No. 352 : Willy's Wonderland (2021)

 

Willy's Wonderland at the IMDb

I found this soon to be cult classic on Amazon Prime and have to say that, despite myself, I actually quite enjoyed it. The film stars Nicholas Cage and appears to be from his ‘filmed in an afternoon to pay the tax bill’ phase. Its budget is listed as a lowly $5m and it was sponsored by the Malaysian film industry to the tune of 30%, which is confirmed by the credits list that suggest most of the post production was carried out overseas.

With a foreign backer to appease the film took the bold decision to have its star have literally no lines of dialogue whatsoever - I imagine that saved plenty on the dubbing costs alone. Apart from a few grunts Cage has nothing to say at all, and if the intention was ‘mysterious’ it came across as ‘constipated’.

Cage plays ’The Janitor’ a drifter, who for unexplained reasons, has a high end sports car. He drives through a small town when he hits a spike trap on the road causing a low end come to a stop - no budget for a big smash here. We quickly learn that this is small town movie cliché number one, with corrupt officials and police putting their well used plan into action. Cage doesn’t have the money for car repairs but a local businessman makes him a strange offer - clean up the abandoned fun house overnight and the $1000 repairs will be covered. Sounds like a good deal? HUGE mistake.

Whilst Cage gets his mops and brushes organised, we have a side plot with a bunch of high school kids who are plotting to burn down the titular fun house. These are your typical teen slasher fodder and I don’t think a single one registered with me. 

Despite having no lines, Cage does show character depth - he drinks a can of energy drink every hour and plays pinball, even when fighting off a hoard of rampaging animatronic characters. Yes, the fun house is inhabited by 8 mascots all of whom have murderous intent. In a large info dump from the sheriff, we learn that the fun house was owned and staffed by a bunch of child killers. When the game was up they carried out a ritual suicide which caused their spirits to inhabit the mechanical fun house hosts, like you do.

The robots were the best bit of the film with a good mix of creepy and exaggerated clown features with various animals and creatures depicted like a crocodile, woodland nymph and the titular Willy the stoat himself. As you’d expect the bad guys gamely line up for individual battle with Cage whilst their contemporaries take out the kids. We learn that the townsfolk lure in strangers to appease the bad guy spirits, lest they once again return to the town to seek their prey there. They should have called Cage in the first place, because as The Janitor, he quickly cleans house.

I was setting up to dislike this film. The opening has a lot of fast edits and has a washed out sepia tone. The gimmick of having Cage not speaking quickly wears thin and there are a lot of awkward scenes were a line of dialogue would move things on, whereas we get Cage looking awkwardly for a way out instead. His character and motivation are wafer thin but the fight scenes are decent and brutal with no time wasted with complicated explanations or justifications. The teens could have been wearing t-shirts marked ‘Fodder’ and their fates would have been no less obvious. Down the cast you’ll recognise no one apart from the lady sheriff who has a few decent credits, but was trying too hard to channel Darlene out of ‘Ozark’ to be effective here.

Overall this was a throwaway piece of nonsense that had just enough to keep me interested. The violence is fun and extreme and it demands nothing in terms of your attention or powers of deduction. The animatronics were well realised although it was clear that it was people in costumes for the fights and they weren’t as tough as invulnerable as the locals would have you believe. Guess you just need to hire the right janitor to take out the trash!

Best Bit : Need a new t-shirt

'W' Rating 15/23

No.326 : White Cargo (1942)

White Cargo at the IMDb

It’s the present day (well it was in 1942) and a young man is starting work at a rubber plantation in Africa. The office is clean and has air conditioning. 'It wasn’t always like this' says the aging boss as the film dissolves back to the frontier days of 1910.

 

A small group of British rubber workers manage a large plantation and many native workers as they fight the climate, lack of women and disease. The booze soaked doctor wanders about stealing folks’ whiskey and plantation manager Walter Pidgeon is being driven bonkers by the endless steam of young trainees sent to help, who all ask about the hunting and the friendliness of the natives.

 

New man Langford is appalled by the sloppy operation and vows to set a good example by not drinking and shaving every day. His pith helmet and lack of language skills amuse the natives and his plant rearing skills leave a lot to be desired.

