Tag: 1996

The Long Kiss Goodnight – 25 years on

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★★★
“We have a mommy who slays the monsters for her daughter – but the monsters are real.” — Shane Black“

As mentioned in my review of Kate, I was startled to discover I had never reviewed this, since it is one of the most well-known entries in the action heroine genre of its time. Since its time was almost exactly 25 years ago  – the movie was released on October 11, 1996 – now seems as good a point as any to rectify the omission. It was the second collaboration in our field between Renny Harlin and then-wife Geena Davis. The first was Cutthroat Island, a film whose troubled production and spectacular failure we have previously covered. But that did not dissuade either Harlin or studio New Line Pictures from trying again, albeit without the troublesome period setting and sea-going. As a result, the budget here was $65 million, a third lower than Cutthroat.

Some aspects were still not exactly cheap. Writer Shane Black was, at the time, a ‘rock star” screenplay author, having written Lethal Weapon – though subsequent efforts The Last Boy Scout and The Last Action Hero had not lived up to commercial expectations. Still, the script for this provoked a bidding war between New Line, Warner Brothers and Columbia Studios, eventually costing the first-named $4 million in July 1994, including a $500K producer’s fee for Black. That was a new record for a spec script, one which would last more than a decade, breaking the previous high of $3 million, paid to Joe Eszterhas for Basic Instinct. This was before filming on Cutthroat Island had even started, so production of Goodnight was put on the back-burner. Consequently, shooting did not begin until 18 months after the script was purchased.

It took place from January-May 1996 in Ontario, Canada, and the conditions posed many issues for the cast and crew. According to Harlin, “The coldest night was when we were working on the bridge in the end sequence. It was a night when the wind was blowing 70 miles an hour and it was minus 98 degrees with the wind chill.” Though it was probably Davis, who had to pretend she was unconscious and lie on the ground, who experienced the worst of it. Harlin had nothing but praise for her: “Geena’s particularly tough. She’s very athletic and very determined. So, if there’s anything she feels that she can’t do, she’ll put all her energies into making sure that she can learn it, and by the time it is needed, she can do it.”

Generally, however, production went smoothly – save for a historic location burning down.  But if you read Black’s February 1995 script, you can see the violence has been significantly toned down by the time it reaches the screen. For example, this line depicting a character, shot in the head in a diner: “Mr. Shotgun dies on his feet. Outgoing matter. Flung. Spattered on the grill where it sizzles along with burnt hamburger.” Ick. A test screening also triggered a significant change. Jackson’s character, private eye Mitch Henessey, was originally intended to die, but the audience reaction was so negative, that Harlin went back and shot additional footage. “That’s right! You can’t kill me, motherfuckers!” now crows Henessey, as he comes back from the dead.

While not the disaster at the box-office which was Cutthroat Island, it wasn’t a great success. In its opening weekend, it came in at #3, well back of fellow new release The Ghost and the Darkness, and even behind The First Wives’ Club, in its fourth week out. By the end of its run, it had taken $33.4 million, though did better overseas, with $56 million. Still, that $89.4 million was not much more than the production budget and after promotion and other costs, profits will have been slim to non-existent. Was it a hang-over from Cutthroat? Poor marketing? Or simply having an action heroine? Black reckons “It might have made more money” with a male lead. That all said, how does it stand up, a quarter-century later?

Truth be told, I’ve seen this several times over the years: it always feels I should like it more than I do, and I come away feeling a little disappointed. Especially now, it is a product of its time, and certainly, pales in comparison to not dissimilar spy movies since, such as Salt or Atomic Blonde. The pacing feels particularly leisurely, with it being close to an hour before Samantha Caine (Davis) gets fully in touch with her inner assassin, “Charly” Baltimore. Charly suffered amnesia after a fall on a mission eight years previously, and had become happy housewife Samantha, complete with boyfriend and adorable little moppet. But a blow to the head reawakens Charley – much to the concern of a number of people, not least of whom are her former employers, to whom she could now become an embarrassment.

Firstly, what is it with Black and hyperviolent Christmas film? Like Die Hard, and much of his output, this takes place over the festive season because… I guess it’s a counterpoint to that hyperviolence. That aside, this is mostly the journey of Charly to rediscover her past, but the terrorist mission she was targeted with disrupting, is about to happen in a couple of days – what are the odds? – as a CIA false-flag operation, under Assistant Director Leland Perkins (Malahide). As leverage against her, Perkins’s minion (Bierko) kidnaps the moppet. Big mistake. Charly storms in and rescues her daughter, before having to stop the planned attack. I must say, the moppet is remarkably resilient, surviving being thrown through a hole in the wall of her house, and a hellacious tanker crash, with barely a scratch.

