The Grim Game (1919)

Millionaire-miser Dudley Cameron (Thomas Jefferson) lives behind high walls and locked and guarded gates, seeing few people. His nephew, Harvey Hanford (Harry Houdini), is not one of them; however, in love with his uncle’s ward, Mary Wentworth (Ann Forrest), Hanford finds his own ways of getting in. At a local cafe, Clifton Allison (Augustus Phillips), the owner of the newspaper for which Hanford works, meets with Dr Tyson (Arthur Hoyt) and Richard Raver (Tully Marshall), Cameron’s doctor and lawyer. Allison confides to the others that he is in debt to Cameron, and may lose The Call if he cannot get his notes renewed. Joining the three men, Hanford proposes a plan to save the paper: in order to boost circulation, The Call has been running a campaign about the dangers of circumstantial evidence; with the help of Dr Tyson, they will arrange for Dudley Cameron’s “disappearance” – to the seaside, for his health – and he, Hanford, will plant evidence against himself. When Cameron is found safe and well, the paper will be vindicated. The other three embrace the plan and all goes well—until Cameron’s dead body is discovered… Harry Houdini’s first feature film, The Grim Game was long considered lost. Thankfully, a single print was held by the Houdini family, who eventually surrendered it to collector Larry Weeks, who in turn gave it up for restoration. The copy now viewable is in remarkably good condition except for its climactic scenes, which are often excised and screened separately for reasons we will get to. Overall this is quite a good film, though it takes far too long over its set-up and is half over before it really gets going. Once it does, it reveals an intriguing resemblance to Fritz Lang’s Beyond A Reasonable Doubt, though the later work is far more serious and has different fish to fry. Here, the viewer knows that Allison, Tyson and Raver all have their reasons for wanting Dudley Cameron dead, but the film does not tip its hand about which one made Hanford’s fake murder real until late in proceedings. The early stretch of The Grim Game allows for a handcuff escape and some acrobatic breaking-in by Hanford / Houdini; while the second half of the film is all about his escape first from jail, and then from a mental hospital—with shackles and straitjackets shed along the way. As a vehicle for Houdini this film works well enough, though to be truthful I think I would have enjoyed it more as a straight thriller, because there’s material here it doesn’t make the most of. The climax of The Grim Game finds Ann Forrest whisked away in a plane by the killer and Hanford and a pilot following in another—with Hanford lowering himself by rope into the first plane. Up to this point it’s all been Houdini but here, in spite of the studio publicity of the time, it was pilot-turned-stuntman Robert E. Kennedy in the long shots—and it was he who was caught up in the shocking moment when the two planes got tangled in one another and began to plunge to the ground. Both, miraculously, were recovered and landed safely by their pilots, though one did flip; and since no-one was killed, and since the accompanying camera-plane caught the whole thing, the film-makers rewrote their ending to accommodate the footage—and sold it by spruiking Houdini’s supposed involvement.

Fury (1936)

Joe Wilson (Spencer Tracy) and Katherine Grant (Sylvia Sidney) face a long separation as they try to save up enough money to get married. Katherine has accepted a better-paid teaching job out west and, as the two part at Union Station, she gives Joe her mother’s wedding-ring, on which two more words have been added to the existing engraving: to Joe. Joe returns to the apartment he shares with his brothers, Charlie (Frank Albertson) and Tom (George Walcott). He is furious to discover that Tom is drunk, and even more so when he learns that the others were drinking with a local gangster for whom Charlie sometimes “does errands”. An unrepentant Charlie points out that Joe’s honesty can’t even earn him enough to get married on, but Joe finally gets his way and the three pitch in together to buy and run a gas station. A year later, he is able to write Katherine that he is coming for her. To save money, along the way Joe camps out in his car. He is oblivious to the shocking kidnapping case that has gripped the area until a sheriff’s deputy, “Bugs” Meyers (Walter Brennan), pulls him over on the strength of his Chicago plates—and those, his lack of an alibi and some mild circumstantial evidence see him detained for examination by the District Attorney (Walter Abel). Word of the arrest spreads through the town, with suspicion turning rapidly into certainty of guilt—and a furious mob descends upon the jail… Fritz Lang announced his arrival in Hollywood with a vengeance in Fury, an excoriating depiction of lynch-law and the gap between American theory and American practice. The film is loosely based on the Brooke Hart kidnap-murder case of 1933, which ended with the alleged killers lynched in a public park in the middle of San Jose: a crime for which no-one was ever held accountable. (In fact on the contrary, they were treated as heroes and protected by government.) It is hard to believe that MGM was responsible for this bitter social drama—which, had Lang gotten his way, would have been even more so: he wanted the victim to be black, but no-one was prepared to deal with that social reality; and he wanted what we might feel was a justifiably unhappy ending; but though the studio intervened on both points, the film says plenty before the compromise kicks in. At the heart of Fury is the rapid descent of ordinary Americans into a mob howling for blood, with an utter disregard for the very due process and rule of law which is supposed to make their country so superior. The sheriff and his deputies are overwhelmed, efforts are made to smash into the jail and, when that fails, the building is set on fire. By now Katherine has learned what is happening to Joe, and she arrives just in time to catch a glimpse of him at the barred window of his prison-cell, as the jail is engulfed by flames… Well. This was 1936, not 1960; and no studio was about to whack its star halfway through a film: through a freak chance, Joe Wilson survives the attempt on his life. We understand that Lang wanted his lynching victim to be able to speak for himself, but this choice still undercuts reality; while there is also the implication that such behaviour is only really wrong if the person on the receiving end is innocent (something that dogged American persecution dramas right through to 1991’s Guilty By Suspicion, with only Cy Endfield’s The Sound Of Fury having the nerve to say otherwise). But the point that Fury ultimately makes is a perfectly valid one. Joe Wilson emerges from his ordeal damaged psychologically even more than physically, with his belief in his country and its people shattered and his own ideals in ruins. Consumed by hatred and a desire for vengeance, Joe conceals himself with the help of Charlie and Tom, and looks on gloatingly as the townspeople at the head of the mob are tried for his murder… The courtroom scene is of course the highlight of Fury, with the District Attorney calmly allowing the good citizens to perjure themselves one after the other providing alibis for the defendants, and then exposing their testimony as such via newsreel footage of the attack on the jail. Katherine is the main witness for the prosecution, describing how she saw Joe in his prison cell and forcing the defense to adopt a different strategy—namely, arguing that no-one has proved that Joe Wilson is dead. But even this “out” for the defendants is quashed when an anonymous letter arrives for the judge, enclosing a gold ring warped and blackened by fire. Katherine identifies it—and in doing so, has all of her growing suspicions confirmed…

Gunga Din (1939)

