5 Films to Complement Ian Sales’ Apollo Quartet
The movie list game with Ian Sales continues. I have been challenged to come up with five movies to complement his Apollo Quartet, as the concluding volume of that series, “All That Outer Space Allows,” hit stores in late April. The following list of 5 is my attempt to come up with a few good films that fit the bill. First, a few “rules”:
Around the World: The Driller Killer (1979; dir. Abel Ferrara)
As Abel Ferrara’s first non-porn feature film, The Driller Killer serves as a signpost of the director’s vision of New York City and its social ills. Ferrara would hone this vision into a more coherent film three years later (in Ms. 45), but in The Driller Killer, he was, I think, in his rawest form: vulgar, uncompromising, and noisy. It’s not surprising, then, that the film was banned in the UK in 1983 given that its UK distribution included a still shot of one of the more gruesome scenes in the entire movie: a man having a drill bit shoved into his skull. What is surprising is that, as Mike Bor of the British Board of Film Classification notes, Ferrara’s film was “almost single-handedly responsible for the Video Recordings Act of 1984,” a reactionary piece of legislation that required creative works to be classified to be legally sold; unclassified works, as such, would be banned.
Review: Blended (2014; dir. Frank Coraci)
Blended (2014; dir. Frank Coraci) can be summed up in a single sentence: an exhausting two hours of jokes about androgynous daughters, lesbians, and Africa. There are few films I can legitimately say should be consigned to the fires where “art” goes to be mercifully removed from human consciousness. Blended, unfortunately, is one of those films. Contrived and painfully anathema to comedy, Blended may be one of the worst films of 2014; it may even be the worst Adam Sandler film to be presented to the public. Starring Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore, Blended follows two single parents, Jim (Sandler) and Lauren (Barrymore), who meet on a blind date and realize they pretty much hate one another. But as fate would have it, they can’t seem to avoid meeting, especially when both Jim and Lauren decide to take their kids on an African safari, not realizing that they’re each going on the same trip. As a result, they become engrossed in one another’s lives, sparking, as to be expected, a romance and giving meaning to the title.
Review: Nightcrawler; or, The Chill of Capital (2014; dir. Dan Gilroy)
To say that reviewing Nightcrawler (2014; dir. Dan Gilroy) is a difficult task would be an understatement. Nightcrawler haunts the viewer like something out of Poltergeist (1982; dir. Tobe Hooper). It’s the kind of experience that I find impossible to forget, not simply because of its focus on Los Angeles’ late-night chaos but also because its examination of that life is in so many ways uncompromising and disturbingly logical. Talking about such a film without blathering on endlessly becomes a difficult task indeed, which may explain why this review is so focused on a single element: Bloom. Nightcrawler follows Louis Bloom, an eccentric small-time thief who literally steals his way into the “nightcrawler” business in Los Angeles after witnessing a “nightcrawler” taping a car accident (Bill Paxton). Determined to “make it,” he begins selling to a low-rated local news station and sets out to dominate the market at any cost.
Review: Taken 2 and Islamaphobia (2012; dir. Olivier Megaton)
After the enormous success of Taken (2009; dir. Pierre Morel), which raked in $226.8 million worldwide on a $25 million budget, it was inevitable that we would get a repeat performance. And a repeat Luc Besson and his cavalcade of writers gave us. Taken 2 attempts at a continuous narrative, but it is ultimately a game of thematic repetition which the film hopes you won’t notice. On the surface, this is fine, since the series identifies its theme anyway, but one must wonder how a world in which someone like Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) exists can continue to operate. After all, Bryan is an uncompromising murderer who cares little for international law. Indeed, he cares little about anyone outside of his personal circle, as becomes clear to us in his oft-quoted speech: I don’t know who you are. I don’t know what you want. If you are looking for ransom, I can tell you I don’t have money. But what I do have are a very particular set of skills, skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you let my daughter go now, that’ll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don’t, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.
Review: Assassin (2014; dir. J.K. Amalou)
You’d think from the cover copy for the Blu Ray release of J.K. Amalous’ Assassin (2014) that what you were about to watch was a character-driven crime thriller fed by crafty dialogue and compelling characters. After all, by declaring that Assassin comes from the makers of Casino and Goodfellas, both Oscar nominated works, the copy implies a film of a certain quality. It is unfortunate, then, that the film on offer is less like Goodfellas and more like a watered down Jason Statham movie. Danny Dyer plays Jamie, an assassin-for-hire who murders competitors and irritations on behalf of “reformed” criminals John and Lee Alberts (Gary and Martin Kemp, respectively). On one such job, Jamie meets Chloe (Holly Weston), a drug-addled stripper, and falls for her. Jamie soon discovers that his last target was Chloe’s father; when Chloe starts asking too many questions, she draws the attention of the Alberts, who demand Jamie kill her, too. Failing to do so, they both become targets, putting Jamie in the sights of men just like him.
