Mac and Me (1988)

MAC AND ME (1988) *
Cable TV came to the little hamlet of Arcadia, Kansas, circa 1988 or 1989 and I watched a whole lot of movies time and time again.

That includes not only blockbusters like Back to the Future Part II and III, Beetlejuice, Big, Die Hard, Total Recall, and Terminator 2, but Arachnophobia, the first two Bill & Ted movies, The Blob remake, Tremors, Red Heat, Cocktail, The ‘Burbs, Bloodsport, Johnny Be Good, Appointment with Death, and even that disaster starring Tony Danza, She’s Out of Control. That last one begs the question WHY? Because it was on, naturally.

I only watched Mac and Me once back then, however, and that’s because even then with less discriminating taste I knew it sucked.

I revisited it all these decades later and it still righteously sucks. Just imagine a stupid E.T the Extra-Terrestrial where none of the cast members have the slightest bit charm or ability to keep our interest and to earn our emotional investment. It’s also incredibly weird and off-putting, especially considering that it’s designed to be family entertainment like E.T and The Wizard of Oz (1939), still the ultimate standard bearer for this kind of movie.

One of the main sources of weirdness: Mac and Me plugs more products than any movie this side of Leonard Part 6 or Happy Gilmore. Don’t you just hate it when a movie does that?

I mean, though, now that I think about it some more, it’s truly a missed opportunity for the ages that Dorothy didn’t drink Coke or the Tin Man didn’t use WD-40 or the Scarecrow didn’t wear designer hay or the Cowardly Lion didn’t have the courage to make a commercial plug right smack dab in the middle of his big melodramatic scene. MGM could have done so much more with their Yellow Brick Road (a sponsor on each and every brick) and the Wicked Witch of the West should have been melted by a brand name water, for crying out loud. We need a remake immediately just so the ruby slippers can be Nike.

Mac and Me could switch people over forever to Pepsi, Burger King, the St. Louis Cardinals, and Sweet Tarts.

Spielberg also missed an opportunity by not having a dance contest in a chain restaurant in E.T.

I was really bummed when I couldn’t find Paul Rudd in the cast and instead endured these apparently neophyte actors like Jonathan Ward, Tina Caspary, Lauren Stanley, and Jade Calegory. Ward and Caspary have considerably more acting experience than Stanley and Calegory, but they’re just as stilted or melodramatic in every scene.

The adult performers and their characters suck, as well, but they are blessed with fewer scenes to suck than the younger actors. By all rights, I should have rooted for the government agents, but, no, I cheered when the end credits rolled on this jive turkey. This is a movie that viewers should put they survived it on their resume.

Oh, in all this hubbub over a crap movie, I almost forgot MAC stands for ‘Mysterious Alien Creature’ and not that one restaurant with the impromptu dance scene interrupted by evil government agents. We have the main one, then his family, and I am guessing they’re distant, no good cousins of E.T. I mean, I doubt they would ever sit together for one of them big family pictures that brings in all the brothers and sisters and cousins and parents and grandparents and grandchildren. E.T. is simply too good for Mac.

Weird children, weird adults, weird aliens, product placement out the wazoo, and Squire Fridell add up to one weird (and awful) movie.

Mac and Me is so awful that Harry and the Hendersons seems like Citizen Kane instead.

Attack of the Fantastical Movies

ATTACK OF THE FANTASTICAL MOVIES: ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN, EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS, PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES, MOTORPSYCHO!, GALAXINA, REPTILICUS, BIG BAD MAMA, REAL LIFE, NINJA III: THE DOMINATION, NIGHT OF THE DEMONS

How do I grade something like ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN from 1958? It has a setup that could be called “laborious” or “lackluster” or “lugubrious.” I’m not going to call it any of those words, but I can see exactly why somebody else would. In other words, it’s not until about the 45-minute mark that we get to the 50 foot woman. Yes, I wish they had reversed the numbers, 15 minutes of setup and 45 minutes of 50 foot woman. Simple mathematics. At least, 45 minutes of setup and 45 minutes of 50 foot woman. Yes, that sounds even better than “15 then 45.” The final 15 or 20 minutes of ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN, though, are solid gold. Rating: ***

— It’s virtually impossible to watch EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS and not think about MARS ATTACKS! (flying saucers) and INDEPENDENCE DAY (Washington D.C. invaded), two blockbusters from 1996 with a combined production budget of $145 million and big, big, big stars, including Jack Nicholson in dual roles in MARS ATTACKS! In EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS from 1956, Ray Harryhausen’s stop-motion flying saucers are the real star of the show (step aside, Hugh Marlowe) and the film thankfully wastes very little time in showcasing them. It’s the inverse of ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN. ***1/2

— Italian director Mario Bava (1914-80) became especially known for his stylish horror films. From his British Film Institute profile, “Mario Bava took a vital role in the creation of the modern horror film. If there was to be a a Mount Rushmore-style monument dedicated to four directors whose work pioneered a new form of big screen chills and thrills, those giant faces etched in granite on the mountainside would be: Bava, Alfred Hitchcock, Georges Franju and Michael Powell.” In the words of a Pavement song, a Bava film has style, miles and miles. Case in point: PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES, a low-budget science fiction and horror production from 1965 that masked its cheap sets through smoky skullduggery. Bava said in Fangoria, “Do you know what that unknown planet was made of? A couple of plastic rocks — yes, two: one and one! — left over from a mythological movie made at Cinecitta! To assist the illusion, I filled the set with smoke!” Watching PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES for the first time, you might think you’ve seen this basic plot somewhere before … ahem … Ridley Scott’s ALIEN. ***1/2

