This Week in Rixflix #13: June 2-8, 2017

Boy, did my movie count dip the week of June 2-8, and if I had not watched a slew of films those first four days (13 of the 18 films overall), it probably would have been even less. The reason? The buildup to the James Comey testimony, then the actual sessions, and the discussion in the aftermath ate up so much of my spare time on the weekdays that it was really hard to think about anything else.

This year has been so dominated by news about He-Who-Must-Be-Orange that it is no wonder that I have smothered my senses so intensely in movie after movie after movie. It's not the real reason that I watch so many films, but an outsider, knowing at the least of my political leanings, could only surmise that the continued presence of President Rage Toddler has me in such a deep depression that I can only find solace by immersing myself in film history. Well, he does not. He annoys the hell out of me every time I even think about his voice or face, but he has no effect on my film viewing habits. Except when there is the possibility of hearings that will hopefully lead to exposing his criminal ways once and for all on legal grounds – not just on social media, though he does a fine job of that himself – that will – hopefully – eventually get him and his graceless family expelled from the White House.

No, I just naturally watch film after film – I have done this for most of my life, and will continue to do so because for me it is simply a part of breathing. I wake up, I put on a movie, I watch a big chunk of it, maybe I will stop it to write for a while, grab some breakfast, watch another 40 minutes of the film, or maybe I finish watching it instead and then write... it really depends on where the day takes me. Not having regular work has made it even easier to immerse myself in these activities, but even when I did have a solid gig, I still managed to average 2-3 films a day. As I said, it's how I breathe...

[Note: the above was written today during the news of the Washington shooting at the baseball field. There is a lot of talk about how deeply divided we are today, and I have always agreed that bipartisanship is the only way to get things done for this country. However, the White House is going to use this opportunity to try to distract us and pave over the investigations going on currently involving Drumpf and his toadies. However much I want peace and harmony in this country and especially the world, I also want the Angry Orange permanently away from any shiny, candy-colored buttons in the War Room. This must be achieved lawfully and correctly, and without any violence, as the use of violence in our democratic process degrades us all.]

The Numbers:

This week's feature-length film count: 18; 12 first-time viewings and 6 repeats.
Highest rated feature-length film: The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) – 9/9
Lowest rated feature film: Shark Babes (2015) – 2/9
Average films per day in June so far: 2.37
Average films per day in 2017 so far: 3.0063
Consecutive days with at least 1 feature-length film seen: 177

The Reviews:

The New Land [aka Nybyggarna] (1972) Dir.: Jan Troell – A couple of years ago, I watched the first of two films by Jan Troell about Swedish immigrants in the United States trying desperately to survive as they traveled through a strange new world in the mid-19th century. That film was called The Emigrants, and it was a remarkably vivid portrayal of people who could lived hardscrabble lives that were likely quite similar to those of my own Swedish ancestors at the same time. That the location of the land where the main characters set up their farm in Minnesota is less than an hour by car today from the county where my father grew up just across the border and north a bit in Wisconsin drives the point home even harder. The follow-up film, The New Land, based like The Emigrants, on the same series of novels by Vilhelm Morberg, is like its predecessor in that it is intricately and lovingly detailed with period touches and also glacially paced. (Both films are well over three hours in running time, so the easily bored should endeavor to avoid this pair.) But slow going does not mean the films weren't completely spellbinding to me, if not a little off-putting at times in how the immigrants react to their new surroundings and its inhabitants. This film in particular has the main characters, played by Bergman regulars Max von Sydow and Liv Ullmann, learning to deal with the native Sioux in the area. The use of indigenous peoples in The New Land is certainly far different than most American portrayals on film, and it will prove most effective when the story contains elements of the Sioux Uprising of 1862, which leads to some of the more jarringly graphic imagery in the film. I am not sure that I would wish to take this journey on film again, though if I did, I would prefer to watch both films back to back. And maybe with some of my older relatives to dig into their memories of our ancestors' corresponding experiences. Fascinating films overall.  – TC4P Rating: 8/9

Yentl (1983) Dir.: Barbara Streisand – There has not been a moment since 1983 where I haven't been prone to suddenly singing in mock fashion the words "Papa can you hear me?" And yet, I have never actually seen Yentl, the film musical directed, produced and starring Barbara Streisand from which the song that carries that line is derived. I had tried to watch it on VHS and cable back in the day but always pulled out of it, and in recent years had recorded it on DVR a handful of times but never quite watched it. Now, I tell you this because your first thought is going to be "Well, yeah, you're a guy (and presumably straight)... why would you want to watch a Barbara Streisand film, especially where she sings?" Well, I grew up with Streisand played in our house, and one memorable evening, I watched a network TV showing of What's Up Doc?, her 1972 Peter Bogdanovich romantic comedy with Ryan O'Neal. The film became a favorite, I came to understand that she was a terrific comedienne and actress, and accepted her from that moment onward. Sure, her music is not my thing normally, but she has that incredible voice, which is featured prominently in Yentl, though I found the music to really be secondary to the story in the film. It's big and brash and lovingly filmed (the heart is quite apparent in the storytelling), but wondered if maybe the musical portion of it wasn't really necessary. Of course, if you take the music out of it, then there is really no reason for a then-40-year-old Streisand to be in the film playing a teenage girl posing as a boy, but if you take her out of it, then the movie doesn't get financed. (The production history is quite convoluted, and really, the more you know about it, the less it looks like a Streisand vanity project in casting herself.) The film is at a tad overlong, and my patience for it actually ran out late in the film, but still I stuck around. It's a pretty film, has some lovely moments, Mandy Patinkin really is a force of nature, and Streisand does just fine despite the whole age thing. And I have checked off another Oscar nominee.  – TC4P Rating: 7/9

Joyride (1977) Dir.: Joseph Ruben – I sometimes wonder if people who actually live in New York and L.A. get upset these days when so many productions are filmed in Vancouver, even when the shows and films sometimes take place in N.Y.C. and L.A. Do they gripe about the minutiae as much as people in other places? Ah, studio filming... Me, I grew up in Alaska, and have had to deal most of my life with things being not quite right in the details when productions filmed elsewhere are supposed to take place in Anchorage, Fairbanks, Nome, Barrow, or some other (often fictional) Alaskan town. While trying to track down a different film from 1977 a couple of weeks back, a search on YouTube gave me a list of other productions from that year, some of which I had never heard before. One of those titles was named Joyride. Seeing that the film had Robert Carradine, Desi Arnaz Jr., and a young Melanie Griffith in it, a quick look at IMDb revealed that the film is supposed to be about three teenagers taking a literal joyride on the lam as they head up to Alaska. Count me in, if only to see if they actually get anywhere near my home state. Nope... I should have just assumed it was so. Joyride was instead shot in Washington, much like Northern Exposure and many other things with supposedly Alaskan locales. I was expecting typical teen prank antics and low grade sleaze, but the film was far grittier than I expected, with some surprisingly dark turns hidden inside. The watch, however, was lessened by the low quality version that I had found. Still, there was enough that I found of interest that I came away knowing I would like to track down a decent copy in the future. So, did anything in the film seem like the actual Alaska at any point? Only fleetingly, but I figured it was probably accidental, though I am not going to hold it against the film. You do what you can with what you've got...  – TC4P Rating: 6/9

