1994 - FROM BEIJING WITH LOVE, funny spoof of James Bond films

Although most Westerners know Hong Kong martial arts and comedian Jackie Chan, actor/director Stephen Chow equally deserved to be known just as well Chan.

This film is a funny satire of the James Bond film series,  At the time of release the Pierce Brosnan era in the James Bond series was in full flower.  However this film seems like Chow is spoofing the Roger Moore era of the Bond films.  In any case there is some very funny spy satire stuff throughout the film along with Chow's slap sticky humor.

As always in a Chow movie he has cast the female lead with a gorgeous performer. In this film Anita Yuen is his chosen love interest who is also a double agent sent to kill him.  She communicates with her evil boss through a toilet that has a two way television link in it.

If you are a Bond fan there are lots of in jokes.  The gadgets don't work very well and the henchmen are even more over the top than "Jaws" in the Roger Moore Bond films. Chow plays the James Bond spoofed character with the correct mix of Bondian arrogance and incompetence with a cigarette literally glued to his lips.  

 

The film was written by Stephen Chow, Roman Cheung/Vincent Kok and Lee Lik-Chi.  The running time is 83 minutes.

1994 - TIMECOP, a pretty good science fiction film

A fairly decent film for a Jean Claude Van Damme movie.  The time travel plot is well thought through and Van Damme at times actually allows himself to get beaten up by the bad guys.  The plot has Van Damme as guess what, a cop traveling through time attempting to keep a corrupt politician from becoming President of the United States.  The challenge for time cop Van Damme is to keep from changing the future.  This is all fairly cleverly worked out in the screenplay.

The most tiresome aspect of this film is the gratuitous love scene between Van Damme and the actor Mia Sara who gets to roll around naked with Van Damme, lucky her.  You can be sure that someone insisted on inserting this sex tease stuff to satisfy the drooling teenage nerds watching the film.  Later there is a virtual reality nude scene the viewer has to sit through as well that adds nothing to the story.  These scenes actually hurt the film and drag the film into the "B" status category. 

Jean Claude Van Damme was always the poor man's Bruce Lee or Arnold Schwarzenegger (take your pick).  His specialty was kicking people.  In TimeCop he kicks lots of people.  Bruce McGill who played "D-Day" in National Lampoon's Animal House a long time ago, is Van Damme's boss.  Ron Silver is the hiss able evil Senator villain and it's a cliched character to be sure but he puts it over.

 

The action is decent, the story is interesting. Peter Hyams the director keeps things moving along.  The film is entertaining even with it's tiresome sex scenes and for the most part doesn't outstay it's welcome.

The film was written by Mark Verheiden, the running time is 98 minutes.

1994 - BARCELONA, the second film from Whit Stillman

The second film from Whit Stillman a less than prolific filmmaker is another quirky comedy much like his first film Metropolitan.  In Metropolitan, Stillman set his story in the world of the debutante ball season in New York.  His main character got himself mixed up with a bunch of fairly self absorbed preppies.  It was an offbeat and amusing film  looking into a world few people knew about and it got Stillman attention as a filmmaker to watch.

His next film Barcelona  had a bigger budget since he was now associated with a film studio and it is almost a chamber piece.  The film focuses on a couple of cousins living in Barcelona, Spain.  It follows their involvement in relationships with some Spanish women and their adjustment to Spanish culture particularly at a time when the United States was not very popular in Europe.

 

This film like Metropolitan also has a lot of that dry humor that was already a characteristic of Stillman's films and this was only his second time behind the camera.  The performances are interesting if at times on the dry side and when the film starts to get a little to dramatic Stillman slips in a couple of  humorous lines and situations to lighten the mood.

 

In the world of Whit Stillman, all of the Spanish women are beautiful and basically jump into bed with our American characters on a minute's notice.  The men are self aware if rather on the neurotic side but not in a debilitating way.  Barcelona is a minor if entertaining comedy, I suppose in the good old days they would call this a "civilized entertainment.

Written by Whit Stillman, the running time is 101 minutes.

1994 - LEGENDS OF THE FALL, attempt at an epic Western film

The director Edward Zwick working from a novella by author Jim Harrison a guy who likes to put a lot of macho posturing in the stories I have read of his.  Zwick tells the epic tale of a family with a ranch in Montana fighting off corruption from the authorities while making a complete mess out of their personal lives.

