TiVoPlex
By John Seal
February 28, 2005
From the obscure to the obscurest to the merely overlooked or underappreciated; they all have a home in the TiVoPlex! All times Pacific.
Tuesday 03/01/05
1am Turner Classic Movies
Shampoo (1975 USA): Expurgated prints of Shampoo have popped up over the years on standard cable, but this is the first uncut broadcast for some time and, this being TCM, is of course also in wide-screen. It’s a sex farce about the conquests of the world’s only straight male hairdresser - well, Beverly Hills’ only straight male hairdresser - played with swagger by Warren Beatty. This being a Beatty picture, there’s also a political subtext to the proceedings, with the 1968 Presidential election serving as a prominent backdrop for the bedroom frolics. Amongst Beatty’s conquests are Goldie Hawn, Julie Christie, Lee Grant (who won the Supporting Actress Academy Award for her performance), and, in her film debut, a pre-Princess Leia Carrie Fisher, who gets to say the ‘F’ word. Directed by Hal Ashby and written by Robert Towne, Shampoo also features Jack Warden, Luana Anders, Howard Hesseman, and film director William Castle.
5pm Encore True Stories
Hail! Hail! Rock ‘n’ Roll! (1987 USA): It’s spoiled a bit by the garish trappings of its dated 1987 look, but this tribute to rock and roll patriarch Chuck Berry still scores points where it counts the most: musically. A staple for many years during PBS pledge drives, Hail! Hail! Rock ‘n’ Roll returns to cable minus the annoying attempts to “sell” you a video copy of the movie in exchange for your fealty to public broadcasting. There’s a bit too much Eric Clapton and Keith Richards for my taste, but balance is provided by retro rockers Bo Diddley, Little Richard, and Jerry Lee Lewis, as well as the great Etta James and the still-missed Roy Orbison. Berry’s mercurial personality is also prominently displayed, and as one who attended a Chuck concert two years ago, I can attest to his prickly refusal to rehearse or tune his guitar before a performance! Nevertheless, he remains an irreplaceable living legend of early rock, and don’t he just know it! Also airs 3/2 at 6:40am, 3/6 at 2:50pm, and 3/7 at 5:20am.
7pm Showtime Extreme
The Nest (2002 FRA): Les Samourais, Red Siren, and now this…seems each week brings us another inadequate but intriguing French action flick. Not that I’m complaining, as it’s nice to see that Le Cinema Française can churn out formulaic genre flicks as easily as they can sex romps and navel-gazing dramas. The Nest features Moroccan-born beauty Nadia Fares as a Special Forces officer charged with escorting a crime lord (Eurotrash veteran Angelo Infanti) to prison. When Infanti’s faceless and well-armed gang of thugs ambush the convoy in an effort to free their boss, Fares takes cover in a computer warehouse, where a group of small-time thieves, including Samy Naceri (from Luc Besson’s Taxi) and Benoit Magimel (who took a licking from Isabelle Huppert in 2001’s The Piano Teacher), are perpetratin’. In a desperate effort to survive, cops and robbers put their differences aside for a spectacular bang bang shoot ‘em up with the forces of evil. Yes, it’s another remake of Rio Bravo, with a strong dose of Assault on Precinct 13 and a heavy dose of Gallic inscrutability. Zoot alors!
Wednesday 03/02/05
4:15pm IFC
Shadow of China (1990 JAP): This overlong drama about a Hong Kong businessman trying to leave his shady past behind him benefits from a strong lead performance by John Lone. Also on hand are Sam Neill, Lair of the White Worm’s Sammi Davis, HK film veteran Roy Chiao, and Simon Yam. Cinematographer Toyomichi Kurita takes good advantage of his Hong Kong locations, but as with most IFC broadcasts, you won’t know until you start watching whether or not the film will be letterboxed or not. C’mon, IFC, if TCM and Fox can list aspect ratios on their Web sites, why can’t you? Canadian music fans, please note: director Mitsuo Yanagimachi was also responsible for the legendary Japanese biker flick, God Speed You, Black Emperor! Also airs 3/3 at 2pm.
