All posts by Rod Lott

Sci-Fi & Fantasy

Dreamscape (1984)

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dreamscapeBaby-faced Alex Gardner (Dennis Quaid, Innerspace) is a gadabout psychic specializing in extreme telekinesis, perpetual womanizing and dim-witted snark: “Who’s your decorator? Darth Vader?” He’s “recruited” for an extended stay at Thornhill College to participate in a top-secret project; over a pitcher a beer at a proto-Hooters pub, Dr. Paul Novotny (Max von Sydow, Flash Gordon) lays it all out: The doc is researching how to psychically project a person into another’s dream and have that person actively participate with — and protect — the REM-phase sleeper.

Having succeeded in the how-to portion, Novotny wants Alex and his considerable mind powers to join the team. Being on the run from gambling-related goons, Alex accepts, and Dreamscape works best when depicting his lab sessions of the surreal and nonsensical. Years away from CGI, director Joseph Ruben (1987’s The Stepfather) has to rely upon cut-rate green screens and matte paintings, but these effects are nonetheless effective. Besides, dreams are imperfect, so having the seams show seems appropriate.

dreamscape1For the first two-thirds of the film, the dream sequences differ wildly in tone. The one set atop an under-construction skyscraper is riddled with high-anxiety suspense, while one involving infidelity is funny. Viewers are served one that is genuinely scary (with a Snakeman lurking among Caligari-esque corridors) and one that is genuinely sexy (as Alex enjoys train-car copulation with a project researcher played by Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom‘s Kate Capshaw in her prime).

If only Dreamscape didn’t collapse in its final act, when the focus shifts from Alex to the President of the United States (Eddie Albert, The Devil’s Rain). Plagued by visions of a nuclear holocaust, the leader of our free world just wants “these damn nightmares to end!,” while others wish to end him. On the whole, the movie is like a ’70s conspiracy thriller wrapped in an issue of EC Comics’ Weird Science. I loved it without question or criticism upon its premiere, when I was 13; I like it fine today. —Rod Lott

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Reading Material

Stephen King Films FAQ: All That’s Left To Know About the King of Horror on Film

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skingfaqBeing born in 1971, I’m just the right age to have experienced the dawn of Stephen King. My middle-school love for his books extended to the movies based on those books, and I have fond memories of so many of them, including:
• renting George A. Romero’s Creepshow over and over (on big-box VHS!) from Sound Warehouse,
• lining up at the Northpark Cinema 4 for the opening weekend of the anthology Cat’s Eye
• and catching Brian De Palma’s Carrie one weeknight on some local UHF channel, only to be jolted into fright by that last scene — one of the rare times a film genuinely has scared me.

All these memories and more came flooding back while reading Stephen King Films FAQ. It’s the first in Applause Theatre & Cinema Books’ ever-growing FAQ series for author Scott Von Doviak, but not his first for the publisher; he wrote the best-so-far entry in its other pop-culture series, If You Like, so my high hopes here were not dashed.

Let’s get my one problem with the book right out of the way, because it resides at the beginning: The first 40 pages offer a brief history of the horror-movie genre at large. If this were Horror Films FAQ, that would be fine, but it’s not and that book already exists, so here, it just seems like stalling, like those advertisements that run in theaters before the real fun begins.

And the rest is real fun for fans. Von Doviak covers the wide territory chronologically (saving sequels and spin-offs for later chapters of their own), weaving a well-researched narrative that’s informative, thorough and not lacking in his own opinions. As shown in his two prior film books, especially 2004’s Hick Flicks: The Rise and Fall of Redneck Cinema, the author exhibits a boisterous sense of humor, and I don’t think I laughed louder than his summation of the made-for-TV miniseries It: “The cast could have been confused with that of a 1990 Hollywood Squares episode. … How seriously can we take an ensemble comprised of Jack Tripper, Venus Flytrap, the wacky judge from Night Court, and John-Boy Walton in a dorky ponytail?”

I love that Von Doviak isn’t blindly fawning over King, as I can see lesser writers doing; he loves what he loves, hates what he hates, and isn’t afraid to share those thoughts, no matter to what degree they are shared by the collective audience. (While we’re on the subject of objectivity and bias, I should note that one of my pieces of film journalism — an interview with Children of the Corn director Fritz Kiersch — is quoted on page 88, of which I had no prior knowledge and alters my opinion of this book not one iota.)

