This Post Does Not Ocelot of Money

Does anyone give a shit that Kourtney Kardashian is pregnant? This picture of an ocelot is more interesting.

Try to Get a Handle On It

A good exploitation film delivers exciting action scenes, interesting locations, and some nice nudity. I think Roger Corman once said something like this, though not exactly in these words. The 1977 film, “Too Hot to Handle,” offers all three. It is filmed in Manila, Philippines and looks very nice on the new Shout Factory dvd entitled, “Roger Corman’s Cult Classics Lethal Ladies Collection.” The set also includes a film I am looking forward to watching, “Firecracker,” and “TNT Jackson.”
In “Too Hot to Handle,” Cheri Cafaro, star of the “Ginger” films of the early 70’s, plays Samantha Fox, an organized and efficient assassin. She is dispatched to Manila to dispose of three people who are bad, bad, bad. The extent of their badness is not described at length in the film, however, it is enough to know that they are bad enough to warrant the talents of Samantha Fox to exterminate them. It does help that we know that the people she is hired to hit are bad people who, it turns out, also had something to do with the death of her father. Knowing that she is single-handedly dispatching of these evil folks makes Samantha even more likable than she is already. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Cheri Cafaro plays her character as an intelligent, strong, and cunning female. I am very glad that Samantha Fox was not played as a dimwit dumb blonde who needs the help of a strong man. Samantha is completely independent.
The Manila chief of police, Domingo de la Torres (Aharon Ipale), gets involved in the investigation after the first of Samantha’s hits, McKenzie Portman (John Van Dreelen) is found dead after he invites her to his home to engage in a little bit of bondage fun. Chief de la Torres is quickly able to determine the Portman’s assassin was female. His reasoning does make sense, even though it might seem unlikely to do so. I liked that the character of Chief de la Torres is played as an intelligent investigator. Both Samantha Fox and Chief de la Torres use each other for sex along the way, however, it is clearly a mutual relationship. Samantha is a strong woman and would not allow him to mistreat her.
Samantha’s second hit, Justin Stockwell (Jordan Rosengarten),one of the biggest douchebag assholes the screen has ever seen, is disposed of in a particularly interesting and cunning fashion. One of the highlights of this film, which may easily be overlooked, is the great makeup job on Cheri Cafaro in this scene. I liked that the third of Samantha’s hits is a woman, meaning the film avoids a simplistic male vs. female storyline.
The music in the film is comprised of a great, groovy score, however, the song heard during the film’s main sex scene is pretty bad. The song is called, “Lady Samantha.” It will make you cringe. As I mentioned, though, the score throughout most of the film is great, especially during the last five minutes of the film. Great stuff it is!
“Too Hot to Handle” feels like an R-rated episode of “Hawaii Five-O”—the old version, of course. That is a very good thing. Scenes take their time to play out and the progression of scenes is well structured and well paced. Of course, it is not award winning material, but it does quite well what it intends to do---entertain. Cheri Cafaro is naked a lot, bad guys and a gal get whacked, lots of cool shots of Manila are shown, and asses get kicked. Put on your oven mitts because Cheri Cafaro is definitely too hot to handle!