 

After half an hour of them floundering about we meet the star attraction - native woman  Tondelayo, played by Hedy Lamar. Tondelayo has a bit of a reputation, possibly as a Hollywood star blacked up as a native, as her hair and make up is always perfect despite the humid jungle conditions and the seeming lack of a hairdressers. Her English is poor and she refers to herself in the third person - ‘Tondelayo like silk and trinkets’. This quickly gets old but Langford is soon mesmerised by her bra top and willingness to please.

 

The other men at the plant, who look to have had their own share of encounters with the naughty native, try to warn him off but soon the pair are married. A few months pass and Tondelayo is bored - will she take ‘till death do us part’ literally and will Pidgeon’s local law mete out a fitting punishment for her? Maybe a trip back to the present day will reveal all!

 

I quite liked the first half hour of this film which saw a bunch of character actors all bicker and offer up a few laughs. Lamarr certainly brightened things up when she arrived but her annoying speech pattern and unlikely look took any realism out of the film and you just knew she was going to screw over the first sucker to give her the time of day.

 

Fair enough she was a cracker, and the jungle didn’t have a lot of options, but it seemed extreme for someone to offer her marriage despite her still asking for tat in the midst of a proposal. Still that’s women for you!

 

I liked Walter Pidgeon best as the Clark Gable like plant manager who was going slowly mad though the heat and tedium of his role. The familiar part of the dipso doc was well executed by Frank Morgan but I was less convinced by the love struck Richard Carlson.

 

The film had good locations and, although I doubt they navigated the Congo for the sets, there was a good sweaty and uncomfortable vibe about the whole affair. If they had made Tondelayo a bit more convincing it would have been a better film but I guess they knew their market and Hedy in a bra for an hour guaranteed success.

 

 

A fun oddity which will probably be buried forever more due to it’s use of black face and indigenous worker abuse - and rightly so!

 

Best Bit : Acclimatise! ‘W’ rating 14/23

 

No.314 : What They Had (2018)

What They Had at the IMDb

I listened to a good Nerdist podcast with Michael Shannon recently, and thought I’d have a look at what he’s been up to. He was aces in ‘Boardwalk Empire’ and in ‘The Shape of Water’ and clearly likes to keep himself busy. We have looked at two of his more recent endeavours over at the Definite Article blog in the shape of ‘The Quarry’ and ‘The Harvest’ with this 2018 film representing his latest ‘W’ offering. Can’t say he doesn’t provide for his audience!

The film is a family drama about the onset of Alzheimer's in the elderly mother. Don’t run away - at least that’s what they should have told the old girl who goes for a wander in the middle of the night in a Chicago snow storm.

Her husband Robert Forster calls his local bar owing son Michael Shannon who in turn calls the daughter Hilary Swank. They manage to find the old lady but realise that they have problems to address. Shannon wants the old bird moved into a home as he bears the brunt of looking after his agent parents and is struggling to cope. Forster and Swank however want her to stay at home. Catholic Forster is committed to his marriage and the vows he made. His children are less devout and fear telling dad that they have lapsed.

Of course everyone has to have their own issues so Swank is in a loveless marriage and has a wayward daughter who is dropping out of college and Shannon craves acceptance from his Dad who doesn’t like his life choices. A right old barrel of laughs then!

In truth there are plenty of wry moments, usually from the forgetful mother who starts hitting on her son and tries to answer a stapler when the phone rings. As the family bump together over the Christmas holidays some home truths are aired and everyone grows somewhat, as Mum’s fate is decided.

I liked this film despite it being a ‘problem people’ cookie cutter special. Blyth Danner did well as the bewildered Mum although a lot of her escapades seemed a bit unlikely and scripted. There was no self fouling or losing her bus pass just little comedy moments where we could  sympathise and empathise all at once. Swank was good was the daughter although she seems a bit fit and focused to be the mess she was portraying. She did however have a funny sequence where she awkwardly flirts with a builder whilst wearing her mother’s blouse and drinking Scotch.

Shannon was also worth the ticket as the son, although his redemption was probably the slightest, with his Dad drinking at his bar his only win - hope he left a tip.Forster, in one of his last performances, was excellent as the struggling husband unable to keep a grasp of his true love as she faded away.

