In the mood for an old movie “like they don’t make anymore”? Here’s a little gem from 1941 that critic Leonard Maltin calls “Hollywood moviemaking at its best, with first-rate cast and performances.” Watch Robert Montgomery and Evelyn Keyes in this charming fantasy-comedy by clicking here.
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
When I walked into a movie theater three years ago to watch Zodiac, I felt the film’s box-office success was a foregone conclusion. It had the right director, David Fincher, who had helmed the nightmarish, tension-filled Se7en and an ingenious little mindfuck called The Game. It was a serial-killer movie, and witness the popularity of The Silence of the Lambs. It starred Robert Downey, Jr. and Jake Gyllenhaal. So I watched the movie, enjoyed it … and it was a box-office flop. Why?
It failed at North American theaters for one of two reasons: bad marketing, or bad execution. I think its downfall was due to a little of both.
First, the good things about Zodiac, and there are many. Once upon a time, before he sold out to comic-book junk like Iron Man and Tropic Thunder, Downey was an inventive actor who appeared in interesting movies. His chain-smoking, sarcastic journalist in Zodiac is a hyperactive joy. Downey can sit on a barstool and do nothing but flick ashes onto the floor, and I’m glued to his every move. Second, Fincher directs the movie like a no-nonsense, serial-killing cousin of All the President’s Men. In the hands of the right filmmaker, such as Fincher, bureaucratic paper-pushing can actually be gripping stuff, and much of the time in this movie it is.
But Fincher’s adherence to “getting it right” can also be a dramatic drag (for the true-crime-impaired, Zodiac is based on an actual case that stymied San Francisco police in the 1970s – and to this day). At two hours and 38 minutes, the film is simply too long. If you’re going to make an audience sit through that much conversation and paperwork, you’d better deliver a decent payoff. Fincher, religiously sticking to the facts of the case, cannot do that.
Or maybe the movie’s disappointing box-office was a result of poor marketing. This is how Fincher explained it: “My philosophy is that if you market a movie to 16-year-old boys and don’t deliver Saw or Se7en, they’re going to be the most vociferous ones coming out of the screening, saying, ‘This movie sucks.’ And you’re saying goodbye to the audience who would get it, because they’re going to look at the ads and say, ‘I don’t want to see some slasher movie.’” Grade: B+
Director: David Fincher Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo, Anthony Edwards, Robert Downey, Jr., Brian Cox, John Carroll Lynch, Chloe Sevigny Release: 2007
Watch Trailers and Clips (click here)
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
I just got back from the store. While I was gone, I left on the television set. And my computer. And a number of lights. I do this kind of thing a lot. I am an American, dammit.
Of course BP is to blame for the oil spill. And yes, government regulators failed to regulate. But trashing the British seems a bit hypocritical unless we, the American consumers, get our act together and stop demanding so much oil on the cheap.
Worst of all are bonehead celebrities like Ashton Kutcher (below). Though well-meaning, stars like Kutcher jet set around the world and live in oil-guzzling mansions. And he’s upset about all of the oil drilling?
*****
I sense a Hollywood trend. Last year, Sandra Bullock won a Razzie Award for Worst Actress in All About Steve. She also won an Oscar for The Blind Side. This year, Kim Cattrall is getting hammered for starring in what some critics call the worst film of the year, Sex and the City 2. But she also stars in what I think might be the best film of the year: The Ghost Writer. Will Cattrall follow in Bullock’s footsteps?
Regardless of Cattrall’s fate this year, who among us will ever forget her memorable performance in Porky’s (below)?
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
The Killer Inside Me is certainly thought-provoking. How do you feel about violence against women on film? What are your thoughts about violence on film, in general? What is the best possible career move for actresses Kate Hudson and Jessica Alba (I’ll get to this one later)?
I haven’t read any of pulp-crime writer Jim Thompson’s books, on one of which Killer is based, but Hollywood has a long history with his works (The Grifters, The Getaway). The late, great Stanley Kubrick was a Thompson fan. I think that prior to watching director Michael Winterbottom’s new movie, some familiarity with Thompson’s world would probably be of help. As Killer unfolded, I kept asking myself: “Who are these people? What makes them tick?” I’m guessing that the answers to these questions come more easily to Thompson fans.
