Moviephile

I believe I already mentioned the fact that my in-laws bought me a trip to see Cinematic Titanic Live for my birthday earlier this month. It was delightful. For my full review of that show (typos and all) visit the official MST3k fan site.

The movie featured at that performance was Santa Claus Conquers the Martians - a movie that was previously performed by MST3k; a “somewhat controversial” choice on their part.  I still don’t know why Cinematic Titanic decided to choose a movie that the exact same people (minus J. Elvis) had already made fun of once… Can it possibly have been some kind of complex, well-thought out move to simultaneously connect to their old fans while distancing themselves from their old work? Or was it just that they were able to get this movie really, really cheap? (Hmmm….)

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians is a poorly made Sci-Fi/Christmas film. The plot is this: the children of Mars have forgotten how to have fun, so a handful of Martians go down to Earth and kidnap Santa with the idea that Santa’s Christmas magic and toys will bring joy back to Martian kids. The best thing I can say about this movie is that it has a kicky little theme song (”Hooray for Santy Claus!”)

Anyway, as I said, I received a trip to the live show for my birthday, and it was lovely. However, fortuitously, I also received the DVD of their riff on said movie. I took it home and watched it with my parents on St. Stephen’s Day. Hense, two viewings of the Cinematic Titanic version of the film.

However, I also have a DVD of the original MST3k riff, and it seemed a shame to pass it over for the sake of its Cinematic Titanic progeny… so when Mr. Hall and I visited his parents, we watched the Mystery Science Theater 3000 version of Santa Claus Conquers the Martians. That makes three viewings.

Then when we got home from our vacation yesterday we discovered we had a Christmas present from a friend, Miss Landis. We opened it up - and found that she (knowing how we enjoy watching bad movies) has given us the un-MST3k’d, un-Cinmatic Titanic’d, RAW version of Santa Claus Conquers the Martians.

I’ve never actually seen this movie without a humorous commentary running over it - so I daresay this spells one more (a FOURTH!) viewing of the film before the end of the holiday season.

Now, don’t get me wrong when you see the title of this post: I love the movie A Christmas Story. It delights me on many different levels. However, I am completely perplexed as to why my generation (think people in their 20’s and 30’s, i.e. small tots when the movie was originally released) have embraced it so.

How do I know they have embraced it? Well, apart from the observation of my own eyes, this headline met my notice this morning:
‘Christmas Story’ fans celebrate film’s 25th year
Well? It turns out they’re holding a convention around the movie - 4000 people are booked to attend. Four-thousand people? I’ve seen elections that didn’t get as good a turn-out.

In case you haven’t seen A Christmas Story, it’s a Christmas story (yeah, yeah) based on the short, humorous essays of author Jean Shepherd. Jean Shepherd actually narrates the film, discussing the incidents therein. It’s all about “Little Ralphie” and his desire for the Christmas present of a “Red Ryder BB-gun” - and the various other Christmas adventures he encounters. It takes place in the 1940’s. It’s obviously a rather low-budget film, but features excellent performances.

Okay, this is what perplexes me. Why did my generation (people born in the mid seventies to mid eighties) embrace this movie about a childhood so utterly removed from our own? 1940’s? That’s like my grandparents’ era. My generation barely even likes to watch movies made before 2001. So why have we whole-heartedly embraced this movie about a Christmastime that is so utterly foreign to anything we might have experienced?

I don’t know. Perhaps it’s simply the fact that it is so foreign… Kind of a “The Christmas That Never Was” kind of thing. Or maybe it’s our idealized version of what Christmas should be. Or maybe it’s simply the fact that there has been a near-complete dearth of good Christmas movies during the past twenty-to-thirty years. (Disagree? Think about it - the only “good” Christmas movies I can name that came out during that time are this, Ernest Saves Christmas and Elf . That’s barely one a decade! Not even to mention the fact that some people would debate whether those two can be classified as “good”!)

I don’t know. I still don’t know.

I know this is a bad note to end on… but I just don’t know why this movie has been so embraced by my generation. Any thoughts? Watch it and let me know.

Time to haul out your long red robes and glowing orbs: it’s Life Day, kiddies, better known as the anniversary of the first (and only) broadcast of the little known Star Wars Holiday Special. Today has special significance, though, because not only is this the anniversary - today is the 30th anniversary.

