THE DARK TOWER (2017) ***

I was a huge Stephen King fan growing up.  His novels instilled in me a love of reading that I still have to this day.  I pretty much stopped reading his books a decade or so ago, but that doesn’t stop me for seeing the new movies based on his work.  (Hell, I even liked Cell.)  The Dark Tower series, while not my favorites, have always been ripe with possibilities for a big screen adaptation.  The surprising thing is that this isn’t an adaptation.  It’s more of an extension/continuation of the novels, which to me is a much more interesting and unique approach.  Although the word of mouth was toxic, The Dark Tower has some cool stuff in it, features a couple of solid performances, and is a great deal of fun.   

He who thought this was bad has forgotten the face of his father.  

Now most King movies take a seven-page story and stretch it out to 90 minutes.  This one takes a seven-book series and puts it into 90 minutes.  Again, this isn’t a straight-up adaptation, but some of the stuff that happens will be familiar to King readers.   

I think people went into this one with a very clear idea of what a Dark Tower film should be.  You can’t review a movie that only exists in your head.  You can only react to what your eyes and ears give you.  While The Dark Tower itself isn’t perfect, the Stephen King fan in me was quite entertained. 

Matthew McConaughey radiates a quiet intensity as The Man in Black.  His steely gaze and nonchalant malevolence is a nice fit for the character.  If a big screen adaptation of The Stand ever happens, I hope he gets to play Flagg.   

Idris Elba also does a fine job as Roland the Gunslinger.  There’s one scene at a dinner table where he gives a speech that sort of nails who Roland is.  The world has moved on, and so has he.  Now all he has his quest for revenge.  However, his relationship with Jake (Tom Taylor) could be the thing that redeems him. 

Speaking of Jake, a lot of people seem to have a problem with him being the main character.  I actually thought it was a neat idea.  He mainly serves as the audience’s surrogate as he’s being introduced to this strange new world right along with you.  Some fans have balked at that, but it’s done rather well.  It’s hard to establish an entire mythology that consumed seven books in a 90-minute running time, so yes, some shortcuts have been made. 

I’m not going to lie, parts of the narrative feel rushed and some of the plot devices are a little clunky and/or too convenient.  Unlike most King works, there’s no filler and it has a definitive ending, so there's that.  Sure, some of the effects may look like they came out of a SYFY mini-series, but overall, The Dark Tower works.   

I can’t say this is a home run, but there were parts of it that crackled.  The end, where the Gunslinger makes his final stand while reciting the Gunslinger Oath was some powerful stuff.  I also enjoyed the nods to other King works that suggest there’s a bigger world at play here.  Whether the filmmakers ever get to explore that world remains to be seen.  All I know is that this is a solid King flick and I for one hope we get to see more of the universe soon.

THE ROOM (2003) ****

I’ve heard so much about Tommy Wiseau’s The Room over the years, but I never really had any desire to watch it.  With all the buzz that The Disaster Artist has been getting, I figured I might as well check it out to see what the fuss is all about.  As a die-hard fan of So Bad It’s Good movies, I had my doubts that this could actually live up to the hype.  Well, I finally get it now.  The Room richly deserves its cult classic status.  If The Disaster Artist is being hailed as the new Ed Wood, then The Room is definitely this generation’s Plan 9 from Outer Space. 

Part Skinamax movie, part bad off-Broadway play (make that high school play), part ego-stroking vanity piece for its director/star, The Room is a wonderfully inept, misguided, and yet strangely heartfelt experience.  Like Ed Wood before him, Wiseau clearly has a vision.  Like Ed Wood, his shortcomings as a director actually enhance the overall experience. 

I just re-read that paragraph and I saw that I called The Room an “experience” not once, but twice.  That’s fairly accurate.  This isn’t necessarily a movie per se, this is a glimpse into the mind of a one-of-a-kind visionary. 

What I love is the way that just about everyone in the movie, with the obvious exception of his cheating girlfriend, treats Wiseau’s character like gold.  Everyone from his barista to a flower shop worker compliments him and/or comments what a great guy he is.  He stacks the deck in his character’s favor in such a childishly positive way that it becomes quite endearing. 

Speaking of endearing, I can’t tell you how funny it is to see four guys in tuxedoes tossing a football around.  Forget that the odds of actually seeing this take place is astronomical.  The unbridled joy in which Wiseau films it is a sight to behold. 

Wiseau acting is another sight to behold.  Never mind the fact that it’s almost impossible to interpret what he’s saying because of his thick accent.  When his excessive emotional acting jags take off, it’s like a rollercoaster of amateurish bravado.  The fact that he gives himself several gratuitous nude and/or love scenes (five inside of the first half-hour) is amazing in and of itself.  In more competent hands, this would’ve come off as narcissistic.  In Wiseau’s hands, it’s a work of goddamned bad movie genius. 