It might have been more fun to have sustained the housewife/spy duality for longer e.g. having Charly turn up at the PTA, or deal with the thousand and one microaggressions of everyday suburban life. Instead, we get rather too many scenes of her driving round with Henessey. These are kinda fun – there’s an entire film to be made about the shady PI, with his sideline in blackmail – yet in a movie that’s two hours long, feel like needless padding. The bad guys are basically stupid, wasting any number of opportunities to take care of the problem i.e. Charley, and go about their plot in a way that… well, let’s be charitable and say, maybe it made sense in the mid-nineties. That is not the only aspect to have dated poorly. The whole “false flag” thing now has the distinct scent of conspiracy nut to it, since we’ve heard this claimed for virtually every attack since 9/11.

It’s certainly not all bad though. Davis is great on both sides of her split personality, eventually merging them into a whole which feels comfortable. There’s no denying her derring-do, and on several occasions, Harlin shoots things so you feel certain it’s a stunt double assembling a gun, or ice-skating, only to pan up and show – nope, it was Geena. The final explosion at Niagara Falls is as spectacular a giant fireball as you could hope to see, and the action scenes in general are top-notch stuff, from a time before you assumed CGI was always involved. However, I think I preferred Cutthroat, not least due to its more consistent tone. Black always wants to seem both hard-edged and jokey; he doesn’t get it right here, leaving each side pointing a finger at the other, in accusatory fashion.

Both Jackson and Harlin speak fondly of the film. Jackson calls Long Kiss the favorite of his own films to watch, and Harlin agrees. Despite the initially underwhelming return, its cult status has helped to feed discussion of a sequel over the years, though Davis – long divorced from Harlin – would not be involved. The director said it would be about Jackson’s character crossing paths with an adult version of Davis’s daughter. Harlin now lives in China, where the film is apparently well-regarded and said that “Several people, producers and financiers, here in China have talked to me about doing either a Chinese remake or doing an English-language sequel.” As of June 2021, he still wants to make a second part.

Will it ever happen? Only time will tell, though given how long since the original movie, it seems doubtful. But we’ll always have that, and the moderate yet violent delights of Geena Davis as a home-maker turned lethal operative.

Dir: Renny Harlin
Star: Geena Davis, Samuel L. Jackson, Patrick Malahide, Craig Bierko

Sumo Vixens

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★★★
“Su’mo money, su’mo problems.”

sumovixensYes, it’s a thinly-disguised excuse to see topless women grappling with each other. It’s from the director of Big Tits Zombie and the charmingly-titled Sexual Parasite: Killer Pussy. The budget appears to have been several thousand yen, at least. But, you know what? I didn’t mind this. There’s a sense of self-awareness here that helps defuse (though certainly not eliminate) the creepier elements. When the heroine proclaims, “People have dirty thoughts about women’s sumo, but I believe there’s something more than that,” you want to believe her. Well, at least until the lesbian canoodling starts, anyway.

Said heroine is Ruriko Sakura (Eba), whose aunt used to be a woman’s sumo champion in her day, which gives Ruriko the idea of reviving the sport. To this end, she recruits former master Szenjirou Arakami (Arase), who has just been relesed from jail for pushing a car loaded with Yakuza into a river. The women they recruit are a motley bunch at best, but Komasa (Mizutani) appears to have strayed in from a pinky violence film, so has promise. However, the Domino Group, a Yakuza-run “agency” has their eye on Ruriko and owns loans held by Arakami. A challenge match is arranged against the Domino girls, and if they win, the loans will be forgiven. If they lose, Ruriko must become their exclusive talent.

It’s the little things that keep this memorable, like the quirky characters, such as the tattooed, green-haired and pierced sumo who spends literally the entire film huffing paint thinner from a plastic bag – even for her bout, she’s like “Here, hold this” to the referee. Or Komasa’s one-eyed nemesis and former partner in a lesbian strip show, Oryu (Kudou), who I’m fairly sure is another pulp cinema tribute. Nakano also slyly subverts some of the obvious sports movie cliches. I trust I’m not spoiling this for anyone, when I tell you plucky underdog Ruriko loses her climactic match in about 0.3 seconds. I think he also takes pot-shots at cable TV – the final match is broadcast there – and its fondness for staged reaction shots.