In case you don’t know what this is: the Star Wars Holiday Special was released during the holiday season following the release of the first (the REAL first) Star Wars movie. It was apparently written by a handful of people who had never seen Star Wars and simply heard that it was “some kids’ movie about robots and crap”… and they went on from there, styling a semi-sci-fi themed variety special, featuring popular comedians and singers of the day - including Art Carney, Bea Arthur, Harvey Korman, and so on.  It has something of a plot: Han Solo is trying to get Chewbacca back to Chewie’s home planet for “Life Day” (Wookie Chirstmas, apparently). Surprisingly, the original cast of Star Wars also appears in this during the “plotted” segments - including an overly eye-makeup’d Mark Hammil, an obviously stoned Carrie Fisher, and a very angry looking Harrison Ford.

(Yes, this really exists. When I first heard about it six years ago, I didn’t believe the person who was telling me about it. I thought it was made up. I thought, “How could they possibly have made something like that? That’s ridiculous!” What a poor, sad, innocent fool I was.)

You know, I’ve seen some bad movies in my time. I’ve seen some real bad movies. But this is possibly the worst thing I’ve ever seen. The first time I watched it I immediately made up my mind that it was going on my list of films NEVER TO EVER WATCH AGAIN. Ever. (Along with The Man With Two Brains, Modern Problems and Nothing But Trouble.)

However, I have watched it again - probably six or seven times, maybe more - partly because of its truly extraordinary badness, but also because it makes you feel like part of a select club when you watch it. There is no such thing as an “official copy” of this film. It is so bad that George Lucas had the master copy destroyed; it only exists in bootleg form from copies taped off TV when it was broadcast. Mr. Lucas has been quoted as saying, “If I had the time, and a hammer, I would track down every bootleg copy and smash it.”

And if you’ve seen Episode One, you know it takes a lot to embarrass George Lucas.

Sadly for Mr. Lucas, it would be nigh-on impossible to track down every copy now. Happily for us true-believers, you can usually find one on Ebay, and can watch most of the special in 10-minute chunks on YouTube. (And, for you fans of MST3k, you can download a commentary for this film by Rifftrax. It is absolutely hilarious, although due to the fact that all the bootlegs are somewhat different, it’s somewhat difficult to keep it sync’d up to the film. Totally worth it, though. We watched it last Christmas and laughed ourselves silly.)

So, in honor of Life Day, track yourself down a copy of The Star Wars Holiday Special. Become a part of this exclusive club. However, I’m warning you… at times your mouth is going to be hanging open in pure horror - and I am so not kidding about that.

While we’re on the topic of movies you should probably see, you should probably see the film UHF if you haven’t already. This is what is generally considered a “cult” movie - a film that didn’t do terribly well when it was released but has gathered a devoted following in the ensuing years.

UHF is about a guy named George who is more or less a failure at life because of his contstant daydreaming (a-la Walter Mitty). Unexpectedly, George is given the chance to run a small UHF station by his uncle - and the hilarity ensues. This film starred and was written by music-comedy-sensation Weird Al Yankovic.

The reason this film didn’t do well is two-fold. The first problem it had was that it was released at a time when it had to compete against Honey, I Shrunk The Kids, Lethal Weapon 2, Batman, and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (i.e. its competition were huge summer blockbusters).

The second part of the reason why it didn’t enjoy more success is that I think a lot of people just didn’t know what to make of it. The humor in this movie is a combination of the bizarre, the outright childish and goofy, and clever parody which are the hallmark of Weird Al’s comedy style. It’s very reminiscent of the very early issues of Mad Magazine (which Al has mentioned were a comedy influence). And I have a feeling that a lot of the people who went to see this movie didn’t get it, thought it was weird and dumb and thumbed their noses at it.

In fact, I can state categorically that this is how some people reacted. My parents rented that movie on VHS shortly after it came out; they were perplexed and disgusted with it and returned it hastily. I (still in the single-digit age group at the time) had no say in the matter - I only remember being somewhat scared of some claymation effects at the end of the movie.

So why am I recommending this movie to you? Because, like a fine wine, this film seems to have gotten better with age. I was reintroduced to it by my husband when we were dating, and I was surprised (and delighted) to discover that it was hilarious. Oddly, when my parents watched it with us, they liked it too. Perhaps it was us that got better with age… Or perhaps it was simply the fact that our sensibilities had been hardened by the 1990’s and we no longer found claymation frightening.

