Movieline Online

“Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.” It’s a warning repeated time and time again in mad scientist movies just after some creature created on a slab is finally burned, be-headed or drowned in a swamp. But it applies to filmmakers themselves as well, particularly the team responsible for Zombie Night and Zombie Night 2: Awakening . While relatively inexpensive video and editing systems have made it easy for just about anyone to make a quote-unquote “movie,” technology can’t replace talent…either behind or in front of the camera. And both of these low-rent gore films were lacking in almost every area except ambition. But, giving credit where credit is due, the same group of filmmakers came up with a rather clever idea for their follow-up project, Reel Zombies . In this faux-documentary an actual zombie apocalypse goes down with all the typical death and destruction (all off-screen, of course). But producer Mike Masters (playing himself, as does the rest of the cast and c...

For filmmakers adapting a popular comic book character to the screen, one of the first questions they face must be “How faithful has this thing got to be?” Treat the original text as a bible and you deliver a dated, cornball superhero in tights. But go too far afield from the source material and you’ve suddenly have millions of fanboys planning a boycott. The Shadow (1994) went out on a limb and stuck with a ‘30s setting complete with tommy guns, glamorous dames and wise-guy dialogue. It was a risky move by screenwriter David Koepp ( Carlito’s Way, Jurassic Park ) considering Dick Tracy – which mined much of the same material – was only moderately successful four years earlier and got hammered by critics (although that might have been the “Madonna” factor). But director Russell Mulcahy’s ( Highlander ) film seem to revel in its cornball cinematic status, set against phony backdrops and questionable special effects that almost dare you to make fun of them. Alec Baldwin plays La...

Discounting the brief media attention brought on by the success of The Artist , it’s only a matter of time before classics of the silent era become irrelevant to all but the most studious of film historians. Luckily, that’s exactly whom Kino Classics caters to with their blu-ray release of 1920’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde which includes not only the John Barrymore film, but a 15-minute segment of the rival version produced by Louis B. Mayer, and the complete one-reel version of the story filmed in 1912. All of them are a bit rough around the edges compared to later adaptations like the Spencer Tracey / Ingrid Bergman version from 1941, but Barrymore’s performance as both the uptight Jekyll and monstrous Hyde drew accolades at the time of its release. The impact of that performance has obviously lessened with the passing of time, with the actor’s “transformation” consisting of little more than jerks and spasms that bear an uncanny resemblance to Martin Short. That said, for its era D...

Michael Mann wasn’t the first or last director to be accused of delivering style over substance. But few filmmakers had the same sort of pop culture impact to throw back in the face of their critics. Of course, Miami Vice had the most widespread influence, but Mann was perfecting his craft with Thief three years earlier. Starring James Caan as an all-business-all-the-time professional safe cracker, this 1981 heist-drama was at the forefront of the new age of modern cops and robbers crime stories. Like most of the director’s early ‘80s output, Thief is populated with characters we already know: criminal kingpins, hired guns, dirty cops and noble felons. But Mann’s cinematic innovation was using this familiarity to sidestep the usual tired screenwriting scenarios, freeing him up to focus on the mood of each scene rather than the motivation. A product of the prison system, Frank (James Caan) is anxious to create a new life for himself using the skills he learned in prison from h...

It’s fairly well established that no Spaghetti western will ever top the work of Sergio Leone, particularly Once Upon a Time in the West , which best encapsulates the director’s operatic, cinematic-style. So fans have now accepted that the best they can do is argue “Who’s Number Two?” But even that debate poses problems, with nearly a dozen Italian shoot ‘em ups in the running. Grindhouse Releasing submits the latest candidate, The Big Gundown (1966), with a massive four-disc set, including two hi-def versions of the film, an expanded U.S cut on DVD and the rare soundtrack CD featuring the score by legendary Ennio Morricone. Marketed in the U.S. as the return of “Mr. Ugly,” The Big Gundown gives star Lee Van Cleef his most interesting role outside of the Leone collaborations. Here he plays a vigilante of sorts, John Corbett, tracking down dangerous outlaws simply to make Texas a safer place to live. His exploits have catapulted him to the steps of public office and attracted th...

Part of the horror remake craze of the early ‘80s, Paul Schrader’s take on Cat People never quite fit with the more conventional reboots like The Thing or more contemporary reimaginings like An American Werewolf in London . First of all, producer Val Lewton’s 1942 original was never all that conventional in the first place. As directed by noir specialist Jacques Tourneur, the film was only tangentially a horror film to begin with, dealing with repressed sexuality and psychological fears with a level of subtlety rare in genre films at the time. Schrader’s remake amps up the eroticism, adds some mild S & M and an entirely new mythological back-story. If not an outright improvement, it’s at the very least an interesting interpretation of the original story, but one that never knows quite how to maintain its status as a “horror film.” Irena (Nastassia Kinski) arrives in New Orleans to meet her brother Paul (Malcolm McDowell), reunited after growing up in separate orphanages. ...

For my money, 2010’s Insidious was the scariest movie of the 2000s. And surprisingly enough, it came from the creators of Saw , one of the most plodding and tortuous (no pun intended) horror film franchises ever. If anything, that proves writer Leigh Whannell and director James Wan know how to stay ahead of a trend. And with horror moving in a more suggestive direction, the creative duo struck a nerve with little more than creaking doors, spooky voices and a whole lot of Poltergeist references. Insidious: Chapter 2 reunites the entire team behind and in front of the cameras, with Rose Byrne returning as the beleaguered wife of Josh Lambert (Patrick Wilson) who returned from the netherworld to retrieve their astral projecting son from a flame-faced demon. But unfortunately, it wasn’t actually Josh who came back. Possessed by the twisted spirit of a mass murderer, his body’s new occupant has the most evil intentions towards the rest of the family, which prompts matriarch Lorrain...