LANDMARK MOVIES

O.K. I will bite for the biggest WOW films that made me sit up and take notice of the finer points of actual film making. To give credit where credit is due, before I took notice of the more amazing films out there, my film discrimination started with realizing all movies were not good. That may be a whole different blog, but the first movie I realized was bad was…. “Johnny Be Good” it was a vehicle for Anthony Michael Hall, and also featured Robert Downy Jr. Even at that young age I thought “This is not funny, this is horrible.” Since then I feel ripped off all the time and still believe Lucas personally owes me money for that second Star Wars trilogy, but there is nothing like the first time.
But, on to the blog, the five films that really changed my perceptions of film and sometimes of life and you should go out and rent them right now. Do it for your country to it for yourself, you deserve it, you work hard and life is too short for bad films.
#1
Evil Dead II
BACKGROUND: Come back with me my friend. Come back to the late eighties, to a place in the mid-west, Nebraska to be specific. At this time in this place there was a video store called Applause Video. A store at the cutting edge of technology, not only did Applause carry VHS but they also rented the shockingly advanced BETA tapes. But this video world only had room for ONE format of tape and Beta was not it. Everyone on earth owned a VHS machine, everyone that is except my Dad. A smart consumer, my father did his research and found the technologically of the more advanced Beta machine to be the smart buy, a little reluctance to admit defeat, he owns said machine to this day, but I digress. Like a Rumsfeld after a landslide Democrat election, the Beta was doomed. Applause Video had a fire/obsolescence sale, all Beta tapes, only two dollars each. I bought about fifteen Beta tapes, throwing in Evil Dead and Evil Dead II as an afterthought, what the heck they were only two bucks a pop.
A few weeks later, my friend Ian was over and we watched the first Evil Dead movie. Average, pretty gory, but nothing special. Then we put in Evil Dead II.

THE MOVIE: While in film school, frequently, as we WERE in film school, the question of favorite, film, director, scene, ECT…. would come up. “Hal Hartley” one pretentious art student would say, “Hartley, he’s O.K. but Kieslowski with his Color trilogy is amazing” another film snob would pipe up. “The Evil Dead II is the best movie EVER” I would state with pure conviction. You see, I was ‘keeping’ in it real’. Hartley and Kieslowski are fantastic and I could write a whole entry on both of them but Evil Dead II was the first time I noticed the creative ways a person could use a camera, and I don’t mean in a porn way either.
The first Evil Dead is about a bunch of teen age kids who go to a cabin in the woods and awaken evil spirits who posses the living. Evil Dead II takes up where the last film left off: Ash, the only survivor from the first film basically re-lives the first film with a slightly bigger budget and a lot more ambition.
Watching Evil Dead for the first time was shockingly fun. I had no idea what I was in for. The character of Ash acts like one might in a horror movie. His first instinct is to get the hell out of there, that was cool; no one EVER acts like they SHOULD in horror movies. The evil spirits will not let him leave and chases his car. Once he hit the tree and got thrown threw the windshield, I thought he was done for, but Ash got up and started running, he runs into an unbeleveably, big on the inside, cabin. His hand gets infected with evil and he ends up cutting it off with a chainsaw while yelling “who’s laughing now!” That was my; “you had me at hello” moment. Or it might have been the fact he uses duct tape to bandage the hand. Really, it is the creative use of camera that got me started loving this film. The “monster”, for ninety percent of the film is POV shot of the monster, this same ‘monster’ shot was used later when Raimi worked with the Cohen Brothers on their crime masterpiece Blood Simple. There is a tight close-up shot that shoots out to the tops of the trees vie crane shot. This is not a deep film, there is NO subtext. What it is, is a wink, nudge, hugely creative, fun film. The first Evil Dead was very gory with a little humor, Evil Dead III or Army of Darkness has no gore and a ton of humor, but me and my friend Goldie Locks both agree Evil Dead II is just right.