— 1965 proved to be a great year for titles with exclamation points and for director, producer, writer, cinematographer, and editor Russ Meyer (1922-2004), whose films often proved to be ahead of their time. Meyer contributed two exclamation point titles — FASTER, PUSSYCAT! KILL! KILL! and MOTORPSYCHO! — during a 1965 in which he directed three films overall; Meyer’s greatest cinematic year began with MUDHONEY. Proof of being ahead of its time: MOTORPSYCHO! (what a title) gives us a psychotic motorcycle trio led by a deeply disturbed Vietnam vet — before TAXI DRIVER, before ROLLING THUNDER, before THE DEER HUNTER, before FIRST BLOOD — in addition to all the elements (large-breasted women and endless cleavage, campy humor, satire, and quotable dialogue) we expect from a Meyer film. ***

— GALAXINA lands a few successful jabs at STAR WARS, STAR TREK, and ALIEN, but otherwise it’s a real long slog through 90-plus minutes of a lowbrow and low-budget science fiction and western parody set in the 31st century. Here’s just one example of the film’s humor: Avery Schreiber (1935-2002) plays a character named “Capt. Cornelius Butt.” Then again, I probably should have just said that it’s a Crown International Pictures release. Surely you remember Crown International Pictures? They brought us such immoral, er, immortal classics as THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS, THEY SAVED HITLER’S BRAIN, SEXTETTE, and THE BEACH GIRLS. The late former Playboy Playmate of the Year Dorothy Stratten fills the title role and she’s been described as “a voluptuous blonde android servant.” Galaxina works better when she’s silent (the first half of the picture), because Stratten proves that she was a true novice thespian every time she speaks during GALAXINA. Stratten reportedly complained to film director and her paramour Peter Bogdanovich that the ads for GALAXINA promoted her being the Playmate of the Year, because she wanted to be taken seriously as an actress. GALAXINA would not do good for anybody wanting to be taken seriously for anything. Unfortunately, Stratten’s estranged husband Paul Snider murdered her two months after the release of GALAXINA. Stratten would be immortalized on film by the 1981 TV movie DEATH OF A CENTERFOLD: THE DOROTHY STRATTEN STORY and the 1983 theatrical release STAR 80, played by Jamie Lee Curtis and Mariel Hemingway, respectively. In case you were wondering, you see a lot more of Stratten in Playboy than GALAXINA. *1/2

— Recent weeks, mostly under self-quarantine, have included a few first-time watch monster movies: GODZILLA VS. MECHAGODZILLA and TERROR OF MECHAGODZILLA, SLITHIS (possibly the worst monster movie ever made), THE GIANT CLAW, and, most recently, REPTILICUS, Denmark’s infamous first entry in the monster movie sweepstakes. Judging by REPTILICUS, the Danish should stick to pastries. They make a mean strudel, not so much a Godzilla rip-off. Apparently, there’s never been a second Danish monster movie, so I guess they have stuck to pastries for nearly 50 years since this 1961 turkey. Anyway, I wanted to find the Danish version of REPTILICUS, but, of course, I had to settle for the English dub from good old American International. The plot: Copper miners find the tail of a prehistoric reptile and it eventually regenerates into Reptilicus, a hand puppet (close-up) and a marionette (wide shot) that give the $50 Giant Claw its money for being the “best” worst movie monster of all-time. I enjoyed REPTILICUS even less than THE GIANT CLAW, though. For example, when Reptilicus eats an extra or two, the victims look like they have been cut out of a magazine and they are being thrown into the puppet’s mouth. In THE GIANT CLAW, at least its victims being eaten scene brought me back to the “Eat ‘em! Eat ‘em! Crunch! Crunch!” scene from Q: THE WINGED SERPENT. I even called out “Crunch! Crunch!” during THE GIANT CLAW. No such luck during REPTILICUS. **

— Arthur Penn’s 1967 film BONNIE AND CLYDE proved to be one of the watershed films of the second half of the 20th century and one indication was that for several years, BONNIE AND CLYDE inspired many sensationalistic crime films set during the Great Depression. Roger Corman produced a whole slew of them, with the most famous being 1974’s BIG BAD MAMA starring Angie Dickinson, Tom Skerritt, and William Shatner and directed by Steve Carver (who later directed the Chuck Norris spectacular LONE WOLF McQUADE). BIG BAD MAMA mixes in a hippie-like free love sensibility and showcases bed hopping and generous amounts of nudity between all the murder and mayhem. The title character (Dickinson) and her two not long past jailbait daughters (Susan Sennett, Robbie Lee) all have multiple nude scenes, highlighted by Dickinson’s full-frontal shot late in the picture. One of the picture’s tag lines: “Wilma gave her daughters everything — her looks, her lovers and the crime of their lives!” Dick Miller (1928-2019), yes, that guy, plays a crime fighter and you know you can’t go too wrong with a picture that features an old-fashioned bloody crime spree, much nudity and shenanigans (Dickinson looked absolutely sensational in 1974), Shatner, and Dick Miller. ***

— Many years before the proliferation of reality TV, Albert Brooks skewered it with his 1979 directorial debut REAL LIFE, a satire of the 1973 PBS documentary “An American Family.” Brooks plays an exaggerated version of himself and watching this movie for the first time in 2020, it’s difficult not to conjure up memories of all the obnoxious or obsequious hosts and participants on reality TV shows from years ago — “The Real World,” “The Bachelor,” et cetera, they’re all terrible and I’m fortunate to have survived all my encounters with them. All those creeps still give me the willies just thinking about it now, but unfortunately reality TV seems like it’s here and it’s here to stay. Take that from somebody who’s not watched a whole lot of TV in the last decade, with reality TV being one of the big reasons. I laughed a lot during REAL LIFE, from the epic sight gag on the head of every cameraman (I laughed every single time) to the fiery grand finale Brooks borrows from GONE WITH THE WIND. ****

