The Stop Button

blogging by Andrew Wickliffe

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  • A Yank in the R.A.F. (1941, Henry King)

    A Yank in the R.A.F. (1941, Henry King)

    Betty Grable has a rough time in A Yank in the R.A.F. through no fault of her own. Her love triangle arc is the only thing going on for long stretches of the film. Despite being about brash narcissist Tyrone Power (the Yank) going over to England and joining the R.A.F.—while the U.S. was still operating under the Congressional Neutrality Acts (so pre-pre-Pearl Harbor)—Power doesn’t really have much of an arc. He’s eventually got the war story love triangle arc, as he and his commanding officer (the objectively less handsome and charming John Sutton) compete for Grable’s attentions. Power has a leg up (no pun) since he and Grable were together a year before when he ditched her for a long weekend to cat around with someone else.

    Whenever Power has a scene where the story’s not following him, the introduction involves him trying to pick up on some lady. Nurses, mostly, but also British housewives. Given Grable’s working nights singing and dancing in a night club and doing Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) work during the day, she’s got dancing friends around, but they’re the only women Power doesn’t pick up on. The script feigns he’s a hopeless flirt—I mean, he’s Tyrone Power, after all, is he going to waste those gifts on one woman—but then he’s very intentional about catting around. It’s shitty.

    Of course, all the dudes feel pretty entitled when it comes to Grable. Not dudes who know her, either. While she does meet Sutton at the airbase, he goes to call on her after drooling over her night-club performance. The recurring gag is fellow airman Reginald Gardiner is Grable’s biggest fan and, despite working with both Power and Sutton (even before Power and Sutton work together), he can’t get an introduction. In a better movie, Grable and Gardiner end up together, mostly because he’s got nothing insincere to woo her with. Power woos her with him being Tyrone Power and their physical chemistry—making things awkwarder is how well Power and Grable play together (at least at the beginning), but then he’s just a manipulative, sometimes way too physical prick–while Sutton’s a rich British gentleman. He can marry her and turn her into… well, if not a capital l lady, at least a lowercase l one. The film skirts around the respectability angle a few times, but it’s still there.

    And still problematic.

    In addition to having the most sympathetic characters, Grable and Gardiner easily gives the film’s best performances. Sutton and Power are both too shallow, albeit on opposite ends of the pond (pun). Sutton’s performance doesn’t have any passion or implication of it. As a result, when he courts Grable, she’s left mooning over someone who does nothing but try to negotiate a marriage contract with her. But he and Power also don’t bicker about R.A.F. business. The title’s A Yank in the R.A.F. and all, but Power’s experiences don’t matter until the third act when he gets to show those Germans what an American can do.

    Another strange, timely aspect–Yank is all about showcasing the British war effort (with some phenomenal aerial photography), but it’s also about how they’re a bunch of wimps who will need the U.S. to save them one of these days. Sadly Power never reminds anyone he’s why they’re not speaking German from last time (also, the way the opening narration says “current war” is chilling).

    But Power doesn’t have an arc, either. Yes, he gets more serious about his duties. But immediately. He’s supposedly the best flier the R.A.F. has got if they’d only give him a chance. It doesn’t go anywhere. He and Sutton go through a whole crash-landing arc, and it doesn’t go anywhere. At best, Power’s arc is meandering. More often, it’s either entirely stalled or entirely beside the point, so the film can focus on Grable having to choose between the dreamboat who mistreats her and the stiff upper lip who can buy her all the ponies she’ll ever want. Or something.

    Grable does admirably well—she even keeps it together for the finale’s multiple big disses–and Yank’s often a great-looking film. Not sure why director King decides, somewhere in the second act, to try for moody lighting, though. Cinematographer Leon Shamroy ably pulls it off, but it just distracts. Though it’s distracting from Sutton and Power being dramatically inert, so… success?

    But the version where Grable and Gardiner–Showgirl in the W.A.A.F.—is probably much better.

    This post is part of the Betty Grable Blogathon hosted by Rebecca of Taking Up Room.

  • Catwoman (2002) #12

    Catwoman (2002) #12

    Cw12Ah, the days when the first part of an arc was really the first part of an arc. This issue opens with Selina—as Catwoman—chasing a kid through the streets of Gotham. He’s in Alleytown, a frankly gorgeous but rundown and dangerous neighborhood in Gotham. Artist Cameron Stewart busts ass on the scenery, so much so it’s like they should’ve just set the arc in Paris. But, no, it’s in Gotham. And we see more traditional Gotham towards the end of the issue when Slam’s out getting wasted and telling Holly how much he luvs Selina.

    But Alleytown is this architecturally distinct neighborhood where Selina—in her narration—describes spending some time as a youth. At first, it seems like writer Ed Brubaker is going to delay revealing the connection, but as things progress, we eventually get the backstory. Selina’s trying to figure out what’s going on with a rash of pickpocketing–there’s something very strange about Leslie Thompkins and Selina ratting out Leslie’s pickpocket—a Black kid on a skateboard–to the cops, especially since Catwoman is all about how the cops are dirty. The kid still manages to get away, thanks to some quick thinking on his part, so Selina has to go investigating while in costume.

    With help from Leslie and (an off-page) Bruce Wayne, Selina is converting an old church into the new East End Community Center, where kids can learn from famous artists for free, amongst other activities, and stay out of the streets and out of trouble. Selina’s using the diamonds she stole in the last arc, though—as always—Bruce spends more on batarangs than she did on getting this community center set up. Even though he’s not in the comic, it’s another reminder that Batman’s a dick.

    It’s a good issue—Stewart has a lot of fun toggling between the action and the talking, especially once he gets to juxtapose a Slam fight scene and a Selina fight scene. Selina meets an old friend—while the cliffhanger is Holly meeting another old friend—only Selina’s old friend is actually a villain out to get her. Brubaker wastes no time on that reveal, with the flashback covering Selina’s youth in Alleytown and her old friend Sylvia, who exited Selina’s life sometime before Batman: Year One. Only Sylvia’s working with a mystery big bad (it’s not a mystery to me, either thanks to distant memory or just the teasers about the next big bad in previous issues, not to mention the Secret Files).

    And it’s all set up. It’s Brubaker arranging the pieces on the board to play with in the rest of the arc. There’s the community center, Sylvia, the pickpockets, Holly’s mystery guest star, and Slam being in love with Selina; we’re in for a big, character-driven arc.

    And I think I just remembered something terrible will happen before it’s over. Something really terrible.

    I can’t wait, but also… it’s going to be rough.

  • Silo (2023) s01e09 – The Getaway

    Silo (2023) s01e09 – The Getaway

    Did they somehow convince Rick Gomez he would have a more significant part in “Silo,” or did his agent just do an excellent job getting him into most of the episodes even though he really doesn’t have anything to do. He’s the guy with the beard who owes Rebecca Ferguson a favor from episode three (or four). Or maybe it all happened off-screen. At this point, he’s just a familiar face (not name, partially because his character’s name is so bland it’s immediately forgettable), even though he’s now figuring into the conspiracy plot.

    Tangentially, of course. He’s a function of “Silo,” not a supporting player.

    The episode opens with a rather lackluster resolution to the previous episode’s high-tension cliffhanger. I think it’s one of those cliffhanger resolutions where there wouldn’t have been a cliffhanger if they’d shown the characters’ points of view last episode.

    But, as usual for two or three episodes now, everyone is after Ferguson as she’s trying to figure out the secrets of the “Silo,” specifically the ones on a mysterious hard drive. The hard drive’s been around since the first episode since it was—temporarily—Rashida Jones’s show. Now we find out the hard drive’s got even more history, with hacker Will Merrick now involved. He’s not just the only one who can hack it for Ferguson—though most of the episode’s about her hacking it on her own—he’s also the one who sold it to Ferdinand Kingsley (who shows up for a brief flashback cameo) sometime before the first episode. It’s all connected.

    Most of the episode’s actually about Common and Chinaza Uche. They’re not working together—Common blames Uche for letting Ferguson escape (while she was just taking advantage of his debilitating illness)—but they’re both trying to find Ferguson. Common’s arc is more about his work-life balance, specifically Tim Robbins thinking he cares too much about his family to be a good villain–outstanding performance from Alexandria Riley as Common’s wife this episode. Pretty much everyone still alive gets something to do this episode, whether it’s Harriet Walter reminding everyone she’s still around, Avi Nash sucking up to Robbins when confronted about his friendship with Ferguson, or Common ominously interrogating Iain Glen.

    Caitlin Zoz has one heck of a scene. She’s Uche’s supportive wife, who ceases to be supportive and starts berating him, specifically about his mysterious impairment—“The Syndrome,” which I’ll bet doesn’t get covered until season two—and it’s a wildly different scene for Zoz. Until this point, she’s been Uche’s cheerleader, which was one-note, but at least she wasn’t a one-note harpy. Many of the people “Silo” has introduced over the season—other than most of those they’ve killed off—turn out to be very disappointing human beings. If no one dies next episode, it might even become the series’s new trope.

    But it’s a good episode. Ferguson gets a decent arc, though there’s some iffy accent work—not iffier than usual, it’s just a big scene, and I was hoping she’d nail the accent. i.e., drive a nail through its heart and bury it somewhere. But, no. There are still some bad accents.

    I wish I could remember more about the Wool adaptation to know if they’re wrapping up the first book or if they’re dividing it between seasons. There are some potentially big reveals coming next episode, but I’m not sure they will be very good. “Silo” will handle them perfectly well—unless something goes very wrong. I think the show’s on solid enough footing these days; nothing can derail its momentum.

    Knock on wood.

  • Black Panther (1998) #7

    Black Panther (1998) #7

    Bp7It’s a good but unfortunate issue of Black Panther. Writer Priest is firing on all cylinders, while the art is a Many Hands mishmash of styles—the issue credits Jimmy Palmiotti and Vince Evans (washes for Evans). But there’s also additional help from Alitha Martinez and Nelson DeCastro. So the art never looks consistent for more than a few pages. Some of Evans’s washes appear to be over pencils. Somehow they took the fun out of Joe Jusko pencils.

    Good thing Priest’s got a killer story. The stuff with Everett K. Ross is starting to get tired. This issue has him roller-blading away from an enraged Bill Clinton, who’s chasing him through the White House with a hockey stick. This bit started last issue, but we still haven’t found out exactly what’s going on because Priest fractures Ross’s narration for dramatic effect. And comedic. Best for comedic.

    But we do find out something about why Ross is in such hot water. For the cliffhanger. Before the cliffhanger, there’s a resolution to the Kraven guest spot—with Kraven doing that whole “cut me, make me bleed” thing, and it’ll be wild if they do it in the movie. It’s not like there’s much else to Kraven’s character. He blathers on to Black Panther during their rematch about how much he always wanted to fight him and so on–Kraven’s exhausting, which Priest fully acknowledges and embraces.

    There are a couple weird moments to date the issue: Ross lusting after the teenage girl bodyguards, who change in front of him, and then Ross saying if he were “Black and gay,” he’d be into T’Challa. We’re seven issues in, and there’s still nothing more to Ross, which would be okay if Priest weren’t still relying on him. I’ve got a specious memory he’ll be gone soon, but it might also just be wishful thinking.

    Or maybe if they draw him like Michael J. Fox again.

    Or if the book could get its act together art-wise. The action scenes should’ve been good, and instead seemed entirely static. High hopes for next time… though I’m definitely not checking the creator credits beforehand.

  • Silo (2023) s01e08 – Hanna

    Silo (2023) s01e08 – Hanna

    This episode, “Silo” assumes a conspiracy thriller mode. Sheriff Rebecca Ferguson starts the episode on the run, only to pull one over on Common and his goons again so there can be an episode. She’s also going to find out who and who she can’t trust—despite some solid direction from Adam Bernstein, he totally whiffs the Hitchcockian reveal, which hurts the third act a bit. The show gets it back for the cliffhanger—“Silo” just got officially renewed, though supposedly AppleTV+ usually orders two seasons and then does the “renewal” notice when the timing’s right.

    I remembered more details from this episode—I think they seem familiar from that Wool comic adaptation—but I’m still real hazy.

    This episode toggles between Ferguson flashing back to the story of her mom, played again by Sienna Guillory, who died when Ferguson was young and played by Amelie Child Villiers. Iain Glen, of course, plays his character both young and old, managing to look older in the younger makeup than as an old guy. He just aged real well.

    And his accent’s a little better. At least good enough it doesn’t set Ferguson down any poor accent choices—hope she doesn’t forget how not to do the bad “Silo” accent between filming seasons one and two.