Thursday 03/03/05
6:30pm Flix
Crossroads (1986 USA): Ah, those troublesome crossroads: you come to them, and inevitably the Devil is standing there waiting to meet you. Walter Hill’s moving, if occasionally cloying, fantasy/drama about a blues musician’s second wind features a return trip to the intersection where said musician sold his soul to Old Scratch himself. The Karate Kid’s Ralph Macchio stars as the young musician who helps him get back to his roots, and whilst Macchio is adequate, most viewers will be more impressed with the performance of the hitherto unsung Joe Seneca as Willie, the semi-fictional bluesman who claims to have played with the legendary Robert Johnson, and also claims to know a previously undocumented Johnson song. Ry Cooder’s soundtrack features some excellent gutbucket blues tunes that allow him to show off his talents with the slide guitar, and if you can overlook the trite romantic subplot between Macchio and co-star Jami Gertz, you’ll get your money’s worth. Look for Joe Morton, the unappreciated star of John Sayle’s 1984 cult favorite The Brother From Another Planet, in a small role as the Devil’s assistant.
Friday 03/04/05
Midnight Showtime
Far From Home (1989 USA): Drew Barrymore fans will want to take a look at this thriller, which features their gal (pre-rehab) in an assortment of skimpy and occasionally damp outfits and beach wear. All others will have to settle for the presence of her completely dry co-stars, including Susan Tyrell, Dick Miller, Jennifer Tilly, and erstwhile Sherlock Holmes Matt Frewer. Frew and Drew play father and daughter on the road home to Los Angeles after a cross-country trip, but wouldn’t you know it, they run out of gas in a small Nevada town being stalked by a mysterious serial killer. Yes, our heroes are far from home indeed, but their film does a good job of sticking pretty close to the Hollywood playbook. Nonetheless, this is an enjoyable guilty pleasure that hasn’t been on the tube in a while, and Barrymore is actually pretty good. Also airs at 3am.
3am Cinemax
Dinosaurus! (1960 USA): One of the silliest films you’ll ever see (though admittedly it’s not as silly as the similarly themed Eegah!), Dinosaurus! came from the same team that brought us 1958’s The Blob, producer Jack Harris and recently-deceased director Irwin Yeaworth Jr. Unfortunately, they couldn’t quite catch lightning in a bottle a second time, and this tale of prehistoric beasties running amuck in the modern world - and a friendly defrosted Neanderthal man - is now a bad-movie classic. Come to think of it, I guess you could say the same thing about The Blob, but that film still manages to send a chill up my spine when the space gelatin digests poor old Olin Howlin. Anyhoo, Dinosaurus! has much worse special effects than its predecessor, an incredibly annoying juvenile lead in Paul Lukather, and a laugh-out-loud screenplay co-scripted by Yeaworth’s wife Jean, which all adds up to a ripping good time for those who appreciate camp cinema. Also airs at 6am.
Saturday 03/05/05
1am The Movie Channel
Sleepaway Camp 2: Unhappy Campers (1988 USA): Successful horror franchises inevitably seem to veer into post-modern comedy territory; witness the wisecracking Chucky and Elm Street series, and inauspicious sequels to films like C*H*U*D* and Return of the Living Dead. The Sleepaway Camp films were no exception, with the gritty atmosphere of the first film ousted in favor of a more light-hearted (but still bloody) approach in this immediate sequel. Pam Springsteen (sister of Da Boss) stars as sex-change killer Angela, a camp counselor with a difference; she likes to murder her teenage charges when they misbehave. This being summer camp, the hormones are raging and there’s a lot of drug and alcohol abuse, simulated pre-marital sex, and topless women to be punished. If you enjoy nudity, gore, and knowing winks to the slasher genre, this is your film. Also airs at 4am.