On the Northwest Frontier, the British outpost at Tantrapur is ambushed, the telegraph wires cut, and the people killed. Colonel Weed (Montagu Love) dispatches troops to reclaim the town and restore communications: they are led by three sergeants, McChesney (Victor McLaglen), Ballentine (Douglas Fairbanks Jr) and Cutter (Cary Grant), troublemakers when off-duty but the best men for such a dangerous assignment. Upon the troops’ arrival, Tantrapur seems deserted: the sergeants search the town and discover a handful of men who claim to be survivors of the attack, but who soon show their true colours. When more hostile natives arrive, the British soldiers must fight their way out. Back at their base, the sergeants show a captured weapon to the colonel, who identifies it as belonging to the Thugs, a murder cult worshipping the goddess Kali which was thought suppressed some fifty years before. Meanwhile, Ballentine breaks it to his friends that when his term of service is up in a few days, he intends to leave the army, get married, and go into the tea business—but McChesney and Cutter aren’t about to stand for that… Gunga Din was one of the big productions of 1939, but despite its success at the time and its subsequent influence upon other films and film-makers, it hasn’t entirely worn well. Loosely based upon Kipling’s poem and, much more so, upon his short story collection, Soldiers Three, the film is brash and cheerful – perhaps a little too cheerful, given the subject matter – with plenty of large-scale action and fight scenes, and two-fisted white men putting native upstarts in their place…which is of course part of the problem. At the time of production, the film’s acceptance of the British point of view was reasonable enough, but it lends itself to some teeth-clenching. More unexpected is that the three central characters are not particularly likeable, with the film spending too long over “comical” behaviour that really isn’t—the only genuinely funny bit being the way that Cutter flinches when he has to say his own first name out loud: Archibald… Perhaps the greatest disconnect here is the lighthearted way the film treats Cutter and McChesney’s sabotaging of Ballentine’s plans for his future, finally manoeuvring him into re-enlisting so that he can go on fighting and killing with them. (This is one of those Boys’ Own Adventure stories that thinks kissing a girl is kind of gay.) But even making all allowance, the film’s treatment of its Indian characters is questionable, to say the least—and that very much includes the title character himself. As played by Sam Jaffe in brown-all-over, humble water-bearer Din dreams of being “a soldier of the Queen”, but since the only people who believe more firmly in the caste system than the Indians are the British, he’s out of luck. McChesney treats him like dirt, but Cutter indulges Din’s ambitions, chiefly because he sees him as the best means to pulling off one of his many get-rich-quick schemes. When Din tells Cutter of a temple with a golden idol, the two set out to plunder it—and accidentally stumble across the secret gathering place of the Thugs… I suspect most viewers of Gunga Din today will have some sneaking sympathy with the murder cult’s attitude, if not with its methods; but even when the film was first released, it was Eduardo Ciannelli as the Guru that people tended to remember—particularly his speech exhorting his followers into action: “Kill for the sake of killing! Kill for the sake of Kali! Kill! Kill! Kill…!” On the other hand, a young Joan Fontaine is completely wasted as Ballentine’s fiancée—being less important to the plot, and less prominent in it, than Annie the elephant. Reginald Sheffield shows up at the end as Kipling, who is one of those present when Gunga Din achieves his ambition of joining the British army…

Jungle Flight (1947)

Former air force flyers Kelly Jordan (Robert Lowery) and Andy Melton (Robert Kent) work for a remote mining operation, flying ore and equipment over dangerous mountain terrain. Their goal is to pay off their planes and start their own business, but the arrangement hits a snag when Kelly foolishly gambles their savings away one night in town. Desperate to get home to America, and to his wife and young daughter, Andy accepts additional flights at the urging of manager Hagin Case (Barton MacLane), ignoring Kelly’s warnings about the weather conditions and the need for maintenance. Meanwhile, when her former husband, ex-con Tom Hammond (Douglas Fowley), catches up with her, singer Laurey Roberts (Ann Savage) is desperate to find a means of escape. She approaches Andy about a flight out, but he tells her his plane is overloaded already; adding wryly that she should try the susceptible Kelly, who is partying somewhere in town. But when Kelly and Laurey do meet later, she must tell him that Andy’s plane has crashed… Pine-Thomas Productions  followed their trifecta of aviation films starring Richard Arlen with this mild actioner, which is notable chiefly for how unpleasant all its male characters are—even alleged hero Kelly Jordan, whose pissing away of the partnership’s joint savings sets events in motion that end up killing Andy Melton. But running only sixty minutes, Jungle Flight hasn’t much time to waste on the unfortunate Andy (and the even more unfortunate Mrs and Miss Andy back home): Kelly accepts responsibility and settles down to earning what he can to support his new dependents, with the film’s focus shifting to his burgeoning romance with Laurey. Having talked Kelly into flying her to the remote base that acts as airport and mining-camp, where she wangles a job as cook (Case’s stomach overrides his judgement), Laurey thinks she has found a refuge; but it is only a matter of time before the obsessed Hammond tracks her down again… As aviation films go, Jungle Flight isn’t much of one: we get some dangerous flying over mountain terrain and two rather unconvincingly staged crashes; but all this pales besides Douglas Fowley’s skin-crawling performance as Hammond, who has killed one man already for looking wrong at Laurey (and served two years!?), and is now gunning for Kelly. A platinum-blonde Ann Savage is almost unrecognisable as Laurey (except maybe for what she does at the film’s climax); while we should give a nod to the fact that, despite inevitably making him the comic relief, the screenplay treats seriously the ambitions of local mechanic Pepe (Curt Bois) to qualify as a pilot.

South Of Algiers (1953)

Also known as: The Golden Mask. When his funding is stopped, archaeologist Dr Burnet (Eris Portman) is forced to accept the free assistance of Nicholas Chapman (Van Heflin), an American author of popular travel writing, who offers to help in exchange for the articles he can get out of Burnet’s expedition. The two men travel to Algiers: on the flight, Burnet explains to Chapman his theory of the Golden Mask of Moloch having been buried with the Roman general who stole it—unaware that he is overheard by treasure-hunters Petris (Charles Goldner) and Kress (Jacques B. Brunius). Burnet and Chapman are met by the former’s daughter, Anne (Wanda Hendrix), who works with him, and Jacques Farnod (Jacques François), another archaeologist. Anne shows Chapman around while the others are preparing their expedition, and is surprised to find him well-informed and passionate about history. The party returns to Burnet’s excavation site, which Petris has infiltrated with his own people. Despite the risk of a cave-in, Chapman enters an underground chamber and photographs an inscription on a tomb. The tomb proves to be that of the Roman general’s son, and makes reference to another site deep in the desert. As Burnet’s party is preparing for the difficult trek, Chapman’s hotel room is ransacked and his papers and photographs stolen… South Of Algiers is a fair travelogue / adventure film whose main attraction is that it was partly shot on location in Algeria, and its mixture of North African cities and peoples, ancient ruins and sweeping deserts is the main reason to watch it. At the same time, there’s a gawking-tourist air to some of this that grows uncomfortable; while between the film’s opening thanking of “the French Colonial Forces” and its “it’s not plundering a country if you’re British” storyline, there’s plenty to wince at—plus a little unintentional humour in the way that Burnet looks down on Chapman as an opportunist. The film’s plot is predictable, with Burnet learning he was wrong about Chapman, a triangle developing between Chapman, Anne and Farnod, and the plunderers-for-knowledge (good!!) racing the plunderers-for-money (bad!!) all the way from Algiers into the depths of the Sahara. There’s also a comic-relief good-Arab, “Thankyou” (Marne Maitland), and a couple of cute kids and their cute donkey, who save the expedition when they prove to know their way through the desert (and who speak excellent English for orphaned “desert nomads”). No-one else will guide the party, for fear of the bandits led by Mahmoud (Alec Mango), who are in turn being hunted by the spahis. And meanwhile, Pertis and Kress will stop at nothing to get their hands on the Golden Mask…

