Tag: USA

Pearl: The Assassin

  By

★★
“Fake pearls.”

pearlI think perhaps the most memorable thing here was that, while doing my usual pre-review Googling, the search results returned with the warning that, “In response to multiple complaints we received under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act, we have removed 35 results from this page.” I’m not sure whether I’m surprised or concerned that 35 sites apparently deemed this worth their while to rip and upload a bootleg copy of this, because it probably doesn’t deserve it. I may be particularly disgruntled due to the presence on the sleeve both of helicopters that don’t exist, and someone totally different from the heroine; half a star was docked from the grade for this. In reality, the star  (Patton, the director’s wife – he plays the florist she’s garotting in the picture, right!) looks more like Marilyn Manson, with a high forehead and close to no eyebrows.

Not that this is necessarily a bad thing – indeed, there’s something to be said for a heroine who challenges conventional notions of beauty, and Pearl does that, even if the distributor chooses to hide this behind a leggy, long-haired model type. She looks like a pissed-off killer, out for vengeance – not any longer on the people who killed her parents, for they were taken care of years ago, as others of that same type. Which would be criminals, drug-dealers, pimps, etc. She kidnaps meth scientist Erik (Morales), using his inside knowledge to work up the chain toward top boss Tre (Brown), while Detective Wyatt (Morafetis) follows the trail of bodies left behind Pearl, from the other end.

Even given my tolerance for independent, low-budget cinema, the action here was particularly poor, barely choreographed and possessing absolutely zero impact. Surprisingly, what worked better than expected were the characters, particularly Erik, who actually possesses something of an arc, going from a meth-head with few redeeming features into something of a tragic hero. By comparison, Pearl doesn’t move the needle very much: she starts off the film as a stone-faced killer, and more or less ends it as a stone-faced killer. You do get to see some of her backstory, but it seems more perfunctory, and it’s also simplistic in the extreme: someone killed her family, now everyone must pay. That might have worked for Charles Bronson forty years ago; now, audiences expect rather more nuance. Still, there was one genuinely shocking moment, demonstrating Tre’s utter ruthlessness, and I actually laughed at one of Erik’s lines. Overall, it’s a case of being able to see where the film-makers are aiming; unfortunately, the results fall significantly short of that target, and you’re probably better off sticking with the obvious sources of inspiration here, instead of this attempt to imitate them.

Dir: Guy Patton
Star: Dana Patton, Scott Michael Morales, Justin Brown, George Morafetis

Hush

  By

★★★★
“What’s ASL for yippee ki-yay?”

hushThere’s one moment here, where the heroine leaves a final message, certain she’s going to die, that’s poignant to a surprising degree, not often seen in the genre. It’s the moment I really bought into this, which was made for a mere $70,000, and is a very nicely assembled machine for creating tension. Deaf author Maddie Young (Siegel) has moved to a house in the middle of nowhere to try and finish her second novel. But one night, the peace and quiet is interrupted the arrival of a masked man (Gallagher), whose intent is clear, even if his reasons remain obscure: the terrorising, and eventual murder, of Maddie. Cut off from all outside assistance, and after all efforts to escape have proved futile, she eventually realizes there is only one way to survive.

Equal parts Stephen King and Wait Until Dark, the Audrey Hepburn film in which a blind woman is similarly the target, this is an object lesson in doing the most with what you have. A cast numbering only a handful and a single location, are not necessarily a barrier to entertaining and effective cinema. The first section is very much a careful build-up: set the central character in her location, establish her strengths (imagination, self-reliance) and vulnerabilities (obvious). Then, unleash the threat, triggering an escalating series of cat-and-mouse incidents, bringing your heroine to the point of desperation mentioned above. Finally? It’s likely no spoiler to say, the tables get turned – but the less detail I provide there, the more you’ll be able to appreciate it.