    Most of the episode is Ferguson trying to stay one step ahead of Common while remembering mom Guillory’s last days, while also trying to undercover the conspiracy around her. There are two levels of conspiracies, of course. The more immediate murder conspiracy, but also the conspiracy where they’re keeping the nature of reality from the citizens. This episode raises more questions than it answers, and I’m very curious about what’ll get pushed to next season and what’ll be revealed in the final two episodes of the season.

    There are just two to go, and the show’s still not done revealing the stakes.

    Good acting from Uche and Tim Robbins in particular. It’s probably Ferguson’s best episode, but it also doesn’t ask her to do much more than run around in an action movie while vulnerable. Maybe it’s the vulnerable part. Though they still don’t seem to know what to do with Avi Nash. If he and Ferguson are supposed to have sincere chemistry together… hope they work on it before next season.

    Bernstein will probably be back for the next episode—do all hour-longs now just do two episode blocks for each director or directing team—which is fine. This episode’s for bridging; it only runs forty minutes and gets Ferguson from A to B with some new knowledge to get her to C next. We’ll probably see C next episode. Though this episode suggests at least two more characters deserve point-of-view focuses.

    “Silo”’s almost entirely managed to climb after a rocky start. But they’re running out of time to make that somewhat disconnected prologue mean something. The show’s more than proven it can do compelling, but it hasn’t proven it can retroactively make the less compelling stuff meaningful.

    But for now, real good.

  • Big News (1929, Gregory La Cava)

    Big News (1929, Gregory La Cava)

    Big News is a successful talking picture, meaning they do a good job recording the synchronized vocals. It’s not successful at really anything else, but the sound’s decent. Someone had the idea of keeping the number of actors low in most scenes, which helps with vocal clarity. Possibly too much because editor Doane Harrison and director La Cava hang on every spoken sentence. It’s peculiar—though not uncommon for the era—but News is early enough even the actors don’t know to mug around yet. They stand static, waiting for whatever’s supposed to happen next. It makes every conversation take twice as long as it should, and Big News is all conversation.

    The film’s a stage adaptation—and a stagy one at that—about newspaper reporter Robert Armstrong going up against speakeasy owner and heroin peddler Sam Hardy. Despite not hiding the speakeasy part of his business from anyone, the advertising editor at the paper—Louis Payne—thinks Hardy is entirely aboveboard. Armstrong’s just an angry drunk out to persecute the American entrepreneur—Hardy’s speakeasy is run out of his… restaurant, which advertises in the newspaper. The long pauses in News would be perfect spots for the actors to turn to the cameras and ask the audience if they’re buying this shit.

    But it’s Pre-Code, so you get to hear people say the word narcotics (and heroin, too; I’m nearly positive). Armstrong bickers with Hardy’s thugs about who’s got the more problematic profession, the newspaperman trying to report on thugs selling drugs to kids or the thug selling drugs to kids who has to be derided in the press. Though the cops aren’t happy with the newspapers either, since the newspapers don’t care about using any old surname for the Irish coppers.

    Surely second-billed Carole Lombard, Armstrong’s estranged wife and professional competitor, will come in and offer some life to the movie.

    Nope.

    Lombard’s just around to whine about Armstrong. She’s the better reporter, and she’s able to get home on time (even when they’re talking about her scooping Armstrong on an overnight story where she was reporting, and he was sleeping off another bender). There are shockingly honest scenes with Lombard and Armstrong’s news editor, Wade Boteler, about how she should divorce him because he’s a useless drunk. He just happens to be a worthless drunk who can get a great scoop now and again, making it up as he goes sometimes, so it’s lucky Hardy’s a hilariously bad Mr. Big. Not bad as in acting—Armstrong, Hardy, and maybe Boteler are the only ones who seem to get the acting bit of voice acting, though incredibly problematic (though potentially progressive) Ms. Lonely Hearts Helen Ainsworth is okay too. But Hardy’s an inept criminal mastermind who lets his ego destroy him.

    The bad performances are Charles Sellon as the newspaper owner, who protects Armstrong but not too far, and Warner Richmond as the assistant district attorney, who seemingly learned he was expected to speak about a minute before La Cava called “action.”

    La Cava’s direction’s a series of medium shots. I think only Armstrong and Hardy ever get close-ups. Lombard definitely doesn’t get any; the movie has no idea what to do with a lady in the picture, much less Lombard. I’m curious if the original play gave the character something to do.

    Oh, and then there’s James Donlan as Armstrong’s drunk reporter pal. It’s unclear whether Donlan has a job other than being drunk all the time and a bad influence on Armstrong. It’s an early enough talkie they haven’t figured out Donlan ought to be a great supporting performance. He’s not.

    Big News is only seventy-five minutes and somewhat worth the curiosity peek—Armstrong and Hardy would much more memorably team (for a scene) in King Kong; it’s an early misuse of Lombard, and there are some recognizable faces. Clarence Wilson plays the coroner; apparently, Lew Ayres is around somewhere. But it’s still really long for seventy-five minutes. That time can be better spent on the cast and crew’s other pictures.

  • Spider-Man: The Con Caper and the Curse of Rava (1978, Tom Blank and Michael Caffey)

    Spider-Man: The Con Caper and the Curse of Rava (1978, Tom Blank and Michael Caffey)

    In a more modern context, The Con Caper and the Curse of Rava take on additional depth. First, there’s convicted state or federal senator (or congressman) William Smithers. He’s a white guy who once upon a time gave Black woman Chip Fields her first chance in the early seventies after she would’ve spent most of her life living during the Civil Rights movement. So being Smithers’s trusted sidekick would’ve meant a lot.

    It’d sure be terrible if Smithers turned out to be a sociopath, just a charming one.

    In the second half—Caper is two episodes of “The Amazing Spider-Man” TV show joined together for syndication and home video, which is how “TV on DVD” worked until… DVD—but the second half’s big eyebrow raise is how the show manages to be shitty towards villain Theodore Bikel while lionizing capitalist imperialism. Bikel’s from Kalistan, which is presumably based on someone in the writers’ room—Robert Janes (which I swear is a pseudonym in something) gets the credit for Curse—but someone heard of Khalistan, a still unsuccessful (going 300 plus years now) attempt by the Sikh to get their own homeland.

    So, Curse is also a great example of how Hollywood media ransacked the cultures and histories of the entire world under the premise: Americans are too dumb to know, then they’re too dumb to care, then they’re just not watching the show–the great balance.

    Curse isn’t about Sikh homelands, of course. It’s about a cult of Kalistani dissidents led by dark pope Bikel (no, really, he’s the pope of the group) who want to steal their historical Rava statue—their god of destruction (while Rava’s scary looking, not cool, and buff, he’s also very male, even though—wait, am I getting made they didn’t use Shiva or something? Look at me retroactively enabling this shit).

    Anyway.

    The statue’s in New York City because the current Kalistan administration wants those American greenbacks, in this case, delivered (or couriered) by none other than Daily Bugle CEO and “Spider-Man” regular J. Jonah Jameson (Robert F. Simon). Simon’s dead wife was big into getting relics into their private blue blood museum, and he’s continuing the tradition in her honor. He’s a justified Karen in his imperialist looting.

    Bikel threatens museum guy Byron Webster with telekinetic feats, pointlessly witnessed by closest-thing-to-a-love-interest Adrienne Larussa. She’s not an actual love interest for Peter Parker (Nicholas Hammond), but she fills the slot. She’s actually in an antagonist position for most of the episode.

    Half.

    Whatever.

    Even though they use South Asian visual imagery for some of the protesting cult members—the ladies, the dudes are all just white seventies hippies—Curse isn’t sure how to write this made-up fantastical religion, so they add this anti-Muslim bent to it. Like some of Bikel’s dialogue. It’s a lot.

    Even though Bikel’s barely in the episode. He’s a long-shot villain who stares at something until Hammond’s Spider-sense goes off.

    All right, now. We’re mostly out of ways Caper Curse ages horrifically. There’s obviously lots of veiled and unveiled misogyny, and general weird classism, but I think the specifics are done. Now for the problem of tying these two episodes together. Con is Fields’s episode; she even sings a song. But it’s about Simon trusting Fields—he’s a shitty blue-blood Karen in the late seventies dealing with all these damn kids and their TokTiks—even after Fields was wrong to trust Smithers. Fields has to eat a little crow, but most of it’s internal. And Smithers turns out to have really broken bad. Not just a little.

    But there’s also the Caper part. Everyone says “con” a lot; everyone says “caper” a lot. The writer—this time credited to Gregory S. Dinallo—wants to make sure the viewers in the audience who’d just learned to read title cards, know the episode’s called The Con Caper. It’s weird. The first half of Caper Curse is this seventies groovy with decent guest stars Andrew Robinson and Ramon Bieri as two prisoners who stage a riot in a ruse to get recently released and now prison reformer Smithers back into the prison. Only from the outside, obviously.

    Apparently, traditional spoiler rules do not apply to compilation TV movies. But since Caper is from season two and Curse is from season one, the whole premise is a spoiler for Curse. However, no one’s really in danger in Curse. It’s mostly about Simons being falsely accused, so they can have vaguely amusing scenes with Simons yelling at Hammond from his jail cell. Then Michael Pataki also gets all these weird scenes with Simons where Pataki’s got to be suspicious of Simons because he’s reporting seeing telekinesis stuff. Except Simons clearly said no to doing the jackass scene on film, so Pataki’s always talking about the report Simons gave. So Pataki’s got to say the silly comic book shit. And he hates it. It’s not a good episode for Pataki, but it’s his most sympathetic. Having to put up with Simons’s Karening is too far.

    There are some amusing changes between the episodes besides Pataki being gone in the first one (because he didn’t come back) and being around for the second. His replacement in season two is Ellen Bry, an annoying capable young woman who wants to hang out with Hammond for some reason. She works at another paper, so she’s also covering Smithers and the prison stuff. But Fields has a decently sized Afro in the first episode, which she doesn’t have in season one. She was very close-cropped in season one. Okay, wait, no… Fields’s hair can make sense.

    See, she cuts it after episode one, which is from season two, then it’s super short in the bridging addition—which takes place on a sitcom family kitchen set, and you can practically hear someone say “Action”—then it grows back a little for the second episode.

    Hammond’s hair is shorter in season two than in season one but even shorter than season two in the bridging scene. So it makes no sense. Also, whoever wrote the bridging dialogue either didn’t give a shit about Curse’s first act or was eye-rolling it.

    The first half’s totally passable late seventies mainstream groovy–so much music from Dana Kaproff. Everything’s got music. It’s awesome. Sort of. It’s fun. Or close enough to it.

    The second half’s basically “Spider-Man” doing “Ghost Story.” Even when Hammond’s got a powered supervillain like Bikel, we’re years from a live-action superhero fight. It’s as if it took Westerns ten years to have actual horses.

    The direct’s low middling. Technicals are competent.

    If there’d been a better second episode—because you forget the transition problems fairly quickly thanks to Curse looking completely and utterly different, including film stock—Caper Curse probably would’ve worked out? Curse is just an unpleasant episode. The B plot is Simons’s jail arc. Oh, and Hammond stalking Larussa and mansplaining to her. He’s a jackass.

    What a way to react to being kidnapped with your coworkers… growing your hair, digging out that suit jacket, buttoning your shirt, and being mean to people.

    I’d said these compilation pictures might be the right way to watch the ever-unavailable “Amazing Spider-Man” TV show, but I’m reconsidering.

  • Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022, Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert)

    Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022, Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert)

    Quite appropriately, Everything Everywhere All at Once is all the things. At once. And more. The film’s a relatively simply told multiverse comic book action-comedy-family-drama-romance-horror story with time to do a traditional hero arc, then deconstruct it. The film gives stars Michelle Yeoh, Stephanie Hsu, and Ke Huy Quan constantly changing roles as we meet various versions of them from across the multiverse. Everything takes it one step further, turning the momentum of meeting alternate versions of the same character (so alternate versions of the same performer but not the same performance) into a main story arc.

    Everything employs an interesting structure—three identified parts, with the first part ending on a cliffhanger and the third part more an epilogue. But there’s a three-act structure to the parts. So the stakes are entirely different in the second part than the first, even though the overall threat is the same—the multiverse is in danger, and only Yeoh can save it.

    Directors Kwan and Scheinert toggle through various styles in the film. Too many to count—while there’s an infinite number of Yeohs out there, the film only really asks the viewer to remember ten. Maybe not even ten. There’s an action movie Yeoh, there’s a family drama Yeoh, there’s an absurd romantic drama Yeoh, there’s a Wong Kar-wai movie Yeoh, and then a handful of sight gag universe Yeohs. In all these other universes, Yeoh’s somehow spectacular. There’s one thing she does better than anyone else.