Johnny, You’re Wanted (1956)

Self-employed lorry driver Johnny (John Slater) is on his way back to London when he is abruptly flagged down by a woman and asked for a lift. He agrees, though he points out to her that running into the road like that is dangerous. He also tries to make small-talk, but his passenger is unresponsive. Johnny sticks to his schedule and pulls into a cafe for a quick meal and to make a phone-call, despite the woman’s impatience. When he returns to his lorry, she is gone. Assuming that she got a faster lift with someone else, Johnny drives on, only to be flagged down  by a police constable and asked to fetch an ambulance for what looks like a case of hit-and-run. To his horror, Johnny recognises the hitchhiker—and when the police determine that her death was not an accident, he finds himself the prime suspect in her murder… This very minor British crime drama was, strangely enough, adapted from a six-episode TV series of the same name. We can only suppose that the original version had rather more substance, as Johnny, You’re Wanted struggles to fill out its meagre 70-minute running-time, padding it with stage performances both real – professional strongwoman Joan Rhodes, playing herself – and fake in the form of “psychic” Professor Balsamo (Garry Marsh), plus supposedly comic scenes set in a joke shop. Perhaps the clue is in the title: Johnny is never in fact “wanted” here, though he is reasonably a suspect (the film makes sure the viewer knows he isn’t guilty). Rather, having convinced himself that his casual remark to the woman about getting herself hurt was a prediction of her death, he starts playing amateur detective—thus drawing more suspicion from Inspector Bennett (Jack Stewart), in charge of the murder case, but also blundering into a separate police investigation into a drug-trafficking ring. Under fire from two directions, Johnny must help the police expose the person who is distributing the drugs and determine that person’s link to the dead woman…

The Train (1964)

With the liberation of Paris imminent, Colonel Franz von Waldheim (Paul Schofield) orders the looting of the Jeu de Paume Museum, with dozens of art treasures boxed for shipment to Germany. Museum curator Mademoiselle Villard (Suzanne Flon) turns to members of the Resistance, several of whom work for the railways. She pleads with them for help—if not in retrieving the art, then just in delaying the departure of von Waldheim’s train until the Allies arrive. The men are sympathetic, but Paul Labiche (Burt Lancaster) points out bitterly that the “cell” now consists of himself and two others only and that they have no resources to waste on art. However, as word of the situation begins to spread, others take matters into their own hands. Elderly engineer “Papa” Boule (Michel Simon) sabotages the train upon its first attempted departure, but is caught and shot—rousing in Labiche’s colleagues, Didont (Albert Rémy) and Pesquet (Charles Millot), a passionate desire to complete the mission. Reluctantly acquiescing, Labiche sets in motion a complex, dangerous plan to keep the train from crossing into Germany… Drawing upon a number of real war-time incidents, and upon the real activities of French Resistance members and their collaborators on the railways, The Train was initially conceived by Arthur Penn as a cerebral drama about the value of art. In this he clashed with Burt Lancaster, who wanted much more of an action movie and had Penn replaced by John Frankenheimer. The film was then redesigned to its star’s specifications, and after a  measured start it foregrounds sabotage and deception and hair’s-breadth escapes – or not – as well as bombing raids and train crashes. The nature of the situation gives no-one involved time to think about what they are doing: snap decisions must be made and plans executed almost on the spur of the moment; orders followed without question. Labiche undertakes the mission not because he believes in it, but because others have died for it; yet finally, it is he alone who holds its success or otherwise in his hands, as the battle for possession for the artworks becomes increasingly a private war between himself and Colonel von Waldheim: an enemy with no price he is not willing to pay… Perhaps the most remarkable thing about The Train is that while it can simply be watched as a war movie or a suspense drama, behind this façade the questions posed by Arthur Penn’s original vision remain. When Mlle Villard rattles off the names of the artists whose creations are being loaded onto the train – Renoir, Cezanne, Picasso, Matisse, Degas – it is easy enough to cry out with her that this must be stopped; but when the cost of stopping it is human lives, what then? The film itself offers no answer; and when all else is done, the ambiguity remains. Burt Lancaster gives a committed performance as the abrasive Labiche, though his accent jars in a cast otherwise made up of French and German actors (speaking English, which doesn’t help). That cast also includes, on one side, Jeanne Moreau and Jacques Marin; and on the other, Wolfgang Preiss and Howard Vernon.

Hawaii (1966)

My personal reading challenges have lately led me to – or more correctly, forced upon me – several of the works of James A. Michener…to the extent that I now have an involuntary flinch reaction whenever his name crops up. His 1959 novel, Hawaii, was a bullet that I dodged…though if you’re hanging out here at all, you probably understand the psychological quirk that compelled me to tackle the film version when it came my way—all restored-to-its-original-189-minute-running-time of it. But even with three hours at its disposal, George Roy Hill’s 1966 adaptation addresses only a single section of Michener’s novel: that dealing with the arrival in the islands of Christian missionaries during the first decades of the 19th century. Fired by an impassioned plea from Prince Keoki Kanakoa (Manu Tupou), young Calvinist minister Abner Hale (Max von Sydow) volunteers for missionary duty in the Hawaiian islands, but the rules of his society insist that missionaries must be married. The Reverend Dr Thorn (Torin Thatcher) suggests to Abner that his niece, Jerusha Bromley (Julie Andrews), might be a suitable candidate. Jerusha considers herself engaged to ship’s captain Rafer Hoxworth (Richard Harris), though her family is doing everything they can to separate the two, including intercepting their letters. Having received no word from Hoxworth for two years, Jerusha is brought to listen to Abner, who is smitten by her at first glance, and whose simplicity and sincerity appeal to her. After a long and dangerous journey, Abner and Jerusha arrive on Maui, where they are greeted by Malama Kanakoa (Jocelyne LaGarde), the Aliʻi Nui of the islands and Keoki’s mother. Though they intended to travel on to Oahu, the imperious Malama orders the Hales to stay—and stay they do. Everything about Hawaii and its people appalls and offends Abner, who sets to work imposing his own religious views upon the free-spirited islanders: a difficult task further complicated by the arrival of a whaling ship captained by Rafer Hoxworth… Hawaii is one of those “big” films that Hollywood churned out so desperately during its losing fight with television. It was filmed on location and offers stunning colour cinematography and detailed sets and costuming…plus a few other things that you weren’t getting on TV in those days: this must have been about the first mainstream movie to offer its viewers frank nudity (by which of course we mean female / non-Caucausian nudity, only two years after briefly seen white breasts got The Pawnbroker censored). The story, however, is about as depressing as it could be—though frustratingly, the film itself doesn’t quite seem to realise it: it seems to think it’s about the struggles of the Hales, instead of about their role in the destruction of a culture, and almost of a people, after the visiting whalers add measles to their earlier white “gifts” of alcohol and venereal disease. That said—the utterly joyless form of Christianity brought to Maui by Abner Hale does almost as much damage, as he sets about overturning centuries-old traditions and beliefs and convincing the islanders that every aspect of their lives constitutes a sin that will see them all damned to hellfire for eternity—and whose unacknowledged racism finally alienates Keoki, his first and strongest adherent, when he refuses to ordain him or any other Hawaiian. The main challenge for the viewer is dealing with the film’s overly generous treatment of Abner: a man who considers his love for his wife a deadly sin, and measures everything else accordingly. Julie Andrews was oddly cast as Jerusha (they made her sing early on, of course, but compensated for it later with a horrifying childbirth scene), but the character’s circumstances are so awful, she barely needs to try to win sympathy. Ultimately, there is only one real reason for anyone to watch this—and that is Jocelyn LaGarde as the Aliʻi Nui. The Tahitian-born LaGarde was not an actress, and could speak no English when she was cast; yet she absolutely steals the film with her performance as Malama, and was rightly nominated for an Academy Award for her one and only acting role (she lost to Sandy Dennis there, but did win a Golden Globe). Hawaii also features Gene Hackman and Carroll O’Connor; Heather Menzies appears as one of Jerusha’s sisters; Bette Midler has a tiny bit part; and two of Max von Sydow’s children play the Hales’ oldest son at different ages.

Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967)

Millie Dillmount (Julie Andrews) arrives in New York determined to be thoroughly modern. Moving into the Priscilla Hotel for Young Ladies, Millie sets to work making over her wardrobe, her hair and her approach to life; and so caught up is she with her project, she hardly notices how often her fellow-guests at the Priscilla seem to depart without saying goodbye to anyone… Having trained as a stenographer with the ultimate goal of marrying her boss, Millie secures a position as secretary to Trevor Graydon (John Gavin), the handsome young head of the Sincere Trust. She also befriends the beautiful but naive Miss Dorothy Brown (Mary Tyler Moore), who hopes to become an actress. The two attend a Friendship Dance, where Millie meets Jimmy Smith (James Fox): the two are drawn to each other, but Millie explains firmly to Jimmy that, given her plans, they can only be pals. However, those plans soon hit a serious snag: the first time Trevor Graydon lays eyes on Miss Dorothy, he falls head over heels for her. Then, when Millie catches a glimpse of Miss Dorothy and Jimmy in a compromising situation, it seems that her best friend has stolen both her men. Meanwhile, young women continue to disappear from the Priscilla… It delights me to imagine that, having made the depressing Hawaii together, George Roy Hill and Julie Andrews looked at each other and said: “Bugger this for a joke—let’s make a musical comedy!” Thoroughly Modern Millie is one of a curious crop of films made around this time – Ken Russell’s The Boy Friend is another – that seems to be trying to “do” Singin’ In The Rain – pastiching a pastiche, as it were – and if it doesn’t (and couldn’t) hit those heights, it’s still a wholehearted and enjoyable effort. Julie Andrews bursts into song on every possible occasion as Millie works hard (though unavailingly) at being “unspeakably fatal”; James Fox does his best Harold Lloyd impression, complete with scaling the outside of a New York skyscraper; Mary Tyler Moore flutters her eyelashes as the perfectly feminine Miss Dorothy; Carol Channing brings the “madcap” as free-spirited Muzzy Van Hossmere; and – my favourite touch – John Gavin displays an admirable sense of humour about his own limitations as an actor. The film also gets away with a few things that it couldn’t have in the 1950s, for example opening with an extended joke predicated on Millie’s / Julie’s boobs; while one of its highlights is its staging of a Jazz Age Jewish wedding. There are a few stumbles along the way, mostly where the film is trying a bit too hard, and the white-slavery subplot is rather on the nose—though the malice there, if any, is directed at the mindset that conceptualised the “Yellow Peril” in the first place—but on the whole it’s a lot of fun, with a number of cleverly conceived and executed sequences. Beatrice Lillie rounds out the cast as hotel concierge / white slaver Mrs Meers, with Jack Soo and Pat Morita as her henchmen. Elmer Bernstein wrote the score for Thoroughly Modern Millie, and won his only Academy Award for it; while a number of 1920s standards were supplemented by new songs by Jimmy Van Heusen and Sammy Cahn.

Flight Of The Navigator (1986)

On the 4th of July 1978, twelve-year-old David Freeman (Joey Cramer) is sent down the road to bring home his little brother, Jeff (Albie Whitaker). David at first cannot find Jeff in the woods where he was playing with his friends; then he falls victim as Jeff gleefully jumps out at him from hiding before running away; then, in chasing his dog, Buster, David slips down a rocky slope and hits his head… Waking to find it dark, David hurries home—only to find his family missing and the house occupied by strangers. The boy’s rising panic prompts the homeowners to call the police. As he waits for his parents to come, a uniformed officer and a social worker make the astonishing discovery that David has been missing for eight years—and in that time has not aged a day. Meanwhile, NASA personnel led by Dr Louis Faraday (Howard Hesseman) have made an even more startling discovery: that of an alien spacecraft, tangled in power lines… Flight Of The Navigator is very much a film of two halves. It takes its time over its set-up, presenting David as an ordinary kid and very much the product of his late-80s society, happy and loved if usually at loggerheads with his kid brother; and initially it plays its premise straight, capturing the mingled joy and fear of David, his parents, Bill (Cliff DeYoung) and Helen (Veronica Cartwright), and sixteen-year-old Jeff (Matt Adler), at being so inexplicably reunited. Ordinary medical testing having done nothing to provide an explanation for David’s situation, the Freemans reluctantly agree to have him examined at NASA. David cannot answer any of Faraday’s questions, but the scanning of his brain does it for him—delivering to the computers extraordinary data including star-charts of areas of the galaxy quite unknown to anyone on Earth… To this point of Flight Of The Navigator, there is a grim undertone to the narrative, with its young protagonist dislocated from his proper time and place, and facing – as he quite realises himself – life as an ongoing experimental subject. Furthermore, having escaped his confinement (this film offers a weirdly sinister depiction of NASA), David learns that, having collected him as a “specimen”, the Trimaxion Drone Ship is unable to return him as intended to his correct time period… So far, so good; but it is at this point that, to my taste, Flight Of The Navigator takes a serious wrong turn: in downloading its star-charts from where it was storing them in David’s brain, the Trimaxion Drone Ship – “Max” for short – also basically downloads David’s personality, that of a smartmouth, TV- and music-obsessed twelve-year-old—and the whole thing morphs into a buddy comedy with a terminal case of the cutes. Then again, though it feels to me like chickening out, this twist probably made the film more appealing to a younger audience, so we won’t grumble. At the time of its release, Flight Of The Navigator was notable for what were then its cutting-edge special effects, including early CGI and the first cinematic use of reflection mapping. The film also features Paul Reubens as the voice of Max, and a young Sarah Jessica Parker as a NASA intern who befriends David.