The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) Dir.: Lewis Gilbert and For Your Eyes Only (1981) Dir.: John Glen – Roger Moore died recently, and while he has never quite been my favorite Bond (I was too influenced by the Connery films early on), Moore had been a constant presence in my life beyond Bond. I grew up watching Moore on two different series: Maverick, where he filled in for a season as Beau, the smooth English cousin of the Maverick brothers after James Garner left the series in 1960, and as The Saint, Simon Templar, on repeats of his 1962-1969 British series. By the time I was twelve, Moore was already established as the new James Bond, having appeared in Live and Let Die and The Man with the Golden Gun by that point. As I did with the Bond films with Sean Connery, I grew up seeing the films on the occasional Sunday night on ABC, where they were all regularly shown in the '70s. But it wasn't until 1977's The Spy Who Loved Me that I saw a Bond film in the theatre. With my parents' going through their divorce and me at the age where I was incessantly annoying about everything, but going to see movies was becoming most special of all to me (once more, we did not have a movie theatre in our small Alaskan town and had to drive to "big city" Anchorage to see them), my mom left my still too young little brothers with my dad and took me to see Bond on our own. It was showing in a double feature with Won Ton Ton, the Dog Who Saved Hollywood (more on that at another time), and we sat in the front row with a Ziploc bag of popcorn that we popped and buttered at home, Doritos that my mom sneaked inside of her bag, and a can of spray cheese in a can to load up the Doritos. It was magnificent!

Moore's death a few weeks ago coincided with the 40th anniversary celebration of the release of The Spy Who Loved Me, which served as arguably the high water mark for his series of seven Bond films at the time (I prefer Golden Gun overall now). I knew it was the anniversary, but hadn't really considered that I might have the chance to see it again on the big screen. Surprise! While we were at the AMC Dine-In Theatres getting ready to watch Wonder Woman on the day it opened, there was a special event advertisement for a double feature showing of Spy and For Your Eyes Only, but the first date (May 31) had past, but the second was in two days (June 4). I didn't really think about it that moment, but by that evening, I had determined that I was going to get to that double feature rain or shine. It meant going by myself since Jen worked, but nothing would stop me. That Sunday, I found myself in Orange, settling in for an afternoon double at the AMC at the Block, and had a terrific experience with the dozen or so other people in the theatre. 

A big thing for me was that these were two of the five Bond films that feature sharks in them (and Spy also has Richard Kiel as the metal-mouthed assassin "Jaws," who quite literally bites a shark to death in the film), but halfway through Spy, while Moore and the gorgeous Barbara Bach are wandering around the Egyptian pyramids, the projector totally stopped, and my fellow patrons and I found ourselves cloaked in darkness for almost 15 minutes. Part of the time, we discussed the film lightly – everyone was greatly enjoying seeing these films on a big screen again – but of course, a couple of us, myself included, ran out to talk to the management, and finally got someone to check on the problem. After the second film was over, the manager was standing by the side as we were exiting and handed each of us a free entry pass for another film, telling us that they didn't know what happened except that the projection system just completely shut down. I will take a free movie ticket any day, and since we saw the whole of the film regardless, no harm, no foul. I got two Bonds, I got Jaws, and most especially, I got tiger sharks. I also saw Alien: Covenant again right before the Bond flicks. That's a full, grand day at the movies for me. – "Spy" TC4P Rating: 7/9; "Eyes" TC4P Rating: 6/9

The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) Dir.: James Whale – No review here, just some quick editorializing and plugging. My love for the Universal Monsters films goes back ages to my very youth, when I saw most of the original films in my early teen years (with a few exceptions, like the later Mummy films featuring Kharis). I have also owned many of the films on VHS, all of them on DVD, and jumped a good portion of them up to Blu-ray a few years ago. That they are a constant presence in my life is to never be doubted. So, why is it that I still watch them on television every time that they cross my path? I don't mean just on Turner Classic Movies, where a handful of Frankensteins may show up from time to time, and not necessarily just in October when they usually hold special events for horror films. I refer to when something like The Bride of Frankenstein – arguably the most accomplished, giddiest and purest example of the Universal monster film – pops up on MeTV on the Svengoolie show on Saturday nights. 

Well, the answer is that I rarely skip out on watching ol' Sven even if I have seen all of the films he shows dozens of times outside the show. It is no surprise that I have a great fondness for horror host shows (especially if at least mildly professionally executed) and while I did not grow up with Svengoolie as a regular showcase like many others in different parts of the country did, I certainly wish to take advantage of him now, especially since Elvira's latest series only played for a short period and we have to wait a bit for the next MST3K season. (Yes, it has mostly sci-fi trappings, but I still count it in the same vein; they do show a lot of movies with monsters in them.) Me, I don't mind the commercials (if you DVR it, even better, but I like to watch it live) and the 12-yea-old in me still enjoys the intentionally lame jokes and interruptions. I am just happy knowing that someone is still putting Dracula, Godzilla, Frankenstein, and the rest of the gang on TV so that newer generations can discover and enjoy these films for themselves like I did as a kid. And when Rich Koz stops doing the show (he is now 65), hopefully someone else will come along to take up the cause. The monsters must live on!   – TC4P Rating: 9/9

This Week in Rixflix #12: May 26–June 1, 2017

Yet another week, and we find ourselves with a generous slate of actual capsule reviews of several films that caught my eye in various ways in that span. The end of May meant that several television series that the wife and I follow were summing up with season (and sometimes series) finales, but we also found time to crack into new seasons of old favorites like the Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. We also spent several hours finally catching up on the last go-around for Grimm, though we still had three episodes left heading into the next week. But who could really concentrate when the looming presence of Wonder Woman premiering on June 2 overrode everything? Really, I just watched everything else to take my mind off that...