    But Yeoh Prime’s one thing she’s better than anyone else at is being a failure. No matter what she tries, it eventually doesn’t work out. The film’s present action in the Prime universe is about Yeoh and husband Quan in trouble with the IRS—specifically relentless auditor Jamie Lee Curtis—at the same time, Yeoh has to take in her father, James Hong. Yeoh and Quan left China as rebellious young adults and came to the United States and opened a laundromat, where they never made enough money, but also never too little they gave up on it. Also, it’s Chinese New Year. Also, Hsu, as their daughter, wants to introduce girlfriend Tallie Medel to grandpa Hong as her girlfriend, and Yeoh’s not sure it’s the right time for Hsu to be herself.

    As Yeoh starts universe-hopping, she’s going to see how her life changed and how it didn’t, which exposes her to insights. What’s so wild—I mean, it’s already wild, it’s a Hong Kong cinema homage kung fu family drama absurdist comedy—but what’s also so wild is how the second part is then all about Yeoh taking agency and learning from those other lives. Everything is about the story’s protagonist taking an active role in how their story progresses.

    The first part has Yeoh and Quan together most of the time, with Yeoh’s relationship with Hsu providing a lot of narrative turmoil but not affecting the action. The second part flips that situation, partnering Yeoh and Hsu most of the time, but Quan’s consequentially bound to the narrative. It’s delicate and detailed, with the directors changing aspect ratios and cameras (or at least good filters) between the various different movies Yeoh finds herself in. Because it’s always a movie, and she’s just watching her life go by.

    Even as Yeoh Prime begins to realize her potential, one of her splinter arcs involves the “good guys” trying to keep her in a passive role. Or at least subordinate, even as she’s discovering she can break free from all constraint. Yeoh’s got a beautiful story arc, which she performs flawlessly. After all the big comparisons between universes in the first half, the film gets more subtle in the second. By the finale, it’s practically gentle, with almost indistinguishable–but still very distinct—differences between the universes.

    The film’s a technical marvel throughout, with cinematographer Larkin Seiple and editor Paul Rogers doing superlative work (in addition to outstanding work from costumes designer Shirley Kurata and production designer Jason Kisvarday). But there’s something even more special about the finale: Seiple and Rogers are no longer trying to wow with the audiovisual but lower the intensity so the performances take center stage. It’s subtle, breathtaking work.

    Phenomenal performances from Yeoh, Hsu, and Quan. Curtis is great too—ditto Hong—but they’re orbiting the stars, not doing these inconceivably gigantic character arcs. Quan gets a little less to do than Yeoh and Hsu, but his presence itself is enough to inform some of Yeoh’s arc. The scenes where she and Hsu really get to act opposite each other are mesmerizing.

    Everything about Everything comes together—the shifts in pacing, the sometimes over-the-top sight gags or references, not to mention Quan. While he doesn’t get the central character relationship, he does get the peripheral one, but he also gets to do a variety of other versions of the character. There’s his sexy WKW guy, there’s the action hero, there’s the concerned dad. Yeoh and Hsu give these momentous performances, but those arcs are part of the plot. Quan gets to do these different characters, and the oomph is in his performance, not the narrative momentum.

    That said, it’s obviously Yeoh’s showcase.

    The film’s a significant accomplishment for cast and crew. Everything’s an exhilarating, emotionally enthralling experience.

  • City Lights (1931, Charles Chaplin)

    City Lights (1931, Charles Chaplin)

    About halfway through City Lights, I realized most of the gags repeat. Especially when it’s Chaplin and his de facto sidekick, Harry Myers. But instead of making the bits seem rote, the repeat value just makes them funnier. There are some differences in how the jokes work, but not very much; Chaplin also lays into the repeat imagery. In the third act, it all makes sense when there’s finally a different reaction to a repeated narrative bit. The way Chaplin brings it all together is sublimely delightful.

    The film opens with the most outdoor sequence in the film, with Chaplin—playing the Tramp—interfering with some city occasion. What sets it apart—besides people having audible (but distorted) voices in an otherwise silent picture. There’s diegetic sound and a musical score (by Chaplin), but all the dialogue’s in intertitles. Immediately after the opening scene, Chaplin meets beautiful blind girl flower seller Virginia Cherrill. He’s smitten with her and buys a flower—she doesn’t realize he’s a tramp; she thinks he’s a rich guy.

    Luckily for the Tramp, he almost immediately makes the acquaintance of actual rich guy Myers. Well, luckily, in the big picture sense. In the immediate picture sense, Chaplin and Myers have a very disconcerting friendship (from Chaplin’s perspective, anyway). Myers is a drunk; his wife has run off to Europe and isn’t coming back. He’s a wild man when drunk, but when he sobers up, he can’t remember he’s made a new pal in Chaplin. So Chaplin keeps getting the boot.

    But whenever he’s got Myers’s inebriated support, Chaplin thinks about how he can help Cherrill, which cements the idea he’s wealthy (he’s driving Myers’s Rolls Royce). Just as someone in Switzerland (maybe Fredonia) develops a cure for blindness, Cherill’s grandmother (Florence Lee) gets a letter from the landlord. Pay up or get kicked out. Tomorrow.

    Will Chaplin be able to keep Myers drunk enough, long enough, to be able to hit him up for some cash? Cherill and Lee owe twenty-two dollars; Myers carries thousand dollar bills (and some hundreds, I think). So it’s not like it’d be a problem. Except whenever Myers gets the slightest bit sober, he completely forgets bestie Chaplin.

    Myers’s unreliablity leads to some occasionally drastic measures for Chaplin, such as a fantastic boxing match. Chaplin fights badass Hank Mann, whose slightest slap can knock out a real boxer—so, Chaplin’s in real danger. And the third act’s pretty dark. City Lights isn’t a tragedy overall, but it’s mostly a tragedy. The opening bit doesn’t have much tragic subtext, but pretty much everything else is soaked in it. There’s a suicide attempt—with nooses around the neck are one of Chaplin’s repeat sight “gags”—there’s destructive drinking, which the Tramp pretty early on acknowledges is way too much. But he’s got to get drunk to get to be friends with Myers.

    Most of the comedy set pieces in the first half involve their drunken carousing. They’re hilarious together too. Chaplin and Myers have great timing together; Myers’s performance as constantly stupefied drunk is superlative. A lot of it is Chaplin’s direction. He’s got just the right pacing for Myers to slowly realized what’s going on in the scene and then rush to get involved (making things worse). Except the Tramp’s rarely asking him for help in these scenes. It’s usually just Myers barging in. It’s always very funny.

    Then the third act’s emotionally rending, as the Tramp finally seems to be on the way to a win—or at least not a loss—only to fail thanks to cruel people. It’s a lot, especially since Chaplin also breaks one of his repeat cycles to make the narrative change happen. Even with the finale involving another repeat cycle, the only way to know if the move will work is to do it. And they work beautifully both times. So good.

    Chaplin’s performance is exquisite. The Tramp’s navigating hostile, turbulent waters in hanging out with Myers. Then he’s basically got a courtship arc with Cherrill, with her blindness being integral to Chaplin being able to pull off the ending.

    Myers is also great. Not so much when he’s sober. He’s fine when he’s sober—like he’s doing the part, and it’s good—but when he’s drunk, he really gets to have some fun. Cherrill doesn’t get any fun. She gets small joys, usually with caveats related to her blindness (and poverty—if Cherrill had any money, the blindness wouldn’t be such a detriment to her success). But she does get a full character arc, something no one else in the film besides the Tramp is even in the picture long enough to attempt. Myers doesn’t get a character arc, for instance.

    City Lights is a fantastic mix of slapstick and sincerity. Chaplin finds the heart in every situation—Myers’s alcoholism is a reaction to intense depression—without ignoring the various unjustifiable cruelties people inflict on one another.

    It’s a lovely, singular motion picture.

  • Silo (2023) s01e07 – The Flamekeepers

    Silo (2023) s01e07 – The Flamekeepers

    Iain Glen’s back this episode, and, wow, I had forgotten his lousy accent. I think it activates Rebecca Ferguson’s worse accent instincts and suddenly she’s slipping.

    Though it’s a great episode for Ferguson in terms of performance. Returning directors Bert & Bertie (thank goodness) put her through the paces without emphasizing it. Ferguson’s basically having a panic attack throughout the entire episode, visibly shaking (which sadly can’t cover the accent stuff). Her reunion with dad Glen starts awkward and then goes terribly, terribly wrong because it turns out Glen’s got a history with returning guest star Sophie Thompson, who Ferguson wants to interview.

    Thompson was in the first episode—a hippie doula who consoled Rashida Jones right before Jones committed suicide—and I thought she had another appearance, maybe in the second episode, but otherwise, she’s been absent because she was arrested.

    This episode, we find out she’s been in the “Silo” version of an old folks’ home, albeit one where they keep everyone doped up (why they don’t just kill people instead of giving them tranquilizers goes unaddressed). What’s particularly strange about the episode is the timing—it aired right around the time Apple announced their “don’t-call-it-VR” headset, and Thompson imagines she’s on a beach, and it looks like she’s seeing it fill out like in the headset. The images populate before her eyes.

    It’s a terrible scene. Necessary because it will give Ferguson and Thompson a significant touchstone with the beach imagery, but it’s a hammering blow; the rest of the episode’s relatively muted, even the Glen reveals—which are substantial—and action-packed finale, the opening is still a little much. Visualizing drug-induced hallucinations will have to improve in the age of spatial computing.

    In addition to Ferguson’s rocky bonding with Glen, then weathering all of Thompson’s truth bombs—not just about dad Glen, but also Ferguson’s mom, the actual way life works in the silo, on and on. But in the end, Ferguson figures something out—something the show didn’t do a great job establishing—and it’s a great scene. Perfect culmination for Ferguson in the episode, too, because she visits mayor Tim Robbins and judge Tanya Moodie, who clue her in on things she never knew about as far as the quid pro quo of success.

    It’s really good stuff.

    Less good stuff is Ferguson’s shoehorned romance with stargazer Avi Nash. Nash is charming enough, but—even with female authority figure characters and a woman credited with the script—it’s traditional boy pursues girl romance. It comes off weird, even with B&B directing—the arc removes agency from Ferguson and gives it to Nash, who doesn’t have anything to do with it.

    Except get kissy.

    Hopefully, they’ll figure out something to do with Nash, but whatever’s happening next—there are three more episodes—we’re probably in the final arc of the season and prepping for the big season finale cliffhanger.

    Other than the Nash stumbles, excellent writing—credit to Jessica Blaire—including three or four big exposition dumps. Nice work from Robbins and Moodie, though it seems like they’re way more supporting than the show initially implied.

    Thompson’s good, even though her wig’s distractingly bad.

    And then Chinaza Uche. He’s great again, though again, mostly playing second fiddle to Ferguson. At least he’s still alive.

    Though… three more episodes… “Silo” can get rid of six characters in three episodes, easy.

    Can’t wait to see.

  • Bride of the Incredible Hulk (1978, Kenneth Johnson)

    Bride of the Incredible Hulk (1978, Kenneth Johnson)

    Bride of the Incredible Hulk is just the season two two-part opener, “Married,” as a theatrical release (for overseas). But it’s also a remarkably self-contained outing for Bill Bixby (and even more so for series costar Jack Colvin, who gets a single scene). The movie opens with Bixby arriving in Hawaii to consult with preeminent psychologist Mariette Hartley. Hartley’s developed new applications for hypnosis to combat physical ailments, and Bixby thinks he can use it to keep Lou Ferrigno at bay.

    Unfortunately, just as Bixby gets to Hartley’s office (some lovely California location shooting filling in for Hawaii), she’s headed onto permanent sabbatical. She’s got a fatal illness, which the audience knows about because the episode opens with the teaser, and it gives away Hartley’s condition, messing up the first act. It’s a shame the Bride version doesn’t have a release, so at least there aren’t spoilers from the “Next On.”

    Bixby eventually convinces Hartley to help him, revealing his secret identity—he’s using “Benton” as his last name in this episode, but once Hartley finds out he’s David Banner, she can’t stop saying his name loudly in public. Even though Colvin’s around looking for the Hulk after he shows up, though—wisely—Colvin’s story goes entirely untold. Because Bride’s staying very busy with Hartley. The movie’s mostly her ruminating on her condition, which is similar to ALS, but director Johnson didn’t want to come up with a whole fake name for the disease. Not when Hartley is mooning over Bixby using big medical words to describe stubbed toes and so on.

    If she agrees to help him with the big green guy, he’ll try to help her cure her own mitochondrial-based disease in the six to eight weeks she has left to live. She starts mooning over him after a couple of days. He reciprocates after she proves she can handle herself with his Ferrigno outbursts, including Ferrigno breaking up a luau. An incredibly problematic luau on at least two fronts. First, the cultural one—though Bride’s entirely unaware; it’s frequently racist, with one of Bixby and Hartley’s couple bits being mocking Japanese people. Then there’s third lead Meeno Peluce. He’s the little boy who lives nearby and shares a beach with Hartley. When Ferrigno breaks up the luau, everyone abandons Peluce to watch in awe. He’ll go on to emulate Ferrigno’s outbursts, which Bixby thinks is adorable and seemingly doesn’t connect the behaviors.

