Doc Watch: Paris is Burning (1990)

Watched:  08/20/2022

Format:  TCM

Viewing:  First

Director:  Jennie Livingston

I remember seeing the trailer for Paris is Burning (1990) when we went to see Slacker at the River Oaks in Houston in summer of 1990.  A straight white 15-year-old from the suburbs of Austin, recently transplanted to the suburbs of Houston, the world of gender-bending queer Black culture was - you will be shocked to learn - not on my radar.  It was so utterly alien to my experience that I was wildly curious - but I also was not going to have a ride back down to the River Oaks and asking to be taken to such a movie would be wildly transgressive, no matter how open minded my mom was.

I remember seeking out the doc a few times in college and being unable to find it, but mostly I'd forget about it except when it was mentioned in cultural touchstone moments, like pretty much anything having to do with Madonna post Vogue.  But by and large, I just forgot about trying to watch it until I saw Alicia Malone was hosting it on TCM as part of the style-centric "Follow the Thread" programming series, and I set the DVR.

80's Watch: Pee-Wee's Big Adventure (1985)

Watched:  08/12/2022

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  Unknown

Director:  Tim Burton

I saw Pee-Wee's Big Adventure (1985) the first time in a theater in the Chicago area when we were on a family roadtrip and were staying with some people who had kids our age.  I mean, we were all a little obligated to like Pee-Wee Herman at the time, and I think there was a smidge of misunderstanding that this was a kids' movie rather than an all-ages movie.  

I recall thinking the movie was funny, better than I expected, and that I'd about needed a change of pants after the Large Marge sequence during which I'd leaped about a foot out of my chair.  

I've seen the movie a few times over the years, and every time I am reminded of the film's genuine greatness.  

I really don't know much about Paul Reubens outside of his work as Pee-Wee Herman, but I assume he's a pretty smart guy.  Literally no one else does what he does.  What was kind of lost on us at the time as kids, and what will be lost on kids new to the movie now is that Pee-Wee Herman is a sort of living embodiment of a Boomer nostalgia and retro goofiness that wasn't commodified in the way Gen-X nostalgia has driven, like, billion dollar Transformers movies.  He was more of a boy-man who still lived in a sort of Howdy Doody world of kitsch and camp that now looks like generic kid-fun, but was roughly coded to bend the intention of everything around him from Abraham Lincoln in the kitchen to a hobo bindle stick.

The story, the characters (Simone!), the settings (dinosaur truck stop, the rodeo) and the set-up are all amazing nonsense.  I mean, it's a movie that features a Santa sleigh with a Godzilla in it during a climactic scene.  The movie doesn't pause for life lessons, it just keeps upping the goofiness.  

Also, the casting is pitch perfect - at least it seems so now - with Jan Hooks, Elizabeth Daily, Diane Salinger, Cassandra Peterson, Mark Holton, Judd Omen, and more..!

 

Anyway - if you want 90 minutes of pure joy, I welcome you to it.  If you do not, take a pass.

Watch Party Watch: Death Spa (1987)

Watched:  08/05/2022

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  First!

Director:  Michael Fischa

So, I mistook this movie for something else I'd watched not too long ago, Killer Workout - the other 1987 movie about a string of murders occurring within an LA health club.  And, I assure you, this would be the best possible double-bill one could program, and one day I will make that happen.  The movies are similar to a point - but this one has a budget and actors you've seen before.  And a *lot* more shenanigans, but with fewer curiously placed yard-phones.

Anyway, I spent the first fifteen minutes of the movie utterly confused as this was *not* the same movie I'd watched, but due to the aesthetics of a 1980's LA gym, film grain of the 1980's all looking pretty similar circa 1987, and my face-blindness, I thought I'd stumbled onto a different cut of the same movie.  But it's not.  It's wildly different.

