Once again, there is nothing like seeing a film with an appreciative audience. Last nights group gathered for a screening of Blade, was not massive like the Rocky Horror and Road Warrior Screenings have been, but they were loud and enthusiastic. From the moment that Wesley Snipes enters the picture, his every move was marveled at, cheered and certainly appreciated. "Blade" may be the coolest superhero to ever don tactical gear, sunglasses, and a katana.
The back story does not matter much, let's just say that Blade is a vampire and a vampire hunter. This movie was a Marvel film a decade before the start of the Cinematic Universe they created. It has the trappings of most of the comic book movies of that era, techno music, early CGI and some story shorthand that is needed to get things rolling right to the action. The villain is a young handsome upcoming actor, Stephen Dorff, the plot gives Blade a female counterpart and a sidekick, and there is a conspiracy with the real authorities. Oh, and the climax of the film involves some mumbo jumbo about a Vampire God.
Sometimes last night's audience was hooting at some of the outdated moments. The villain for instance uses a computer with some primitive graphics that might have been cutting edge in their day but now look quaint. Kris Kristofferson plays the withering sidekick to Blade, and his indifference to the gasoline he is pumping while lighting a cigarette provoked howls because it was supposed to. By the way, Kristofferson is the spitting image in this film of my buddy Don Hayes.
Snipes gets to kick ass several times in the film. His opening salvo involves silver infused bullets that cause the vampires to explode. There is a nice scene with some stakes, a knife and the sharp edged boomerang that is supposed to have been designed by his partner. The main battle at the end however is a sword fight that would be impossible for him to win because of the supercharged nature of the villain. That might be a problem but the cool part is that Blade gets to perform what would have been the coup de grace several times in the scene.
There are two sequels to this film, I don't think I have seen either of them. This is only the second time I saw this film, and it felt a lot like a first time since I remembered very little about it. I think the reboot should be pretty good, but let's face it, no one is going to replace Wesley Snipes. Mahershala Ali will be cool, but he won't be cool in the same 90's way.
We had started the day with "Disney's Sleeping Beauty", but we finished it with two Vincent Price Horror Classics. A pretty good juxtaposition for a Saturday spent in a movie theater.
HOUSE OF WAX
Vincent Price started his career as a horror icon with this 1953 production. Up to this point he had been a reliable secondary character who sometimes got a chance to steal a scene, but this is the film where his melodious voice starts being used for terrifying purposes. If you watch the trailer above, Price gets a small mention. but the thing that was being used to sell this movie was the 3-D presentation. I know that I saw this in 3-D at one point, because I remembered a couple of the obvious gimmicks they included to make the 3-D pop. I had this on my itinerary for the TCM Festival this year, but when we had to cancel our attendance at the last moment because our dog had to have life saving surgery, it went by the wayside, along with all of my other plans and money.
Fortunately, The Paramount Classic Summer Film Series programmed it for this year. Maybe as a result of Steve, the main programmer having seen it himself at the TCMFF, which he referenced in his introduction of the films. Unfortunately this was not a 3-D screening, but the film doesn't really need that gimmick to work, it is very solid on it's own. Price is Professor Henry Jarrord, a sculptor who works in wax back in NYC around the turn of the 20th Century. He has great artistic pretentions and is a little too enamored by his Marie Antionette. When his business partner tries to murder him in an act of arson, he appears to have survived, but his hands are so injured that he cannot sculpt anymore. How does he compensate? Ah, that is where the mystery comes in.
The plotting is a little old fashioned but it moves along at a solid pace and the actors are interesting enough for us to follow along. Especially delightful is Carolyn Jones who most people will recognize from the 1960s version of the Addams Family. She plays the roommate of the main female lead, a girl who is a little free for the times and ends up like a lot of sexually liberated teens do in modern slashers. Her friend and the main character Sue is played by Phillis Kirk (pretty close to my Mom's Name, they both had SAG cards in the early fifties). The movie plays out as Sue is stalked by a mysterious lurker, and a boy she is romantically involved with, takes a role as sculptor for Jarrod's revived House of Wax.