    Given how strange it is to watch Bixby in therapy sessions with Hartley and realize he’s just got garden variety anger management issues. He tells Hartley so many flashbacks, Lara Parker should’ve gotten credit for her pilot movie footage (regardless of her not having any lines). Poor Susan Sullivan (the actual love interest from the pilot movie) is forgotten or maybe even retconned. Bixby leaves her contributions to his work out entirely when recapping the show premise for Hartley.

    It’s a pretty good episode for Bixby. The racist stuff hurts his demeanor, and his pressuring Hartley to put a ring on it is very strange (and entirely unexplored). But they do have great chemistry. His stuff with trying to control Ferrigno goes completely unresolved, even in terms of episode arcs, and Johnson’s too worried about getting the thing done on budget to tie the final action sequence to Bixby mediating his way into the desert of his mind, population two: him and Ferrigno. Those “dream” sequences are visually striking. They’re somewhat inert, narratively, but they’re cool looking. Bixby gets it really bad at the end when he’s got to have a heart-to-heart with Peluce about the morale of the story, and Peluce is godawful, and Bixby just can’t make it work.

    But Hartley—and her processing of her impending death—is the star. She’s fantastic. And she’s the star of Bride (and “Married,” which is a weird way to do a season opener, but it was the seventies). Even when she’s got weaker material—not just her being a racist shit but also when she daydreams Peluce is she and Bixby’s kid, instead of them both giving their lives to science and denying the only fulfilling human experience, raising a child actor.

    Johnson does well with a lot of the direction. John McPherson’s photography is nice. Doesn’t match all the stock footage, but it’s nice.

    Bride has problems, but it’s a damn good TV melodrama with superhero action accouterment.

  • The Lineup (1958, Don Siegel)

    The Lineup (1958, Don Siegel)

    The Lineup is a spin-off of a TV series, an adaptation of a radio show. What is the difference between spin-off and adaptation? The movie has some of the same actors as the TV show, while the radio show didn’t share stars with the TV series. The movie came out before the series was even done running. It went on for a whole other season after the movie. I’m guessing the show didn’t tie into the movie’s events, but maybe there was a whole fallout episode where lead Warner Anderson tracks down whoever hired psychopathic hitmen Eli Wallach and Robert Keith.

    The movie runs about eighty-six minutes—so three episodes of the show (until the final season, which went to hour-long)—but the police procedural part barely figures in once Wallach shows up. The Lineup opens with a taxi driver bumping a truck, then running over the traffic cop who tries to flag him down—before the taxi driver dies, shot through the window by another cop. There’s a lot of noise about how a passenger liner porter threw a suitcase in the cab before it raced off—without the suitcase’s owner (an incredibly game Raymond Bailey). Coppers Anderson and Emile Meyer investigate (Meyer wasn’t on the show—and didn’t join after the movie). Lots and lots of talk about the line-up; if only Bailey can identify the porter, they’ll be able to solve the case.

    Except Bailey can’t identify the porter, which complicates the investigation because Anderson and Meyer found a bunch of heroin in Bailey’s suitcase. It looks like he’s just an unintentional mule for the real criminals, but they’ve got to be sure.

    The entire investigation into Bailey, which involves Anderson and Meyer not just interviewing him but also having plenty of procedural scenes and consultations (including a quick appearance from series co-star Marshall Reed), has absolutely nothing to do with the movie itself. In fact, it’s never definitive Bailey wasn’t involved because we never find out anything about the original smuggling bit. Wallach and Keith are in town for a day; they’re supposed to get the heroin the bad guy—The Man—has had put into their luggage without their knowledge. Their driver was supposed to be the cabbie, who’s dead, so instead, it’s new guy Richard Jaeckel.

    Wallach and Keith are vicious and cruel. Keith eggs Wallach on for most of the film, directing Wallach’s violent rage, but there’s a give and take to it. Keith wants Wallach to be an erudite hitman, just to show he’s better than their colleagues. It’s underbaked, but at least it’s personality. They’ve got three targets—a sailor, a wealthy couple, and a mother and daughter. It’s eight hours of work for the pair, and the film follows them from start to finish. The cops get lucky tracking them down, showcasing the benefits of living in a police state—when the bad men kidnap your daughter for her doll, you can thank the omnipresent, occupying police force for her rescue.

    Though not in this case because, again, the investigation doesn’t have any bearing on the resolution. Even after multiple related homicides, the best they come up with is a couple of tan white guys. Sure, they’re in Frisco, but maybe somebody’s up from L.A. with a tan. And there aren’t any people of color in the movie at all, so they’re just looking for two guys. Swell detective work. When Anderson and Meyer show up for the finish, the movie doesn’t even pretend they’re interesting. Director Siegel (who also directed the first episode of “The Lineup” TV show) is having way too much fun with Wallach, Keith, and Jaeckel. And the locations. Siegel loves shooting on location, all over San Francisco, with some gorgeous sequences–great black and white photography from Hal Mohr.

    The Lineup’s a solid programmer. Wallach’s great, Keith’s great. Mary LaRoche’s good as the mom. The front stuff with Anderson and Meyer drags, with the locations doing the heavy lifting, but Wallach is captivating. Keith’s transfixing, but it’s one of those “what’s the bad guy going to do next” type pictures for Wallach. Siegel really leans into it.

    It never made me curious about the show, however. And the resolution’s grandiose but a little pat, narratively speaking. Stirling Silliphant gets the sole writer credit, even though it feels very Many Hands. But it’s a solid programmer.

  • One Touch of Venus (1948, William A. Seiter)

    One Touch of Venus (1948, William A. Seiter)

    While One Touch of Venus only runs eighty-two minutes, it manages to do three sets of romantic arcs. It’s able to fit them all because lukewarm towel and ostensible lead Robert Walker disappears for long stretches of the movie. Sometimes Walker goes so Dick Haymes can serenade Olga San Juan; sometimes he goes so the actual A plot involving department store owner Tim Conway can take precedence. But he’s gone enough Venus shows it functions better without him, specifically when it’s focused on Ava Gardner. It takes Gardner a while to show some agency in the film—and she’s only really utilizing it to save (or seduce) Walker—but once she gets the chance, she doesn’t stop until the ship has righted for everyone involved.

    Well, righted well enough for her and Walker, and San Juan disappears, which isn’t great, but Conway and Arden finish superbly.

    The film begins with department store window dresser Walker setting up a Roman ruins diorama. It’s unclear it’s a diorama during the titles, which works out really well. It’s a good start. Then the film immediately sputters, introducing San Juan. She’s Walker’s girlfriend. She wants to get married. Isn’t she the absolute worst? You know who doesn’t think she’s the worst, though? Haymes. He thinks she’s great. But Walker thinks she’s the worst, but he’s on his way up to see department store owner Conway for a special assignment, so he doesn’t have time to dawdle.

    Walker asks Haymes to babysit San Juan. It eventually includes San Juan and Haymes making soup in Walker’s apartment because the film—if it addressed the living situation—wasn’t forceful enough about Haymes and Walker being roommates. Also, everyone lives within two blocks of the department store.

    I’m getting distracted with the more interesting second act, sorry.

    Walker goes up to the boss’s, only to discover Conway just needs him to fix a pulley to smoothly reveal his latest purchase—a statue of Venus. The movie mentions some backstory to the statue, but it’s never important. It’s just to give Conway and Eve Arden something to talk about besides bickering about him being a womanizer and her being unappreciated for doing all the actual work of running his business. It’s the forties, after all. Conway and Arden are great together. They start with Conway relying on Arden, then the bickering, so it’s clear when it counts, Conway shuts up and listens.

    After some middling physical comedy work, Walker kisses a statue, turning it into Gardner. She’s the actual Venus, somehow freed from the statue by her father, Jupiter. If the curse is only lifted when some guy gets too frisky with her saucy statue, I feel like it’d have been a franchise. Walker ostensibly has had a glass of champagne, and it’s gone to his head, but he and Haymes are lushes, so, no. We never find out the rules of Gardner’s human form. Walker can’t do the scenes with her. He’s initially freaked out by the transformation, then Conway sics the cops on Walker for stealing the statue, so there’s an additional layer to everything. Suffering detective James Flavin investigates.

    The first act is trying to be screwball, except Walker’s an ass. It’s also a musical. Haymes and San Juan frequently go from musical interlude to musical interlude, and Gardner’s (dubbed) singing affects the libidos of all the lovers in the city. Sounds like it’d make a great montage, except we only find out about it in a dialogue aside. The film’s entirely focused on the department store and the handful of people involved, even though they have the perfect opportunity to mention it when there’s a mass making out in the park scene. The movie doesn’t establish it’s not the norm.

    It’s also where director Seiter shows off his proficiency at directing the musical number. Venus is always fine. Walker’s not good at the slapstick and cruel in the screwball, but he’s not bad. He’s a twerp. And then he’s a twerp with Gardner, except she loves him unconditionally for smooching the marble. And he’s not interested in Gardner because he’s got a girl already—San Juan, who he doesn’t want anything to do with when they’re in scenes together. Until—about halfway through the second act—he just falls for Gardner, even though she’s been super seductive, even though Conway’s met her for a minute and is also pursuing her. Walker’s characterization—script and performance—fizzle their potential—and necessary–chemistry.

    So it’s a good thing once Gardner gets going on her own, everyone gets along beautifully. It even works in musical numbers (where Gardner’s not actually singing). She has one with San Juan and Arden—it’s a trio number about looking good for your man or something while making him dinner—and (again, thanks to the musical staging) it kind of just works. There ought to be a bunch of subtexts, except the movie can’t get too into the details of San Juan and Walker’s relationship (or he and Gardner’s).

    Everyone, even Walker, to some degree, is appealing. By the end of the picture, his pursuit of Gardner in their romantic comedy is enthusiastic enough—and there’s enough distance between them—it’s compelling. But Gardner’s best with Conway and Arden. Arden gets fourth billing (presumably below Haymes because he’s singing more), but she walks off with the movie in the first act. In the second act, she makes a bunch of jokes at the expense of her own appearance (what with a goddess like Gardner around), and it’s not great, but the film then gives Arden a great third act. Based on her girl powering with Gardner. So it all works out.

    Much of the tepid romantic subplot elements could be a result of the Code; Venus is a Broadway adaptation; they could get away with more on stage than they could on screen.

    Conway’s awesome. He’s sixth billed, but since Walker disappears, Conway’s the de facto main love interest for the third act. It’s a brisk, assured transition; once Gardner’s in charge, Venus finds the confidence it’d been missing from the start.

    Lovely photography from Franz Planer, okay enough songs—the singing’s better than the songs but okay enough—competent, assured, meat and potatoes direction from Seiter. Fabulous gowns for Gardner by Orry-Kelly—it’s glamorous without being too glamorous, with a bit of Code-acceptable and barely problematic cheesecake thrown in. Arden image-shaming herself is much worse stuff.

    Gardner saves Venus from a mediocre start. Conway and Arden make a big difference too, but it’s all about Gardner.

    This post is part of the Sixth Broadway Bound Blogathon hosted by Rebecca of Taking Up Room.

  • Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #269

    Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #269

    The cover promises the Fatal Five’s return; while they do return, there’s also a mystery villain who starts the issue. He flies off towards Earth in his mystery ship; a ship crash lands on Earth, and the Fatal Five emerge from the ship, attacking Mon-El and Shadow Lass (who ditch Princess Projectra to get busy until superhero duties interfere).

    I think the explanation is simply there are two spaceships. Still, it’s unclear if writer Gerry Conway wanted it to be confusing—because then it makes the Fatal Five seem like they might be holograms or something (the mystery villain uses mind projections on someone), and it makes the stakes feel a little tepid. Even for Legion. There’s going to be some battling, and there’s going to be a cliffhanger, but, really, we’re nowhere near Conway getting around to telling the story, so why get excited?

    The rest of the issue is about Colossal Boy’s mom running for president of Earth and there being an assassination attempt. The scene where Colossal Boy finds out his mom is running takes Conway three pages. He’s got to get flustered when people ask him why he’s exclaiming. The cover also promised eight more pages, but no one puts them to any good use. Arguably, the double-page spread ought to be good–the Legion hanging out in some plaza on Earth and seeing the presidential announcements–but Jim Janes and Frank Chiaramonte’s art is often bad.

    Not always. But often. And when it’s not bad, it’s barely middling.

    The worst thing in the comic is how Conway writes Timber Wolf, the Legion’s emo dipshit, but all the character writing is pretty bad.