In the case of “hero” Lou Ford (Casey Affleck), we probably don’t want to know who he is – not who he really is. Ford is a small-town cop, a young man seemingly as amiable as his high-pitched, West Texas drawl. Everyone in town knows soft-spoken Lou; they’ve known him since his childhood. Or do they really? Do they, for example, know that in his youth Lou sexually assaulted a little girl, then let his stepbrother take the fall for it? Do the townspeople know that Lou harbors near-constant urges to act violently?
Killer is nothing if not violent – primarily violence against women. There is one scene in particular, in which Alba’s character, a prostitute, is graphically pummeled in the face, which will probably mesmerize some in the audience, and repel others. We all know that violence is part of human nature, but do we need it spelled out in such detail? Your answer to that question will probably determine how you react to this film, overall.
The performances are praiseworthy. Affleck is a study in sociopathic coolness as he vacillates between inbred Southern manners and the “sickness” within. His amoral cop listens to classical music, surrounded by shelves of books in his father’s study, while contemplating his next atrocity. Hudson and Alba are apparently on board to transition their careers from eye-candy roles to “serious actress.” In this movie, that requires both of them to bare all (well, at least their derrieres … well, at least Alba’s derriere; Hudson might have used a double) in rough-sex scenes.
My guess is that any potential controversy over the violence in this film will come to nothing. Killer isn’t mainstream enough to garner much attention outside of, possibly, the art-house circuit. Grade: B-
Director: Michael Winterbottom Cast: Casey Affleck, Kate Hudson, Jessica Alba, Ned Beatty, Elias Koteas, Tom Bower, Simon Baker, Bill Pullman, Rosa Pasquarella Release: 2010
Watch Trailers (click here)
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
by Agatha Christie
You gotta love Dame Agatha, bless her devious heart. No one was better at planting red herrings and dreaming up convoluted plots. And her little Belgian, Hercule Poirot, is one of literature’s classic characters. But Christie used one irritating device — over and over again — that never fails to bother me: mistaken identity.
A crucial character will be in disguise, or age will have altered his or her physical appearance, and other characters will be deceived by the ruse. This would be understandable if the poser was merely an acquaintance, but often this person will be well known to the duped characters — and still go unrecognized. I refuse to buy into that. Mesopotamia, alas, features just such a deception. But what the hell, Christie books are really just comic books for big kids, and in every other respect this novel is another treat from the queen of mystery.
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
In 1984, director John Carpenter was still reeling from the box-office failure of his last film, 1982’s The Thing. Carpenter believed his next project needed to be something a bit kinder and gentler. The result was Starman, a whimsical, science-fiction romantic drama (whew — that’s a lot of adjectives!) starring Jeff Bridges and Karen Allen. Watch it for free by clicking here.
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
. 
If ever there was a guilty pleasure that rewards the patient, it would be Night of the Demons (1988). Viewers who manage to endure the excruciating first 45 minutes of this low-budget flick are rewarded by a story that – finally — delivers everything you expect from a campy haunted-house movie: real scares, some wit and, oh yes, lots of gratuitous nudity.
But the trick is to make it to that halfway point. Director Kevin S. Tenney apparently realized he had a script with a long opening act with very little action, so he employed a variety of offbeat shots, angles, and stage business to enliven things. But there was no escaping a clichéd beginning: Ten kids decide to party in spooky old Hull House. They drink, tell jokes, play music, and make out. Despite Tenney’s best efforts, this half of the movie is as familiar and mind-numbing as it sounds. The acting is amateurish, the dialogue is lame, and the music is, well, 1980s. But then ….
If you are still awake at halftime, you won’t have trouble keeping your eyes open the rest of the way. Everything about Night of the Demons kicks into overdrive – the pace, the suspense, and the shocks. The movie also becomes quite funny: “I’m just warming my hands in the fire,” coos a smiling demon, raising her flaming fingers from the fireplace for a stunned onlooker’s appraisal.
