Tuesday, March 26, 2024

Movie Review: IT STAINS THE SANDS RED (2016) *** and a 1\2 out of *****

Amidst the numerous movies and TV shows released in the wake of The Walking Dead’s success, one stands out.

It Stains The Sands Red, released in 2016, takes the zombie movie template and energizes it in many subtle and inventive ways.

Directed by Colin Minihan, and written by Minihan and Stuart Ortiz, It Stains The Sands Red, uses its modest budget and limited locations to great effect. But the secret ingredient, is actress Brittany Allen.

Allen, playing Molly, a lost soul who drowns her sorrows in booze and toxic men, delivers a performance that's nothing short of dazzling.

Her character, a quote unquote bimbo, who, after being left stranded in the deserts of Las Vegas, with a tenacious zombie on her tail, could have become an annoying, tiresome character, in the hands of a less capable actress.

But Allen takes the role and runs with it, delivering a portrayal that is equal parts funny and moving.

Director Minihan, milking the minimalist concept for all its worth, directs the film with a keen eye for visuals, and a deft handling of pacing and tone. This is basically a two-hander, between Allen's character, Molly, and the zombie chasing her, nicknamed Smalls, terrifically played by Juan Riedinger. And in the hands of Minihan, the film stays compelling, moody, and superbly entertaining.

There are a few dull moments in the middle section, and the sequence with the two prison escapees comes off as off key and gratuitous, but, for the most part, It Stains The Sands Red, manages to utilize the zombie genre playbook to its advantage, while adding depth, pathos, and plenty of invention, to create a mesmerizing tale of survival and redemption.

Text © Ahmed Khalifa. 2024.

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Movie Review: DOG GONE (2023) *** and a 1\2 out of *****

Netflix isn’t exactly known for its quality family content.

But every once in a while, they seem to make a genuinely family-friendly show or movie that wears its heart on its sleeve, and seems to have no agenda but to entertain, and provide something that family members can enjoy together.

Their delightful reboot of the Benji franchise, released in 2018, and directed by Brandon Camp, the son of the late Joe Camp, the creator of the original franchise, was one such movie.

Another pleasant surprise is Dog Gone, released in 2023.

Adapted by Nick Santora from the book Dog Gone: A Lost Pet's Extraordinary Journey and the Family Who Brought Him Home by Pauls Toutonghi, and directed by veteran director Stephen Herek, Dog Gone, is one of the best family movies to come out of Hollywood in years.

The plot revolves around a father-son duo, who start to overcome their differences while hiking the Appalachian Trail, as they search for their lost dog, Gonker, so they can give him the monthly medicine he needs to survive Addison's disease.

The father-son duo, played respectively by Rob Lowe and Johnny Berchtold, form the heart of the movie. The son, Fielding, sees himself as a free spirit who doesn’t want to be hemmed in by traditions and the 9 to 5 rat race. While the father, John, wonderfully played by Lowe, sees his son as an unrealistic dreamer, head in the clouds, who doesn’t want to face the realities of everyday life, and what it takes to build a steady career.

Their conflict, while cliched, is handled with subtlety and just the right amount of humor, making us care for both characters while acknowledging their foibles and philosophical blind spots.

The script by Santora is surprisingly taut and layered, delivering a story that entertains without being frivolous, lets us get to know the characters without drowning us in exposition, and, most importantly, moves us without veering into overt sentimentality.

But the film’s secret weapon is Rob Lowe, who, as actor and co-producer, manages to instill the film with just the right tone. His performance anchors the film in both humor and drama while never losing a step, and it is Lowe who carries the film through with plenty of charm and craftsmanship.

And Kimberly Williams, a veteran of family films, who manages to add energy and heart to almost everything she is in, also gives an endearing and memorable performance as Fielding’s mother, Ginny.

Berchtold, while delivering a likable and believable performance as Fielding, seems slightly miscast, as the role needed someone funnier and warmer. But his portrayal is nothing less than heartfelt, and his chemistry with Lowe is undeniable.

And thanks to director Stephen Herek’s assured and straightforward direction, Dog Gone comes across as visually arresting and terrifically paced, and moves smoothly from one plot twist to another.

With Dog Gone, Herek, who also directed the live-action adaptation of 101 Dalmatians, manages to make a family movie par excellence, the kind of film the modern day Disney studio wishes it could pull off.

Dog Gone is heart-warming, smart entertainment for the whole family, the kind they don’t make enough of nowadays.

Text © Ahmed Khalifa. 2024.

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Thursday, February 22, 2024

Film Review: KING OF NEW YORK (1990) *** and a 1\2 out of *****

Abel Ferrara is a maverick. Ever since he burst onto the scene in 1979, with his controversial punk slasher, Driller Killer, he has been making movies that are, in turn, stylish, thought-provoking, repulsive, and always fascinating.