    I hope next issue’s at least a little better. I don’t expect it to improve, but I hope.

  • Silo (2023) s01e06 – The Relic

    Silo (2023) s01e06 – The Relic

    No one dies this episode of “Silo,” which be more of an improvement if the first quarter of the episode didn’t seem like a retread of last episode. New sheriff Rebecca Ferguson goes to see judge Tanya Moodie, who’s not feeling well, and lets Common do most of the talking at the meeting. Also going with Ferguson is her new (unwanted) deputy, Chinaza Uche, who was Common’s pick to be sheriff, but instead it’s Ferguson.

    Uche gives Ferguson some tips for going to see Moodie, which makes no sense since she went to see Moodie at the end of the last episode. Something just feels off about it.

    Not the direction—Bert & Bertie are hands down the best directors “Silo” has had, and they’re able to give Ferguson’s flashbacks with dead boyfriend Ferdinand Kingsley a level of gravitas “Silo” usually can’t reach. They still can’t get Ferguson’s accent in line (though Harriet Walter’s is gone now), and the weird accents make even less sense after the episode has a big reveal of where the silo is located on Earth.

    Ferguson had the bright idea to plant evidence on Common’s dead colleague—who killed at least two of five (ish) dead people on the show—and let Uche uncover it. Despite Common wanting Uche for sheriff, Uche’s more than willing to back Ferguson up, but she doesn’t trust him enough to let him. Uche’s really good. I hope he lasts the season.

    The investigation into the planted evidence leads Ferguson to guest star Sonita Henry (who’s also really good), a mystery woman from Kingsley’s past. Ferguson had no idea her dead boyfriend had an ex, much less an ex at the top of the silo, not to mention he apparently came from a (relatively) wealthy family. All the revelations make Ferguson rethink her recent decisions, which is the… second episode in a row she does so? Third? Fourth? The only thing more common than Ferguson thinking she should quit and hand the series over to someone else is that someone else getting murdered.

    The bumpiness seems to be coming off the script, credit to Aric Avelino. It feels like it’s either supposed to be coming up after hiatus, or Avelino just didn’t see the last episode. Or maybe they changed how they were going to be edited.

    It’s a solid episode—certainly better than the lows–, but it’s burned through the flashback goodwill (if it ever had any). It’d also be nice to have some more Tim Robbins. He pops in for a scene, has some fun, pops out. No one else gets to have any fun.

    They’ve only four more episodes (to the season; presumably, the show is getting another), and they still haven’t sorted the stakes. How a show set in an underground silo has room to meander is beyond me, but they do.

    Fingers crossed Bert & Bertie are back next time, and—no offense—Kingsley finally isn’t.

  • Wild Life (2023, Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin)

    Wild Life (2023, Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin)

    Wild Life has a “what if Douglas Sirk did an epic filmed over multiple years” feel to it. And Wild Life, though the film never acknowledges it, was filmed over multiple years. And not by directors Vasarhelyi and Chin. The subject of the film—Douglas Tompkins (the lead is his widow, Kris Tompkins, but it’s all about him)—made a movie about being a mountaineering adventurer. So they use a bunch of the footage in Life, but never mention Tompkins’s interest in being the Carl Denham of extreme sports.

    It’s a strange omission, though, as maybe not because Wild Life’s filmmakers are so disinterested in filmmaking they use an oil painting filter on Tompkins’s death scene recreation to make it look classy. But all of Life has some weird omissions.

    First, it’s a single-sided commercial for Tompkins’s work, which is really easy because they seem pretty great for rich people? They’re conservationists who protected a bunch of land; they did do it in Chile, which might complicate things. But these are likable—albeit exceptionally wealthy—folks.

    So, when Douglas Tompkins got divorced, he had a bunch of money because he co-founded Espirit with his ex-wife—the film sets him up like the fashion Steve Jobs for ten minutes, then completely forgets it. It’s a Sirk melodrama, just a really upbeat one about good-looking blue-blood boomers saving South America from the South Americans through their love of skiing, hiking, and surfing. It’s privileged (and knows it enough it avoid mentioning high school dropout Douglas Tompkins was dropping out from prep schools) and colonial. But since the people are right, does it matter?

    I mean, it doesn’t matter to Vasarhelyi and Chin. They obfuscate the entire movie, opening with Douglas Tompkins’s death but waiting until the end to reveal its dramatic potential. They also do these really cheesy diary-writing sequences with Kris Tompkins. For all the Wild, the film always feels controlled, like there’s a thumb always holding it in place.

    It also does a bad job balancing the movie adaptation-ready relationship between the Tompkins with Kris Tompkins continuing the work after her husband’s death. They’d been partners, but buying up Chilean wilderness to donate to the country (as protected national parkland), was Douglas Tompkins’s idea. The movie’s got this frame about Kris Tompkins climbing the highest mountain in their parks, which her husband named after her, but it’s completely unimportant. Except to show how white saviors boomers still get it done. But for the film? Nothing. Good shots of everyone pensive on peaks.

    Because Wild Life’s a commercial. Just say it, though.

    It’s an incredibly manipulative commercial too. I’m fascinated with how they edited footage. They’ve got someone weeping but then someone else sitting in front of the person consoling that person, making the consoling person anonymous. Did Vasarhelyi and Chin film a funeral making sure to block out the people who didn’t sign waivers? Did they do an Eyes Wide Shut composite? Wild Life’s a lionizing bit of propaganda, arguably less impressive than a Wikipedia article, but the construction’s intriguing.

    Great editing from Bob Eisenhardt and Adam Kurnitz. The cutting is so good—and the integration of the uncredited footage is so impressive—they get a pass on the silly filters the film uses at times–even oil-painted tragedies.

    Director Chin’s also got a photography credit—he’s also a character in the picture, never mentioning he was making the movie at the time—along with Clair Popkin, and the footage is absolutely stunning. There’s nowhere near enough of it, but it is gorgeous.

    When in Chile, visit the Pumalín Douglas Tompkins National Park. There, saved you ninety minutes.

    Wait, wait, wait. I’m not forgetting these bits. Sorry.

    The film’s real bad at portraying how Chileans feel about the Tompkins’s work. Everyone in the film is pro—one guy says the way they acted before was nationally embarrassing—and the ex-president, Michelle Bachelet, might be the only time the movie passes Bechdel (emphasis on the might; everyone else definitely fails). But then Life keeps subtitling Chileans speaking English because their accents are… too accent-y? It’s condescending. Then when Kris Tompkins dedicates something to all the Chilean staff, she mentions her husband (deceased) and someone else. The someone else gets all the cheers from the audience.

    So, little weird.

    But, depending on the cast, I’d probably watch the mini-series. Douglas and Kris Tompkins are absurdly photogenic, which Douglas seems to have leveraged his entire careers, so it’ll be a difficult casting.

    Actually, no, wait. Sam Rockwell and Sarah Paulson.

  • Spider-Man: Night of the Clones and Escort to Danger (1978, Fernando Lamas and Dennis Donnelly)

    Spider-Man: Night of the Clones and Escort to Danger (1978, Fernando Lamas and Dennis Donnelly)

    Night of the Clones and Escort to Danger is a strange way to watch a couple episodes of “The Amazing Spider-Man.” Without anywhere near enough episodes for syndication, the show’s producers packaged a couple episodes together so they would have TV movies for syndication. Well, TV movie length, anyway. Some of these duets would come with newly shot footage to tie the episodes together; not so for Clones and Escort. One episode ends, the next begins. Seemingly the next day?

    Night ends at a costume ball for the not-Nobel Prize committee; Danger begins with Robert F. Simon chastising Nicholas Hammond for spending the whole night at a party with a glamorous movie star and not getting any pictures. The unseen and in the compilation seems potentially more interesting than the rest of it. In addition to no connective tissue between the first and second halves of Clones and Escort, there’s also no character development. In the first half, Simon is mentoring Hammond. In the second half, Simon is pissed at Hammond (presumably about the movie star thing, but there’s lots more as the episode—sorry, half—progresses). Cop Michael Pataki is down on Hammond the first half, then turns around and defends him twice in the second. But it also ends up being a not-bad way to watch “Spider-Man,” if only because you can see things improving.

    In particular, whiny know-it-all Hammond becomes far more likable in the second half. The first half has him puppy-dogging around mad scientist Lloyd Bochner, who’s perfected cloning and gets to play two parts. Bochner’s evil clone taking over happens pretty early on, so it’s hard to know how Bochner would be as the “good” guy. He’s occasionally camping as the villain, but he’s got his moments. He’s particularly terrifying when the Mr. Hyde version targets Morgan Fairchild, who grew up with Bochner Prime as a surrogate father.

    Fairchild’s atrocious. Almost comically. She gets through the part—and the writing (script credit to John W. Bloch is terrible)—but she’s really bad. It’s a complicated bad too. First, she’s playing Karl Swenson’s granddaughter and the de facto event coordinator for the not-Nobel Committee. They’ve looked Bochner over for five years because they thought his cloning experiments would end with him cloning an evil version of himself. The evil Bochner is going to kill them all in retribution, including Fairchild. It’s unclear. Once Bochner attacks her and locks her and Spider-Man in an abandoned building’s still-working bank vault, we get much less of his perspective.

    At least until he clones himself another Hammond, who hates regular Hammond, which is hilarious, and makes Hammond more sympathetic, carrying over to the second episode. But Hammond’s also sympathetic because Fairchild—after being saved by Spider-Man—capes for Bochner, even as the police investigate. She’s sure it’s all a misunderstanding, and Spider-Man… chased her into the vault. It’s a nonsensical part with lousy writing. There’s nothing Fairchild could do. But she’s still pretty bad.

    In fact, her dialogue seems to be written for someone with a Swedish accent. It’s so strange.

    Or maybe it’s just worse than it seems.

    Danger is all about Hammond getting involved with a South American dissident BarBara Luna’s attempt to avenge herself (and her recently deceased displaced despot brother) on the new democratic president, played by Alejandro Rey. Rey’s in New York because his Stanford coed daughter (Madeleine Stowe) wants to be the next Miss Galaxy. Luna wants their country—Tavilia—to return to a dictatorship under her rule and has hired infamous international assassin Oddjob (no, really, it’s Harold Sakata, and he’s got a hat thing going) to kidnap Stowe to force Rey to abdicate. Not sure it’s how transfers of power work, but it does turn out no one really knows how those work.

    “Spider-Man” aged well thanks to the world being so much stupider than anyone thought back in the late seventies.

    Anyway.

    Can Hammond save Stowe in time? It makes for a decent enough episode—with a phenomenal car chase (the stunt drivers)–primarily thanks to the cast. Rey’s not good, but he’s earnest and sympathetic. Ditto Stowe (who somehow gets even less to do than Fairchild). And Pataki’s fun. Sakata and sidekick assassin Bob Minor aren’t great (Minor’s better than Sakata), but it’s fine. It’s a “Spider-Man” show; it’s fine. And Hammond’s likable. After seeing him get shit for trying to save Fairchild’s life (and never getting thanked), having him get positive reinforcement ain’t bad.

    Plus, Chip Fields gets more to do in the second half. She’s in the first episode a little—sort of taking over Fairchild’s screen time for the conclusion (Fairchild seems miserable in the episode, and her negative chemistry with Hammond is awkward to watch)—but then in the second, she and Hammond get to do hijinks. She’s Simon’s assistant, and outside some “I get to give him sass because affirmative action” framing, she’s a delight. And she’s fun with Hammond.

    I’m curious to see how these compilations work when the second episode isn’t such a noticeable improvement, making for a bullish viewing experience, but Clones and Escort is way more successful than it ought to be. Especially since the show reused footage between the episodes (the not-Nobel hotel is the same as Rey’s hotel, with no one remembering they’d been there yesterday for another episode). Lots of reused Spider-Man stunt footage too. Lots. And editors John A. Barton and Thomas Fries—despite that fantastic car chase—are lost with fight scenes. They misapply good ideas. It’s very frustrating.

    But, by the end of a very eventful week for Hammond, it’s not bad.

    Oh, also—Irene Tedrow as Aunt May (there was an Uncle Max in CBS’s Marvel Television Universe, but no mention of Uncle Ben, foreshadowing the MCU, no doubt). Tedrow’s replacing Jeff Donnell from the pilot movie, and, well, imagining growing up with Tedrow… Hammond’s whiny, know-it-all persona makes sense. So, bad, but only from a particular point of view.

    Kind of like the rest of it.

  • What’s Love Got to Do with It (1993, Brian Gibson)

    What’s Love Got to Do with It (1993, Brian Gibson)

    Not counting the ill-advised, if still not wholly unwelcome epilogue, What’s Love Got to Do with It ends about ten years before the film came out. Love’s a biopic of Tina Turner (played by Angela Bassett except for the adorable then rending prologue), almost entirely focusing on her time with Ike Turner (Laurence Fishburne). Just present action, Love covers twenty-five-ish years.