— The Cannon Group’s best of the worst films could generously be called “sublime stupidity” and I believe that description fits NINJA III: THE DOMINATION perfectly. Part ENTER THE NINJA, part FLASHDANCE, and part EXORCIST, THE DOMINATION must be seen to not be believed. Imagine Jennifer Beals possessed by the evil spirit of a ninja with an Oriental Max von Sydow attempting to bring it out. THE DOMINATION starts out with its very best scene, a golf course massacre that leads to the bad ninja transferring his spirit into the body of telephone lineman and aerobics instructor Christie (Lucinda Dickey). Also happening in the first 30 minutes of the picture: Christie’s aerobics class, her fight against a handful of creeps who were harassing one of her students, and possibly the most awkward bedroom seduction scene in the history of cinema. Christie won’t give this creepy cop the time of day and then, practically the next moment, they end up in embrace and she pours V-8 on herself … this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. There’s also a bizarre sequence involving Christie’s Bouncer arcade game. On the International Arcade Museum page for Bouncer, it says “Bouncer was seen in the low budget martial arts film NINJA 3: THE DOMINATION. The game is in the main character’s apartment and she is seen playing it. The character becomes possessed by the spirit of the ninja, and as he overtakes her body, the arcade cabinet begins to bellow out smoke and hypnotizes her with a little laser show from the screen.” I thought she was already possessed. Yeah, I know, bizarre. Then again, bizarre basically describes both THE DOMINATION and Cannon films in general. We wouldn’t have them any other way. ***

— We’ve seen NIGHT OF THE DEMONS done better before, especially the first two EVIL DEAD movies and RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD, which it seems to reference through both Linnea Quigley and punk rock. We’ve seen this plot before: 10 (mostly) horny high school kids have a Halloween party inside an abandoned funeral parlor. You can fill in the rest, down to every detail both personality and plot. It’s not a bad movie, exactly, it’s just after having seen EVIL DEAD and RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD and EVIL DEAD 2, why settle for less? Seemingly just about every movie from the ‘80s — the good, the bad, and the ugly — has developed a cult following over time and NIGHT OF THE DEMONS is one of them, spoken about in an enthusiastic tone by admirers. I can sympathize, because I feel similarly about numerous movies. I have mixed feelings on NIGHT OF THE DEMONS. On one hand, I can’t think very highly of a movie that goes for three jump scares very early on. That loses points for it real quickly. It’s also one of those movies that I started liking less down the home stretch and I wished it would get to its inevitable conclusion sooner rather than later. On the other hand, it does have a few good moments, just not enough for a recommendation. **

Big (1988)

BIG (1988) Three-and-a-half stars

Twelve-year-old Joshua Baskin (David Moscow) cannot gain admittance on a roller coaster ride because he’s not tall enough, so the embarrassed young man finds a Zoltar Speaks machine and it grants his wish that he were big. Overnight, Joshua Baskin becomes 30 years old and he’s played by Tom Hanks for basically the rest of the movie.

BIG is by far the best of the body switch movies that were all the rave during the Reagan administration. Anybody sentient during that era can surely remember a body switch pic or two. Let’s see, we had OH! HEAVENLY DOG from 1980, whose July 11 release date predates Reagan and which gives us Chevy Chase trapped inside Benji … Chase provides voice-over for Benji in a rather dull murder mystery. Then, there’s LIKE FATHER LIKE SON from 1987 pairing Dudley Moore and Kirk Cameron, who just scream father and son, in one of the worst movies of all-time had it not come out during the same year as such cinematic landmarks as THE GARBAGE PAIL KIDS MOVIE, LEONARD PART 6, JAWS THE REVENGE, MANNEQUIN, and TEEN WOLF TOO. Never mind, it’s still one of the worst movies of all-time.

BIG streamlined and more or less perfected the body switch, because we stick with one character (Joshua Baskin) the whole time and there’s less of a suspension of disbelief required for the movie to work. For example, in LIKE FATHER LIKE SON, we have to picture Dudley Moore inside Kirk Cameron and vice-versa (pun and reference to another body switch movie intended), but it’s almost impossible since their speaking voices remain the same. Movies like LIKE FATHER LIKE SON are why the late Roger Ebert coined the phrase “The Idiot Plot.”

Hanks gives a strong performance, especially in conveying the whole child trapped inside a grown man’s body through body language, facial gestures, boyish enthusiasm, wide-eyed reactions. He works his predicament for laughs, for pathos, for drama, and there’s a compelling sequence during his first “big” day when he’s staying at this seedy New York City hotel and he’s scared by the real world. Hanks broke away from his poor man’s Bill Murray for the first time in his career and established his own niche that would culminate in playing Forrest Gump.

Elizabeth Perkins is just terrific in BIG and I don’t think she’s ever been either better or more beautiful than as Susan. Perkins matches Hanks every step of the way during their complicated romance and please go back and watch her during the farewell scene with Baskin. She kisses him on the forehead and strokes behind his ear, in a tender and more motherly fashion. She makes the scene work, as Hanks reverts back to Moscow as Baskin.

Robert Loggia (1930-2015) and John Heard (1946-2017) were two of the best character actors during their respective careers.

Loggia plays against type here as MacMillan, the owner of a toy company who takes a major liking to the way Baskin looks at toys; phooey to marketing reports, Baskin and MacMillan test toys the old-fashioned way by going straight to the biggest toy store. They pair together for a toy piano duet and create one of the most iconic movie scenes of the late 80s. It’s known quite simply as the “Big Piano Scene.”

There was often an edge to Heard during his performances and he taps into that edge a great deal in BIG. Heard creates a real jerk.

Penny Marshall became a name director after BIG and she and Hanks reunited for A LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN. Anne Spielberg and Gary Ross wrote the script and Barry Sonnenfeld worked as cinematographer; Ross later directed PLEASANTVILLE and Sonnenfeld’s directorial credits include GET SHORTY and MEN IN BLACK.

