Chiroptera Watch: Bats (1999)

Watched:  03/17/2023

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  First

Director:  Louis Morneau

So, I like a good movie about people being attacked by animals.  This is that.  It will not surprise you that Bats (1999) is about bats.  Attacking people.  And the people who are quite cross that they are being attacked by bats.  

Mutant bats, but bats.

So, anyway, it's about pretty much nothing else.  There's no real sub-text.  It's just a movie about trying to stop bats from eating you and the medley of challenges that arise in the pursuit of stopping bats.  No intentional analogies, but it IS about bats with a weaponized virus that is accidentally released, and threatens to doom humanity if not contained and.... ehhhhh.....  that reads pretty weird here in 2023.  

It borrows heavily from Alien and Aliens from sound FX to character choices.  The bats are shown in close-up, they are terrific puppets, and I have no notes.  Love the bats.  Well done.  The movie never lets itself think it needs sub-plots, so expect no romance.  But I do think they must have decided to do some green-screened insert shots in a few dialog bits, because it really seems like the lighting is weird and the characters are shot in a weird single mid-shot dead center of the frame dropping jokes or whatever.  Maybe the first go-round was too grim for what it was?

This isn't a criticism, but Lou Diamond Phillips was featured less prominently than I'd figured or hoped for - he's in it, but he's featured supporting. Our star is Dina Meyer, who was having a moment in Hollywood, but they chose to straighten her magnificent curls, and I am against that decision.  

she's lovely here, but just sort of bleeds into the wall-paper of 1990's young female white-girl actors

just look at those spectacular locks

Anyway - I actually liked the movie!  It did what I hoped it would do.  It didn't weigh itself down with misguided moralizing, and it set up an internal logic and stuck to it.  Animals got the upper hand for a while and the puppets were neat.

There's probably more to say about Dina Meyer as a star, but we'll save that for another day.  And certainly LDP, who is always good.  And there's a dissertation worth of discussion about the mononymous Leon playing "Jimmy" and the role of African-American males in horror and horror-adjacent films, especially in the late 90's as audiences expected tropes to be addressed.

 

WWII Watch: Watch on the Rhine (1943)

Watched:  03/12/2023

Format:  TCM

Viewing:  First

Director:  Herman Shumlin, Hal Mohr (uncredited)

I had never seen Watch on the Rhine (1943), which is a bit odd.  It stars Bette Davis, who is tops in my book.  But, the real reason is: back in the early 1990's I was a high school drama kid.  In the spring of 1992, I worked tech support and understudy on Watch on the Rhine, which my school took to UIL One-Act Play competition.  We trimmed the show down to a 40 minute version of the 1941 stage play,* which I guess I ran through dozens and dozens of times.

The play was a formative experience  for multiple reasons, not least of which included pondering the content of the play every day for months on end.  But, still, I was sixteen when I read the play and just turned 17 when the experience was over.  So my perspective was widened but life hadn't come at me.  I didn't yet fully grasp the forces at work, what had happened in the decade or more before the war, how WWI led directly to WWII, and that the world is not a simple place and always 100 times more complex than you believe at first blush, ways that inform the movie and play.

PodCast 236: "Elvis" (2022) - a rock n' roll episode w/ SimonUK and Ryan

Watched:  03/06/2023

Format:  HBOmax

Viewing: First

Decade:  2020's

Director:  Baz Luhrmann

For more ways to listen

Your two hunks o' burnin' love take on the Luhrmann-ized retelling of the life of The King. We ponder the nature of biopics, fame, Dutch accents, appropriate management fees, pink suits and the power of shaking one's hips. It's another Oscar-contender episode!

SoundCloud 

The Signal Watch PodCast · 236: "Elvis" (2022) - a rock n' roll episode w/ SimonUK and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

That's All Right - Elvis Presley 

Unchained Meldoy - Elvis Presley 

PodCast 235: "Top Gun: Maverick" (2022) - a high-flying SimonUK and Ryan PodCast

Watched:  02/19/2023

Format:  Amazon?