Is it better?  I mean - yes.  This one doesn't feel like guerilla film-making, and it has te budget to deliver on the things you were expecting in Killer Workout but didn't really get.  Namely, gory FX and a bounty of bewbs - just kinda strewn about in that 1980's way that says "look what we got to do.  Let's go enjoy some cocaine."

The plot is an insane mix of future-shock computer stuff that never really plays out, possession of humans AND computers, Dressed to Kill,  Psycho, Carrie and many things I am sure I missed.  Anyway, I was kinda blue I'd picked the wrong movie at first - but at this point I now stan Death Spa.  The back half of this movie is absolutely bonkers and you realize the first half just exists to lull you into a false sense of security that you know what this movie is.  And you do not.  

Somehow casting but not really starring one of the guys from Dawn of the Dead, Kirk's son David from Wrath of Khan, and the woman who played Teela in Masters of the Universe, it's got a "that guy!" vibe I particularly enjoyed.  I don't know who the actual leads are, and was frankly confused who some of the women in the film were supposed to be or what their relationship was to anything - but that's 1980's filmmaking for you.  It's about MEN.  In JACKETS.  Who PUSH UP THEIR JACKET SLEEVES.

There's also some amazing sound design where they do not care that planes are flying overhead and birds are furiously chirping.  I always like it when its clear they couldn't afford a re-record session and the real world invades your killer computer ghost movie.  

OH.  And there's a parapsychologist.  And a kinda sexy lady who is blinded by chlorine?  And the guy lives in a house seemingly designed by MC Escher and that's where he puts her, and despite her recent hospital stay he keeps changing her into very formal clothes and then 9 1/2 Weeks-ing her with asparagus, the sexiest vegetable.

Anyway, watch this movie.  Ten thumbs up.

PodCast 204: "Evil Dead 2 - Dead By Dawn" (1987) - an Evil Dead PodCast w/ JAL and Ryan

Watched:  07/12/2022

Format:  BluRay

Viewing:  Unknown

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Sam Raimi

For more ways to listen

JAL and Ryan return to that cabin in the woods and take a listen to an old reel-to-reel sitting around. It's horror-comedy time with one of the finest, most creative and ground breaking films not just of the genre, but of film writ large. Join us as we talk the second installment in Raimi's trilogy and what the kids don't know.

SoundCloud 

The Signal Watch PodCast · 204: "Evil Dead 2 - Dead By Dawn" (1987) - an Evil Dead PodCast w/ JAL and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

Behemoth - Joseph LoDuca, Evil Dead II OST 

Hail He/ End Titles - Joseph LoDuca,  Evil Dead II OST 

Halloween and Horror

The Signal Watch PodCast · Halloween and Horror

Watch Party Watch: Streets of Fire (1984)

Watched:  06/10/2022

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  Unknown

Director:  Walter Hill

Sooner or later I was going to make the Friday Watch Party Gang watch this movie, and indeed, I did.  

Reactions were, at best, mixed.  

The last time I watched this movie, I was ill and Jamie and I recorded a very iffy podcast that required some follow up when I was feeling better.

Listen here!

Amazon Watch Party Watch: Krull (1983)

Watched:  05/20/2022

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  Unknown

Decade: 1980's

Director: Peter Yates

Even as a kid, I had no real affinity for Krull (1983).  It arrived as part of the fantasy movie blitz of the 1980's, and I didn't see it in the theater.  The trailer had some interesting imagery, but I just didn't watch it.  At some kid's birthday, I watched the Fire Mares part of the movie, said internally "what the @#$% is this?", but wasn't super interested.  But, as a kid with time on his hands and a VCR, eventually I watched the film.  However, most of my memories of the story itself are from a comic book adaptation I picked up somewhere.  I think we only bought the first issue.  

About 16 years ago, Columbia House was in its death throes and had moved into DVD's.  I gave it a whirl and picked up 11 DVDs for $11 or whatever, and among my pickings was Krull.  Jamie and I tried to watch it, and I decided "this is boring" and we didn't try again.   On a rewatch, I am not sure why we thought it was boring.  It's not.  That's not really the crime to which the movie could be held accountable.