Bloodsport (1988)

Captain Frank Dux (Jean-Claude Van Damme) plans to use his leave to travel to Hong Kong, to compete in a full-contact martial arts tournament known as the Kumite. When his superior officers find out they try to stop him, but Dux goes AWOL from Camp Peary, with CID agents Helmer (Norman Burton) and Rawlins (Forest Whitaker) sent to bring him back. Dux’s first stop is the home of his sensei, Senzo Tanaka (Roy Chiao), who is seriously ill. Dux thinks back to his childhood—his friendship with Tanaka’s son, Shingo, and, after the latter’s death, his adoption by Tanaka, who trained him in ninjitsu. Dux promises Tanaka that he will win the Kumite, to honour him and Shingo. In Hong Kong, Dux meets fellow American Ray Jackson (Donald Gibbs): the two are collected by their handler, Victor Lin (Ken Siu), and taken deep into Kowloon Walled City, where the tournament is to be staged. The organisers question Dux’s connection to the Tanaka clan, and he must prove his credentials by executing the Dim Mak death-touch. Looking on is the Kumite’s reigning champion, Chong Li (Bolo Yeung), who notoriously killed one of his opponents in the previous tournament… I gather that, by now, almost everything claimed by Frank Dux in the back-story of Bloodsport has been called into question; though at the same time there doesn’t seem to be any doubt about the film’s position in the pantheon of American martial arts movies, nor its impact upon the real-world development of mixed martial arts. The film also gave Jean-Claude Van Damme an armchair ride to action-film stardom as Frank Dux; and whatever it might be lacking in terms of plot, Bloodsport delivers exactly what it promised—namely, sweaty men beating the crap out of each other for about two-thirds of its running-time; plus one of the genre’s most beloved training montages, as Tanaka puts Dux through the physical and psychological wringer…including, fortunately for him, teaching him how to fight blind. (FYI: the first full-splits of Van Damme’s career occurs at the 12-minute mark of this; “That hurts me just looking at it,” Ray Jackson says later to Dux, speaking for all of us.) It doesn’t do to think too much about the fine details of the Kumite—though I do love the fact that the organisers question Dux’s credentials, but don’t even blink at Jackson, whose fighting style might best be described as “Drunken Bar Brawl”. I also have to wonder, given that nothing seems to be illegal in these fights – Dux even stoops to a crotch-punch at one point – why they bother having a referee out there? – particularly since, the one moment when he might have been useful, when Chong Li throws a crushed salt tablet into Dux’s eyes, he notices nothing wrong. Bolo Yeung is genuinely terrifying as Chong Li, an obvious psychopath who likes killing his opponents just for fun; and worse still, taunting them with his pec-flexing first. It is Dux who breaks Chong Li’s record for the fastest knockout, but it is Jackson who earns his direct enmity by mouthing off—and who pays the price. When the final bout of the Kumite pits him against Chong Li, Dux is determined to avenge his friend as well as honour his sensei… We’re not watching Bloodsport for the acting, which is just as well; nevertheless, a baby-faced Van Damme gives the film everything it needed as Dux. Leah Ayres is Token Female / reporter Janice Kent, with whom Dux has a fling (I also love the film’s bait-and-switch here, flashing Jean-Claude’s butt instead of Leah’s boobs); and Philip Chan is the Hong Kong police official who is no help at all to the CID guys in getting Dux back. However, my favourite character is the local high-roller (Bill Yuen Ping Kuen, I think) who is the first to realise there’s a new sheriff in town…

The Haunting Of Sarah Hardy (1989)

Based upon the novel The Crossing by Jim Flanagan. After the funeral of her father, young Sarah York (Bethany Ward) is forced by her unstable mother to say out loud, “I wish you were dead.” She is then a witness as her mother rushes away to throw herself into the ocean… Fifteen years later, everyone is delighted when Sarah (Sela Ward) marries handsome stockbroker, Austin Hardy (Michael Wells)—except perhaps psychiatrist Dr Allen deVineyn (Roscoe Born), who has loved Sarah devotedly since they were children. At the reception, Allen and Sarah’s best friend, Lucy (Morgan Fairchild), are startled when Sarah tells them that she and Austin intend to settle at The Pines, the site of so much tragedy. They are interrupted by a huge delivery of flowers, which comes with no card: lilies, the late Mrs York’s favourite… At The Pines, Sarah and Austin are greeted by Emily Stepford (Polly Bergen), the York’s housekeeper, who has looked after the property since the double tragedy. Sarah remembers gratefully Mrs Stepford’s care of her when she was a child, but becomes irritated by her officiousness. As she and Austin settle in, Sarah begins to experience strange events: glimpses of a shadowy figure; a voice that seems to be calling her name; and, one night, music from her mother’s harpsichord… The Haunting Of Sarah Hardy is a made-for-TV movie in the worst sense, completely predictable and lacking even the mildest jump-scare despite its title. After a bizarre opening sequence which is so oddly presented that you expect it to be All A Dream, if not something being told to a therapist, the film offers an unimaginative round of mild persecutions for its beleaguered heroine. Is Sarah being haunted by her crazy mother, back from the dead? – or wherever: her body was never found – or is someone gaslighting her? – and if so, who? Her perfect new husband? Her jealous never-boyfriend? Her actress-BFF? Her tin-pot Mrs Danvers housekeeper? The Haunting Of Sarah Hardy tips its hand annoyingly early about what’s going on, then spends far too long over its second act, with the viewer ahead of the characters at pretty much every point. There’s one detail here I did find a bit shocking, considering the film’s pedigree; the only other surprises are some moments so dumb you can’t believe they went there—like Sarah’s solitary return to what ought to be an active crime scene. On a more non sequitur note, when Lucy gets killed off in her soap she moves on to what looks like the worst production of Macbeth EVER: I’m sorry we don’t see more of that. Sela Ward tries hard here but is defeated by the exasperations of Thomas Baum’s screenplay. The film was shot on location at the Pittock Mansion outside Portland and the house and its foggy coastal surroundings are the best thing about it.

(Yes, okay, this film is predictable; but that’s no excuse for its summary statement at the IMDb, which tells you exactly what’s going on! Steer clear if you have any interest in this.)

Grave Secrets: The Legacy Of Hilltop Drive (1992)

Based upon the book The Black Hope Horror by Ben and Jean Williams, with John Bruce Shoemaker. Jean Williams (Patty Duke) and her husband, Ben (David Selby), known as “Shag”, buy a block of land in a rural housing development outside Houston, where they plan to build a house for their retirement. Jean is insistent that the house be shifted to the edge of the block, to preserve an old tree bearing odd carvings which stands near its centre. When they are ready to move in, Jean and Shag are helped out by their daughter, Tina (Kiersten Warren), and her fiancé, Darryl (Jon Pennell); their older daughter, Gayla (Kelly Rowan), turns up at their housewarming with a surprising but welcome request: that they take in her young daughter, Carli (Kimberley Cullum), while she is in Europe with her boyfriend. The party comes to an abrupt end when Tina is taken seriously ill: she is rushed to the hospital where the doctors diagnose but cannot explain the advent of an aggressive form of cancer. She remains in hospital to begin her therapy, and her parents divide their time between her and Carli. When the child asks that her bedroom door be kept closed at night so that, “The shadow-people can’t get in”, Jean puts it down to nerves and upset over Tina; but as time passes she herself becomes aware of something wrong in the house: a sense that she is being watched; a feeling of always being cold, though Shag complains of the heat; irritating, unexplained troubles, such as the toilet flushing on its own and the TV and garage door malfunctioning. Over time, these incidents become more serious—and threatening… I was (somehow) unaware before watching Grave Secrets of this particular real-life haunting story, and only looked into it after watching the film; and while this is hardly the appropriate forum for debating the merits of the story and the Williams’ subsequent book, the inevitable arguments about their truth or otherwise, and the equally inevitable compare-and-contrasting with The Amityville Horror and Poltergeist, make it difficult to know how to approach this—particularly given the human tragedy allegedly associated with this haunting. However— As a film, the most interesting thing about Grave Secrets is that it is less a horror movie or a ghost story, and more about how people might react to finding themselves in such a situation. In time it is revealed that the new housing development has been situated over an old graveyard used chiefly for the pauper’s burials of former slaves and their descendants; but since it was never an “official” cemetery, there are no records and no proof that the development company knew anything before acquiring and parceling out the land. The narrative then becomes a blending of supernatural manifestations and hard economic reality. This film is at its most engaging when it is revealed that others besides the Williamses have been experiencing strange phenomena but stayed silent due to mingled fear and embarrassment: each household isolating itself by putting on a brave face for the neighbours, when support if not help was at hand. Meanwhile, Sam Haney (David Soul) and his wife, Judith (Terry Davis), whose excavation for a swimming-pool brought the matter rather horribly to light in the first place, are locked in a legal battle that threatens to bankrupt them… As a fright film, Grave Secrets is fairly weak tea; though some of its incidents are extremely unpleasant (warning: animals do not fare well in this). Patty Duke’s performance is the anchor of the story, as Jean tries to find out the truth and find a way of laying the ghosts: her receptiveness is in contrast to Shag’s “there must be a rational explanation” stance, which he maintains even after experiences that drive him to the brink of a breakdown. (Hearing noises one night, he grabs a gun while she grabs a cross.) Both are determined not be driven away—and as a consequence, they pay a terrible price…