Tenney wasn’t making Citizen Kane, but he did his best with a skimpy $1.2 million budget. One of the producers explains the filmmakers’ attitude on the DVD’s commentary track: “This is a crowd pleaser, it really is. It’s a fun movie. It doesn’t tax you too much … you just watch the pretty naked girls and the exploding heads and the cool shots and the funny cast and just party hearty.” That you do – if you can make it past the midpoint. Guilty Pleasure Grade: B+
Gratuitous Screencaps:
Linnea Quigley
Amelia Kinkade
Cathy Podewell
Jill Terashita
Director: Kevin S. Tenney Cast: Cathy Podewell, Alvin Alexis, William Gallo, Amelia Kinkade, Linnea Quigley, Jill Terashita Release: 1988
Watch the Trailer (click here)
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
. 
Joy Behar is growing on me. I haven’t watched her on The View, because that entails getting out of bed in the morning, but on HLN’s The Joy Behar Show she’s funny and insightful. Most refreshing: She manages to keep her ego in check. And is it possible she’s nearly 70 years old?
Bret Michaels is a great guy. In fact, he might be a saint, because he once beat a brain hemorrhage and now he has diabetes. He also once starred in a sex tape with Pamela Anderson and his tour bus was shot at. The New York Times describes him as a “well-meaning has-been.” He is a saint.
A.J. Hammer and Brooke Anderson of HLN’s Showbiz Tonight often chastise “the media.” Silly me. And here I thought that this sanctimonious, hypocritical duo was part of “the media.”
Unlikely Hero of the Week: Bud Selig for getting something right by not overturning a blown call by the umpire during Armando Galarraga’s near-perfect game. Baseball games are already too long; don’t make it worse by encouraging replays and overrules on every close play.
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
Midway through a screening of Splice at my local cinema, a man’s cell phone went off in the row behind me. The recorded message was in Homer Simpson’s voice. The man apparently had trouble turning off his phone in the dark. Normally, this kind of interruption during a film infuriates me, but not this time. No, I wanted to listen to Homer Simpson. Heck, I even thought about eavesdropping on the man’s conversation, if he’d let me. Anything, and I mean anything, to help me escape the dreary business occurring on the movie screen.
The creature in Splice, a doe-eyed lovely called “Dren” (that’s nerd spelled back— oh, never mind), was learning how to spell with Scrabble tiles. She had put together the letters T-E-D-I-O-U-S. My feelings exactly. I saw how bored the creature was, and now I wanted to chat with her and Homer Simpson. Maybe they could empathize with me: anything to stop this ridiculous story on the silver screen.
I wanted to like this movie. Really, I did. The director, Vincenzo Natali, impressed me with his 1998 feature, the clever science-fiction thriller Cube. But whereas Cube was low-budget, fresh, and unpretentious, Splice has big-budget special effects, some fairly well-known actors – and not a shred of originality. The protagonists, a scientist couple, start out bickering and never stop bickering. Nothing could make this couple happy; not a major scientific breakthrough, not their well-paying jobs, not even their movie-star looks.
Film schools teach fledgling screenwriters that conflict is necessary in drama, but nonstop, abrasive nagging isn’t conflict, it’s an Anacin commercial. I wanted this couple to die. Quickly.
The creature, given life by some mumbo-jumbo combination of DNA and cloning, was apparently a fish. And a bird. And a zombie. And a porn star. But I wanted it to go on living and killing so that everyone else in this miserable movie could die. Then I could go home and watch The Simpsons. Grade: D
Director: Vincenzo Natali Cast: Adrien Brody, Sarah Polley, Delphine Chaneac, Brandon McGibbon, Simona Maicanescu, David Hewlett Release: 2010
Watch Trailers and Clips (click here)
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
by John Ajvide Lindqvist
If Sweden has an answer to Stephen King, his name is John Ajvide Lindqvist. I’ve been a fan of the film version of Lindqvist’s book for some time, so I wanted to check out the source material. The novel is the same as the movie — yet significantly different. There are departures, primarily the gender (or lack thereof) of Eli, one half of the dynamic young protagonists. Eli’s background, and Lindqvist’s handling of it, make this novel a deeper, if not darker, experience than the film. This is at times a very disturbing story, but it is also message horror, cutting a nasty swath through suburban Swedish society circa 1981. If that sounds off-puttingly political for a book of this genre, rest assured that the gore quotient rivals anything found in King.
© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)