Yes, The Room is a bad movie.  However, like the “best” bad movies, it wears its heart on its sleeve.  Like Ed Wood before him, Wiseau is sincere about his subject matter and his sincerity is as entertaining as his ineptitude.    

THE EMOJI MOVIE (2017) **

Did you know that the Emojis that live in your phone have to go around making that same stupid face they’re known for all the time?  It’s true.  One Emoji, Meh (T.J. Miller) bucks the trend and tries to show the world a range of emotions.  However, when he makes the wrong face in the text window of the phone, it causes his user to think the phone is broken.  He then goes to get the phone erased and Meh and his friend Hi-5 (James Corden) have to try to upload themselves to “The Cloud” before they are deleted for good. 

As far as movies based on smiley faces go, The Emoji Movie isn’t as bad as it could’ve been.  It takes a barely-there premise and serves up a couple of laugh-out-loud moments along the way.  I admit that some parts were cleverer than I expected.  Then again, my expectations were already pretty low to begin with.  In Emoji speak, it’s more “meh” than “poop”, but there’s not a lot of “heart”. 

Then again, it’s hard to completely hate any movie in which the always awesome Steven Wright is perfectly cast as Meh’s father.  I also got a kick out of seeing Patrick Stewart playing “Poop”.  Too bad they didn’t give him any “Number One” jokes. 

It’s Hi-5 though who gets the best line when he says, “This is like that time Peace Sign only gave me one finger!”

ANDROID COP (2014) **

Michael Jai White stars as a badass cop who is saddled with a partly robotic partner.  As in any Buddy Cop Movie, they don’t get along.  The robot cop does things by the book (mostly because of his programming) while White refuses to play by the rules.  When an assignment takes them into a desolate wasteland, they soon come to realize that they are being set up to walk right into a trap.  They then must work together as a team in order to survive. 

Android Cop is, obviously, The Asylum’s riff on the (now, mostly forgotten) Robocop remake.  As with that movie, the robot cop wears a cheesy faceplate that looks dorky.  The difference is that the focus is mostly on White as he is forced to put up with, and eventually rely on his odd new partner.  In that respect, it’s more like Alien Nation, but with robots.  (The film manages to steal bits from Escape from New York and Judge Dredd along the way.)   

While it’s nice seeing the ever-athletic White in a starring role, the filmmakers don’t make the best use of his talents.  He gets a few opportunities to show off his considerable Kung Fu skills, but unfortunately, the action is poorly framed and edited.  Probably aware that his talent is going to waste, White sometimes seems like he’s sleepwalking through some scenes.  Or maybe he was just on auto(maton)pilot.  Co-stars Kadeem Hardison and Charles S. Dutton (who looks like he filmed his scenes in a single day) are likewise limited thanks to their flimsily-written characters. 

Android Cop is also plagued with inconsistent continuity, ragged editing, shoddy effects, and inept production values.  I know this is an Asylum movie we’re talking about here, but even the Sharknado series has some semblance of basic competence.  I will say that it does have a decent plot twist in the third act; if you make it that far. 

As bad as most of the movie is, there was at least one scene that was legitimately funny.  It comes early on when White is negotiating with some terrorists.  They conclude their list of outlandish demands with a case of Mexican Coke.  This causes White to do a double-take and say, “Mexican Coke?  The kind with the real sugar?  I can’t do that!”  Since Mexican Coke is one of my few weaknesses, that scene alone was enough to earn the flick at least an extra Half Star from me. 

AKA:  Robotic Cop.

THE BOYS FROM BRAZIL (1978) ****

I kind of avoided The Boys from Brazil after all these years because the whole thing sounded cheesy.  Based on what I’d heard, I was picturing They Saved Hitler’s Brain, but with Oscar-winning actors.  That really isn’t too far off the mark, but that’s kind of what makes it so awesome.  I mean, The Boys from Brazil showed me sights I’d never thought I’d ever see in a movie, including: 

1.     The greatest actor of his generation, Sir Laurence Olivier avenging the death of the star of Police Academy, Steve Guttenberg. 

2.     Gregory Peck, who played the symbol of heroism and righteousness, Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird, playing the evil Nazi Dr. Josef Mengele performing despicable medical experiments on children.  

3.     Peck, giving a monologue about being in “a godforsaken place” that is basically plagiarized entirely from Ed Wood’s Bride of the Monster.    

Directed by Franklin J. (Planet of the Apes) Schaffner and based on the novel by Ira Levin, The Boys from Brazil is a hoot from start to finish.  It opens with a suspenseful extended sequence in which Steve Guttenberg goes hot on the trail of Nazis in Paraguay.  When the Nazis find him and murder him, it’s then up to Olivier to pick up where he left off.  He eventually uncovers an elaborate assassination plot involving dozens of seemingly unrelated targets.  Sir Larry O. does some more digging and learns the truth is crazier than he could’ve ever imagined. 