 British actor Anthony Hopkins is the head of the family, Aidan Quinn is the son who wants to get into politics, there's a younger brother whose name escapes me but it doesn't matter anyway since he ends up dying in World War I early in the film.  However the big casting news in this film was Brad Pitt as Tristan a handsome fellow who likes to run around and challenge bears to fist fights as a test of his manliness.  Needless to say all the women swoon over him.

The film has the requisite couple of hot frontier women.  Julia Ormond, another British actor, is married to Quinn but secretly pines for hunky Brad Pitt, that won't end well.  Karina Lombard is the young farmer girl living on the ranch who grows up looking like a hot Vogue model who Tristan ends up with.

The film is well photographed by John Toll on some spectacular Canadian locations, apparently Montana couldn't cut it when it came to location filming for this film.  The director does keep the story moving along although some of the plotting might be a little questionable.  If you are in for a western epic I guess this will do.

The film was written by Susan Shilliday and William D. Wittliff.  As befits an epic film, the running time is 133 minutes.

1994 - I'LL DO ANYTHING, decent romantic comedy from James L. Brooks

This tale of Hollywood and an actor learning to be a parent to his estranged six year old daughter is the film that started out as a musical.  Test audiences hated the musical numbers so they were all dropped from the film.  The writer/director James L. Brooks rewrote new scenes which were inserted into the final film but to no avail.  The film was a critical and financial flop.

James L. Brooks the mastermind behind this failure had been on a hot streak with successes like Broadcast News and Terms Of Endearment.  Brooks is a talented guy but I can't recall any musical scenes inserted into any of his previous films.  He clearly decided he was the guy to revive the defunct musical genre.  Disaster was foreordained.

 

What's left is a fairly decent romantic comedy with lots of amusing jokes about Hollywood.  Nick Nolte is an actor who has never been able to get a  break in the movies.  Much to his surprise while taking care of his daughter his ex-wife has abandoned, she turns out to be a talented child actor who gets a part in a sit-com.  At the same time Nolte begins a relationship with a production assistant played by Joely Richardson an English actor who does a convincing job with her west coast accent.

Another relationship is featured in the film between Albert Brooks playing a pushy producer of action films who begins a romance with a film analyst played by Julie Kavner.  Albert Brooks character is clearly modeled after flamboyant producer Joel Sliver.  Albert Brooks is his funny self as usual.

James L. Brooks may not have been someone to take on a musical comedy. His strength has always been in creating interesting characters and putting them in funny situations.  Brooks is always a meticulous craftsman, the performances and scenes are filmed at his very high standard of quality.  I'll Do Anything is probably a lightweight film at best however it has a lot of entertaining qualities.

The running time is 115 minutes.

1994 - REVENGE OF THE MUSKETEERS, aka La fille de d'Artagnan)

This is an adventure story based on characters from Alexandre Dumas the writer of The Three Musketeers.  This original story has the Musketeers now older and in retirement.  The daugher of  D'Artagnan, Eloise D'Artagnan  is essentially the main focus of this story as she uncovers a plot to kill the King of France and his advisor Cardinal Mazarin by a group of French aristocrats who want to take over France.

Eloise enlists the help of her father and a poet who has fallen in love with her and helps reunite the retired Musketeers.  There's lots of sword fight action, a rather amusing comedy of errors type plot and the whole film is on the light hearted side for the most part.

The film has a good cast with a delightful Sophie Marcel as Eloise D'Artagnan and that old warhorse of French theater and film Philippe Noiret as D'Artagnan.  The two of them play off of each other very well.  Bertrand Tavernier a distinguished director took over the direction from Riccardo Freda who apparently couldn't get along with the cast particularly Sophie Marcel.  This is fairly lightweight stuff for Tavernier but it is well photographed and well staged.

 

For the most part  Revenge of the Musketeers, is a fun film with enough action and humor  that should satisfy the viewer, Sophie Marcel really makes the film take off.

The running time is 125 minutes, the film was written by Michel Léviant, Bertrand Tavernier and Jean Cosmos.

