No. 358 : Windfall (2022)

 

Windfall at the IMDb

This film popped up on my Netflix offering and, despite never having heard of it, I thought I’d give it a go – well you are entitled to your once a year ‘W’ fix!

The film is pretty low key, set all in one house and garden over a couple of days. We open with a man approaching a sumptuous desert property eating an orange from the orchard along the way. There is no dialogue for the first seven minutes as he systematically goes through the house looking for things to steal. He chances upon a handgun, a wad of cash and a Rolex watch. So far so good and he’s ready to go.

 Fortunately for the film, the two homeowners arrive back and soon chance upon the hapless burglar. The next 80 minutes or so deal with the ensuing hostage situation and, as you’d expect, details slowly emerge about the relationships and the background to the situation. At an early stage the burglar leaves but on seeing a CCTV camera, which the owner had denied existed, he returns seeking a $500k payoff. The owner readily agrees, but the cash will take a day to assemble. To complicate matters further the Mexican gardener shows up and soon he’s a hostage too.

Will the cash appear and why has this specific target been chosen? Will the crumbling marital relationship survive the ordeal and who will reap the windfall of the title, if anyone?

 

This was an OK sort of film, but it was really slow and not a lot happened to cover even the lean run time we are given. None of the characters are afforded names which is always an annoying conceit for me – everyone is shouting ‘Babe’ or ‘You’ all the time! The burglar, named ‘Nobody’ in the credits, was played by Jason Segel who you’ll remember from ‘Forgetting Sarah Marshall’. This dramatic role highlights that comedy is his strength as I wasn’t buying his desperate hours, soul searching protagonist here. The homeowner is credited under ‘CEO’ and is played by Jesse Plemmons or Todd from ‘Breaking Bad’ as he’s more commonly known. I think he may have done a better turn as the burglar as he didn’t convince as the tech entrepreneur billionaire.

 

Filling out the cast as ’Wife’ was Lily Collins – she was forgettable too and did little with thin material. She gets a big finale that wasn’t earned, and I think that was the result of 90 minutes of the run time approaching with no cohesive or logical ending in sight.

 

The film did offer a bit of commentary on technology making people obsolete but to be honest my sympathies started with CEO and stayed there. ‘Nobody’ came across as entitled and unfocussed and although his randomness was a deliberate part of the character, he never came together as someone whom I cared about, feared or believed.

 

There are a couple of minor twists to keep you interested but it will be a passing, and soon to be forgotten, interest. I see the three principals all got producing credits along with the director and I’m sure a sunny shoot on the Netflix tab was fun for all concerned – just a shame the viewer wasn’t invited along for the ride!

Best Bit : The Gardener Does the Windows

'W' Rating 11/23

No.346 : Women’s Prison Massacre (1983)

 Women's Prison Massacre at the IMDb

The IMDb title page for this film gives it a possessive apostrophe but the poster and title card do not. The original intent may have been for it to be a plural and not a possessive, but it’s probably not important given that the likely viewers of this sleazy trash will be more concerned with the boob quotient rather than correct punctuation. Why can’t we have both though?

This Italian relic dates from 1983 and appears to be part of the ‘Black Emmanuelle’ franchise. This is not explicit however (unlike the film) as although we have the same actress and a character called Emmanuelle, there isn’t any continuity with the previous films…er, as I’ve been led to understand. Maybe they wanted this as a standalone epic or they couldn’t get the rights. Either way it is a terrible exploitation film with blood and boobs served up in equal measure.

The film opens with three ladies delivering monologues to an audience of prisoners. It’s not clear where we are but it looks like it’s meant to be Mexico given the policemen dress like ice cream salesmen. Anyway the play doesn’t go down well, with Emmanuelle getting particularly bad reviews from head bitch Albina, who is possibly so named as she’s a bit pale.

We learn that Emmanuelle has been falsely imprisoned by a corrupt DA who will stop at nothing to silence her. Meanwhile four notorious murders, Led by ‘Crazy Boy’ have been captured. The DA has the great plan to house them at the women’s prison before their executions. It’s not made clear, and it’s certainly not conveyed to the bad guys, but it seems like the DA hopes the baddies will kill Emmanuelle when they inevitably escape. This plan is very weak, mainly because our villains know nothing about it or have anything to gain from it.

The four worst criminals in the country are transported in a single van along some desert back roads. The guards manage to avoid a fake road block when the wise one catches the doppelgangers out, but after a low rent chase the baddies are out and our wise bearded friend is likely to be dead given he's taken a point blank shotgun blast he took to the chest.

Actually he miraculously survives, and our clichéd quartet of baddies, including a sadistic German one, pitch up at the prison and kill all the guards. The police hang back letting each of the men carry out their fantasies against the female prisoners - some of whom are willing, others less so.

Various atrocities take place including a game of Russian roulette, which sees a tin of tomato soup thrown in the lead baddie’s face, before our guys make their break for freedom. They want $5m and a car and are taking Emmanuelle and the lady governor as hostages. Can it end well? Doubtful, given the rest was a load of nonsense!

This was a really tacky film that for some reason Amazon Prime suggested I may be interested in. What a clever algorithm that has detected, through my viewing habits, that I like ‘W’ initialled films. 

You can’t slag this effort off too much, as it pretty much delivers what you’d expect given the title, cast and premise. Emmanuelle was strangely shy in the cut I saw, but the other inmates redressed the balance with several full on displays of love behind bars. The inflatable man wasn’t necessary however.

The dubbing was terrible as was the dialogue - maybe ‘I want to cut your nipples off’ was lost in translation. The plot was wafer thin, but even then it didn’t make sense. The whole plan seemed to be to get some men in a woman’s prison for an hour, have them behave badly, before a shoot out at the end. You can’t say they didn’t deliver on that.

If you seek this film out expecting trashy rubbish with a lot of blood and nudity you won't be disappointed. If you want anything else, then you will be.

Best Bit : Toilet Block Punishment ‘W’ Rating : 11/23

No.335 : What the Waters Left Behind (2017)

What the Waters Left Behind at the IMDb

As our regular reader will attest, we are not adverse to the odd foreign film here at the ‘W’ Movie Blog and, with that in mind, let’s head south to Argentina for this derivative murder fest.

We get some exposition to start as we learn of a small village that was beset by rising flood waters. It had to be forcibly evacuated by the military before it was totally engulfed with the population displaced - or where they? Obviously not.

Many years later a documentary film crew have returned to the village which has recently re-emerged, due to the falling floodwaters. They are pretty low rent, relying on an ancient VW camper van and some limited equipment. They have in tow a young woman who was a refugee from the village, and the plan is to capture her memories of the once vibrant town.

On the journey to the village we get to know our six victims, er, filmmakers, who have the usual list of quirks and character points such as love rivals and a small poodle owner. Yappy dug is definitely getting it.

They stop off at a small petrol station and visit the worst toilet this side of ‘Trainspotting’. The attendants are all a bit strange, especially the old woman who insists that they buy her pies in exchange for her ‘clearing up their shit. On the evidence seen, not much shit gets cleared up, even on a good day.

