Monday, January 30, 2006

Movie Log 2006 #8-14: B-Fest
There were actually 13 movies on the schedule, but I don't count repeats in the annual log.
This year opened with Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, with a screenplay co-written by Reeve. He didn't quite deserve his fate, but he did himself no karmic favors here. Lex Luthor uses a Superman hair to create a silly looking blonde superbeing to take on Superman. Meanwhile Superman goes to the UN and rounds up the world's entire nuclear arsenal (never mind that, as Frank Miller and Alan Moore have illustrated, the Cold War would have ended early with the presence of an invulnerable being in the US). Oh, and the Daily Planet gets bought by some Murdochian character, and his daughter is Mariel Hemingway, who has eyes for Clark. She ends up flying around in the vacuum of space sans any kind of protective gear. Except her shoulder pads.

Next up wasCreature from the Black Lagoon in 3D, which I'd seen. Still fun, but the print was a little washed out. The tints didn't match those of the glasses; the 3-D still worked to an extent, but was headache inducing. On to Godzilla (1998). Ahhh, remember when it was fun to think about NYC getting destroyed? I will give this movie credit for not wasting too much time setting things up; the ass-kicking begins almost immediately. But then we get bogged down in the backstory of the useless Maria Pitillo. The ending turns into a Jurassic Park retread.

Plan 9 From Outer Space Seen this too many times, so I went to the lounge to rest up. I also missed the first half of Coffy, which I saw the first time I went to B-Fest. Woke up in time to see the razor-blades-in-the-Afro bit; a fave.

This year's soulkiller was Gas-s-s-s!, a late Roger Corman vehicle. A nerve gas kills everyone over 25, and a group of hippies, including Ben Vereen, Cindy Williams, and "Tally Coppola" (yes, Talia Shire) go driving off in search of some Oracle. Along the way they meet a football team who practices raping and pillaging, and a group of bikers who specialize in golf. This was one of those films where every scene is supposed to mean something, but it all ends up meaningless.

There's an apparently-minority view that Troma pics don't belong at B-fest. I tend to agree; they try a little too hard to be bad and usually end up dull. Tromeo & Juliet was a step up, but I still gave up about an hour in and crashed for a while. It's the R&J story with all the dismemberment, nudity and lesbian scenes the Bard's tale was sorely lacking. Oh, and it turns out the star-crossed lovers are long-lost siblings. And they don't care and have mutant babies. Heartwarming!

So a few years ago at this event, I saw Can Heironymous Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humppe and Find True Happiness? At the time I thought "who since Anthony Newley has been given free rein to write, star in, direct, and compose the music for such a turd of a vanity project? Ah yes, Prince's Graffiti Bridge! I was wondering how this would go over. The movie is crap, but the music is actually quite good. So it's some time after Purple Rain and "The Kid" and Morris Day are vying for control of The Kid's club, Glam Slam. It's not drawing all that well because his songs are "too spiritual." (I've always found it interesting that while Prince wrote all the music, the songs he gives The Time are mostly better than the ones he performs). Along comes this doggerel-spewing woman (Ingrid Chavez) who is not-so-mysteriously supposed to be an angel trying to save both Morris and Prince. In a nearly-30-year career of looking ridiculous, this movie captures Prince's lowest point: long, straightened hair, a sad excuse for a beard, and some get-ups that defy description. Thigh-high stockings with no pants. Seriously. He also shortchanges himself as a performer -- what made Purple Rain bearable was the extended performance footage. Here he's cutting in and out of songs mid-number, staging too many songs as music videos, and is spending too much time dancing around instead of playing.

Earth Girls are Easy- Not too much bad to be said here. I'd seen this before and it didn't hold up all that well, but it's light, meets its low aims, and Geena Davis spends much of her time in a bikini. And I always liked Julie Brown. Up until Eternal Sunshine this was the best Jim Carrey film, though that's not saying much. Michael McKean is wasted as a surfer-dude pool cleaner.

Rhinestone - Plenty bad to say about this, the third quasi-musical in a row. Among the people who should've known better are Phil Alden Robinson (Field of Dreams) and the late, lamented Richard Farnsworth. And Dolly Parton, of course, whom I think has a very likable performance persona, but with the exception of 9 to 5 it's never translated well to screen. Dolly's a singer who wants out of her contract with a sleazy bar owner (Ron Leibman). She bets him that in two weeks she can turn cabbie Sylvester Stallone into a singer able to win over the tough crowds at the bar's open-mic night. And since when is a NYC urban-cowboy bar the make-or-break place on the country scene? Light on the hillbilly stereotypes, but Stallone's-a gotta the parents-a straight out of a Joe Dolce song.

Cobra Woman An explorer finds his fiancee (Maria Montez) has been kidnapped and taken to Cobra Island. They track her there and finds the island ruled by an evil queen (also Montez), and that the good twin is the rightful ruler. Oh yeah, Sabu shows up, and may have top billing; I don't remember. This was good and dumb, and put the true "B" back in B-Fest.

Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 If not for Gas-s-s-s! this would have been the worst film on the bill. Having not seen the original Baby Geniuses, I thought I'd be completely lost, but it turns out the two have very little to do with each other. Okay, so babies speak their own language. Apparently in this language they talk about particle physics and Proust and things. You'd think if they were that smart they'd have figured out potty-training by now, but...well, Iet's move on. One baby in BG 1 was played by some triplets named Fitzgerald. They return in BG2, this time playing a kid superspy named Kahuna. It turns out Kahuna is actually around 70 years old and stopped growing. His full-grown evil older brother Jon Voigt -- that is, ACADEMY AWARD-WINNER Jon Voigt. He's got some nefarious plot to control kids, for all the good that's going to do.

King Kong (1933) Saw it very recently, and have seen it before at the best possible venue (Music Box), so we bailed. Besides, it was clearly too good to show at B-fest.

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