The Dead Center (2018) – A doctor in the hospital’s psych ward, who tends to get over-attached to his patients, deals with a mysterious patient who appeared from nowhere, and who show symptoms by turns of amnesia, catatonia, and delusional self-harm. Meanwhile, the police’s medical examiner tries to track down a body that has mysteriously vanished from the hospital morgue. (And yes, I’m cheating — one of the earliest scenes show that the amnesiac and the corpse are one and the same.)
This is a well-made little independent supernatural thriller, eschewing familiar plot patterns and relying very ably on the actors’ strengths. Also, it will make you appreciate just how important sound design can be.
Awara Paagal Deewana (2002) – Hoo boy! We have three rival heirs to a crime lord’s fortune (daughter, estranged son, and protege who married the daughter only as a favor to the crime lord) who have to come together to get a fortune of diamonds from a New York bank… unless one or more of them are documentably dead. Meanwhile, in New York, an Indian father-in-law and son-in-law (both dentists!) live in the same house and are henpecked by their overbearing wives, i.e., the mother and daughter. (Let me know if I need to get out the white board.) Then the protege comes to New York — to the house right next door to the dentists, in fact — both to hide out from the estranged son and to be close in case there’s any way to get the diamonds.
There’s nothing like a movie shot in a language you don’t speak to let you know the inadequacy of subtitles to convey verbal humor. Here we’ve got the father-in-law who always mistakes everyone’s names (including his own) and gets confused whenever anyone tries to correct him, a henchman with a stutter whose name sounds exactly like the word for “umbrella,” and a punchy brawler-enforcer who keeps losing the names of common things and has to goad those around him to fill in the blanks. “Lost in translation” indeed.
It’s a fun crime-comedy, with ninja wire-fu, Mission: Impossible-style disguises, and a devil-may-care attitude about the geography of New York State, but the obligatory song-and-dance scenes all have to be dream sequences because they can’t be fit in anywhere else, and there are about a dozen false endings before it finally finishes (yes, even more than The Return of the King).
Elimination Game (2014) – This was officially meant to be a remake of the 1982 Ozsploitation cult classic Turkey Shoot (aka Escape 2000), but it actually ends up being an unofficial adaptation of Stephen King’s The Running Man (more faithful than the official Arnold Schwarzenegger version, anyway). Dominic Purcell is a Navy SEAL who’s framed for a civilian massacre; after three years of incarceration, he’s made a contestant of the world’s #1 TV show Turkey Shoot, which pits convicted criminals against hunter-assassins. There will be much hell broken loose.
The worst moment is in the pre-credit sequence; there’s some CG that’s so embarrassingly bad I thought we were going for comedy here. On the other hand, the best (i.e., most realistic) part is the televised bits from the TV show, where the hosts are well into American Gladiators territory.
The rest of it… well, it could have used one more run-through on the screenplay. As I find myself saying often, “It doesn’t cost any more to shoot a good script than a bad one, guys.”
Abandoned Movies:
The Amityville Horror (2005) – For good or ill, the original was one of the ur-templates for the modern haunted house movie. Unfortunately, the new version really brought nothing new to the table (aside from the novelty of seeing Ryan Reynolds costumed in period 1970s dress).
Dark Nemesis (2011) – I don’t have any problem with movies which rely on greenscreens. I do have a problem with a movie which relies so heavily on poor greenscreening that the picture might as well have a flashing “GREENSCREEN IN USE” across it. Especially when the visuals are apparently supposed to be the main selling point.
Skeleton Man (2004) – Casper Van Dien is the poster child for one-time Megaplex stars now reduced to cameos in camcorder epics.
Evil’s City (2005) – Because nothing grips the attention of the audience in the opening of a movie like four college kids trading expository dialogue.
Alien Dawn (2013) – The good: Showcases how a microbudget production can still boast digital effects that big-budget filmmakers of decades gone by would have sold their souls for. The bad: It costs no more to film a good script than a bad one, guys.
Invasion of the Pod People (2007) – This just looked so impoverished — both the locations and the cinematography of said locations — that I was almost embarrassed to be watching. (Also: unlikable people being belligerent as a substitute for characterization!)
From Dusk Till Dawn (1996) – Quentin Tarantino has always shown a positive genius at making reprehensible characters engaging. (Too many lesser filmmakers think that “unlikable people being belligerent” is close enough.) Maybe I’m just getting too old, but the “engaging” doesn’t compensate for the “reprehensible” in my eyes.
Dhee (2007) – From my admittedly ill-informed viewpoint, Telugu-language Indian movies make Hindi-language “Bollywood” moves look subtle and nuanced.
Jesse James: Lawman (2015) – Microbudget auteur Brett Kelly actually snares Kevin Sorbo and Peter Fonda for what are essentially framing cameos. I jumped ship before the initial long-and-boring conversation ended.
So… the plot’s something like that one background joke in the Max Headroom movie? “Nightingale’s here. That body you sold us has taken a walk…”
It’s been waaay too long since I’ve seen that to remember that joke.