The Numbers: 

This week's feature-length film count: 20; 9 first-time viewings and 11 repeats.
Highest rated feature-length film: Rolling Thunder (1977) and Mister Roberts (1955) – 8/9
Lowest rated feature films: Ensign Pulver (1986), Caged Heat (1974) and Blue Crush 2 (2011) – 5/9
Average films per day in May: 2.87
Average films per day in 2017 so far: 3.02
Consecutive days with at least 1 feature-length film seen per day: 170

The Reviews:

Swamp Thing (1982) Dir.: Wes Craven – Having been a big fan of DC's Swamp Thing character for a number of years, especially when drawn by Berni Wrightson, I remember being very excited ( if not highly surprised) when the Craven-directed film version hit theatres way back in 1982, during my final year of high school. I also remember being pretty disappointed, especially by clunkiness of the battle scenes between Swampy and the Arcane monster. Despite my dislike for the film on first going to it, I have seen the film several times since, and think it is merely fine. While the Arcane monster suit is still completely ridiculous-looking, and the scenes with the villain's rampaging forces maintain my annoyance as well, I now believe that good ol' Wes did alright by dear Swampy after all. There is a heart to be discovered beneath all that foliage, and it is that heart that drives any story about the creature to believability. I feel for the most part that Craven gets that mood absolutely correct in the film's more dramatic scenes, but also balances the film with some darkly humorous lines. A younger Ray Wise might be a tad miscast as Dr. Alec Holland, who will become the Swamp Thing, but vet Louis Jourdan delivers an appropriately smarmy and eye-rolling turn as Arcane. (As long as he too doesn't turn into a monster, the movie is safe.) – TC4P Rating: 6/9

Moonlight (2016) Dir.: Barry Jenkins – I mentioned a couple of weeks back in my short dismissal of La La Land that I was never really allowed to enter the film emotionally, and could therefore make no connection at all with either the main characters of the film nor the musical trappings of the film. I appreciated its technical achievement and some of the acting, but felt it was lacking anything remotely near actual human emotion. Taking a look finally at Moonlight, the film that won the Best Picture Oscar from out of La La Whatever's clutches (that's my name for that film from now on), I had the exact opposite reaction. Even though I live worlds apart from the film's characters – a drug-dealer, his wife, the young, put upon gay child the dealer and his wife take under their wing out of compassion, and the child's drug-addicted prostitute mother – there was nothing but connection on an emotional level for me. This is one of the richest cinematic journeys to which I have seen Oscar commit in eons, but if you think that it is one of those films that starts in darkness and slowly builds to a glorious cascading of heavenly light, you have another thing coming. This film is layered in such a way that it really tells three different stories about the same character at different points in his life, and how his life turns from his reactions to his circumstances. Each slice of his life offers up new surprises, new complications, and old questions waiting to be answered. It is not an easy ride, nor does it ever let you believe it is. But it is refreshing to see what might otherwise become an undiscovered cult classic actually get recognized by the Academy. Some see pandering to the current national discussion regarding race; I just see a highly excellent film getting its due. Next time, Oscar, how about passing some of that love over to Barry Jenkins, the man behind the film? – TC4P Rating: 8/9

No Time for Sergeants (1958) Dir.: Mervyn LeRoy – Time has not been kind to my opinion of this film, which I saw at a fairly youthful age (Andy Griffith was always appreciated in our house). TCM played it on The Essentials recently, and it was clearly a fave of host Alec Baldwin. His co-host, a fully bearded David Letterman, was less enthralled with the film, but still respected it. I do as well, but Letterman is right about the bathroom scene, where he invoked his own rule that "if it wouldn't happen in real life," then he couldn't really accept the premise of the joke. Well, I won't fully agree with that rule, because the films of the Marx Brothers, Abbott and Costello, Laurel and Hardy, and the Three Stooges are loaded with things that couldn't happen in real life, and I have not stopped laughing at them yet. Back to this film, I really like the opening half, where we meet Griffith's seemingly simple and overtly strong hillbilly character who is drummed into basic training with the Air Force. His character, Pvt. Will Stockdale, has a lot of the hick appeal that Griffith would use on his famous What It Was, Was Football monologue, that I used to hear all the time on Dr. Demento. Griffith had played this role first on a television production and then on the Broadway stage, where he earned a Tony nomination. In the film, I start to lose interest when the story reaches the base and turns into a basic service comedy for an hour of its running time; it never totally lost me, however, and the final portion (involving a flight through a nuclear test region) still came off as wacky fun for me. I just had higher expectations overall after having waited so long to see it again. That makes me more of a Letterman than a Baldwin ultimately in this battle, and I think that I am fine with that. – TC4P Rating: 6/9

Ensign Pulver (1964) Dir.: Joshua Logan – On the same day that I watched Ensign Pulver, I also watched the film that preceded it, the 1955 version of Mister Roberts. In that film, Pulver is played by Jack Lemmon, and what more can I say except that Lemmon won the first of his two Oscars for his supporting role in that part? The part is a showstopper in many ways, and Lemmon used it to really break through the big time in high fashion. Nearly ten years later, there came this sequel, written and directed by Joshua Logan, who not only directed and co-wrote the original stage version of Mister Roberts but also served as the uncredited co-director of a few scenes on the film version after John Ford got ill and Mervyn LeRoy left the production. The task of filling the role of Pulver is left to Robert Walker, Jr., and while he doesn't do too badly in the role, he could never get near Lemmon in comedic timing and charisma. In the role played so gruffly but well by James Cagney originally, we instead get Burl Ives, who has a couple of nice moments, but is really miscast in the part. (Strangely, the film no longer has Lemmon, but his future partner and pal Walter Matthau shows up in the role of the ship's doctor.) The chief failing of the second film is that there is no reliable replacement for the vacated position that Roberts left on the ship at the first film's close. In the original, Pulver's antics shine because he is secondary to the plot for much of the way; here, with his resourceful but still fairly wacky character taking over for Roberts, Pulver seems to retreat in a childish way, and you realize just how much Mister Roberts relied on Henry Fonda as the title character to provide a strong moral center. Enjoyable in parts, but overall, a misfire. – TC4P Rating: 5/9