Viewing: First

Decade:  2020's

Director:  Joseph Kosinski

For more ways to listen

Simon and Ryan feel the need for speed! These two misfits should be thrown out of podcasting, but they're just too damn good. Instead, they're being sent to watch another sequel 30 years in the making. Join us as as we talk this Oscar contender, why it hit, what it does right and how it gets a pass for what it does wrong. And, against all odds, they don't dwell on Connelly for too long.

SoundCloud 

The Signal Watch PodCast · 235: "Top Gun: Maverick" (2022) - a high-flying SimonUK and Ryan PodCast

YouTube

Music:

Main Titles (You've Been Called Back to Top Gun) - Harold Faltermeyer

Top Gun Anthem - Harold Faltermeyer

SimonUK Cinema Series

The Signal Watch PodCast · SimonUK Cinema Series

Noir Watch: Hunt the Man Down (1950)

Watched:  03/02/2023

Format:  TCM

Viewing:  First

Director:  George Archainbaud

For good or ill, there's more movie packed into the 70 minutes of Hunt the Man Down (1950) than in your average 3-hour Oscar Bait prestige film.  And, I'll argue, this movie is actually entertaining while carrying a message about how things *should* work that seems wildly progressive and cutting edge against decades of cynicism and trying to feel wise by having the lowest of expectations of humanity.

The set up is less than simple.  A guy tries to stick up a bar at closing, and the dishwasher stops him and saves the day.  The press puts the hero's picture in the paper (against his will), and it turns out he's a guy who was about to be convicted of murder 12 years prior, but he escaped his guard and fled the day before he was sentenced.  The cops pick him up and he's set to be retried using the original testimony of the witnesses.

Hearing the story of what transpired the night in question, the public defender (Gig Young) has to go back and find the original witnesses with the assistance of his father, a former cop who is reluctant to help spring a guy.  

And, hoo boy, has history happened in the past dozen years.  Alcoholism, madness, suspicious coupling, war heroes, puppetry, mysterious deaths and murder.  It's just slapping the noir-centric fates button for the witnesses as Gig Young locates each one and determines how their futures hinged on that night.

But what's remarkable is the unshakeable belief the movie has in every man's right to a day in court with vigorous defense.  Gig Young isn't even sure his guy didn't do it - but he's going to make sure he does the leg work that didn't happen in the years prior.  It's positively wild to see a movie that's not about people with crafty defense lawyers who can bamboozle a juror's box full of rubes and get their guy off and the poor prosecutor who must see justice done.  There's a real everyman quality to both Young and his client (and especially Young's dad) that appeals to what everyone should expect, and a recognition that not everyone who winds up behind bars is actually guilty.  There's a reason we have a system that's supposed to give you a shot.  And even if that system does fail, maybe it's because we bring a lot of baggage in with us as jurors - including the media we watch.

This movie is no 12 Angry Men, but I was shocked how *good* it was for what it was.  It uses every moment to push the story forward, it contains almost a dozen characters and you know who all of them are and how they function despite minimal screentime, and manages to get it's point across while being way less soap boxy than I got in the paragraph above.  But, hey, that post WWII idealism was not the worst thing in the world.

You can expect a certain level of film - this was the B movie to help fill a double-bill.  Not everyone here is star material, but it's not distracting.  And we do get Cleo Moore as a brunette, which is not a complaint.

There are plot holes.  Why would you stay in the same town where you could run into any number of people who could recognize you?  Why - when you were in the paper - wouldn't you sprint out of town? But.

Anyway - worth a watch some time.

If I have a beef - it's that:  despite the title, no man is hunted down.  The defendant is found by accident.  The witnesses just turn up one by one.  Like, I get that maybe it's about not treating defendants as prey, but.  Sometimes it feels like they just slap a name on these movies.

Netflix Watch: We Have a Ghost (2023)

Watched:  03/02/2023

Format:  Netflix

Viewing:  First

Director:  Christopher Landon

Well, I was looking for something else on Netflix and saw the #1 streaming movie was something I'd never heard of but it starred Captain America, Jennifer Coolidge and Jim Hopper.  And I generally liked the premise of people catching evidence of a ghost and what that might actually mean in 2023.

