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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 03/28/06

1am Fox Movie Channel
The Boy in Blue (1986 CAN): There's something distinctly Canadian about this obscure sports drama, which makes its wide-screen television debut this morning. Specifically, it's about sculling, an athletic activity most Americans only hear about once every Olympics, if then. How do you get financing for a film about such a relatively arcane sport? Why, you cast a young, hip, and happening Nic Cage in the lead role, that's how. Not that Cage's presence helped The Boy in Blue at the American box office, where it grossed a little over a quarter of a million bucks. Oh, how's the film? Well, if you're not a stickler for historical accuracy, it's reasonably entertaining, the sculling footage is well shot if a bit passive, and Cage is quite good as 19th-century rowing champ Ned Hanlan. Added incentives come via the ubiquitous presence of Christopher Plummer as a sleazy big-time gambler, providing the film with a certain villainous gravitas; and the top quality thesping of character actor Sean Sullivan, who earned a posthumous Genie (AKA Canadian Oscar) for his performance as Hanlan's sculling mentor.

2:20pm Encore Love Stories
The Chorus (2004 FRA): Just as there's an American mythology that revolves around "the heartland", where hardworking men and women in pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness go to church every Sunday and never miss the 4th of July picnic, so also exists a mythology of France: a land of rolling bucolic farmlands where culture and gastronomy are held in equal regard, and liberté, equalité, and fraternité rule the roost. Alas, neither generality is supported by the facts, as both countries exist on the backs of the dark-skinned under-classes who every now and then flex their muscle and engage in a little urban street warfare. But old canards die hard, and this film - a massive success in its native land - proves the French just as anxious to stick their heads in the sand and ignore the ugly realities around them as we are. Set in the good old days of post-liberation 1949, this flight of fantasy about a wonderful schoolteacher and his classroom of obstreperous but lovable (and 100% white) students will remind viewers of a hundred other "inspirational" films about grown-ups who "make a difference" and improve the lives of the troubled young people in their care. And who am I to hypocritically grouse? After all, one of MY favorite films - To Sir With Love - fits right into this schema, featuring a dollop of swinging ‘60s nostalgia on top of its multicultural feel-good message. The Chorus is from France, however, where the swinging ‘60s meant Jerry Lewis and Johnny Hallyday, so the nostalgia is of a distinctly more traditional and Catholic variety, with the naughty but lovable lads of Fond de l'Etang school singing their way into the hearts of their countrymen and saving themselves from, presumably, lives of crime, Left Bank philosophizing, and other disreputable pursuits. None of this should detract from The Chorus' qualities - it's extremely well-made, well-acted, and as comfortable as an old sweater, which probably explains why it got nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award - but the bottom line is that this is a very commercial and very conservative film. Godard, Resnais, or even Truffaut, it ain't.

5:30pm Showtime
Downfall (2004 GER): Well, well, well...here's ANOTHER of 2004's Best Foreign Film nominees making its American television premiere this evening, and in wide-screen, too! Depicting the last days of Hitler and his entourage, this grueling drama is perfect fare for those of you who really enjoy watching people commit suicide. Bruno Ganz is remarkable as the maniacal and delusional Hitler, who seemed to think he could still win the war with the Russians within hailing distance of the Führer bunker, and Ulrich Matthes and Corinna Harfouch are equally brilliant as the loathsome Joseph and Magda Goebbels, whose disturbing bedtime routine will have parents checking to make sure their own little ones are sleeping safely. The film's generous 156-minute running time flies by in a flurry of self-inflicted gunshot wounds, poison-pill popping, and other assorted grotesqueries, but it's powerful stuff and hardly serves as the Hitler apologia some critics imagined it to be. Incidentally, the winner of the 2004 Best Foreign Film Oscar ultimately went to Alejandro Amenábar's inspirational weepie, The Sea Inside, whilst Downfall and the superb South African drama Yesterday went home empty-handed. Apparently the tragedy of a Spanish poet who made a foolish and unwise error in judgment far outweighs the suffering of a black African woman who unwittingly acquires AIDS thanks to the peregrinations of her philandering husband, but at least The Chorus didn't win.

Wednesday 03/29/06

11am The Movie Channel
True Confessions (1981 USA): Featuring two of America's greatest actors at the height of their powers, True Confessions almost qualifies as a lost classic. Written by the husband-and-wife team of Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne (the duo also responsible for 1971's Panic in Needle Park), the film is set in the late 1940s and features Robert De Niro and Robert Duvall as estranged brothers drawn back together by the murder of a prostitute. Directed by the underutilized Ulu Grosbard, the film also features Burgess Meredith, Cyril Cusack, and (in one of his first screen appearances) Dan Hedaya. A fine Georges Delerue score is the final enticement on offer, but the real draw remains the opportunity to see De Niro and Duvall face off for the first (and so far, only) time since 1974's The Godfather, Part II. Previously recommended in this column in a pan-and-scan print, True Confessions is now appearing in its much superior wide-screen format, and also airs at 2pm.