1994 - THE REF, 2/3's of a great comedy

The Ref starts out with smarmy comedian Denis Leary as a burglar robbing upscale homes in Connecticut.   After almost getting caught by the police Leary takes a married couple hostage in order to hide out at their house on Christmas Eve.  Little does Leary know this is not just an ordinary married couple but a married couple with severe marital problems. As played by Judy Davis and Kevin Spacey they are at verbal war with each other and throw insults around like they are grenades. Leary ends up trying to keep the peace between them while planning his escape. 

There's lots of funny stuff going on here.   The mother in law played by British actor Glynis Johns is a nasty old battleaxe of a woman.  The son who is in military school is blackmailing school officials, the rest of the family that descends on the home for Christmas Eve dinner is a collection of upper class weirdos.

 The chief problem with this film is that all it starts to run out of gas about 2/3's of the way through.  Obviously since this is a mainstream Hollywood movie set at Christmas everyone is going to work out their issues, but these resolutions come just a little to fast and the comedic situations just seem to run out of gas as things get sillier and sillier.  This is kind of disappointing for what started out as a pretty smart comedy. 

 

Still the film is mostly enjoyable especially when it is satirizing this upper class bunch of white losers.  Denis Leary is a kind of take it or leave it comedian but I thought he was funny.  Judy Davis and Kevin Spacey are a great married couple from hell. 

The film was written by Richard LaGravenese and Marie Weiss.  The running time is 97 minutes.

1994 - PULP FICTION, still very entertaining

I probably haven't seen since Pulp Fiction since it was first released around Christmas time in 1994.  That was back when after spending the Holidays with your family you were desperate to get away from them for a couple of hours by running out to a movie.

Pulp Fiction was Tarantino's follow up to Reservoir Dogs a film which got him attention from the critics and the audience.  Pulp Fiction really cemented his reputation as the preeminent maker of cool guy films.  In spite of a few slow moments the film still holds up and is still incredibly entertaining.

Tarantino put together an impressive cast anyway you cut it.  Samuel Jackson is great as the philosophy spouting killer.  John Travolta's career was revitalized with this film.  Uma Thurman went on to work with Tarantino in Kill Bill Vol's 1 & 2.  Harvey Keitel, Christopher Walken, Tim Roth and Amanda Plummer all contribute amusing bits to this film.  It's kind of like the actors sensed they had good roles for a change and really ran with the parts when they showed up in film.

 

The film had a unique structure like chapters in a book,  Tarantino boldly jumped back and forth in time something audiences never really saw in a mainstream film. I enjoyed revisiting this film again.

 

The running time is 154 minutes, the screenplay was by Tarantino with a story assist from Roger Avery.

1994, BURNING PARADISE IN HELL, an odd film from Ringo Lam

Usually one associates urban action films with directors like John Woo and in this case Ringo Lam.  Burning Paradise in Hell is unusual in that it is a period piece which is a little out of Lam's film making element.

The film has one of Asia's legendary hero's Fong Sai-yuk trying to rescue a girl stuck in an underground lair ruled by a despot who has rigged the whole place up with lots of deadly booby traps.  Frankly the plot doesn't really make much sense which seems to be the way with these films.

 

Lots of action well staged a sufficiently creepy atmosphere but I've probably seen to many of these Asian action films this month, this one had that old feeling of deju-vu to it.  If you like your martial arts action sufficiently wild you will probably enjoy this film.  Tsui Hark was the producer.

Written by Nam Yin and Wong Wan-choi, the running time is 104 minutes.

1994 - WONDER SEVEN , typical over the top Hong Kong action film

A film with Michelle Yeoh made fairly early in her career.  She receives top billing but is more like a supporting or featured player.  It does appear that she is doing a lot of her own stunts and she is a rather undeniable film presence.

This is what I would call a typical over the top Hong Kong action film.  The title Wonder Seven refers to a team of undercover police agents who race around on motorcycles fighting crime.  The plot has something to do with a computer chip which the bad guys are trying to steal for some reason which I was never really sure about.  There's lots of shooting and improbable motorcycle stunts and some good action in a Hong Kong high rise that's a little reminiscent of Die Hard's office building action.

 

The whole thing is made with a lot of skill and there's no denying that it's action packed although at the expense of any kind of coherent plot or deep characterization, this film is for the undemanding action movie fan for the most part.

 

The running time is 90 minutes, the writers were, Tan Cheung, Siu-Tung Ching and Elsa Tang.

