What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[MrBarlow]

The Last Stand. 2013.

A drug kingpin escapes custody and heads towards Mexico with the F.B.I following him, in his path is a small town of Sommerton run by a Sheriff who was a member of the LAPD and a small band of deputies to stop the kingpin from crossing the border.

Big Arnie trying to be a Sheriff of a small Western town, sounds like he was trying to be like Clint Eastwood without a hat but does get to fire a six-shooter at a piece of meat. Johnny Knoxville plays the owner of the barn gun museum proprietor who is later deputized as a law man. Peter Stormare plays the henchman helping his boss to get over the border into Mexico and Forest Whitaker as the F.B.I agent trying to catch his prisoner.

Arnie's first lead role in ten years and still seems he can pack a punch and getting his ass handed to him a few times, the film does have one or two flaws, blood splatter and a few good shoot outs, still a bit of a guilty pleasure to watch, even though it kept the Mrs quiet.

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[MrBarlow]

The China Syndrome. 1979.

Reporter Kimberly Wells and cameraman Richard Adams doing a story on energy saving. While visiting Ventera Power Plant a incident happens that appears to be something small but find out a cover up of something big may have happened.

Filmed in 1978 and not released until March 1979, the film was criticized by the Nuclear Power Energy committee for being a work of fiction then the incident at Three Mile Island happened that was almost the same incident...bet their faces were red.

Jane Fonda and Michael Douglas play the reporter and cameraman who try to find was exactly happened and are stonewalled by their boss and become more of a investigation duo and meet with a specialist who gives the best line in this film " Your Lucky To Be Alive".

Jack Lemmon gives a decent portrayal as shift plant supervisor Jack Godell who is told what happens and takes it but soon uncovers more than just a small incident and tries to become the whistle blower that may have repercussions than just simple threats.

Director James Bridges seemed to know how to capture the audience's attention with this very nicely styled pace thriller that can have plenty of tense moments and with very little to no background score throughout the film makes it more realistic.

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[Demoncrat]

Ricochet .... think we watched that and Raising Cain tripping


Ahem.

VR Fighter (2021, Tang Quiojia)

aka One More Shot. Chinese madness unfolds when a man finds a new path in order to right that wrong.
These new second tier FX are laughable sometimes. The shots are wincingly reminiscent of PS1 graphics cough.
Regardless this is a knock off of various developments in the action genre and it accquits itself reasonably.

The rather emotional finale reminded me more of the Korean things I've seen that aren't as spoken about as some others from that region.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Raw Deal (1986)

A pretty run of the mill but efficiently entertaining action vehicle for Arnold Schwarzenegger in which he infiltrates the Chicago mob in a bid to bring it to it's knees.

There's some good action set pieces courtesy of director John Irvin and the likes of Sam Wanamaker, Darren McGavin and Robert Davi give the supporting cast a bit of gravitas.

Whilst watching it felt like this could easily have been a Poliziotteschi from the seventies starring the likes of Franco Nero or Maurizio Merli. The fact it's Italian produced (De Laurentiis) and written by Sergio Leone's screenwriters Luciano Vincenzoni and Sergio Donati adds credence to this thought.

[J Harker]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

Raw Deal (1986)



A pretty run of the mill but efficiently entertaining action vehicle for Arnold Schwarzenegger in which he infiltrates the Chicago mob in a bid to bring it to it's knees.



There's some good action set pieces courtesy of director John Irvin and the likes of Sam Wanamaker, Darren McGavin and Robert Davi give the supporting cast a bit of gravitas.



Whilst watching it felt like this could easily have been a Poliziotteschi from the seventies starring the likes of Franco Nero or Maurizio Merli. The fact it's Italian produced (De Laurentiis) and written by Sergio Leone's screenwriters Luciano Vincenzoni and Sergio Donati adds credence to this thought.

One I intend to grab when the forthcoming StudioCanal restoration drops in price. Obviously a little way off.

Sent from my SM-G780G using Tapatalk

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by J Harker

One I intend to grab when the forthcoming StudioCanal restoration drops in price. Obviously a little way off.

Sent from my SM-G780G using Tapatalk

I didn't know it was being reissued and restored. The Blu i have is the earlier SC title (It was a freebie along with Red Heat). The copy i have looks fine for how i rate the film.

I'm sure a new restoration will be pretty awesome though.

Just had a look at the new extras.

There aren't any. One of the docs seems to be on every Arnie SC disc. It's definitely on the new Red Sonja as i've watched it.

[MacBlayne]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

Raw Deal (1986)

A pretty run of the mill but efficiently entertaining action vehicle for Arnold Schwarzenegger in which he infiltrates the Chicago mob in a bid to bring it to it's knees.

There's some good action set pieces courtesy of director John Irvin and the likes of Sam Wanamaker, Darren McGavin and Robert Davi give the supporting cast a bit of gravitas.

Whilst watching it felt like this could easily have been a Poliziotteschi from the seventies starring the likes of Franco Nero or Maurizio Merli. The fact it's Italian produced (De Laurentiis) and written by Sergio Leone's screenwriters Luciano Vincenzoni and Sergio Donati adds credence to this thought.