1:30am Sundance
Aftermath: the Remnants of War (2002 CAN): This fascinating documentary takes a look at one of the least understood phenomena of warfare: the ordnance left behind when “major combat” has ended. Be it artillery shells, cluster bombs, land mines, Agent Orange, or depleted uranium, threats continue to loom over strife-torn lands for decades after the last shot has been fired. This film journeys from the World War I battlefields of France, still yielding deadly surprises to this day, to the scenes of more recent conflicts in Bosnia and Vietnam, where locals contend with the lingering effects of chemical warfare, courtesy the United States of America. After taking a lengthy trip around the festival circuit (where it scooped up many awards, including the UNESCO prize for Best Humanitarian Film), Aftermath makes its television debut this morning.
Sunday 03/06/05
7:35am Fox Movie Channel
Blood Feud (1983 USA): I haven’t seen this made-for-TV movie about the less-than-cordial relationship between Teamster boss Jimmy Hoffa and Attorney General Robert Kennedy, but take a look at the cast: it’s the only film where Robert Blake (nominated for a Golden Globe for his performance as Hoffa), Danny Aiello, Forrest Tucker, Brian Dennehy, Lance Henriksen, Ernest Borgnine, Seymour Cassel, Jose Ferrer, Vito Scotti, and Memphis Mafioso Red West worked together. Whether that’s enough to get you to plop down on the couch for Blood Feud’s full three-and-a-half-hour running time is debatable, but I’m definitely planning on taking a look.
9pm Turner Classic Movies
Lorna Doone (1922 USA): After its annual 31 Days of Oscar hiatus, Silent Sunday Night returns to TCM with this Maurice Tourneur-helmed weepie. Madge Bellamy plays the title character, a sweet young farm girl whose puppy love for a handsome farm boy abruptly comes to an end when she is abducted by wicked Ensor Doone (Frank Keenan). Years later, an attempt at arranged marriage with Doone’s callow son (the delightfully monikered Donald McDonald) is doomed to failure, and Lorna is rescued by her now fully-grown childhood paramour (John Bowers). This is a typical, if slightly above-average, silent melodrama from Tourneur, a former graphic designer and magazine illustrator who started his cinema career in 1911 by producing a film for Paris’ infamous Grand Guignol theater.
Monday 03/07/05
5:15pm Showtime
Super Size Me (2004 USA): Don’t get me wrong; I really enjoyed this humorous and pointed look at the dangers of excessive fast food consumption. Director Morgan Spurlock makes for an engaging host and he knows how to keep the audience’s attention. But really; a Best Documentary nomination? Coupled with the recognition given the adulatory Tupac: Resurrection, the Academy seems to be setting the bar lower than usual this year. No nomination for The Corporation? What about DiG? Mayor of the Sunset Strip? I’m not saying those film are necessarily BETTER than Super Size Me, but they were all a little more ambitious, or at least exposed the viewer to previously unexplored topics. Now, I know Spurlock shoehorned some statistics into his film, but when you get down to it, there’s nothing here that should be news to anyone who’s picked up a newspaper in the last few years. Griping aside, though, it’s not Morgan’s fault that his film was nominated, and the bottom line is, Super Size Me is an extremely entertaining, if only moderately educational, documentary. Go ahead and watch it. It goes down easy and tastes pretty good. Also airs at 8:15pm.
6pm Sundance
How to Draw a Bunny (2002 USA): This week’s best title belongs to this crudely-made but captivating documentary look at the life of Ray Johnson, an obscure pop artist and Warhol acolyte who drowned himself in 1995. One of Johnson’s signature images (along with Warholian icons such as the Lucky Strike logo and Elvis) was a crudely-drawn bunny head, hence the film’s title. Johnson never explained the significance of the bunny during his lifetime, and this film doesn’t exactly clear up the mystery, but it’s a fascinating look at a prankster who left his mark on the New York art world.
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