Action in Arabia (1944) Dir.: Léonide Moguy – About fifteen minutes into Action in Arabia, I became completely convinced that the film was meant to be RKO's answer to Warner Bros.' Casablanca. After all, you have the World War II period, a mysterious foreign setting dripping with possibilities (Damascus, not actually a part of the Arabian Peninsula, but really in Western Asia), a calm, cool lead who might turn out to be something more than he seems (George Sanders), a cool blonde (Virginia Bruce, playing a super spy) who is bound to get romantically involved with the hero, Nazis running amok and trying to control the area, and the film even opens with a map of North Africa which comes accompanied by narration by Lou Marcelle (who performed the same function for Casablanca). Of course, the results are not nearly as dramatically satisfying or well-filmed as the Michael Curtiz classic, but that is not to say that Action in Arabia is not a ball of fun all its own. A marvelous supporting role by Robert (King Kong) Armstrong is my favorite in the film besides the always reliable Sanders, but there are also stellar turns by Batman '66's Alan Napier as the cruel, conniving villain and Gene Lockhart as a sniveling, constantly shifting smuggler. Some of the action takes the film nearly into serial territory, and the tone of the film shifts from murder mystery to spy thriller to action film with the slightest nudge. It's all completely escapist, and has nowhere near the soul of the film it emulates at first, but man is it entertaining. Can't wait for a second go at it in the future. – TC4P Rating: 6/9

Blue Crush 2 (2011) Dir.: Mike Elliott – I will fully admit that while I watched this film under the guise of doing research for my blog, The Shark Film Office, there was also a part of me that said "I don't mind spending a couple of hours this afternoon watching attractive girls going surfing... nope, not one bit." While the original 2002 Blue Crush starring Kate Bosworth had nothing in the way of even a mention about sharks, I still had hopes that there might at least be some dialogue about the creatures in the followup, and it was completely because the second film relocates to South Africa. (It's an easy thing to pull off since the newer film has completely new characters and has no other relation to the first film except the two words in its title.) The plot is so old hat as to be nauseating: pampered, blond L.A. teenager whose surfer girl mommy died of cancer years earlier gets tired of her dad being a non-presence in her life and runs away to South Africa on her own to get his attention. She meets a local girl, has all her swag stolen by thugs, and joins her new friend in her communal living shack with a bunch of dirty surf hippies beside the ocean.  They run afoul of the law and the gangs, but everything rides on the blond girl getting a chance to recreate her mom's S.A. surf trip from before she was born. There is some quick talk of the girls getting thrown to the sharks by the thugs, but that is it for toothy menace. Lots of pretty but fairly tepid surf scenes, a zillion cute girls in bikinis (hottest of all being Sharni Vinson a couple of years before she played the tough girl lead in Adam Wingard's You're Next), and a wholly unbelievable but completely predictable storyline. – TC4P Rating: 5/9

Rolling Thunder (1977) Dir.: John Flynn – There is a very good reason why Quentin Tarantino is not only very high on this film as one of the cornerstones of his movie philosophy, but that he also named a production company after it. There are plenty of examples of revenge action flicks from the 1970s, and I will not fault your opinion if you prefer Death Wish or another film in its place, but Rolling Thunder is arguably one of the better crafted examples of the genre in that period. It certainly has plenty within it that sticks in your mind far beyond a single showing, including the hard-edged, unwavering conviction in the lead role of star William Devane. I grew up with a lingering impression of Devane as John F. Kennedy in The Missiles of October, but my mind would have reeled had I seen this film when it was released and I was only 12/13 years of age. A vet returns home from Vietnam after being a prison camp for seven years, his wife and child are murdered and his hand is cut off, he enlists the aid of his best friend from the service (a young Tommy Lee Jones) and his new girlfriend to track down the gang of killers with a hook on his hand, a loaded shotgun, and one seriously bad attitude. I saw the film on cable ages ago, and then promptly set it aside. Seeing it again recently awakened a flood of memories of what a riveting performance Devane gives and his resulting path of ultra-violence that leaves the viewer both cheering and rattled at the same time. A must for action fans. – TC4P Rating: 8/9

More "Countdown to Halloween" Hijinks from Cinema 4...

Just a couple of quick notices to make you aware of freshly posted articles on my other sites that tie into my Countdown to Halloween theme this month:

On CINEMA 4: CEL BLOC:

Sicque! Sicque! Sicque! (1966)

The Inspector (the cartoon version of Peter Sellers' Inspector Clouseau from the Pink Panther films) and his steadfast partner Sergeant Deaux-Deaux face off against a monstrous "mue-nster" in this takeoff on Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. My favorite of the Inspector series for numerous reasons, not all of them involving monsters. The second of seven Halloween-oriented cartoons that will be featured throughout the month of October on Cinema 4: Cel Bloc.

On THE SHARK FILM OFFICE:

90210 Shark Attack (2014)

A truly idiotic affair, 90210 Shark Attack would seem to have everything you need to make a cult classic: horny teenagers, sex, a magical curse, a former scream queen with major shark film credentials in need of a paycheck (Donna Wilkes from Jaws 2), and (one would hope) sharks. The man behind the camera is David DeCoteau, who gave us scream queen boobie-fests (bless his heart) in the '80s and '90s such as Sorority Babes at the Slimeball Bowl-A-Rama, Nightmare Sisters, and Creepozoids. So, what the hell happened, besides way too much horridly selected stock footage? Click the link above and find out just what...

RTJ

Meanwhile, Other "Countdown to Halloween" Fun in Cinema 4 Land...

Just a couple quick notices to make you aware of posts and articles on my other sites that tie into the launch of Countdown to Halloween this morning:

On CINEMA 4: CEL BLOC:

Spooks (1930)

Oswald the Lucky Rabbit faces off against a parody version of the Phantom of the Opera as he tries to protect his girlfriend Kitty in Walter Lantz's 1930 short, Spooks. There might even be a strange swipe at Walt Disney in the film in the use of a mouse (or a series of mice) that looks exactly like Mickey Mouse, the character that Disney and Ub Iwerks created to replace the stolen Oswald. The first of seven Halloween-oriented cartoons that will be featured throughout the month of October on Cinema 4: Cel Bloc.

On THE SHARK FILM OFFICE:

The Munsters in "Marineland Carnival" Promo (1965)

CBS did some cross-promotion and had the stars of one of their primetime hits take part in an early television special built around Marineland of the Pacific in Palos Verdes, California. Naturally, for me to discuss such a thing on the The Shark Film Office, sharks need to be involved in some small way, yes? Well, sort of almost maybe. Find out how through the link above.

RTJ

Countdown to Halloween 2016: Pylon-Style!

Even Totoro is ready for Halloween, resplendent
and relaxed in my Baby Monster Beanie...

Holy crap, I made it another year...

Not that I was expecting to go anywhere, but with everything that has happened to me over the past eighteen months or so, just being able to take part in another Countdown to Halloween has to be seen as some form of accomplishment.

