Category: Reviews

REVIEW: “Cruella” is everything, y’all…or maybe it’s not?

I got a new phone recently so I gave my 11 year old my old one. My wife and I discussed all kinds of reasons pro and con for our child to join the cult of the telecommunicated. In the end, we decided our need for a digital tether was more important than any fears of cyber bullies and the Tide Pod Challenge. Yes, we were worried that he’d spend all his time on it, texting friends and looking at naughty pictures, but turns out he just googles ancient monarchies in eastern Europe and plays Pokemon Go.

On the last day of fifth grade, all the kids in his class exchanged digits and started this elaborate text chain that continued throughout the entire summer. Most of it was just pictures of their pets, silly gifs and monosyllabic answers. I checked out the feed occasionally, thinking it would be a glimpse into the mind of the contemporary tween. I learned that these kids need to put down their phones and go outside more, but who am I to judge?

One of the more illuminating strings was started by a girl who had just been to the movies. Kids were going back and forth about absolutely nothing and then she announced, “I just saw Cruella and it is everything, y’all.” So you can understand why this pronouncement made me instantly curious about the film. Could it finally answer the questions that no one was asking about a villain from a 60 year old Disney cartoon? Will we finally find out what’s behind her crazy B&W hairdo and those doggy issues? Is she actually indeed…everything?

In case you’ve been living in a cave, Cruella was one of Disney’s latest attempts to reimagine their animation catalogue into live-action films for a new generation. This one at least took the extra step and went the prequel route instead of a straight up remake. Like the A. Jolie Maleficent flicks that preceded it, this movie turned an iconic villain into a misunderstood antihero. Cruella shows us the character as a child and follows her to young adulthood so we learn how she became a whacked-out fashion harpy obsessed with turning dogs into coats.

This movie takes Cruella De Vil and mixes in a lot of The Devil Wears Prada with a bit of Oceans 11 and a smidge of Mommie Dearest and then layers in a bunch of awesome early seventies rock to concoct a clever tale of how a precocious girl with a temper, weird hair and a flair for fashion became the scourge of dog moms everywhere. Here’s the thing: Cruella is not a bad movie. It’s actually pretty entertaining. But it’s not everything.

Shot with a chaotic style and a love for color, this movie has a retro vibe that recalls mod London, but also a style that feels refreshingly up to date. Cruella makes you forget that it’s riffing on an old cartoon while also stitching together seams that tie it back to the original. The flick also pays tribute to the flamboyant Glenn Close performance from the nineties (the first time this character got the live-action treatment) while doing its own thing.

Most of this credit should probably go to this movie’s director, Craig Gillespie, who leads this team of actors, artists, costumers and cinematographers. His last gig was turning infamous skater Tonya Harding into the antiheroine of her own darkly comic fable. He’s got a thing for making movies about odd people in weird situations. He helmed the indie Lars and the Real Girl, where Ryan Gosling falls in love with a sex doll, and he also did the surprisingly solid remake of Fright Night. Gillespie can keep things quirky enough to make even a “ripped from the headlines” biopic or a big studio remake zippy and fun.

The cast serves his vision well. All of them are up for it, especially the two Emmas, Stone and Thompson, in the lead roles of Cruella and her mentor. They spar deliciously as combatants in this movie’s glam couture war. Fashion is merely a backdrop for everyone to be as gleefully over the top as they possible can and wear the clothes to match. The wardrobe people in this flick all get gold stars. The frocks look fab!

These players do their part to fuel story and they all perform admirably, but few stand out from the ensemble. The biggest thrill you’ll get from watching is realizing what actors are breathing new life into characters that you met decades ago when you watched the original as children. So perhaps the biggest enjoyment of this movie is also it’s largest disappointment.

For all its verve and style, this flick would not exist if not for a beloved old cartoon and a studio’s desire to leverage that affection for a big box office pay day. Kudos to the director and his crew for refusing to phone it in. They pour champagne all over this production where other more jaded filmmakers would have just served sparkling cider.

Cruella is appealing eye candy with a classic soundtrack and a game cast, but is it everything, y’all? Not really. Although, I can see why 11 year olds would think so.

I’m sorry, Rutger Hauer

We miss you, Rutger Hauer

Cool. Clever. Cunning. These are the words that come to mind when I think of the legendary Rutger Hauer. We lost this awesome dude a few years back and his passing reminded me of some of his most memorable roles: Nighthawks, Blade Runner, LadyHawke, Flesh & Blood, The Hitcher, and The Blood of Heroes. He could play a stalwart hero and a charming villain.