Overall a difficult subject was explored with humour and warmth and, although you may come away thinking it worked out a bit pat, at least it wasn't two hours of shouting at the man in the tree whilst wearing a nappy. Maybe that's being saved for the sequel.

Best Bit : Hilary works the builder  ‘W’ Rating  17/23

No.313 : What If (2013)

What If at the IMDb

First world problems now as a group of attractive 30 somethings try to navigate the exciting world of relationships in this likeable comedy drama.

Harry Potter himself stars as Wallace, a medical school drop out who found his girlfriend had cheated on him, just as his parents had on each other. Not surprisingly he’s cynical about relationships but feels a spark when he meets Chantry, a cute animator whose illustrations pop up throughout the film. She does that annoying thing of mentioning her boyfriend a lot, but we suspect that the pair will get together because, you know, films.

Wallace has a flatmate in the shape of Adam Driver who gives out terrible advice. He has a girlfriend and is a cousin of Chantry and is against the ‘incestuous’ proto-relationship - but he’s not really.

Our dream couple enter the friend zone and find out they have a lot in common such as Elvis sandwiches and going to the pictures on their own. Chantry is torn when her boyfriend’s job takes him to Dublin for a year and she spends more time with the puppy dog Potter. After some initial shyness, when she makes him close his eyes before helping her off with a dress, they soon graduate to full on skinny dipping.

A few obstacles fall into our heroes' paths but can they get together before the film ends? You bet!

I’m always a sap for a romantic comedy and this was no exception. Harry was good in the lead doing his self effacing Englishman part. He has some good lines and a cynical outlook - I like his reply ‘Nothing’s too slutty for you’ when Chantry asked if her a dress made her look easy.

It was good that the boyfriend wasn’t portrayed as a total dick with only a small hint that he may have been cheating on Chantry. Potter did come across as a bit of a creep when relegated to the friend zone and I imagine in real life the girl would just have had him collecting her dry cleaning forever more in the outside hope he may get a drunken fumble one day.

As always Adam Driver, the best thing in the film with our blog enjoying his recent outing in While We're Young. He was clearly deserving of a big break and it’s just a shame it came in those lamentable 'Star Wars’ films. In this he was very much a supporting character but I always enjoyed his scenes which were usually full of some outrageous patter and advice.

Zoe Kazan was good as Chantry although her character was a bit annoying. It was like she kept engineering ways to avoid the inevitable. The fall out scene at the café was classic ‘pain in the arse’ woman and why Potter went back for another try can only be explained by her looking cute in her undies.

If you are looking for surprises or even some sex and violence, you won’t find it here. I could see this film having a large following amongst those looking for a way to be more than just good friends with the option of their affections. Still a chance!

There was no peril and no doubt as to how things would turn out but that’s not what the film aspired to. Get them matched up in 100 minutes and it’s warm feelings all round - Romanticanus!

Best Bit : Beach Party  16/23

No.264 : Wild Bill (2011)

Wild Bill at the IMDb

No, no it’s not a reprise of  'W' Movie 165 'Wild Bill', the Bill Hickok biopic. This is a gritty British drama with more swearing and fewer cows.

This ‘Wild Bill’ dates from 2011 and was directed by Dexter Fletcher of ‘Press Gang’ fame. It is a bit grim and urban but there is a lot to like, not least a smattering of familiar faces on various stages of their career trajectories.

We meet the titular Bill as he’s being released from Prison after an 8 years stretch for drugs, G.B.H. - you name it. We follow his long trip home from his cell on the Isle of Wight to his horrible flat in a London sink estate. His two sons Dean 15, and Jimmy 11, have been coping on their own for the nine months since Mum ran off with a fancy man to Spain. They are not best pleased to let Dad back in the flat and only acquiesce when forced to do so by the local villains. There ruffians expect Bill to come back to his drug dealing patch, and to seal the deal they get him plastered and a date with the fetching Roxie.

Dean is providing for the family and working as a labourer off the books. Jimmy, who has a bit of the stage school about him, is going off the rails; dogging school and smashing windows. Bill soon sees what he’s missed and resolves to be a good Dad. In no time flat he’s cooking dinner and cleaning the bog.