If you’re wondering why this stalk ‘n’ slasher is here, consider this quote from Siegel: “We do credit Wait Until Dark for being the driving force, but we always thought this movie is more like Die Hard; we wanted to beat Maddie up, we wanted her to use the whole space. We just think Die Hard is a perfect movie, and I’ve always wanted to be that kind of action hero. One of my all-time career goals is to be Ripley in the next remake of Aliens!” Having watched the film, much of the above makes sense. It’s certainly a punishingly physical role, though since she also co-wrote the script with the director, she has no-one but herself to blame [they’re now married, so it clearly wasn’t too distressing…]

While obviously operating on a much smaller scale, much of it works almost as well, though the absence of any motive for the attacker is a little bit of a cop-out. Even something simple, as in The Strangers (“Because you were home”), might have been better. There’s also one moment where it felt like our deaf heroine reacted when her phone rang, which seemed odd. But the positives here easily outweigh any complaints, with Maddie a great heroine, who refuses to be defined by her disability – even if it puts her at a significant disadvantage in this situation. It’s also an experience thoroughly grounded in reality, where things might play out like this, given the scenario. And if you were considering moving to the country, Hush will probably make you think again.

Dir: Mike Flanagan
Star: Kate Siegel, John Gallagher Jr.

Wicked Blood

  By

★★★
“wickedbloodLittle Miss Sunshine no more.”

The obvious inspiration here is Winter’s Bone, with its similar tale of a teenage girl trying to rescue her meth-infected family. Indeed, given the title here goes so far as to share the same initials, this feels almost like a “mockbuster,” hoping to capitalize on RedBox or Netflix consumer confusion. That said, it’s solid enough, even if there’s just something… wrong about watching Abigail Breslin, one of our most beloved of screen moppets since we saw her in Signs, blowing people up with hand-grenades. She plays Hannah Lee Baker, a bright young girl with a fondness for chess, but an orphan. Along with her older sister Amber (Vega), she lives with her Uncle Donny (Temple), who cooks meth for local crime boss, Frank Stinson (Bean). As Amber falls for Stinson’s rival, Hannah works on a chance to move away from their precarious position, but “Uncle Frank” isn’t exactly going to let any of them leave easily.

It’s a good cast, though both Breslin and Vega bring some baggage in their filmographies: Vega was one half of Robert Rodriguez’s Spy Kids series, so is clearly growing up as well. They aren’t the only ones in unusual roles, Also kinda weird to see the very Yorkshire Bean sporting an American accent; while I won’t say whether or not he lives up to the Sean Bean meme, this is probably the third-creepiest Uncle Frank in cinema history [behind the ones in Hellraiser and Blue Velvet]. The chess metaphor is nice, if somewhat over-used; it’s clear Hannah is the smartest tool in her family, and the only one that’s capable of thinking further ahead than the next meal. She desperately wants to avoid becoming like Donny, having seen the terrible toll “hillbilly crack” has taken on him and his life, and is prepared to go to any lengths to avoid the same fate.

However, there is certainly a sense that we’ve seen this all before, with nothing particularly new in the storyline department. While I certainly admire the way Heather went about things, some of her actions were rather poorly explained, seeming to serve no purpose for her expressed goal. In particular, she opts to start stealing meth from Uncle Frank, but doesn’t appear to have any particular plan with what to do with her box o’ drugs. I’d like to have seen more of the heroine using her intellect, playing the factions off against each other, and using her smarts for leverage, because that’s obviously Hannah’s biggest edge, and the film doesn’t make enough of it. However, the performances are effective, and they help this one pass the time perfectly adequately, even when the plotting leaves a considerable amount to be desired.

Dir: Mark Young
Star: Abigail Breslin, Alexa Vega, Lew Temple, Sean Bean

The Huntsman: Winter’s War

  By

★★★½
“Now with 43% fewer dwarves, and 99% less Kristin Stewart.”

I did not see Snow White And The Huntsman: my tolerance for Kristin Stewart went after Chris decided we should watch all three Twilight movies [to her credit, a decision she bitterly regretted]. So I can’t say how this compares to its predecessor. On it’s own though, it brings us a trio of kick-ass heroines, some truly awesome visuals, and Stewart at a “made in a factory than also manufactures peanut products” level. If not without its problems, I’ll take that as a foundation, every day and twice on Sundays. There are two stories here: Queens Ravenna (Theron) and Freya (Blunt), sisters who part ways after Freya’s child is killed, with the betrayed Freya heading to the frozen North to rule her empire with a will of iron. Ravenna goes on to magic mirror blah poison apple blah blah dwarves – you know that bit – before apparently being killed.

