Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: Shaughnessy, the Iron Marshal

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May 212013

 

This TV movie is based on a fairly late novel by Louis L'Amour, and it adapts well to the screen. Tom Shaughnessy is an Irish boxer in New York who runs afoul of a local crime boss by not losing a bout where he was supposed to take a dive, and he winds up injured and fleeing New York in a railroad boxcar. He passes out and doesn't come to until the train is stopped at a siding in Kansas, where Shaughnessy promptly collapses again.

You know how these things work from there. Shaughnessy winds up becoming the marshal of a wild cowtown, makes assorted friends and enemies, and winds up facing down the bad guys, although he handles things more with his fists than with a gun.

Predictable or not, it makes for an entertaining yarn. Matthew Settle, who went on to a long-running role on GOSSIP GIRL, is a long way from New York's upper east side in this one but does a good job as Shaughnessy. There are plenty of good characters in the cast, such as Bo Hopkins, Stuart Whitman, John Hawkes, and John Carroll Lynch. The scenery's good and the action scenes are well done. The screenplay is by William Blinn, who was involved with a couple of Seventies icons: he wrote the screenplay for the original BRIAN'S SONG, and he created the series STARSKY AND HUTCH. I was a big fan of both, so it's always good to see Blinn's work. (He's also the author of a Western novel, A COLD DAY IN HELL, which is on my shelves but which I haven't read yet.)

The problem with SHAUGHNESSY, THE IRON MARSHAL is that it seems to have been the pilot for a TV series that didn't sell, and as such, some of the major plotlines are left unresolved. It's a shame they weren't able to at least make a couple more movies to wrap things up. But as it stands, this is a pretty enjoyable low-budget Western and certainly worth watching if you come across it.

Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: Stranger Than Fiction

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May 142013

 

(This post originally appeared in slightly different form on June 27, 2007.)

When comedians make serious movies, sometimes it works (most of Bill Murray’s efforts along those lines) and sometimes it doesn’t (most of Jim Carrey’s). In STRANGER THAN FICTION, Will Ferrell tries on a more serious role and succeeds pretty well. He plays IRS agent Harold Krick, whose life is suddenly disrupted by a voice-over narration that only he can hear, coming from some woman with a British accent. Eventually Harold discovers that he’s a character in a novel being written by an author (played by Emma Thompson) who’s struggling with writer’s block. But is he only a character on a page, or does he really exist? That’s the question on which most of the movie turns.

While most of the humor in this film is of the whimsical variety, there are a couple of laugh out loud moments, too, and they’re achieved without Ferrell having to run around naked as he does in most of his other movies. One of the questions plaguing Ferrell’s character is whether the novel about him will turn out to be a tragedy or a comedy, and the same question hangs over this movie until the end. The script is well-written and includes some interesting observations about the nature of fiction; the cast, which includes Dustin Hoffman as an English professor, is good all around; the minimalist sets fit right in with the characters and story; and the music, which is in the same vein most of the time, works well. I enjoyed this one quite a bit, more than I expected to, really. Well worth a look.

Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: She Gets What She Wants

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May 072013

 

I'd never heard of this movie until it popped up in a Netflix recommendation. But it's a Texas-set (and as it turns out, Texas-filmed) teen comedy, so I thought I'd give it a chance. It's the story of a vain, self-centered beauty queen/head cheerleader who has her life ruined by a French exchange student who gradually sabotages her and takes over her life.

What you've got here is a reasonably well-written movie that's worth watching because of the Texas bits it gets right, the mildly raunchy humor, the presence of some veteran character actors like Julie White and Michael McKean, and a good performance from Jane McGregor as the cheerleader, who's really the lead despite Piper Perabo being top-billed as the exchange student. SHE GETS WHAT SHE WANTS isn't a great movie, but I enjoyed it.

Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: The Desperate Trail

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Apr 022013

 

THE DESPERATE TRAIL is a made-for-cable Western starring Sam Elliott. Now, I would have said that I'd seen all of Sam Elliott's Westerns, but nope, this one was new to me. Although Elliott is top-billed, he actually plays a supporting role as a ruthless, vengeful marshal who's pursuing a female fugitive (Linda Fiorentino) convicted of killing her husband. While she's on the run, she throws in with a charming con man and outlaw played by Craig Sheffer, and they team up hoping to rob a big money shipment from a bank.

This movie takes some odd turns. Sam Elliott is the villain, and despite a good performance from him, I'm not sure that works for me. I'm just too used to seeing him as the hero. The music is very low-key and doesn't sound like Western movie music at all, which also bothers me, and there's something off about the photography that doesn't look right.

That said, there are some interesting characters, a few moments of unexpected and almost bizarre humor, and a couple of decent gunfights. I got caught up in the story despite the quibbles I mentioned above. THE DESPERATE TRAIL is a flawed movie, but I think it's worth watching, especially if you're a Sam Elliott completist like me.

Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: Detour

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Mar 262013

 

This post originally appeared in slightly different form on August 15, 2007.

