Enter the Void
An Abyss of Hate and Lights! Starring: Nathaniel Brown, Paz de la Huerta By Robert Patrick Bulbs are popping and lights are flickering. Fluttering waves of neon-images start cascading down the screen. What am I watching, should I be amused? More blotchy shapes emerge, head butting each other, then wafting into nothingness. It’s pretty clear at this point that “Enter the Void” is an art-house Lite Brite. The storyline is an...
Remake Hell: The Thin Man
Johnny Depp, with his deft-looking hats and rugged face-terrain, make for hipster paradise. If I wanted to curl back the cover of “Pride and Prejudice” at a coffee shop, while dunking my biscotti in a frothy cappuccino, Depp would be that middle-aged dude, wearing horn-rimmed glasses, that would offer me insights into the thoughts of Jane Austen’s literary mega-work. The guy is subdued, intellectual in that grim-way that seems cool,...
Green With Evil: Part Three
Let me tell you, I was THRILLED during one of my thrift store hunts to find this in a dollar VHS bin: Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Green Ranger Miniseries: “Green With Evil”: Part 3 of 5! I did a little scouring on the internet to determine whether this does, indeed, qualify for VHS Screener status. It appears as though some original Mighty Morphin episodes have been collected onto DVDs, but I could not find specific mention of the...
Nowhere Boy
Lennon: The Degrassi Years Starring: Aaron Johnson, Kristen Scott Thomas By Robert Patrick “Nowhere Boy” is unique in the fact that, while wholly accessible and about an interesting entity, it doesn’t necessarily need to be made. I know, you’re confused as to why a movie about the bespectacled poet laureate John Lennon doesn’t need to be made. The guy is a demigod! His face is interchangeable with the peace sign. These days a freehand...
Orson Welles: Killer
By Robert Patrick The Herculean Orson Welles, was, when nestled into his element, a complete artisan. The director would plug more cigars into his mouth than wine bottles have corks. Talc and hubris, the orders of the morning. Yeah, Welles had a baritone delivery that would make a foghorn blush. He was, above all else, and when at the top of his game, a monolithic force void of humility and compromise. Is it so hard to believe, then,...
A Comment on Movie Accents
Confession time. I love movie accents, especially when they are absurdly out of place. There is something about them that satisfies my deep desire for all things campy and ridiculous. I love Sean Connery and the fact that he simply does not give a damn where his character is supposed to be from. In “The Hunt for Red October” he is a Russian. In “Highlander” he is an Egyptian named Juan Sanchez Villa-Lobos Ramirez (he lived in Spain...
Never Let Me Go
Get Those Smiles out, You’re Going to Cry for Two Hours! Starring: Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley, Andrew Garfield By Robert Patrick The sterile, cold, unaffected world of “Never Let Me Go” is about as toneless as a hard boiled egg. A ubiquitous gray inundates the sidewalks, cafes and schools. Director Mark Romanek’s opus is about as tart as a tub of unflavored yogurt. When seen, weathered primary colors are...
It’s Kind of a Funny Story
Emotions: A Teenager’s Favorite Accessory Starring: Keir Gilchrist, Zach Galifianakis By Robert Patrick Plug Zach Galifianakis into a film, prop the letters of his name up at a marquee, and wait for teenagers, salivating at the maw like swarthy bulls, to charge into the theater as if the ticket attendant was a staunch torero. I can imagine them now, in a fit of giddy excitement, as they pull someone’s hand behind them,...
Interview with Jack Gregson
Jack Gregson, walking around in San Diego, finds a wooden banister, where, if only for a moment, he rests his hands. He begins drumming his index finger, restively, against the glossy wooden frame, almost as if his outstretched digit was a cigarette that was being instinctually snuffed out on a makeshift ashtray. “You guys applaud at the trailers,” Gregson says, commenting on the differences between American and English...
B-Movie Review: Kickboxer From Hell
Oh my god, where to begin. The film “Kickboxer From Hell,” (provided by the truly stunning people from Eden Entertainment Inc.) contained the least kickboxing, and yet the most hell, of any kickboxing film created before it. Or after it. Or ever again in the conceivable future. Here’s the blurb from the back of the DVD case: “While in Hong Kong preparing for a big tournament, American kickboxing champion Sean becomes involved with...