Our heroes get ripped off on the fuel and window screen wipe down so they roar off yelling abuse and ditching the rancid pies - huge mistake!

At the village things go OK at first with the refugee showing the team around and recounting some interesting tales. Their van however breaks down and it’s clear someone has cut the petrol pipe. They make the standard error of splitting up and soon they start to fall afoul of some colourful locals and a snake. As their numbers inevitably whittle down, we wonder who will survive and whether the ‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ people have their copyright infringement lawsuit ready to go.

I think if this film was in English it would have been easier to dismiss as a clear knockoff in an already crowed survival horror genre. As it was, the Spanish language and exotic locations kept me interested or at least reading the subtitles.

It’s clear early on that the villains of the piece were a ‘Sawney Bean’ type cannibal family, with the gas station pies the first hint that maybe the vegan option wasn’t so bad. They revealed themselves gradually, and the look of sheep skull hats and massive cudgels was quite impressive and very ‘Silent Hill’.

The big surprise was nothing of the sort and I was only caught unawares as it was actually presented as such and not just assumed. The locations were excellent for the first hour with what looked like a real life disaster zone being used. Once the action decamped to an obvious set for the cannibals lair I lost interest and the film any momentum that it had earned.

There were a few bone crunching kills but nothing you haven’t seen before and better in films like ‘Wolf Creek’.

Overall this was an interesting pastime but it offered little new apart from some inventive locations and costumes. I’d seek my thrills elsewhere if I were you.

Best Bit : ‘Nearly Done’  ‘W’ Rating 11/23

 

No.333 : White Space (2018)

White Space at the IMDb

Problem : You want to make a sci-fi film but don’t have a plot. Solution? Just repurpose some old public domain classic and you’re good to go.

Strange as it may sound this film is ‘Moby Dick’ in space. But wouldn’t that need a big whale you may ask? Well this has one, a big space whale, like the type that definitely exist, but just haven’t been found yet. Don’t ask about what they eat or how they propel themselves; it’s probably a metaphor or something.

We start in the future, but also in the past in 2123. A big fraggin’ space whale totals a ship killing nearly all of the crew. We then fast forward 24 years and learn that one of the young survivors now has his own ship and he’s out for revenge. He has a ragtag crew of basically every space faring stereotype you can think of, from the Bourbon drinking old salt to the nerdy, misfit engineer.

The crew are supposedly out farming food in space and the best pickings are in ‘white space’  where communications are difficult and perils await in the shape of space pirates and space whales. The crew are keen to harvest the ambergris and get home but the captain is twisted by his lust for revenge on the whale who took his father and he’s got a homing beacon on it that is now giving a signal.

On the way to the inevitable showdown the crew get robbed by some pirates and the engineer gets infected by a parasite that turns him into Vincent D’Onofrio out of ‘Men in Black’. They also have to contend with a saboteur and a snooper from a government agency who want to keep an eye on our heroes’ shady practices.

Who will survive? Would Melville approve and does watching this count as me having read the book?

This was a strange offering. It had long sequences that looked like cut scenes from video games and a ridiculous premise that wasn’t really explored - I’m none the wiser as to what ‘white space’ was meant to be. At least they didn’t hide their inspiration with the ship named ‘The Essex’ (the proto ‘Pequod’) and plenty of other Melville nods sprinkled along the way. The source material meant that you knew our captain was going to go full Ahab at some point, so it was no surprise when he did so. Maybe it was to the actor though, who was unconvincing when trying to display madness, mania or even slight excitement.

The subplot with the possessed engineer was poorly delivered also with a couple of nasty and brutal stabbings - haven’t these people heard of ray guns? It was maybe a budget issue as they had the same set of kitchen scales as my wife - maybe they were space antiques?

Virtually every space film you can think of gets a nod here with the slime coming through the roof onto the metal decking a straight lift from every Alien film, and the crew appearing like a ‘Firefly’ fan convention. None of the characters worked for me and some of the backstories were poor - one woman had several convictions for assaults with a frying pan. She must have been Scottish - at least she got to use her singular talent when confronted by the baddie!

Overall this was a strange offering which, despite some decent special effects, didn’t make a lot of sense and failed to engage with me on any level. One to throw back!

Best Bit : Mr Stabby Loses His Head  ’W’ Rating 11/23

 

No.307 : White Chamber (2018)

White Chamber at the IMDb

Britain is in chaos and nationalism is on the rise! No, it’s not a documentary but a film set sometime “Soon”. The film starts with some ponderous narration with a chap waving a flag on top of Glastonbury Tor. There has been a civil war with a totalitarian government squaring up against a rebellion led by the UK Liberation army.

We then cut to a bright white box and realise that the budget has been spent on that big flag the bloke was waving. A woman wakes up in said box and starts conversing with a distorted voice - ‘where am I?’ ‘who are you?’ ‘can I get my money back?’. After some cruel treatment via the box’s handy hot and cold floor, the true horror slowly dawns on us - will the whole film just be a woman yelling at a wall?

Happily not, after a while a face appears in the wall and it’s that bloke in the black robes off the ‘Mummy’ films. The woman claims to be a new start called Ruth but our man keeps pressing for more details about the operation and her role in the shady experiments he knows that goes on there.

Eventually the chamber opens up and another compartment is revealed to contain a woman with a pretty bad chemical peel. The two fight and Ruth gives her the finger so to speak. We then dissolve to a ‘5 Day’s earlier’ caption and we realise it’s our old favourite, the non-linear narrative.

We meet our woman greeting a new recruit called Ruth - blatant identity theft right there! The man behind the voice (or at least someone who looks like him) is now in the chamber and our woman is the head scientist. It turns out interrogation isn’t their goal but to test new amphetamines that can enhance the abilities of soldiers. We get a bit more back story from an old bloke who looks like Bill Nighy and her off the coffee adverts from the 80’s.

Who will triumph in this battle of wits? Who are ‘the good guys’? and can I have my 90 minutes back please?

This was an OK film but it’s limited scope and in your face politics had me against it from near the start. The main female character played by Shauna Macdonald wasn’t likeable at all, even in the opening section where we were meant to be on her side. Later, when she was revealed to be the evil scientist, albeit one with some heartache, I still wasn’t convinced ,and she was more irritating than scary or despicable.

Coffee woman and the new start didn’t have a lot to do with the later failing to convince in her Road to Damascus type conversion. The guy off the Mummy films was OK but a bit preachy and overly manic when hepped up on goofballs.

The politics were terribly in your face - literally, with one scene having the character telling you how crappy the country is straight to camera, before cutting to another for a reaction shot. Subtle this was not.

To be fair the film did manage to keep my interest, but given we knew after 20 minutes that the roles would be reversed the tension gained was allowed to dissipate. The film did look cheap with most of the action happening in some corridors. It looked like they had broken into an office block for the shoot but couldn’t access the rooms, only the stairs and landings. In places it was almost like a film school project with ropey dialogue delivered in a flat, unbelievable manner by unconvincing actors.

It’s better than being locked in a white box - but only just.