"What does the P stand for?"

[Frankie Teardrop]

RUBBER – A murderous tyre can explode people’s heads through the power of telekinesis. If that sounds like a recipe for some kind of Charles Band-produced horror comedy knock-off, a swift glance at director Quentin Dupieux‘s resume should be enough to convince you that an arch exercise in cinematic deconstruction is more likely on the cards. That’s entirely the case. ‘Rubber’ doesn’t just dally with the fourth wall, it practically pisses against it – a good portion of the film is about its ‘audience’, who look on at all the tyre horror-action through binoculars from their desert vantage point (until most of them are stiffed by a poisoned chicken). The potential for cringe-inducing posturing is circumvented by the eeriness of the location, some genuine laughs / gore and an overall atmosphere of weirdness. I hadn’t seen it since it came out in 2011, and it was a relief to find that I still really liked it.

DECODER – An anomaly, and an interesting one, in that it hails the Berlin post punk / industrial scene of the late seventies / early eighties – not your typical cinematic underground, although I guess a close parallel would be the American No Wave stuff (Beth B, Nick Zed etc) that was happening around the time. Some slacker / music dude (played by Einsturzende Neubauten’s F M Einheit) discovers that a local fast-food joint is feeding its customers piped music full of subliminal messages; meanwhile, his gf hangs out with some toads and goes to work in a peepshow. ‘Decoder’ plays with a lot of the ideas that were in the air back then – the power of covert media conditioning to induce social control etc – and in fact the film is honoured by a cameo from the godfather of all that stuff, William Burroughs, whilst none other than Genesis P Orridge pops up as a sort-of guerrilla priest. Visually it’s very nice, with hazy drifts of gelled lighting versus the hard angles of the post-war greyscape. ‘Decoder’ really works on the level of this kind of ambience alone, but I wish it had stayed there because it flounders a bit when it retreats from abstraction and tries to tie its themes and images to a conventional plotline about urban insurrection. Still, interesting. Worth checking out if you like gritty zero budget 16mm arthouse dystopian sci-fi satire, or if you still wear a black trench coat, listen to TG and carry around a battered copy of ‘Nova Express’ even though you’re in your forties, Frankie (ulp).

VOICES FROM BEYOND – Another one of Fulci’s final few, VFB is a twisted whodunnit narrated by the (ghost? Corpse?) of a murder victim who has reached out from beyond the grave to enlist his daughter as a detective. It’s full of typical Fulci signatures – an overload of diffusion and a camera that always makes its presence felt, not to mention a bit of gore, mean-spirited nudity and maggoty action (we’re treated to lingering close-ups of the main character as he putrefies in his grave.) For me, watching it for the first time yesterday whilst on my fourth can of Stella, it had a little bit of a drag factor maybe and the plot seemed quite labyrinthine at points, but these are only quibbles; the essentially quite weird atmosphere of a bona fide Fulci flick was there in every frame (an example that stuck in my mind – naked woman screaming as she crouches beside a big cartoon hen toy. There, you’re just not going to get that in many other places). I really liked it. Again, not one from his glory years, but die-hards and fans of odd Euro horror will easily get something from this.

[MacBlayne]

BRING ME THE HEAD OF ALFREDO GARCIA

WARNING: This review will feature some mild spoilers. If you haven’t seen this, then please remedy that. If you have, and are strangely interested in the waffling of some random schmuck’s favourite film from one of his favourite directors, then read on!

Sam Peckinpah was no stranger to negative reviews, but the reaction to Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia was a whole new level. Only Siskel and Ebert seemed to be on the film’s wavelength. Other critics were repulsed, and some even boasted about walking out. It wasn’t just the worst film of the year, but the worst film ever. It even secured an entry into Harry Medved’s moronic scribe, The 50 Worst Films of All Time. “They HATED it,” producer Marty Baum recalled.

To this day, I will never understand what happened. This is not just Peckinpah’s finest hour, but one of the greatest achievements in all of cinema. You can hear Peckinpah pound his hear throughout the 116 minutes, pleading with an audience, or a world, that isn’t interested. And what makes it so heartbreaking is that Peckinpah knows already knows this, but doesn’t know what else to do but keep pounding his heart.

The plot of Bring Me… is very sparse. A ruthless man known simply as El Jefe demands the head of one Alfredo Garcia for the crime of impregnating his teenage daughter. So encompassed with rage, he offers a $1,000,000 reward for Garcia’s decapitation. His team of ruthless bounty hunters happily take up the task. But rather than do all the hard work themselves, they secure the services of down-on-his-luck Bennie (Warren Oates) to find Garcia, promising him $10,000. Bennie happens to know his lover was sweet on Garcia, and is more than delighted to learn Garcia is already dead.

Bennie sets off on what should be an easy road trip, dreaming of the life $10,000 can offer him and his lover, Elita (Isela Vega). By the end of the film, well… as the tagline stated, “Why is this man’s head worth $1,000,000 and the lives of 21 people?”