There are several grim scenes that might bug sensitive souls, but there is no gore in the film. The Wax figures are interesting but the set up is primitive compared to the way later exhibits would take on the sensational and macabre scenes that draw people in addition to celebrity's figures. Price is just great as a talented but demented figure, driven mad by the loss of his life's work and his talents. You will get a kick over his enthusiastic line readings when he talks about the sculptures as if they are real. He romanticizes his work to the nth degree.
THEATER OF BLOOD
To the best of my recollection, I saw this while I was in High School. My friend Don Hayes seems to remember going with me, and that is quite possible. I know we saw "The House That Dripped Blood" together and so it's very likely we saw this one as well. Vincent Price himself thought of this as one of his favorite films, and it is easy to see why. In addition to playing a mad actor wreaking revenge on critics who had maligned him, he gets a chance to quote liberally from the works of Shakespeare and it is a bit like a compilation reel for a stage actor to have when called for. His range is very good.
Like most horror films, it is the kills that the audience is waiting for and the trick here is that Edward Lionheart, the actor Price is playing, uses scenes from the Shakespeare plays he performed in his last repertory season. The film is as much a comedy as it is a horror film, so the gruesome deaths are often accompanied by a quip or two that might have come from either the Bard himself, or a stage critic. Either way, the justice that Lionheart feels he is doling out is poetic as a result.
The film might very well encourage you to seek out some of the plays featured, because they are not all the best known of Shakespeare's works. One of the critic's continues to be dismissive of Lionheart, even after several murders when he points out that "The Merchant of Venice" has no murder in it, he declares " It's him, all right. Only Lionheart would have the temerity to rewrite Shakespeare!". Of course others have been doing so for years before and after this film, but it is still a funny line.
As we encounter the critics, we can begin to see the coarseness of their opinions and the way those words might have a deeper impact than merely being playful metaphors in a review. Although it is one of the more creative murders in the story, the death of Robert Morely's character feels a little sadder because it is not just he who suffers the wrath of Lionheart. I heard several intakes of breath at the screening when audience members suddenly realized what was about to be revealed. It was a cruel moment with a horrifying visual exclamation point, but it is also completely memorable and in keeping with the thrust of the film.
The band of addicts that make up Lionheart's new troupe of actors are the strangest part of the story, but I am willing to go along with their crazy behavior as long as it makes the film interesting. Diana Rigg plays Edward's loyal daughter and biggest fan. She bounces between scenes as a member of the crazed troupe and as a tech working on films, who provides some exposition for the chief critic that will be the last target of Lionheart. There are several very recognizable actors who play the guest victims if the film, and they also seem to be having some fun.
In a complete turnaround from the previous night's Rocky Horror extravaganza, the Paramount had this Walt Disney Classic Scheduled, complete with Princess Aurora in the lobby to take pictures with for all the little princesses who came to the screening. Amanda was wearing her Sleeping Beauty dress, but I could not convince her to pose with Aurora.
Disney's Sleeping Beauty was the last of the strictly hand drawn animation films, other processes using different technologies have followed. It is a fabulous looking movie with vivid colors, detailed backgrounds and characters with very distinctive features. The three fairies Flora, Fauna and Merryweather are delightful in their differences, and the color scheme becomes a running joke in the film, which ties them to the vision of the movie as well as the plot.
In fact, the good fairies are really the main characters in the movie even though there is a love story and a hero. Merryweather is able to change the evil spell that Maleficent, an evil fairy has cast, so that it is sleep rather than death which ensnares the princess. The fairies are the ones who take the princess as an infant and hide her. When they discover that the young man that Briar Rose (Aurora) has fallen in love with, it is they who come to his rescue when he is captured by Maleficent. They give him weapons to fight her and cast spells to assist him. Aurora and Prince Phillip are almost secondary characters to the story of the fairies.
The film uses a score adapted from the Tchaikovsky's ballet "Sleeping Beauty." The music then feels completely familiar. The main theme which becomes the song "Once Upon a Dream" is lovely and very recognizable, even for neophytes of the ballet world. The style of the castles seems to be authentic of mediaeval European eras but my guess is that is was most closely based on the castle that was already at Disneyland and called Sleeping Beauty's castle, even before the film was finished.