Best Bit : Finger Buffet  ‘W’ Rating : 11/23

No.278 : Watermelon (2003)

Watermelon at the IMDb

Rochdale born actress Anna Friel mangles her way through this 2003 ITV TV movie with the worst Irish accent this side of the Blarney Stone.

Friel plays Claire who is meant to be a free spirit but just comes across as a total nightmare. She drags her dim-witted boyfriend from Dublin  to London on the pretext that she has a job lined up. Of course she doesn’t, and it’s only an interview which goes terribly apart from some flirting with a dishy young man on the panel. The interview ends suddenly when Anna throws up on some fish, but yer man isn’t put off and the two head to the pub.

After a full sesh she spurns the young man’s advances only to find that, in a surprising moment of wisdom, her boyfriend has decided to head back to Ireland. Without missing a beat Anna calls back the shorn suitor and the two spend the night together. Things are soon looking up, with Anna getting a photocopying job at the same magazine she threw up at along side the new smitten boyfriend.

But wait! We need drama, and Anna finds out she’s pregnant. The two move in together and in a quick montage we see Anna’s belly swell up so that she looks like the watermelon of the title - think I’d be taking my watermelon back to the green grocer if it looked like that! Anna knows the baby’s father is boyfriend one, but being a conniving wee cow, sorry free spirit, she doesn’t tell the hapless fool. Things come together when her waters break at work and she has to tell the hospital that she’s gone full term. Even the dopey new boyfriend manages to work out that he only started boffing Anna 7 months ago so he’s holding another man’s baby.

Mildly upset he stomps off and Anna heads back to Dublin and into the home of her shamed parents, including mum Brenda Fricker off ‘So I Married an Axe Murderer‘. Anna suffers some minor travails and Dad has a heart attack owing to his daughter being a tart and all that. She also bad mouths the innocent father who gamely offers to come back on the scene. Meanwhile, the London lover has shacked up with his frankly better option boss but loses the rag when she tries to repaint the nursery.

The scene is set for a big confrontation as the two men, for reasons unknown, vie for the affections of the free loving Anna and her screaming kid.

This wasn’t so much a modern day morality tale as some sink estate wish fulfilment. I couldn’t see any redeeming features in Anna’s character at all, although to be fair, she did do some excellent bath work. The two male leads were dreadful with neither having a spark of personality. The big restaurant denouement was a shouting match with handbags that was more cringey than gallant or brave.

Overall this was a throwaway piece of fluff that offered nothing in the way of social commentary or even entertainment. The character arcs were unbelievable and the happy ending didn’t ring true at all.

Best Bit : Bath Time! W Score 11/23

No.267 : War of the Wildcats (1943)

War of the Wildcats at the IMDb

There are so many wonderful films out there across Netflix and Amazon Prime, not to mention the limitless offerings of the hundreds of channels of terrestrial TV as well as the internet. But let’s forget all that nonsense and watch a faded black and white western that I found in the depths of Film 4. Well it saves you having to!

Made in 1943, but looking a lot older, ‘War of the Wildcats’ is a forgettable western starring John Wayne who was at the height of his draft dodging powers at the time. He got a deferment for being a father of four so that’s all right then - at least he didn’t make loads of films pretending to be people who did the actual fighting. Oh he did? Very poor.

This film isn’t quite ‘very poor’ but I will have to up my typing speed if I’m going to finish this review before I forget it entirely.

We open on a train car full of people heading to the oil fields to make it rich. ‘I’m gonna get one of those new cars’ says one. ‘Did you hear about the Wright brothers’ says another, hoping to let us know it’s 1906 and to save the money for a caption. At the back of the train is the private car of Jim ‘Hunk’ Gardner. He’s an oil baron and a real sleaze ball, with comely wenches coming and going from his car. One almost showed an ankle.

At a small town he hauls on board Kathy, a teacher who is being run out of town for writing a scandalous book. He says hello and then plants a big kiss on her. Bit rapey there mate. She doesn’t like it, but doesn’t leave either and soon the two are getting on famously. Any chance of him getting his end away quickly evaporates when John Wayne shows up. His horse has died and he’s after a lift.

They all end up in a small oil town with the two men vying for Kathy’s favours. She initially goes with Jim and professes undying love. When he reasonably says ‘well maybe not forever’ - he has known her 20 minutes - she flounces off to Wayne.

Wayne manages to get a job as Jim’s bodyguard after besting the incumbent Cherokee but this proves to be a terrible decision when Wayne tells the Indians that they are getting ripped off by Jim’s 12% royalty deal for the oil on their land. Wayne offers 50% and after agreeing terms with Teddy Roosevelt himself, Wayne starts the task of getting 10,000 barrels out of the ground before a 4 month deadline expires.

Will he get the oil? Will he get the girl? Will there be  dirty tricks afoot and a mad dash to the finish line in Tulsa? Yes on all counts!

This was a long and mostly dull film, but it was enough of a curiosity to keep me interested and, to be fair, there were a couple of decent action sequences.

The whole film hangs on Wayne which is a shame as he’s a terrible actor. Lots of soft focus close ups and dire dialogue about what his granny used to say. He is versatile though - a singing scene in the bath showed that he can’t sing either.

Albert Dekker was better and a sure lift for the Hedley Lamarr character in ‘Blazing Saddles’. His schemes were so despicable as was his moustache twirling. He never had a chance with the dame but made up for it with some scene chewing acting and a few punch ups.

The love interest was Martha Scott who, whilst only 31 at the time of filming, looked a lot older. This was probably down to her wardrobe that contained a few cast offs from Morticia Addams. She had bigger shoulder pads than an NFL quarterback and showed so little flesh that a suit of armour would have been sexier.

It was also good to see Gabby Hayes who delivered some genuine frontier gibberish.

The film built up to a big dash at the end when Wayne tried to deliver his oil by wagon after the baddie bought up all the pipes. He sets off with about 20 wagons and we see about 15 blow up and one goes off a hill. It’s a miracle therefore that he still manages to get 20 over the line!

I was surprised about the fairness to the Native Americans (well it is the movies!) and the frankly socialist values that Wayne was trotting out. No wonder he didn’t fight in the war - Joe Stalin never called!

There is some fun to be had in ‘War of the Wildcats’ but not as much as in a ‘Shake n Vac’ commercial.

Best Bit : ‘I’ll call you Kitten and give you a big kiss‘. ‘OK then‘.
‘W’ Rating 11/23

No.244 : Watchers (1988)

Watchers at the IMDb

 If you are in the market for an 80’s monster film with big hair and a super intelligent dog then ‘Watchers’ may just be what you are looking for. It’s based on a book by Dean Koontz (at least I think that’s how he spells his name) and I’m guessing it is pretty far removed from the source material as no one does much watching nor are any of the protagonists called ‘watchers’. Still I watched it (worse luck) so let’s see what we saw.

The film stars a mulleted Corey Haim who has a BMX and a hot girlfriend. They get all kissy face in a barn but before you know it she’s been kidnapped and a large monster is on the prowl. We learn from Secret Service Agent Michael Ironside (hair loss at critical levels) that an experiment has escaped from a local lab and it is on a killing spree. It doesn’t like eyes or mirrors so you have to wonder if it is having a bad hair day itself. In fact it is looking for its fellow escapee, a super smart dog. Ironside also warns that there were three experiments at the lab!