However, I’m getting off my point, which was that despite its unenthusiastic reception by the public at its release, UHF actually did quite well on tape; its audience, no longer distracted with Indiana Jones or Batman, finally found it. It was popular enough that when it was finally released on DVD, it was decked out with all sorts of extras including a commentary by Weird Al. A commentary, I might add, which is so hilarious that I think I have watched the film with commentary just as much as I’ve watched it without. Yes, it’s that good.

So, anyway, put this movie in your queue and prepare yourself for smart, dumb, goofy bizarreness - and a bit of Weird Al’s signature music. Oh, by the way, in case you’re wondering why I called this film”Oft-Maligned” - it’s because of what I mentioned earlier about people not understanding and thumbing their noses. It’s amazing how, if something is funny, people will simply dismiss it. Mr. Yankovic is a very intelligent man and a lot of thought goes into the works that he produces; just because something features “dumb” humor doesn’t make it dumb.

So watch UHF . And then tell me what you think of it. I’d really like to hear from somebody who doesn’t like it so that I can figure out what is the dividing line between someone who likes Weird Al’s comedy and somebody who hates it.

We have watched two more James Bond movies since I last wrote, and no, we did not go to see the new one today: Mr. Hall had to work all day, and I certainly am not going to go to the movies by myself. (That would just be weird.) So we won’t be seeing that one until Tuesday.

However, rather than write yet another blog about James Bond movies (if you don’t care about them you’re probably getting pretty tired of that at this point) I decided I would recommend a movie for you today.

If you haven’t seen it, a movie you should put in your rental queue is this: Time Bandits. This movie was penned by Terry Gilliam and Michael Palin (of Monty Python fame); it is the story of an adventurous boy stuck in a drab, boring British home, and how he gets caught up in an adventure that drags him through time and space to a final climactic battle between good and evil. It’s sci-fi, it’s fantasy, it’s adventure, it’s comedy, it’s historical, it’s mythic.

And it’s funny. And has special appearances by John Cleese, Sean Connery, Michael Palin (surprise!) - as well as David Warner as Evil. Can you ask for a better recommendation than that? No, I don’t think that you can.

Well, Halloween is over - and, rather to my surprise, rather than getting the 70 trick-or-treaters we had last year, we had five. Five??! Come on! Not that I’m complaining about having all this candy left around the house… but seriously…!

We have this backlog of Hammer movies to watch now, but I’m not sure we’re going to attempt that until next Halloween. I’m kind of want to just finish them since we’ve got them here - and plus, the last one was pretty interesting - so, hm, I don’t know. I’m rambling… I’d better get back to the point of this post.

We have our election-day viewing all mapped-out. We’re going to watch Team America: World Police, You’re Not Elected, Charlie Brown, and the “Vote or Die” episode of South Park. (”Vote or Die” is not the actual title of the episode; the actual title is a bit too crude for me to share with you).

Team America: World Police is the spawn of South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker. This is a very, very bizarre film: namely because Matt and Trey decided that - rather than animate it, or actually have live-action actors - it would be a puppet movie. They used marionettes to make this movie. Don’t get me wrong - it’s hilarious - but also terrifying and disgusting in many different ways. (Of course, I believe that was the intention.)

It’s the story of “Team America”, a group of “world police” (perhaps you could have gathered that much from the title) who go around stopping terrorism. They recruit an actor to the team to help stop a big terrorist action, and things spin out of control from there. They not only battle North Korea, but also the Screen Actor’s Guild (which is called the Film Actor’s Guild in the film. If you look at the initials of that name - this is the level of humor you can expect.)

This is a very funny movie, very political, very strong, and has an excellent and hilarious score; the theme song, America, ***k Yeah! is a classic. However, if it isn’t obvious, this movie is NOT recommended for children - or even young teens - on account of the strong language, innappropriate humor, graphic violence, and graphic sex scenes (well, I guess they’re only graphic in intent: the puppets naked, but are not anatomically correct).

This film was something of a box-office flop, possibly because people didn’t know what to expect when going to see it - or maybe just because people were perplexed that it starred puppets. Or maybe it was the (unintentionally) conservative message that the movie promoted. Oh well! It was probably a number of different factors. I still think that anyone of any political stance could enjoy the movie if they were open-minded and enjoyed seeing marionettes fight.

