All posts by Rod Lott

Horror

Shock-O-Rama (2005)

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I’ve never been able to stomach more than a minute of ei Independent Cinema’s softcore efforts, like Spider-Babe, The Lord of the G-Strings, Kinky Kong and Play-Mate of the Apes. Not being 13 years old, I don’t see the appeal. Surprise then, to see one that’s actually kinda clever, at least by their low standards: Shock-O-Rama.

It helps that it’s interested in a lot more than simulated lesbian sex scenes. Writer/director Brett Piper (perhaps most notable for They Bite) pays loving tribute to horror anthologies in a joyful, drive-in style. It’s like asking, “What if Grindhouse were made for $7.49? Plus tax?”

In the wraparound, Misty Mundae practically plays herself: a Z-grade movie actress. She’s fired by her producers, who then have to screen other films to find a new starlet to fill her void. Cue the stories, one involving aliens in a junkyard; the other, skanks undergoing a scientific experiment (that’s where most of the T&A lay, FYI).

The wraparound becomes a story in itself as Mundae resurrects — and then is pursued by — a zombie. The proceedings never take themselves seriously, which is wise considering the bar for acting is set pretty low. Piper pulls off some good effects, too, on an apparent Big Lots! budget. —Rod Lott

Buy it at Amazon.

Kitchen Sink

The Best of Trailers from Hell!: Volume One (2010)

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With that credo that “Any movie can be great at 2 1/2 minutes,” director Joe Dante’s Trailers from Hell website makes the leap to DVD with The Best of Trailers from Hell!: Volume One. Dante and pals John Landis, Eli Roth and Edgar Wright all take turns providing commentary for the coming attractions to their favorite genre pictures — not Mystery Science Theater 3000-style, but purely informational. It’s like the coolest film class in the history of ever.

B-movie fans will come away from the hourlong free-for-all with two frames of mind:
1. “Man, that reminded me a lot of stuff I really need to see again.”
2. “Man, that reminded me a lot of stuff I really need to check out.”

For me, that latter camp includes the proto-slasher Horrors of the Black Museum, Paul Bartel’s giallo-influenced Private Parts, David Cronenberg’s biological horror of Rabid, Roger Vadim’s lesbian-vampire outing Blood and Roses, and the possession picture The Sentinel. Of the four hosts, Roth is the most enjoyable, simply for how infectious his spirit is, whether the clip is for a grindhouse cheapie like Three on a Meathook or Alfred Hitchcock’s classic The Birds.

To provide bang for your buck, the disc also includes a full-length feature — well, 67 minutes, anyway — of the Lionel Atwill/Fay Wray cheapie The Vampire Bat, plus two vintage cartoons from the 1930s — including Ub Iwerks’ “The Headless Horseman” — that my 5-year-old went ape-shit over. —Rod Lott

Buy it at Trailers from Hell!

Western

Ghost Rock (2003)

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Despite its title, Ghost Rock is not a spook-filled musical. It’s a kung-fu western! Hey, great idea … when it was Jackie Chan’s Shanghai Noon. But starring Gary Busey? Not so much.

Perpetually carrying that kicked-by-a-horse look and what looks like a bellyful of sausage patties, Busey plays the corrupt mayor of Ghost Rock, a dusty old backlot, er, town run by crooks and outlaws. Michael Worth (Acapulco H.E.A.T.) and lovely Jenya Lano (Stealing Candy) return there after being absent for many years to settle an old score.

Adrienne Barbeau is the madam of the local whorehouse, Jeff Fahey makes a cameo and … I’m not making this sound any more inviting, am I? Some of Busey’s set-ups are shot in an entirely different film stock, so they don’t match other shot within the same scene.

Amateurish and inept, Ghost Rock has as many clichés as it does bullets fired, with all the predictability of a staged theme-park gunfight (Guy falls from second-story railing? Check!), acted with local theater types who think they’re making art. They aren’t. —Rod Lott

Buy it at Amazon.

Thriller

Track Down (2000)

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Despite Miramax’s best efforts to make you think otherwise (i.e. never releasing it in theaters, waiting five years to dump it on video, giving Skeet Ulrich a lead role), Track Down isn’t as bad as you’d expect.

It’s the true story of Kevin Mitnick, the hacker who evaded the FBI for two years after breaking into computer networks and stealing software and data that could have been highly damaging, had he chosen to do so.

Mitnick is played by Ulrich, who no longer looks like Johnny Depp, but Kevin Federline. As he attempts to live off the grid, he’s chased not only by federal agents, but computer security expert Tsutomu Shimomura (Russell Wong), whose hard drive Mitnick wiped clean and whose super-secret virus-worm-thingie he swiped.

Track Down has an interesting dilemma: How do you make hacking visually exciting? Well, other than having Angelina Jolie strip down in a pool, you can’t. So it has to rely on your standard cat-and-mouse setup to generate any thrills. But in doing so, Track Down forgets to dumb down the technology aspect to make it easily acceptable. It assumes you already know a lot about hacking, from the lingo to the how-to.

I obviously don’t know as much as I should have, because after watching the film, I have no idea what exactly Mitnick did or who Shimomura is. But I do know that Halloween 6 director Joe Chappelle so obviously used this flashy piece as a calling card to get his CSI: Miami gig.

Jeremy Sisto, Master P and Amanda Peet are thrown into the cast just to piss me off. —Rod Lott

Buy it at Amazon.

Mystery

Passengers (2008)

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Passengers plays like a mix of The Sixth Sense, Fearless (the airplane one, not the throat-kicking one) and all the bluish Crayons in the big box with the built-in sharpener. After a commercial jet crashes, grief counselor Claire (Anne Hathaway) is called in to talk to the passengers — hence the title!

They seem to differ on whether there was an explosion and other details. They also seem to disappear one by one, which may have something to do with the shadowy man who stalks them and appears outside the window. But, hey, what’s with the looniest of the bunch, this Eric fellow (Patrick Wilson)? He acts like he just stubbed his toe, not survived the opening of Lost!

Rodrigo García directs with a gloomy crispness that makes all of Canada look like an Architectural Digest spread, but the limp screenplay by Ronnie Christensen jumps from drama to mystery to romance to “how much longer does this have?” It’s not a thriller, as it’s generally classified.

The film is yet another that introduces a lazy twist ending, presented so shoddily it holds no surprise. García doesn’t so much build up to it as he does stumble into it. The actors are passable, but why does Hathaway always look like she just drank cherry Kool-Aid? And is it in Wilson’s contract to show his bare ass in every movie? —Rod Lott

Buy it at Amazon.