You know, whenever I saw the title of this movie, I always assumed “The Boys” was code for Nazis.  You know, like Hitler and the Boys are up to no good in Brazil.  Turns out, it’s a lot funnier than that.  The “Boys” are actually (SPOILER) HITLER CLONES (!!!) that are spread out all over the world.  While it sounds farfetched (and believe me, it is), the dead seriousness of which the material is handled makes it work on both levels.  Yes, the premise is ridiculous, but somehow, Schaffner and company pull it off.  I mean, the whole idea is so absurd that only a guy like Olivier could make you care about it.  

If you think about it though, this is the next logical step from a baby Antichrist.  The idea of an army of teenage Hitler clones, while absurd, is pretty scary.  Because of that, the film would work well as a double feature to either Rosemary’s Baby (which was also written by Levin) or The Omen (which also starred Peck). 

Speaking of Peck, he is great cast against type as the repulsive Mengele.  He chews scenery, but is never hammy and always remains imposing and intimidating.  Olivier, who memorably played a Nazi himself in Marathon Man, is just as much fun to watch here playing the other side of the coin as the frail, but crafty Nazi hunter. 

It’s the Hitler Clone Kid who gets the best line of the movie though when he calls Peck a “Freaked-out maniac!”

HOT ROD GANG (1958) **

After a series of circumstances too contrived to get into now, hot rodder John Ashley must disguise himself as a bearded rock n’ roller.  He then must keep his double life a secret from his family all the while using his newfound anonymity to perform at a fundraiser.  Things threaten to go off the rails once his rival frames him for a series of hot rod robberies. 

I like John Ashley as much as the next guy, but it’s hard to take him seriously as a rocker (in and out of the beard).  He sings a bunch of numbers in this movie and none of them make much of an impression.  At least Gene Vincent is around to provide a handful of decent songs.  Unfortunately, he doesn’t get nearly as much screen time as Ashley does. 

Hot Rod Gang feels like one of those types of American International films that started life as a cool title and/or poster and then once the company sold the rights to it, they were forced to make a movie around it.  (The whole “gang” subplot takes a backseat to the musical numbers fairly quickly.)  It also doesn’t help that the flick lacks the piss and vinegar that is the hallmark of the best AIP juvenile delinquent/rock musicals.  It's not bad or anything; it's just far too vanilla and lightweight to really stick with you.  It also doesn’t help that the situations Ashley gets himself into aren’t very funny and wouldn’t have even cut it for a lazy sitcom.  

AKA:  Fury Unleashed.

VALERIAN AND THE CITY OF A THOUSAND PLANETS (2017) *** ½

Luc Besson’s latest eye-popping science fiction bonanza begins on a note rarely touched upon in recent genre offerings:  Hope.  During the opening credits, set to David Bowie’s “Space Oddity”, we get to see Earth’s early days of space exploration give way to a growing space station that eventually befriends and aligns itself with other distant planets.  It’s a simple yet effective scene that shows us a vision of the future that is positive and even a bit moving. 

After that sequence, the film settles into a more familiar, bombastic blockbuster type of rhythm.  We then follow the roughish space cop Valerian (Dane DeHaan) and his sexy partner Laureline (Cara Delevingne) as they try to protect an alien critter whose very existence is proof of an elaborate military cover-up.  From then on, the movie becomes a series of elaborate, sometimes mind-boggling set pieces, but if it wasn’t for the thoughtful opening scene, the fate of the whole universe wouldn’t nearly be as meaningful.

DeHaan gives a cool performance as he has a Keanu Reeves type of swagger.  With his surfer dude accent and perfect hair, he’s a bit of a pretty boy, but he’s always a bit more capable than you'd expect.  He has a lot of chemistry with Delevingne, who is nothing short of a stone-cold fox in this.  She’s also a game trooper and badass action heroine to boot.  

It’s Besson’s dazzling visuals that are the real star though.  There’s a sequence that takes place in a virtual marketplace that is dizzying since it takes place in multiple planes of reality, often at the same time.  Think a virtual reality version of Amazon.com on Tatooine with a bit of Blade Runner thrown in for good measure.   

While some sequences are blissfully joyous, others are a bit plodding.  It’s definitely a step down from The Fifth Element (it’s more like The Fourth Element), but if you can’t love a movie that requires its heroine to stick her head up an alien jellyfish's ass to project her ESP, there’s probably no hope for you.  I know it’s not perfect or anything, but it’s hard for me to hate any film that features Ethan Hawke as a space pimp, Rihanna as a shapeshifting stripper, and Herbie Hancock as the Minister of Space Defense.