Speaking of movies you’d think I would have seen before now, I just watched DETOUR for the first time. This one has quite a reputation as a film noir, despite its low budget and lesser-known actors. It’s the story of a guy hitchhiking across the country (Tom Neal) so that he can be reunited with his girlfriend. Unfortunately for him, he accepts a ride from someone he shouldn’t, and he winds up having to cope with death, deception, and a dangerous woman -- all the stuff of classic noir, in other words.

For the most part DETOUR works really well. Yes, it looks cheap, but most of it is set in cheap places. I’m just old enough to have experienced first-hand the sort of greasy roadside diners, rustic gas stations, and dingy tourist courts where most of this movie takes place. You could still find plenty of those in rural Texas in the early Sixties. Tom Neal does a pretty good job as the unlucky Al Roberts and provides the usual voice-over narration. And Ann Savage, who plays the femme fatale Vera, is genuinely scary. There’s a moment soon after she meets Neal’s character when she turns her head sharply and looks directly at him for the first time, and her feral expression will send a shiver right through you. I think it’s her performance, and the lines from the script about doom and the arbitrariness of fate, that give DETOUR its reputation.

But the ending of the film is a real let-down. It’s arbitrary, all right, but not in a symbolic way. It’s just abrupt and disappointing and left me with the feeling that some of the movie is missing because of all the things that are set up and then never explored, as if the director said, “Okay, that’s it, we’re out of film.” Maybe that’s what happened, for all I know. I’m glad I finally saw DETOUR anyway. It’s about half of a great film.

Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: 12 Rounds

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Mar 192013

 

As I mentioned last week, here's my post about John Cena's second movie, which originally appeared here on August 16, 2009.

I thought THE MARINE, the previous action thriller starring the WWE’s John Cena, was a surprisingly good, smartly written, and well-acted film. So I hoped that Cena’s latest film, 12 ROUNDS, would be pretty good, too.

In this one, Cena plays a New Orleans beat cop who stumbles into an FBI operation to catch a notorious international arms dealer. He winds up catching the guy and getting promoted to detective along with his partner. But a year later, the brilliant, ruthless villain escapes from prison and returns to New Orleans bent on revenge. He takes Cena’s girlfriend hostage and starts making our hero deal with all sorts of intricately plotted, deadly challenges (the twelve rounds of the title) in order to save her. Needless to say, mayhem ensues. Stuff blows up real good. Cena does a lot of runnin’, jumpin’, and fightin’. But then . . .

Ah, but then 12 ROUNDS turns into one of the most cleverly plotted movies I’ve seen in a long time, and as far as I could tell, all the twists were set up fairly. Some of them you’ll probably be able to predict, but all I can say is that I was surprised a number of times, and I love being surprised by a movie.

Cena handles the action scenes just fine, and he’s a pretty darned good actor, too. He has a very capable supporting cast in this one including Ashley Scott and Steve Harris. The director is Renny Harlin, who may not be the A-list director he was fifteen or twenty years ago but still knows how to put together a pretty entertaining film. (And doggone it, I still think CUTTHROAT ISLAND and THE LONG KISS GOODNIGHT are good movies!)

So not only was I not disappointed by 12 ROUNDS, I was very impressed by it, and if you enjoy intelligent action thrillers, I highly recommend it. And I’m looking forward to Cena’s next film.

UPDATE: That next film was the inspirational sports drama LEGENDARY, which is okay but not up to the level of Cena's first two movies. And that's been it for his movie roles, as far as I know.

Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: The Marine

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Mar 122013

 

This post originally appeared in slightly different form on September 5, 2007.

So you’ve got this big, tough Marine, John Triton, who gets thrown out of the service because he disobeyed orders and singlehandedly saved several other Marines who had been captured by the enemy in Iraq. Triton comes back to his beautiful wife in the United States and has a predictably hard time fitting into civilian life.

At the same time there’s this ruthless gang of professional jewel thieves who are on the run after pulling a big robbery. You know they’re going to cross paths with Triton sooner or later, and when they do . . . well, the story could go one of two different ways. Either it becomes a taut little noir thriller, or it turns into a noisy action/adventure film with lots of running and fighting and shooting and things Blowing Up Real Good.

Since THE MARINE is the first starring vehicle for WWE performer John Cena, who’s attempting to follow in The Rock’s footsteps and become an action movie star, you can probably guess which path this story follows.

That said, THE MARINE is very entertaining and well-written. There’s a thread of dry humor that runs all through the film, resulting in lines like the one delivered by the great character actor Robert Patrick, playing the leader of the bad guys, who orders everyone not to look at him during the big robbery early in the film: “I have intimacy issues . . . and a gun.” By the time John Triton leaps toward the camera with some huge explosion going off right behind him for the third or fourth time, you get the idea that the filmmakers aren’t taking any of this too seriously and neither should we. It’s just a goofy, over-the-top action movie, but a slyly intelligent one at the same time.

Not surprisingly, John Cena has an impressive physical presence, and while the script doesn’t call for him to do much more than run and jump and fight, he handles the few quieter moments pretty well, too. Dwayne Johnson -- The Rock -- was a decent actor right from the start, and Cena may prove to be, too. I liked THE MARINE quite a bit and recommend it to those who like action/adventure films.