In fact, it's a very, very pretty movie.  The sets are immaculate and gigantic.  The exteriors are all over Europe in lovely pastoral settings.  There's some truly fantastic visual stuff happening, and in a lot of ways, the movie is genuinely well-directed when it slows down to have a beat or two.  The director, Peter Yates, is no slouch and did one of my favorite new-to-me films from the past few years, The Friends of Eddie Coyle, which could not be more different if Yates had physically been trying to get as far away from that movie as possible.

But, real talk, they kinda forgot to give anyone but the asshole wizard any personality beyond the thinnest layers atop an archetype.  It's weird.  There's an exposition guy who tells the "prince" what to do.  The price is princely (read:  nice but dim), and the wise old man is wise.  The stoic cyclops is stoic.  Perhaps because the actor cannot see and therefore cannot move.  

PodCast 200: "Once Upon a Time in America" (1984) - Signal Watch Canon Episode w/ SGHarms and Ryan

Watched:  05/21/2022

Format:  BluRay

Viewing:  Unknown/ First for Extended Version

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Sergio Leone

For more ways to listen

Steven returns to the podcast to talk one of Ryan's canon films, and one of Leone's last. It's an epic length podcast for an epic-length film, and certainly not everyone's cup of tea. Join us as we talk about what works, what doesn't, the challenges of the film, and what it all means.

SoundCloud 

The Signal Watch PodCast · 200: "Once Upon a Time in America" (1984) - Signal Watch Canon Episode w/ SGHarms and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

Deborah's Theme - Ennio Morricone, Once Upon a Time in America OST

Once Upon a Time in America - Ennio Morricone, Once Upon a Time in America OST

Signal Watch Canon

The Signal Watch PodCast · The Signal Watch Canon

80's TV Movie Watch: The Spirit (1987)

Watched:  05/02/2022

Format:  DVD from Warner Archive

Viewing:  First

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Michael Schultz

Way back in the 1980's, I ordered a Bud Plant catalog so I could get an idea of what all was out there in the world of comics.  I remember two things that really stuck out - a Mike Kaluta image of The Shadow (the first time I'd heard of the character) - and an image for a collection of The Spirit strips with P'gell prominently featured.  You know the one.

I didn't know what the hell The Spirit was, but to my 11 year old brain, this seemed very sexy indeed, and I assumed The Spirit was some sort of soft-core comic.  

Flash forward probably only a matter of months, and I read in Comics Scene that someone was making a TV movie of The Spirit, learned more about it (not a softcore book!) and back in the days when we weren't having superhero media rained down upon us, I was very interested.  

Finally the movie was slated to air, and of course there was some scheduling conflict (we just missed TV in those days), but I could probably catch the last hour or so.  I don't remember where we were or what was up, but I do remember my mom ran into a friend and started talking.  And I just had to stand there while the clock spun and my 1980's chances with no DVR faded away of seeing any of the movie.  

I walked in the door, watched the last five minutes, and then went to do homework.

PODCAST 193: "Chances Are" (1989) - a Birthday Exchange Movie Discussion w/ Jamie and Ryan

Watched:  04/10/2022

Format:  Amazon

Viewing: First

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Emilie Ardolino

For more ways to listen

NSFW! In retaliation for his selection, Jamie busts out a mostly-forgotten late-80's magical-realism romantic comedy that really draws some interesting lines in the sand for what it thinks are totally fine ideas to put into a movie. Thrill to Jamie and Ryan pondering how this was a mainstream movie that went without comment at the time.

SoundCloud 

The Signal Watch PodCast · 193: "Chances Are" (1989) - a Birthday Exchange Movie Discussion w/ Jamie and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

After All - Cher and Peter Cetera

Chances Are - Johnny Mathis

Jamie's Cinema Classics

The Signal Watch PodCast · Jamie's Cinema Classics

Watch Party Watch: Flash Gordon (1980)

Watched:  04/01/2022

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  Unknown

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Mike Hodges

In a lot of ways, Flash Gordon (1980) maybe came out at exactly the wrong time and set the tone for what would be a problem for comic-based material until X-Men in 2000.  