Meanwhile, Freya’s army is spearheaded by a mixed gender platoon of soldiers, trained from young children under her sole commandment: do not love. Naturally, that doesn’t work, with Eric (Hemsworth) and Sara (Chastain) falling for each other and trying to elope. They’re caught, Sara apparently killed, and Eric tossed off a cliff. He survives, going on to become Snow White’s Huntsman in the original movie. Fast forward a few years, and he’s sent to recover Ravenna’s magic mirror, which has been stolen while in transit to a place where its evil power can be contained. However, Freya is also after it, believing she can use the mirror to reclaim her sister’s kingdom and expand her own.

huntsmanWhile Chastain kicks surprising amounts of butt, the love story here is likely the least interesting aspect of the film, though it has some competition down at the bottom with the comic-relief dwarves (look, we love Nick Frost as much as the next people… but this was like watching a beloved uncle get falling-down drunk). Far more interesting is the Freya/Ravenna dynamic: both actresses go full-bore into their roles and it’s quite glorious to watch, helped by some quite incredible costumes, and use of special effects that enhance the atmosphere, rather than just being used for shock and awe. Ravenna’s entrance – technically, re-entrance – is just spectacular, and likely won’t be beaten this year. I was surprised the budget was as low as $115 million, because it looks as good as anything I’ve seen, to the point when I’m seriously considering a Blu-Ray purchase (and I’ve got maybe a dozen of those, so that’s rare indeed).

It’s a shame this wasn’t more successful. Maybe it helps I haven’t seen Frozen either, to which I’ve seen a number of reviews compare this. Admittedly, the story needs more focus, and should have decided whether to be a prequel or a sequel. Hemsworth and Chastain should not have bothered with unconvincing Scottish accents either. Yet it overcomes these issues with sheer force of will from the actresses involved. All three have some pedigree in the action genre; Theron and Chastain most obviously, but even Blunt played one of Boudica’s daughters, back in 2003. They take the material more seriously than it likely deserves (unquestionably, more seriously than Hemsworth, Frost or the other male actors), and their gravitas helps drag the viewer along with them. And even when it can’t quite pull that off, you can still admire the pretty pictures.

Dir: Cedric Nicolas-Troyan
Star: Chris Hemsworth, Emily Blunt, Jessica Chastain, Charlize Theron

The Wrong Car

  By

★★
“The first Uber paranoia film?”

wrongcarI was kinda amused by the concept here, which tells the story of law student Trudy (Savre), who is drugged and raped after getting into what she thinks is a “NetCar” – a thinly-disguised Uber – vehicle, only to find it driven by a predator who waits near venues for vulnerable (read, “drunk”) young women, who are expecting the Uber… sorry, the “NetCar” they ordered to show up. The police are, as typical in this kind of TV movie, powerless to help, and it’s up to Savre and her roommate, Gretchen (Raisa) to track down the perpetrator. To that end, Trudy becomes a NetCar driver herself, seeking to stop the rapist before any more women fall victim to him. Her new career puts Trudy in the way of further danger, after a pair of gangbangers get into her car, yet also brings her potential romance in the cute, well-off shape of investment advisers Donovan (Davis).

My amusement was partly due to family history, as Chris was (for a couple of months) an Uber driver for some extra money. Turned out not to be worth her effort for the return – but nor was her life as a driver anywhere near as exciting as Trudy’s. Chris was never hijacked by anyone, to go pick up one of their friends who’d been shot, for instance. Nor did she meet any cute, well-off investment advisers. Not that she told me, anyway. For this is a neo-Luddite scare story, about the dangers of a technological innovation, which carefully ignores things like, for example, the fact that anyone who calls an Uber car can then see exactly where it is on the app – so would surely know, even if utterly drunk, it was not pulled up in front of them. But why let that get in the way of a made-for-Lifetime slab of misandry?

