[Moderator's note: I am splitting these reviews up by country, because I have to split them up some way. I am not trying to be provincial. -ecl]
SIFF Reviews
(United States Films)
Film reviews by Jeff Meyer
Copyright 1991 Jeff Meyer
ONE CUP OF COFFEE (USA, 1990):
We were supposed to see this last year, but there were production problems and it didn't make it. The story of a good-natured, positive, rather corny minor-league baseball player well past his prime (William Russ) who befriends a young black player (Glenn Plummer) in the late 50s. A nice, quiet film with a love for baseball and some very good, understated performances. A lot of people who saw it disliked the way the plot turned; I'll just say that the film went in a different direction than I thought it would, and while I was somewhat disappointed, I still thought it a valid and engaging story.
The director showed up to talk about the film afterwards; my one kernel of advice to him would be to tell the audience about his vision of the film *through* the film, and skip the expositions from the pulpit.
THE AMBULANCE (USA, 1990):
Larry (THE STUFF, Q, IT'S ALIVE) Cohen's latest. Cohen's usual weird, campy style is here, and the cast is certainly interesting, but the film lacks the strong central plot device that drives his other films so well. Beautiful girl (Janine Turner of NORTHERN EXPOSURE, the most attractive woman on television (IMO), in a small role) with diabetes is hustled into an ambulance after suffering from a fainting spell -- brought on by obnoxious Eric Roberts trying to pick her up on the streets of New York. The girl and the ambulance disappear, and Roberts, playing a comic book artist for Marvel Comics (his character is constantly nagged by Stan Lee for art (*right* -- I bet Stan doesn't even know where Marvel's offices are these days)), tries to track the girl down to rescue her.
That's generally the story. What fun can be derived from the proceedings are gotten from the supporting cast; while Roberts plays the sort of obnoxious character he's so good at (maybe he's a pleasant, quiet fellow in real life), the second bananas are quite good. James Earl Jones is only on for about 10 minutes, but his incredibly paranoid, gum-chewing police detective is one for the books. Megan Gallagher (late of HILL STREET BLUES) does a commendable job as Robert's investigative partner. And if anyone told me that Red Buttons could put in a good performance... His impression of an aging Daily News Jimmy Olsen is worth a look.
The thing runs on too long and takes it's own sweet time getting there; Robert's romantic resolution gets a chuckle out of you, but that's about it. Wait 'till it hits cable, and then only for mondo video connoisseurs.
FEMME FATALE (USA, 1991):
Before embarking on his honeymoon, an artist (Colin Firth) returns home to his cabin to discover his newlywed wife gone, and a cryptic message saying "I don't know who you are." He goes to nearby Los Angeles in search of her, and therein lies the tale. It's an interesting enough thriller, with some nice sardonic touches (mostly from an artist friend of the husband, played by Billy Zane) and L.A. humor (my God, it's got its own genre), but FEMME FATALE ends up with some thriller psychology which is just too much to swallow, and a conclusion which is completely bogus; from a distance it looks romantic, but given any thought, it leaves one rather queasy. Sort of a domestic male fantasy. Not recommended, but points for good cinematography.
RUBIN AND ED (USA, 1991):
Well, there's weird, there's funny, there's funny & weird; and sometimes there's just plain weird. This is the latter. Rubin (Crispin Glover) is a completely spaced individual who lives in his mother's hotel. Ed (Howard Hessman) is a self-improvement course drone, in charge of bringing in new recruits. Rubin agrees to come to a meeting if Ed will help him bury the body of his cat (which has been residing in Rubin's freezer) in the desert. And as you might guess, Rubin and Ed get on each other's nerves a lot.
Not much else to say. Hessman does a good job with what he's given, but there's no way you're going to make these two guys much fun to watch for any period of time. There's some clever camerawork at points, but even that seems to dry up over the course of the movie.. There's always something about Glover that makes me uncomfortable, and here it's his character's main point. (Oh, Glover was scheduled to talk after the movie; he showed up, but decided not to talk to us. That Dave Letterman sure is a good judge of character...)
HEAVEN'S GATE (USA, 1980):
Yup, *that* HEAVEN'S GATE. However, this is the complete, uncut version that was shown to such disastrous reviews in New York, and which led to the producers cutting the film down to two-thirds it's original running time before giving it nationwide release. (Three hours and 40 minutes.)
So, you ask, is it that bad? Well, there's nothing that makes you want to stand up in the theater, point to the actions on the screen, and scream in disbelief; but if I'd been one of those New York critics, the last 15 minutes of this film would have left me in a pretty savage mood, too. The rest of the film never gets worse than being just pointless, though the sound is surprisingly bad, and the all-star cast has very few stand-out performances. John Hurt has some good lines (and his scene right before the intermission is a beaut), and Jeff Bridges continues to demonstrate that he simply cannot put in a bad performance, but everyone else takes a lesson from Kris Kristofferson and puts forth a tree-like visage. The final hour is brutal and nasty but appears to have nothing to say, except "evil rich people win quite often." It shouldn't take 3.5 hours to do that.