Carnosaur 3: Primal Species (1996)

An army convoy is attacked and slaughtered by terrorists, who steal the truck they were guarding. The terrorists drive the truck to an empty dockside warehouse. Inside it, they expect to find uranium—but discover something else… Colonel Rance Higgins (Scott Valentine) and his elite anti-terrorism squad are then sent in with orders to retrieve the truck’s classified contents. They find a scene of slaughter, but no indication of any radiation; and as they search the warehouse, they are suddenly attacked by velociraptors… With all but two of his team dead, Higgins is outraged when General Mercer (Anthony Peck) tells him that they are still expected to take the animals alive, due to their value as scientific specimens. Dr Hodges (Janet Gunn) explains that the creatures have high intelligence and great regenerative powers. Accompanied by the scientist and reinforced by a unit of marines, Higgins and his men embark on their mission… The law of diminishing returns has its fingerprints all over Carnosaur 3, a tedious exercise in obnoxious macho behaviour penned by someone who knows even less about correct military procedure than he does about science. Beyond one vague reference to a “disturbed scientist” (there’s a redundancy for you), there’s barely even a hand-wave here towards the preceding two films. Instead, we have two velociraptors and a female T-Rex valuable (somehow) as a source of mysterious new treatments for pretty much any disease you can name. Higgins and the others don’t care, they just want to kill them in spite of their orders to the contrary; and the film fills out its running-time with swearing, posturing, gunfire, explosions and the occasional dismemberment, until Dr Hodges sort of falls for Higgins and changes sides to “Project Extinction”. I think there’s some reuse of effects footage from the other films here, but mostly we have models and a guy in a suit on the rampage, which is at least amusing; plus a much higher body-count than before, though not high enough. There’s also a carnosaur autopsy that doesn’t quite go to plan (spoiler: it’s not dead). Otherwise, the dialogue is awful, the action repetitive, and the ending predictably kicker.

Mistrial (1996)

Responding to a call about a drug overdose in a derelict building, two uniformed police officers are ambushed and shot dead. The case falls to Detective Steve Donohue (Bill Pullman) and his partner, Bobby Zito (Casey Siemaszko). While interviewing the mother of one of the victims, Donohue learns that Ida Cruz (Christina Cox) was being harassed by her ex-husband, Eddie Rios (Jon Seda), who was unable to accept that she had, in effect, chosen her job over him; Mrs Cruz (Miriam Colon) also mentions a bundle of old letters that Rios was desperate to get back. Knowing that Rios is a leading figure in a community action group with whom the NYPD has had trouble in the past, Captain Lou Unger (Robert Loggia) warns Donohue to tread carefully, as the media will be watching. Worried about the possibility of evidence being destroyed, Donohue decides to push his questioning of Rios: he shows up at his apartment just as Rios is hurrying out, and a brief confrontation turns into a violent struggle; shots are fired, and when the dust settles both Rios’ girlfriend and his brother are dead… Rios is arrested and, when a gun and shell-casings and the bundle of letters are found, charged with the cop-killings; a witness places him at the murder scene; but despite all this, Donohue soon realises that he is the one on trial… I don’t like to use the word “dated”, but it is true that certain things don’t age well—and this particular example of what I’ve seen other reviewers call “copaganda” is one of them. I suppose I can accept that Mistrial reflects mid-90s societal attitudes to the police – in fact, you have to if you’re going to get anywhere with this – but the screenplay by director Heywood Gould is so heavy-handed, the deck is so stacked against Donohue in particular and the police in general, that the impulse is to push back against what is being thrust down your throat. The film unfolds in a world where “the system” – that is, the law and the Constitution behind it – exists purely to make police work impossible; where judges delight in throwing out evidence on a technicality; where no-one believes a word that any cop says, even if it means letting a cop-killer walk free. In fact it isn’t clear what the case against Eddie Rios consists of, once all the evidence-throwing-out is done; but we can hardly be surprised that the verdict is ‘not guilty’. For Donohue, this is the last straw: in a moment of madness, he takes the courtroom hostage and stages his own re-trial… The premise of Mistrial is self-evidently absurd, though that’s not the main problem with the film—which is, rather, that it doesn’t question, it just asserts—and at length. Though written for the (small) screen, this feels like a filmed stage-play, with the characters making speech after speech after speech—particularly Donohue, of course, who is allowed to air his grievances without the film ever really engaging with the fact that, had he just followed proper procedure in the first place in approaching Eddie Rios, none of this would be happening. Bill Pullman is completely miscast here, unconvincing both as a veteran homicide cop and as a man pushed to his breaking-point by that pesky “system”, and his performance is the rock on which this finally founders. Mistrial also features Kate Burton as Donohue’s loyal wife, Blair Underwood as a hostage negotiator, James Rebhorn as the mayor (boo! hiss!), Josef Sommer as Rios’ attorney (boo!! hiss!!), and Roberta Maxwell as the judge (BOO!! HISS!!). This was the second of three co-castings for Bill Pullman and Robert Loggia across 1996-1997, and their final lengthy scene together is one of the film’s better touches, with Unger having to talk Donohue down from what is shaping as a suicide situation, if not murder-suicide…

Mirror Mirror IV: Reflections (2000)