Everyone's a Winner with Hesher

I wish I had a cool guitar riff play after I say something. There is a scene at the beginning of “Hesher” in which Hesher (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) says something to T.J. Forney (Devin Brochu) and after Hesher has spoken, a nice guitar riff is heard. That occurs in the first five minutes of Spencer Susser’s film about a boy of about 14 years who is, in a strange way, befriended by a long-haired stoner guy whose name turns out to be Hesher. We do not know a whole lot about Hesher, and throughout the course of the film, we never learn much of anything about him. That is ok with me because it works. Hesher moves into the house of T.J. and his father, Paul, (Rainn Wilson) without permission. Paul does not put up any resistance. Paul and his son are recovering from the recent loss of his wife and T.J’s mother. Hesher’s presence in their lives acts as a strangely interesting antidote for their issues. Add to this, T.J’s crush on a grocery store cashier named Nicole (Natalie Portman). Though she does not necessarily act as any kind guiding light in T.J’s life, she does add an additional bit of charm to the film.
“Hesher” is one of those cool films in which things just happen randomly, exactly like the narrative structure of most of what I write. In the case of “Hesher,” there appears to be some rationale to the random events that occur. Hesher, though uncouth, vulgar, and of questionable odor, proves to be the person, or maybe the force that T.J. and his father need to fully recover from their loss. Grief counseling sessions do not seem to help a great deal. T.J. is constantly bullied by Dustin (Brendan Hill) a young man who almost reaches the level of vulgarity of which Hesher is quite the master. Hesher eventually helps T.J. get back at Dustin in an unconventional, though fulfulling way. Thankfully, this event is not treated as family film fodder as T.J. is not as happy with Hesher’s handiwork as Hesher is. The structure of “Hesher” is like a series of vignettes which are linear and serve to document the process through which T.J. and his father are able to deal with and accept the situation in which their lives exist. One may debate whether or not Hesher is supposed to be a representation of Christ, a foul-mouthed Christ, but who serves the same purpose---the purpose of guidance through trying times in one’s life. Of course, Hesher may also be just some random guy who shows up in their lives and distracts them from their grief for a while. Who Hesher is is never stated, and I liked that. His purpose in the lives of T.J. and his father, however, is clear.
I liked the film quite a bit with only a few exceptions. About an hour in, something happens in the film which is a bit of a movie cliché. Wow, Microsoft Word just automatically added the tilde over the “e” in cliché! It did it again! I was going to just leave it as is. Sometimes stuff like that just happens…..
Anyway, something happens midway through “Hesher” which is cliché. I wish it had not happened, solely because what happened was a cliché. As well, the ending, though fulfilling, is comprised of a bit too much “end of movie speech-ness.” Those who have seen a lot of movies will likely know what I mean by this. Basically, at the end of the film, one of the main characters shows up to make a speech telling us what the point of the film is and how we should feel. I only say this as a way of defining “end of movie speech-ness.” In “Hesher,” we get this, however, it is not inflicted with this malady too badly and as I mentioned, the overall result of the final twenty minutes of the film is very effective and well done.
All of the performances in “Hesher” are great, especially Levitt, Wilson, Brochu, and Piper Laurie as T.J’s grandmother. “Hesher” is a vulgar feel-good movie. I did not expect to “feel good” at the film’s conclusion, however, the message that director Susser conveys is clear.
I enjoyed the ditty Hesher tells T.J. and Nicole in his van about the four women with whom he once shared……an experience. See this film and you will enjoy this tale as well. Remember, everyone’s a winner.

How Are They Gonna Steal an Entire Building? It Appears to Be Quite Heavy and Unable to Fit in My Pocket.

First of all, I hope you enjoy the picture of the otter showing us her baby. I thought a picture of a tall building would be a bit dull. Anyway, I was looking forward to seeing “Tower Heist,” however, I did not expect to be bowled over by it’s genius or complex storytelling. I was correct in my assumption. “Tower Heist” is a good, pleasant film. What propels the film is the performances of four actors: Ben Stiller, Eddie Murphy, Matthew Broderick, and Alan Alda. All four deliver very good performances. Without these fine actors’ performances, “Tower Heist” could have been very mediocre. The story is nothing new. Disgruntled employees plan a way to get back at their unscrupulous boss. In this case, the unscrupulousness of the boss, Arthur Shaw (Alda), is more than calling his employees names or making them work long hours. Shaw has embezzled his employees’ money in something similar to a Ponzi scheme. Josh Kovacs (Stiller), Shaw’s trusted assistant and manager of Shaw’s apartment building in New York City, cannot believe, at first that Shaw would have done such things. Upon learning that, indeed, Shaw is a malicious son of a bitch, Kovacs assembles a team of former Shaw employees to infiltrate the inner-workings of Shaw’s building so as to steal back their money. Along the way, Kovacs enlists the help of Slide (Murphy). Slide is a petty criminal who is bailed out of jail by Kovacs. Slide is to be the experienced theft expert of the team, however, his expertise is discovered to be limited to small-time thefts and not massive heists. That’s ok, though, because Kovacs’ team is good enough as it is to, through various machinations of scriptwriting, perform a massive undertaking which, as you will see if you watch this film, is quite ridiculous, however, since a majority of the performers in the film do a great job, I found myself not minding the fact that what the team ends up doing is quite impossible, at least in the non-movie world.
Eddie Murphy stands out as Slide. His dialogue is the vulgar and funny variety we remember from his roles in "48 Hours" and "Beverly Hills Cop." Thankfully for us all, he does not wear a fat suit or dress as a woman in this film. He says lots of dirty words and is crass. This is great news! Murphy is given a chance to be funny in “Tower Heist” and he succeeds. It was wonderful to see Ben Stiller in a role in which he is not humiliated 30 times during the course of the film. Stiller is an outstanding comedic actor as can be witnessed in “Flirting With Disaster” and “Greenberg.” Though he is not given any over the top dialogue as is Murphy, Stiller does deliver his understated, funny lines with the ease and grace one would expect from a standout Stiller performance. Alan Alda is fantastic as the bastard, Arthur Shaw. It is always great to see Alan Alda in a film and such is the case in “Tower Heist.” Alda is fully capable of playing mean and slimy—and it is even more effective to use Alda in such a role because most know his characters to be easygoing. Of course, if you remember his role of Hawkeye on MASH, it is clear that his ability to deliver sarcasm and his ability to perform on a dramatic level are on display. In “Whispers in the Dark,” Alda surprises us with quite a scene of insane bravura that I will always remember. That film is not very good, however, as he does in most films in which he appears, Alda stood out.
Matthew Broderick, always a reliable performer, delvers a very good performance as a down on his luck stockbroker who is threatened with eviction from his luxury apartment in the Shaw building. His role in the heist is as the one who can fully point out just how much money Shaw has stolen. Broderick, as he did in “Election,” delivers his lines with fantastic comic nervousness. Gabourey Sidibe, who gained notoriety from her performance in “Precious” is the only source of complaint I have about “Tower Heist.” She did not seem to fit in with the rest of the heist team. Her appearance in the film seemed more like stunt casting. I never bought her performance as a Jamaican safecracker,mon.
I feel compelled to point out that I was very happy to find that there were few car crashes, explosions, shootouts, or other assorted and unnecessary action movie cliches in "Tower Heist." There is a brief car chase scene, but, as I stated, it thankfully does not take long to resolve.
I will not reveal how the plan the team of heisters has in store for the evil Arthur Shaw develops, however, as I alluded to, it is quite ridiculous. Regardless of the ridiculousness of the plan, the cast of “Tower Heist” is engaging enough to allow me to not be distracted by said plan. “Tower Heist” does not reach the top story of flim genius, however it does climb a few floors above the midway point of the filmmaking edifice.