With Star Wars and Superman released to critical and financial success, Dino De Laurentiis began mining the properties that had influenced the creation of both properties and set the tone in Hollywood that Marvel and DC couldn't get anything green lit for years - but somehow pulp characters would get movies.*  As The Incredible Hulk and Wonder Woman disappeared from TV, Buck Rogers showed up on the small screen, and De Laurentiis went and tapped Lorenzo Semple, Jr., one of the main brains behind the 1960's Batman series, to bring Flash Gordon to the big screen.  

PODCAST 191: "Hired To Kill" (1990) - Movies of Doom w/ SimonUK and Ryan

Watched:  03/14/2022

Format:  Amazon Prime

Viewing: First    

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Nico Mastorakis

For more ways to listen

SimonUK and Ryan head into enemy territory with Movies of Doom, our first voyage into "wow, this looks terrible. Let's watch this immediately" cinema. This one has A Very 90's Actor, 7 actresses you'll never see again, and 3 legends of Hollywood cashing in for a vacation in Southern Europe. It's the Dirty Dozen meets every 80's action movie, meets astounding sexism!

SoundCloud 

The Signal Watch PodCast · 191: "Hired To Kill" (1990) - Movies of Doom w/ SimonUK and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

I'm Too Sexy - Right Said Fred

Movies of Doom!

The Signal Watch PodCast · Movies of Doom

80's Watch: Jewel of the Nile (1985)

As Jamie asked:  What is the physics of what's happening here?

Watched:  04/02/2022

Format:  HBOmax

Viewing:  third?

Director:  Lewis Teague

Woof.

This movie is so bad it has a body count.  No, really.  The last thing in the credits is a "in memory of" and four names scroll by, including the name of Diane Thomas who created Romancing the Stone, of which this is a sequel.

Even as a kid, when I saw The Jewel of the Nile (1985) in the theater, I thought this movie was "not good".  I couldn't have told you why then.  Jamie informs me, when I said "this feels like a cash grab" that it was made incredibly quickly on the heels of Romancing the Stone, and that Kathleen Turner initially refused to do it because the script was so bad.  Y'all, Kathleen Turner is not wrong.  

A weirdly meandering film that just keeps happening, there's essentially a start and an end with no middle during which a bunch of stuff just sort of happens and when our leads are together, they seem like they absolutely *should* part ways as all they can do is argue, it makes the entire third-act rekindling of the romance of the movie make no sense.  But there are multiple scenes in the movie that make no sense but happen just so there's something happening on screen - maybe the greatest example of which is "the chief's son wants to fight Jack so he can court Joan" but the Chief's son is in a hut?  And they just showed up?  And why didn't they just say they were married or betrothed?  Like.  uggghhhhh.

PodCast 189: "The Evil Dead" (1981) - a Horror Canon episode w/ JAL and Ryan

Watched:  03/13/2022

Format:  HBOMax+

Viewing: Unknown

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Sam Raimi

For more ways to listen

JAL returns to the PodCast to talk about a movie series that helped cement a friendship! Join us as we ponder the crazy early vision of a master of movie making, getting good results out of annoying everyone around you, and what you can do on a shoestring budget that can still provide genuine scares and have a bloody good time.

SoundCloud 

The Signal Watch PodCast · 189: "The Evil Dead" (1981) - a Horror Canon episode w/ JAL and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

Introduction - Joseph LoDuca, The Evil Dead OST

Dawn of the Evil Dead - Joseph LoDuca, The Evil Dead OST

Horror Podcasts!

The Signal Watch PodCast · Halloween and Horror

Watch Party Watch: The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension (1984)

Watched:  02/25/2022

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  Unknown

Director:  W.D. Richter

A first viewing of The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension (1984) is not an easy task, I would assume.  