UPDATE: John Cena hasn't really lived up to the potential I saw in him in this film, at least not as an action movie star, although he's still a big name in wrestling. But I thought his follow-up to this film was even better, and I think I'm going to rerun my post about it next week.

Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: Crossfire Trail

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Feb 262013

 

Somehow we missed this made-for-cable Western starring Tom Selleck and based on a novel by Louis L'Amour when it came out about a dozen years ago, hence the "overlooked" designation. Hard to believe, isn't it? But we came across an inexpensive copy of the DVD at Sam's, couldn't remember if we'd seen it, and decided to take a chance. I'm glad we did.

I'd read the novel probably thirty years ago, so the story wasn't completely new to me and the movie version seems like a pretty faithful adaptation. The hero, Rafe Covington (played by Selleck, and by the way, the character's name was Rafe Caradec in the book), shows up in Wyoming to protect the ranch owned by a friend of his who has died, and to protect the friend's widow (Virginia Madsen) as well. The local saloon owner/bad guy (Mark Harmon) has designs on both.

No, there's nothing here that will surprise anybody who's read or watched a few Westerns. But even something that's very familiar can be quite entertaining if done well, and CROSSFIRE TRAIL is. Selleck makes a great Western hero and has a real flair for delivering lines like the one he says to Madsen when he's explaining why he didn't become a priest like his mother wanted him to be: "Never quite got the knack of turnin' the other cheek." In addition, character actors abound, such as Wilford Brimley playing an old ranch hand who becomes Selleck's sidekick and Barry Corbin as the local sheriff who's in the bad guy's pocket. Brad Johnson is appropriately menacing as a sinister gunfighter.

Simon Wincer, who directed QUIGLEY DOWN UNDER (a great film with a lousy title), is the director of CROSSFIRE TRAIL and keeps the action moving along at a nice pace. The Canadian scenery, standing in for Wyoming, is spectacular, the music is stirring, and all in all I had a grand time watching this one. If you're a Western fan like me and missed it like we did, you should hunt up a copy and check it out.

Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: Safety Not Guaranteed

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Jan 082013

 

SAFETY NOT GUARANTEED is just the sort of movie this series of blog posts was made for. I'd never heard of it until the science fiction and fantasy website io9 included it on the list of the best SF and fantasy movies of 2012. So I checked it out and think it's an excellent film.

The story concerns a magazine journalist and a couple of interns investigating an oddball guy who claims to have invented a time machine and advertises for a companion to go back in time with him. "Provide your own weapons", the ad says. "Safety not guaranteed." So in order to get the story, the female intern answers the ad.

Well, you can probably guess most of what happens from there, up to and including the ending. But the journey to get there is very entertaining. This is one of those rare comedy/dramas that actually works for me, with some very funny moments and some very touching ones. It's well written and well acted. Most of the cast I'd never heard of, with the exceptions of Jake Johnson, who's great on the TV series NEW GIRL and very good here as the journalist, and Kristen Bell in a very small but pivotal part late in the movie.

I enjoyed SAFETY NOT GUARANTEED, so it gets a strong recommendation from me.

Tuesday’s Overlooked Movies: Island in the Sky

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Nov 062012

 

(Sorry I not only don't have anything political or election-related to post today, this is also a rerun from 2007. Things have been a mite hectic lately.)

I was right when I said I didn’t think I’d ever seen this film before, so if for no other reason I enjoyed it simply because to me it was a new John Wayne movie and that’s a real rarity. Luckily it’s also a good film.

Wayne plays a pilot flying for the Air Transport Command during World War II (as did Ernest K. Gann, author of the novel upon which this movie was based). Bad weather forces him to land in the snow-covered Canadian wilderness, far north of any civilization. Wayne and the four members of his crew have to survive the sub-zero weather until search parties can find them, and they have only a little food and a hand-cranked radio with which to send out distress signals.

The action cuts back and forth between the stranded men and the other pilots who are searching for them. There are character actors galore in this movie: Andy Devine, Harry Carey Jr., Bob Steele, Paul Fix, Sean McClory, an impossibly-young James Arness . . . If there had been a tough, wise-cracking dame among them, I would have sworn this was a Howard Hawks movie. Instead it was directed by William Wellman, another master of the hardboiled aviation film.

While this is a good film and I enjoyed it, I wouldn’t put it in the top tier of John Wayne movies. Wayne is okay in it, but it’s not one of his better performances. And the sheer size of the ensemble cast maybe works against it. There are too many characters to keep up with, and while everybody gets a little to do, nobody is on-screen enough to make much of an impression, with the exception of Andy Devine, who doesn’t play his role as comedy relief for a change. According to Leonard Maltin’s introduction on the DVD, this film was overshadowed by THE HIGH AND THE MIGHTY, another Wayne/Wellman/Gann aviation picture that was released the next year. That’s probably true. I think THE HIGH AND THE MIGHTY is a better film. But ISLAND IN THE SKY is well worth watching, too.

Incidentally, among the DVD extras is a short but very nice interview with Harry Carey Jr. Be sure to watch it, too, if you’re checking out ISLAND IN THE SKY.