The super smart dog shows up at Corey’s house and he christens it ‘Fur face’. The dog understands English and is soon fetching hot dogs, playing Scrabble and writing computer messages with a pencil in it’s mouth. Obviously these things are impossible with paws so fortunately its handiwork happens off camera. While Corey is bonding with the dog, partly by sleeping in the nude with it under his covers, the monster is on the rampage. Various bit parts get chomped and have their eyes removed in scenes a bit too graphic for a film with a smart dog and BMX interest.

Ironside realises that Corey is his best chance to catch up with the monster and dog and soon gets as brutal as the monster - are his ties to the lab more than he is letting on or did he just find the wig shop closed? As everyone converges on a remote shack the scene is set for a titanic battle where the real monster will be unmasked and the fires will be terrifying - well there is a lot of hairspray about.

This was a right old pile of crap but it was funny and dated enough to keep me watching. Not in an ironic way where I laughed at the hairstyles and bad acting…Ok in  exactly that way.

The feeble plot doesn’t have enough to sustain a 90 minute film so subplots and disposable characters are thrown in such as Jason Priestley’s BMX gang who are dispatched in merciless fashion by the monster who clearly had enough of their terribleness - at least Piggy almost made it. The monster itself was a slow reveal with hairy arms and the odd toothy yell all we were treated to. They should maybe have kept it ambiguous as the 'terrifying creature' turned out to be the same costume as the one from‘Bigfoot and the Hendersons’.

The acting, admittedly with terrible material, was shocking with Michael Ironside doing his best to be a hard as nails baddie whilst trying to stop dazzling us all with his bald head and spouting his menace free dialogue. At one point his partner says “This is pretty ridiculous, don’t you think?” Sir, you are correct!

Best Bit : Michael’s big reveal
‘W’ Rating 11/23

No.171 : Wichita (1955)

Wichita on IMDb

Off to the wild west now, or rather the ‘mild’ west as there’s not a drop of blood or even any cussing in this strait-laced affair.

We open as some cattle drovers settle down for the night with some beans and possibly gay sex. Their plans, whatever they may be, are interrupted when they spot a stranger on the horizon. They give him a cautious welcome and it turns out he’s Wyatt Earp. Although the aging actor playing him, Joel McCrea, is already 50 no one knows who he is - better get a move on Gramps or they’ll need to install a stair lift by the time you get to the OK Corral!

They bed down for the night and soon two drovers approach Earp’s bed - maybe his red shirt and neckerchief was a signal? but no! They're after his cash. They get hold of his fat bank roll but Earp is wise to the game and after recovering his cash he punches the miscreants out. He heads off to Wichita with his dreams of opening a hardware shop intact. The drovers lick their wounds safe in the knowledge that they’ll be in Wichita soon themselves, and may get their chance at some revenge.

Earp hits town and wins favour with the mayor as his plans don’t involve opening another bar - Kavos this ain't. He goes to the bank and is able to thwart the tamest robbery attempt you’ll ever see, with robbers who look more like Sunday School teachers than brigands. The mayor immediately offers Earp the job of Marshall but our man is determined to sell his buckets, goddarn it!

Fate naturally takes control however when the pished up drovers enter the town and start grappling with some overdressed whores and shooting off their pistols. A hooker and then, seemingly more importantly, a young boy get shot by stray bullets and the even mild mannered Earp has had enough. He grabs the Marshall’s badge and a shotgun and kicks some ass. Well he politely asks them to stop, if it wouldn't be too much trouble.

Now mad with power Earp bans all guns from the town much to the chagrin of local worthy Doc Black who hires two guns to take out this meddlesome Marshall. But D’oh! He’s only hired Earp’s own brothers and gets run out of town for his bother. While all this non-killing is going on Earp finds the time to picnic with a local lass half his age. Tragedy looms however when the evil Doc returns and shoots Earp’s girl’s mother. Earp feigns anger and sets out in pursuit. Can he bring the villains to justice and ride off into the sunset with his gal?

This is definitely a film of its time with nothing remotely offensive or even slightly troubling going on. The biggest crime is the shooting of the boy, who frankly deserved it for his terrible ‘Oh I'm shot' acting. It was so bad it was only beaten by the leg shaking wackiness of Lloyd Bridges in his big shoot out scene. The whores showed nothing and the drunken drovers are so disinterested, even after six month’s abstinence, that they’d rather go about shooting their guns than getting to grips with the painted ladies.

The script is dire with every western cliché present and correct. The baddies literally wear black hats as if we’d mistake our clean cut hero for any of those less than menacing characters. The romance aspect looked tacked on with ‘do you want to go on a picnic’ seemingly shorthand for ‘let’s get it on’. Of course a small peck is followed by asking permission to be married - remember that kids!

The action scenes were dreadful with our man never missing a shot and the bad guys only chalking up one whore’s arm and a 5 year old in return for 10,000 rounds fired.

Of course the film was made for more innocent times, and no doubt some people gasped when the villain twirled his moustache, but nowadays it just looks like a funny throwback to a more naive and gentle period when the good guys won and the bad guys got their just desserts.

Best Bit : "The boy’s name was Michael Jackson - he was 5 years old" - Ow!

W Score 11/23

No.160 : Weekend With The Babysitter (1970)

Weekend With the Babysitter at the IMDb

Here’s a bit of an oddity from 1970 that garnered a frankly woeful 1.4/10 at the IMDb. It’s a hard film to categorise - it’s a sort of soft porn, action thriller fantasy with a bit of education and stoner wisdom thrown in for good measure.

We open with scenes of a young girl on a moped inter cut with some action at the border. The customs are shown to be doing a bang up job and although that seems incongruous with the carefree girl all will become clear soon. Or not, depends if you can stay the course really.

Anyway our hot chick arrives at her destination and we find that she’s the titular babysitter - but there’s been a mix up! The wife is indeed going out but not with the husband who is staying in. As he waves the wife off he tells the girl to stay so he can pay her for her time. The dirty bastard.

The pair settle down on the sofa and the girl starts reading a script that the chap, who is a director, is due to film next week. The girl laughs at how crummy the script is (oh the irony!) and tells him that the kids don’t talk like that. To prove her point she takes him out to meet her skuzzy friends.

Meanwhile, we learn that the wife has a drug problem and is visiting her dealer. They want paid and all she can offer is a loan of her husband’s boat which could bypass the customs problems we witnessed earlier. They take her along on the smuggling trip and after doping her up make her indulge in some lesbian sex for no other reason, it would seem, other than to secure an ‘X’ certificate for this tame offering.

Back at the house the husband is flat on his back after the night on the tiles but the girl stays over to make him breakfast and take him to the speedway, like you do. After lots of unnecessary shots of screaming bikes and babysitter nudity he realises that his wife is missing and commandeers a friend’s plane to search for her. Once spotted he rallies his new biker chums to intercept the bad guys and save the wife. Will lives be lost and will our man take his junkie wife back over the nubile babysitter?

