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From the obscure to the obscurest to the merely overlooked or underappreciated; they all have a home in the TiVoPlex! All times Pacific.

Tuesday 05/20/08

6:30 PM Sundance
Off the Grid: Life on the Mesa (2007 USA): Living ‘off the grid' - otherwise known as foregoing services offered by your friendly local government - is an increasingly common alternative lifestyle choice. It's primarily the province of survivalists and other social renegades, however, as this documentary makes abundantly clear. Shot on and around a ranch in northern New Mexico known simply as The Mesa, Off the Grid takes a look at its residents, a strange amalgam of gun nuts, vegan hippies, Gulf War vets, runaways, and other assorted outcasts, who would rather live free of utility bills or die. The film examines their response when a group of anarcho-punks move in and start stealing stuff, testing the community's First Commandment: don't shoot your neighbor! The winner of the Jury Award at 2007's Ann Arbor Film Festival, Off the Grid will have you asking yourself: is property REALLY theft, especially if you steal it?

Wednesday 05/21/08

12:10 AM Starz
Angel-A (2005 FRA): France's very own Roland Emmerich (or perhaps Michael Bay), Luc Besson, directed this less flashy than usual action feature about a beautiful woman and the grifter with whom she falls in love. Danish thesp Rie Rasmussen plays Angel-A, a blonde bombshell who meets cute but damp with confidence man Andre (Jamel Debbouze) during their concurrent riverside suicide attempts. After Andre rescues her, Angel promises to stay by his side through thick and thin—even after she learns a host of debtors are hounding him for the 40,000 Euros he owes them. Shot in black and white, Angel-A is Besson's attempt to make a character driven film, but it only partially succeeds, primarily on the strength of the lead performances. Filmed in what appears to be a deserted Paris, it's an attractive if under-developed tale of love, desperation, and misplaced loyalty. Also airs at 3:10 AM.

9:20 AM Starz Edge
Screamers (2006 USA): I was hoping this was going to be a documentary about L.A. art-punk pioneers The Screamers, but no such luck—it's actually a film featuring Glendale rockers System of a Down. Consisting of four Armenian-Americans, the band try to draw attention to the 1915 genocide visited upon their ancestors by the Ottoman Empire, and that's the subject of this film, which amongst much else also includes interview footage of since assassinated Armenian journalist Hrant Dink. The film provocatively suggests that the western world's refusal to acknowledge the genocide—still a contentious issue over 90 years after the fact—has given other murderous governments political cover, providing sanction for mass killings from Germany to Rwanda. There are some musicians I appreciate more for their actions and intellect than for their recordings—Henry Rollins and Frank Zappa spring to mind—and though I still don't like System of a Down's music (of which there's quite a bit herein), they get full marks for social consciousness.

4:00 PM Sundance
Bombon: El Perro (2004 ARG): It's been a while since I've had an Argentinian film to herald, but here's a new one, albeit one that's also cut from gentler cloth than usual. Set amidst the wilds of Patagonia, the film features Juan Villegas as Juan, an unemployed mechanic thrust into the highly competitive world of dog shows when he ends up caring for a purebred pooch. The dog is a rare Argentine Dogo, and Juan soon finds himself up to his neck in pedigree papers, rosettes, and questionable breeding programs. It's the feel good movie of the week—even if you're more of a cat person.

Thursday 05/22/08

Noon Sundance
La Moustache (2005 FRA): The mystique of masculine facial hair is explored in this very odd, Charlie Kaufman-esque fable from director Emmanuel Carrere. Vincent Lindon stars as Marc, a Parisian Everyman who decides to shave off the fuzz above his upper lip after apparently gaining the approval of wife Agnes (Emmanuelle Devos). He looks forward to gauging the reaction of his closest friends at a forthcoming dinner party but is baffled when they don't seem to notice the change, and then actively deny that he ever had a moustache in the first place. The dispute evolves into a serious argument that threatens to destroy his long-term relationship with Agnes, and Marc heads off on a solo trip to the Far East to rediscover himself and perhaps find the solution to the mystery. Baffling, enigmatic, and thought-provoking to a fault, La Moustache also features an elegiac Philip Glass score.

6:00 PM IFC
Sweet Sixteen (2002 GB): Regular readers know I have a soft spot for Marxist director Ken Loach. His films are almost always political, but rarely polemical, and Sweet Sixteen is no exception to the rule. Set in the impoverished slums of Glasgow, Scotland, the film stars Martin Compston as a young man trying to save his falsely-convicted mother from the clutches of her nasty drug-dealing boyfriend and her equally unpleasant father upon her release from prison. Unfortunately but understandably saddled with subtitles to help the uninitiated cope with the cast's extremely thick Scots accents, this is a fine slice of life drama written by Paul Laverty and lensed by Barry Ackroyd, both frequent Loach collaborators.