Some critics at the time slated the decision to have Garcia already dead, but they are missing the point. Bennie isn’t out to commit murder. Garcia is dead – he’s just taking the head. It’s not the worst thing imaginable, which he quickly reminds a doubtful Elita. “There's nothing sacred about a hole in the ground or the man that's in it - or you, or me. The church cuts off the toes and fingers and every other damn thing - they're saints. Well, Alfredo is our saint.”

This is the start of Bennie’s downfall. As the saying goes, whether it be a rock or a grain of sand, they both sink to the bottom.” Despite the protests of Elita, Bennie is blinded by greed, and cannot see the abyss he’s careening towards. Peckinpah was a man troubled by greed within his own life. Peckinpah was famously confrontational, but usually stuck to the film until he was removed from edit suite. As much as he despised what MGM did to his Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, he was there to see it all. For at the end of the day, Peckinpah accepted their money. He hated them for chasing the box-office without a care for what they were offering, and he despised himself for going with it. In one interview with Playboy magazine, he called himself a whore (funnily enough, in that same interview, he recanted this by saying whores are wonderful, and should be treated favourably).

But for all Peckinpah’s self-loathing, he cannot hate Bennie. Bennie’s decision, as ethically indefensible as it may be, it requires courage. Bennie, and others like him, has to put himself out there. We all want wealth, but are unwilling to sacrifice ourselves to gain it. Bennie tries, damn it, and that demands respect.

And it’s not just Bennie who commands Peckinpah’s love and respect, but the females within the same world. Peckinpah is a filmmaker frequently accused of demonising women within his films, as well as beating them in reality, but Bring Me… shows a whole other perspective to him. In the opening scenes, El Jefe’s daughter stands defiant against her father, despite the suffering and humiliation she endures in front of her extended family (mostly female, and subjected to shame that they cannot help this girl). She breaks down after some horrific violence (that the camera does not show), but she will have her day later in one incredible line.

But it’s Elita who takes Peckinpah’s heart, and presumably the audience. Isela Vega gives one of the most beautiful, haunting performances in any film. Elita is a strong, hopeful, but never naïve character that doesn’t show courage in her physical prowess, but in what she is willing to give up. She doesn’t grab machine guns, nor does she drop a cynical speech to woo the Twitter crowd. In what must be one of the most devastating moments Peckinpah ever filmed (and this man built a career out of that), Bennie proposes to Elita. It is a moment of genuine sweetness and beauty, and wipes the floor with most romantic dramas. However, as much as we would love this moment of tranquillity to stretch forever, they are confronted by a pair of rapists armed with a gun.

Bennie also carries a gun, and wants nothing more than to use it. Elita knows this, but is frightened at the chance that her lover, her future husband, her chance at escaping a life of being a “whore” could easily slip away, and thus sacrifices her body to the rapist. As she leaves with her rapist, she says to an apoplectic Bennie, “I been here before and you don't know the way.” Hand on my heart, this delivery almost destroyed me, and proves that for all of Peckinpah’s issue with women, he DID NOT hate them.

Said scene also shows off the incredible range of Warren Oates. When Bennie finally catches the rapist, he shows rage, anguish, pain, jealously, and fear - all within the space of the five seconds it takes for him to pull the trigger. Oates was, and still is, one of the most incredible performers to grace the earth. We are lucky to just have had him. He was usually relegated to supporting roles, but Bring Me… provides him with a leading role to support his talents. However, he did have plenty of inspiration.

It was only after the film had been finished, and shown to the producers, that Peckinpah realised that he had made an autobiography. Peckinpah had a lot of trust in Oates, and give him a lot of freedom in his performance. Oates recognised Peckinpah in the script, and thus mimicked Peckinpah in his performance, right down to the white suit, and sleeping with sunglasses on. At this point in Peckinpah’s life, he was losing his battle with depression and alcoholism, and wore sunglasses to hide his haunted eyes. Knowing this makes it slightly easier as to why Bennie acts the way he does.

And like Peckinpah, although greed could cloud his intentions, he was a man of his word, bound by some old-school notion of honour. Bennie promised to bring the head of Alfredo Garcia, and he will deliver. But he also made a promise to Elita. He made a promise to himself. And those promises need to be fulfilled.

The final moments are Peckinpah breaking loose from the shackles of the studio system. He doesn’t know what’s going to happen next. He doesn’t care. He has to take a chance. Like Bennie, he’s just going to risk it and hope for the best. However, unlike Bennie, Peckinpah suspects what will likely happen, and the final freeze frame tells us what that is.

Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia is a masterpiece. There is no other way to put it. It is haunting, cynical, hopeful, repugnant, contradictory, and beautiful. It sees the worst in us, and it still loves us like a disappointed father. It is Peckinpah at his purest. He was once asked if there was a film he felt that wasn’t brutalised by the studios, and he responded, “I did 'Alfredo Garcia' and I did it exactly the way I wanted to. Good or bad, like it or not, that was my film.”

He’s not wrong.

[Demoncrat]

Rubber is the gift that keeps on giving I've found.