This is quite a funny film if you don’t take it too seriously. The two leads are awful with the silver haired director as convincing as a hat stand. We’ve no idea what the baby sitter’s motivation is in seducing the old timer but fair play to him seeing as this was before the time of Viagra. The sex scenes are pretty tame although I did like how one ended with a cut to an anchor splashing into the water!

The kids all get a say and one boy’s assertion that not all bikers were bad was proven when they intercept the bad guys and destroy their drugs rather than toking up themselves. The twangy early 70’s soundtrack is a bit of a distraction but if ever a film was of its time this is it.

It’s certainly not as bad as the low scoring suggests but by no means a classic either. For your money you do get a fair bit of nudity, some cringingly bad sex scenes and dialogue you wouldn’t hear in a porno - so a wise investment all round then!

Best Bit : Pilot calling the control tower and asking them to call a biker bar for help

‘W’ Rating 11/23

No. 143 : Wedding Crashers (2005)

Wedding Crashers at the IMDb

Here’s a film that looks like it will be good for a few laughs but when you sit through the thing you realise that it’s a lot of preachy sentimental guff. And I love you man for hearing that.

Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn are the titular crashers, a laborious process that seems to involve a lot of work to get some free canapés and score some chicks - haven’t these guys ever heard of the free buffet at Hooters? Basically they finagle their way into weddings and work hard at being the life and soul of the party. They don’t mention how they get in the seating plan for dinner but for my money I imagine most hosts would welcome them as most weddings painfully dull.

The first 20 minutes is basically an extended montage of various weddings and demonstrates the versatility of our fellows - they can do Jewish, Indian you name it. As the montage closes we see them bed an unfeasible parade of lovelies and frankly we’re all as jealous as Hell. But wait! Are they really happy and fulfilled? Who cares? Let’s have more laughs. Sadly no, the remainder of our film deals with the realisation that the fun times are fleeting and we should get married to be really happy.

The turning point comes at a wedding hosted by a US senator played by Christopher Walken, who seems in strangely muted form. After our guys steal the show they are invited back to the family spread for the weekend. Owen is keen to go as he’s taken a shine to Rachel McAdams whereas Vince is less so due to the amorous attentions of the clearly loopy Isla Fisher. Of course they go and over the course of the weekend have various misadventures with Jane Seymour’s horny mother and the artist brother who takes a shine to Vince.

All is not well however as McAdams' slimy fiancée smells a rat and exposes our guys fabricated tales. They rightly get booted out but their friendship suffers as the love struck Wilson can’t cope with rejection. Vaughn meanwhile is still seeing Fisher leaving Wilson no choice but to seek council from the legendary crasher Chazz, Will Ferrell, who has now graduated to crashing funerals. With the family now strangely happy for Vaughn to marry their daughter it’s up to Wilson to crash one last wedding in the hope of a happy ending for all.

I enjoyed this film a lot less than I should have done given the talent on show. The leads are all likable when they are misbehaving but as soon as it gets serious it goes downhill fast. Some of the sentimental pap is barf inducing especially from Wilson whose serial stalker comes out with some real mawkish rubbish. Vaughn is little better offering hugs and ‘love yous’ every five minutes. The only one who comes out with any credibility is Ferrell who sticks to the mantra and seems to be doing fine despite being painted as a loser.

I did feel sorry for the fiancé character who seemed the only one on the ball and gets vilified for exposing the con men. His character gets assassinated when he’s rude to the servant and eyes up some chicks but at least he is up front about it. His downfall at the end isn’t really earned although I did like Vaughn’s ‘Ike Turner’ line.

The other thing that irritated me was the constant quoting of the rules - yeah like they’re going to learn over 100 nuggets of wisdom and live by them. Beer and chicks should have covered it. There were a few good bits including a Milftastic turn by Seymour but overall the message was too in your face and it smothered what comedy the film may have had. It was also troubling to see Wilson with a suicide book only months before his own attempt - sloppy work props department!

Best Bit : Feel them
‘W’ Rating : 11/23

No. 140 : Welcome To Spring Break (1989)

Welcome to Spring Break at the IMDb

This film is also known as ‘Nightmare Beach’ but that’s a rubbish title seeing as hardly any of the action takes place at the beach and of course because it doesn’t start with a ‘W’.

The film is one of a raft of teen slasher films that were rushed out to cash in on the home video boom. It is terrible, and to be honest it’s hard to find many positives in the mess but let's have a look anyway. Someone may not have to suffer because I did.

We open with a pre-credits sequence of a man being executed by electric chair. A gang of bikers pays silent vigil outside and apart from a promise to seek revenge from beyond the grave things go to plan. After the credits we meet the motley cast. Skip and his buddy are in town to get over Skip’s disastrous performance in a football match. They drink at a bar tended by the sister of the girl that the executed biker murdered and run into the ‘Demons’ biker gang too.

We also meet the corrupt police chief played by the usually reliable but not here John Saxon and the mayor, who wants nothing to upset his lucrative spring break trade. Filling out the roster we get a party girl and her priest father who warns of doom for all sinners and a man who shouts ‘Go Gators’ in almost ever scene. The party is going well with wet t-shirt parties all the rage until a hitchhiker foolishly accepts a lift from a mysterious biker who has his own rock sound track. His bike is modified to electrocute any passengers to the extent that the girl ends up looking Kentucky fried.

Further murders follow including a hooker and a peeping tom before Skip’s pal gets set alight by the baddie after a kicking from the bikers. Amazingly the police chief and coroner agree to dump the body in a mine rather than suffer some bad publicity. Skip enlists the help of the bar girl and soon they are unravelling the web of conspiracy. With the body count rising so is our list of suspects - could the electrocuted biker be making good on his deathly promise or is it the police chief or the priest?

The best thing about this film is that it doesn’t take itself too seriously and rightly so. The guy playing Skip has to be the worst actor I’ve ever seen and it’s no surprise that this film killed his career stone dead. His eulogy over his dead, but salt covered, friend was indescribably bad with Saxon arriving just in time to save us all more misery.

The deaths come at a steady rate and some are quite imaginative although not too realistic - who’d of thought that a small electrical cable would have enough juice to cook your head and make your eye pop out? The budget is clearly miniscule with gaggles of real spring breakers roped in as extras and to take their tops off.

The ‘mystery’ killer was so obvious from the start I’m surprised that he bothered to wear a helmet. If you confess to not getting it straight away you should say your prayers and hope he gets collared soon. It was the priest. Although how he got away with those tight leathers and a big souped up and modified motorbike I can only imagine. Oh wait, a catholic priest - standard dress and behaviour then!

This is by no means the worst teen slasher flick you’ll ever see but it’s awful acting and non existent plot means that you’ll just have to make the best of the bikini girls and wet t-shirts, which is fine.

Best Bit : Peep show gets closed
‘W’ Rating : 11/23

No. 116 : Walled In (2009)

Walled in at the IMDb

Here’s a nice happy tale that opens with a small child waking in a confined space before being drowned in concrete. Lovely, heart warming stuff. The credits follow straight away and by using a familiar montage of newspaper cuttings we learn that a serial killer is at large after killing 16 people by, you’ve guessed it, walling them in.