We Have a Ghost (2023) feels, however, like a few movies that were shuffled together from different results from different writers all given the same prompt and characters but no guidance for what genre this movie was, who it was for, and especially no plot outline.  The result is a strange mish-mash of a film that wants to be funny, touching, exciting, a road movie, a haunted house movie, a teen romance, a wacky buddy comedy, a sci-fi flick...  and a touching story about family, father-child relations and probably ten more things.  I thought it was a kid's movie til about halfway through, and then was like... well, no.

That said, it's weirdly watchable.  It may not be great, or even particularly good, mainly because it bounces so fast from idea to idea that nothing ever really sticks - but it does have some crazy talent in the movie and so you get to see how that can prop up a very shaky film.  David Harbour never even really talks, and still gives a genuinely moving performance.  Anthony Mackie reminds you why he gets cast in so much stuff playing a guy hitting middle-age who thinks maybe he finally struck oil, Jennifer Coolidge is Jennifer Coolidge (if she were a TV ghost-psychic).  Tig Notaro plays the scientist - who seems to have a backstory they left on the cutting room floor - who is mixed up in ghost-chasing, the government G-Men and everything else.  

Our lead is young actor Jahi Di'allo Winston who is very good.  But, man, the movie sure takes its time making it clear you should like his character.  

I don't want to dwell on it too much.  It had a lot of issues.  But I also felt like it got weirdly violent for a minute or two, and it didn't really know a movie can say something, not just be a series of events that unspool.  There's no subtext - this movie is all text.  

The most promising bit of the film, and where I thought it was going before it decided it was not that, is immediately after the evidence of the ghost hits the internet.  You get to see humanity - filtered through the modern internet - doesn't know if the ghost is real-real or not, and makes him into something meme-able and for discourse and all the dumb shit we do as people.  But then the film spins off into something about government overreach, lasers, and a tragic back story I don't know anyone was sitting around hoping for based on the premise.  

SPOILER

I also was just like - did Anthony Mackie really get taken out by a very old man with a pan?  Like...  no one saw that and said "this isn't working."  They just let it be a thing that happened in a movie we all watched.  

PodCast 234: "The Raid: Redemption" (2011) - Action Watch w/ MikeS and Ryan

Watched:  02/17/2023

Format:  Amazon

Viewing: Second

Decade:  2010's

Director:  Gareth Evans

Soundcloud

The Signal Watch PodCast · 234: "The Raid: Redemption" (2011) - Action Watch w/ MikeS and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

We Have Company - Mike Shinoda and Joseph Trapanese

Putting a Mad Dog Down - Mike Shinoda and Joseph Trapanese 

Action Films

The Signal Watch PodCast · Action Watch

Marvel Watch: Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)

Watched:  Early February?

Format:  Disney+

Viewing:  First

Director:  Ryan Coogler

We watched this at the beginning of February when it was released.  I am holding comment until we re-watch and podcast it.  I won't spoil you on the movie or - I guess - what we'll say about it.

But I do need to note that we did see it, so here's a post.

Watch Party Watch: In the Line of Duty 2 - Super Cops (AKA: Yes, Madam!) (1985)

Watched:  02/24/2023

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  First

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Corey Yuen

This movie was very bad.  Well, this is actually two different movies stapled together, neither of which was thought out terribly well or given an ending.  I have no idea what was lost in translation, or if this was an edit.  But, woof.

We watched the movie for (a) a pre-fame Michelle Yeoh and (b) Cynthia Rothrock kicking the shit out of people.  And we got those!  And I liked that part.  Plus, really seeing how from 1985, Michelle Yeoh was obviously a star, from her martial arts prowess to her grace on screen to being able to rock some rad 1985 looks (what *can't* she do?).  

But Yeoh and Rothrock are only in maybe 3/7ths of the film.  The rest is handed over to three dum-dums who seem like they're in a kid's film minus the extraordinary amount of foul language the voice-over saddled them with.  