There seems to be a certain nostalgia for BIG, just like at times it seems like that’s all true for anything (the good and the bad, and the ugly) from the 80s.

How far can that nostalgia go? Well, there’s the Nostalgic Zoltar Speaks machine for sale on the Zoltar site. One machine comes equipped with a $10,500 price tag and that’s not counting any customization like a wireless microphone to talk through Zoltar ($425 without remote control, $520 with), breathing movement for Zoltar ($625), motion activated attract ($75), custom fortune cards, custom audio messages, and traveling case ($1,500 plastic, $650 wood).

If you do buy that Nostalgic Zoltar Speaks machine for a major chunk of change, do you dare make a wish, “I wish I were big.” I say you better for that level of investment.

They Live (1988)

THEY LIVE

THEY LIVE (1988) Three-and-a-half stars
Back in October 2018, I started writing movie reviews again and sharing them on Facebook so that we could have something else to read other than one more political diatribe or one more unfunny meme taking cheap shots at entire groups of people.

Months later, I will go against the grain and consider THEY LIVE, both an anti-yuppie, anti-Reagan satire and a kick ass 1980s action and science fiction thriller from director John Carpenter.

THEY LIVE came out November 4, 1988 and made $4.8 million during its opening weekend, earning one-third of its box office take.

Four days after THEY LIVE’s opening day, tough-talking and hard-hitting Texan conservative George H.W. Bush crushed soft and elitist Massachusetts liberal Michael Dukakis in the U.S. Presidential Election.

(Though, of course, Bush was born in Massachusetts, attended Yale, and belonged to Skull and Bones, a secret society at Yale, he was not one of the elite to his fervent supporters. Bush’s son, George W. Bush, later riffed on similar associations with Texas and Massachusetts in 2004 against John Kerry. I mean, don’t you know that Massachusetts is the exclusive domain of the most “pussy liberals” and “T is for Tough” just like “T is for Texas.” You can have the utmost faith in a Texan against terrorism.)

Bush could have used THEY LIVE’s most famous one-liner for his campaign slogan, “I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass … and I’m all out of bubblegum.”

In the long run, that might have worked out better for Bush — given his popularity after “Operation Nifty Package” and “Operation Desert Storm” — than “Read my lips: no new taxes,” a mantra written by Peggy Noonan for the 1988 Republican National Convention.

Likewise, THEY LIVE would have worked better for Dukakis than a tank, a photo op the Bush campaign used against Dukakis in a memorable 30-second ad with dramatic narration and subtitles, “He opposed new aircraft carriers. He opposed anti-satellite weapons. He opposed four missile systems, including the Pershing Two Missile deployment. Dukakis opposed the Stealth Bomber and a ground emergency warning system against nuclear attack. He even criticized our rescue mission to Grenada and our strike on Libya. And now he wants to be our Commander-in-Chief. America can’t afford that risk.”

“America can’t afford that risk” pops up on a screen mostly filled with the ridiculous image of a smiling Dukakis in that darn tank, topped off by that even more ridiculous name-tagged helmet “Mike Dukakis.” Dukakis looks like an absolute fool, an absolute tool, even worse than “strategic guest star” Eddie Murphy in BEST DEFENSE. Who would vote for this clown?

The Democrats would have been so much cooler if they had been able to latch on to THEY LIVE for the 1988 presidential campaign.

No, as we all know, they failed.

Just imagine an ad with Dukakis sitting at home watching the Republican National Convention and he puts on the THEY LIVE shades, revealing all the Republicans to be aliens. Their real agenda also shows up on screen: CONSUME — OBEY — SUBMIT — WATCH TV — BUY — MARRY REPRODUCE — DO NOT QUESTION AUTHORITY — NO THOUGHT — WORK 8 HOURS. (This would also work against the Democrats.)

I bet nobody can remember any negative campaign ad against Bush in the 1988 Election … but we all remember Willie Horton and “Revolving Door” against Dukakis painting him in broad ideological strokes. Again, leftist = wimp, conservative = tough guy.

It worked and still works.

I mean, where would Donald Trump be without such macho, tough guy associations?

You can just chuck any claims on “family values” and “Moral Majority” right out the window.

“I moved on her, and I failed. I’ll admit it.

“I did try and fuck her. She was married.

“And I moved on her very heavily. In fact, I took her out furniture shopping. She wanted to get some furniture. I said, ‘I’ll show you where they have some nice furniture.’ I took her out furniture — I moved on her like a bitch. But I couldn’t get there. And she was married. Then all of a sudden I see her, she’s now got the big phony tits and everything. She’s totally changed her look. …

“I better use some Tic Tacs just in case I start kissing her. You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab ‘em by the pussy. You can do anything.”

Now there’s a campaign slogan for your average Republican or Democrat candidate in an Election coming soon to a screen near you — I CAN DO ANYTHING.

(For the record, I think Trump, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Spike Lee, Ted Nugent, Rush Limbaugh, and Alec Baldwin are flip sides of the same coin.)

So THEY LIVE mixes liberal and radical ideology with, let’s face it, conservative ass kicking or “Rambo Meets The Sandinistas.”

THEY LIVE’s poster: “You see them on the street. You watch them on TV. You might even vote for one this fall. You think they’re people just like you. You’re wrong. Dead wrong.”

Carpenter, under the name “Frank Armitage,” adapted Ray Nelson’s 1963 short story “Eight O’Clock in the Morning.” Nelson and Philip K. Dick were friends and even co-conspirators on the 1967 alien invasion novel “The Ganymede Takeover.”

On the eve of the 2012 Election, Carpenter talked with “Entertainment Weekly,” “Well, THEY LIVE was a primal scream against Reaganism of the ‘80s. And the ‘80s never went away. They’re still with us. That’s what makes THEY LIVE look so fresh — it’s a document of greed and insanity. It’s about life in the United States then and now. If anything, things have gotten worse.”