THE RESULT: I went to film school


#2
Razor’s Edge

BACKGROUND: Had to be around 1990, my sister was dating a guy who read a bunch of philosophy books, he was quiet, intense, and all punk rock. He really liked this movie so I ended up watching it because in his quietness I always believed he was thinking something deep. Turns out he just didn’t know how to talk to people, go figure, but he turned me onto this film.
THE MOVIE: This version of the Razor’s Edge is a re-make of a 1950’s movie, which is an adaptation of a book, all by the same name. The film is about a man who is living in high society Britain, he enters into service in WWI, and has a life changing experience. When he comes back to his rich life style he puts off the high paying job to go figure out life. He works in a coal mine and eventually goes to India to speak with monks. When he comes back he tries to reconcile his new found spiritual beliefs with those of the very materialistic life he left.
This film was Bill Murray’s first venture into ‘serious’ film territory. Razor’s Edge bombed at the box office, putting off for years another attempt by Murray to try a role like this. The mind reels to think of what might have been if the movie had done well, Lost in Translation, and Broken Flowers would have to wait a scant ten years or so. I think his next movie after Razor’s Edge was Ghostbusters II.
Fun Fact: Duran Duran’s Wild Boys was on the soundtrack of this film. Mercifully it was only in the credit, still…… what the hell?!? Because I know when I think “1920’s melodrama about a man weighing the questions of existence, and enlightenment”, I think- Duran Duran.
THE RESULT: Aside from a very few attempts to shoehorn some Bill Murray ‘humor’ into a drama, this is a great film. I respect it just for taking a stab at something deeper than a wading pool, but not so deep as to loose the audience. This was the first film I saw that made me realize there was more to movie life than 16 candles and Die Hard. “Ahhhh Refreshing”

#3
MANHATTAN
BACKGROUND: Somewhere around 1992-93 I started getting into Woody Allen movies and since my co-blogger Brian, took Annie Hall, I get stuck with the ugly step-sister, Manhattan. This is actually a big movie for my friend Rocky, I remember seeing Manhattan and then going over to Rocky’s trailer at the trailer park (we weren’t making all that much money back in the day) and saying “let’s watch this” I remember Rocky being really impressed with Manhattan and going on and on about it, he of course, was right.
THE MOVIE: Woody Allen made ten years of slapstick, funny, but let’s be honest not THAT funny films, then the huge light-year leap forward with Annie Hall. Yes it is a fantastic film but I contend that Manhattan is an equally far jump forward. There is more emphasis on the drama, and that beautiful black and white photography. The lies people tell each other and the lies they tell themselves are all shown here and with great wit. It’s just like real relationships except I have never been that funny when someone is breaking up with me, well, I might have looked funny to other people but trust me it’s not the same thing.
THE RESULT: I gush about Woody Allen films all the time, except, you know, the last 13 films he made. But he had a great run for about 20 years there. So, go watch Manhattan already.

#4
RAVENOUS

BACKGROUND: It had to be about 1998, I went to a movie, and it was this one.

THE MOVIE: Guy Pearce plays a civil war solider that is sort of dishonored and sent to a remote camp with a bunch of screw ups in the mountains in new California. Robert Carlyle plays an army office who leads a small wagon train that winds up becoming a second Donner Party; Carlyle is the only survivor and wanders into camp. It turns out he ate all the other people and wants to keep eating people because it is his road to eternal youth and great strength.
Have you ever seen some strange, weird animal that everyone but YOU thought was strange. Something like a squid, or pug dog, or hairless cat, well, maybe not a hairless cat those things can’t be loved, it’s a scientific fact. Anyway, Ravenous is my ugly mutt that no one loves. ; <> Ravenous had problems from the start. In production they switched directors, then there was a flood that swept away half of the set, and all that wasn’t half as bad as the marketing. Ravenous had the largest drop of audience from opening week to second week of any movie EVER. I think since then that honor has been given to The Real Cancun. I think Ravenous does not deserve this, as a matter of fact I think Ravenous is a great film. Extremely well acted, with subtext about the consumption, greed and sense of entitlement that has grown in this country from the start. Alas, it was not the ‘right kind’ of gross out for the horror audience, and way too much raw carnage for the art house crowd.
THE RESULT: I’m a bitter bitter man who snarls at people whom happen to disagree with me. Art house crowd you are on notice, Ravenous is better than Life is Beautiful and has more to say about the human condition. You horror clone babies should watch something more challenging than Hostel, or the latest gorography flick, watch something good for once, and leave my puppy alone. Sniff…. Sniff….


#5
Network

BACKGROUND: 1991 or so, at my friend Rocky’s apartment with his nutty room mates and they were watching this film. I loved that place that we affectionately referred to as ‘The Palace’, it was not like a cozy warm place to hang out at. In fact it was the opposite of that, sort of strange and a little tense all the time, it was great. Anyhoo, they would watch a movie rarely and when they did it was not the typical movie for our age group.

THE MOVIE: A network anchor man gets fed up and starts to say what he feels. Famous for the line “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore”. Network is a satire of the media and the drive for ratings at any cost, released in 1976, at the time it probably seems a bit overblown, now it seems par for course. Super watchability.

THE RESULT: This was the first film I saw that was ‘old’ and was still sharp. A bunch of old actors I had never heard of: Peter Finch, William Holden, Robert Duvall, and an old people story about the media and I loved it. I had no idea, at the time that a movie that had not come out last week could still be good. Apparently if you have a great script, and good acting it doesn’t matter how old your film is, who knew?