You’re Not Elected, Charlie Brown, our other pick, is one of the lesser Charlie Brown cartoons. The title is a little bit of a stretch, since Charlie Brown doesn’t run for office: according to wikipedia, it was originally “You’re Elected, Charlie Brown” - but they changed it when they realized that title made even less sense.

Personally, I think that It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown and A Charlie Brown Christmas are the only ones that are really worth owning: the others are less coherent, and don’t have scores that are as enjoyable. I also found the ones that  emphasized romances between the children a little creepy. The one where Charlie Brown has to kiss the little red-headed girl - or the one where Peppermint Patty sings “Poor Sweet Baby” to Charlie Brown - were irritating and gross to me as a child. I’m kind of tempted, though, to watch A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving this year, as I only saw it once as a child, and don’t remember the details very clearly.

But I’m really digressing from the topic of You’re Not Elected, Charlie Brown: if you buy a copy of this, try to buy the one that is a double-feature with Great Pumpkin, because it’s not worth buying on its own. It may be good election-day viewing, though, since either way somebody isn’t getting elected on the 4th. I’m not making a prediction this year about who will win because there are too many new factors to consider… We shall see.

Well, Mr. Hall and I finally watched another Hammer horror movie. (Yes, since it is now Halloween we have officially failed our quest to watch all the Hammer Draculas and Frankensteins by Halloween - but, oh well! It was a fun endeavour and leaves us room for more Halloween viewing next time around). This one was called The Brides of Dracula. It really should have been called “Only Faintly Connected to Dracula” - because Dracula had almost nothing to do with it, and the Brides only somewhat figured in (and weren’t actually his bride, anyway). Mr. Hall suggested that it should have been called “Son of Dracula”, because the real villain was this young Baron who had been turned by Dracula. Not that he was much of a villain: he succeeded in vampirizing just three girls in this film, and one of them was his own mother (gross!). Then, in the climactic scenes, Van Helsing totally whaled on the guy - until the vampire choked Van Helsing with a chain. I was sitting there asking why the vampire wasn’t using any otherworldly powers on him (no explanation. Guess he was just tired of using his vampire powers and felt like besting Van Helsing using old-fashioned fisticuffs.) The film had a few boring moments, some inexplicable plot devices and a rather compressed ending - but we were more or less happy with it, and the way Van Helsing defeated the vampire was pretty original.

Last night, we viewed our official Halloween movie and carved pumpkins. Our “official” movie is Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting, which is THE MOST TERRIFYING MOVIE I HAVE EVER SEEN. You know what makes this movie so scary? You never see any of the monsters. You are left to imagine the horrors of Hill House, and that is far scarier than anything they could possibly have shown. It is highly, highly unsettling, and will leave you feeling that ghosts are going to get into your brain.

By the way, I am talking about the 1960’s version of the film, not the recent remake. That film, by all accounts, sucks.

Then, because we were scared of ghosts, we watched It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown! This was a good way to finish off the evening. I don’t know if we’re going to do any Halloween viewing tonight, because last Halloween I was so swamped with Trick-or-Treaters that I didn’t get an opportunity to do anything but answer the door…

People don’t appreciate Jim Varney.

This is simply a fact of life. They may know of the “Ernest” movies, probably think they’re pretty dumb (even if they enjoy them) and that’s the end of that story.

The problem with this is that the late Jim Varney was actually a really good actor. Did you know that he was classically trained? The man had talent! I mean, take the movie Ernest Goes to Jail. No, it’s not the best of the Ernest movies (that would be Ernest Saves Christmas). But in it, Jim Varney manages to create two distinct characters (Ernest and Evil Ernest) - in everything from inflection to expression to muscular movement. It’s quite impressive. I dare you to watch that movie and tell me that he didn’t give an excellent performance. Yet he gets no credit for it because he flies around and shoots electricity out of his hands. Tragic.

This leads me to a bit more of Halloween-related viewing: Ernest Scared Stupid. This movie was made at the height of the Ernest character’s popularity, has the best production values and arguably the best script and story of any in the series. This movie gives me warm feelings because - although I never saw it as a child - I have very fond memories of watching it at an Honors Halloween Party in college. Best Honors party ever.

(Yes, the Honors kids watched Ernest Scared Stupid and It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Well, what do you want? Honors kids know how to have fun.)