For, make no mistake, that’s what it is: there is literally not a man in the film who is what I would call a decent human being, being a selection of sexists and creepers, when not actually rapey. After a couple of movies from Lifetime that have actually been solid (Big Driver and Deliverance Creek), this was definitely a step back into the cliches for which their previous output was somewhat notorious. That said, as a pulpy pot-boiler of entertainment, it’s competently created, with Savre a credible enough heroine who has a nice arc after her assault, going through the various stages of reaction on her way to deciding Something Must Be Done. It’s not too hard to see where this is going to end up, and the script in general offers few, if any, surprises – one, to be precise. Yet I can’t deny a certain gratification is provided by the final resolution, though I’d probably still have preferred justice involving a more “bullet to genitals” approach. Probably not very Lifetime-friendly that, though…

Dir: John Stimpson
Star: Danielle Savre, Jackson Davis, Francia Raisa, Christina Elmore
a.k.a. Black Car

Painkiller Jane – TV Series

  By

★★
“The pain and strain, stays mainly in the Jane…”

painkiller1Originally created as a comic-book by Jimmy Palmiotti and Joe Quesada in the mid-nineties, it told the story of its heroine, Jane Vasko, who became effectively immortal after an incident left her with superhuman regenerative powers. She can still be hurt, certainly – even knocked down – but she heals at a phenomenal rate, rendering her nearly unstoppable. Over the years since, she has crossed paths with a number of other characters, including Hellboy and Vampirella, and the show became a TV movie on SyFy in December 2005, starring Emmanuelle Vaugier as Jane. The film was also used to gauge interest in a potential TV series, and one duly emerged in April 2007, albeit with Kristanna Loken now in the role, and effectively pretending the movie didn’t exist. For example, Jane went back from being a soldier to the law-enforcement agent of the comic, albeit a DEA agent rather than an undercover cop, and the cause of her abilities also became rather less opaque.

Unfortunately, it still wasn’t very good, especially in the early episodes. This is actually my second attempt to review the show: after eight episodes or so in the my original effort, I realized I had entirely abandoned watching them, and simply had them on in the background while I did something else. The return effort proved my attention span was made of sterner stuff, though I admit that I might not have watched every single frame of every single show. But I did make it through to the end, which teases a second series that never materialized, SyFy deciding it would not renew the show in August, with half a dozen episodes remaining to be screened.

painkiller2Certainly, from a 2016 viewpoint, it seems overly familiar, treading territory we’ve seen, with variations, in X-Men, Heroes and Alphas, among others. The core concept here is the “neuro” – someone who has developed an inexplicable paranormal talent which might be anything from invisibility through mind control to fire manipulation. Jane encounters one such on a drug bust at a nightclub, and as a result, is recruited by Andre McBride (Stewart), who leads an undercover team dedicated to capturing and neutralizing neuros. The rest of the team are the usual bunch of shallow stereotypes e.g. computer wiz Riley Jensen (Roberts), ex-military muscle Connor King (Danby), etc. but Jane is “different” in that her first mission results in her neuro-esque ability being awakened, after she is defenestrated from a high-rise window. I say “neuro-esque,” since there’s an ongoing vague debate as to whether she should be chipped and shipped off to NICO, the internment camp set up for the “special”.

After that, however, the show rapidly became not much more than a series of “neuro of the week” episodes, effectively abandoning much real interest in its heroine and her abilities. To some extent, I can understand this: once you’ve established that she is, literally, bulletproof, what more can you do? There’s not much sense of threat. But outside of sporadic examples, the creators didn’t make sufficient use of Vasko’s abilities, which could certainly have come useful, as the most extreme example of “taking one for the team” Nor do they bother to give her much life outside the disused subway station which is her team’s super-secret lair. There’s a brief friendship with the girl next door, which comes to a sudden end with so little impact, it feels like the actress involved must have demanded a pay rise or something. Then there’s a boyfriend, and at least that relationship does end up having a point – like the rest of the show, however, it takes far too long to get there.

