TiVoPlex
TiVoPlex for Tuesday, November 25, 2008 through Monday, December 1, 2008
By John Seal
November 24, 2008
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Tuesday 11/25/08
11:20 PM Starz in Black
Someone is Killing Tate (2008 USA): A small scale indie that briefly played on the festival circuit this summer, Someone is Killing Tate makes its television debut this evening on Starz in Black. Directed by USC Film School grad and Oakland native Leon Lozano, it's the story of Tate Bradley, a 25-year old African-American who survives a suicide attempt and then tries to figure out what drove him to desperation in the first place. The truth is revealed gradually as friends and family members drop by to offer their support to Tate, who begins to realize he's not alone in bearing responsibility for the extreme measures he's taken. Lozano has the potential to be one of the most important African-American filmmakers of his generation, and his freshman feature effort (which has already won an impressive array of awards) well deserves the wider exposure it's about to get on national television. You can also examine the film's well-accoutred trophy case at its Myspace page (http://www.myspace.com/somethingiskillingtate).
Wednesday 11/26/08
2:45 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Loved One (1965 USA): I'm a huge admirer of novelist Evelyn Waugh, and one of my favorite Waugh stories is The Loved One, his acerbic dissection of the funeral industry. I'm not as big a fan of director Tony Richardson, a filmmaker often in thrall to the overly florid performance, but in this case even he couldn't entirely ruin the source material. Robert Morse, briefly a star thanks to his Tony-award winning turn in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, stars as British poet Dennis Barlow, newly arrived in Los Angeles on holiday but pressed into service to arrange for the burial of his recently deceased uncle (John Gielgud). He meets buttery funeral director Rev. Glenworthy (Jonathan Winters), falls for grief counsellor Aimee Thanatogenous (Anjanette Comer), cross's swords with embalmer and closet-case Mr. Joyboy (Rod Steiger), and finds himself sucked into the business via a job at a pet cemetery. It's all undeniably wacky if overly arch, and though it's a delight to watch the cast at work (including co-stars Dana Andrews, Liberace, Tab Hunter, and James Coburn), Richardson's film can't begin to equal Waugh's prose achievement. It's not bad as a satire on consumerism, but it's terrible as a literary adaptation.
5:00 PM Encore Westerns
Johnny Guitar (1954 USA): Nicholas Ray's highly-stylized Western about a woman barkeep in the Old West plays a bit like a 19th-century Mildred Pierce, but maybe that's because Joan Crawford is the woman in question. This film has become infamous on the postmodernist circuit for its lesbian "subtext," which arguably is there, but not to the extent some might hope. Top acting kudos go to Mercedes McCambridge (why didn't she work more?) as Emma Small, the town bluenose determined to get rid of the den of iniquity owned and operated by Ms. Crawford. Lushly shot in Trucolor (there's a process we all miss), Johnny Guitar has acquired a camp reputation it doesn't really deserve. Either way you view it, it's pretty good.
7:00 PM Sundance
The Killing of John Lennon (2007 GB): I missed The Killing of John Lennon during its cinema run, and judging from its pathetic box office take, you did, too. (In fact, it did so poorly that it likely won't turn a profit even AFTER taking ancillary income into account.) The film generally received scathing reviews and was described by critics as ‘fatuous', ‘exploitative', and ‘baffling', amongst other generous words of praise. Being a huge Beatles fan, however, I can't help but be drawn to director Andrew Piddington's Mark Chapman biopic, no matter how distasteful the subject matter. If you're another Fab Four or Lennon obsessive, chances are you'll probably also want to take a sideways glance.
Thursday 11/27/08
3:30 AM Fox Movie Channel
Planet of the Apes (1968 USA): And so it begins. In celebration of the 40th anniversary of one of 20th Century Fox's biggest cash cows, Fox Movie Channel is airing all their Planet of the Apes films (with the notable exception of Tim Burton's abortive 2001 remake) over the next few days. Up first, of course, is the one that started it all, Franklin Schaffner's brilliantly realized 1968 adaptation of Pierre Boulle's dystopian novel. Starring Charlton Heston as astronaut Taylor, the survivor of a 40th century spaceship crash, the film imagines life on a strange planet populated by intelligent, talking apes who treat human beings as an exploitable underclass. The film was a huge success and spawned a series of sequels, as well as a television series and a plethora of toys, lunch boxes, and other pop culture ephemera. Strangely, FMC follows this with the five made for TV movies that post-dated the theatrical series: at 6:00 AM by Back to the Planet of the Apes; at 8:00 AM by The Forgotten City of the Planet of the Apes; at 10:00 AM by Treachery and Greed on the Planet of the Apes; at 12:30 PM by Life, Liberty, and Pursuit on the Planet of the Apes; and at 5:45 PM by Farewell to the Planet of the Apes. These "films" were actually feature length TV movies re-edited from episodes of the 1974 television series. They're then followed by the REAL sequels, beginning at 7:30 PM by Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970), in which horribly scarred human survivors of a nuclear holocaust (including Victor Buono) try to reassert their authority over their simian overlords; at 9:30 PM by Escape From the Planet of the Apes (1971), wherein apes Cornelius and Zira (Roddy McDowall and Kim Hunter) are sent back in time to love beads and bell bottoms-era Los Angeles; at 11:30 PM by my personal favorite, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972), in which issues of slavery and race come directly to the surface; and (on 11/28) at 1:15 AM by series finale Battle for the Planet of the Apes, which features a somewhat anti-climactic throw-down between damn dirty apes and humans, as well as an inter-ape struggle involving troublemaking gorilla Aldo (Claude Akins). These films haven't aired in their correct aspect ratio for years, though they have cropped up from time to time on AMC in expurgated format. This is a great opportunity to view the Ape canon in a single sitting, and the films remain in 24 hour rotation throughout November 28th, 29th, and 30th.