    Most of the time is spent in the fifties and sixties, as locally successful musician Fishburne makes it big when Bassett becomes his singer. Bassett’s a country girl moved to the big city (St. Louis), reuniting with the mother who abandoned her (Jenifer Lewis, whose disappearance is another of the film’s problems) and big sister Phyllis Yvonne Stickney. Who also disappears. Lots of disappearing characters in Love.

    There are very few bad performances in Love. They’re uniformly white men too. First, Rob LaBelle shows up as Phil Spector, and he’s risibly godawful, then James Reyne is even worse as comeback Tina’s manager. On the one hand, the movie’s biggest problem is not tracking Bassett post-divorce and into her significant eighties success (forty-something Black woman recreating her career and stardom). On the other, Reyne’s so terrible. I don’t know if the movie could’ve sustained him.

    They would have had to do some really good performance scenes.

    The best things about Love are Bassett, Fishburne, and the musical performance scenes. Bassett’s got a fabulous stage presence (and lip-synching). But the music rarely matters. Love is the Tina Turner story (as of 1992) and, at that time, it still involved (at least in the public consciousness) Ike, which turns Love into a movie about a manipulated and groomed young woman (a characterization Turner disputed) suffering for twenty-some years before showing up the dangerous loser sociopath she’d kept famous.

    Except part of the Tina Turner story is she’s badass. Once Bassett gets to the badass stage—even if it’s badass Buddhist (something else the film’s got a peculiar handle on, Tina’s spirituality)—the movie’s not just over; it’s so over, it brings in the real Turner for a musical number, a jiggle, and a wink. Besides knowing Bassett and Fishburne were great in the movie, one of the only other things I knew was Turner gets to finish out the movie, effectively erasing Bassett from the film’s memory. It’s a complicated situation, to be sure, and it probably could’ve been done well, but definitely not by director Gibson.

    Gibson’s exceptionally bland. There’s no aspect of the film he appears interested in, which is strange since there are so many possibilities. It’s set during the Golden Age of Rock ‘n Roll (for a while). Gibson’s not interested. It’s about the transition into the Sixties. Gibson’s not interested.

    Technically, the best scenes are the musical numbers. They’re where editor Stuart H. Pappé does his best cutting. Pappé occasionally will have bad cuts in other scenes (mainly towards the front), but the musical numbers are great. Even if the film doesn’t really tie them to the narrative. Love will do things like fold three years into three sequential scenes with nothing about the passage of time, so it’s not surprising the musical sequences are disconnected. Love buries the lede on Fishburne being physically abusive to Bassett for added dramatic emphasis, which is one heck of a move but also not surprising.

    Like I said, the movie’s half as long as it ought to be—Bassett thriving away from Fishburne ought to be the story—but given what they do with the few scenes in that era (and the casting), it might not actually help the film. Not with the same creatives behind the camera, anyway.

    Jamie Anderson’s cinematography is usually Touchstone Bland, but he does have a few really well-lighted scenes. Good production design from Stephen Altman and costumes from Ruth E. Carter. Stanley Clarke’s score is indescribably horrendous. Just a different score might be enough to pull Love up.

    Vanessa Bell Calloway (as Bassett’s only friend) and Lewis are the best supporting performances. No one in Bassett and Fishburne’s entourage is bad (Chi McBride, Khandi Alexander, and Penny Johnson Jerald have the most significant parts), but they’re playing caricatures.

    Even with its Touchstone-y constraints, Love ought to be better. Bassett, Fishburne, and Turner deserve it. Not Ike Turner, though. He was a piece of shit (and the scenes Fishburne had the producers add to “humanize” abusive Ike make him more obviously a sociopathic predator, so Fishburne being outstanding isn’t not problematic). Turner herself made some very astute observations about the film’s framing of Bassett as a victim (which a better second half would’ve helped, though it seems like it’s foundational).

    So, very unfortunately, Love’s a mixed bag. Great acting—Bassett’s mesmerizing—can’t make up for an alternately vapid and bland (albeit not incompetent—except that score) production.

  • Do a Powerbomb (2022) #7

    Do a Powerbomb (2022) #7

    STL250206 1 cropCreator Daniel Warren Johnson’s art on this last issue of Do a Powerbomb is fantastic, some of the best action art. In the series and beyond. Johnson really ups the ante with the final wrestling match, which has newly reunited (sort of) father and daughter wrestling team Cobrasun and Lona fighting God. God’s a big wrestling fan and a brutal opponent. Johnson does nothing with God as a character, which is fine. He’s in the middle of the biggest possible cop-out for a story—is Do a Powerbomb supposed to be a retelling of a Greek myth, maybe—so it’s nice he doesn’t stop for another big cop-out.

    Sadly, despite the best-in-class artwork—so damn good—the comic itself is beyond disappointing. Johnson managed to turn his compelling, textured narrative into something he can resolve with platitudes. And there aren’t any surprises in the issue (other than how good the art gets); Johnson forecasted the whole conclusion a few issues ago.

    Johnson’s banal, tepid conclusion hurts the series overall—maybe not as badly in a single sit reading the collection versus delay between issues—but it’s still exceptionally lazy stuff.

    Powerbomb can’t be a disappointment overall—not with that art, not with Johnson so boldly forecasting the book’s trip into trite starting a couple of issues ago.

    I never thought, starting the book, there’d be so little to talk about when it was over.

    I guess it’s technically my favorite Christian comic book, but it’s not like there are a lot of candidates.

    I love that art, though–shame about the writing.

  • Side Effects (2022)

    Side Effects (2022)

    Side eSide Effects feels like a series of public service announcements strung together. It doesn’t feel like mandatory public service announcements, which is something, but earnest only gets you so far. In the case of Side Effects, there’s nothing past so far. It’s a competent graphic novel about college freshman Hannah experiencing a mental health crisis while meeting a girl who also experiences mental health crises.

    What are these crises? Where do they come from?

    None of your business.

    Writer Ted Anderson gets to accessible through blandness. Besides the story being about a bunch of primarily queer young women, everything in the book has been watered down. Even their conversations have been watered down. Hannah’s shrink comes off as less personable than ChatGPT while still being undeniably supportive.

    The “hook” of Side Effects is Hannah getting a bunch of Dial H-For-Hero superpowers, except it depends on what kind of medication she’s taking. Now the real way to do the comic would be to talk about how the medications make her feel different, maybe tie the powers into those changes—or even the adverse side effects of the actual drug. But Anderson’s not willing to go there with Hannah (or any of the other characters). Side Effects is from an indie press, but one with a very corporate approach to storytelling.

    So the heart and soul have to come from artist Tara O’Connor. And O’Connor does okay. She’s better with expressions than composition, but she keeps the book moving, which helps a bunch since it’s really long and nothing really happens to Hannah. She has misadventures because of her powers (which sometimes only she can see). She even helps a fellow student in some very serious trouble (and very responsibly told), but she’s got no character. So maybe starting the book with her getting to college and cutting to her first panic attack without even introducing the supporting cast (or establishing it wasn’t happening immediately upon arrival) wasn’t the way to go.

    With several asterisks—Side Effects is for teen readers (it says “Young Adult” after all) and is priced for library shelves—it’s okay. It’s average for the genre. The only thing to make it stand out is its lack of insight and passion. Of course, well-meaning corporate product is better than not-well-meaning corporate product, but it’s tough to get excited about it either way. If publishers Seismic Press (an imprint of Aftershock) really wanted to do good, couldn’t they have released a thirty-two-pager on Free Comic Book Day?

  • Silo (2023) s01e05 – The Janitor’s Boy

    Silo (2023) s01e05 – The Janitor’s Boy

    “Silo” threads a tiny eye of the needle and manages to kill off yet another character, fully introduce the conspiracy behind their murder, introduce two potential patsies and one killer, resolve that murder arc, and do an action sequence. All with a script credit show creator Graham Yost, who hasn’t had his name on the good episodes to this point. Maybe it’s director David Semel once again delivering the goods.

    He also appears to have told the cast to knock it off with the silly accents. Rebecca Ferguson doesn’t get many lines—she’s the terse film noir detective only in a Western, only in a sci-fi—but when she does have them, the down deep accent is missing. It’s far more obvious when Harriet Walter shows up and barely has that weird eighties kids’ fantasy movie accent thing going. “Silo”’s been excelling despite a lot, but it’d be awesome if the accent thing got sorted.

    This episode has new sheriff Ferguson (on her second or third day on the job, at most) investigating another homicide before the last body’s even cold. She’s got to work with her new deputy, played by Chinaza Uche. He was supposed to be the new sheriff if secret police agent Common got his way, and Common is the one who gives Uche the job, taking advantage of Ferguson not knowing the rules. It’s possible Uche and Ferguson are going to become amusing buddy cops, but so far, it’s not even implied.

    Because even though we’re now halfway through the season, “Silo” still hasn’t established what the norm’s going to be. This episode ends with Ferguson starting the second act of the season (“Silo”’s on a delay since the first two episodes featured protagonists who die in their episode), and it’s entirely possible they could introduce a new supporting cast for the rest of the season.

    But this episode—which does have to trick the audience to succeed (Yost’s going to Yost)—is still a major success. “Silo” can be about its bullshit but still excel. Ferguson’s got a swift murder investigation to run, which involves Common conspiring against her—but how far—and Tim Robbins being fun and kooky as the mayor (as opposed to low-key sexist). We also meet the Judge, played by an apparently uncredited Tanya Moodie, who is not the stunt cast I was expecting but is quite good. In her nothing scene.

    Based on how the investigation wraps up, it’s unclear whether she’ll be important going forward. It’s wild how “Silo” mixes narrative shenanigans with prestige streaming so well. Maybe it helps the narrative shenanigans are from the source material (“Silo” has yet to Westworld, for instance); the approach does let the audience in on some secrets, but they’re not great secrets. It’s not even character development since the show’s managed to kill off almost every major character it’s introduced. And Ferguson barely knows most of the victims (if at all).

    And they’re making it work, which is delightful.

    “Silo”’s on pretty dang solid footing now.

    I wonder who dies next week?

  • Tomb of Dracula (1972) #36

    Tomb of Dracula (1972) #36

    Tomb of Dracula 36This issue’s a wonderful showcase for how seemingly nothing can go right for Tomb of Dracula, but thanks to the creators—even as writer Marv Wolfman crafts a silly tale, he’s still got the right artists with Gene Colan and Tom Palmer to give the issue a pulse. The cover promises Dracula’s coming to the United States. The issue delivers, with some caveats. First and foremost, the issue ends with Dracula at the airport. There are some hints at what’s next, but Wolfman’s padding.

    It’s also a bad Dracula issue. He’s ostensibly losing his shit because Doctor Sun—now stationed in Boston—is sucking away the Count’s vampiric life force and whatnot, but it leads to Dracula going on a murderous rampage at London Heathrow. In the ticket line. He’s mad his flight’s delayed. Wolfman sets the whole thing up like Airport UK, then lets Dracula kill off the cast. Then he hijacks a fighter jet so Colan and Palmer can do a fighter jet comic for six pages. It’s weird and poorly concocted. Like, if Dracula’s really losing his shit, do that story. Don’t do Dracula in familiar modern settings just for filler.

    Then there’s also the weird framing. Rachel, Quincy, and Inspector Chelm (who doesn’t get a single line, I don’t think) are getting a briefing from Dr. Scott. I think they’re in the UK still, but it’s also not worth the detail. Rachel and Quincy bitch about Dr. Scott taking too long to get to the point–i.e., he can’t stop expositing—and he tells them, no, he’s going to exposit as much as he damn well pleases, and now he’s going to do it twice as much. So he’s knowingly blathering.

    And he’s super-sexist to Rachel. Like, so sexist Wolfman’s using it as a disparaging characteristic (as opposed to the series’s regular levels of sexism leveled at Rachel). But Dr. Scott alternates between calling Rachel “Dr. Van Helsing” and “Ms. Van Helsing,” and the latter is bolded because he goes from calling her doctor to not. Because he’s a dick. Maybe it’s all typos from Wolfman, and letterer Joe Rosen just thought it was something better.

    But it’s kind of wild. And goes nowhere.

    Dracula gets to the United States, come back next issue—an actual joke Rachel makes at Dr. Scott’s expense. The issue’s way too self-aware about being filler. All the characters should just remark on how gorgeous everything looks so we know the comic’s acknowledging Colan and Palmer doing transcendent work is the real draw for the comic. It could be Tomb of Cthulhu and just as revelatory.