We cut to 15 years later and a pretty young demolition expert (is there any other kind?) gets the offer of a partnership in the family firm if she can raze a building that we know but she doesn’t was the walling in house. Strange that such an infamous case passed her by, but pretty soon she’s on site taking notes and readying the place for demolition. Here she meets the widow of one of the victims who now acts as caretaker and her troubled son, the creepy kid out of ‘Birth’.

We learn that the ugly building in the middle of nowhere has 200 apartments, four of which are still occupied. The eighth floor where the murders took place is out of bounds as is the roof, so no guesses where the next ports of call are. The boy takes a shine to our demolition specialist and he grants her access to various secret passages and steals her books from a cranky old woman which once belonged the building’s now presumed dead creator.

As she completes her survey she finds that a lot of space is missing and learns that a central area has been secretly sealed off for dubious purposes. With her anonymous boyfriend now on the scene the pair resolve to find out the secrets of the building and of the murders which may not be as solved as we were lead to believe.

I enjoyed the first hour of this film but my interest quickly waned when the boy friend appeared and the ‘surprise’ was revealed. To be honest when the flying headline said ‘Architect Dead; Factory Worker Suspected and On Run’ I though ‘hmm wonder if he faked it’. I won’t give the shock away, but he did.

The building was well realised and it was a bit like the Architectural Digest version of the ‘Saw’ films. It did however lack the inventiveness of that franchise and for the last half hour it looked like it was being made up on the hoof. The dead eyed boy was an obvious candidate for the crimes but I certainly didn’t forsee the unbelievable contents of the pit or the mad ramblings of its inhabitant.

There were a couple of decent bits but points were lost for the dreaded shock - it’s a dream - shock - oh wait it’s a dream within a dream - wake up. Fool me once shame on me fool me twice get a new cliché. Mischa Barton was OK in the lead but not entirely convincing as a demolition expert given her ‘The O.C’ credentials. She was certainly better than the boyfriend who may as well have has a black spot on his head when he showed up although he did last two minutes longer than I expected.

All in all it’s a pretty competently made thriller but it lacked any real horror, shocks or suspense; so unless you are walled into a small space yourself with only this DVD for company, I wouldn’t bother.

Best Bit : Bath Time

‘W’ Rating 11/23

No. 114 : Who Killed The Electric Car? (2006)

Who Killed the Electric Car at the IMDb

Together with entertaining, the point of a documentary has to be informing and educating its audience. If you asked any person the question posed in the film’s title they’d no doubt reply ‘oil companies?’ - and guess what - you’d be right! As an exercise in the bleedin’ obvious the film does well, but less so when the criteria is to be enlightening and informative.

When the credits show that Martin Sheen is doing the narration and that Ed Begley Jnr. is a contributor you have a good idea where the film’s leanings lie and your instinct would be correct. It’s well enough made and it keeps its sound bites short while peppering the film with interesting facts and graphics. What is also does however is give you the sense that you’re being lectured and that the conclusions were drawn long before the first camera rolled.

The arguments presented are pretty damning with the electric car seemingly killed off despite its magical abilities. Of course the oil companies and the car manufacturers are interested in making money and it is hardly surprising that they did what they could to throw a spanner in the works. With the technology more or less proven the oil industry lost interest as they still have 30 years of supplies to flog. The car makers lose out on the lucrative servicing of the dirty gas guzzlers so they have an obvious interest in the status quo.

So that fair enough then, we are in a capitalist economy and the corporations should be free to do as they please as long as it’s legal. Not so, as this film gleefully shows with endless small groups of hippy types blockading car storage facilities and boo-hooing over the crushing of their beloved, but short range cars. All the usual suspects are trotted out with the self righteousness of some of the output strong enough to power a small nation.

There were a few interesting snippets and I was at least glad to see that technology exists that will serve us when the oil goes. For now the government is in the pocket of the oil companies and the wars in the gulf keep industry turning and the backhanders rolling in. It’s clearly not right but that’s how it is and nothing short of a revolution will stop that. Well a revolution or staging a tacky mock funeral for an ugly car at a cemetery.

The film is OK as a naive distraction but if they think anything will be changed by stating the obvious or staging cheap stunts they have to be as mental as the chap who clearly enjoys sticking more than his charger into his boxy car!

Best Bit : Mel Gibson’s beard
‘W’ Rating 11/23

No. 107 : Without A Paddle : Nature’s Calling (2009)

Without a Paddle - Nature's Calling at the IMDb

It’s surprising how many crappy films earn a sequel but I was certainly taken aback that the lamentable original of this franchise managed to spawn a straight to video second helping. I saw the first ‘Paddle’ film on 19/01/2005 and immediately excised it from my memory. I remember it’s got Shaggy and Scott Evil in it and that the ending solved the DB Cooper mystery but apart from that I remember nothing.

I therefore went into ‘Nature’s Calling’ with a relatively open mind, or at least as open as it can be when it has the dreaded ‘DVD premiere’ tag affixed. Some brief research showed that none of the original stellar cast reprise their role and instead we get a cast of unknowns basically remaking the original.

The film opens in classic redemption film style with a flash back where we meet our two heroes at school when they are 14. Zach is the cool doofus type whereas Ben is the studious one who falls for a girl who soon gets expelled for campaigning for lab rats. After the titles we meet the pair in their twenties with Zach working at an old folks’ home and Ben as a corporate lawyer.

Hollywood then plays it’s unlikely hand with an elderly patient of Zach’s asking him to find her long lost grand daughter who also happens to be Ben’s unrequited love. The pair resolve to find the girl, a choice that especially suits Ben who has a pair of escaped criminals he failed to defend on his trail. As the guys ready to leave they are joined by Nigel, an annoying British step son of the dying pensioner who may have an agenda of his own.

The trio hire a raft in small town Oregon and there’s barely time for the clichéd locals to warn of the monster in the woods before they set off. As the trio set off downstream we are treated to endless ‘Deliverance’ style P.O.V. shots and no end of intrigue, I’ll be bound.

This is an awful film that deserves it’s ignominious release and poor ratings. It is clearly aimed at an adolescent market with endless planks in the balls gags allied with references to ‘wood’ and ‘shitake’ (thanks ‘Goldmember’). The quest for a teen certificate means that there is no nudity or swearing but plenty of CGI squirrel ball biting action.

The cast are uniformly dreadful with Ben the worst, a sort of Keanu Reeves without the charisma. I did have a soft spot for Nigel whom we were supposed to hate but seemed a decent guy amongst his twattish companions despite his tiring Kevin Kline impression.

The plot, as it was, was predictable throughout and every bit of skulduggery was telegraphed form several scenes earlier. There was an attempt at a wrong foot with respect to the love story but given that the characters were all interchangeable you’ll hardly notice. The big end revelation was only a surprise in retrospect as I thought that’s what the old woman meant in the first place.

The film is competently made and some of the raft scenes were well done. Darkest Oregon did look a bit like a nature garden in places however and the CGI squirrels and hummingbird were badly misjudged. I did like NFL legend Jerry Rice turning up as Al Gore’s mental and black brother but sadly his late breaking appearance failed to rescue the sinking raft.

