Drama

Purple Rain (1984)

Starring Prince, Apollonia Kotero, Morris Day, Clarence Williams III, Jerome Benton, Jill Jones, Wendy Melvoin, Lisa Coleman, Bobby ‘Z’ Rivkin, Matt Fink, Brown Mark

Directed by Albert Magnoli

Expectations: Moderate.

As much as I love Prince — and let me tell you: I LOVE PRINCE! — I really wasn’t looking forward to re-watching Purple Rain. I saw it “not too long ago,” which to me is about two years ago. I usually wait longer than that, as I’m the type of person to just forge ahead and watch movies I’ve never seen before. Despite this bias, re-watching Purple Rain offered a lot more entertainment than I had expected it would. I knew the live footage was dope, and nothing has changed that. But what I didn’t count on was achieving a new respect for the story that Purple Rain tells.

On the surface, Purple Rain is a vanity project, an extended music video, a way to broaden Prince’s fan base. But what those distinctions don’t explain are the multiple instances of domestic violence and the other complex themes present. These themes show that a simple extended music video was not Prince’s intention at all. The story connecting his songs is challenging and fraught with emotional distress. It’s an incredibly bold move, and a lesser artist couldn’t have pulled it off. Can you imagine if the Justin Bieber movie had the balls to do something like that? Purple Rain is so much more than an extended music video, it’s also an experimental musical drama that achieves everything it sets out to. In today’s day where the studios are more worried about offending someone than creating something truly unique, Prince’s Purple Rain stands out as a true piece of art.

It’s Totally Perfect!

MOV_55b8ce66_b Today many movies are for entertainment and are not classically great. I believe a great movie is one that you can’t get enough of; you just have to watch it over and over again. The movie Perfect falls under the “great” category. Usually movies are categorized into one or two genres, but Perfect takes the cake and slices its way into three categories: drama, comedy, and romance. Too bad sexy isn’t a genre. Perfect is a great movie because it manages to capture a time period with its awesome history, radical setting, and bitchin’ acting. When we think of films rooted in history we often think Schindler’s List or Hotel Rwanda, but not Perfect. Perfect is, however, based upon a series of articles by journalist Aaron Latham that appeared in Rolling Stone magazine in the ’70s and ’80s.

The movie’s two main characters are Adam Lawrence (John Travolta), a writer for Rolling Stone, and Jessie (Jamie Lee Curtis), a fitness instructor for The Sports Connection. The movie begins with Adam trying to persuade his boss Mark (Jann Wenner, real-life founder and editor of Rolling Stone) to send him to Los Angeles to get an interview with a notorious mobster. Mark agrees to send Adam to California with the stipulation that Adam will simultaneously write a story about fitness clubs becoming the new “singles’ bars” in California.

In the ’80s, the health and fitness craze was in full swing. Bally’s Total Fitness, Richard Simmons, Olivia Newton John’s Let’s Get Physical, and Nike’s Just Do It campaign were all introduced. The Sports Connection was a legendary institution, considered a main hub of America’s newfound obsession with StairMasters, dance aerobics, and sweatbands. It was the first club to give its members the total package, offering healthy foods, juice bars, instructor-led training sessions, and a place where singles could meet other singles. Although the film is not historical in the traditional sense, it captures the essence of the sun-soaked, sweat-drenched California of the eighties. The beaches, palm trees, roller skating, and overall California vibe are a constant backdrop, not to mention the blatant sexuality of living in California during the height of the fitness craze. Jessie also represents the archetypical fitness instructor, wearing leg warmers, headbands, tights, and leotards throughout the film. When a movie is able to weave non-fictional events into a fictional framework, there is much more substance.

Perfect (1985)

Starring John Travolta, Jamie Lee Curtis, Jann Wenner, Marilu Henner, Laraine Newman, Anne De Salvo, Mathew Reed

Directed by James Bridges

Expectations: High.

I think it’s clichéd to open up with some variation of “Perfect was perfect!” but for what it was, Perfect was kinda perfect. Modern viewers are never going to understand what makes Perfect so exciting and entertaining; they’ll be lost in the sea of skin-tight, multicolored leotards and shaking asses. But where those modern viewers might call Perfect‘s dated and very ’80s vibe a bad thing, this was exactly what made it so enjoyable to me. It reminded me of my childhood when the aerobics craze was sweeping the nation, with hype so huge I thought aerobics had only just been invented. How proud I was at six years old to live in a time when we had discovered this new, fun way to tone our bodies.

Perfect tells the story of Adam Lawrence (John Travolta), a reporter for Rolling Stone who’s working on a huge story surrounding the investigation of a business man accused of shady dealings. While on an interview for this story, he happens to spot some 20-somethings heading for the gym in their wonderful ’80s aerobic wear. One article pitch later and Travolta is investigating the health club singles’ scene at The Sports Connection in LA, and ogling a furiously gyrating Jamie Lee Curtis.

New Fist of Fury (1976)

New Fist of Fury [新精武門] (1976)
AKA Fists to Fight

Starring Jackie Chan, Nora Miao, Chan Sing, Henry Luk Yat-Lung, Yi Ming, Suen Lam, Lau Ming, Cheng Siu-Siu, Hon Siu, Han Ying Chieh, Chiang Kam, Liu Ping

Directed by Lo Wei

Expectations: Moderate.