    There’s also a bit with Frank and Brother Voodoo in Brazil. Frank has tracked down his treacherous, murderous best friend, only to find the dude’s lambed it, leaving his lady friend to take the heat. So Frank starts threatening to slap her around—which the lady comments on—before Brother Voodoo gets the issue on track.

    Tomb of Dracula’s a weird book. Even for the seventies. Everyone in it is a combination of dope and dickhead, with Dracula usually the least offensive. Such gorgeous art, though.

  • The World, the Flesh and the Devil (1959, Ranald MacDougall)

    The World, the Flesh and the Devil (1959, Ranald MacDougall)

    The World, the Flesh and the Devil is one of those rare films where even the opening titles are spoilers. Devil is an end-of-the-world picture, all about coal miner Harry Belafonte emerging from a cave-in to discover he’s the last man alive. Except we’ve had the titles, so we know we’re also watching a movie with Inger Stevens and Mel Ferrer. They really should’ve asked SAG for an exception. Or filled the picture with cameos, like Belafonte watches a very special clip from “Bonanza,” and they can get some more names in the credits.

    The first act is all Belafonte, starting with the cave-in drama. Devil only runs ninety-five minutes, but they could’ve gotten another four good minutes in montage of Belafonte waiting to be rescued especially since he appears to run out of food at some point. On the other hand, it might’ve just been another Belafonte singing sequence, so maybe not. Director MacDougall often does quite well within constraints—and his suspense finale is spectacular—but he can’t figure out a way to shoehorn in Belafonte’s singing. The sequences are usually charming—Belafonte’s a great lead when he’s the lead—but they’re practically commercial breaks. They could be commercial breaks. He could sing jingles.

    What I’m saying is apparently World, the Flesh and the Devil didn’t have enough corporate or brand synergy in 1959, and they should remake it as an ongoing streaming series with integrated commercials and so on.

    Or not.

    Anyway.

    Belafonte comes out of the mine to discover everyone’s gone. He was in the mine five days. The bad guys poisoned the atmosphere, and the nuclear war-obsessed populace all went into their shelters. They came out on the second day. And all got poisoned and evaporated (there’s nary a corpse in Devil, something they really should have addressed). If you stayed in until five days, you survived. Presumably. We never find out Ferrer’s story. Devil tries to be a human drama in a sci-fi setting without much sci-fi, but MacDougall’s approach is to entirely avoid the subject, even when there’s pronounced details. So the film—and its characters—need to pretend they’re not sitting right on the table.

    When you’re the last man on Earth, there’s only one place to go: New York City. It makes sense from a movie perspective—Belafonte running through the city’s empty streets provides many a striking visual—but we never find out why Belafonte’s going there. Is he from there? Family? Doesn’t matter. He finds a nice apartment building and some transport and starts setting up the new world, complete with a radio transmitter to broadcast to other survivors.

    Like Stevens, who enters the picture in the second act, which is when Devil becomes a very strange race drama. The film was banned in the South, but it certainly seems like the distributors were still hopeful. Stevens and Belafonte are the last people alive. She likes him, likes him, but she’s a young white woman, and he’s a Black man. White supremacy might not exist right now, but add another white person, and it will. Some of it is subtext—Belafonte never really gets to talk about what he’s saying, and Stevens always seems super ignorant—but there are some honest moments in their burgeoning relationship.

    And they’re both incredibly sympathetic and likable.

    So when Ferrer arrives—the harbinger of the third act—and all of a sudden, there is another white person, and it’s a white man, it’s clear the film’s headed towards some kind of conclusion. It just takes the movie forever to get there, as Ferrer and Belafonte keep avoiding the potential for conflict and instead mope around. Belafonte mopes productively, saving relics of the old world like books and paintings—it’s not even a subplot, just something for Belafonte to be doing as he exits scenes with Ferrer and Stevens. Meanwhile, Ferrer keeps telling Stevens the clock is ticking on when he cares whether or not she’s at all enthusiastic about her consent.

    The third act’s suspense finale on the rooftops of New York City almost saves Devil. The movie cops out, but the sequence itself is superb. It’s also where the film’s always admirable, but only sometimes successful matte paintings shine, and editor Harold F. Kress doesn’t have any bad cuts. Devil usually looks fine or better—Harold J. Marzorati’s black and white photography is solid—but either MacDougall didn’t get enough coverage, or Kress’s got no cutting rhythm because sometimes the editing is way too jumpy.

    The Miklós Rózsa could be better at times, but it’s not like it breaks anything.

    Belafonte’s always good; Stevens’s is usually good (in a tricky role; while she doesn’t consciously acknowledge white supremacy, she does realize she doesn’t like the patriarchy much), and Ferrer’s solid… enough. Ferrer’s successful as far as the part goes, but there’s nothing else to it. The part’s got more subtext than Belafonte’s or Stevens’s, so Ferrer doesn’t have to flex. And he doesn’t.

    Devil’s okay. It’s trying too hard to be milquetoast, but it’s far from a failure.

  • Monkey Prince (2022) #2

    Monkey Prince (2022) #2

    Monkey Prince 2Wait, is Batman just supposed to be a bad dad? Did DC really not think giving him a kid through? Or does Monkey Prince writer Gene Luen Yang just get to flash his bonafides and characterize Batman as a complete dipshit?

    In addition to Batman attempting to gaslight and emotionally manipulate Robin (who’s now his son), which Robin calls out, we also find out Batman doesn’t tell Commissioner Gordon things like “I went into a high school and beheaded someone.” Is the natural conclusion of fascist, abusive Bat-dad is he’s a punchline?

    Maybe, but seeing how little Batman cares about anything is still bizarre. Civilians, murder victims, whatever. Basically, he’s a tool, just like the school bully in Monkey Prince. Luckily for lead Marcus, his new school’s got plenty of non-tools around, including—sort of—Robin’s alter ego, Damian Wayne. Damian’s an annoying kid on the school newspaper who interrupts his interviews to take WayneTech Watch calls from his dad and mock him.

    Marcus also gets to hang out with his crush, Kaya, and it’s adorable when he gets elated at the thought he’s on her radar (only to discover she’s part of the school’s mental health club, something Bruce Wayne probably ought to be paying for city-wide). He and de facto mentor Mr. Zhu have some long talks about Monkey Princing, and then there’s some more with Marcus’s parents.

    I’m guessing Prince established Marcus was adopted last issue, but I’d forgotten. It doesn’t really change anything (yet?), but Yang’s setting him up for a big moment when he discovers his adorkable parents are actually supervillain support scientists.

    Yang’s still in the setup phase of the series, though I did entirely miss the Penguin has been turned into “Golden Horn Penguin.” I blame artist Bernard Chang, who does an excellent job throughout—especially with the humor—but his one introduction shot to a mutated Penguin isn’t enough. I thought the mutant was eating Penguin, not Penguin mutated and eating other people.

    Anyway.

    Really strong issue, can’t wait for more, exactly what a teenage superhero comic should be.

  • War Story: Condors (2003)

    War Story: Condors (2003)

    War Story Condors 1After Condors, I’m even more decided on the idea—Garth Ennis wanted to write a play. I’m not sure if he wanted to be a playwright or just write a play, but Condors is a play. The entire comic takes place in a bomb crater with four different soldiers fighting in the Spanish Civil War. Only one of them is Spanish. There’s an IRA man fighting on the side of the fascists. There’s a British socialist. Finally, there’s a German flier.

    At some point, Ennis—in a practically wall-breaking bit of exposition—explains many think the Spanish Civil War is just where Hitler’s testing out the Nazi war machine before unleashing it on France or England.

    What’s so interesting about reading the War Story series twenty years after they released, after reading twenty years of Ennis war comics, which have consistently improved….

    I get to see where Ennis went wrong and adjusted. Because there’s also the sophomore slump here, and on the wrong book to have one. War Story’s got so much against it already: it’s a war comic, which not even 9/11 made popular again, and it’s an anthology (has anyone checked to make sure the supposed one-time popularity of anthology series isn’t actually just historical gaslighting). And it’s Vertigo, so even if you were a super-duper mainstream fan of Preacher, your shop might not carry it.

    So not the time for Ennis to be phoning in a script.

    And it’s better than the last story. Condors is third in the collection, third released, so Ennis has at least halted the decline. Though coming after J for Jenny—the excellent first story in the collection, which I remain convinced got moved to start out on a solid footing—Condors would’ve been a disappointment.

    But coming after Reivers? And having frequent Ennis collaborator Carlos Ezquerra on the art? Condors is all right. I mean, it’s a disappointment, but with some asterisks. It’s too bad it isn’t better; it’s just not a surprise it isn’t. Because Ennis doesn’t have the story here, either, he’s trying to talking heads his way into insightful, leaving it up to the reader to decide. But the reader’s deciding between a Nazi and a psychotic terrorist. The Spanish soldier knows what’s up, so he’s the history lesson. The comic makes a little fun of the socialist’s idealism, but even in 2003, Ennis wasn’t saying he’s wrong.

    The four men sit around and tell their stories. No one’s got a weapon; everyone’s tired; let’s hang out until the shelling stops.

    Ennis gives them all complicated, traumatic back stories—they all grew up in the shadow of the First World War, which irrevocably broke their respective childhoods—but they’re still caricatures in the present. Maybe it was a spec script? There are a bunch of flashbacks, including recent ones establishing how the men ended up in this particular bomb crater on this particular day, so there’s lots of war action. Ezquerra does an okay job contrasting the “glory” with the reality (the German’s father came home without arms or a face; alive) but the present-day battle stuff’s filler.

    I’m glad I’m finally reading these original War Story comics, but I’m also really glad I know Ennis won’t be stuck in this mud forever. Or even much longer.

    But I also know why there wasn’t a third Vertigo volume.

    Condors is okay. But there’s better (and worse) Ennis and Ezquerra out there to read.

  • American Gothic (1995) s01e12 – Ring of Fire

    American Gothic (1995) s01e12 – Ring of Fire

    Paige Turco has been one of “American Gothic”’s more unsteady actors to this point. She’s had some good moments, but she’s had more uneven ones, and the show doesn’t seem to know what to do with her in general. She vaguely flirts with Jake Weber, vaguely hate-flirts with Gary Cole, and vaguely hangs out with little cousin Lucas Black. But her whole arc about uncovering the secrets of her parents’ deaths? It’s been stalled for ages.

    Until now.

    For better but really just worse, “Gothic”’s resolving Turco’s history arc. Left unresolved will be relationships with Cole and Weber—though Turco’s first scene with Weber has her tracing his hands with her fingers, which is shockingly intimate. Especially when Weber later on makes fun of her dead parents.

    After discovering she’s got repressed memories—which appear in “Gothic”’s established vision visual motif—caused by tweenage trauma. There’s also the Private Ryan thing where Turco’s recovered memories include events she wasn’t present for. Unless, of course, she’s psychic and could have connections to her family home.

    CBS didn’t air Ring of Fire (at all, not even summer burn-off), which means Turco’s history story was left entirely unresolved. But it should’ve come about halfway through the season, which makes sense. They’ve explored some of the other characters; now it’s Turco’s turn.

    Only she’s been in the creepy little town for months. This episode, we find out she hasn’t been back to her parents’ house since returning in the pilot. She also didn’t investigate whether or not her family’s summer cottage was still around. She hasn’t even asked the nice old lady at the newspaper any questions about her parents’ death. She just tells everyone she’s investigating Cole for it but hasn’t actually done anything.

    Cole’s fed up with the slander and the crimes against property—Turco breaks into his house, marking the first time we’ve seen the police chief’s mansion, and it’s pretty impressive. However, Cole’s been talking about it since the pilot, so it’s also a little late. Turco can’t find any incriminating evidence sitting out in the open so Cole offers to tell her the truth if she asks nicely.

    Fast forward through some visions and nightmares—and the episode male gazing at Turco, who’s spending the entire episode traumatized in one way or another. Director Lou Antonio does a terrible job this episode, but he’s also super duper sure to peep a glance at Turco whenever possible. Antonio’s composition is occasionally shudder-worthy and causes plenty of jarring cuts.

    Michael R. Perry and Stephen Gaghan get the writing credit. Unfortunately, it’s not a good script. Not just because of the nothing-burger (except maybe some kissing cousins) of a reveal for Turco’s subplot but also how the episode characterizes everyone else on the show. Weber and Black are the worst, but Cole’s a little different too. Brenda Bakke and Nick Searcy show up for the episode’s “subplot,” which has Bakke jealous of Cole and Turco and Cole supposedly unaware of it. It’s two and a half scenes. It’s nothing.

    On the one hand, CBS shouldn’t have messed up the air order… on the other, it’s a terrible episode.