The basic story is that Yeoh's maybe boyfriend? from England is assassinated because he has evidence on film of forged documents from the world's jolliest badguy.  Two dum-dum's accidentally steal the evidence, and hand it over to a dipsit named Fingers who outfits crooks.  Rothrock - who is ADR'd by Lady Matt Barry - is made sort of cruel?  And I think we're supposed to get a good cop/ bad cop pairing between she and Yeoh, but there's so little time spent on it in favor of watching the three dumb-asses mug, it's just bizarre.

The film also just... ends.  Like, there's a lot to unpack after the 90 minutes you just spent with the characters, and a pivot to one of the dummies picking up a gun and committing cold blooded murder was a twist, certainly.  But our heroes are all going to jail at the end.  

I dunno.  It feels like they just forgot to write an ending and were like "oh, Dave.  We ran out of money to finish the third act, so we're going to just have you grab this gun and murder Barry.  Okay?"  And everyone wanted to go home, so they agreed.

I don't hate the movie  but I can't think of anything I enjoyed that wasn't Yeoh or Rothrock related.  (edit:  not true.  I enjoyed the mirthfulness of the chief baddie and the facial hair of his henchman, Wolf.)

Noir Watch: Lightning Strikes Twice (1951)

Watched:  02/23/2023

Format:  TCM

Viewing:  First

Director:  King Vidor

The thing that might leap out at you watching Lightning Strikes Twice (1951) is that the film was written by a woman, based on a novel by a woman.  So while it's absolutely a grimy, desert noir, it's also not focused on a Dana Andrews floating into town and getting in over his head - it's Ruth Roman.  And the male characters of the film are certainly important, but they're not the show that you're here to see.*  This movie has terrific - I mean great - female characters who don't feel like they got knocked out of the "mother", "housewife", "nightclub girl" mold you may realize you've gotten too used to.

Raquel Watch Party Watch: Kansas City Bomber (1972)

Watched:  02/17/2023

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  First

Decade:  1970's

Director:  Jerrold Freedman

So...  Picking movies for Friday watch parties is always a challenge.  We talk over the movies, so it can't be anything too complicated.  It has to be fun because we're not watching a movie on a Friday to be miserable - and that's not the vibe for riffing, anyway.  

While Raquel Welch is an international icon, and I wanted to use the Watch Party to celebrate her the week of her passing, she is just as likely to play a supporting part as a lead.  But this was all about Ms. Welch, and thus I was also looking to find a movie in which she played the lead.  Plus, I like Roller Derby.  So, I picked Kansas City Bomber (1972), not really knowing much about it.  But that is not to say that I saw the trailers and was not dazzled that the romantic co-star was Kevin McCarthy.  I mean... 

Noir Watch: Kiss The Blood Off My Hands (1948)

Watched:  02/15/2023

Format:  TCM

Viewing:  First

Director:  Norman Foster

Boy, they really used to know how to name a movie, didn't they?  

Kiss the Blood Off My Hands (1948) is post-war noir, filmed in Hollywood doing it's darndest to look like post-War London, and populated by British ex-pats and Burt Lancaster.  You get Joan Fontaine!  How can that be wrong?

This film is the darkest of noir, and an interesting example of the movement.  Normally I think of noir as including either a person who is in a morally corrupt world because of their choice of job as a detective, but much more often as a person who is corrupted by a compulsion (here's where you get your femme fatales leading morally shaky fellows astray) and their world turns upside down.  But this movie has a flawed protagonist who is also the victim of what we'd now call PTSD - a veteran of the war who saw no point in going back to the U.S. and is adrift in London.  

Watch Party Watch: Birdemic III - Sea Eagle (2022)

Watched:  02/10/2023

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  First

Director:  James Nguyen

You can't really write about a Birdemic movie as a movie.  You could, I guess.  But what's the point?

A Birdemic film is an experience.  It's there to make you ask an infinite number of questions like: why?  So many "why's?".  So many "what's?".  And "how's?"

Jamie, Steanso and I attended what was one of the very earliest public screenings of the original Birdemic,  It was during a period where I wasn't blogging, so there isn't a record, I guess.  But I do have a record of seeing the sequel.  