One of the greatest chapters finds Von Doviak hosting an all-night Corn marathon, painful sequel by painful sequel, and the book deviates from the King features to include looks at the “Dollar Baby” shorts, adaptations that never made it out of development hell, the Marvel comic books and the occasional Broadway fiasco. The paperback comes packed with photos and poster art, although not as fully as Stephen Graham Jones’ enjoyable Creepshows: The Illustrated Stephen King Movie Guide, a 2002 release in serious need of an update it’s unlikely to get, so consider this FAQ that. —Rod Lott

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Horror

HazMat (2013)

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hazmatWith HazMat, writer/director/producer Lou Simon not only proves that women can make slasher films, too, but also that they can be as terrible as men’s.

Dave (Todd Bruno) is the host of a TV prank show titled Scary Antics. Since it’s on the bubble, he aims to amp things up; ergo, the setups grow meaner. The latest involves some “friends” setting up Jacob (Norbert Velez) at a supposedly haunted warehouse … that also is the site of his own father’s murder. Hilarious, right, bro?

hazmat1Pretty quickly after entering, Jacob cannot separate reality from stupid prank shows and snaps. He then … well, let’s let one of the more annoying characters tell us via her unbelievably calm phone call for help: “There is a crazy man with an ax. He’s already killed two people and he’s coming after us.”

Misreading of dialogue plagues the script’s pages; the tech guy who speaks as if he has rocks in his mouth reads the panicked “Oh, no!” as the morphine-sedated “Oh, no.” As per usual in microbudgeted horror, the act of killing has been given more attention than performances or plot, both of which are atrocious here. Too bad, because on looks alone, Jacob’s HazMat suit screams “franchise character.” Let’s hope it never gets the chance. —Rod Lott

Documentary

The Revisionaries (2012)

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revisionariesIn 2009, I was considering moving to Texas for a job offer. I decided not to pursue it, and Don McLeroy is one reason why — seriously.

His name may not be known to you, but his actions are. He was the Texas State Board of Education member who put his personal ideology before the brains of Lone Star youth, in order to force a number of utterly ridiculous changes to the public school system’s history textbooks. His main target was the theory of evolution, but his beefs didn’t stick to matters best left to the pulpit. For example, whether he realized it or not, his xenophobia was showing in asking to replace a book’s mention of “hip-hop” to “country music.” (Lord forbid the children know the existence of rap! Or colored people!)

revisionaries1Any sane politician would be aghast at what McLeroy proposed; the trouble was, not many of McLeroy’s fellow board members appeared to be. Scott Thurman’s documentary The Revisionaries chronicles the Austin dentist-cum-politician’s crusade — make no mistake; that’s what this was — from inside the board’s meeting rooms. What merely nauseated you on news soundbites in 2009 will sicken you extended to 92 minutes.

I don’t consider Thurman’s film to be an attack on religion — after all, he lets both sides tell their stories — but I do consider it an attack on hypocrisy. Shouldn’t legislators leave the Sunday-school lessons to, you know, church? Time and taxpayer dollars would be better spent working to fix society’s real problems. —Rod Lott

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Horror

Night of the Demons 2 (1994)

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nightdemons2While his Catholic school roomies are obsessed with copping a feel, Perry (Bobby Jacoby, Tremors) is obsessed with conjuring a demon — specifically, Angela (role-reprising Amelia Kinkade), the satanic seductress who wrought hell in 1988’s Night of the Demons. Ozploitation pioneer Brian Trenchard-Smith (Dead End Drive-In) takes the reins from Kevin S. Tenney to direct this follow-up.

Like the original, Night of the Demons 2 is set on Halloween night. At St. Rita’s Academy, that means a big dance. But when some of the students sin their way out of an invitation, they aren’t about to let some yardstick-wielding nun rain on their parade; instead, they go to Hull House, the abandoned abode still haunted by Angela. Being dragged there is the unpopular, mousy Melissa (Merle Kennedy, May), Angela’s orphaned sister.

nightdemons21Not entirely the same story retread, Night of the Demons 2 distinguishes itself with better actors (including The Brady Bunch Movie‘s Christine Taylor, aka Mrs. Ben Stiller, as a snooty prude), better effects (including a lipstick tube that looks like a dog’s erection) and better breasts (Linnea Quigley has nothing on Zoe Trilling or Cristi Harris). It also has more inventive death sequences. For instance, I’ve seen plenty of movies in which a horny guy grabs a pair of boobs, but never before have I seen a pair of boobs grabbing a horny guy. Another EC Comics-style standout has one unfortunate boy playing basketball with own head; on the downside, this unleashes sports puns galore, each more groan-inducing than the one before.

Trenchard-Smith loses focus in the third act as he allows returning screenwriter Joe Augustyn to steer the material toward self-parody (example: Sister Gloria, played by Heathers‘ Jennifer Rhodes, busts out some martial-arts moves), but I suppose that’s all part of the fun. As with its predecessor, Night of the Demons 2 is one of those rare horror films that feels like a Halloween party in itself. —Rod Lott

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