A FUTILE AND STUPID GESTURE (2018) *** ½

If you saw Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead, you probably already know the story of the rise and fall of National Lampoon.  A Futile and Stupid Gesture is the biopic version that focuses on the relationship of Lampoon founders Doug Kenney (Will Forte) and Henry Beard (Domhnall Gleeson).  They work together on the Harvard Lampoon and after graduation, they decide to make a legitimate magazine out of it.  They hire the most talented people they can find, and the magazine becomes a cultural touchstone.  Together, Kenney and Beard change the face of modern comedy, but when their relationship splinters, Kenney goes on a self-destructive path of sex, drugs, and rock n’… err.. comedy.

Since A Futile and Stupid Gesture is about the Lampoon, it doesn’t take itself too seriously.  Most biopics get dragged down by Hollywoodizing certain facts.  Here, the film points out discrepancies from the movie and what happened in real life, while making fun of the very nature of attempting a biopic of the Lampoon.  I especially liked the scene that shows the crumbling of Kenney’s marriage as if it were part of a Lampoon pictorial.

Director David (Wet Hot American Summer) Wain covers all the highlights regarding the rise of the magazine, but if you want a factual history, see the documentary.  This is more of a chance for Forte to show his acting chops while simultaneously being very funny.  He and Gleeson make for a terrific team and their chemistry holds the film together, even when it starts to ramble in the late stages.

The casting of the supporting players is inspired.  Thomas Lennon does a mean Michael O’Donaghue.  He gets to reenact some of his best material and does it so well that you wish he’d star in his own O’Donaghue biopic somewhere down the line.  It’s also a blast seeing Joel McHale playing Chevy Chase, especially given their relationship on Community.  He keenly captures Chase’s vocal cadence does a dead-on version of his patented pratfalls.  I for one wouldn’t mind seeing McHale in Fletch 3 sometime in the near future.

In fact, the performances are so good that when the film reaches its poignant conclusion, we feel a tinge of sadness for what could’ve been.  The scene where (two versions of) Kenney visits his own funeral packs an unexpected wallop.  Thankfully, the film ends on an appropriate note that Kenney surely would approve of.

6 SOULS (2013) **

Julianne Moore stars as a widowed shrink whose father (Jeffrey DeMunn from Christmas Evil) gets his kicks by finding medical oddities for her to examine.  His latest discovery (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) is a split personality who has a seemingly endless supply of new personalities.  As Moore analyzes Meyers, people close to her wind up dead and he begins to take on their personalities. 

6 Souls starts off well enough.  At times, it resembles a Primal Fear variation mixed with a Lifetime Movie.  Once we learn Meyers’ big secret, the wheels begin coming off in short order.  It also doesn’t help that the ending is pretty crummy, and the big twist in the finale is predictable too.  Directors Marlind and Stein (who directed the much better Underworld:  Awakening) bring very little style to the table and stage the various jump scares and big reveals in a pedestrian manner.

Moore gives a solid performance, all things considered.  Even though the movie gets increasingly schlocky as it goes along, she refuses to phone it in.  Meyers also does an admirable job going from personality to personality, although his histrionics aren’t enough to save the flick. 

The most interesting thing for me was that it was written by Michael Cooney, the man who wrote Identity and directed the greatest killer snowman movie of all time, Jack Frost.  As a fan of Cooney’s work, I had fun spotting how and where he ripped off his own material.  Like Jack Frost, it starts off with a serial killer about to be executed at midnight, and like Identity the plot hinges heavily on a split personality gimmick.  6 Souls also features a character whose head winds up bending backwards, which figures into the plots of both Jack Frost and Identity.  This is by far, the least of the three, but at least the solid lead performances make it bearable. 

AKA:  Shelter.

PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING (2018) ****

Guillermo del Toro’s Pacific Rim was an entertaining mix of Transformers and Godzilla.  It didn’t exactly set the world on fire or anything, but I’m glad it exists.  Del Toro returned as a producer/consultant on this sequel, handing the directorial reigns over to Steven S. DeKnight.  DeKnight had the unenviable task of following del Toro, a job made even harder since del Toro just won an Oscar for the Shape of Water.  I admit, I was a tad worried going in.  To say that I was underwhelmed by DeKnight’s work on the lackluster Daredevil TV show is a massive understatement.  

Surprisingly enough, Pacific Rim:  Uprising is an engaging and heartfelt sequel that manages to be better and more exciting than the original.  DeKnight takes what del Toro did and expands upon it beautifully.  Not only does Uprising give us a bigger picture of the overall mythology, he also fills the movie with characters (and robots) we can care about and root for.  I mean, sure, the scenes of the robots beating the crap out of monsters (and each other) are totally badass, but they’d be nothing but brainless action sequences if we weren’t fully invested in the humans inside of them.  I have to give credit where credit is due:  DeKnight did a helluva job.