BLOOD AND CONCRETE (USA, 1991):
Oh boy, another hip low-budget L.A. drug-and-crime film; I was hoping they'd gone out of fashion when Vestron Pictures folded. Couldn't they have just stopped after TO LIVE AND DIE IN L.A.? Fashionable up-to-your-hips swearing, really kinky villains, and a plot that you just know was punched together with cries of "just like Raymond Chandler!" Maybe if Marlowe was still alive, he'd be running around with Jennifer Beals, but by God, his plot would be tighter than this. Billy Zane plays the handsome petty crook caught between nasty kinky drug kingpins (a psychotic bodybuilding homosexual killer; how original) and nasty smelly cops (Darren McGavin, playing it way over the top.) If you have any doubts as to how this film ends, you must only see about two films a year.
ONE FALSE MOVE (USA, 1991 (World Premiere)):
This is a film in the spirit of the old Warner crime pictures; not quite film noir, but not DRAGNET, either. A trio of criminals go on a killing spree in L.A., and then head across country to the home town of two of the members, in Arkansas. The L.A. police decide to set up an ambush for them, and enlist the help of local sheriff Dale "Hurricane" Dixon, a gung-ho cop played by Bill Paxton who is looking for a chance to prove himself. The film falls basically along those lines, with a lot of good suspense camerawork and music. It does bog down before the climax with some unexpected bathos, but the finale has all the irony any film noir fan could want. The cast is fine, without any standout performances.
If you like the genre, this is a decent example of it.
THE SEARCH FOR SIGNS OF inteligent LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE (USA, 1991 (World Premiere)):
Yup, it's the filmed version of the famed Lily Tomlin/Jane Wagner stage play. It's a stage performance where a number of characters, all played by Tomlin, perform vignettes which are loosely tied together. The character who wanders through most of these, Trudy (?), a bag lady with extra-terrestrial connections, zips in and out and links things together a bit.
I haven't seen the stage play, so I can't comment on how it stands up to that; I can say that I enjoyed the film version quite a bit. I ended up seeing about three "stage performances" on film this year, and Tomlin's is by far the best; the material by Wagner is sharp and funny and has the habit of turning on you and making you think -- a process enhanced by that looney, thoughtful smile of Trudy. The film tends to suddenly jump between Tomlin playing her characters in costume (and sometimes on a set) and her live on stage in slacks and blouse. I'm not sure I see the reasoning behind it, but it doesn't distract from the performance.
The showing I saw was the world premiere; Tomlin showed up at the theater before the screening, dressed in a cross between a Cannes stereotype and Werner Fassbinder, and did a brief, funny bit thanking the Festival committee. Afterwards, she got up and talked about production for about 30 minutes; she was obviously exhausted (much of it emotionally -- it really was the first public screening, and she was nervous about the audience's reaction.) Very gracious, very funny, and very informative; the film was made for less than $2 million (gads!), and she wished she had more money to do some more re-editting on the film. She jokingly referred to the Robin Hood re-editting brouhaha when she said she had the print to SEARCH locked up in her apartment, under her pillow.
I admit a bias for Tomlin and Wagner's humor in the first place, but even so, I think this is a film you'll enjoy. Tomlin said the film will probably be out in October, from Orion, I believe. I recommend it to you unreservedly.
SCORCHERS (USA, 1991 (World Premiere)):
A very well-done play-to-film adaptation dealing with two basic stories in a small bayou town in Louisiana. The first is a wedding between a young local couple (Emily Lloyd and James Wilder), the problems the girl has with her wedding night, and how her father (whose name I've forgotten -- I voted for him two times in the Golden Space Needle ballot (Rob! Oh, Rob!)) helps her deal with it. The
second is a conversation at the local tavern between the bartender (James Earl Jones), the local drunk (Denholm Elliot), the local madam (Faye Dunaway) and a jilted wife (Meg Tilly). As you can see, helluva cast; of the two plots, the first comes off semi-successfully -- Lloyd and the father go back and forth between real emotion and a sort of syrupy sweetness; but the second ensemble makes the film worth every penny of admission, as Jones and Elliot and Dunaway go on a verbal romp, dealing with everything from drinking to marital infidelity to understanding classical music. Jones and Elliot are a delight to watch together, and Dunaway hasn't been this good in years -- saucy and cynical and a treat to look at and listen to.
The other standout performance is the actor playing the father, who does a four-minute monologue to the camera at the beginning which is absolutely riveting and smile-inducing; the director, David Beaird, came on afterwards (very impressive, very polite and really gave me the impression that he knew his stuff) and said there was a chance that might get cut out of the film, as funding was up in the air as of two months ago. He was dead-set against cutting the sequence, and the audience certainly showed their support for his position. Apparently SCORCHERS wouldn't have gotten made if Lloyd and Jones hadn't committed to it at the beginning -- an interesting aspect of movie-making.
Fully entertaining $5 picture. Hope you get to see it.
Moriarty, aka Jeff Meyer
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