In the same interview, Carpenter touched on why aliens should be evil and why professional wrestler — which should be synonymous with “professional actor” — Roddy Piper (1954-2015) landed the gig of the protagonist John Nada.

“First of all, I was a wrestling fan when I was young. Even when I figured out what wrestling was, I was still a fan. To me, Roddy just had a weathered face and looked like he’d been working all his life. He wasn’t a Hollywood star. He had some scars on his face and I thought he would be convincing walking into town with a backpack on his back looking for work. I’d met Roddy at Wrestlemania 3 in Pontiac, Michigan. He was a great heel.”

Piper works his way around one-liners every bit as effectively as both Clint Eastwood and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Not only the epic “bubblegum,” but also “Either put on these glasses or start eating that trash can,” “It looks like you dipped your face in the cheese dip back in 1957,” “That’s like pouring perfume on a pig,” and “Life’s a bitch, and she’s in heat.”

Piper was one of the all-time great wrestling trash talkers and that served him (and us) well in THEY LIVE.

Keith David plays the character Frank Armitage and we remember David from PLATOON, where he proved a nice counterpoint to Charlie Sheen’s green protagonist, especially in the first part of the film.

For example, in this dialogue, “Shit. You gotta be rich in the first place to think like that. Everybody know the poor are always being fucked over by the rich. Always have, always will.”

Piper and David have one of the memorable fights in THEY LIVE. “South Park” later paid tribute with a Timmy and Jimmy brawl.

Piper and David slug it out for a good six minutes — just because Dada wants Frank to put on the shades and Frank demurs — and in a 2015 article, Vulture starts out, “The fight lasts for six minutes and purportedly serves no purpose; its incomprehensible duration is the joke, and in lieu of a punch line, Carpenter gives us punches.”

Wrong, in that it serves no purpose.

For one, it’s a showcase for the professional wrestler.

Secondly, Piper and David wanted a real brawl, according to info found on IMDb, only faking hits to the face and groin. Apparently, the duo rehearsed their fisticuffs for three weeks. Their final brawl impressed Carpenter so much that he left every single bit of it in the film. The plans had originally been for a 20-second fight.

Finally, viewers have read it as a metaphor for working class people fighting each other rather than fighting their real enemies and that we are wasting our precious time in that fight amongst ourselves.

Six minutes in a movie could symbolize a lifetime in reality.

Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988)

KILLER KLOWNS

KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE (1988) Three-and-a-half stars
Sociologists would undoubtedly have a field day unpacking why KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE retains cult classic status.

We can start at the first two words in the title and focus upon our seemingly eternal fascination with both killers and clowns.

Then, our nostalgia for 1980s kitsch.

I don’t know, that’s not why I dig KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE, because, to begin with, I don’t quite have the same obsession with killers and clowns that most Americans have or I don’t suffer from “coulrophobia,” the irrational fear of clowns.

I know several people who seriously consider 1980s mass entertainments THE GOONIES, DIRTY DANCING, FERRIS BUELLER’S DAY OFF, THE BREAKFAST CLUB, et cetera, not only their favorite movies, but they’ll go on record and proclaim their favorite “the greatest movie ever made.” Talk about a conversational cul-de-sac, it’s happened so many darn times over the years especially during college. I lost track of how many times I stood there in stone face silence (like Buster Keaton) while my brain pondered exactly how many films these other people have seen and why they’re stuck in 1987, for crying out loud.

I did not see KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE until many years later, though I always remembered that glorious title before I put the down payment on the DVD.

I love KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE because it’s a demented cartoon (the best kind of cartoon) that has ingeniousness to spare: “The Big Top” for the Killer Klowns’ spaceship; popcorn ray-guns; cotton candy cocoons that produce a dread end for dead humans; an invisible Clown car; shadow puppetry; killer pies; and the 18-foot tall Killer Klown leader known as “Jojo the Klownzilla,” a man-in-a-suit Godzilla parody or tribute.

KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE will remind some viewers of Steve McQueen’s debut motion picture, THE BLOB (1958).

You know, kids on lovers’ lane see what could be Halley’s Comet … no, hey, wait, that’s what a crusty old farmer named Gene Green (Royal Dano) mistakes “The Big Top” for when he sees the same unidentified flying object streaking across the sky in the opening sequence and boy, oh boy, that’s a dread mistake for Mean Gene and his poor, poor loyal dog Pooh Bear when they go investigate. Ol’ Man Green speaks a few great lines before his inevitable exit, “What in tarnation is going on?”

Straight out of THE BLOB, teenage sweethearts Mike Tobacco (Grant Cramer) and Debbie Stone (Suzanne Snyder) also investigate further and they go to the local authorities with their findings, centered on “The Big Top” and its inner workings. Our two local authorities, of course, are hesitant to believe these wacko teenagers and their whacked out stories of popcorn-shooting guns and cotton candy cocoons.

Damn kids and their elaborate pranks.

We do have a more sympathetic police officer in Dave Hansen (John Allen Nelson) and I seem to remember every other more sympathetic police officer travels by the name “Dave.” You just know you can have total faith in a guy named Dave.

Yes, at least one more sympathetic police officer did have that first name, “Lt. Dave” in THE BLOB, who patiently listened to and believed the cockamamie stories of Steve (McQueen) and Jane (Aneta Corsaut).

Just like THE BLOB, we have one policeman more sympathetic to the kiddos in KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE and then we have Curtis Mooney, who seems like a relative of Dean Vernon Wormer from NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ANIMAL HOUSE.

Of course, there’s a brilliant reason for that, both characters are played by the same actor.

The late John Vernon (1932-2005) has a fabulous start to his IMDb biography: “John Vernon was a prolific stage-trained Canadian character player who made a career out of convincingly playing crafty villains, morally-bankrupt officials and heartless authority figures in American films and television since the 1960s.”

