For anyone expecting a car film in the vein of “Vanishing Point,” they’re bound to be ridiculously disappointed. For “Two Lane Blacktop” is much more about the journey and the thrill of being a racer as it is about races. This is not “The Fast and the Furious” that revolves around hot women and fast cars, but more about two journeymen and their young aid who engage in endless travels from town to town in a world ruled by law and order. James Taylor is the Driver a fast talking back dealing con man on the road with his hot rod and his two cohorts who constantly are on the look out for a new challenge. When they reach their destination, they scope out potential rivals, deal them in to a big race, and collect their rewards. On the way the three folks in their car are looking for something: a purpose.
Tag Archives: Drama
Dark Blue: The Complete First Season (DVD)
I wish I could have loved “Dark Blue,” I really do, but as I’ve learned over the many many years of television addiction, finding an entertaining show about police officers working against the conventions of the law is often about as fun as watching paint dry. “Dark Blue” truly tries for grit and edge but is often much too polished to buy such a pitch. TNT has pretty much banked on creating television series that are just branches off of more successful franchises and “Dark Blue” is a mix of “The Shield” with some “CSI” for good measure. While it does make its money on being a procedural, it also manages to have an actual arc to it.
The She-Beast (1965)
I’m still trying to figure out if Michael Reeves’ 1966 quasi-creature feature is an unintentional satire, or just an overrated piece of cult cotton candy that gets more credit than it deserves. It was tough to make heads or tails of this movie at times, and you can sense the writer going off the rails in many instances where he just didn’t seem to be able to grasp his own premise. Why would it take bullets to bring down a witch that was around during the eighteenth century? Why bullets of all things? It’s tough to really capture what the film is going for when it purports to be an honest to goodness horror film and then shows a title card reading “Transylvania – Today.” Seriously? That’s the best that they could do?
Emily in the A.M. (2010)
Director Daniel Brown conducts his short drama much in the vein of Scorsese’s underrated gem “After Hours” in which he uses the exploits of a midnight stroll through the city experiencing various exploits with wackos and locals as a form of our character exploring something about themselves. Alison Strycharz gives a very somber and heartfelt performance as the lovelorn Emily, a young girl whose own undoing may be her inability to take a hint and as such becomes a pariah in her own relationship. Confronting her boyfriend one night after an attempt to spend time with him, Emily moves out on her own in to a new city and finds herself incapable of moving on with her life. There, she does anything to pass the time and wallowing in her own memories with him that may all just be lies she told herself to sleep easily at night.
Edge of Darkness (2010) (DVD)
Based on the critically acclaimed BBC Mini series, director Martin Campbell’s revenge thriller is a hefty mixing of genres that begins as a family drama, continues on as a revenge action film and ends as a conspiracy mystery where Mel Gibson is able to shine yet again as grieving single father Thomas Craven. Possessing a passable and forgivable Boston accent, Gibson as Craven is a man whose life has garnered him a distance from his only living family member, his daughter Emma. Noticeably disturbed and ill, Emma and Thomas re-connect and attempt to seal their relationship but all fate is sealed when a sick Emma is shot outside of Thomas’ house by a masked gunman. Working outside the law, Thomas decides that there is much more to the murder than meets the eye, and he begins unraveling a mystery that is beyond anything he could have imagined.
Valentine's Day (2010)
What with director Richard Curtis’s “Love Actually” becoming a bonafide crowd pleasing classic featuring an ensemble of the greatest British actors around with the heavy theme of love conquering all, it was only a matter of time until American studios decided that Americans needed their own love themed ensemble classic, in spite of the fact that most people who love “Love Actually” don’t mind that it’s British. Nevertheless not ones to just stand back and let the Brits have the love, “Valentine’s Day” is a two hour Hallmark card, one that doesn’t enlist the best American cast, but the hottest, with the newest and most in vogue engaging in their own mini-plots vested in the themes of the exploitative of holidays: “Valentine’s Day.”
Knock 'Em Dead Kid (2009)
Director Christopher L. Golon’s coming of age drama could very well be mistaken for your average mumblecore flick that is storming independent film festivals of late. With a gritty realistic sense of direction, dialogue flows from the cast with startling energy. “Knock ‘Em Dead Kid” almost feels like something specifically tailor made of the more high brow festivals. While I did appreciate Mr. Golon’s appreciation for naturalism and depicting the reality of everyday monotony, he’s often much too obsessed with staging sleek scenes and character interaction to bring us on course for the actual story which involves protagonist Bret realizing that he’s outgrowing his friends and must move on and grow up. Channeling the likes of Larry Clark, director Golon follows these individuals around town as they walk around, chatter endlessly about their sexual preferences and engage in sexual activities with their lady friends.
The movie sets up a particular conundrum as its progresses as when we’re focused on Bret interacting with his friends he’s natural and down to Earth, but when we finally get to key scenes involving his development, especially one where a party guest approaches and flirts with him, the dialogue is noticeably stifled and stilted. The actors overplay their roles too strongly, and they never feel like they’re genuinely interacting, just going through the motions for Golon’s dialogue, and it restrains an otherwise potentially engrossing little slice of life. While I’m sure there are reasons for it, Golon never quite manages to stage the more important scenes in the movie well enough. If two characters are interacting he keeps one off frame, he sloppily cuts back and forth, and there isn’t a lot of dynamic when they’re being confronted.
Especially in the scene where Bret is approached by a cop questioning him about the beating he and his friends gave one of their rivals the night before. The ultimate weight on Bret is downplayed considerably as he never seems to be really disturbed about the fact that the cops may be on to his part in the beating which could mean definite jail time, and when he does obsess over it, he seems very calm as does his girlfriend who plays it off instead of offering the idea that what he did was horrible whether it was justified or not. There are elements that are unusual like the weird cutting away from Bret and his girlfriend to a montage when they’re discussing the incident in the beginning of the film. And of course there’s the female antagonist threatening to turn Bret over to infidelity which ultimately feels arbitrary and present just to create obligatory conflict in a story that already has a hefty portion of it.
I was never sure where to stand with Bret so I wasn’t positive if I should root him on or just wait for his downfall. Was he having trouble grasping his maturity and responsibilities or was he just a grade A prick? I juxtaposed the premise here with that of “Saturday Night Fever” and with some tweaking, Golon could have the same story with the same power. In the aforementioned film you could sense Tony Manero trapped in irresponsibility and stupidity to the point where he’d had enough and decided to grow up, but with Bret, I could never figure out what he had in mind and what he wanted to do with himself. Golon has on his hands a script that could work given better circumstances.
It’s a story with themes that requires actors with much more presence, and emotional turmoil and they sadly don’t deliver such promise in key sequences that should have been turbulent but are otherwise haphazardly conducted and rendered irrelevant to the overall result of Bret’s situation. While not a waste of time, “Knock ‘Em Dead Kid” isn’t as good as it has the possibility to be, and I hope Golon tries again with this premise in the future. Director Christopher L. Golon has the right idea and the right themes present for a movie that combines Larry Clark and classic mumblecore for a potentially great coming of age drama, but sadly its lack of focus, wonky editing, and uneven acting drown out most of its promise. It’s not the worst effort I’ve ever seen, but it can be so much more with a tightened second cut.