For after initially setting up an evil corporation as the Big Bad, the series seem to forget about them completely for the next 20 episodes, before suddenly blowing the dust of the company for the final episode. It seems likely that never-realized second season might have gone in that direction, though if that was always the intent, seems very odd to start off as they did. The budget was apparently jacked up for the final three episodes, allowing for the cast and crew to travel to Hungary and the NICO facility, where it turns out there have been various dubious medical experiments going on, involving reversing the chips implanted to disable the neuro abilities. There are some interesting moral questions raised in this arc, and it’s a shame the show chose to ignore them, until after it had been given the ace.

painkiller3

That isn’t to say the show was entirely worthless up to that point. There were a few episodes which actually made use of the concepts and developed them in interesting ways. The one I liked most was Playback, about a neuro who could reset time to the beginning of the day. He was being used to plot the assassination of a visiting foreign politician, gradually refining his plan to negate the countermeasures of Jane and her team, as if this were Groundhog Day. Jane’s ability to take damage came in handy here, and the script was well-thought out, both in problem and solution; while they couldn’t foil the neuros plan, they could make the rest of his day such a bad one, he was compelled to rewind one more time. More of this smart invention would have been welcome, but the show instead seemed to run out of ideas almost immediately. I mean, a handful of episodes in, and you’re already going down the “ghost hunters” route? Why not just have a musical episode and be done with it?

AS in most things she has done – hell, even BloodRayne – Loken is fine, and seems to embrace the action aspects with enthusiasm. I’d say that gives her the edge over her predecessor, Vaugier, and the series likely solidifies her position on the B-rung of action actresses [“Can’t afford Milla Jovovich? Give me a call!”] It’s the writing that is the key weakness here, often giving the impression that they were making things up as they went along, never a good thing. Still, it may not be the end for Jane. In July 2014, it was announced that Palmiotti was producing an independent feature film version, with the Soska Sisters signing on to direct. While I’m not sure about them as a choice [I saw their horror film American Mary, and found it very much over-rated], and I haven’t heard anything much regarding the project since, it’s interesting that adapting Painkiller Jane appears to be every bit as difficult to kill off as the character herself!

Star: Kristanna Loken, Rob Stewart, Noah Danby, Sean Owen Roberts

Unholy Rollers

  By

★★★½
“The Adventures of Grandmistress Karen on the Wheels of Steel”

unholyWinner of Most Unexpected Credit goes to this roller-derby exploitation flick, out of cheapie producers American International, because the opening credit proclaim, “Supervising Editor – Martin Scorsese.” Yep. THAT Scorsese, the year before anyone much noticed him with Mean Streets, worked on what would now be called a “mockbuster” – Scorsese later describing it in Scorsese on Scorsese as “the rip-off of the Racquel Welch movie about roller-derbys, Kansas City Bombers“. However, it ended up trailing in to cinemas in Bombers‘ wake and, according to its editor, “was destroyed.” That’s a shame, as there’s a nicely gritty feel to this, which rings true. It certainly acknowledges that the action and fights in roller-derby may be staged, but – as we’ve seen in the local roller-derby scene – the inter-personal dramas are entirely real. It also reminded me of the independent pro wrestling world, of which we’ve had some experience, promoter Mr. Stern (Quinn) harping on about showmanship, perpetually aware of the need to give his audience what they want.

And, what they want is Karen Walker (Jennings), who quits her job in a canning plant after one too many bouts of sexual harassment, and tries out for the Los Angeles Avengers. Making the team, her no-holds barred approach to competition wins over the fans, much to the disdain of current audience favourite, Mickey Martinez (Rees). Karen’s rise is, correctly, perceived as a threat by Mickey – though only has herself to blame, having led the rest of the team in humiliating the rookie at a bar, after she rebuffs Mickey’s sexual advances. Karen is rescued by the captain of the Avengers’ male squad, Nick (Warela), and they begin a torrid, hot-cold affair, in part due to Nick’s marital status. As the tension between Karen and Mickey grows, Stern senses an opportunity, and transfers the veteran to the Avengers’ hated rivals, the San Diego Demons. setting up a show-down between the two, which touches off Karen’s fuse, in no uncertain terms.