He’s great in KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE, picking up right where he left off in ANIMAL HOUSE.

Maybe Wormer relocated to Crescent Cove and changed his name to Curtis Mooney.

Cramer plays a protagonist named “Mike Tobacco” and it took me a little bit to remember a character from “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” and WILLY WONKA AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY named “Mike Teavee.” Are they distant relatives? While the TV obsessive Mike Teavee brought his obsession to another level in both the book and the 1971 film adaptation, we never see Mike Tobacco smoke tobacco in KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE, although we can be sure that Curtis Mooney believes that Mr. Tobacco’s smoking something stronger than tobacco when he descends upon the police station with that “killer clowns from outer space” story.

The Chiodo Bros. — Stephen, Charles, and Edward — are the auteurs behind KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE, siblings who specialize in clay models, creatures, stop motion, and animatronics. Their credits, in addition to the main film under discussion, include puppets and effects work for CRITTERS, ERNEST SCARED STUPID, and TEAM AMERICA: WORLD POLICE, as well as the Large Marge claymation scene from PEE-WEE’S BIG ADVENTURE.

They deserve a spot alongside such icons as Willis O’Brien and Ray Harryhausen.

On a certain level, KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE deals in a nostalgia for animation, horror, and science fiction entertainments of the past.

The IMDb lists numerous references, but the most important ones seem to be GODZILLA, INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS, FORBIDDEN PLANET, PHANTASM, and ALIEN, as well as THE BLOB, of course, all of which seasoned viewers will be able to notice.

The film’s tagline captures the spirit of the enterprise: “In space, no one can eat ice cream.”

Cane Toads: An Unnatural History (1988)

day 108, cane toads an unnatural history

CANE TOADS: AN UNNATURAL HISTORY (1988) Four stars
January 14, 2019 will go down in history as one of the great movie-watching days of my life.

Let’s see, I consumed a 1984 kung fu comedy with a little bit of everything including drunken boxing and a monster known as “Banana Monster” or “Watermelon Monster” (TAOISM DRUNKARD, a.k.a. DRUNKEN WU TANG); a 1983 made-for-TV documentary called FROM STAR WARS TO JEDI: THE MAKING OF A SAGA that took a behind-the-scenes look at the making of RETURN OF THE JEDI; a 1987 anime that one headline called “classic demon Anime loaded with succubi, gore and tentacles” (WICKED CITY); a 1985 Japanese comedy mixing a love of movies and a love of food (TAMPOPO); one of the better Godzilla movies (GODZILLA VS. BIOLLANTE); an older Jackie Chan and an older Pierce Brosnan making it work in THE FOREIGNER; a 1988 Krzysztof Kieslowski film called A SHORT FILM ABOUT LOVE that lasts over 80 minutes (guess in the long run 80 minutes constitutes a short time); and I started on Peter Jackson’s debut BAD TASTE before calling it a day.

In between THE FOREIGNER and A SHORT FILM ABOUT LOVE, I watched CANE TOADS: AN UNNATURAL HISTORY, a 47-minute documentary directed by Mark Lewis on a species taking over northern Australia.

I found a poster for the movie and it hits you with such blurbs as “An Absolute Delight!” (New York Times), “An assault of sex-mad giant toads munching their way across Australia!” (Roger Ebert), and “Riotously funny and hilariously twisted!” (Dallas Times Herald). It has CANE TOADS in huge letters across the top of the spread and a photo of a cane toad who’s as big as the girl who’s holding it.

Yes, it’s one of those “nature run amok” films.

We find out early on that in 1935, the cane toad was introduced to Australia as pest control on a beetle pestering their sugar cane.

Let’s just say that plan backfired, and it backfired miserably.

The toads are back in the headlines in Australia.

“Australian senator says government should pay welfare recipients to kill cane toads” reads one.

Senator Pauline Hanson wrote an open latter to Prime Minister Scott Morrison and she’s a beaut.

“Dear Prime Minister

“As Queensland and neighboring states go through our Summer months, a further explosion of cane toads are hatching, adding to the estimated 200 million already here in Australia.

“Since their misguided introduction to deal with cane beetle in the North Queensland town of Gordonvale in 1935, cane toad numbers have exploded beyond the borders of Queensland and are having enormous effect on native Australian species.

“Unlike native frogs that lay between 1,000 and 2,000 eggs during their breeding cycle, toads will lay between 8,000 and 35,000.

“Their poisonous toxin is deadly to many native species including lizards, quolls, dingoes and crocodiles. Adult cane toads will eat almost anything it can fit in its mouth, including dead animals and pet food scraps. Their appetite and prolific breeding cycle knows no boundaries.”

Parents think teenagers are bad.

Hanson called for swift, bipartisan action.

“I would also encourage you to introduce a 3 month bounty over the Summer months to help reduce the breeding numbers throughout Queensland, New South Wales, the Northern Territory and Western Australia.

“A 10 cent reward for the collection of each cane toad, I believe would encourage most Australians living with the pest to take an active roll (role) in reducing their numbers until a biological measure is developed.”

In the movie, Lewis reportedly wanted to create sympathy for the hated animal.

One resident said, “There are still quite a large number of the toads around, but not as big as they use to be. But I still let the animal and they give me a lot of enjoyment.”

We get a toad’s eye view of the world in a multitude of shots.

Our title creatures participate in a PSYCHO spoof.

They even get songs like “Cane Toad Blues” (Tim Finn) and “Warts ‘N All” (Don Spencer, Allan Caswell).

Around the five- or six-minute mark, Dr. Glen Ingram, then the Senior Curator Amphibia and Birds at Queensland Museum, explains the process of “Amplexus.”

These toads sure do love them a whole lotta “Amplexus.” They are responsible for the phrase “horny toad.”

