Book Review: LOVE SONGS by Lawrence Sanders ** and 1/2 out of ****

With Love Songs (1972), Lawrence Sanders, once dubbed "America's Mr. Bestseller", delivers a strange, flawed, but compulsively readable psycho-sexual family drama.

Although the book is somewhat typical of the 1970's - there's plenty of kinky sex, groovy dialogue, characters walking around everywhere in bare feet, and a lot of existential talk about the meaning of life and love - unlike Sidney Sheldon, Irving Wallace, and others of his contemporaries, Sanders has a singular, fascinating authorial voice and a talent for smooth and confident prose, which have made his books age better. His books don't feel like they've just come off the assembly line (like the books of James Patterson, for instance), and there's a fevered, obsessive quality to his writing that is endlessly fascinating.

Love Songs, an uneven, dated novel, shouldn't work. The characters are mostly unlikable, and some of the dialogue is so purple it's almost funny. But work it does. This is an unputdownable book, and one which tells a bizarre, atmospheric tale of love, hate, drugs, and violence. A lot of what goes on here is implausible and psychologically ambiguous, but damn if it's not fun to read about.

If you're new to Sanders, this is not the place to start. A better choice would be one of his Deadly Sin books, or Capital Crimes, a superbly entertaining update of the Rasputin story.

Text © Ahmed Khalifa. 2019.

Movie Review: RAMBO: LAST BLOOD (2019) *** OUT OF ****

Released to a vicious critical response and disappointing box-office receipts, Rambo: Last Blood (2019), the fifth, and some say last, entry in the Rambo franchise, is a challenging film.

For die-hard fans of the character who have followed the series for almost forty years, Rambo: Last Blood is not an easy pill to swallow, let alone for casual viewers who are just after a solid, old-school action movie. The John Rambo featured here is an ageing, barely functional ex-soldier, trying to keep it together and not let the PTSD get the better of him. He has a surrogate daughter in the grandchild of his family's housekeeper, and he seems to have settled down into a steady, if uneasy life. Then the girl is kidnapped, and Rambo's life takes a tragically dark turn.

Stallone, who co-produced and co-wrote, takes a huge risk with this film. It's a dark, violent, slow drama, with much less action than one would expect from this type of movie. But, ultimately, it's a hugely rewarding risk. Stallone, aided by a solid cast and steady if conventional direction by Adrian Grunberg, chooses to tell a story that no one, not even the fans, expected; a downward spiral into despair, rage, and loss. Yes, there's a satisfying final battle, with plenty of gun play and a high body count, but that's not what makes the ending pack a punch. It's the cost that Rambo has to pay for survival and revenge, which Stallone plays beautifully, using his age-ravaged, scarred, and blood-stained face to say things that can't be said with words, in one of the best performances of his career.

The final shot, and a post-credit scene, hint at what might lie ahead for Rambo. But if this is the last we see of the character, then I can honestly say that the series ends on a hard-hitting, haunting, and dignified note.

Text © Ahmed Khalifa. 2019.

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