Dean’s fledgling romance with hairdresser Steff  is stalled by the theft of some money and Jimmy tries to help the family by being a lookout for the drugs gang. Sadly when the cops come calling he trashes the gear and is now in debt to the drug barons.

Bill meanwhile gets a £3 an hour job holding up a sign and soon has the cash to buy his son a hooker for his birthday (it’s Roxy again!) and plates up a mean shepherd’s pie. The kids start to recognise his effort but Jimmy‘s drug debt will see them all have some troubled times before they can start playing happy families. Or gin rummy for that matter. Will this be a story of redemption or was Bill damned before he got off the ferry?

Despite myself I enjoyed this latest instalment of Alan Partridge’s ‘Bad Slags'. The characters are uniformly horrible but you can’t hep to warm to them as they try to make the best of their terrible existences. Charlie Creed-Mills is great as the hapless Bill. He’s painted as a legendary nutter from the start and it’s fun seeing him follow a worthwhile path, as we know it's going to end with him kicking off. I recognised him from ‘Harry Brown’ and I’m pretty sure the same pub was in that too - maybe they come as a package?

Of the sons the older one Dean played by Will Poulter was better and you’ll know him from the recent interactive ‘Black Mirror’, ‘Bandersnatch. He was in the Narnia films too, but I’ve only seen the first one and don’t remember him. He spends a lot of the film scowling but does look made up when the hairdresser takes her top off.

For your money you also get two scenes of Andy Serkiss as a pointless drug lord and Liz White off ‘Life on Mars’ as the ‘hooker with a heart’, Roxy. In addition Ramsay Bolton comes on and does his mad eye shtick - keep working on that your time will come! Needless to say Sean Petwee also shows up as is the legal requirement of any film make in the UK. This time he helps out by only showing up in one scene and he reuses his copper’s costume from ‘Alpha Papa’. Oh, and as a bonus you also get Miss Cross off ‘Rushmore’ as Bill’s ineffectual parole officer.

The direction and pace of the film were well handled and I like the long montage of how drugs were packaged and distributed in the estate. It was a bit like ‘Breaking Bad’. Wait a minute, it was exactly like ‘Breaking Bad’!

The film builds towards an inevitable climax and, to be honest, it was the only part that I felt short-changed by. Our man was summoned to the pub for a showdown with a mental drugs gang, What followed was a bit limp and I don’t think the build up got the pay off it deserved. That said, it was well enough made and I had enough invested in the characters for me to enjoy the overall package.

All the main characters enjoyed something of an arc and, although nothing was resolved, we still have hope for the future. Can’t ask for much more than that!

W Rating 18/23 Best Bit : You don’t get that at my hairdresser’s!

No.189 : Widow on the Hill (2005)

Widow on the Hill at the IMDb

Made for TV true crime drama next - you can accuse us of cherry picking here at the 'W' Movie Blog.

Natasha Henstridge stars as Linda, the titular widow who is a nurse with a penchant for low cut tops. The film has the narrative device of a TV show interviewing Linda as she faces a murder charge. The story is then told in flashback with occasional cuts to the present day as the interview develops. We learn from the off that Linda has been accused of killing her new husband, James Brolin.

We meet James in livelier times as a wealthy landowner whose wife is dying. He hires a nurse from an agency and gets Natasha - Bingo! James’ daughters don’t like the new lady in their Dad’s life and worry she’s a gold digger. Pretty soon James’ wife shuffles off and in no time Natasha is in the wife’s fur coat and in his bed. Her sexy style turns the old man’s head and she’s married to him in no time flat.

His daughters however fail to be won over especially as the new wedding ring is the one mum promised to her daughter. The lovely Natasha starts to woo her way into the county set but we all know she’s after his cash - or is she? Have we been seduced by the evil schemer or does she really just have a taste for James’ silver locks and outdoorsy style?

It’s not long before she starts shagging the staff and threatening the family - can this total bitch get away with ruining the family and inheriting the house?