For example, around 150 were introduced to Oahu in 1932 and in just 17 months, the toads numbered over 100,000.

One article described cane toads as “Fat, toxic and nocturnal.” For some reason, that description called to mind Dean Wormer telling Flounder, “Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son.”

Watching CANE TOADS: AN UNNATURAL HISTORY also brought to mind the 1972 American International exploitation picture FROGS.

One of the legends involving that low-budget picture was that many of the film’s 500 Florida frogs and 100 giant South American toads escaped during production.

Maybe they ran into the cane toads or movie star Ray Milland, who left FROGS three days early because he was such an unhappy camper.

Guess you could say that it’s more a laughing matter for somebody who doesn’t have to deal with cane toads in any way shape or form, because “They pose a bigger menace than the German Army in World War II” (quote from another movie poster).

Bloodsport (1988)

day 43, bloodsport

BLOODSPORT (1988) Three stars
RZA said that he’s probably watched THE 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN 300 times.

I have probably watched Jean-Claude Van Damme’s feature debut BLOODSPORT a good 100 times.

I can just remember being a young lad watching it every single damn time it played on cable television.

Yeah, every single time.

Idly clicking on that remote control day after day, depressed by all them channels and nothing to watch, then here came BLOODSPORT like an oasis in the sub-Sahara of Midwestern small town cable TV.

BLOODSPORT, you saved me from watching SHE’S OUT OF CONTROL again because there’s “nothing to do and nowhere to go.”

Van Damme played an important part in my adolescence. For a while, I was a raving JCVD fan, watching as many of his cheesy action flicks as possible. To be sure, JCVD had many, many fans during the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s, where his performing the splits at least once every flick became nearly as ubiquitous as Keanu Reeves saying “Whoa!” in all his films. All we needed was Van Damme splits followed by a Reeves “Whoa!” Life would have been perfect.

Eventually, though, I had to face the facts that Van Damme’s movies were not all that good.

Yeah, you’re right, I’m still mad about being ripped off by his 1997 pairing with Dennis Rodman, DOUBLE TEAM, and Rodman’s acting made a basketball fan pine away for the acting of his Chicago Bulls teammate Michael Jordan, who struggled considerably playing himself in SPACE JAM. That’s bad.

I felt ripped off by DOUBLE TEAM and somebody else rented it.

Oh dear Lord, I even forgot Mickey Rourke was in DOUBLE TEAM.

Roger Ebert started his review, “DOUBLE TEAM is one of the most preposterous action films ever made.”

That comes with the territory for Van Damme movies and it’s just amazing what cocaine will do.

Anyway, here we are back at BLOODSPORT, Van Damme’s magnum opus.

Under normal circumstances, it’s not a good movie, but like TEEN WOLF and OVER THE TOP, for example, I enjoy it particularly because it’s not good and it stockpiles cliches like rogue nations do atomic weapons. I like BLOODSPORT more than both TEEN WOLF and OVER THE TOP, though.

Let’s go through a brief cliche checklist for BLOODSPORT:

— Illegal martial arts tournament in Hong Kong.

— Our hero (Van Damme) who wants to go to honor his sensei, who trained our hero as if he was his own son.

— Our hero who must go absent without leave because his Army superiors balk at his participation in the martial arts tournament.

— The Army send a couple buffoons to chase our hero around Hong Kong. Bet they skip this film during a Forest Whitaker career retrospective.

— Our hero’s arch enemy (Bolo Yeung) in the illegal martial arts tournament who effectively creates a mood of menace until he finally opens his mouth to speak.

— Our hero’s new best friend (Donald Gibb), a loud-mouthed, cartoonish American who must take a fall to give the hero the revenge angle in the final match.

— Our hero’s obligatory love interest (Leah Ayres), who’s a reporter that wants access to the illegal martial arts tournament. She’s just appalled, terrified by the violence and, of course, wants the hero to not participate.

— How could I forget the loud, loud, loud rock music that’s used because the movie’s producers couldn’t afford Survivor.

Here it’s “Fight to Survive” by Stan Bush, a jaunty little rock number I remembered simply as “Kumite!,” the name of the illegal martial arts tournament the song chants until it’s hopelessly attached to your cerebrum.

Yes, that Stan Bush, who gave the world “The Touch” from TRANSFORMERS THE MOVIE, later covered by Dirk Diggler in BOOGIE NIGHTS during his cocaine wannabe rock star days.

In 1986, Bush’s “The Touch” and “Weird Al” Yankovic’s “Dare to Be Stupid” (Al’s Devo style parody) split a single. Epic. Surely, it was released on Epic Records. (How ironic that YouTube cued up “Dare to Be Stupid” right after rocking out to “The Touch.”)

Think I like “Fight to Survive” more than “The Touch.”

— There’s a child actor playing the young Frank Dux (later played by Van Damme) in BLOODSPORT and he’s an astonishingly bad actor. He’s named Pierre Rafini and his only credit listed on IMDb is “Young Frank.” Awesome.

Honestly, that’s not a huge liability, since he’s only in a small portion of the film, not like for example David Mendenhall in OVER THE TOP and Norman D. Golden II in COP AND A HALF, who mugged so heavily during their performances that I look for my wallet after every viewing of their respective films.

— Slow motion. Lots and lots of slow motion. Maybe the whole movie should have been made in slow motion and we’d have a GONE WITH THE WIND-length martial arts epic.

— “Based on a true story,” about as true as “The Amityville Horror.”

Credit: “This motion picture is based upon true events in the life of Frank W. Bux. From 1975 to 1980 Frank W. Dux fought 329 matches. He retired undefeated as the World Heavy Weight Full Contact Kumite Champion. … (yada yada yada not in credits yada yada yada).”