I saw Buckaroo Banzai on its release in the theater thanks to a dad who was not particularly nerdy and didn't care for nerd culture, but had certainly enjoyed serials and whatnot in his youth, and absolutely got what the movie was selling.  And I loved it.  Absolutely was into the movie.  I still love the idea of a team of folks with specialties standing between civilization and chaos.  And I got that the movie was funny and winky.  

But I also watched it over and over on cable and recorded on VHS for a bit through middle school.  What I didn't know was that the movie had flopped.  Horribly.  I mean, it made sense that my dad had to drive us across town to the one theater showing the movie, which was mostly empty.  But I also had seen Adventures in Babysitting in a theater so empty of anyone but me and my pals, the manager had come in before the movie to tell us "no monkeyshines", and that's an American classic.

Watch Party Watch: The Keep (1983)

Watched:  02/18/2022

Format:  Amazon 

Viewing:  Unknown

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Michael Mann

This is not a good movie, but it is a fascinating movie.  If you hate Nazis (and I do!) it's not unappealing to see a supernatural force take them apart.  

I found out during this viewing that I had been given some wildly inaccurate information about the origins of the film - that it was based on a Richard Matheson novel (it is not) and that in the original novel, it's Dracula in the Keep, thus the Carpathian mountains (completely and utterly wrong).  Frankly, having read the description of the novel, I like the idea of Dracula cooling in a Keep in the Carpathians a whole lot more than the description of the novel, which sounds like a very matter-of-fact fantasy novel that would not be my jam. 

The appeal of the film is in watching early Michael Mann with a budget and - if you're so inclined - a Tangerine Dream score that matches the action.  It's a dreamy, music video of a movie with minimal dialog and falls squarely in a rare 20-year period where that was maybe fine in film.  Before, people would not have known what you were doing, and after, movies started filling in every crevice of a film with wall-to-wall exposition.  

I was pleased the assembled watch-partiers were more or less fine with the movie, all things considered.  I guess when Sheena was our last touch-base, this is like Citizen Kane.  

Anyway, there's some interesting dynamics at play as it's clear the main evil supernatural force is a big ol liar and the promise that he may just murder his way to Berlin and melt Hitler is a bit of bullshit to convince Ian McKellan to help him out, but for a brief moment, you think "well, maybe we can let this extradimensional being tear shit up.  Enemy of my enemy, etc..."  Also, the movie makes a fine point about how citizens can get caught up in the bullshit of their nation's leaders and become subordinate to the true believers, who generally are not the kind of folks who really want to have to answer to.

Regret Double Bill Watch: "Sheena" and "Bolero" - both (1984)

 

Watched:  02/11/2022

Format:  Amazon Prime/ HBOmax

Viewing:  First/ First

Director:   John Guillerman / John Derek

So, usually we announce an Amazon Watch Party well in advance, but when I wrapped work on Friday at 5:00, Jamie said "are we doing a Watch Party?" which roughly translates to "I know you hadn't planned a Watch Party, but we're doing one" so, as I generally DNGAF, I was like "yeah, fine."

After some looking, we landed on Sheena (1984), because if I was getting roped into a movie party, Tanya Roberts.  I think maybe I'd seen Sheena in middle-school, because I vaguely remembered bits.  And I was, even then, vaguely aware of Sheena as an old-school pulp/ comics character.  In fact, she debuted in 1938 - which is 3 years before Wondy.  I also remembered what I considered to be "too many flamingoes".  And, boy howdy, was that memory right.  

Of course in the era of Blockbuster and other video shops, Tanya Roberts looked back at you from the cover of many-a-sun-bleached box covers.  

Finally Got to it Watch: Firestarter (1984)

Watched:  01/28/2021

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  First

Director:  Mark L. Lester

Firestarter (1984) is a 90 minute movie that the studio inexplicably decided needed to be 2 full hours.  A taut 90 minutes would have not given me time to ponder "why is this happening?  Why is anyone doing what it is they are doing?  Why would anyone be this dumb?"