  • Silo (2023) s01e04 – Truth

    Silo (2023) s01e04 – Truth

    I spent a while this episode worrying last week’s superior episode was a fluke, but, no, “Silo”’s found some great footing, even with the still wonky future accents—which make even less sense because we flashback to Harriet Walter when Rebecca Ferguson gets down to the engineering department as a kid, and Walter doesn’t have the weird accent. Even with the very real possibility the show is going to kill off a supporting character every episode, which I don’t remember from the Wool comic book adaptation, and means they’re going to need to start introducing more characters real soon….

    Even with those potential problems, “Silo”’s great. Well, it’s another great episode. It’s going to take a while for these peaks to prove stable.

    But this episode’s got a lot of good gristle for the future. In addition to Ferguson becoming sheriff and working up a mutually reluctant partnership with her deputy, Will Patton (who’s so good, especially as “Silo” becomes a Western this episode), we also find out Patton’s in some weird up-top-copper conspiracy with secret police agent Common. Tim Robbins also gets a bunch more to do, which turns out very well. Until this point, Robbins has been a peculiar stunt cameo. In this episode he gets to do stuff, including have stand-offs with Ferguson; they’re great. As long as neither of them dies too, there should be plenty more good stand-offs.

    It takes Ferguson and Patton most of the episode to decide to work together, partially because Patton’s on a self-destruction arc, and Ferguson’s got to prove herself reliable not just for being his boss but for cleaning him up when he’s a mess.

    The flashbacks—starring Amelie Child Villiers as young Ferguson—set up Walter and Ferguson’s “down deep” future but also establish Villiers’s relationship with dad Iain Glen. Things in the present are too busy for Ferguson to go say hi to Glen (even though we’ve already met him). The episode opens with a flashback in the flashback, to when Sienna Guillory—as Villiers’s mom and Mrs. Glen—is still alive. Also, there’s a little brother. They die between the first and second flashbacks, which then establish Glen’s not suited for single parenting and Villiers would be much happier anywhere but with him. Luckily, she’s simpatico with Walter, who somehow knew Guillory.

    We don’t find out how Guillory or the brother died, we don’t find out if Glen’s thirty-six pounds of de-aging makeup (or is that bad CGI) was a personal appearance fad in the silo or if they didn’t have enough budget (not to mention the possibility of different casting), and we don’t meet the judge yet. So we’ve got one major cast reveal left. I don’t think it will be Susan Sarandon, but it should be Susan Sarandon. Or Susan Dey.

    This episode’s also got a different director, David Semel, who is a very experienced television director and not that cinematographer who ended up directing Steven Seagal movies (Dean Semler). Semel does a perfectly reasonable job directing. He knows how to direct the actors, he gets how the show’s straddling multiple genres—they’re not sexist against Ferguson, they’re classist—and it’s precisely what the show needs after Morten Tyldum’s wanting work from the chair. Semel’s sturdy.

    “Silo” may stumble and fumble going forward; it may even get stronger, but as long as they can deliver on half their promises… the show’s going to be okay.

    Even with those accents. And the often too iffy special effects (no more “young” Glen, pretty please).

    Also, it’ll be a problem if they solve the mystery by killing off all the suspects until it’s just Ferguson versus the bad guy. I mean, obviously, that one. Really hope they don’t do that one.

  • The Zero Theorem (2013, Terry Gilliam)

    The Zero Theorem (2013, Terry Gilliam)

    I had been planning on opening this post about The MacGuffin—sorry, I mean The Zero Theorem—with a quip about how it’s faster to just Google “Terry Gilliam Brexit” than to watch the movie but Gilliam’s actually not one of the bad Pythons on Brexit. So I had to fall back to The MacGuffin quip.

    Zero Theorem’s an interminable 107 minutes ruminating on the human condition through the eyes of Christoph Waltz’s dystopian future worker-bee. Waltz “crunches entities,” which are like little AI equations or something. It doesn’t make sense and doesn’t have to make sense. Pat Rushin’s script is terrible, but also, there’s a left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing. We watch Waltz do his work, which is done with a juiced-up video game controller, and the interface is very “this is a Unix system, I know this,” until it’s clear it’s just a CGI block animation with some equations written on the blocks. So he’s a gamer, only Waltz clearly wasn’t seeing these video animations because he might’ve done something to move along with the video.

    It gets worse later on when Waltz gets a teen sidekick, played by Lucas Hedges. Hedges will wrest control of the game—sorry, entity cruncher—from Waltz; only the CGI won’t change at all. In fact, they just more boldly reuse the same animations from before when Hedges is doing it. So Waltz’s work doesn’t matter because the visual representation is nonsense but also because it doesn’t make any sense but also because it relates to the Zero Theorem, which is just a MacGuffin.

    The movie’s layers of pointless stacked.

    About the only good thing in Theorem is David Thewlis, who occasionally stops by as Waltz’s boss. Everyone in Theorem is a thin caricature, usually with some exaggerated costume design to imply depth, but Thewlis is the only one with enough costume oddities to get anything out of it. He’s got a terrible toupee, but he also enjoys the potential for dress up. It’s nearly a character.

    It’s not, but nearly.

    And better than anyone else.

    Hedges has a lousy part but is also bad. Waltz is fine. He trusts director Gilliam and gives it his all. Gilliam doesn’t deliver and will occasionally embarrass Waltz to no end, but Waltz’s loyalty doesn’t waver. I guess he gets a gold star.

    The main characters are Waltz, Hedges, and Mélanie Thierry. Thierry is the virtual sex worker—virtual sex; she’s real, the sex isn’t—with a heart of gold who falls for Waltz, even though there’s a pronounced age difference. The age difference comes up when Waltz’s computer psychiatrist (Tilda Swinton in another Tilda Swinton cameo—this time, she raps… yawn) points it out, so they turn off the computer. Thierry’s at least not a teenager.

    She’s also awful.

    It’s not her fault; it’s just her performance is she isn’t a native English speaker, and so has an awkward accent. Plus, she gets scantily clad and then naked (Waltz also gets naked, though the camera doesn’t linger in the same ways). What more do you want from a part?

    Besides the script, Zero’s problem is the budget. Gilliam can’t make hash out of a low budget, instead utilizing cheap (and bad) CGI. He’s also desperate enough to reference some of his previous movies directly (did he forget he didn’t make Blade Runner though?). But it’s not just the CGI. Gilliam doesn’t get any help from his crew.

    David Warren’s production design is the most obvious detriment. It’s all very early 2010s—Warren’s convinced the future is young people filming themselves on iPads. Aren’t they terrible? The young people, not the iPads. Waltz just can’t understand them but will eventually work his redemption arc by changing himself (not really, but the script says they have to say the lines, so they do) to fit Hedges’s requests.

    Most of the movie takes place in Waltz’s home, an old church. So lots of unlikely future tech and religious imagery. Sure, let’s try that one again.

    Also working against the film are cinematographer Nicola Pecorini and composer George Fenton. Fenton’s just bland and repetitive, while Pecorini’s bland, repetitive, and downright bad at a lot of the lighting. The composite shots are particularly dreadful.

    The film doesn’t exactly have any moments, but there are times when Waltz gets some traction out of nothing.

    Oh, I forgot. Matt Damon’s the big boss. At times even he seems to know he’s in a lousy movie.

  • Luba’s Comics and Stories (2000) #1

    Luba’s Comics and Stories (2000) #1

    Lcs1Creator Beto Hernandez released Luba's Comics and Stories simultaneous to the regular Luba series, which I knew when I was reading Luba, but didn’t attempt to read both in publication order. I’ve been a little worried about it, and, based on the first issue, it certainly seems possible there are going to be connections I’ll miss. However, I’m confident Beto will deliver, regardless of whether I forget some minutiae.

    On the last page of this issue—which has a feature with Fritz, Petra, and Luba (though Luba’s just an observer) and then a backup with Venus—there’s a scene about Fritz’s belly-dancing, which I remember was a brief subplot in the regular series. Now I’m wondering if there’s a great panel of Venus looking at the reader only without the commentary until now.

    And the first story opens with a gallery show, and I wonder if there’s a crossover with the main book.

    Comics and Stories is going to focus on supporting characters from the Luba cast, though Fritz and Petra have both been protagonists in their own right over the years. This adventure has Petra hijacking a sisters’ night out; Fritz wanted to take everyone to her boyfriend’s S&M photography showcase (the boyfriend’s a model, not the photographer), but then Petra got drunk and decided it was time to roam around.

    They have a handful of adventures in the present, one sister telling Luba about the other, and then the comic goes into flashback, giving some insight into Fritz and Petra’s pasts. Petra gets the first story, Fritz the second. Both are bittersweet tales, which Venus’s backup later makes even more so. There’s a lot more humor to the Venus backup because she’s such a great narrator, but Beto also incorporates it into the feature. The Fritz and Petra story ends on a narrative gag, only to find an immediate wistful follow-up, which gives it a lovely conclusion.

    It’ll be interesting to see what Beto will do with an interconnected companion anthology spin-off for his interconnected anthology series. It will continue being great, but these stories are both relatively familiar (i.e., Fritz and Petra have already played protagonist, Beto’s already done Venus backups). A whole series of character development for great characters doesn’t sound bad, and Beto’s way of echoing between the two stories is phenomenal.

    After one issue, Comics and Stories is almost exactly what I figured it’d be, though potentially with more Easter eggs (reverse Easter eggs? Inverted Easter eggs?). Hopefully, they don’t become too relevant to the plots, and I can’t keep up.

    But the comic? It’s awesome. More, please.

  • Room Service (1938, William A. Seiter)

    Room Service (1938, William A. Seiter)

    Room Service appears—well, sounds like—it sounds like it ends with Groucho Marx singing along to a spiritual in a stage play and breaking into occasional mimicry of a Black woman singing. For no reason. Like there was a subplot about a racist parrot they cut from the movie (it runs seventy-eight minutes, so it’s not impossible). But, no. It’s just this weird, shitty moment, which kicks Service square in the nuts.

    Without that moment, I’d describe Room Service as middling, but—wait for it—inoffensive Marx Brothers. We’re in the era where Zeppo’s retired, Groucho’s checked out, Chico’s fifty-fifty, and Harpo’s seventy-thirty, but the direction’s bringing him down. Visibly.

    The Brothers will get into a bit throughout the film, and director Seiter won’t showcase it. It’s like he’s resentful at his stars… all of them. I’m not sure Lucille Ball gets more than one close-up. She just sort of walks in and out of scenes, providing cleric support and reminding everyone Groucho’s dating a hottie. It’s too bad because she and Groucho have enough chemistry; it’d have been fun to see her around more. Room Service did not start its life as a Marx Brothers play, so the archetypes are a little off. Screenwriter Morrie Ryskind is more successful with some adaptations than others. Groucho’s the least successful.

    Anyway.

    The bad guy in the movie is Donald MacBride. He’s the company man from corporate (hotel corporate) who’s in town to throw the Marx Brothers out for being deadbeats. MacBride originated the role on Broadway, which is kind of a surprise since MacBride’s the one who knows where the camera’s supposed to be, and Seiter doesn’t. MacBride does whole scenes acting in a non-existent covering shot. Or maybe all that footage got lost. Maybe it had the racist parrot on the same reel, and someone smart burned it before it got to the editing room.

    It’s not in the IMDb trivia.

    The direction’s never good; about a fourth of the jokes land, though there are eventually excellent jokes (thanks to Harpo). Chico gets less and less enthusiastic throughout; he’s playing Groucho’s sidekick, only Lucy really ought to be Groucho’s sidekick, but then there’s Cliff Dunstan as Groucho’s suffering brother-in-law. Dunstan’s great. He also originated on Broadway. And Room Service is actually about putting on a Broadway play. Groucho’s the broke producer. Obviously.

    Just as Dunstan has to throw Groucho out, playwright Frank Albertson comes to town to see how things are going. See, he’s broke too. He’s also the most obvious Zeppo part. It’s just so frustratingly a Zeppo part.

    Albertson’s okay. He’s fine. He doesn’t have to sing or dance, he just has to moon over Ann Miller, which is weird because of a significant age difference. It also complicates Miller being good. Like, she’s good, but it’s just… no. IMDb trivia page has the details.

    The opening credits are cute, which shouldn’t be as memorable as one of the film’s standouts. There are some good sequences, but they’re obvious set pieces and never as good as they should be. Some of it’s the production. The sets are just a little small, especially since Seiter’s composition is so bad. That composition—and the lack of coverage—hurts the editing. George Crone’s a little slow with the cuts, even when it’s not to compensate for Seiter, but if Crone paced it better, the movie would probably only be too short to be played as the feature. Room Service’s plot is skin and bones, and they still pad reaction shots.

    The third act’s a boon. Basically, once a turkey flies, it’s on an uptick until the end.

    Then wham goes the WWTF of Groucho’s singing voice.

    What and why.