The action is, as you’d expect, entirely woeful and the camera angles are particularly predatory, tending to focus on specific body parts to the exclusion of, say, the women’s faces. Yet the makers are clearly aware of the idiocy on view, and certainly cannot be accused of taking themselves too seriously. Ruriko somehow manages to keep her clothes on, when all about her are losing theirs, and though she has a boyfriend, he doesn’t turn up until literally the final scene. She’s goal-oriented, committed and you could make the case she’s actually a better role-model of independent womanhood than many depictions in more mainstream works. At heart, though, this could only be fully appreciated by the 16-year-old male audience, for whom it was apparently made.

Dir: Takao Nakano
Star: Eba, Arase, Kei Mizutani, Shouku Kudou

Eye for An Eye (1996)

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★★★
“No-nonsense crypto-fascist cinema.”

eyeforaneyeSubtle, this ain’t. But if you’re looking for a knee-jerk tale of vigilante vengeance, when the lily-livered justice system has failed, kowtowing instead to the “rights” of the guilty… This has certainly got you covered. Karen McCann (Field) is on the phone with her teenage daughter, planning a birthday party, when their call is interrupted by the arrival of serial rapist and murderer, Robert Doob (Sutherland). Karen can only listen as her daughter is brutalized by Doob, then bludgeoned to death with an ice sculpture. While his DNA is found at the scene, Doob walks because of a prosecutorial blunder, leaving Karen and husband Mack (Harris) aggrieved, and investigating detective Joe Denillo (Mantegna) powerless to help, even when Karen follows Doob and finds him apparently preparing to strike again. She joins a support group for those who also lost their kids, only to discover some of the members have an additional agenda; to help each other take revenge, where the law has been unable to do so. However, it turns out the FBI have also been monitoring the group, so what is Karen to do?

It’s entirely straightforward, pitting the perfect American family against an utter sleazeball; Sutherland is extremely creepy in his portrayal of Doob, and it’s quite eye-opening if you’re more used to him as (the similarly crypto-fascist) Jack Bauer. This reaches its apex when Doob confronts Karen and her surviving six-year-old daughter, Megan, whom he has been stalking, and whispers to the mother, “I don’t even really like kiddie pussy – but I’m willing to make an exception…” Yeah, I think that was probably the point at which the last vestiges of my liberal sensitivities checked out, and I could throw myself fully behind Karen’s mission. Just don’t expect anything approaching moral balance, or philosophical insight: this is rabble-rousing cinema at its most elemental. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing; it’s following in a long line of such movies, going back at least as far as Dirty Harry in 1971.

On the other hand, I can’t really argue with Roger Ebert, when he wrote, “Movies like Eye for an Eye cheapen our character by encouraging us to indulge simplistic emotions – to react instead of analyzing.”  For this certainly is simplistic, and if Sutherland is impressively one-dimensions as the villain, Field is less convincing as Karen, in what needed to be a rather more nuanced performance, if it was going to rise above the material [There’s also an unexpected cameo from Cynthia Rothrock, of all people, as her self-defence teacher]. However, not all cinema needs to be “deep” or “thought-provoking,” and Schlesinger clearly has no such aspirations. Even if the targets here are hung low, it still hits more than it misses.

Dir: John Schlesinger
Star: Sally Field, Kiefer Sutherland, Ed Harris, Joe Mantegna

Breakaway

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★★
“Marginally better than having your kneecaps broken. “

breakawayAfter a brisk start, this gradually falls apart, the script collapsing under the strain of too much disbelief, as everyone whizzes around in search of $300,000 in stolen mob money. This was taken by Myra (Thompson), a courier for a gangster boss, Anton (Ray Dash). She wanted out of the business, but makes the mistake of telling him so, and her “last job,” delivering money to a hitman, is actually an ambush. Myra escapes with the cash, causing Anton to send a string of other killers after her, most notably Grey (Joe Estevez). Meanwhile she tries to avoid detection, with the help of both her two-timing boyfriend Carter (DeRose), who is cheating on her with a cafe manager Gina (Harding – yes, it’s that Tonya Harding) and a college professor Dan (Noakes), whom she meets at an art gallery. Everyone schemes, double-crosses and fights each other, to try and recover the brown paper-bag containing the cash, leading to a final battle at Anton’s.

Initially, it’s quite promising, with Myra being efficient and effective in her job, more than capable of taking care of herself. [Her character’s fondness for wearing a really short skirt doesn’t do any harm either!] However, it soon becomes apparent that her survival is equally due to the howling ineptness of everyone whom she comes up against. I don’t know if the aim was to make Anton and his minions out to be lovable buffoons, but if so, it only half succeeds: they nail the “buffoon” part in the bulls-eye. Which is a lot better shooting than can be said for the henchmen, since they couldn’t hit a barn if they were inside it. This starts off amusing, until you realize their incompetence is not a joke.