9:15pm Turner Classic Movies
Raw Deal (1948 USA): One of the greatest American films noir returns to the small screen this evening after a far too lengthy absence. Dennis O'Keefe stars as Joe Sullivan, a two-bit gangster bent on revenge against Rick (a supremely malevolent Raymond Burr), the guy whose robbery rap he took. Rick sets Joe up a second time by helping him break out of jail, figuring he'll get nabbed or killed by the cops, but he eludes the law and starts wending his way towards vengeance. Will he snuff Rick and settle down with his tough-as-nails moll (Claire Trevor)? Or will he turn to the straight-and-narrow courtesy good-girl Ann (Marsha Hunt)? Lensed by the great noir cinematographer John Alton and directed by genre specialist Anthony Mann (T-Man, He Walked By Night), Raw Deal also features Whit Bissell and John Ireland in supporting roles.

Thursday 03/30/06

7pm Turner Classic Movies
Jason and the Argonauts (1963 GB): Unbelievably, I've never previously recommended this wonderful Ray Harryhausen fantasy feature to my readers. I probably assumed that most of you are quite familiar with it already, but as there's not a lot else of interest on the air today, Jason and the Argonauts' TiVoPlex time has come. For those few of you who don't know it from Adam, the film tells the story of Jason's search for the mythical Golden Fleece, a dangerous trek that involves him battling harpies, sword-wielding skeletons, a giant bronze statue and other impediments produced by the fertile imagination and supple fingers of stop-motion pioneer Harryhausen. Though the monsters are the main attraction - no one would mistake the unremarkable and top-billed Todd Armstrong as a box office draw - the supporting cast is exemplary, including Niall MacGinniss as Zeus, Honor Blackman as Hera, and Nigel Green as Hercules, as well as the original Dr. Who, Patrick Troughton, as Phineas. Of equal note is Bernard Herrmann's superb score, his final and arguably best effort in the fantasy genre. Fun for the whole family, Jason and the Argonauts is, of course, appearing on TCM in wide-screen.

10pm The Movie Channel
Instant Karma (1990 USA): Yes, we have another winner in our weekly Least Likely Film to Appear in Its Correct Aspect Ratio competition! This time it's this deservedly obscure romantic comedy starring Craig Sheffer as Zane, a television producer with a myriad of problems: his current show, Rock and Roll PI, is being dumbed down by the network; his coke-addled prima donna star (David Cassidy) is causing problems; the IRS keeps calling; and worst of all, he has no woman! Ah, but this is Hollywood, where love and redemption are always just around the corner, in this case in the form of an aspiring actress (Chelsea Noble) who loves Zane for who he is, and not for the jobs he can get her. If you believe that piece of serendipity - instant karma, indeed! - you'll love this film. Otherwise, you can safely give it a miss. Also airs 3/31 at 1am.

Friday 03/31/06

5pm Turner Classic Movies
Fear Strikes Out (1957 USA): This downbeat biopic features Anthony Perkins as baseball player Jimmy Piersall, a talented centerfielder with a hardnosed Type A father (Karl Malden) and a major case of what we would now call anxiety disorder. When the Boston Red Sox come a-courting, Jimmy's future seems set, until his impossible-to-please dad gets wind of the deal and sends his son into a welter of depression. This is less a sports pic than a psychodrama, with Perkins delivering a fine performance as the Gold Glove centerfielder and Malden blowing steam out his nostrils throughout. If you're looking for baseball action, look elsewhere, but if something a little darker and heavier appeals, you might want to give Fear Strikes Out a look.

Saturday 04/01/06

7pm Sundance Channel
It's All Gone Pete Tong (2004 GB): A tragi-comic mockumentary about a disco DJ who loses his hearing, It's All Gone Pete Tong (cockney rhyming slang for "gone wrong") features toothsome Paul Kaye (television's Dennis Pennis) as Frankie Wilde, the stricken king of Balaeric Beat. Though he can't hear a thing, Frankie tries to fake things for a while, but eventually his affliction becomes all too obvious to the punters and he's forced into temporary retirement. Abandoned by his wife, children, and manager, and under hallucinatory assault from a cocaine-fueled stuffed badger, Frankie turns to speech therapist Penelope (Beatriz Batarda) for help. The film awkwardly shifts from wicked humor to redemptive drama in the third act as Penelope teaches her charge to lip-read, but Kaye is engaging as the addled mix-master, and director Michael Dowse displays a knack for anarchic humor. Though the turn for the serious is a bit of a letdown, It's All Gone Pete Tong has its moments, and real life DJ Pete Tong (who, to the best of my knowledge, has never been a hard-of-hearing coke fiend) makes a cameo appearance as himself.

Sunday 04/02/06

9pm Sundance
A Tale of Two Sisters (2003 ROK): For those who enjoy their J-horror, here's a Korean variant on the style from up-and-coming director Ji-Woon Kim. Already fast-tracked for a Hollywood remake, A Tale of Two Sisters stars Su-jeong Lim and Geun-yeong Mun as siblings who return home after a stint of hospitalization to find their overworked father remarried and the family pile apparently haunted by something lurking within its musty rooms and uncooperative kitchen appliances. Methodically and intricately plotted, A Tale of Two Sisters is also superbly shot by first-time cinematographer Mo-Gae Lee, who milks every shadowy corner for everything it's worth. This is also a film that works better the second time around, so keep it on your hard drive for an encore screening.