Friday 05/23/08

5:30 AM Showtime
Date with an Angel (1987 USA): Angel movies took off in a big way in the wake of 1977's Oh God! and were still going strong throughout the eighties. Generally positing the intercession of supernatural creatures on behalf of foolish and flawed mortals, these films were rampant throughout the decade, and here's one of the worst of the genre. Emmanuelle Beart made her best-forgotten American film debut as the sepulchral being, who's found floating in a pool one day by post-stag party celebrant Jim Sanders (All My Children's Michael E. Knight). Jim determines to nurse her back to health, but he runs the risk of annoying fiancée Patty (Phoebe Cates), who finds the new woman in Jim's life mysteriously threatening. That's about it plot-wise, as the film treads an extremely predictable path before reaching an unsurprising and treacly denouement. Date with an Angel hasn't been on premium cable in eons—hence this week's back-handed recommendation—and airs again at 8:30 AM.

7:00 PM Sundance
Amazing Journey: The Story of the Who (2007 USA): Already the subject of one ‘definitive' rockumentary (The Kids Are Alright), Shepherd's Bush rockers The Who are, against all odds, still a going concern a quarter century on—hence the apparent need for a new film to bring things up to date. Amazing Journey does that in fine fashion, and fills in more of the backstory as well. Featuring copious interview footage with surviving members Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend, the film revisits such career highlights as the legendary Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour appearance, whilst also detailing more recent adventures, from the 1979 Cincinnati concert stampede to Townshend's recent troubles with the law. There's also interesting stuff from old-time colleagues such as manager Chris Stamp and producer Glyn Johns, as well as disposable tributes from the ubiquitous Sting, Eddie Vedder, and Noel Gallagher. I'm happy to report, however, that whilst The Edge gets in his two cents worth, Bono is nowhere to be seen.


Saturday 05/24/08

12:45 AM Turner Classic Movies
Raw Meat (1972 GB): Like Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, Raw Meat (released originally as Death Line) brings two things that taste great together—well, together. A cannibal flick set in the tunnels of my favorite mass transit system (the London Underground), Raw Meat stars Donald Pleasence and Norman Rossington as Calhoun and Rogers, policemen determined to solve the mystery of the disappearing commuters, amongst whom is the girlfriend of American tourist Alex Campbell (David Ladd, son of Alan, husband of Cheryl). The ante is upped significantly, however, when one of Whitehall's finest civil servants comes a cropper, forcing Scotland Yard to dig deep, tunnel into the clues, and run the culprit to ground. If you've ever sat between stations in a hot, stuffy, crammed to bursting tube train for any length of time, you've probably dreamt that death might be a better option—but after you meet The Man (Hugh Armstrong) you might reconsider. This is required viewing for fans of British horror, and also for admirers of Christopher Lee, who puts in a brief cameo appearance as an MI5 agent—and though Raw Meat has appeared in the past on Flix, I believe this is its first American television airing in its correct aspect ratio.

9:00 PM Sundance
Shortbus (2006 USA): I haven't seen this ensemble drama from Hedwig and the Angry Inch creator John Cameron Mitchell, but its reputation precedes it and it at least deserves a mention. Reputedly filled with all sorts of kinky sex, Shortbus is probably best avoided by those who find sado-masochism and dildos either repellent or embarrassing. If, on the other hand, you find such subjects of interest, please enjoy Shortbus once the children are abed and the shades have been pulled down.

Sunday 05/25/08

1:00 AM Turner Classic Movies
Beach Red (1967 USA): Here's what I wrote early last year about this film: Last time Cornel Wilde's Beach Red showed up on TCM, I botched my recording and ended up with only half the film. It returns in widescreen tonight, and hopefully my mastery of DVD-R has improved some over the years. As for the film, it's a war movie classic, and stars Wilde as an Army captain leading the assault on a Japanese held island during WWII. Along for the blood and guts are a sadistic sergeant played to perfection by Rip Torn, and a wide-eyed innocent portrayed by amateur thespian Patrick Wolfe, who never made another picture. One of the first American films to eschew the standard war movie clichés of the post-war period, Beach Red doesn't look quite as daring as it did back in the day, but still packs a punch and looks great in it's correct aspect ratio. Well, guess what? I botched that third attempt to record it, and am now aiming to finally make amends and add this film to my video library once and for all. DVD-R: it's really not as hard as I make it look.

Monday 05/26/08

8:00 PM IFC
The Edukators (2004 AUS): There must be something in that Austrian water. For those who enjoy the films of Michael Haneke, The Edukators provides similar edgy discomfort via its tale of three radical anti-globalization activists who engage in furniture rearranging in order to get their message across. Really. When their latest act of revolutionary interior design is interrupted by powerful industrialist Hardenburg (Burghart Klaussner), the trio panic and end up kidnapping him, causing unanticipated consequences and a considerable amount of intellectual navel-gazing. Starring Goodbye Lenin's Daniel Bruhl, this is an exceptional intellectual thriller that puts a post-modern twist on the radicalism of the late 1960s and 1970s.