That's right... once again, I am taking part in the annual Countdown to Halloween festivities. That's not just any ol' "taking part in Halloween" thing. That's easy to do, and anyone with sense and the spirit of fun does so each and every October. And I suppose just about anyone can take part in Countdown to Halloween as well. There are only two prerequisites, and most people really only need to fulfill one of them, while a far lesser number would need to fulfill both of them (though all are invited to engage in the second one, of course). 

The first prerequisite is to have access to the internet, which everyone but a Luddite would today. Computer, phone, TV, gaming system, tablet, school... most people have access. Visit http://countdowntohalloween.blogspot.com/ to see a list of all the websites and blogs that are taking part in Countdown to Halloween this year. Once there, you click on the sites that sound interesting to you, and check out everything they have to say to you or show you regarding the Halloween season or other topics tangentially related to the season.

The second prerequisite, and the reason why I am here, is having a blog or website that you are planning to devote to regular or semi-regular posts on whatever topic strikes your fancy that you believe followers of Halloween fun and frivolity might like to stop and check out for a few minutes during their time on the worldwide web. As I said, you really only need to fulfill one of these steps, but in my case, I like to post on my own sites and check out what others have to offer during the month. 

I have a lot of surprises in store this month, none of which I will give away here, but I do like to provide variety. Rest assured, if you are into monster movies, cartoons, toys, trading cards, sharks, and Halloween or horror-oriented books and music, you will find a little bit of each (and sometimes a lot) written about here on The Cinema 4 Pylon, and on its sister blog, Cinema 4: Cel Bloc. Both blogs are full participants in this year's Countdown, though the Cel Bloc will only update every five or six days, while the Pylon will try to stick to a mostly daily schedule through most of the month.

But there's more! I will also have sporadic posts on my other sites as well: The Shark Film Office and V for Voluminous, C for Cinema. However, links to any articles on those sites that might be "holiday relevant" will be posted here on the Pylon first, so you don't have to go crazy checking out so many different sites every day.

One other shout-out that I should make. My writing partner, Aaron Lowe, will have his blog, Working Dead Productions, involved in the Countdown to Halloween as well. Together, though, we recently created a website titled We Who Watch Behind the Rows: Stephen King in Print and on Film. For the Countdown, we have decided to do a concentration on King's first officially published novel (under his own name), Carrie, and after we finish discussing the novel, we will then turn our attention to several posts reviewing the four film adaptations derived from that work. To read our introduction announcement to this project, "Carrie" On, My Wayward Sons here.

I hope that you take some time to bounce around my sites while you are here, and if you like what you see and read, please return any time. Otherwise, Happy Halloween!

RTJ

What It Is, My Man, and What It Will Be...

If you are the sort of person who is nice and polite and checks back regularly with websites you enjoy and wonders sometimes why a website for which you retain a particular admiration doesn't update more frequently, then this post is for you.

Of course, I would not dare to presume that my humble website might be counted amongst those sites for which you hold particular admiration, but on the off-chance that it is to be counted within that group, then please let your eyes drift downward.

I have not posted on The Cinema 4 Pylon since July 10, and that post was Part 1 of what was meant to be a multi-part excursion into the world of straight-to-video action thrillers, a genre which I have largely avoided in recent years. The post was triggered by an impromptu and cheap DVD purchase in a Wal-Mart in my then just-completed holiday trip up to my home state of Alaska, and there was never meant to be a two-month gap between the first part and even the merest mention of the second part.

The last thing I posted before that was on the day after I returned from my trip to Alaska on July 7. It too was Part 1 of what was meant to be a multi-part excursion into something completely different, this time into a personal history of Disneyland and how my sense of the place was completely warped by a seemingly innocent children's book in my youth. The Part 2 and the Part 3 to that Part 1 were already written by that point – in fact, were written even before I left for my Alaska trip at the end of June – but I started to rethink the piece after I posted Part 1, and so has now been sitting in limbo until I have time to revisit it again. But it is the same story as with the first Part 1 I mentioned... it was never meant to get to this place.

So, why have I not been posting on here?

Well, a myriad of reasons. I can give those reasons in a list, but such lists turn into excuses, and then it just becomes a case of lying to myself. Basically, what I am saying in the end is that the Pylon became less important to me than everything else in my life. 

That isn't true, of course: the Cinema 4 Pylon is meant to be a representation of my mind, and my mind is all that I have going for me when all is said and done. What has happened is that I split that mind into too many fragments in recent months, and some of those fragments have taken on a life of their own unexpectedly.

THE SHARK FILM OFFICE

Most important to me of late has been the success I have been having in getting The Shark Film Office to finally take off its water wings. The Shark Film Office has been around since 2006, but I just never committed to it back then, and kind of wrote it off altogether, especially when I went through my darkest period a few years ago and almost completely stopped writing. When I turned the engines back on the Pylon last September, however, I then followed suit on my animation blog, the Cinema 4: Cel Bloc. Once the Cel Bloc was up and running again to my satisfaction, I started to think seriously about The Shark Film Office and whether to revive it or not. There was a moment or two where my cursor hovered over the "Delete Blog" button (I, of course, had saved out all of my text elsewhere), but doing so seemed to trigger something in my head. I started thinking more and more about how I would do the site if really, truly committed to the shark site.

Knowing that Syfy had a full week of shark movies coming up at the end of July with six brand new premiere films was the kicker, and just before that was the latest edition of Discovery's Channel's Shark Week, which allowed me to expand to documentary reviews as well. But something happened on Google+ for me that allowed me to rethink my whole plan. I was getting a ridiculous amount of views on my Google+ page, far more than any of my friends on there were getting, and it was all happening since I started up the Pylon again last year. I don't know what triggered it, but now my Google+ posts were showing up high in search results for any subject on which I posted, most often in the Top 10 results. Sure, I would rather that the actual articles would show up in the search results instead – but, hey, a link is a link, and these results were translating into Rik-diculous numbers of views and in turn getting people to visit my websites.

THE DYNAMIC DUO

In this mix are a couple of other projects that my writing partner and erstwhile pal, Aaron Lowe, and I have been bashing out over the past few months that have also proven to be a lot of fun and get us a little notice lately: Visiting and Revisiting with Rik and Aaron and We Who Watch Behind the Rows: Stephen King in Print and on Film.