Ferrara, dubbed the poet gangster of cinema, by actor Laurence Fishburne, has a tendency to overdo, to push things too far, sometimes to the detriment of the picture. But he rarely makes a film that is without merit, and is an artist to be reckoned with.

King of New York, released in 1990, is one of Abel Ferrara’s most accessible films. Part crime thriller, part social drama, it’s a strange and mesmerizing mishmash of genres and styles that is nothing short of compelling.

Frank White, played by a hypnotic Christopher Walken, is a former drug lord who returns to New York city after being released from prison, seeking to take total control of the criminal underworld, in order to give back to the community and help the poor of the city.

White, as played by Walken, is a fascinating character. Imagined by Ferrara to be a cross between Nicky Barnes, a Harlem gangster, and Joey Gallo, an Italian mobster, White is a brutal, complex figure, who revels in using force and violence, while seeing himself as a kind of dark knight in shining armor, who gives the poor and the lost, especially from black neighborhoods, a second chance, by recruiting them for his drug operation. He is an ends justify the means kind of guy, who would stop at nothing to achieve his goal.

Ferrara, and writer Nicholas St. John, try to tell a multifaceted story about the drug wars, government corruption, loyalty, and personal courage in the face of evil, and fill the film with characters that range from the realistic to the cartoonish.

Despite being shot quickly and on a modest budget of 5 point 3 million dollars, Ferrara, a visual stylist extraordinaire, manages to portray New York in the film in a way that is rarely shown in movies. As a beautiful, nocturnal landscape. Part noirish dream, part hellish nightmare. His vision of drug cartels as a kind of dressed to the nines tribal groups, who mostly speak through guns and violence, is alluring but somewhat fantastical, and his tendency to linger on the seedier aspects of criminal life borders on the distasteful.

But that is Ferrara’s style. Plenty of style, a dash of philosophical musing, and a touch of vulgarity. It’s a potent if not always palpable mix, that nonetheless makes his movies look and feel like no one else’s.

The terrific cast, led by Walken at his most ebullient and eccentric, includes an understated Wesley Snipes, and Laurence Fishburne, in an over the top but highly enjoyable performance.

Upon release, the film was criticized for its violence, and rightly so. As Ferrara’s tendency to push things too far and let some scenes overstay their welcome, is present here. And the sprawling story, covering a multitude of issues and characters in under two hours, make the film feel unevenly paced and, to some degree, tonally erratic. But these flaws don’t take away from the overall effect of the film, which is to mesmerize and captivate.

With the glut of movies made about the drug lords in the 1990s, King of New York stands out, because of its style, its sheer visual and aural power. It grabs you, and doesn’t let go, right up to its haunting final shot.

Text © Ahmed Khalifa. 2024.

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Saturday, February 10, 2024

LAST SEEN: A New Mystery Podcast

The Complete Mystery Podcast, Last Seen, is now available.

When a friend asks for help in finding her missing sister, William Last, a quiet man struggling with a troubled past, has to embark on a journey that will lead him into the darkest corners of reality, and beyond.

Last Seen is a fiction podcast for fans of dark mysteries with a touch of noir and the otherworldly.

Written by Ahmed Khalifa. Produced by The Dark Fantastic Network.

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Before They Were Famous: Frank Darabont's Buried Alive

Frank Darabont, the Oscar-nominated writer director of such films as The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile, and the man behind the first season of the ground-breaking TV series The Walking Dead, cut his teeth writing horror films, like The Blob (1988) and A Nightmare On Elm Street 3: The Dream Warriors (1987).

But before he directed such critically-acclaimed films as the two aforementioned Stephen King adaptations, he made his directorial debut with Buried Alive, a TV movie produced for the USA cable network, and released in 1990.

On the surface, the film, about a woman who poisons her do-gooder husband to run away with her sociopathic lover, only to discover that her husband isn’t quite dead and is back for revenge, sounds like just another cheesy 90’s made-for-TV movie. Cue the bad synth score, the has-been TV actors struggling through their middle-ages crises, and the horrible dialogue. But, Buried Alive proves to be much more than that.

Milking the limited budget and the twisty script by Mark Peter Carducci for all their worth, Darabont injects this modest thriller with tons of energy, style, wit, and transforms what could have been a forgettable B-movie into a minor suspense classic.

Good performances by Tim Matheson, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and William Atherton, and the moody score by Michael Colombier, also help. But this is Darabont’s show, and you can see glimpses of his filmmaking prowess showing through the trappings he tries to transcend.

An atmospheric piece of American Gothic, Frank Darabont’s Buried Alive is worth rediscovering.

Text © Ahmed Khalifa. 2024.

