filmmaker to produce their new show. It is obvious that the fan films have more heart, intelligence, and fun, and understanding of what makes good Star Trek than Paramount has.
PARAMOUNT’s rebooted STAR TREK films, a case of diminishing returns, from the excellence of the first one, to the too self indulgent but still great second film, to the atrocious third film; points to a company that is in desperate need of course correction. And that same folly and arrogant stupidity that highlights their dealings with the fans, mars their handling of this latest television show.
For more on this, I want to direct you to a MIDNIGHT’S EDGE YouTube video, that revealed some of the reasons for Paramount’s mishandling of the latest Star Trek property and where CBS fits in. It’s a riveting and informative bit of reporting.
In a saturated streaming 21st century world, where most kids have available at their fingertips, access to move movies and more choices than entire video stores, how do you get people to watch your movie and not flick off of it in the first 5 minutes?
Well you do what Tim Lewiston’s 2011 THE HOT POTATO does, have a great poster, a top notch cast, and most importantly a stellar title sequence.
It is the latter that really grabbed me. THE HOT POTATO despite sporting a great cast, didn’t even make a ripple on its debut. At a cost of $6 million dollars, the film was shot at the end of 2010, and sat shelved for two years, to finally just receive a film festival showing, before being released straight to DVD, also at the end of 2012.
However the film, through free Amazon Prime Streaming is perhaps ripe for the attention and audience, that it could not garner either theatrically or via DVD sales.
And beyond negligible publicity and a Blockbuster geared theatrical market that is not kind to the smaller, more intimate film, another reason for this film to fail at the theater is sans subtitles the film is in large stretches unintelligible. The competing accents, and idioms and slang, would give even some English speakers pause.
God love Ray Winstone he is a fantasdtic actor, but he like a lot of method actors likes to mumble, add that to an at times undecipherable bit of Cockney, from many of the actors, and you have a film unwatchablde without subtitles.
Enter Amazon Prime, and in the comfort of your home you can enjoy this film,that quite frankly stands up as a more enjoyable LOCK STOCK AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS. Add in a great soundtrack, and one of the best title sequences, and you have a movie worthy of rediscovery!
As someone who does a lot of shopping on Amazon and goes through a lot of reviews, to determine valid feedback from weighted or insincere or unreliable feedback; FAKESPOT is a site that can help make that determination process less time intensive.
I tried them on products that I felt had questionable rating scores, and ones I thought were acurately described, and fakespot confirmed my thoughts, in a fraction of the time it took me to determine greatness from bs.
Okay so it is Sunday 30 July 2017, and it has been a minute since I posted.
One of the things that has been occupying me (besides today’s POWER and ELEMENTARY marathons):
OATS STUDIOS
I do not like You Tube if I have to go to its web page, for the simple fact I hate its un-moderated comments and ignored idiocy and stupidity. But the YouTube channel on Amazon Fire or Roku is something else. I find it actually useful, and nice to view on my big screen TV. And no un-moderated comments to deal with.
The main thing I go to YouTube for is short films, followed closely by movie trailers.
But for short films YouTube’s Roku or Fire Channel, is a great boon. Giving a stage and platform for filmmakers who would otherwise go undiscovered to develop an audience and a name, through short films that wow you and stay with you far more viscerally than most feature length films can.
That brings us to OATS STUDIOS, a production company created by Neill Blomkamp of DISTRICT 9 and ELYSIUM fame.
I am not a fan of the feature films of Neill Blomkamp, they have wonderful core ideas, but tend to get lost under poor Hollywood casting or unnecessary backstory. However in the short film is where Blomkamp’s OATS STUDIOS shine.
Sporting cutting edge world class visual effects, great actors and performances, and big screen direction the films of OATS STUDIOS are, 30 minute or less, masterpieces of creativity and speculative fiction, of science fiction mixed with war, mixed with horror, mixed with a cautionary mirror tainted with pressing concerns, both moral and material.
FIREBASE
RAKKA
ZYGOTE
Those Oat Studio short films form a loose trilogy, united by a common theme of mankind pushed to the brink by powers unearthly. And the films are also united by being superlative and imaginative, and gems of 21st century short films.
FIREBASE (which I have also titled DREAMS OF THE RIVER GOD), the 2nd film released, is a little over 26 minutes, and set in Vietnam War era Vietnam… combines so many mind-blowing concepts, and creates one of the screens memorable creations, in the character of… The River God. I can see this spawning a lot of spin-off short films, set in this universe.
RAKKA, the first film released, moves several decades ahead to a world on the brink of extermination by a threat otherworldly.
and ZYGOTE, the last film released as of this writing, further still in the future, sports one of the most imaginative and horrific monsters since Carpenter’s THING. I like RAKKA but I love FIREBASE and ZYGOTE.
All this to say if you are looking for something to watch, then make it to the Oats Studios site and find the aforementioned films by Neill Blomkamp.
As of this writing they do not yet have a BLURAY up for these films, but I urge them to release one. Quality productions such as this deserve a quality Blu-Ray production with special features and director’s commentary, and not simply the ephemeral availability of websites and streaming.
In a saturated streaming 21st century world, where most kids have available at their fingertips, access to move movies and more choices than entire video stores, how do you get people to watch your movie and not flick off of it in the first 5 minutes?
