Action

Half Past Dead (2002)

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Prophetically titled, Half Past Dead was Steven Seagal’s last theatrical hurrah as an action hero. Either as a sign of desperation or as a self-deluded desire of demonstrating range, the former tuffie agreed to wear a ’do rag and play a Russian, yet eschewed any attempt at an accent. Leave that shit to Meryl, right?

Seagal’s Sasha Petrosevitch works undercover for the FBI. As the film opens, Sasha is introduced to a crime syndicate boss named Eckvall (but it sounded like “Eggfart”), helps take down an arrogant criminal (arrogant rapper Ja Rule, 2001’s The Fast and the Furious), almost dies for it (hence the title) and dons prison garb at New Alcatraz.

While Sasha is in the clinker, a bald bad guy (Bruce Weitz, Deep Impact) is scheduled to be executed for stealing $200 million in government gold bars, and the Supreme Court justice (Linda Thorson, Curtains) who helped put him away is there to witness. So naturally, a gang of would-be thieves drops in via helicopter and takes the justice hostage until the death-row inmate reveals where he’s hidden that loot.

The treasure hunters’ leaders are played by Morris Chestnut (2015’s Heist) and Nia Peeples (Werewolf: The Beast Among Us), who looks like she’s wearing the prototype for Sears’ Underworld collection and moves as if she were Michael Myers from Halloween.

This all results in an action free-for-all. Martial arts! Pornographic gunplay! Acrobatic swinging from chains! Guards thrown through glass! Story be damned! Written and directed by former actor Don Michael Paul (Rolling Vengeance), Half Past Dead seems interested only in being so slick that one could cook pancakes on it and not have them stick. Such an approach is admittedly entertaining, even when it’s absolutely absurd. —Rod Lott

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Comedy

Supervan (1977)

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It is hard to believe there was a time in this country when Americans shelled out thousands of dollars not just to drive vans as a primary mode of transportation, but to emblazon them with airbrushed fantasies of mermaids and Mickey Mouse and more, all of which look to have been dictated to a slumming Frank Frazetta by a toddler who forgot to take his Ritalin that morning. And yet here, to serve as historical record (and little else) is proof: Supervan. It is a movie that is likable against odds stacked higher than used tires.

Otherwise known as Vandora, the Supervan is a solar-powered, souped-up four-wheeler of the future, today! Designed for the film by Batmobile builder George Barris, who cameos as himself, the Supervan is the great white-and-red hope for the idealistic, yet unemployed Clint Morgan (Mark Schneider, The Premonition) to score the $5,000 prize up for grabs at the second annual Non-National Invitational Freak Out. (Results after feeding that through our patent-pending Outdated Slang Translator: “van contest.”) Consisting of events ranging from the “show-and-shine” and “wiggle-woggle” to its climactic mudslide competition, the Freak Out is sponsored by the corrupt Mid America Motors Corporation, whose cigar-chomping CEO, T.B. Trenton (Morgan Woodward, Final Chapter: Walking Tall), seeks to rig the games with his firm’s new gas guzzler, the Trenton Trucker.

Adding a wrinkle to this hackneyed conflict is that en route to the Freak Out, Clint saves a cute woman named Karen (Katie Saylor, Invasion of the Bee Girls) from being gang-raped by bikers, and she instantly assumes the plot position as our youthful hero’s stock sidekick-cum-girlfriend … despite being Trenton’s daughter. The story grows no more complicated than that; viewers will find more depth in the carpeted interior of any given van on display.

Directed by Lamar Card, who gave us the following year’s equally novel Disco Fever, Supervan is less a movie than an opportunity to show off enough bitchin’ rides and braless babes to capitalize on the of-its-time trend of action-comedies rife with speed traps, sheriff’s deputies with high blood pressure and CB radio-speak that demands subtitles; interestingly, this Missouri-made picture beat the hicksploitation granddaddy, Smokey and the Bandit, to theaters by a matter of months. With seemingly endless scenes of driving and dicking around, it exudes the spirit and storytelling of a feature-length Mr. Microphone commercial, albeit one in which a car can blow another up via laser beam.