Annika (Kim Mai Guest) and Ian (Paul Emerson) break into the prop-room of a theatre complex to “borrow” some costumes. In another part of the building, a cleaning-lady (Mary Kathleen Gordon) discovers an ornate mirror covered in cloth and hung with protective symbols including crucifixes: she nevertheless unwraps it, and gazes delightedly into its depths… Hearing agonised screams, Annika and Ian rush to the scene and discover smouldering remains. They are then attacked and pursued by a demonic figure and flee desperately for their lives… A year later, a withdrawn Annika grows angry with the efforts of her mother (P. J. Soles) to bring her out of her depression, and finally announces that she will not only leave the house, she will attend the Halloween party being hosted by the bar now built into the theatre complex. There, wheeler-dealer Chad (Krisztián Kovács) is constructing a “Madness Maze”, a series of horror tableaux, for his employer, the Countess St. Croix (Alice Amter). It is finished in time despite the interference of Chad’s demanding girlfriend, Melissa (Casey McCarthy), and the party has begun by the time that Annika arrives—and, almost immediately, catches a glimpse of someone she is sure is Ian… “Reflections”? Really?? Boy, someone must have been up all night coming up with that… This fourth and last entry in the franchise is an improvement on The Voyeur in that it at least has some ambition…but that’s about all it has. The titular mirror turns up in a prop warehouse without explanation (though curiously, there’s a nod here at Raven Dance), and becomes the centrepiece of a series of confusing experiences suffered by Annika, Chad, Melissa and two party-goers, Jack (Jeff Garvin) and Joey (Grady Lee Beard); while conversely, being seemingly in the power of a mysterious individual called Frederick Champion (Billy Drago). In a bewildering artistic choice, the film shows its cards early—putting the viewer well ahead of the characters as they try to figure out what is happening to them (and taking their sweet time about it). Increasingly, the plot focuses upon Annika, and the question of what really did happen to her and Ian the year before, something which is revealed only through Annika’s fractured memories. Meanwhile, the others are picked off one by one… A large measure of goodwill is required to get anything out of Mirror Mirror IV. The acting is generally poor despite the best efforts of Kim Mai Guest in her only film role, and while there are a few good ideas along the way (and several really stupid ones), the script never deigns to explain why these particular people are involved in Annika’s struggle with her past. The one really amusing thing here is the franchise tradition (if you can call it that) of bringing back an actor from the previous entry in a different role: William Sanderson, Mark Ruffalo and now Billy Drago as the ambiguous Frederick, who first seems like Annika’s protector, but clearly has a dangerous connection to the mirror. P. J. Soles has no more than a brief cameo as Annika’s mother—though it is her scene that (prematurely) lets the viewer in on the film’s game.

Spiders (2000)

A spider is injected with an experimental compound before being loaded onto the space shuttle. The beginning of the mission goes to plan but, when the shuttle is hit by a meteor shower which damages the vessel and releases the spider… Though ordered by her editor to cover the shuttle story, college newspaper reporter Marcie Eyre (Lara Parilla) instead follows a lead about an alien abduction with her friends, Slick (Oliver Macready) and Jake (Nick Swarts), which takes them to an isolated compound in the desert. When nothing happens, the boys get bored; while Marcie receives an irate phone-call informing her that the shuttle has burned up on re-entry. However, almost immediately the mostly intact shuttle makes a crash-landing right in front of the three. Stunned, they rush to the vessel to look for survivors: they find three of the four crew dead and horribly mutilated, a fourth grotesquely misshapen but alive. They do not notice the spiders… When government agents and the army show up, Marcie, Slick and Jake manage to hide in an empty truck, but find themselves under three body-bags being transported to a secret underground facility. Agent Gray (Mark Phelan) secures the lone survivor, not knowing a spider has already laid her eggs in him… We should probably get what’s wrong with Spiders out of the way first. Though we understand, in time, that the film is having fun with her transformation from Geeky Reporter to Action Girl, as initially introduced Marcie is both flaky and unsympathetic; plus the screenplay dwells to unnecessary length on her obsession with conspiracy theories and alien abductions. Too much time is also spent on the kids running around and hiding once they are trapped in the underground installation, which of course features a plethora of long dark passageways and large metal pipes. These early stages of Spiders test the viewer’s patience; but at a certain point it all clicks into gear. This is very much a post-X-Files film, wherein no matter how paranoid your anti-government conspiracy theories are, they’re not nearly paranoid enough—as Marcie and her friends find to their cost, when confronted with the results of injecting a tarantula with alien DNA. Agent Gray is determined to have the first experimental spider captured alive, and sacrifices troops right and left in his attempt to reclaim “the Mother-In-Law”, as it is called. Exactly how the soldiers are supposed to catch this thing is left to everyone’s imagination, especially since – surprise! – the DNA plus solar radiation results in massively huge, rapidly breeding, almost unkillable spiders. Once the first specimen bursts out of the unfortunate shuttle survivor, Spiders gives us exactly what we’re here for: the body count is high, the bodily fluids copious, and the spider effects surprisingly good—in fact, for a film of this ilk, excellent. Most of them are CGI, plus a few models, I think; but there are also some real Goliath tarantulas in the early scenes. Marcie finally teams up with Gray’s mild-mannered subordinate, Agent Murphy (Josh Green) – who discovers along the way that he really wasn’t cut out to be a Guv’mint Sp00k – and the two escape the facility together, only to find themselves tasked with destroying the massive arachnid now rampaging through the city… This final nod to Tarantula is the icing on the cake in a film that becomes more engaging as it goes along. The early stages, as I say, are pretty bad; but if giant bugs – and/or absurd action sequences – are your thing, stick with it.

(My second “NASA is really eee-vil” film in a week, very weird…)

Raptor (2001)

Also known as: Carnosaur 4. During a jeep ride through the desert, three teenagers are attacked and gruesomely killed. Sheriff Jim Tanner (Eric Roberts) is called to the scene by his deputy, Ben Glover (Harrison Page), where they are also joined by animal-control officer, Barbara Phillips (Melissa Brasselle), with whom Tanner has history. As the three debate what could have been responsible, a strange roar echoes across the desert… Meanwhile, at the Eunice Corporation, Dr Frank Hyde (Corbin Bernsen) interrogates his underlings about how one of their experimental hatchlings could have escaped. Hyde orders the remaining eggs shipped out. Dr Karen Konbath (Teresa DePriest) tells him that they will be transported to Eunice’s sister facility in an ordinary poultry van, to disguise their origins. On the road, a disturbance occurs in the back of the truck: the driver pulls over to see what has happened and is slaughtered; while the deputy who radios in about the bloody scene meets the same fate. Tanner responds to the call, pausing only to pass a few disapproving remarks about the boyfriend of his daughter, Lola (Lorissa McComas), who works at the station. She meets him anyway; but their tryst ends in bloody mayhem… I sat down some weeks ago to watch Raptor not knowing it was actually Carnosaur 4; and having made that belated discovery, the inevitable happened. But here we finally are. This shamelessly cheap knock-off directed – or “directed” – by Jim Wynorski in his Jay Andrews guise (and, amusingly enough, scored by James Horner!) cuts together huge chunks of the preceding three films – all of its dinosaur footage is recycled – linking them, on one hand, with Jim Tanner’s investigation into the rash of strange deaths, and on the other with Dr Hyde’s determination to keep his dinosaur project going no matter what the human cost. The only other piece of new footage is a sex scene in which the camera leers at Lorissa McComas’s fake boobs for seven-and-a-half straight minutes. (At least it gave me a chance to go heat up a coffee and a croissant.) That rather put me off at the outset; but as it turns out, the best joke of this far-from-serious film is how much more enjoyable it is than Carnosaur 3. Of course we get reused footage of Special Ops crews running around brandishing their weapons and saying “fuck” a lot; but the cobbled-together screenplay also brings back the Eunice Corporation, albeit in a new guise, and lets a mad scientist do some ranting, in addition to running through the previous films’ greatest hits—and to facilitate the latter, Harrison Page and Frank Novack were re-cast as new characters, so that they could be killed all over again. Eric Roberts gives a likeable, low-key performance here that betrays no (perfectly justifiable) contempt for the material; but Corbin Bersen’s burlesque-y I’m-too-good-for-this-crap offering is as familiar as his range of colour-coordinated berets; while as an animal control officer, Melissa Brasselle is…somewhat less than convincing. (The French-manicured talons must be a huge help on the job.) But, hell: there’s rubber dinosaurs and bloody death scenes and mad science and a back-by-popular-demand helicopter crash and an outrageous reworking of the climax of Carnosaur 2 and a hilariously stupid kicker ending, and what else are we watching these for? Raptor apparently exists in four cuts of slightly different lengths; I watched the longest one because of course I did. Though now I’m wondering if there was less boobage in the others…?