1994 - GIRLS IN PRISON , another in the Rebel Highway series

Girls In Prison as the title states is about girls in prison.  Songwriter Angie O'Hara is framed for the murder of a record executive by a couple who want to steal her soon to be hit song.  While in prison she endures the usual girls in prison tropes.  In this instance, lesbianism, the naked gratuitous shower scenes and the usual girl on girl violence.

The latest film I viewed in this series has the same good points and bad points in the series.  Excellent sets and costumes reflecting the 1950's settings are the good points and the strangely indifferent attitude these directors seem to bring to this series are the bad points.  This film as typical in this series, seems to lack the craziness of the old AIP films they are based on which in turn makes them less fun to view.

 

The acting is all over the place, some of the girls seem to be sleep walking though their parts while others, in this case Anne Heche embrace their over the top characters in an entertaining fashion.

 

For the most part this is about an average film in the series.

Written by Samuel Fuller of all people and his wife Christa Lang, the running time is 83 minutes.

1994 - ROADRACERS, from the Rebel Highway series

Roadracers involves a greasy haired hot rod driver racing around a small town while being harassed by the local sheriff. The sheriff has a son who is basically a juvenile delinquent who is also the antagonist of the hot rod driver.  It all comes to a head one night and in a violent showdown.

 The road racer is played by David Arquette an actor usually known for playing goof balls on TV shows and in films.  Arquette improbably has a hot Hispanic girlfriend played by Salma Hayek.  Perennial character actor villain William Sadler is the sheriff and you can throw in a cameo by actor Kevin McCarthy watching himself in The Invasion Of The Body Snatchers.

 

The film was directed by Robert Rodriguez in that frenzied manner he brought to his debut film El Maricachi.  This attempt at making a B-movie generally succeeds.  Coming from a background of making a film for next to no budget Rodriguez probably was probably in heaven with a budget of around one million dollars.  

 

The whole point of these Rebel Highway films was to make them on the cheap and to replicate the AIP exploitation films. Although I am only two films into this series this seems the most successful so far.

Written by Rodriguez and  Tommy Nix, the running time is 95 minutes.

1994 - MOTORCYCLE GANG, my first film in the Rebel Highway series.

Time to give the Rebel Highway series a look.  This series was an attempt to recreate the exploitation films of the 1950's and early 1960's by giving directors a small budget and allowing them to have control over their films.  Macho director John Milius is up with this pagan to the motorcycle films that AIP cranked out for a while.

The film is unsurprisingly called Motorcycle Gang.  TV veteran Gerald McRaney plays a father who is traveling to California with his hot to trot daughter played by Carla Gugino (a 22 year old actress attempting to pass for a teenager) and his cheating wife.  The family gets involved with a motorcycle gang of killers who kidnap the daughter.  The film deals with the father and mother attempting to get their daughter back.  However all is not what it seems, the father has a secret violent past unbeknownst to the motorcycle gang.   Let the action commence.

 

This would seems like a film right up John Milius's alley but he directs the film in an extremely pedestrian manner.  The actors at times are sleepwalking through their cliched characters and the whole thing suffers from a lack of tension.  The action scenes are somewhat on the lame side as well.

 

This is not a particularly good start for the first film I'm viewing in the series, it's kind of a disappointment.  The running time is 84 minutes.  It was written by Laurie McQuillan and Kent Anderson.

1994 - THAT'S ENTERTAINMENT! PART III, more of the same with a few variations.

The third in the series, the original film, That's Entertainment was a movie made up of clips from MGM's peak musical period.  The old time stars who had appeared in these musicals were brought in to provide some commentary, praising the genius of MGM's musical department.

That's Entertainment, Part II had Gene Kelly directing the introductions of yet more clips from MGM's musicals.  This time Kelly and Fred Astaire did the introductions and commentaries.  It was already apparent that most of the good stuff had been used in the first film.  That's Entertainment, Part II did have Astaire and Kelly performing in a couple of numbers.  The two legendary hoofers actually did pretty well considering their ages.

 
That's Entertainment! Part III had a few new twists to it besides the usual hodge podge of musical numbers.  Outtakes from numbers that didn't make it into any film were featured.  A bizzare number featuring some sisters who were contortionists didn't make the cut.  A number with Lena Horne cut from the all black musical Cabin In The Sky probably removed for censorship reasons when it played down south.  In addition, many numbers that were re-staged with different sets and costumes, apparently the filmmakers didn't feel the numbers were effective as originally performed.

