THOR: RAGNAROK (2017) ****

Thor:  Ragnarok is set in the Iron Man 3 mold.  A fresh and energetic director (in this case, What We Do in the Shadows’ Taika Waititi) comes in and gives a potentially tired superhero a makeover.  Like what Shane Black did for Tony Stark in Iron Man 3, Waititi and his screenwriters see what Thor is made of by taking away everything that makes him Thor. His father Odin (Anthony Hopkins) passes away.  An evil villainess (Cate Blanchett) destroys his hammer and murders his friends.  Heck, he even loses his trademark golden locks when he is made to fight in a gladiatorial bout.  One holdover from the other Marvel films is the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo).  Even then, he’s a mindless pit fighter whom Thor must beat the snot out of in order to make him come to his senses.   

Facing the eventual destruction of his home world of Asgard, Thor and Hulk must find a way off the planet ruled by The Grandmaster (a hilarious Jeff Goldblum).  They turn to a ramshackle team of oddballs and misfits including a drunkard Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson) and a blue rock man (Waititi) to make their escape.  Naturally, Thor’s trickster brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston) enters the fray.  Surely, he can be trusted this time, right? 

Waititi was a great choice to direct.  This isn’t a case of an indie director being given a giant blockbuster and being turned into a corporate Yes Man.  His unique sensibilities are firmly intact and as a result, Waititi has made the funniest Marvel movie to date.  Sure, we knew he can do comedy, but the big surprise is that he handles the action sequences with the knack of a gifted action director.  The opening sequence where the camera follows Thor’s hammer as it decimates a horde of CGI monsters is one of the best action scenes in a Marvel flick to date and the finale is a real showstopper too. 

Waititi even manages to steal the movie as the hulking, but soft-spoken alien sidekick.  In fact, all the new players are full of energy and help revitalize the franchise.  The villains in particular are a hoot.  Blanchett has never been hotter and it’s a treat to see her chewing the scenery with relish.  Goldblum looks like he’s having the time of his life playing the devious Grandmaster and Karl Urban gets a nice little character arc as a guard who is swayed by Blanchett’s power.  Also, be on the lookout for the members of Loki’s acting troupe.  They provide some of the biggest laughs in the film. 

Ragnarok is most importantly a testament to Hemsworth’s charisma.  He showed he’s a gifted comedian in the Vacation and Ghostbusters remakes, but he really comes into his own as a leading man here.  He also generates more sparks with Thompson than he ever did in two movies with Natalie Portman. 

Hemsworth plays the comedic material naturally.  It’s not like, “Oh look, Thor’s suddenly a comedian”; it’s a natural organic progression of his character.  In the first film, he was a headstrong youth ready to claim his throne.  Now, many sequels and team-ups later, he’s to the point where nothing fazes him, even a thousand-foot-tall lava beast.  He’s gone from hammer-wielding braggart to nonplussed wisecracking observer.  Whereas most of the characters in the other Marvel films seem to stay stagnant, Thor has shown he gets better with age. 

Another brilliant stroke was getting Mark Mothersbaugh to do the score.  It’s got a funky ‘80s flavor that is perfectly in tune with Waititi’s colorful throwback aesthetic.  Seriously, can we just get Mothersbaugh to provide the music for all the Marvel films for now on?    

Marvel Cinematic Universe Scorecard: 

Avengers:  Age of Ultron:  ****

The Incredible Hulk:  ****

Iron Man:  ****

Thor:  Ragnarok:  ****

Spider-Man:  Homecoming:  ****

Iron Man 3:  ****

Captain America:  Civil War:  *** ½

Ant-Man:  *** ½

Guardians of the Galaxy:  *** ½

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2:  *** ½

The Avengers:  ***

Captain America:  The First Avenger:  ***

Captain America:  The Winter Soldier:  ***

Thor:  ***

Thor:  The Dark World:  ***

Iron Man 2:  ***

Doctor Strange:  ** ½  

2017 Comic Book Movie Scorecard:

The LEGO Batman Movie:  ****

Thor:  Ragnarok:  ****

Spider-Man:  Homecoming:  ****

Logan:  ****

Wilson:  *** ½

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2:  *** ½

Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets *** ½

Wonder Woman:  *** ½

Ghost in the Shell:  *** ½

Atomic Blonde:  **

Death Note:  **

DEAD MAN (1996) **

Johnny Depp stars as a lowly city slicker who gets a job as an accountant in the wild west town of Machine.  When he arrives in town, he is dismayed to learn the position has already been taken.  Penniless with no way to return home, he spends the night with a woman (Mili Avital) he meets outside of a bar.  When her husband (Gabriel Byrne) catches them in bed together, Depp kills him and runs off.  Byrne’s grieving father (Robert Mitchum) then sends out three desperados to track him down and kill him. 