In the decade since the world won its final battle with the Kaiju, the nations’ top scientists have been mulling over the future of the giant robotic Jaegers.  The bigwigs decide Jaeger pilots have become redundant and replace them with a line of drone robots.  Naturally, the drones go on the fritz and the Jaegers are sent back into battle to bring them down.

The Jaeger vs. Drone battles are awesome.  There are times where you’ll swear we’ve finally got that Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots movie we’ve always wanted.  There’s more badass stuff in one of these scenes than in all the live-action Transformers movies combined.  The final battle is filled to the brim with eye-popping special effects and some of the best giant robot beatdowns ever captured on the silver screen.

The cast is solid from top to bottom.  John Boyega proves he can carry a movie that isn’t called Star Wars.  He does a fine job playing the son of Idris Elba’s character from the first film who shows he can be a chip off the old block while simultaneously blazing his own trail.  Scott Eastwood proves he’s a movie star too.  Of course, he helps that he is a doppelganger of his old man, but he has plenty of charisma to spare.  Cailee Spaeny makes an impression as Boyega’s new recruit and her relationship with her homemade Jaeger is pretty much the heart of the entire picture.  It was also fun seeing Charlie Day and Burn Gorman stepping effortlessly back into their scientist roles again.

In short, Pacific Rim:  Uprising was the most fun I’ve had in a theater in a long time.  (Or at least since the last John Boyega sci-fi sequel.)  Y’all need to rush out and see it.  It would be a shame if the series doesn’t continue because I for one am all for another trip to this universe.

ELECTRA (1990) *

Electra is a modern day updating of the Greek myth.  That is to say, it is full of hookers and pimps.  I guess this wasn’t the worst idea in the world, but since the cast is so amateurish and the script is so unnecessarily pretentious that it pretty much sinks it right from the get-go.

As a girl, Electra (Robin O’Dell) witnesses her mother murder her father and steal all his money.  Years go by and Electra winds up becoming a hopeless junkie prostitute who wallows in excess and despair.  Her three hooker friends worry about her and try to get her some help.  When Electra’s brother (Greg Pitts) shows up, she tries to convince him to murder their mother.

The opening scenes hold promise.  The murder of Electra’s father is decent enough.  (He gets electrocuted in his swimming pool.)  Once the action switches over to the grown-up Electra, it gets boring fast.  There are only so many scenes of junkie hookers spouting mind-numbing monologues and delivering endless dissertations on philosophy a viewer can take.  

All of this might’ve been bearable had there been a heavy concentration on T & A.  You’d think that a movie about hookers accustomed to all things Greek would’ve been full of debauchery.  However, the nudity is oh-so brief and not nearly enough to make this excruciating affair worthwhile.

AKA:  Electra Love 2000.

NO MORE DIRTY DEALS (1993) * ½

Taimak (Bruce Leroy from The Last Dragon) hires a mechanic (the hilariously named Von Von Lindenberg) to soup up his motorboat.  (“I’ll make your boat go so fast, you’ll be whistling out your ass!”)  Von Von is jealous that Taimak lives in a mansion and has plenty of sunbathing women in bikinis at his disposal.  Von Von quickly gets so swept up in Taimak’s world of excess (which includes a romp with a stripper named Tequila) that he fails to realize he’s in fact a ruthless criminal.

No More Dirty Deals is one of those movies where an average Joe gets lured by money and beautiful women into a life of crime.  This sort of thing could’ve worked had Taimak’s world of luxury actually seemed intriguing.  Unless you have an unnatural affinity for speedboats, it’s hardly what I’d call tempting.  The sunbathing bikini babes and strippers aren’t THAT hot either.  David Jean Schweitzer’s direction is amateurish at best and there isn’t enough violence and T & A here to make up for the shoddy craftsmanship.  The action is sparse, and the finale is pretty weak too.

That said, there aren’t that many Taimak vehicles out there, so you’ve got to take what you can get.

Taimak isn’t bad in the scenes where he’s living up the glamorous life in his swanky mansion.  However, he just isn’t very convincing when he makes the switch over to maniacal crime lord in the second half of the picture.  (There are some moments where he seems to be channeling Rockwell in the “Somebody’s Watching Me” music video.)  Luckily, Von Von gives a decent performance as the poor dope who gets in way over his head.

You can sense the Miami Vice influence here.  There are a LOT of scenes of rich guys driving speedboats while rock music blares on the soundtrack.  If you can struggle past them, you might enjoy it.  

Speaking of music, the songs were provided by a band called “Stranger” and they aren’t bad.  (They sound like a bluesy version of AC/DC.)  I’m sure with a better movie behind them, they could’ve gone places.  Stranger (and Taimak) deserves better.

DANGEROUS OBSESSION (1990) ***

Brian (Dream On) Benben stars as a wisecracking Jewish private detective who listens to doo-wop and still lives with his parents.  He gets hired to investigate the death of a druggie evangelist and winds up falling in love with the head minister’s daughter (Debrah Farentino).  It seems that everyone who sleeps with her turns up dead.  Will Benben be next?