Roger Ebert called Jennings, “the hardest, most vicious female performance in a long time,” and you can see why: there’s not much effort here to make her likeable, and that’s a good part of the appeal. She’s all spiky, defiant attitude, and any attempts to make her conform simply result in greater rebellion. Meanwhile, the cheapskate nature of the whole operation is made clear before the opening credits, with a brutalized rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner. Jennings is clearly doing a good bit of her own skating, with a lot less protection than Ellen Page had in Whip It, Throw in the funky retro-sounds of Louie and the Rockets, and you’ve got something which makes for an entertaining time, even if many of the supporting performances are basic at best, and the film doesn’t so much end, as crash headlong into the end-credits. Still, this is a case where lack of polish perhaps works for a film, as much as against it.

Dir: Vernon Zimmerman
Star: Claudia Jennings, Betty Anne Rees, Louis Quinn, Jay Warela

Camino

  By

★★★½
“Flash, bang, wallop – what? A picture!”

caminoFollowing up on their successfully crunchy collaboration in Raze, director Waller and star Bell head into the jungle and back to the eighties – an era before cell-phones and digital cameras – for this story of one woman’s fight for survival against a band of Colombian rebels, led by Spanish immigrant, Guillermo (Vigalondo). In this case, the woman is Avery Taggart (Bell), a lauded war photographer whose latest mission is to cover the enigmatic yet charismatic Guillermo, whose mission initially appears as much philanthropic as military. Keyword: initially. For Avery stumbles into the rebel’s darker side, witnessing, and worse, photographing him carrying out a drug deal, then slitting the throat of an inconveniently-passing local child. Knowing this revelation would destroy him, Guillermo blames Avery for the murder, and sets out after her with his group, intent on preventing the incriminating film from getting out of the jungle. However, it won’t be easy: Avery has picked up a few survival skills from her life during wartime, and some of Guillermo’s foot-soldiers are unconvinced by his explanation.

I think the first surprise here is the opening chunk, before she goes into the jungle, which has Bell delivering the most intense acting of her career. Quite a discomforting performance too, it has to be said, and I did wonder if I was watching the right film for a bit. Fortunately, we’re eventually on the right track; nobody will exactly have rented this to watch Zoë emote in a hotel room, surprisingly impressive though it is. The action here is brutal: while the body-count is relatively small – compared, say to Raze – nobody dies quickly here at all, with demises which seem to stretch out forever. The peak is probably the first fight, in which Avery is stalked by Guillermo’s psychopathic lieutenant. This turns into a knock-down, drag-out brawl that is relentless and hardcore. Nothing after can quite compare, to be honest. The ending of the main story thread is, entirely deliberately, understated and almost casual, though a coda delivers a satisfactory payoff.

You do wonder how a photographer is able to do more than hold her own against jungle-hardened soldiers; I was half-expecting a further appendix scene where Avery turned out to be a CIA agent of some kind. [Truth be told, I wouldn’t have minded!] Vigalondo makes for a decent villain, if a little too verbose; had this had actually been made in the mid-80’s, rather than just set there, it would have been a perfect role for Klaus Kinski, and Nacho puts over a similar mix of thinly-disguised psychopath. The jungle almost becomes a supporting character here, abetted by an unusual, crunchy yet chewy soundtrack from electronic project Kreng. The film might have benefited from some editing and the script an additional polish. But, as expected, it’s Bell’s show and she delivers the convincing mix of elegance and physicality we have come to appreciate, like a tightly-wound spring inside a camera case.

Dir: Josh C. Waller
Star: Zoë Bell, Nacho Vigalondo, Francisco Barreiro, Sheila Vand

L.A. Bounty

  By

★★★
“Deeds, not words.”

labountyI’ve been doing this site for 13 years, and it’s amazing that this is the first “real” Sybil Danning movie I’ve covered (save her appearances in Malibu Express and Grindhouse), For she was one of the first action heroines I ever noticed, back in the golden era of VHS which was the eighties, when I was at college. Battle Beyond the Stars, Phantom Empire, Reform School Girls…. While I’d be hard pushed to call many of them cinematic classics – or even good, by normal standards – Danning, whose picture can be found in the dictionary beside the word “statuesque”, made an impact in them all. She seemed to be on the verge of a breakthrough, when an accident during rehearsal effectively ended her action career, leaving her with severely herniated discs in her back, and LA Bounty as her swansong.