Best Bit : Riding the rapids
'W' Rating 11/23

No.98 : Willow (1998)

Willow at the IMDb

‘Willow’ was one of the few George Lucas films that I hadn’t seen on release as I had a preconceived notion that it would be a bit cutesy pie and dull. And you know what they say about prejudging things? Yes, sometimes you’ll be right!

Lucas in fact only gets a story credit for the film with the always pedestrian Ron Howard on directing duties. The film is a Hobbit like fantasy yarn that Lucas no doubt came up with after reading some Tolkein and indeed The Bible.

Willow is a family man dwarf who lives with his similarly sized people in a wood. Things are going OK for him but elsewhere the wicked Queen, who is lifted straight from ‘Snow White’, is plotting to scupper a prophesy that predicts her downfall. A baby destined to take her throne is snatched from her mother but before she can be killed the tot is placed in a raft and sent down the river. As chance would have it lands by Willow’s village and is found by his kids. Willow tries to act as if he doesn’t want the baby but we know this is just poor performing from Warwick Davis and he’s up for extra daddy duties soon after.

When some bad guys show up looking for the chosen child Willow has to go on a predictable quest to allow the baby to fulfil its destiny. Along the way they meet lovable rogue Val Kilmer, who agrees to assist him, and various other peoples of the world including some tiny folk nicked wholesale from ‘Gulliver’s Travels’. Meanwhile the dastardly Queen sends her minions out to find our party including the unfeasibly lovely Joanne Whaley, who if she’s really bad then I’m a Dutchman.

The quest takes a predictable path with the requisite number of shots of the cast marching through the snow attained early on. As they head towards Mordor, sorry, the Queen’s Castle, they have an epic battle with a rubbish two headed plastic monster before the final showdown. Can Willow save the day and defeat the wicked Queen and still make it home to show off his new magic tricks? Probably.

I didn’t really like this film from the off and the game of ‘spot the rip off’ can only be enjoyed for so long. The set up with the lost baby was so clichéd I’m surprised that God didn’t sue for copyright. Once we have the characters and quest established you have a pretty unbroken and predictable two hour journey to the inevitable climax. You have to wonder why you bothered and I for one wish I hadn’t.

It is obviously a fantasy movie aimed at kids but films like ‘The Princess Bride’ manage to work with similar material and at least work in a few laughs for the adults and nod towards the predictability of the genre. I did quite like the Lilliputian like tiny folk but the special effects were too ropey to make them seem realistic. That and the plastic monsters suggest that Lucas failed to pony up a ‘Star Wars’ type budget and frankly it shows.

Of the cast Val and Joanne are best with a real chemistry that spilled over into real life. Kilmer especially seems to be having a good time as the lovable and hapless rogue and is almost a Jack Sparrow prototype. Warwick Davis is less good in the title role and never convinces at all. It’s certainly a tough ask of him to carry the movie and it’s one that he falls short of. To be fair the material is poor and hackneyed and some of the dialogue would have the best thesps in the world gasping for air.

‘Willow’ could have been a fun romp but instead it’s a dull retread of every fantasy film you’ve ever seen. It offers poor dialogue, rubbish special effects and a plot as straight as a pool cue. You may enjoy some of the film but those periods are as short as most of the cast.

Best Bit : Wagon chase

‘W’ Score : 11/23

No.85 : Weird Science (1985)

Weird Science at the IMDb

High school losers Gary and Wyatt are desperate to get laid, but have no chance when the school bullies pull their pants down in front of the girls’ gym class. After watching a strangely coloured version of ’Frankenstein’ they hit on the idea of creating a woman that they can, presumably, shag. Fortunately Wyatt is a spoiled child and has a computer set-up that would make NASA green with envy and programming skills that seem somewhat advanced for 1985.

After feeding in a lot of pictures into a handy slot on the computer they press ‘enter’ just as the house is hit by lightening. As movie law dictates they don’t get a blown fuse but the shapely Kelly LeBrock in small purple panties instead. I always just get an error message - bah! Despite their earlier bravado the lads are unable to take advantage of their willing cyber-babe, settling instead for a threesome in the shower with their pants on.

The digital babe, who is soon named ‘Lisa’, takes the lads out for a night on the town where they get annoyingly pished in stereotyped black bar. The boys are fitted out in fashionable gears and given fancy cars by Lisa but are still picked on by the bullies, including a fey looking Robert Downey Jnr. and Wyatt’s brother played by Bill Paxton in typically obnoxious form.

In a bid to court popularity they hold a party to impress the girls and the rest of the school, who are invited by Lisa. The house however gets wrecked by a bunch of biker mutants and by a nuclear missile conjured up when an attempt to replicate the experiment, that created Lisa, goes awry.

Can the house be fixed before the parents get back and can the lads find love out with the digital realm?




This is an awful film by John Hughes who also gave us the flawless ‘Pretty in Pink’ (unless you dislike Duckie Dale, which I do). It’s basically nerd wish fulfilment, with the pair of immature tossers getting the dream girl and all the stuff they ever wanted for the flick of a switch. Added to that they get the girls and show up the bullies and best the nasty brother. Pity the poor losers who try this for real and burn their house down and get raped in jail!

The two leads are not likable at all and the acting talent that Gary showed in the great ’Vacation’ has all but deserted him at this point. His wimpy pal is worse and his ’I love you scene’ at the end was cringeworthy. Paxton had a one dimensional role but still doesn’t convince as the bullying brother and as an actress LeBrock looks nice, but that’s it.

It may seem a bit harsh to give a kicking to a teenage romp with cut off tee-shirts and shower scenes but it really is chronic. When the lads ditch Kelly for the real life lovelies we are expected to admire their development from nerds to players, but instead it just doesn’t ring true. There are a couple of decent sequences but overall the film is morally ambiguous and more than a little misogynistic too. Not that these are necessarily bad things (!) but in the context of a teen film they’re plain wrong.

The nerd watching this at home between fits of tears would draw two conclusions - suck up to the bullies and forget your own beliefs to be accepted, and the girl that previously wouldn’t give you the time of day is worth having over Kelly because she now likes your Ferrari. Worthwhile advice there for all!

Surprisingly this tosh spawned a TV series that ran for two years and featured the even lovelier Vanessa Angel (Kingpin). I may have to investigate that too to see if the moral ambiguity has been maintained!


Best Bit : ’The Hills Have Eyes’ guy shows up

‘W’ Score : 11/23

No.75 : Where the Buffalo Roam (1980)

 Where the Buffalo Roam at the IMDb

Bill Murray stars as gonzo writer Hunter S. Thompson in this bio-pic that focuses on three episodes from his times as a journalist for Life magazine.

The film has a predictable book ending device that sees Murray at his desk with a deadline looming. Short of inspiration he thinks back to his past and the three episodes follow. We fist meet him in San Francisco in the 1960’s where he recalls the exploits of Lazlo, his lawyer, who turns up in each subsequent part. Bill sits in the courtroom as his friend defends some hippy pot smokers, unsuccessfully.