It’s the kind of film where, if everyone behaved with any morsel of common sense, things would be over in 10 minutes. Instead, you have frequently to resist the urge to yell at the screen, whenever the characters instead behave with the willful stupidity necessary to the plot. As noted, some of the elements here have potential, Thompson among them. It’s unfortunate that the makers did not apparently have enough confidence in her ability to carry the film, and chose to throw all the other plot threads on top. These don’t add depth or complexity, so much as unnecessary encumbrance. Grey is the only other character with any credibility, and the film would have been much better, if it had been stripped down to he vs. she. Junk the minions, junk Carter and, especially, junk Gina, because Harding’s performance serves solely as a demonstration of the gulf between professional actors and amateur ones.

Dir: Sean Dash
Star: Teri Thompson, Tony Noakes, Chris DeRose, Tonya Harding

The Stunt Woman (Ah Kam)

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★★
“Because stunt women have feelings too.”

stuntwomanThe end credits of this show, in a style familiar from Jackie Chan movies, the “stunts gone wrong” montage. Except here, it’s Michelle Yeoh suffering a serious back injury after a bad landing following a jump from a bridge. What’s particularly galling is that the stunt was entirely pointless, in terms of the movie, and also filmed so badly, they could easily have used someone much more experienced in that kind of thing. This is likely what happens when you have a director who apparently has no aptitude for, or interest in, action cinema. Instead, Hui’s filmography is full of earnest social cinema such as Summer Snow, “about a middle-aged woman trying to cope with everyday family problems and an Alzheimer-inflicted father-in-law,” according to Wikipedia.

On a similar basis, I guess this is about a middle-aged stunt woman, Ah Kam (Yeoh), trying to cope with everyday cinematic problems, and an alcohol-inflicted father-figure (Hung). What we learn, is that the life of an stunt person involves as much sitting around and drinking as it does actual, ah, stunting. We also find out, apparently, that you can go from walking-on to the set, to becoming the de facto director in about two days. Actually, snark aside, this is the most interesting section of the film, with a no-holds barred depiction of the crappy conditions under which action scenes are created in Hong Kong cinema, with a brutal mix of time constraints, Triad hassles and a near-complete disregard for personal safety. You won’t do this stunt? Kiss employment goodbye, because there’s always someone else who will. If nothing else, you will come away from this with an enhanced regard for the people who put their bodies on the line for your entertainment.

However, odds are that’s all you’ll get, for the longer this goes on, the further this meanders off track, in to a series of unsatisfying threads which are equally underdeveloped and unsatisfying. Ah Kam falls for a man and follows him to China, only to find life as a bar manager not what she expected, so she gives up and goes back to movie work. The Triad troubles escalate until they lead to the death of a major character, but this doesn’t go anywhere much either. Even when she has to rescue a young boy, kidnapped for what’s basically a prank on a mob boss, there’s little or no resolution, the movie ending in such an abrupt fashion, it feels like Hui ran out of film-stock. While it’s nice to see Yeoh given a chance to exercise her dramatic talents more, and she acquits herself well, the results are singularly disappointing, and unfortunately, are also definitely not worth the injury she sustained.

Dir: Ann Hui
Star: Michelle Yeoh, Sammo Hung, Ken Lo, Hoi Mang

Zero Woman: Assassin Lovers

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★★★★
“Grimly fiendish yet effective killers’ romance.”

zerowoman3Mob boss Daidohji (Yutani) has the city almost within his grasp, thanks to a minion promising him material he can use to blackmail the mayor. But his success is short-lived, as the minion is taken our by Rei (Takeda), who is then ordered by her boss Takefuji (Nishioka) to finish the job, taking out Diadohji and the rest of his gang. Not that the mobster is sitting back and waiting: he hires his own assassin, Katsumura (Matsusa), to get to Rei before she can get to him. However, neither killer is exactly happy with their role as pawns in the bigger scheme of things, and when they meet, it’s time for a little R&R. As in “romance and rebellion.”

This is the best of the saga which I’ve seen to date, mainly because it does a better job of striking a balance among the various elements. The storyline and characterization are not lazily ignored in preference for more easily exploitable elements; not that there’s any shortage of either sex or violence, but they seem to flow naturally from the plot, rather than appearing to drive it. The relationship between Katsumura and Rei has some credibility to it, with each seeing a reflection of themselves in the other. But will that be able to over-ride Rei’s strong loyalties to Section Zero? The film does a good job of keeping that in doubt, right up to the very end, where Rei is given the ultimate in ultimatums by Takefuji, and it’s not clear what way she’s going to jump.