Dead Man is Jim Jarmusch’s version of an old-fashioned western filtered through his unmistakable quirky style.  Because of the fractured nature of the film, the tension between Depp and the bounty hunters never picks up any momentum.  The constant fade-outs and fade-ins gets to wear on the nerves after a while too.  It’s not altogether uninteresting, but it’s not exactly successful either. 

Since so much of the film is episodic, it’s only natural that the vignettes are mighty uneven.  The surreal opening sequence featuring Crispin Glover aboard a train where everyone opens fire on a herd of buffalo is memorable.  Too bad none of the ensuing scenes never live up to that moment. 

Still, it’s worth watching just to see the all-star cast.  You’ll never know who will turn up or who they’ll be paired with.  (This is probably your only chance to see Billy Bob Thornton share a campfire with Jared Harris and Iggy Pop.)  Unfortunately, the soundtrack, which is nothing more than a few of Neil Young’s droning guitar licks, along with the rambling and at times, dullness of the film, might have you nodding off.

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: BAN THE SADIST VIDEOS! 2 (2006) *** ½

David Gregory’s informative and absorbing follow-up to his Video Nasties documentary, Ban the Sadist Videos! focuses on the BBFC, the British Board of Film Censorship.  Thanks to their chronic nitpicking of gory and violent images in horror movies, Britain becomes the most censored nation in the free word.  The head censor in charge, James Ferman, takes to his job all too well, gleefully cutting stuff out of movies as he sees fit.  In actuality, the things he found objectionable (like throwing stars, nunchucks, blood on female flesh, etc.) seems pretty arbitrary.   

Gregory also shows how the British government used Video Nasties (mostly thanks to the country’s sensationalized tabloids) as the public scapegoat for violent real-life incidents.  The infamous Bulger case, where two boys killed a toddler, is blamed on Child’s Play 3, even though the kids never even saw the movie!  There is then a movement to further crackdown on horror films, which leads to an unlikely champion in Ferman, who winds up defending them. 

There are a couple of interesting side notes here, like the rise of the black market for movies without certificates.  I also enjoyed seeing the logistics of putting censorship into action (the board has to go back and watch thousands of videos that have already been released, leading to a huge backlog).  Gregory also does a side-by-side comparison of Evilspeak and its eventual censored version.  I wish there were more of these comparisons, because seeing the actual cut footage gives you a good idea of what the censors found objectionable. 

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: BAN THE SADIST VIDEOS! (2005) *** ½

David Gregory is one of the great horror film documentarians of our time.  A director of several behind-the-scenes DVD special features, he has been entertaining and informing for decades, giving us in-depth documentaries on some of the most popular horror movies ever made.  With Ban the Sadist Videos, Gregory gives us a comprehensive look at Britain’s crackdown on horror videos in the ‘80s. 

Gregory begins with a glimpse of just how wide open the video market was in the early ‘80s.  Since the major studios were a little slow on the uptake, independent companies were able to flood the market with exploitation titles like Last House on the Left, I Spit on Your Grave, and Cannibal Holocaust.  Video stores were practically everywhere at the time, so these films were readily available to just about anyone.  Soon, moral crusaders took it upon themselves to ban the movies in an effort to “save the children”.  This led to a government crackdown on violent videos and police raids on mom and pop video stores, which gave the videos instant worldwide notoriety. 

In America, we didn’t have this sort of hubbub.  Our battle was mostly with the MPAA who cut out all the nasty bits before the movie could even be released.  As a Yank, I found this documentary to be highly informative, but the real reason to see it is for all the cool archive footage of the old video stores and seeing goriest snippets of the films in question.  I also enjoyed the interviews with filmmakers like Jess Franco, Wes Craven, and Dario Argento, who talk about how it feels to have your work censored.  I just wish there was more footage of them because most of the directors interviewed take the censorship kind of personally.  

