Who’s Chester Novell Turner? He’s a correspondence-course filmmaker who shot two homemade horror opuses at the height of the home-video revolution: 1984’s Black Devil Doll from Hell and 1987’s Tales from the Quadead Zone. Until recently, these ultra-rare, ultra-obscure titles fetched hundreds of dollars on eBay. I might feel sorry for the poor bastards who […]
Rod Lott
Posted inArts & Culture
Passion
A remake of the 2010 French film Love Crime, Passion burns in an advertising agency in Germany headed by Christine (Rachel McAdams, To the Wonder), a bratty, manipulative bitch who uses one of her creatives, Isabelle (Noomi Rapace, Prometheus), as a puppet. When Christine takes credit for Isabelle’s idea for a smartphone campaign spot, it […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Lovelace
This approach speaks to the controversy that dogged Lovelace’s later life, in which she denounced porn of all forms, saying that she was coerced by gunpoint and other means into performing oral sex for the cameras of Deep Throat, not to mention dalliances into prostitution. So, no, Lovelace is not the feel-good hit of the […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Bounty Killer
In its post-apocalyptic setting of 2042, what remains of our country is a barren wasteland where death warrants are issued for white-collar criminals (somehow, there are still plenty) and bounty hunters compete madly for them, racking up quite a body count. Speaking of rack, “the greatest killer the world had ever known” happens to be […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Killer Holiday / Murder University
Killer Holiday is so named because the killer’s name is Holiday (ha-ha?) and because for the aggravating eight college students passing for protagonists, it’s spring break, dude! So your Overweight Douche, your Frat Douche, your Party Girl, your Smart Girl and so on pile into an RV to get their kicks on Route 66, because […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Big Bus
Never as readily available and accessible as it should be, The Big Bus belatedly pulls back into in-print status through Warner Archive. Better manufactured-on-demand than never! His lead-up to The Muppet Movie, director James Frawley keeps the atmosphere light with slapstick as the company behind the $12 million nuclear-powered superbus known as Cyclops has no […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Byzantium
The film takes its title from an old hotel into which Clara (Gemma Arterton, Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters) moves with her “daughter,” Eleanor (Saoirse Ronan, The Host). The women are vampires; for 200 years they’ve been bound by blood and that’s a thirst they can’t quite quench, although Eleanor sure wishes she could. To survive, Eleanor seeks […]
Posted inMusic
My Name Is Nobody
A half-decade later, Fonda re-teamed with Leone, who this time served as producer for My Name Is Nobody. Although a far less serious film, it’s arguably more entertaining — a pure delight. See if you don’t agree, now that the 1973 film gallops out of the sunrise and onto Blu-ray. Fonda’s Jack Beauregard is an […]
Posted inArts & Culture
A Hijacking
The Rozen is en route to Mumbai when the weapons-toting Somalis overtake the ship and its seven-man crew. Writer/director Tobias Lindholm doesn’t utilize the captain as our viewpoint, but the cook, Mikkel (Pilou Asbæk, TV’s The Borgias), a nice man who makes a mean omelet. The other half of A Hijacking gets inside the head of […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Grave secrets
Without the war in Vietnam, the civil rights movement, Calgon detergent and Fred Rogers’ tonsils, Night of the Living Dead would not exist. And without Night of the Living Dead, there would be no The Walking Dead, no World War Z, no entire cottage industry centered around those “all messed-up” ghouls who crave and dine […]