We then move to the 1972 Superbowl where Bill has a hotel suite and is fully abusing the expenses tab. He doesn’t go to the game and trades his tickets for a hat before joining Lazlo at his militia training camp.

The last part sees Bill on the campaign trail with nominee Richard Nixon. He is refused an interview but manages to get some prize quotes when he gets Odo off ‘Deep Space Nine’ high and nicks his credentials.

As the last story fades we rejoin Bill in the present with his dog and his assignment complete.

I didn’t really like this film much mainly because I didn’t like Bill Murray’s character at all. He was constantly being wacky and obstinate but came across as a total prick. You never got the impression that he was anything other than Bill Murray doing an impression, and that distraction undermined the whole film.

For a gonzo writer like Thompson the lazy framing method for the stories must have been an embarrassment and I doubt he liked being portrayed as a laconic douche bag either. Peter Boyle as Lazlo was a bit better and at least the mania from him didn’t seem forced. The other main player was an underused Bruno Kirby as Thompson’s editor who spent the whole film getting angry at missed deadlines.

The three episode format for the film did make it more digestible, but I don’t think anything was learned or developed from section to section. Lazlo was the only real connection and his part was more comic relief than essential to the stories. Of the three sections the last was best and the actor who played Richard Nixon did a pretty good job - better than Anthony Hopkins at least! This was the most fun too and saw Bill relegated form the journalist plane to the zoo plane where all the hangers on got high. And flew on it too. Boom Boom.

The opening episode was the worst with an interminable 30 minutes spent on some students getting tried for pot possession. I know it was to show how bad ‘the man’ was but it seemed a real waste of time as we joined Bill sitting casually by, watching events unfold. The middle part was ranked as such and had a few funny bits; but this was were Bill was at his most wasteful and annoying and some poor maid will have to clean that up.

I hadn’t heard of this film before, and it was a lot more accessible than the other Hunter bio-pic ‘Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas’, but it’s poor lead performance let it down along with the dull predictable script.

Best Bit Tricky Dickie in the toilet
‘W’ Score 11/23

No.58 : Wolf (1994)

 Wolf at the IMDb

On the way home from clinching a book deal in Vermont Jack Nicholson smashes his Volvo into a jaywalking wolf. Rather than drive off or hit it with a tyre iron he goes to see if it’s OK, and gets bitten for his trouble.

He quickly notices changes in himself such as hairy hands and improved vision and hearing. Just as well really, as his firm is being taken over and his job is on the line. He learns he is to be marginalized by new owner Christopher Plummer’s incoming regime, that sees slimy subordinate James Spader promised Jack’s job. At a party at the boss’ house, where he learns his fate, he meets Plummer’s daughter the slightly dull Michelle Pfeiffer.

Whereas he‘d have previously accepted his fate, he goes on the attack and threatens to take all the good authors from the firm and upset the stock price. Impressed by this Plummer agrees to Jack‘s demands while Jack himself is starting to lose time and wake up covered in blood. Suspecting something wolfy is going on, Jack meets up with an aged expert and begins to harness his new powers. When he finds his wife is seeing Spader he gives him a bite and her the boot, but things go pear shaped when the wife turns up dead.

The police suspect Jack but he was in bed with Michelle at the time of the killing - or was he? As the police move in we discover who the killer is and who else has the hairy hands syndrome. Can Jack find the happiness that he’s being denied in the non-lupine world?




‘Wolf’ is an OK distraction but it is so predictable and derivative that I wouldn’t recommend it. The plot essentially follows that of ‘An American Werewolf in London’ with the midnight hunts and enhanced senses all present and correct. I liked the idea of his new found talents being transferred to the dog eat dog business world but this wasn’t developed in favour of the dull romantic angle.





The big reveal at the end was seen a mile off and the whole thing was unsatisfying. The transformation scenes were very poor with yellow contacts and big side boards being all we get. The wolves can jump great heights but this just looked like basic wire work.

Nicholson is always watchable but this definitely falls into the playing himself category. There was no chemistry with Pfeiffer, and Spader just played his usual slime bag character. You do get some Cybil Fawlty for your money, so it’s not all bad.

‘Wolf’ offers nothing new in an already cluttered genre and you have to wonder why they bothered.Not to worry it’s finished nowooooo!

Best Bit :Michelle’s short skirt bitch fight
‘W’ Rating : 11/23

No.45 : Watermelon Man (1970)

Watermelon Man at the IMDb


Jeff Gerber is a white middle aged insurance broker who lives with his wife and two kids in an affluent white suburb. He works out every morning and gets his kicks racing the bus to the office, to the annoyance of his fellow commuters. He is also a little bit of a racist. Not in a Ku Klux Klan sense, but he likes ribbing the black bus drivers and lift attendants that they may be rioters and gun toting hoods.

He is somewhat surprised when he wakes up as a black man, almost as much as his wife, who although sympathetic to blacks is less keen to be married to one. Initially Jeff is in denial and tries all sorts of potions to bleach himself white again. He also consults his doctor and thinks of suing the company who made his sun lamp.

He soon accepts the situation and has to learn to live with the sort of prejudices that he once ladled out. Things come to a head when he starts to get threatening phone calls and then a delegation from the neighbourhood requesting he leave lest their house prices suffer. It’s not all bad, as the previously standoffish Swedish secretary becomes a lot more sociable when Jeff gets some colour.

With his wife leaving him and the neighbours buying him out of his home Jeff decides to move on with his life and embrace his new heritage.

If you don’t get the message behind this film you have clearly underwent a frontal lobotomy. The characters are all such vivid shades of black and white, pun intended, that you can’t but fail to see that racism is a bad thing. When we meet Jeff he’s an amiable and likable soul but our goodwill is soon eroded as he encounters people of colour. He’s not bad as such, just crass and ignorant. When he transforms the boot is on the other foot and Whitey, to a man and woman, becomes a total bigot. It's kinda like a bit racist to say all white people are racist, isn’t it?

The film’s agenda from the off is pretty clear, and it isn’t that we’re all equal, it’s that black people are downtrodden and the whites are all bastards. This may have been fair currency when the film was made in 1970 but now it seems stupid and offensive.

There is no reason given for the transformation, although repressed genes and soy sauce are mooted as possibilities. Like ’Groundhog Day’ you just have to accept that’s how things are and not bother looking for a reason. The ‘white’ Jeff looks a bit odd and it’s obvious from the off that it’s the black actor ‘whited up’. There was probably no other way to make the film but it is certainly no surprise when the big reveal takes place after 20 minutes - the guy just looks the same. Maybe that’s the hidden message!

There were a few funny scenes such as the black Jeff walking into a shop and the assistant immediately sticking his hands up. It was also funny when Jeff went on his usual run only to be stopped by cops asking what he’s stolen.

Apart from the odd laugh the film’s message is too relentless to call this entertainment, and the jaded one sided viewpoint turned me off entirely. Jeff seems to accept his position with no trouble at all and by the end he’s training up for a revolution. If the message had been one of integration and acceptance the film would have been a lot more worthwhile. As it was it came across as bitter, nasty and just a little racist itself.

Best Bit : Chasing the bus
‘W’ Score 11/23