90's Watch: Don't Tell Mom The Babysitter's Dead (1991)

Watched:  02/09/2023

Format:  HBOmax

Viewing:  First

Director:  Stephen Herek

Sometimes a movie goes off the rails so fast and so hard, feels cynically produced on top of that, that it's hard not to just get mad, fold your arms and complain til the credits roll.  For the past 32 years, I'd successfully not seen Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead (1991), which came out when I was 16 and was working through my Gen-X feelings of rejecting things I felt were marketed at me - but specifically at a very dumb version of me the people selling me stuff mostly took to be an idiot.

In 1991, Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead was *heavily* sold at teen audiences with ads on MTV and elsewhere running seemingly non-stop.  Certainly I saw  trailers before other movies.  And you always knew:  if the movie looks like this, and they're advertising it this hard, it's because it sucks and they need to get people in before word spreads.  

There was a long tail of 1980's-style comedy into the 1990's, enough so that it probably deserves its own niche, but this movie feels like a 1987 release more than something that would hit at the same time as Home Alone. 

The pitch is this:  

Period Noir Watch: Hangover Square (1945)

Watched:  02/08/2023

Format:  TCM

Viewing:  First

Director:  John Brahm

Really dug this film.  What could have been a hokey set-up is carried off without a hitch, all pistons firing on this one.  From performances of a great cast, to a score that's woven in and far more than incidental, there's astounding camera work and lighting, amazing sets, etc...  and a story that has nuance, but a clear through-line.

Honestly, I prioritized the film because it starred Linda Darnell and Laird Cregar, who I appreciate for every different reasons.  But even with the strong assemblage of parts, the film felt like it 

Laird Cregar and Linda Darnell get cozy in a cab

 

The basic story is: 

Musical Watch: Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954)

the movie that posits: women love being abducted and held against their will

Watched:  02/07/2022

Format:  HBOmax

Viewing:  First (and possibly last)

Director:  Stanley Donen

Holy cats, y'all.

I...  I don't even know where to start.  There's so, so many angles to this thing, so I'll try and capture my thoughts as best I can.  

I want to be very clear - Until this film, I (perhaps wrongly) believed I'm *pretty good* at contextualizing the cultural differences between our social norms and mores and those of yesteryear.  I may even be able to do period-piece stuff made in prior decades, trying to grok what the people of 1954 found charming about frontier life.  

In general, I can see a film and say "yes, I understand that there were ways that we viewed gender/ race/ manners/ religion/ etc..  that no longer reflect how we'd likely feel now" and I can go on with my life.

But.  Y'all.  I am adrift.  

My take-away is that the current interest in this film by classic film buffs is rubber-necking, ironic appreciation, or just outright hate-watching.  Or not!  Classic film buffs are an unruly bunch.  In its release year, this movie was very successful, financially and critically.  So I don't know anything about mankind anymore.

I've now seen the movie, and will only watch it again if it's my opportunity to bring the madness to the people.  

Some thoughts:

Awards Watch: Tár (2022)

Watched:  02/04/2023

Format:  Peacock

Viewing:  First

Director:  Todd Field

I knew very little about Tár (2022) when I put the film on.  During it's initial limited release, the movie received resounding critical acclaim, but has since had dismal box office.  That alone is worth studying - box office can only tell us so much. Maybe it will pick up as a streaming offering.  I had actually wanted to see it on the big screen and with better sound, but the runtime and this week's weather made it far easier to just watch at home - so I may be the demographic theaters are panicking about.  We're fine with these movies, but we also are okay with waiting a couple of months to just watch them from our couches.

In the end, I'm not sure I'm entirely sold on the movie, regarding Cate Blanchett's as EGOT composer, conductor, writer, etc... Lydia Tár.  I'll need to think about it some more.  

The film exists squarely in worlds with which I have no familiarity - the world of symphonies, of composition, of Berlin and New York, of the small world of classical music with it's all too rare stars.  It should all seem very far away, and at times - it does.  This could have been a movie about a writer of books, or a movie star or nearly anything else.  But the choice is intentional.  This is an alien world, recognized to require excellence just to get in the door.  We can't imagine what it takes to excel, how one walks through space when one has been chosen to lead the world's best symphonies.  What they do during the day, how all of this works.  