Card and his cast work hard for every joke, without precisely knowing the proper structure of one; each gag tends to be missing either the setup or the punchline. Similarly, secondary characters saunter in, free of context or introduction, then disappear without contributing to a payoff. Among them is a lisping trio of gay men vanpooling to the Freak Out, with the driver sporting a “MAN HANDLER USA” T-shirt and the dash littered with copies of Playgirl magazine. Somehow, Supervan finds room for a moment of sheer horror as a shapely wet T-shirt contestant is embraced by none other than Charles Bukowski. Clutching a pull-tab beer and with his belly having escaped to the outside of his shirt, the legendarily alcohol-soaked poet looks more unkempt than any wrecked vehicle of your choice among all 91 minutes. —Rod Lott

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Horror

Winchester (2018)

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Reclusive widow Sarah Winchester (Helen Mirren, The Fate of the Furious) owns 51% of the gun company that bears her name, but the board of directors fears she’s lost her marbles since losing her husband and only child to the Grim Reaper. After all, what possible good reason could a person have to purchase an eight-room home, only to add 92 rooms onto it?

That’s what Dr. Price (Jason Clarke, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes) is going to find out! Hired by the board, the whore-lovin’, opium-droppin’ doc is dispatched to the Winchester house in San Jose, California, to assess the missus’ state of mind. What he finds is that the abode is twistier than she is, what with its maze-like stairwells, false doors, secret rooms, hidey-holes and gh-gh-gh-ghosts! Yep — with a straight face, she tells Price that her increasingly spacious house plays host to many specters: one for each life snuffed by the brand of rifle that brings her riches, which is why the residence is in perpetual renovation. (Lucky for her bank account, the story takes place in 1906.)

Topical only on the surface, Winchester finds inspiration from true events — namely, the widow’s Winchester Mystery House, long a tourist attraction — yet could stand to find more, whether in fact or in fiction. After setting up the home’s funhouse uniqueness, sibling directors Michael and Peter Spierig (Jigsaw) do not do enough with it, jettisoning it quickly for a rote possession storyline and haunted-house jump scares that could take place in any Insidious sequel.

Still, being talented pros, neither Mirren nor Clarke — nor third lead Sarah Snook (the Spierig brothers’ Predestination) as Sarah’s niece — half-ass the half-baked material, which is admirable on their part. Winchester is well-made mediocrity. —Rod Lott

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Comedy

The Janitor (2003)

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Perhaps the time was right for a horror comedy about a crazed practitioner of the custodial arts. So God gives you The Janitor — often laugh-out-loud funny and more often gleefully offensive.

In this tiny-budgeted labor of love from California, a dumpy janitor named Lionel (Honest Trailers mastermind Andy Signore) works at the offices of Generico Corporation, where members of the workforce either scorn him or ignore him, naturally. He carries a torch for a female employee who is repulsed by his very mop-pushing presence. It’s enough to drive a guy mad.

Lionel’s ambitions do not end in the halls of Generico; his dream is to ply his no-diploma-required trade at a college sorority house. He’s about to get his big break, until his janitorial partner/mentor, Mr. Growbo (Bruce Cronander, The Poughkeepsie Tapes), sweeps swoops in to steal the position out of spite, feeling despondent and betrayed by Lionel’s desire to leave. It’s enough to drive a guy even madder. At that point, Lionel — who by now already has terminated a few co-workers — embarks on a full-blown sorority house massacre.

A mix of raunchy comedy and messy splatter, The Janitor is so over-the-top, one wonders if there was a tiled ceiling to begin with. For example, Lionel has to cover up a homicide by lubricating his hand with spit in order to jerk off a fresh corpse. “Maybe next time you’ll think twice before decapitating a hooker,” scolds Growbo; it’s a long story.