There’s also a nice, slick look to the film, which unfolds under an apparent endless array of neon lights, and on perpetually-moist streets, a visual style that helps conceal the low-budget nature of proceedings. While the story may rely to heavily on the clichés of the genre, those involved, on both sides of the camera, execute – pun not intended – their responsibilities with enough flair and energy to counter-balance its shortcomings, and the end result is certainly a significant improvement on the first two films in the revived series.

Dir: Masahide Kuwabara
Star: Kumiko Takeda, Keiji Matsuda, Charlie Yutani, Tokuma Nishioka

Libertarias

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★★
“More like sitting through an earnest lecture in Politics 1.0.1, at a college of dubious merit. “

Like most civil wars, the Spanish one was a nasty, brutal affair that split families as well as the nation. Not that you’d know it from this, which suggests the citizens were entirely behind the anarchist forces: odd how the opposing Fascist forces not only prevailed, but then held power for close to 40 years. You don’t do that without significant popular support. Putting that aside (for the moment), this is the story of Maria (Gil), a young nun ‘liberated’ from her convent as the Civil War gets under way, amid a wave of anti-religious fervour. Initially just trying to get home to Zaragosa, she’s escorted by militant militia woman Pilar (Belen), and eventually decides to join their female fighting force and take up arms against the Fascists. That puts them at odds not just with the men in charge, but many of their own sex, who would rather see them doing laundry and providing ancilliary support, rather than in the front lines.

Actually, I can see from this why they lost, because this comes across as a bunch of idealistic anarchists, playing at soldiers, and going up against the real thing. The results were hardly surprising (and I also note the hypocrisy on view, in a society which professes the equality of men and women, while actively discriminating against the latter). It’s not an area of history with which I’m all that familiar, and the lead actresses did a good job with what were really paper-thin characters – oh, look, it’s a prostitute with a heart of gold. When it sticks to the central group, it’s a lot more successful than when it tries to broaden things out, for example by the inclusion of a former priest with the hots for Maria. It’s also way too heavy-handed with the politics and political symbolism, and the final section, while certainly an effective illustration of the brutality present in armed conflict, comes out of nowhere and jars badly with the tone set by the rest of the film.

There are a few moments which do stand out, such as Maria lecturing the Fascist troops with Anarchist propaganda through a megaphone – that goes about as well as you’d expect. But the bulk of its over two-hour running time is a chore, with a story that feels built around and forced into making its political points, and is only loosely masquerading as entertainment.

Dir: Vicente Aranda
Star: Ariadna Gil, Ana Belen, Victoria Abril, Blanca Apilanez

No Contest II: Access Denied

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★★½
“Second time’s the not-so charming.”

In many ways, this is a shameless rip-off of a shameless rip-off, trying to recapture the success of the original. It’s not quite as successful, lacking the gleeful sense of energy which help its predecessor overcome its (obvious) limitations. Once more, Tweed plays action actress Sharon Bell, this time filming her latest work in Eastern Europe. She arranges for the film to do some location work in a gallery owned by sister, Bobbi (Heitmeyer), which is just about to open an exhibition, showcasing artefacts that were looted by the Nazis in World War II. The gallery is taken over by Eric Dane (Henriksen) and his crew, who seal the place off from the outside world, intent in stealing a lethal German nerve agent hidden in the base of one of the sculptures. Unfortunately, inside at the time are both sisters, along with the movie director Jack Terry (Payne), who is scouting the place out.

To be honest, the plot makes little sense. Why does Dane – who has apparently had access to the statue for quite some time – wait until it is installed in the gallery, behind a hefty security system, before going after the nerve-gas? And when he does, his subsequent actions and plan seem to be designed more to artificially generate tension for the movie plot, than any practical purpose: for example, his decision to leave one of the canisters, attached to an unstoppable time, in an air-duct, while he is still present in the sealed building. Meanwhile, the heroes prove adept at fashioning tear-gas and lethal blow-darts from everyday materials (or, at least, everyday materials for an art gallery).

If you don’t look too hard, this is still passably entertaining, with the art gallery providing an interesting location for some battles (the cat-fight between Sharon and Dane’s henchwoman comes to mind, ending on a piece of unfortunately-pointy artwork). Henriksen us good value as ever in the psycho role, e.g. shooting people because they can’t deliver Shakespeare to his liking and, while Payne is better known as a villain, he does decent work here in a more sympathetic role. However, the film doesn’t use them as effectively as before, and the film needs to be less obviously stage-managed towards its conclusion, which is obvious well before it happens. The flaws are likely not much worse here – just a little more obvious.

Dir: Paul Lynch
Star: Shannon Tweed, Lance Henriksen, Bruce Payne, Jayne Heitmeyer
a.k.a. Face the Evil