While Blade Runner’s Roy Batty is my all-time favorite Hauer role, he made quite an impression on 12-year-old me when he was the bad guy in Nighthawks. He was a suave terrorist opposite Sly Stallone’s hardboiled cop in a cat-and-mouse story playing out in the urban jungle of NYC. Nighthawks resonates in my memory for two reasons: it was the first time I ever saw Rutger Hauer and it was the first time I watched an R-rated movie without adult supervision.

It was 1981 and my family had just subscribed to HBO. We had that box on the TV where you switched the switch to get to the good stuff. We’d been watching a movie, probably something with George Segal, and then my folks when to bed, leaving my sister and I alone as the opening credits of Nighthawks unfurled. They didn’t seem too concerned. The movie starred Rocky, Lando Calrissian and the Bionic Woman. How bad could it be?

I was a pre-teen indulging in some late night R-rated movie magic, but there was another reason I was cultivated by this flick. Here was this charismatic international dude, who I’d never seen before, and he was both cool and scary. He and his girlfriend, the bald chick from the first Star Trek movie (now not bald), were doing their best to turn the Big Apple into fruit salad. Most of the movie villains I’d encountered then were of the animated variety so Hauer’s darkly charismatic Wulfgar was a revelation. I was going to keep an eye on this guy.

Over the years, Hauer’s temperature in Hollywood fluctuated like a kid with the flu. Late night HBO became his stomping grounds and then the video store. He didn’t get top billing in too many big name movies after the ’80’s, but you always knew when he was onscreen. Plus, the guy will forever be known as the hunky killer robot who broke Harrison Ford’s fingers and delivered one of the best movie monologues ever. He was that cool.

And that’s why he deserves a better epitaph than Split Second. I caught this C-List thriller on a streamer recently and I gave it a shot because of Hauer’s starring role. It’s a messy amalgam of Blade Runner, Seven, and 48 Hours. A very messy amalgam. While it’s not Hauer’s final film, it’s the last movie I saw with him in so it plays like his swan song in my addled brain.

It’s obviously just a gig for him because he seems only mildly interested. The movie is set in the near future of 2008 (it was made in 1992). London has succumbed to flooding in the wake of intense rains caused by global warming. But you only know that because the crew hosed down the streets before shooting. This movie wants to serve up a creepy dystopian vibe, but someone should have told them you need more than bad lighting to create atmosphere.

The future noir setting is mainly an excuse to make everything look dingy. And the only nod to the future seems to be the opening coda and all the really big guns on display. Oh, and all those sloshy streets. Hauer plays Harley Stone, an edgy cop chasing a serial killer who offed his partner. The bad guy shows up once a month to disembowel his prey and leave cryptic messages for our hero.

Here’s the biggest problem with this movie. The villain defies explanation. He’s grounded in reality at points and supernatural at others. It’s like the screenwriters spun a wheel before scripting every scene. Hauer’s character development is limited to his costume choices: trenchcoat, dark glasses, big guns. Split Second is not a good movie. You feel bad for everyone in it, but you weep for Hauer. Not just because he’s gone, but because he deserves better than this tepid schizoid little flick. Split Second is not a proper tribute.

I’m going to go watch Blade Runner again.

OG BSG is 4 Me!

I remember my parents letting me stay up late to watch the 3-hour premiere of Battlestar Galactica on TV in 1978. The news broke in toward the end for live coverage of the Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel. They pre-empted like the last half hour of the show.

My folks sent me to bed and I was so pissed that I was going to miss the end. I couldn’t go to bed. I just paced back and forth in my room. My dad actually came and got me when the news was over and I got to watch Apollo and Starbuck beat the Cylons and kick off the series. So for the record, 9-year-old me was much more concerned about intergalactic warfare than peace in the Middle East.

Such was life in a post-Star Wars world. In the late seventies, Star Wars ruled my life. The movies. The comic books. The bedsheets. It was all about that galaxy far, far away. But if you wanted to experience Star Wars on the screen, you had to go to the movies. Yes, Virginia, there was no Blu-Ray, no on-demand, no Disney+. The only way to see your favorite flick was in the theater. If it was no longer showing, you were out of luck. You’d have to wait a year or two for it to show up on network TV.

Life was tough, kids.

My love of Star Wars lead to an infatuation with Battlestar Galactica. Apollo, Starbuck, and Athena were proxies for Luke, Han, and Leia. They had spaceships, killer robots, laser guns and heroes with good hair. That was good enough to satisfy my Star Wars jones. Plus, it was on TV EVERY week. I was glued to the set Sunday nights to follow the Galactica as it led a ragtag fugitive fleet on a lonely quest for a shining planet known as Earth.