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: THE DEMONS (1973) *** ½

A witch is burned at the stake and vows her daughters will avenge her.  Lady De Winter (Karin Fields) searches for the daughters and finds Kathleen (Anne Libert) and Margaret (Britt Nichols) in a nearby convent.  Since Kathleen is seen as the most hedonistic one, she is taken away to be tried and tortured as a witch.  That night, Margaret is visited by “her father”, Satan, who rapes her.  This turns Margaret into a full-blown witch and she sets out to get revenge for the death of her mother. 

Jess Franco’s The Demons plays like a combination of a witch hunt movie and a nunsploitation picture.  It’s filled with several memorable set pieces of sacrilegious sex and kinky torture sex scenes.  If horny nuns masturbating and seducing each other is your thing, you’re going to love it.  The scene where Margaret is raped by Satan is also jaw-dropping, even if the music sounds like fake Led Zeppelin.  The following sequence in which she tempts her Mother Superior into fornicating with her is equally scandalous. 

For me, the scenes with Lady De Winter were the most erotic.  I loved the scene where she gets so hot while watching witches being tortured that she makes her lover play kinky S & M witch hunt games with her in the bedroom.  The best part though occurs late in the picture when Margaret comes to her in disguise.  She doesn't recognize Margaret's face, but when Lady De Winter bends her over and lifts up her skirt, she recognizes her ass!  Pure genius!  

In short, this is one of Franco's best.  The only part that doesn’t work is the subplot involving the characters who want to overthrow the King and join up with Dutch resistance.  This dull palace intrigue should’ve been cut, but even with the two-hour running time, the film goes by quicker than you'd expect.  

AKA:  She-Demons.  AKA:  The Sex Demons.

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: THE OUTING (1987) ** ½

Thieves steal a lamp from an old lady and wind up unleashing a killer genie.  The next day, a bunch of kids go to a museum on a field trip.  They get the bright idea to leave the group behind and spend the night in the museum.  Naturally, the genie shows up and starts picking them off one by one. 

Most of the movie is clunky and sometimes dull, but it's nearly saved by a handful of gory set pieces and zany kills.  The scene where a woman takes an axe to the brain and awakens moments later to kill her attacker with a well-placed headbutt is awesome.  We also get people cut in half, death by impalement, head crushing, and a funny scene in which a snake goes up a guy’s pants. 

These odd moments, not to mention the cool monster help to almost, but not quite make up for the film’s various shortcomings.  The teens are mostly annoying and the pacing is erratic.  The ending is also weird and frustrating.  Up until The Outing, I’ve never seen a movie end with a scene in which a Pepsi truck acts as both a jump scare and product placement.  I guess that counts for something.   

Overall, The Outing is far too uneven to ever really work.  As far as killer genie movies go, it’s still much better than any films in the Wishmaster series.  It’s definitely no Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama though. 

AKA:  The Lamp.

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: THE CORPSE GRINDERS (1971) ***

Most people say Astro-Zombies is Ted V. Mikels’ best work, but I’d like to think this is his magnum opus.  The Corpse Grinders is 70 minutes of ‘70s silliness.  Imagine if Al Adamson tried to make an Andy Milligan movie and that might give you an idea of the lunacy in store. 

A doctor and his sexy nurse try to uncover why housecats are suddenly turning on their owners and killing them.  As it turns out, the proprietors of the Lotus Cat Food Company have been using corpses to enhance their cat food.  They soon take to using fresher ingredients (READ:  Living people) to increase their supply. 

The Corpse Grinders probably has too much plot for such a silly movie.  You have to follow the subplot of the doctor playing amateur detective along with the drama at the cat food plant, as well as the struggles of the gravedigger who supplies the company with fresh corpses.  That’s not even taking into account all the cat attacks that spice things up every now and then.  Even though the plot has a lot of moving parts, Mikels keeps the pacing running pretty smoothly. 

The shots of corpses and living people being put on the conveyor belt and fed to the industrial cat food machine are priceless.  The close-ups of the chewed-up meat spewing out of the machine are great too and I loved the not-so subliminal shots of the spinning wheels that are intercut over the potential victims’ faces.  The film probably needed a couple more cat attack scenes to fully make it a bona fide classic, but when you consider just how tough it is to get a cat to do anything, let alone act, it’s amazing we got as many as we did. 

Even if The Corpse Grinders is a decidedly low-rent affair, the cinematography makes it look like a million bucks.  The colorful lighting looks like something out of an Argento film.  I can’t say it’s a must-see or anything, but it definitely looks better than your typical schlock movie of the era. 

AKA:  Night of the Howling Beast.  AKA:  The Flesh Grinders.