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Wednesday, October 25, 2023

Halloween Treat: Rediscovering HAUNTED HONEYMOON (1986)

© Orion Pictures.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Gene Wilder was one of the highest paid and most successful actors in Hollywood. With hits like Silver Streak in 1976, and Stir Crazy in 1980 under his belt, and Oscar nominations for his work on Mel Brooks’ The Producers, in 1967, and Young Frankenstein, in 1974, which Wilder also co-wrote, it was expected that Wilder would make the transition from actor to writer director, and he did so, with 1975's The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes’ Smarter Brother, which proved to be a hit.

He then directed The World’s Greatest Lover, in 1977, which was a commercial and critical disappointment.

After taking a long break from directing, Wilder bounced back with his next effort, 1984's The Woman in Red, which was one of the surprise sleeper hits of that year, and which garnered an Oscar nomination for best song as well.

The success of The Woman in Red, led to Orion Pictures offering Wilder another project of his choice to write and direct.

The result was Haunted Honeymoon, released in 1986.

The film was instantly dismissed by critics as an unfunny disaster, and, after proving to be a commercial failure, quickly disappeared from theaters.

At first glance, it is easy to see why Haunted Honeymoon failed so miserably upon release.

Wilder, who, up to that point, was mostly known for his quirky brand of bombastic comedy, produced something quite different with Haunted Honeymoon, a mishmash of genres, including horror, mystery, freudian thriller, and slapstick comedy. An uneasy mixture that would have been challenging to pull off for any filmmaker, let alone a relatively unseasoned director like Wilder.

But, apparent flaws aside, Haunted Honeymoon has a lot to offer.

The film takes place in the 1930s, and tells the story of Larry Abbot, a man who has everything going for him. He is starring in the most successful show on the radio and he’s about to get married to Vickie, the love of his life. But underneath all the fame and success, something is troubling him, leading him to freeze while performing on the air. So he decides to go on a trip with Vickie to the eerie castle where he grew up, and where his family still resides. But upon arrival, Larry is entangled in a web of murder and dark family secrets, and discovers that one of the residents of the castle might be a werewolf.

Like all of the films Wilder has written or directed, Haunted Honeymoon is more of an ensemble piece than a starring vehicle for Wilder, with Wilder providing his terrific cast with plenty of opportunities to shine.

From Bryan Pringle as Pfister, the imposing but lovable alcoholic butler, to Jonathan Pryce as Charles, the sleazy ne’er do well, to the delightful Eve Ferret as the bubbly Sylvia.

Surprisingly enough, two of the film’s biggest stars don’t fare so well. Gilda Radner is woefully miscast as Vickie, Wilder character’s love interest, and Wilder himself admitted in his autobiography, Kiss Me Like A Stranger, that he only cast Radner under pressure from her and to spare her feelings. And although Radner shines in a moment or two, she’s too good a comedienne not to, her performance is awkward and distracting.

And Dom Deluise, performing in drag as Katherine, Larry’s aunt and the family’s imposing matriarch, almost has nothing to do, with Wilder and Deluise seemingly depending on the mere sight of Deluise in woman’s dress to do the work.

And like all the films Wilder directed, Haunted Honeymoon comes off as incoherent, occasionally overwrought, and too self-indulgent, jumping from one scene to the next with little rhyme or reason, and feeling more like a series of episodes than a cohesive story.

So it’s easy to see why Haunted Honeymoon doesn’t work on many levels.

But despite all the film’s problems, it still has its charms.

The film has a brilliantly stylish Gothic atmosphere, with dazzling production design by co-writer Terence Marsh, who, in spite of a modest budget, manages to enrich the film’s sets with plenty of lush period detail. This provides one of the film’s highlights, as Haunted Honeymoon is obviously Wilder’s loving tribute to the horror comedies of the 1930s and 40s, with thundering skies, secret passages, evil villains with glowing eyes, and even a werewolf or two.

And the film’s second half is a fast-paced delight, featuring one scary gag after another, with Wilder arguably doing some of his best work as director, as the film is undeniably Wilder’s most visually accomplished effort.

Even if the climax is a bit abrupt, and there’s one revelation too many, Haunted Honeymoon is an enjoyable misfire, a visually stylish, unique, and absorbing horror comedy from a one of a kind comedic artist.

Text © Ahmed Khalifa. 2023.

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Thursday, September 21, 2023

IN RED: A Tale of Suspense (Audio Short Story)

Late at night, Gary finds himself in the middle of an empty street. Where is he? How did he get here? And what is that red light inching closer and closer, bringing with it sweet music and bad memories?

A dark tale of suspense, presented as an enhanced audio book, for an immersive listening experience.

Written and produced by Ahmed Khalifa.

© The Dark Fantastic Network. 2023.

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