Dangerous Obsession simultaneously plays like a spoof of private eye movies and a goofy version of an erotic thriller.  It doesn’t do either of those things particularly well, but it remains watchable thanks to Benben’s entertaining performance.  His twitchy, wisecracking antics are reminiscent of Dustin Hoffman and he gets most of his laughs just from reaction shots.  He also has a lot of oddball quirks (like having a slot machine mounted to the dashboard of his car) that make him likeable.

The plot is interesting since it features a Jewish detective investigating a Catholic ministry.  Even though he’s been hired by the head of the church, he still is very much an unwanted outsider.  It’s a unique wrinkle that you wish had been explored a little deeper.  

There’s no telling if Dangerous Obsession would’ve been a classic private eye movie had it decided to play things straight.  It was released by Troma and there are moments that make it definitely feel like one of their films.  All I know is that that there are scenes here that you just won’t find in your average gumshoe flick.  I mean the part where Benben is tempted into a church by a topless femme fatale who holds him at gunpoint while a slob menaces him with a chainsaw just has to be seen to be believed.  

Chinatown it is not, but it is certainly a lot of fun.

AKA:  Mortal Sins.  AKA:  Divine Obsession.  AKA:  God’s Payroll.

THE LAST MOVIE STAR (2018) ****

Burt Reynolds famously appeared naked in the pages of Cosmopolitan, but his performance in The Last Movie Star might be the most naked he’s ever been.  He bares his soul in this film.  Although Burt may have argued he was more of a “star” than an “actor”, his performance here proves otherwise.  In a career full of wonderful performances, this ranks right up there with his best stuff. 

Burt plays an old movie star named Vic Edwards who gets an invitation to go to Nashville to pick up a lifetime achievement award.  When he gets there, he is dismayed to learn it’s nothing more than a bunch of hipster film buffs showing movies in the back room of a saloon.  He promptly gets drunk and tells everyone off before retreating to his hotel room.  The next day, he orders his driver Lil (Ariel Winter) to take him to the airport.  On the way there, he asks her to drive past his old neighborhood, so he can see the house he grew up in.  

Thus begins Vic’s journey of self-discovery.  Along the way, he comes to terms with his past, accepts his present, and learns to be hopeful for the future.  He even manages to impart some life lessons to Lil, who goes from seeing him as “some creepy old dude” to a sort of father figure and mentor.

The Last Movie Star was written and directed by Adam Rifkin as a love letter to Burt.  He’s stated that if Burt turned him down, he’d refuse to make the movie.  That makes sense, but I also think that only Rifkin could’ve told this particular story.  After all, we’re talking about the man who made The Chase, the closest anyone has ever come to replicating the feel and fun of Smokey and the Bandit.

Your enjoyment of The Last Movie Star may depend largely on how much baggage you bring into it.  If you’re only a casual Burt Reynolds fan, you might find it to be a pleasant dramedy.  If you’re like me and worship at the altar of all things Burt, it will be a heartbreaking, devastating, exhilarating, and reaffirming experience.  That’s because Burt is mostly playing a thinly veiled version of himself.  When he is pouring his soul out about lost loves, career failures, and past regrets, he could just as easily be talking about himself.  Because of that, the film largely has a documentary vibe to it.  Rifkin’s style is unobtrusive, and the more personal moments feel more spontaneous than scripted.

The scenes of Reynolds and his buddy, played by Chevy Chase have a loose, off-the-cuff feeling about them.  They are so good together than you’ll wonder why someone didn’t think to put them in a movie sooner.  The heart of the film belongs to Burt and Ariel Winter.  They make for a mismatched team on the surface, but their chemistry together is truly something special.  Burt’s had a lot of memorable leading ladies over the years and Winter holds her own with the best of them.  There’s a scene where she rattles off a never-ending list of prescriptions she’s taken for depression while Burt patiently listens that is really touching.  

The standout moments come when Burt is transported into scenes from his two biggest hits, Smokey and the Bandit and Deliverance.  He tries to give his younger self advice (he tells the Bandit, “Slow down!”), although he’s fully aware that it’ll do no good.  Not only are these scenes fun to watch if you’re a Burt fan, it deftly does two things simultaneously:  It allows Burt to make peace with his past while reminding the audience of just how earthshattering a phenomenon he was back in the ‘70s.

Throughout the movie, Burt is unafraid to show his age.  He uses a cane and walks with a stoop.  He speaks a little slower, and his movements are often fragile (and sometimes painful to watch).  However, the old Burt is still there, razor sharp as ever.  The putdowns he makes under his breath are hilarious.  On the outset, The Last Movie Star seems like it’s about Burt saying goodbye.  By the end, we realize it’s a statement that he still has plenty left in the tank.

AKA:  Dog Years.