What Do Green Erasers Tell Us About Ourselves and Further, What Do We Tell Ourselves About Green Erasers?

The opening theme heard in Aldo Lado’s “The Humanoid” is very nice. The score, written by Ennio Morricone, is unique and only once sounds like an already known piece of music. There is one bit of orchestration that sounds like Beethoven’s Ode to Joy. I will let that pass, as I do not know if it is an intentional nod to that piece of music or not.
First of all, up front I will acknowledge that “The Humanoid” is an intentional rip-off of “Star Wars.” Released in 1979, it does not try to hide it’s knock-off status in any way. The villain looks like Darth Vader---actually, the villain looks more like Rick Moranis’ character, Dark Helmet, in “Spaceballs.” In “The Humanoid,” we can see the villain’s face as he wears what looks like an oversized hardhat with a hint of a mask covering his face, but not so much that we cannot see the actor. I wonder if Mel Brooks ever saw “The Humanoid” and thought that this look would suit Dark Helmet in his 1987 film. We do know that Mel Brooks is extra cool simply for the fact that he produced David Lynch’s first studio film, “The Elephant Man” in 1980. Brooks must have seen Lynch’s genius in “Eraserhead,” and took from that picture the fact that Lynch was an outstanding filmmaker.
Richard Kiel plays the humanoid in question in “The Humanoid.” Kiel is best known as Jaws from two James Bond films, “The Spy Who Loved Me” and “Moonraker.” Kiel is 7 feet, 2 inches tall, however his height is only mentioned one time in the film and it is not exploited for humorous effect at any point in the film, which is refreshing. Tall vs. short humor rarely works and is quite a tired form of humor. One fun thing about “The Humanoid” is the fact that Richard Kiel’s character, Golob, speaks in his normal voice for the first 15 minutes of the film. He is also bearded. The reason why Golob ceases speech after 15 minutes is because Lord Graal (the guy dressed a bit like Darth Vader) wants to create a race of humanoids to perform various bits of malfeasance upon the world. Graal enlists the assistance of Dr. Kraspin (Arthur Kennedy) to create a rocket which, when coming into contact with a normal human, will transform said human into a robotic, speechless being, or humanoid. Richard Kiel does not give the greatest performance during the first 15 minutes. His delivery is not very good and he is very unnatural. Despite this, I could not help but like his character and his robot dog pal who travels with him in his spaceship before he is shot down by the evil Graal and soon thereafter lands in a body of water which not only turns Golob into a “humanoid,” but always provides Golob with a nice shave in the process.
Barbara Bach is also in this film! She is always a welcome addition to any film. Her beauty in this film, however, is somewhat masked by the two costumes she wears in the film. During the first half of the film her hair looks like that puffy stuff that the hood of a winter coat is made out of. It looks like a very big version of that puffy stuff. It almost looks like she is wearing a large hood, but it turns out it is her hair. She looks like she is wearing an eagle around her head. This is not the best look for her, but she is still hot. In the second half of the film, she wears what looks like a bicycle helmet. The decision of the makers of The Humanoid to not allow Barbara Bach’s gorgeous hair to appear in a natural style for 1979, knocks the star rating of this film down by one full star. It may be of some interest that Barbara Bach was the “Bond Girl” in “The Spy Who Loved Me,” the first Bond film in which Richard Kiel (Golob) appeared. Maybe you don’t care about such things. I do. If you do not, so be it.
Once the plot is established about an evil lord in space enlisting the aid of an equally mad doctor so as to create “humanoids” for nefarious purposes, the film weaves a fairly entertaining tale of the humanoid and his companions, Barbara Gibson (Corrine Clery) and a young Asian boy named Tom Tom (yeah, I know…), whose relationship to Barbara is not established, or if it was I was not paying attention as I may have been too distracted by Barbara Bach’s hair, in attempting to thwart the plans of the evil twosome. As Netflix might say, “If you liked ‘Star Crash,’ you may like ‘The Humanoid!’” If Netflix and it’s rating system made this statement, I would be in agreement. I liked “Star Crash.” I liked “The Humanoid.” “Star Crash” is better, or one might say, it is stranger and goofier, which, in turn, makes it better, meaning more fun to watch, than “The Humanoid.” Should you ever find it or get a chance to see it, let Barbara Bach’s hair wash over you as you enjoy “The Humanoid.” I know that as long as there is corn in the fields and lead in the pencil, I will never allow the memory of "The Humanoid" to be erased from my mind. And that's One to Grow On!