New Fist of Fury opens with Lo Wei helping Nora Miao and the remnants of the Ching Wu school to flee Japanese-occupied Shanghai, by way of a boat to the also Japanese-occupied Taiwan. That might seem like it’s not the best place to find refuge, but Nora Miao specifically wants to go there to show the Japanese what for. There they meet a delinquent thief (Jackie Chan) who mistakenly steals Bruce’s nunchaku, thus getting himself wrapped up in the middle of a Chinese vs. Japanese martial arts struggle.

During my super passionate Jackie Chan years, I always did my best to avoid his early films. I got burned a couple of times and there’s nothing worse for a budding, teenage JC fan than wanting to kick back and watch Jackie kick ass only to kick back and watch Jackie in a two-minute cameo. So I mostly stuck to what I knew was great and left it at that. I do remember seeing New Fist of Fury before, but that’s about all I remember about it. Clearly it didn’t scratch that undying Jackie itch back then. But now I am a different person, and I realize much better what to expect out of different directors and martial arts periods, so I’m able to appreciate these early films for what they are instead of what they aren’t. New Fist of Fury is never going to be Armour of God, so there’s no reason to be disappointed when it’s not.

Ace in the Hole (1951)

Ace in the Hole (1951)
AKA The Big Carnival

Starring Kirk Douglas, Jan Sterling, Robert Arthur, Porter Hall, Frank Cady, Richard Benedict, Ray Teal, Lewis Martin, John Berkes, Frances Dominguez, Gene Evans

Directed by Billy Wilder

Expectations: Very high. This has been on the watchlist for years.

Many years ago, my good friend Uncle Jasper told me about this movie Ace in the Hole. He said something like, “You gotta see it, Will. You’ll love it.” At the time we were both heavily into Billy Wilder’s films, so I made a mental note to see it when I could. The film proved rather hard to track down, though, as it had never been released to DVD and its VHS release had long since gone out of print. But the real reason is most likely my penchant for procrastination, because even when Criterion put out a stunning edition of the film in 2007, I decided to watch it later. This time it was because sometime in the mid-2000s I had tired of watching classic films, so I thought I’d wait until a better time presented itself. But as those who also procrastinate will know, there never is a better time and before you know it another five years have passed. So that’s why Ace in the Hole was the first film I locked in for my Blind Spot list, and honestly, I think the experience was even better for waiting.

Ace in the Hole starts with a pompous journalist riding in his car into Albuquerque, NM… behind a tow truck. Chuck Tatum (Kirk Douglas) is a big-time journalist from New York, but he’s a little down on his luck. He lost his job so he’s come to Albuquerque in hopes of landing something quick and repairing his reputation through a dynamite story that makes headlines nationwide. Even though the paper in Albuquerque mostly covers local interest stories like fairs and rattlesnake events, he’s confident he can drum up something. Tatum’s confidence is his overwhelming trait, but his entrance via tow truck shows us that he’s also something of an unreliable force and not as self-sufficient as he’d like us to believe.

Run of the Arrow (1957)

Run of the Arrow (1957)
AKA Hot Lead, Yuma

Starring Rod Steiger, Sara Montiel, Brian Keith, Ralph Meeker, Jay C. Flippen, Charles Bronson, Olive Carey, H.M. Wynant, Neyle Morrow, Frank DeKova

Directed by Samuel Fuller

Expectations: High. Sam Fuller.

This review officially marks the halfway point of my Sam Fuller series. It’s a little crazy that it’s taken me this long to only get halfway through, but I’m attacking it with newfound vigor and strength so I hope to complete it by year’s end. We’ll see. Anyway… Run of the Arrow! A truly impressive movie on so many levels, Sam Fuller once again crafts a yarn unlike any other I’ve seen, even among his own films. Every film I’ve seen of his is unique and thought-provoking, and Run of the Arrow is definitely one that brings up many questions. It’s a film about war, disillusionment, race and tolerance, and the road it travels to explore each of them is very unique.

Customary for a Sam Fuller film, the story opens excellently. Dead bodies rest on the smoking fields of battle and blood-red titles fade on-screen to let us know that it is the final day of the Civil War. A Union soldier rides lazy and confused through the battlefield. A gunshot sounds, and the soldier falls from his perch atop the horse. A rebel stands from a crouch behind a wagon wheel. He loots the soldier’s pockets and eats his food, using the man’s chest as a table. But when the soldier makes a tortured sound, the rebel finds the compassion within him to take him to a doctor’s tent that just so happens to be right outside the house where General Lee is surrendering to General Grant. The rebel is disgusted and refuses to accept the rule of the Yanks, so he leaves his family and rides west. There he meets up with a wandering Sioux named Walking Coyote, and his personal journey truly begins.

The Caller (1987)

Starring Madolyn Smith Osborne, Malcolm McDowell

Directed by Arthur Allan Seidelman

Expectations: Moderately high. I like Malcolm McDowell and Siedelman directed Hercules in New York!

I like movies that are cinematic. They don’t always have to be this way, but it’s always going to help if it is. Barring the last few minutes of the film, The Caller is about as far from being cinematic as is possible, as the entire film consists of two people talking to each other for 95 minutes. You might think I’m exaggerating, and in this case I wish I was. Two people. 95 minutes. Non-stop talking. It feels like a long, talky play with the production values of an ’80s TV movie. Neither of those are my thing so clearly this is a movie I was never going to like. You might like it if those things are your things, though. Maybe.

The film opens with a woman getting gas while someone in a trench coat watches her from a nearby payphone. Sounds interesting, right? Don’t be fooled. She goes home to her cabin in the woods and removes a bloody hat box from the back of her jeep. Don’t be fooled. The woman then showers and calls her daughter to tell her that she’ll be so proud of her mommy for what she’s going to do. Intrigued? Don’t be fooled.