That said - the movie doesn't obfuscate what is occurring - and it's a testament to the writing, directing and performances that this world and its arcane (archaic?) rules are so clear.  And that system running up against extremely modern concerns and calls for responsibility.

PodCast 231: "Black Adam" (2022) - a Kryptonian Thought Beast Episode w/ Stuart and Ryan

Watched: 01/28/2023

Format:  HBOmax

Viewing: First

Decade:  2020's

Director:  Jaume Collet-Serra

For more ways to listen

Stuart and Ryan see a red door and they want it painted Black Adam! It's a DC movie, so you know that means there's a few dozen missteps to discuss, starting with picking a villain as our hero and carrying through to WB letting Dwayne Johnson think he now runs DC. It's one of those films where the most interesting thing about it is everything around the movie.

SoundCloud 

The Signal Watch PodCast · 231: "Black Adam" (2022) - a Kryptonian Thought Beast Episode w/ Stuart and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

Black Adam Theme - Lorne Balfe

Paint it Black - The Rolling Stones

DC Comics Movies and TV

The Signal Watch PodCast · DC Cinema and TV

80's Watch: Action Jackson (1988)

Watched:  02/04/2023

Format:  HBOmax

Viewing:  First

Director:  Craig R Baxley

Well, 13-year-old-me that wanted to see this, we did it.  We finally got around to watching Action Jackson (1988).  And what a strange, strange movie this is.  

There are moments where you think "this movie had a $5 budget" and then you think "well, there are lots of explosions and stuff."  But you also know the star here was Carl Weathers, who is charismatic and cool, but he hadn't carried a ton of stuff or big action movies.  The director is the stunt coordinator from Predator, and the film includes not just Weathers but Bill Duke as the cranky captain calling Jackson into his office and a brief appearance by Sonny Landham (Billy in Predator).  

But that's not all!  Craig T. Nelson plays the Mr. Big corporate villain, a fresh-faced Sharon Stone is his dumb-as-a-bag-of-rocks wife, Vanity is our deeply complicated love interest/ MacGuffin, Tom Wilson (Biff from BTTF) is a cop,  Robert Davi gets five minutes.  But most remarkable, it's just full of "that guy!" character actors in almost every scene.  

Amazon Watch Party Watch: Gorilla at Large (1954)

Watched:  02/03/2023

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  First

Director:  Harmon Jones

So, to my complete surprise, I liked this movie semi-unironically.  

I found it weird that this movie starred fairly big names for the time.  Not huge stars, but knowable names and more than one of them.  It has Raymond Burr, Lee J. Cobb, a young Lee Marvin, Cameron Mitchell (before he spiraled into camp), and Anne Bancroft here to remind you she is, indeed, a very good idea.  I was not familiar with Charlotte Austin, who plays the virginal character, but who could scream like crazy and had great hair (and was in another gorilla movie in 1958 called The Bride and the Beast, penned by Ed Wood Jr.).

At around the 70% mark of the movie, I think it was Jenifer who pointed out "this is gorilla noir", and she was not wrong.  This is absolutely murder mystery noir, set against the backdrop of a carnival, with a gorilla as a character, and plenty of intrigue to go around.  The movie is knowing enough that it constantly plays with expectations, and I had no idea how this thing would wrap up until the end.  

It's also, visually, very interesting.  Shot at Nu Pike Amusement Park in Long Beach.  I thought it was the same location as Woman on the Run/ Gun Crazy and others, and was very wrong.  My takeaway is that California had some great amusement options in the 20th century.  (The Burglar was filmed in New Jersey, so I was way off there.)  But as something shot originally for 3D presentation, and in bright technicolor, it's a fascinating bit of visual cotton candy, including a dynamic scene with a mirror maze (that I'm not clear on how it was shot without showing the crew standing behind the camera, tbh).

It's not challenging the AFI Top 100 as an underserved, underseen classic, but it's *interesting*.  Including the bizarre decisions that led to the finale.