Noodles On Film: Case File #1--"With Friends Like These"

There are many reasons to like Canada. I enjoy the accent of the Canadian. Oftentimes, Canadians are quite pleasant. William Shatner is Canadian as is Michael J. Fox. None of these facts are new to anybody, though. I watched a 1990 Canadian horror anthology film that I purchased at a Half Price Books Warehouse sale just five days ago. The name of this film is “With Friends Like These.” This anthology film is comprised of three stories. It is always a good idea in an anthology film to save the best story for last, as was the case in “Creepshow.”
I have seen several horror anthology films in my illustrious lifetime including Creepshow, Creepshow 2, Nightmares, and Tales From the Darkside: the Movie. “With Friends Like These” ranks a bit below these four films, but that does not make it a drag to watch. It feels like either an above-average student film, or a made for tv, or perhaps, made for cable film. I doubt it had much of a theatrical release. It was filmed in and around Montreal, a city I very much enjoyed back in 1996.
The first tale is the weakest. It is about a man who purchases a fancy car with money from his and his fiancee’s bank account. She allows him to use $1500, but he spends $5000 of it, almost draining their savings. The car talks. Unfortunately, it does not have the awesome voice of William Daniels. That is all I will say about this one.
The second story is the best one. This one is about a man who lives in a very dirty apartment. He does not keep his kitchen, or any other part of his apartment clean. He is a slob. In his refrigerator, we see a disgusting, moldy mess of old, spilled food, or what looks like it used to be food. After the introduction of the character and his circumstances, there is a scene in which the man opens up his refrigerator door and there is some kind of creature living inside of it. This creature is composed of only a torso and a head. The torso talks. It has a decent voice, but again, he is no William Daniels. I believe the creature in the refrigerator is played by Russell Yvan. His name is given in the credits as “Creature.” This is the only creature in the film, so I am going with that. The concept of this second story is very interesting—a man’s fridge is so moldy and gross that all of the yucky stuff inside it turns into said mold creature. The creature and the man become pals and the creature gives the man dating advice. I think, all men, at some point need a moldy, green torso living in their refrigerator to give them dating advice. It just makes good sense. The mold creature depends on the coldness of the fridge to survive so when the power goes out in the man’s apartment, the man has to run out to the store to buy ice to keep the creature alive. Chaos does not ensue, thankfully, as this is a fairly straight-forward entry in the triad of tales within this film. Other things happen in this tale, however, I will not provide spoilers just in case any readers of this collection of letters and words happens to be fortunate enough, as I was, to find a vhs copy of this film.
The third story in this triumvirate is fairly decent, though nothing about it is surprising. It is apparent that the filmmakers thought they were delivering a surprising twist ending, however, they slip in a few insert shots too many which spoil the surprise. This tale is about a woman who uses the services of a dating agency to find the perfect man for her. It is cool to see some early 90’s technology in action, such as those old, light brown, clunky desktop computers all businesses had back then. It may have been more interesting to watch a documentary about twenty year old technology, however, we see, instead this tale of the woman who is matched up with what the dating services' computers determine is her perfect man. The savvy reader of this fine review will likely figure out the big twist in this story shortly after the “perfect man” is introduced. The performance of Christopher McCabe as the “perfect man” is good as is the performance of Nathalie Gauthier as the woman searching for her ideal mate. Of the three stories in this anthology, this one relies most on the surprise ending element, however, it is the least surprising. The performances of the leads, however, make it better than it might have been.
The most annoying part of “With Friends Like These” is the horrible in-between stories narration that Norman Fell, tv’s Mr. Roper from Three’s Company was given to read. It is not his fault. The lines he reads as we see various people getting onto and off of a city bus are very bad. The word “relationship” is said, I guarantee, over twenty times during these in between stories connecting scenes. I think the point of the narration is that you never know what you are really getting into when you enter into any given friendship or “relationship” with somebody. The problem is that this point is made using the same words, just rearranged four different times throughout the film, in between the stories. Even though it is always pleasing to hear to sound of Norman Fell’s voice, he is also no William Daniels.
So, why should anyone seek out this film? Just for fun, I suppose. If you are curious about low-budget horror anthology films from the early 90’s, this is just the film for you. I am glad I found it at Half Price Books and am proud to include it in my obscure vhs tape collection. The tape is orange! I think it is my first orange tape! I would love to know more about this film, however, there is very little information about it online. This is one of those movies in which it would be fun to listen to the director or some of the actors involved talk about it on a commentary track. Well, I feel that way about most low-budget films from 1970-1990, but because of the fact that this one is more obscure than normal, my zeal to learn more about it is of greater intensity. Wow! Greater intensity! Indeed.
It would be way too easy to dismiss “With Friends Like These” as a cheap, low-budget film with terrible acting. The acting in this film is pretty good, considering the fact that many of the actors in this film do not appear to have had much film experience. Perhaps they were stage actors in Canada. It is definitely a low-budget project, but for being such, it does provide 81 minutes of entertainment. With movies like these…there will always be something new and interesting to discover.