This was a decent enough TV drama but there wasn’t too much to recommend it apart from Natasha running about in a fetching black bra and panties set. Her character was thinly drawn and we knew she was a wrong ‘un from the off with her scheming and manipulating. She didn’t offer much that would garner our sympathies and although she was set up to be a villain she just came across as a bit of a bitch.

Brolin is always likeable but he lacked believability as the rich sucker being drawn in by feminine wiles. His two suspicious daughters were just annoying and the supposedly drunk one didn’t look like she'd ever had as much as a sweet sherry.

The narrative device of the news show was a decent stab at keeping us guessing with the story being broken down to small chunks, with the present day Linda commenting on the events we’d just seen. There was no prospect of any surprises however with Brolin’s fate sealed before we met him. The script was so biased against the slutty wife that we knew the outcome early on but it was good fun to see how evil she could get while wearing a succession of bras.

It was a strange choice to have the whole film build up to the trial and then cover the court action itself with a couple of on screen captions. Maybe they ran out of cash or indeed underwear.

The production values were decent enough but it was essentially a family drama set in a small town so it didn’t need a Death Star or cast of thousands. It wasn’t anything to rave about but it’s certainly worth a look if you catch it on late night TV.

‘W’ Score 15/23

No.161 : Whip It (2009)

Whip It at the IMDb

After the ‘girl power’ frenzy that was ‘While She Was Out’ I approached this film with some misgivings seeing as it was written by a lady and directed by Drew Barrymore. As you’d suspect the ‘go girl’ element is high and all the male characters are thinly drawn but it was a pleasant, if slightly familiar distraction.

Ellen Page, late of ‘Juno’ stars as a student and part time waitress who is under the thumb of her overbearing mother who thinks that her two daughters should follow in her footsteps and enter beauty pageants. Clearly our girl is more of a free spirit and after finding a flyer for an all girl roller derby match she decides to go along with her friend to see if there are any ‘cute guys’.

Of course there are and before we know it our little shrew is trying out for the team and having awkward soppy moments with a louche dude who has a band and interesting hair. The roller derby team , ‘The Hurl Scouts’ dress like mobile hookers and generally slap each other about a lot - no wonder there is no shortage of guys. The teams plays against the same five teams and we soon meet the baddie team ‘The Holly Rollers’ and their evil leader played by Juliette Lewis, reprising her bad girl routine from ‘Starsky & Hutch’.

Despite falling over a lot at the trials and looking about twelve our heroine gets on the team after lying about her age. Meanwhile romance is blossoming with the douche bag and he even gets to see her lacy bra and a souvenir in her ‘Stryper’ t-shirt. The roller derby team are usually last but with their new star player they soon start rising up the league.

Before we know it it’s time for all the clichés to set in with the championship game and the mother / daughter beauty pageant taking place the same night. Who will she choose? Will they win and what event? Has the dick weed boyfriend given away her t-shirt? It’s all so immaterial you might find yourself caring.

I actually quite liked this film although I’d be hard pressed to say why. But let’s try.

For one the sport was quite fun. I’d heard of but never seen a roller derby and it looks pretty gruesome. I wasn’t totally sold on the action scenes but they had the standard device of a funny commentator to explain things to the slow people. The team was your usual mix of sassy characters with a smart quip and some bonding never far away. At least the skirts where short and the school girl blouses tight.

The directing by Drew Barrymore was OK but I’d like to have seen a bit of the fat trimmed as nearly two hours for a formulaic rites of passage / sports film is a bit too long. There were a couple of good scenes with the one in the swimming pool nice and touching without being too letchy about a 17 year old.

The cast were all pretty good with Ellen Page almost convincing as a hell cat skater. At one point she does a tiny jump over one person and everyone is like ‘whoa Evel Kinevil here’ although not very convincingly. Barrymore couldn’t resist a small role in the team too but she was looking a bit long in the tooth for the short skirt and coloured hair - more like someone’s granny who forgot her pills.

Over all the film was a forgettable bit of fluff. It did have some indie sensibilities and was almost a hybrid of ‘Little Miss Sunshine’ and ‘Rollerball’ but not enough to spark the imagination or get me pulling on my skates.

As Devo didn’t say Whip It - Quite Good.

Best Bit : I’m wearing my best bra
‘W’ Rating 15/23