I have written about both of these projects on this website already, and you can find out more on both by visiting the links to them above or going into my bio page. Of course, we have run into some difficulties in not just maintaining both of our own original sites (his is Working Dead Productions) when we spread ourselves out a tad thin with not just extra blogs, but also in maintaining a working life and a family life. In my case, I had been out of work for well over a year, which has allowed me a lot of free writing time and given me an opportunity to revive the blogs and get my shit together in that regard. Additionally, I have a wife who works, but our only charge is a small cat. In Aaron's case, he has a regular job and a wife and daughter, though they expanded recently with the addition of a second newborn daughter. So, now his writing is often done with baby in one hand.

We have really enjoyed the first response to our first few attempts on both sites (the first several articles for each, you might recall, were split between our respective pages before we decided to build new sites for each title), and have big plans moving forward. Aaron and I are always throwing around ideas for a podcast, either audio or video, though I seem to be the one really holding us back in that regard.

COUNTDOWN TO HALLOWEEN

Coming up first though, is the annual Countdown to Halloween in October, something in which both Aaron and I have taken part in recent years, and plan to continue this year. Countdown to Halloween is a handy site which allows people who run Halloween-oriented blogs, or blogs related to horror, toys, candy, masks, costumes, etc., to gather in one place and have people who are into any of those topics easily find websites of interest. Taking part in the Countdown gives bloggers access to badges they can display on their site and allows them to expand their audience.

I don't know what Aaron has planned for his own site, but here is what I can tell you about two of mine and We Who Watch as well:

The Cinema 4 Pylon – Semi-regular posts throughout October on various monster toys in my collection, more about monster trading cards, Halloween music posts, and a couple more editions in my relatively new The Monster's on the Loose! series, where I discuss the horror-related films, shows and cartoons that were most instrumental in developing my interest in the genre when I was but a wee lad.

Cinema 4: Cel Bloc – I have articles on several cartoons planned for October, all with spooky themes (naturally), with a concentration on Walt Disney cartoons this time. Scheduled shorts to include Lonesome Ghosts (1937), The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (1949), Sicque! Sicque! Sicque! (1966), Spooks (1930), and Trick or Treat (1952).

We Who Watch Behind the Rows – Aaron and I are spending part of September reading Stephen King's first officially published novel Carrie (1974) and then watching the four film projects derived from it: Brian De Palma's seminal version (1976), the rather belated and unnecessary sequel The Rage: Carrie 2 (1999) with Emily Bergl, the unnecessary TV remake (2002) with Angela Bettis (who makes it watchable, of course), and the still unnecessary theatrical remake (2013) with Chloe Grace Moretz. Then we will post about all of them throughout the month of October. Sorry to tip my hand on the films, but I haven't rewatched them yet; those are just my opinions going into this process, having seen all of them before. [There is also a Filipino version of Carrie, though I doubt we will find a copy in time for this series.]

We have not discussed plans for a Halloween film or two on Visiting and Revisiting, but that may be because it is hard to find horror films that neither one of us hasn't seen already. The next film we plan to cover there is Miracle Mile, which we will hopefully get to in the next week or two.

BACK 2 THE BASE

The robustness of our combined plans, of course, are always going to be hampered and/or enhanced by what we do personally. Speaking for myself – and really, I probably shouldn't even be that bold – I have told you all of this without relating to you the good fortune of recent weeks: that I have started to pick up freelancing work. Yes, this means money, which is alway a good thing to have, but it has also meant a reduction in the amount of free time that I have at hand lately. It started out small, as a mere handful of hours that has blossomed into a great many more than I was anticipating, and it has been nice to be able to work completely from home and at my own pace. And now a second project has landed in my lap at the same time, so I am now having to learn how to balance this along with everything else. But I feel productive in a societal and monetary sense again, and this will helpfully keep the wolves at bay for a short period.

In the end, I will be posting here on the Pylon again regularly, I just need my schedule to align with my goals a little more. For now, blog-wise, I remain focused on the shark site online, but there is another contender for my time of which I have yet to speak except to a small handful of individuals. Even with this utterance, I hope that they shall remain mum as to its details in the public venue, especially in response to this posting.

I have committed myself to a personal writing project offline that will hopefully turn into a completed book over the next year's time. Knowing that I am a few months into the project will also give you another idea as to why The Cinema 4 Pylon has suddenly been relegated to second class citizen status within the universe of its own creation. More details will be released in coming months. Or not at all, if the entire thing goes kablooey on me. In which case, forget you ever read this...

RTJ

The Shark Film Office: Marina Monster (2008)

Marina Monster (2008)
Dir.: Christine Whitlock
Cinema 4 Rating: 1/9

If I ever get the chance to make my own monster, shark, OR monstrous shark movie, I hope it's half as stupid as Marina Monster.

Farting and burping sounds when some characters appear in view of the camera. Clown horns punctuating "jokes" so that we are certain to understand they were meant that way. A foghorn-and-cowbell combination (or sometimes a couple of bass notes) that sounds when certain female breasts arrive onscreen (always covered discreetly). Cliched, noirish saxophone bursts when one character is seduced by another or when one particularly muscled character lifts his shirt. Cash register noises when another character makes drug deals over and over again. A rumbling sound (accompanied by a shaky camera) that occurs every time (and there are many of these moments) that a dock in the harbor is hit by the titular monster. Marina Monster is a cornucopia of ridiculous sound effects that are draped over a film where every other element can be charitably called "amateurish" but more often lends itself to a constant sad shaking of one's head while wondering if carrying on through the remainder of the film is a worthwhile option.

The character names are meant to be silly and parodic, so certainly this film is never meant to be taken seriously for even a second. How could you with names such as Earl Molar, Oceanna Anchor, Commodore Drip Molar, Commodore Skip Anchor, Zena Waters, Skipper Surf Toe, Rusty Winch, Aqua Foam, and Bibby Rigger? It was one of the rare aspects of this film that I found quite pleasant, wondering just how far the filmmaker, Christine Whitlock, would take the gag. Well, it would seem nearly into porn territory with other names like Stiff Mast (the muscle guy) and Limp Eel, but Marina Monster is far too chaste (except for some weird stepmother incest gags) and almost naive to go too far. I somewhat imagine Whitlock as being a cousin to the director of the film being made in 1976's The First Nudie Musical, who is called upon to helm a porn musical (titled Come, Come Again), but keeps giggling and hiding his eyes during the sex scenes.