The Clooney and Harris Lists

People are always comparing me to George Clooney, you know-- my looks, (insert Don Knotts-like sniff here), charm, suaveness (insert one more Don Knotts-like sniff here). For this reason, I choose to follow his lead and create my own list of my 100 favorite movies. His list is comprised of his top 100 films from 1964-1976. He calls this the “the greatest era in filmmaking by far.” I agree with this statement. I, however, unlike Mr. Clooney, do not choose to limit my choices to selections from a specific time frame. I have chosen to open my list to all years in which films were being made. For those interested, here is Clooney’s list: www.parade.com/celebrity/slideshows/editors-pick/george-clooney-top-100-movies.html.
I will divide my list into two groups of fifty, beginning with this here post and ending in a future post which is upcoming soon and which will be posted sometime in the future, which will occur later. These are in no particular order, just like my thought process:
1. Sideways (2004)
2. Slingblade (1998)
3. Magnolia (1999)
4. The Exorcist (1973)
5. Halloween (1978)
6. Beyond the Door (1974)
7. The Visitor (2008)
8. The Visitor (1978)
9. All the President’s Men (1976)
10. Fargo (1995)
11. Oleanna (1994)
12. Glengarry Glen Ross (1992)
13. Eraserhead (1977)
14. 1776 (1972)
15. Grease (1978)
16. Annie Hall (1977)
17. Leaving Las Vegas (1994)
18. The Music of Chance (1993)
19. Sleeper (1973)
20. White Dog (1982)
21. War Games (1982)
22. No Country For Old Men (2008)
23. Stroszek (1977)
24. My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done (2009)
25. Roger and Me (1989)
26. Fitzcarraldo (1982)
27. Burden of Dreams (1983)
28. Barry Lyndon (1975)
29. Anguish (1986)
30. Breaking Point (1975-Bo Arne Vibenius)
31. King of Kong (2005)
32. The Passenger (1975)
33. Grindhouse
34. Inglorious Basterds (2008)
35. Pulp Fiction (1994)
36. Superman (1978)
37. Misery (1990)
38. Carnival Magic (1981)
39. Halloween 3---yes, that one (1983)
40. Blade Runner (1982)
41. Alien (1979)
42. Scanners (1980)
43. Akeelah and the Bee (2002)
44. Star Trek 2 (1982)
45. Star Trek 4 (1986)
46. The Room---this is a special film (2003)
47. Die Hard (1988)
48. E.T. (1982)
49. Schindler’s List (1993)
50. Anatomy of a Murder (1959)