My childhood best friend and I were so enamored of the show, we’d spend hours playing Battlestar Galactica, fighting imaginary space battles with couch cushions fashioned into cockpits while we wore homemade helmets. In our minds, we were space warriors fighting for survival amongst the stars. In reality, we were two kids with diaper boxes on our heads. Fandom is a powerful thing.

The show ultimately only lasted one season. The effects made it expensive to produce so the show quickly became the “adventure of the week” with recycled space battles and thin storylines. It was completely retooled for a reboot series, jettisoning most of the original cast to tell a story set 20 years in their future. In this new show, Galactica makes it to Earth circa 1980. They spend a lot of time running around LA, which meant the show saved money on sets and costumes. We did get some cool flying motorcycles, but mostly it was lame.

I pretend this misfire doesn’t exist and I don’t pay much attention to the celebrated reboot that won fans and awards about 10 years ago. The new show was good and told some bold stories, using the sci-fi premise as a morality play and a metaphor for 9/11, but I didn’t really go for it. I just wanted to see folks in cool suede jackets, shooting laser guns. There’s talk of another series based on the reboot being readied for Peacock, NBC/Universal’s streaming channel. I’ll probably take a pass unless the cast has really good hair.

Battlestar Galactica is an entertaining Star Wars knockoff with a pinch of mythology and a heavy dollop of 70’s cheese. Watch the show again if you can find it. There was a DVD boxed set out awhile ago and all the episodes popped up on the Tubi streaming channel recently. Check it out and let me know what you think. It’s a little goofy, but a lot of the effects still hold up, the soundtrack is bombastically cool and the cast is game.

It’s a good ride.

The Terminator still kicks ass

I was at a high school party when I discovered the B-movie brilliance that is the original Terminator movie. It was 1985 and this was no Raybans and Reeboks clad beer blast. It was a cast party for the school play. There were a lot of chips and some Jolt Cola. And a VCR. We were so crazy back then.

So I was hanging with my fellow drama nerds and trying to get my crush to look past the glare on her braces to notice me. We were reveling in the glow of our packed-house performance and celebrating how we all the remembered to sing and dance at the same time. Then someone finished the last slice of pizza and it was time to blow things up.

The host pulled out one of those enormous brown plastic boxes that movies used to come in from the small Mom and Pop video store. He waved it around to get our attention and announced, “Let’s watch this movie. It’s got killer robots.” So we all huddled around the big TV in his living room and he fired up the family VCR. The action was non-stop. By that, I mean all the other kids were making out so I watched the movie. I was hooked the moment that robot foot crushed the skull.

Do you remember when James Cameron made movies instead of building worlds? Sure, I like spectacle as much as the next guy, but Cameron used to tell stories. Fast, smart, action-packed ones that didn’t involve sinking ships or big blue people. Back before he got lost in his own ego, James Cameron was kick ass. And that first Terminator movie is stone cold proof.

Is this Cameron’s best film? Sure, he won the Oscar for that fancy boat flick and he remade Dances with Wolves with 3D aliens, but The Terminator is the real deal.  After almost 40 years and several sequels, a viewer can get a little jaded, but this flick is tight, creative, and thrilling.

The Terminator was Cameron’s second movie after an ignominious debut as director of Piranha 2: The Spawning. No one knew him as a filmmaker. The cast included the girl from Children of the Corn and Captain Terrell from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. The biggest star was Schwarzenegger, who was more well known at this point for his muscles than his acting. The movie came out of nowhere. All you knew was Arnold played a killer robot from the future.

It was the first movie I ever saw where the bad guy WOULD NOT STOP. Not being a huge horror movie fan at the time, I didn’t know the trope of the never-ending killer. Here was a movie where that cliche actually made sense. Of course, he’s not going to stop. He’s a machine. This concept also helped cover up the fact that Arnie is not a master thespian. You forgive the monotone line readings and lumbering gait. Is it bad acting or is he just imitating a robot? Who cares? This movie is awesome!

I watched The Terminator again recently and it totally holds up. The movie has aged better than most its peers. And it’s certainly better than the other Terminator flicks. Yes, T2 is pretty awesome, but it’s a mega-budget sequel with all kinds of bells and whistles, whereas The Terminator was made for about $25, some props from the Army surplus store, and a fleet of AMC Gremlins. This flick is an example of a B-movie done well.

All you have to do is scan late night cable (or your favorite streaming service) to see how many times it’s been poorly imitated over the last three decades. It proves that a director with vision, a decent story, and a little ingenuity can create something clever and vastly entertaining.