This was all interesting stuff especially for film buffs.  Unfortunately the film finally settles down into it's familiar format with the veteran performers introducing numbers which lets face it were about the bottom of the barrel since the filmmakers had already picked over the good stuff for the previous films.

 

I guess if That's Entetainment! III proves anything it's that MGM which did had some of the finest technicians on staff did tend to cater to a very middle class audience.  A lot of the numbers in this film are extremely bland.

The film was written by  Bud Friedgen and Michael J. Sheridan who were the editors on all three of these films and the directors on this one.  The running time is 113 minutes.

1994 - IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS, disappointing John Carpenter film

A private investigator played by Sam Neill is searching for a reclusive horror story writer who is supposed to be based on H.P. Lovecraft a writer from the 1930's but could just as easily be horror novelist Steven King.  As Neill delves into the whereabouts of the writer,  Sutter Cane played by creepy German actor Jurgen Prochnow.  Neill begins to suspect that his stories are actually becoming true.

This is a decent enough premise but unfortunately the execution of the idea is kind of a muddled mess.  The story confusingly jumps around with frenzied editing tricks, jump scares and yucky monsters that are reminiscent of Carpenter's The Thing which was a much better film.  

 

If I step back and objectively think about this film, Carpenter's direction is actually pretty good.  He stages the scenes well and the actors all give fairly decent performances.  The problem is the mess of a screenplay by the writer Michael De Luca who was also the executive producer.  De Luca was also responsible for the horrible Judge Dredd with Sylvester Stallone which is not to be confused with the good Judge Dredd film simply called Dredd.  

 

Unfortunately towards the end of his career, Carpenter struggled with finding stories that appealed to the film going audience. The running time is 95 minutes.

1994 - THE LEGEND OF THE DRUNKEN MASTER aka DRUNKEN MASTER II

 Jackie Chan's sequel to Drunken Master was a mixed bag.  It has two splendid fight sequences, some cheap sentimentality and a lot of the silly slapstick humor he seems so fond of.  Yet the film is Jackie Chan in his prime as an athlete.

The story is loosely based on the legend of Wong Fei-hung a famous martial arts expert and physician.  However Jackie Chan has chosen to play him as a guy who can't fight unless he gets really drunk. It's all kind of stupid after a while.  Chan has loaded the film up with his usual stock company.  Chief among them is Anita Mui a legendary cantonese singer who Chan has cast as his stepmother of all people. 

The film was directed by Lau Kar-leung who was a martial arts choreographer and director.  Apparently he and Jackie Chan had a lot of disagreements during the making of the film but it's clear from the final form of the film Jackie Chan was calling most of the shots behind the camera.

 

A key film in the Jackie Chan filmography, the film does have some amazing martial arts scenes. 

The film was written by Edward Tang, Tong Man-ming and Yuen Chieh-chi it runs 102 minutes.

1994 - THE MADNESS OF KING GEORGE, yes another film about the British royals

Yes, it's another film about British royalty which means powdered wigs, women's gowns with lots of major bosom uplift and lots of uniforms and starched pants.  The film is adapted from the play of almost the same name.  The play is actually called The Madness of King George III.  For some reason they dropped the roman numerals in the screen version.

 

 

The film is a character study of England's King George The III the monarch who saw the American colonies gain their independence from England.  Apparently George The III had a few mental problems which is the story line of the play.  The drama comes from seeing if George will get his marbles back before the British Parliament strips him of his powers and gives them to his indolent son.

The cast is one of those only in England can we find this bunch.  Ian Holm, Rupert Everett, Rupert Graves, Amanda Donohoe, Geoffrey Palmer, Helen Mirren (with her clothes on for a change) and Nigel Hawthorne recreating his stage role as the nutty King.

The film is a good character study and very well acted although George the III is so extremely dislikable when he's sane that it's a little hard to work up much sympathy for him when he is trying to recover from his mental illness.  In any case the film is probably best enjoyed by that certain bunch of people known as Anglophiles.  Frankly, you can see this kind of stuff on public television Sunday nights often.

107 minutes, written by the playwright Alan Bennett.