She plays bounty hunter of few words, Ruger, an ex-cop who has been holding a grudge against those who killed her partner and got away with it. In particular,. that’s Cavanaugh (Hauser), an import-export businessman who has a number of other, shadier sidelines. His latest involves kidnapping a candidate for mayor of LA, only for Ruger to interrupt the process. As a result, the victim’s wife could identify the perps, so must be disposed of, only for Ruger to come to the rescue once again, intent on being the heavily-armed fly in the ointment, as she works her way up the chain of lowlife scum, towards Cavanaugh.

It is a bog-standard actioner from the period, with eighties hair, eighties fashion, an eighties soundtrack, and lots of bloodless gunplay. But two things salvage it from absolutely forgettability. And, no, that isn’t a set-up for a reference to Sybil’s breasts [impressive though they are; as a teenager, I must have worn out my copy of The Howling II…], for I mean Danning and Hauser, who are nicely constructed as polar opposites. Ruger is a women of very few words; the IMDb says it’s a a total of 31 during the entire film, but that doesn’t diminish much from the badassery of her character. At the other extreme, Cavanaugh runs his mouth at hypersonic velocity, and you get the sense he is capable of going from playful puppiness to psychotic rage in the blink of an eye. The contrast is well-conceived and nicely-executed, building to an extended finale around the villain’s warehouse where Ruger has to fend off everything from clockwork explosive birds to a giant, stuffed polar-bear.

As mentioned, while you’d be hard pushed to argue this was unjustly overlooked at the Oscars or whatever, it’s workmanlike enough. If the material has seen better days and the budget seems to be missing a zero, it’s improved enough by the two leads to leave you wondering where Danning’s career might have gone, if fate hadn’t dealt her such a crappy hand.

Dir: Worth Keeter
Star: Sybil Danning, Wings Hauser, Blackie Dammett, Henry Darrow

The Paleface

  By

★★★
“Starring the two and only Jane Russell.”

palefaceOr, to steal another line from Mr. Hope, “Culture is the ability to describe Jane Russell without moving your hands”. It’s surprisingly advanced for its 1948 era, with Russell playing Calamity Jane, who is busted out of prison to go undercover and infiltrate an arms ring guilty of the heinous crime of selling weapons to Indians. [Because, from a liberal 2015 perspective, god forbid anyone try to even the playing field on that particular genocide…] She’s set up with a cover husband, but when he turns up dead, she’s forced to improvise and settles on ‘Painless’ Peter Potter (Hope), an itinerant dentist, as the patsy for the role, as they join a wagon train heading West. Needless to say, he’s delighted, and the legend of his own mind only grows after he fends off an attack by Indians – unaware, all the sharpshooting was entirely Jane’s doing. For her aim is to set him up as some kind of heroic Federal agent, provoking the gang into tipping their hand with retaliation.

It’s impressively even in tone, with Jane clearly the smarter, braver and more talented one of the pairing, running rings around Peter as she manipulates him into being the unwitting stalking horse for her mission. It’s only right at the end, when they both have (somewhat inexplicably) been captured by the Indians, that he rises above his humble origins and skills, doing his part in a rousing finale involving some brisk horse stunts. Russell’s performance was the subject of some mockery, Life magazine saying at the time, in a feature called Jane Russell’s Gamut of Emotions, “she demonstrates how to express a great variety of emotions, without twitching a facial muscle.” However, I think it has perhaps stood the test of time better than Hope’s comic mugging, playing into the cold and calculating killing machine trope – she would rather whack Potter into unconsciousness than kiss him. Certainly, it has lasted better than Bob’s rendition of Buttons & Bows, which inexplicably won the Academy Award that year for best original song.

To be honest, the comedic aspects also seem rather out of keeping with the body count, though it’s hard to tell how much of this may be parody of the genre – certainly, the site of Potter standing beside a literal pile of native American corpses is more likely to provoke embarrassed silence these days, than mirthful chuckles. The film is on much less questionable grounds concentrating on the nicely reversed dynamic between the two leads; even if this collapses into the obligatory and entirely expected fluffy ending, the final sight gag did actually make me laugh out loud, and that’s not easy to do.

Dir: Norman Z. McLeod
Star: Bob Hope, Jane Russell, Robert Armstrong, Iris Adrian