But the movie is 120 minutes, and so I did think these things.  

I don't blame director Mark L. Lester, who brought us Commando and Bobbi Jo and the Outlaw, because I think he did some stuff in this movie very well, but there's just too much movie here, which is an editing problem.  And, he didn't write the script.  I also don't blame Tangerine Dream, who provided the score and who are not at their best here.  

I don't blame Drew Barrymore, who is a child in this movie.  Nor do I blame Martin Sheen or George C. Scott, Louise Fletcher or Art Carney.  I might be blaming everyone else.  This movie is boring and makes no sense, and for a movie that's 120 minutes so they can explain stuff but that just keeps making things worse, that's a feat.  

Thriller Watch: Dressed to Kill (1980)

Watched:  01/22/2022

Format:  BluRay - Criterion

Viewing:  Unknown.  Probably third all the way through

Director:  Brian De Palma

It's very hard to say "I love Dressed to Kill (1980)" with a straight face, but I do think De Palma's pivot to a more explicit eroticism from the staid suggestion of such in the Hitchockian thriller is worth at least looking at.  At this point in his career, De Palma's movies read a lot like film school theory classes come to life, but I can't really remember our courses ever highlighting De Palma.  Maybe he's too on the nose with some of this stuff.  Maybe he wasn't "classic" enough.  

But, yeah, what Hitch only hinted at, De Palma is pleased to put up on screen.  Your mileage may vary was to whether this works for you, but in an era where cinema was where adults went for entertainment, and with De Palma dealing neither with the Hayes Code nor Hitch's pre-War sense of decorum, just be aware the film is frank about illicit sex and sexual kinks, and there's no shortage of female nudity (that's an Angie Dickinson body double in those key shots there at the opening, btw).  

Watch Party Watch: Who's That Girl? (1987)

Watched:   01/21/2022

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  First

Director:  James Foley

I don't know what the opposite is of "catching lightning in a bottle", but Who's That Girl? (1987) is here to make me wonder what that might be, or if we're in need of a new phrase.  

Look.  If you were a straight dude coming of age in the 1980's, you might not have talked about it, but chances are you spent a lot of time thinking about Madonna.  Not as part of the cultural discourse that somehow always placed Madonna in the middle of the po-discourse Venn Diagram and which was mostly nonsense, but for other reasons.  There's twenty seconds of video here which will help you understand.  

So, yes.  Madonna.  By 1987 she was a marketing and musical force who decided to dabble in acting.  Warner Bros., who was in the Madonna business and made both music and movies, said "sure, whatever".  Madonna somehow landed on a script about a girl getting out of prison who has to prove she's innocent, and decided this would be the movie she'd make.  

If catching lightning in a bottle is an unique combination of factors that come together and create a very special film, this is a mix of predictable hackery paired with an unprepared celebrity who doesn't know the difference between fame and talent needed to pull off a project.

PODCAST 177: "North Sea Hijack"/ "ffolkes" (1980) - w/ SimonUK Cinema Selection w/ Ryan

Watched:  12/28/2021

Format:  DVD

Viewing:  First

Decade:  1980

Director:  Andrew V McLaglen

For more ways to listen

It's Roger Moore in a beard and playing with cats and fighting villains! What's not to like? SimonUK and Ryan get on board to bear witness as Anthony Perkins decides to make some quick cash by entering the petroleum industry! It's all hands on deck as James Mason and many other familiar faces mix it up in a high stakes chess match that no one in the US ever managed to watch!

The Signal Watch PodCast · 177: "North Sea Hijack"/ "ffolkes" (1980) - w/ SimonUK Cinema Selection w/ Ryan

Music:

Main Titles and Closing Titles - Michael J Lewis

SimonUK Cinema Series 

The Signal Watch PodCast · SimonUK Cinema Series