Maleficent is an evil and compelling villain and her look was so effective that when the reimagining of fairy tales fad took over a few years ago, she was a natural. I did not really think it was needed, and I am happy with this iteration of her character. The animals in the film are well used, including three birds who reflect the colors of the good fairies and the raven which is Maleficent's familiar. The two kings are great contrasts visually, one being stout and the other quite lean.
Just as an aside, this is one of the most beautiful LaserDisc packages of a movie.
The Video clip above was shared with us on Saturday Night by Director Robert Rodriguez. He has been hosting a set of five films during the Paramount Classic Film Series, and he was there to share some enthusiasm about this movie. As he explained it, he picked films to talk about because he'd had a chance to meet the film makers responsible for these movies that he loved. Miller was a guest on a talk show that Rodriguez hosts called "The Director's Chair". It was a visit by miller to SXSW a few years ago that gave Rodriguez a chance to sit down with Miller and talk about this film. I have included a video of that interview below.
The few minutes that our host spent talking with us about this film was plenty to get everyone stoked to see "The Road Warrior" as it was known in the States. I first saw this film in 1982, during one of the great cinema summers of all time. I had not seen the original "Mad Max" at that point, so the marketing of the film to an audience as if it were a stand alone feature seems to have worked, since the U.S. was the one territory that "mad Max" was not a big hit in. Rodriguez attributes the failure to the version that played in the states which had a dreadful dubbing, supposedly because we Americans would have a hard time making out the Australian dialect. There was very little chance for that to be a problem with this movie, which is told so visually, you could just about forgo the dialogue.
A dystopian story of survival, where fuel is the most precious resource and gangs of marauders kill and destroy their way across the countryside seeking it, "the Road Warrior " feels like a samurai movie, with a lone outcast coming to the rescue of a town of innocents besieged by the desert pirates. This movie is full of inventive moments and ideas. The Gyro Captain is an antagonist at first, and then an ally. The very idea of the mini-helicopter in this setting was really creative. Max has a symbiotic relationship with a dog that is paralleled by the Gyro Capitan and his snake. Of course the dog is a lot more appealing, and when he exits the story (off screen thankfully) the audience responds sympathetically.
The film is forty years old but I still want to avoid spoilers if any of you have not seen it yet. I do need to say that the twist in the plot to escape at the end was very effective, and another one of those inventive elements that make this movie rise to a level far above the other exploitation material that it could be compared to from the era. In addition to the clever plot moments, the film has some of the greatest car stunts you are likely to encounter. They were done in camera, on set, not in a computer while someone was working from home. The video clip above hints at the dangerous nature of the stunts, but the real breathtaking moments are in the film. Cars levitate due to explosions. Bodies are thrown spinning through the air because of collisions, and jump scares pop out at 70 miles an hour.
The climax of the film is a long chase sequence that is deservedly legendary. Mel Gibson is the stoic hero who drives a tanker seemingly filled with the black gold. as it is pursued by a horde of ruffians that are so distinctive, as to have been copied by a dozen other dystopian movies ever since. The whole chase is accentuated by a propulsive score from Australian composer Brian May. In an aside to the audience, Robert Rodriguez advised us not to listen to it when we are behind the wheel of a car, it might propel us to hit the accelerator inappropriately.
I can rewatch this movie endlessly, it works so well and never feels like it gives you a moment to breathe, even though there are some interludes where there is no action taking place. The poster you see here, was one of two that I helped my friend Dan Hasegawa mount so he could display them in his office at Cal State Fullerton while he was in grad school. I never owned a copy of it and frankly that is to my shame because it is really spectacular. [The other Poster was for "Red Dawn" which I also wish I had.]
Max is an anti-hero in the traditional sense of the word. He does things that are heroic, but he does them for his own reasons, never out of a sense of altruism. One of the points that this movie makes is that such a world view is likely to be the end of civilization, so we ought to give a damn about something, even if it is cool on screen to be a little nihilistic.
Rodriguez displaying a gift he received from Road Warrior Director George Miller.