For a piece of self-financed microcinema, The Janitor bears quite the coat of polish while also looking back in the well-Windexed mirror. The gore effects are H.G. Lewis-level terrific, while Russ Meyer fans will appreciate the gargantuan helpings of gratuitous nudity. Co-written and co-directed by Signore and TJ Nordaker, the movie reminded me of 1989’s infamous Las Vegas Blood Bath, yet entirely self-aware. —Rod Lott

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Reading Material

Reading Material: Short Ends 4/25/18

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In case Stephen Thrower’s recent two-volume look at the man’s filmography is too pricey for your tastes, Jess Franco: The World’s Most Dangerous Filmmaker may be more your wallet’s speed, particularly for Franco neophytes. The second of crime-fic purveyor Stark House’s titles to be issued under its “Film Classics” label (a 2006 reprint of the late, great Ed Gorman and Kevin McCarthy’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers: A Tribute was the first), Kristofer Todd Upjohn’s paperback examines roughly 45 Franco films, arranged in no order whatsoever. This randomness fits Franco’s anything-goes approach, as the ever-prolific director doused and dabbled in horror, sex, crime, comedy and the occasional Fu Manchu adventure. The Diabolical Dr. Z, Venus in Furs, The Erotic Rites of Frankenstein, Countess Perverse, Bloody Moon, Faceless — all of these and more undergo Upjohn’s critical eye, probing enough to whet the reader’s appetite for first tastes or return visits. The author clearly knows of what he writes, although his constant referencing of “Thanatos and Eros” (death and sex) seems like a needless attempt to add a layer of academic-minded icing to the cake, when such a move is unnecessary — after all, it’s cake: delicious and irresistible as is.

Indeed, Chris Nashawaty’s Caddyshack: The Making of a Hollywood Cinderella Story does tell the tale behind the 1980 crass comedy, but only after doing the same about the founding of National Lampoon magazine and its move into film with Animal House. One can’t fault the author for doing so, because the making of Caddyshack equals the un-making of Kenney. Whereas Nashawaty’s previous book (the 2013 Roger Corman bio, Crab Monsters, Teenage Cavemen, and Candy Stripe Nurses) presented its subject by way of an oral history, this Flatiron Books hardcover is a tightly written narrative of debauchery on Warner Bros.’ dime, and full of what the beloved movie lacks: actual plot. Some of its key storylines are legendary: Kenney’s vacuum-like coke habit, Bill Murray’s mad improv skills and Chevy Chase’s legendary assholiness. Others, however, are comparatively revelatory: Cindy Morgan’s struggle to be treated with a modicum of kindness, Rodney Dangerfield not knowing what to do when director Harold Ramis called “Action!” and Ted Knight’s old-pro frustration with coke habits, improv skills and assholiness. The result? A behind-the-scenes, you-are-there(-and-stoned-as-fuck) account for the record books, if cinema kept such a record. So it’s got that going for it, which is nice.

Readers are more apt to enjoy Indie Science Fiction Cinema Today: Conversations with 21st Century Filmmakers when they have seen the movies in question. Luckily for co-authors Kathleen Fernandez-Vander Kaay and Chris Vander Kaay, the films covered — from aliens and superheroes to alternate histories and other dimensions — are more commercial and readily available than that “indie” tag might suggest. For example, the Julie Benz vehicle Circle is a Netflix fave; the Tim Burton-produced 9 played theaters nationwide; and so many others already have earned cult followings, including Iron Sky, Turbo Kid and Pontypool. Directorial duo Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead are represented by, appropriately enough, two separate interviews: one for Resolution, one for Spring. While the Vander Kaays’ Q-and-As about the creative process and budgetary constraints mean that much of the McFarland & Company release may be more transcribed than written, that lends the book the feel of overhearing casual conversations, many of them worth the eavesdropping. —Rod Lott

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