But that feeling of a porn-level parody is certainly apt here when one considers that most of the cast seems to be filled with anyone who happened to cross Whitlock's path on the day the scenes were filmed. I might actually be more impressed with the outcome were this the case (and it is an interesting concept for an experiment), but it is also clear that there are many people in the cast -- the larger, speaking roles -- who at least have some theatrical experience. I'm not sure this extends to the actor playing the film's narrator, who introduces himself as Professor Squid -- that's right -- from a room with a white curtained backdrop, a whiteboard (and water bottle) on an easel, various shark drawings, and a table with a map of the bay, on which are placed toy boats and a toy shark. Professor Squid opens Marina Monster's story with this anti-shark rant:

"Today, we're here to talk about sharks, evil eating machines that live in the ocean... but not always! They're now in fresh water, eating people wherever they go. Hungry, evil sharks! In the bay, fisherman are noticing less fish. Bull sharks have been seen in the Mississippi River going as far north as Illinois, eating as they go in fresh water."

The location then switches to a harbor that I would guess is in Hamilton, Ontario, where director Whitlock lives and films her micro-budget movies. On a small dock, we are given the basic template for nearly every attack that occurs throughout the picture. An unidentified man sits on the end of the dock, swishing the water with a small net attached to a long pole. A second man in a stupid straw hat and floral print shirt is standing on the dock a few feet away. A girl in a bikini walks down the length of the dock and comes up to the first man and crouches down to ask him how the fishing is going. The girl says that she will see him in Jamaica (totally unexplained) and walks away. The second man, utterly without provocation, strides up to the first man and shoves him hard into the waters of the bay (mind you, the dock is about two feet above the water).

Suddenly, there is a shark seen on the surface of the water. The girl runs back to pull her friend out, but suddenly there is that low rumble and a shaking of the camera. The girl is thrown off balance into the water. The first man is then pulled underneath the water to never be seen again. The second man, still on the dock, is shaken into the drink by another rumble of the dock. Both he and the girl are then pulled under to the depths of the bay. We return to Professor Squid, who quips with a shit-eating grin: "Hungry little thing, isn't it?" The shark, clearly phony, is shown "swimming" on the surface as the film cuts to the interminable opening credits, nearly three minutes of mind-numbing regatta footage set to an exceedingly generic rock beat.

This opening attack sequence, where three or more people fall into the water in succession and get eaten by a largely unseen predator is repeated time and again throughout the film, though always with small variances in the number of people. I'm not quite sure why everyone is fishing with what amounts to a pool skimmer, but they are, and perhaps the various "no fishing" signs we are shown throughout the film might attest to the limits taken during filming. This also points to me that these dock scenes may have been shot on the sly and without permission of the harbor where they occur. Since there are no shots of the shark next to the docks or any gore effects at all, and people just jump or fall in and splash around before going under, I'd say it is likely this was the case. Also, the bumping of the dock by the shark is used pretty inconsistently, and so you get several scenes of people just simply falling or really jumping into the water without real purpose behind it. And most of these scenes are started with people getting into a small squabble over some imagined gripe or grudge, and then someone gets pushed in, leading to a chain reaction of falls and deaths.

In some ways, the repetition of these scenes is quite hypnotic, and instead of needing the story's plot to escape from the poorly filmed attack scenes, these attack scenes actually serve as a refuge from the terrible dramatics and dialogue of the rest of the film. That you will only go about three to four minutes before more people get eaten becomes a blessing. This film has a tremendously high body count for a shark film that isn't Sharknado. There are forty people listed as "victims" in the closing credits, and sure enough, when one counts up all thirteen attacks in the film, the final death toll is a solid forty. And yet, there is nothing in the plot about anyone actually trying to figure why people are disappearing, even after a couple of main characters see five people lose their lives.

• By the 15-minute mark of Marina Monster, ten people have already been eaten, in between brief moments with the film's actual speaking characters setting up the plot of the film.
• By the 30-minute mark, one would think there would be some investigation as to why 23 people have disappeared around the harbor area in a rather short amount of story time. 
• It is 33 minutes into the film when the two lead characters, Earl Molar and his lady love Oceanna Anchor, realize that something horrid is going in the water. But still nothing gets done.
• At the 40-minute mark, the body count is 35, and the film's reporter character, Lola Dent, who is investigating the embezzlement scandal at the core of the plot, finally mentions the "people missing from the piers and marinas in the bay."
• 52 minutes in, we have the full 40 victims.

After most of the attacks, Professor Squid will chime in for a few seconds with a statement, often unrelated to what has just occurred, except that there happens to be a shark and he has eaten a few more people. Sometimes he is holding a toy shark or even a shark pool toy. Amongst Prof. Squid's -- ahem -- witticisms:

• "Bull sharks are eating machines, hungry creatures that love to eat, and eat, and eat."
• "Bull sharks in marinas find things to eat."
• "Oh, my word! That teenage shark has an appetite, doesn't it?"
• "My, what big teeth he has!"
• "He just doesn't get enough to eat, does he?"
• "Male bull sharks eat alone." (This one is odd because it is attached to only scene where the shark devours a single male victim.)
• "Vhat, a little kosher meal?" (Interesting in that none of the victims in this scene seem to be obviously Jewish in any way whatsoever, not that they couldn't possibly have been. And if there were, how offensive would this be?)
• "A bull shark is your worst nightmare."

But enough of the oddly inserted Professor Squid moments. Surprisingly, there is a ridiculously convoluted plot in Marina Monster built around an annual regatta event called the "Around the Bay" race. It's really not worth following through even the first scene, but the director's website insists it is based on Romeo and Juliet. (But sadly, no suicide parts.) Yes, there are a lead couple in the film that are secretly in love at the start of the film, and their respective fathers are each from a different rival yacht club. But for most of Marina Monster, we get no recognizable romantic feeling from these characters until very deep into the story, and really only after the shark is dispatched four/fifths of the way through the running time.

The real plot of the film involves Commodore Drip Molar, head of the regatta committee, who has squandered the yacht club's funds and needs to win the big race to save his ass. His current wife (his third) is fooling around with anybody she can get her hands on, including his son Earl, quite against Earl's wishes. (Her big come-on line is "My name is San-dee, but I'm smooth." It is one of many failed double entendres buried in this movie.)  Also, one of the Commodore's exes wants him back and is willing to blackmail him to get her wish. The Commodore is also deeply involved financially with a drug dealer (who looks like he stepped right out of Miami Vice) named Surf Toe. Part of the reason for the plot getting so confused is that new characters -- not counting the dock victims -- are still being introduced past the halfway point.