8:00 PM Sundance
The Mother (2003 GB): The Mother ended atop my best of show list in 2004, but hardly anyone else saw it. That's an understandable fate for any small-scale British film, but doubly so considering the subject matter of this one: the sex life of the senior citizen. Anne Reid plays May, a new widow getting on in years who happens to have the hots for handyman Darren (future Bond Daniel Craig), who also happens to be engaged in an affair with May's daughter-in-law, Paula (Cathryn Bradshaw). Directed by Roger Michell and written by Hanif Kureishi (My Beautiful Laundrette), this is a brutally honest exploration of the damage done to a family suffused with dysfunctional relationships, where no one seems willing or able to tell the truth and everyone ends up extremely unhappy. This isn't an easy film to watch, and it's certainly a hard one to like, but The Mother goes places few other films have dared go, and for that it's to be both commended and strongly recommended.
Friday 11/28/08
11:45 AM Starz in Black
The Girl, The Gold Watch, and Dynamite (1981 USA): The sequel to the popular movie-of-the-week The Girl, The Gold Watch, and Everything, TGTGWAD features Philip MacHale as Kirby Winter, the owner of a very special timepiece that can freeze time. Kirby is about to wed gal pal Bonnie (Lee Purcell), but when a crisis involving the family farm arises, romance must take a backseat to the watch's magical powers. An enjoyable but rarely seen piece of fluff, this film also features appearances from a whole host of familiar faces from big and small screen alike, including Larry Linville, Jerry Mathers, Zohra Lampert, Jack Elam, Tom Poston, Morgan Fairchild, and Gene Barry, plus football star Lyle Alzado and singer songwriter Richie Havens (whose presence can offer the only possible explanation for the appearance of this film on Starz in Black).
Saturday 11/29/08
1:00 AM Turner Classic Movies
Beat Street (1984 USA): Rae Dawn Chong stars in this hip hop "classic", which makes its widescreen television debut this morning on TCM. Chong plays Tracy Carlson, a privileged New York college student who tries to help some street kids bring rap music and culture into the mainstream. There's rhyming, break-dancing, and graffiti aplenty, but unlike most other ‘80s films about hip hop, Beat Street is a serious attempt at drama. It's definitely a step above Breakin' or Tougher than Leather, but remains a million miles from the gritty neo-realism of Boyz N the Hood.
1:30 AM IFC
Hell (1961 JAP): Long only available as an un-subtitled bootleg tape, Hell (Jigoku) finally received an official stateside home video release in late 2006. It's the story of a college student (Shigeru Amachi) whose complicity in a hit and run accident is consuming him with guilt. His feelings aren't ameliorated by the lectures provided by his girlfriend's father, a theology professor who specializes in all things Luciferian. The first half of the film sets the stage; the second takes the viewer on an incredible journey into an impressionistic underworld of tortured souls and eternal suffering. This was the part of the film we were all watching those blurry boots for; now that the entire film appears in widescreen and has been rendered intelligible, it's even more powerful.
Sunday 11/30/08
5:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Runaway (?): Ah, sweet mystery of life. The Direct TV guide only lists the title for this film. The TCM website says this is the 1963 Runaway featuring Cesar Romero and the recently deceased Anita Page. However, it also lists a 62-minute running time, which just happens to be the exact running time of a British made thriller from 1963 which is, of course, also entitled The Runaway. Which shall it be? I'm hoping for the latter, expecting the former, but will be happy with either, as they're both obscure films.
9:00 PM Sundance
I'm a Cyborg, But That's OK (2006 ROK): The most recent film from Korean bad boy Chan Wook Park, I'm a Cyborg is a relatively restrained piece of work which will appeal to folks who found Oldboy a little on the bloody side. Su-jeong Lim stars as Young-goon, a pixie-like factory worker who thinks she's been transformed into a cyborg after an unfortunate encounter with a radio aerial. She gets herself committed to a mental hospital, where she meets loopy with the equally deluded Park Il-sun (pop star Rain), a serial kleptomaniac who insinuates his way into the crypto-cyborg's heart. It's all a bit twee, which is not a word one normally associates with Park.
9:15 PM Turner Classic Movies
Wizard of Oz (1925 USA): There were several silent film adaptations of the L. Frank Baum canon, but this is the one that's of more than passing academic interest. Produced and directed by silent comedy star Larry Semon, this version of the classic tale takes considerable liberties with the Baum narrative, but remains true in spirit to the popular series of novels. Semon himself stars as The Scarecrow (perfect casting, as Semon was a beak-nosed weed of a man), Dorothy Dwan portrays Dorothy, and Oliver Hardy appears as The Tin Woodsman. There's also some unfortunate racial humor involving Spencer Bell, an actor frequently employed by Semon (they're excellent together in 1924's Kid Speed) and here billed as G. Howe Black (ho ho). If you tune in expecting to see a straightforward precursor to the Judy Garland classic, you'll be disappointed - but fans of slapstick comedy will get satisfaction.