BLOODSPORT screenwriter Sheldon Lettich touched on Dux in an interview found on Asian Movie Pulse, “Frank told me a lot of a tall tales, most of which turned out to be bullshit. … There was one guy who he introduced me to, named Richard Bender, who claimed to have actually been at the Kumite event and who swore everything Frank told me was true. A few years later this guy had a falling out with Frank, and confessed to me that everything he told me about the Kumite was a lie; Frank had coached him in what to say. … Nearly everyone knew he (Dux) was just a delusional day-dreamer and a big bullshitter.”

Dux served as the fight choreographer for BLOODSPORT.

— Van Damme made such waves in the motion picture industry that he received a Razzie nomination for “Worst New Star” and his competition included Don the Talking Horse from HOT TO TROT, Tami Erin from THE NEW ADVENTURES OF PIPPI LONGSTOCKING, Robby Rosa from SALSA, and the winner Ronald McDonald from MAC AND ME.

Lettich received a Worst Screenplay nomination for his work with Sylvester Stallone for RAMBO III. Both lost to COCKTAIL and its screenplay by Heywood Gould.

— Cannon released BLOODSPORT and all I can say about that is “Electric Boogaloo.”

Poltergeist III (1988)

POLTERGEIST III (1988) One star
Cheech & Chong said “man” 295 times in UP IN SMOKE (1978).

By comparison, characters said “Carol Anne” 121 times in POLTERGEIST III.

Still, I have this nice dream where the movies are spliced together via the miracle of modern technology and somehow Cheech & Chong say “Carol Anne” rather than “man” 295 times. Yes, rather than the characters played by Tom Skerritt and Nancy Allen, Cheech & Chong are tracking down Carol Anne and fighting the evil spirits. Skerritt makes a cameo in this alternate POLTERGEIST III, since he played Strawberry in UP IN SMOKE and that will be his character this second time around.

I do have this strange habit of imagining alternate scenes or alternate entire movies pieced together from two different movies.

For example, I remember Carey Mulligan’s character singing “New York, New York” in SHAME (the Steve McQueen and not the Ingmar Bergman version) and then all of a sudden, I had this vision of the Gremlins’ grand musical production number of the same song in GREMLINS 2: THE NEW BATCH. Here was the big tender moment in SHAME and I wanted the Gremlins’ version instead to show up on the screen. It played out inside my head that Mulligan started before she was oh so rudely interrupted by the mass Gremlin chaos choir. I also sing the Gremlins’ version every time I come across Frank Sinatra’s standard, which must be one of the most overplayed songs in popular culture.

Fantasies like that help to pass time, especially during a bad movie like POLTERGEIST III where I often can’t stand the sight of what’s on screen.

In economics, the law of diminishing returns refers to a point at which the profit becomes less than the amount of money or energy invested.

In movies, diminishing returns refers mainly to sequels that are vastly inferior to previous films in the series. Just look at any number of movie series for examples.

This third POLTERGEIST tries our patience right from the start with its central premise and it only gets worse through its execution.

It’s rather sick.

I mean, that poor child Carol Anne (played by Heather O’Rourke).

Why couldn’t they just let her be after POLTERGEIST II: THE OTHER SIDE?

What she endured in the first two movies would be enough for several lifetimes, but she’s back for a third installment and without her parents (Craig T. Nelson and Jo Beth Williams) and brother (Oliver Robins). Carol Anne’s been sent to live with her aunt (Allen) and uncle (Skerritt) at their high rise apartment in Chicago.

We know that she’s going to be put through the wringer for the third time as soon as we see her, no matter that she’s 2,000 miles and 30 hours by car away from Southern California, location of the infinitely superior first POLTERGEIST.

(By the way, Nelson was approached to return for POLTERGEIST III but he reportedly said “Two was enough.” That’s nowhere as brilliant as what Roy Scheider thought about JAWS 3-D, “Mephistopheles couldn’t talk me into doing (it). They knew better than to even ask.”)

POLTERGEIST III saddles poor Carol Anne with a psychiatrist named Dr. Seaton (Richard Fire). Of course, in the movies, psychiatrists normally do more harm than good and well, this Dr. Seaton character follows that character pattern to a T. Dr. Seaton encourages Carol Anne to chat with him about her experiences, though he believes her to be delusional, and, of course, this discussion enables the evil spirit of Rev. Henry Kane to find Carol Anne and wreak havoc on her once again.

This Dr. Seaton is a real piece of work. He belongs in the annals of bad screen doctors alongside such notables as the paranormal investigator played by Robert Joy in AMITYVILLE 3-D and the psychiatrist played by Bruce Willis in COLOR OF NIGHT.

A demon first burns Joy’s Dr. Elliot West’s face and then drags him to Hell. One of just a couple highlights in AMITYVILLE 3-D.

Dr. Seaton gets pushed to his death down the empty elevator shaft of the 100-story John Hancock Center.

Willis’ psychiatrist lives through COLOR OF NIGHT.

Well, you know, two out of three ain’t bad.

The POLTERGEIST movies, especially this third installment, have long been tinged with sadness and talk of the “Poltergeist Curse” almost overshadows the movies.

Dominique Dunne, who played Carol Anne’s older sister, died at the age of 22 five months to the day after the release of POLTERGEIST. Dunne’s ex-boyfriend, John Thomas Sweeney, strangled Dunne in the driveway of her West Hollywood home. Dunne went into a coma and died five days later on November 4, 1982.

O’Rourke died at the age of 12 on February 1, 1988 under extremely unusual circumstances. She died of cardiopulmonary arrest caused by septic shock due to intestinal stenosis, and her manager said at the time, “It’s weird. She was completely healthy Saturday, they thought she had the flu on Sunday and she was dead on Monday.” She had been diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease (chronic inflammation of the intestines) in 1987.

Dunne and O’Rourke are buried at the Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles.

POLTERGEIST III (released June 10, 1988) was O’Rourke’s last film and it was dedicated to her memory.