Every character seems to either have slept with the other characters, or wants to sleep with the other characters. Everyone flirts endlessly, saying odd pickup lines quite out of sync with the rest of the action going on around them. Most of the characters also think nothing of trying to seduce other characters directly in front of girlfriends, boyfriends, wives, and husbands. The camera, too, gets into the horny act. While women are certainly capable of creating exploitation films of both the softcore and hardcore varieties, it is still rather odd that the camera will almost unconsciously drift down to ogle the bosoms of various women -- whether said bosoms are worthy of ogling or not -- and will do so often when fading out of a scene. Since the film is not sold as a softcore product at all and actually has zero nudity in it, there is a great reliance on breast shots and the aforementioned comic sound effects that go with those shots. 

In one scene featuring otherwise unnamed and heretofore unknown victims, one young woman (definitely one of the fairer ones in the film) is never really given a closeup so that we really know what she looks like. But her breasts sure get a closeup. After her would-be boyfriend falls into the water, she runs along the dock and the camera stays tight on her chest and stomach for the entire run, until she too falls in to be eaten by the shark. It is scenes like this that really make me wonder what the aims of the filmmaker were in creating this film. As I mentioned, through her dialogue and scenario, she seems remarkably naive about sexual affairs. It is entirely possible that her goals were merely a personal "whim" (i.e., Whitlock loves titties), and were that to be revealed to me, I would be just dandy with it. Until then, the true meaning remains a mystery.

Also, my guess about the actors being friends of the director stems mainly from the fact that there seems to have been little thought given to just who should play what role, like she just said, "Hey, do you want a part in my film?" and then choosing a random name in the screenplay and saying, "Here... play this character." Couples seem truly mismatched, most of the cast is physically what many would term "sloppy" (there are four or five traditionally attractive females -- all playing shark victims -- in the usual cinematic sense), and even the lead parts seem to have been given to their actors "just because". That said, I guess that I do have to applaud Whitlock for putting just anybody in this film no matter what body type they possess, and in bikinis no less... and then pushing them off a dock to get eaten by a shark. It's like she is taking a stand against body-shaming, and then suddenly having a change of heart partway through that stand.

With around sixteen minutes to go in this seventy-minute film, we finally get the big "Around the Bay" race. This apparently consists of generic, absolutely non-thrilling sailing footage posing as a regatta race around the bay, all shot from far away from the boats. In fact, except for the bit that I am about mention in a few seconds, there is no attempt at all at showing an actual boat with one of the characters from the film manning it as they sail about on the waters of the bay. The closest we get is a shot of two boats in the distance, with subtitles underneath each boat telling us which one is Skip and which one is Drip.

There is, however, around the fifty-six minute mark of Marina Monster, a five-minute segment of the film where its visual style is completely at odds with the rambling, unintentionally hilarious stillness that precedes it. We get a real, close-up glimpse of the monster shark, a seemingly papier-mâché creation that, quite surprising, not only talks but sings, "Give me yum yums!" in a style that must have been inspired by Little Shop of Horrors. He only sings that line a couple of times before the hero arrives to dispatch him, but the appearance of the shark, as no-frills and handmade as he obviously is, came as a welcome relief to this viewer. So, too, did the use of green screen to film the scene of the hero and heroine both being menaced by and killing the monster shark. It looks amateurish and silly, but when matched against everything else in the film, it looks brilliant. It made me wish more of the film had been done in this quite obviously hammy and self-aware style. Naturally, the film doesn't want to be taken seriously at any point, but I would have ironically taken this film more seriously if they had gone out of their way to be a little more craftsmanlike in their silliness.

After forty murders and the revelation of a singing sea-beast, the shark action ends with over thirteen minutes left in the film. In the last decently filmed shot in the film, the Romeo and Juliet couple finally get their smooch on, in another green-screen shot with a pink background and scores of red heart-shaped balloons falling down all around them. It should be noted that Oceanna takes the initiative and dips Earl, planting the massive kiss on him. But after that, what else could they have to do for thirteen minutes? The film snaps out of its brief green-screen reverie and switches back to its previous dull business.

And this is where I tell you that this film is a sequel to another Christine Whitlock-helmed monster fish movie called Sharp Teeth, filmed in 2006. Some of the characters/actors in this film starred in Sharp Teeth as well, including the lead character, Earl Molar. That film was about a normal carp that was mutated into a monstrous killer by a bag of "Experimental Super Grow Fish Food". How do I know this without having seen Sharp Teeth except for a trailer? Well, in those final thirteen minutes, Marina Monster seems to decide to connect the dots with its predecessor and have a couple of characters from the first film show up at the end. Why? Really not sure at all. We get a couple of flashback scenes involving Earl Molar's buddy who is now a cop, and then another where we see a character who is now in a wheelchair due to what happened with the monster carp from Sharp Teeth. After this, the film switches back to Professor Squid again, who says "There are other terrors lurking in the bay!" with a strange intonation. Again, why? And once more, I am not sure. Was there supposed to be a third film to complete this trilogy of harbor-based marine terror?

Whitlock has only produced one other film since then, a Caribbean set "psychological horror" film released in 2013 called Days of the Iguanas. The movie doesn't even appear on IMDb in her filmography, but it is available on Amazon on DVD. I don't know if it has any connection at all with the first two films, but the line early on when the second shark victim tells the first that she will see him in Jamaica has me wondering.

I mentioned in the first line of this piece that if I made a shark movie of the low-budget and low-aiming style of Marina Monster, that I would be happy indeed if my film came out half as stupid as this one does. To be sure, I am envious of filmmakers like Whitlock and her ilk, who do what they have to do to get their goofy projects made, no matter the outcome. Back in Alaska, I had some friends recently take part in a horror spoof called Moose: The Movie, written and directed by other acquaintances. Against all odds, it not only managed to get a fair amount of press during its making and after it was released, but even garnered a couple of decent reviews. This is not par for the course for such projects, of course, and most low-budget, non-Hollywood-based directors have to settle for putting out a movie where everyone involved will basically just have to be excited that it ever got completed. There will be little in the way of tangible success, if any, and they are bound to take a severe critical ravaging from all sides, including dopey websites like mine.

Yes, Marina Monster is insipid and truly bottom of the barrel in every element of its creation. And even though it gets my lowest rating that I can possibly give such a film, that does not mean that I don't admire it in a small, strange way. That is, I wish that I had gotten the chance to make such a film, and to be laughed at roundly for doing so. It wouldn't matter, because I would have made a silly monster shark movie. There is a pride in just doing such a thing. But for now, I guess that I will just be happy that I survived two viewings -- yes, two -- of Marina Monster and feel none the worse for it.

Except for my eyes, which now just want to casually rest upon whichever poorly cast, sloppy bosoms happen to cross my path... DAMN YOU, CHRISTINE WHITLOCK!!! I've been cursed!

RTJ