Tail Sting (2001)

When a secret cargo leaves a genetic research station in a remote area of New South Wales, an attempt to steal the goods is thwarted by the company’s head of security (Joe Boony). At the airport, the cargo is safely loaded onto a flight to Los Angeles, and Fred reports to his boss, Dr Stewart (George Hoth), and his colleagues, Dr Jennifer Ryan (Laura Putney) and Dr Scott Milhouse (Rick Kelly). As the flight takes off under the control of Captain Jack Russell (Christian Scott aka Robert Merrill), Scott excuses himself to the rest and slips away to make a phone-call to the ground—berating the failed hijackers who tell him that, if he wants the cargo, he’s on his own. Scott manages to make his way unseen into the cargo-hold, where he accesses the glass canisters which contain the precious research samples. He is caught in the act by Fred and, after a struggle, accidentally kills him. In a panic, Scott stashes several of the canisters but they are loosely stored; and when the plane suddenly banks, they fall and smash… Well, well, well—if it isn’t scorpions on a plane. Its critters are the least strange thing about Tail Sting, a film that feels “off” right from its opening moments: frankly, my first thought was that this is an Australian production masquerading – badly – as American, partly because half the actors sound like they’re doing an accent; though this proved not to be the case (note that the vehicles in the opening sequence are all left-hand drive). Anyway, we’re left to accept that Melbourne is in the outback somewhere (so we judge from the airport’s surroundings), and that a flight from there to the US would have not a single Australian onboard…perhaps because its original destination was Newark. Tail Sting is one of those low-budget killer-animal films that at some point realised it couldn’t execute its plot seriously, so it tried to be “funny”: if you’ve watched enough of these things, you’ll know the tone I mean—and also your own tolerance levels for that sort of material. Mine are low…plus I was probably also annoyed that so many disaster-movie opportunities here went unexploited (we get a pilot literally flying blind and the film barely acknowledges it!). The scorpions themselves are, per Deep Blue Sea, modified to be much bigger than usual so that their creators can harvest more of the cure-all compound that this is about in the first place; though this hardly explains their explosive growth spurt once they’re out of suspended animation. This is perhaps the dumbest of the film’s many dumb choices, as these monstrous arachnids (which one of the scientists calls “insects”, sigh) are somehow able to access any point on the plane as they go thundering around pinching, puncturing and envenomating the passengers and flight-crew. The scorpions are puppets, which is kind of refreshing, though we do get more than one glimpse of the puppeteers. Meanwhile, the cast acts as broadly as possible, falling victim in order of their stereotypicalness (teens having sex in the loo? – check; flaming gay flight attendant? – check). Finally we’re left with just square-jawed Captain Jack, embarrassing excuse for a scientist Jennifer, by-now-raving-maniac Scott, karate expert Courtney (Tara Price), motor-mouthed Omar (Conroe Brooks)…and a couple of others who, these days, raise eyebrows. Tail Sting was released in January of 2001: some months later, I doubt the subplot involving Middle Eastern stowaways Yaffi (Gulshan Grover) and Sudan (Guy Bracca) would have played out the way it does, or indeed have been there at all. But as it stands, this is one of the film’s pleasant surprises.

The Legends Of The Guardians: The Owls Of Ga’hoole (2010)

Noctus (Hugo Weaving) and Marella (Essie Davis), mated barn owls, live in the Tyto Forest with their owlets, brothers Kludd (Ryan Kwanten) and Soren (Jim Sturgess), and baby Eglantine (Adrienne DeFaria). Soren is obsessed with the stories told by his father of warrior owls known as the Guardians of Ga’hoole, and their battle against an evil faction calling themselves the Pure Ones: though repeatedly assured that these are merely legends, Soren believes in them passionately and tries to model himself on the Guardians’ code of honour. One night when their parents are out hunting, the two boys practice their flying exercises. Kludd becomes jealous of Soren’s greater skill and, in a moment of anger, pushes him from a branch, but loses his balance and falls also; the two boys find themselves on the ground, without sufficient flying strength to return to the nest. They are attacked by a Tasmanian devil and fight desperately for their lives before being rescued by two long-eared owls—but instead of being returned home, they are carried away across the sea and find themselves among many other kidnapped owlets. To his horror, Soren realises that the legends are true – that they are among the Pure Ones – and that another war is imminent… Based upon the novels of Kathyrn Lasky and directed by Zack Snyder, this computer animated fantasy is both overly complicated and overly simple. There’s very little we haven’t seen before in the story of The Legends Of The Guardians, with its good and evil factions, its stock characters and its predictable plot elements; while at the same time, those few new inclusions like the superweapon being built by the Pure Ones and such touches as the owls’ metal-working skills go effectively unexplained. The contrast between the latter and the film’s more realistic depiction of its owls is rather jarring—but it’s the owls that dominate and, let’s face it, it’s the owls we’re here for. Though barn owls take centre-stage, all sorts of different species – snowy owls, sooty owls, burrowing owls, boreal owls, short-eared owls, great grey owls, and others – appear in the film, which is to be commended for not shying away from genuine owl behaviours like predation and the icky business of owl pellets (which are in fact vital to the plot). Meanwhile, the supporting cast includes an “oracular echidna” (Barry Otto) and a western blind snake called Mrs Plithiver (Miriam Margolyes), who acts as nest maid to the barn-owl family. The kidnapped owlets are confronted by Nyra (Helen Mirren), mate of the Pure Ones’ leader, Metal Beak (Joel Edgerton), who divides the involuntary recruits into soldiers and pickers. Soren and Gylfie (Essie Davis), a tiny elf owl he has befriended, are banished to extract certain metal fragments out of mounds of owl pellets; while Kludd is soon won over by Nyra’s wiles and eagerly becomes a soldier—though at a price. Asked what he can give his new family, Kludd coldly promises his young sister as a sacrifice… While the battle between the Guardians and the Pure Ones, and the rising to hero-dom of Soren, plays out in a predictable way, The Legends Of The Guardians maintains a dark tone throughout, and its animation is spectacular. (In IMAX and 3D, this thing must have been mind-blowing.) The film’s other great virtue is its ridiculously good cast, which also includes Geoffrey Rush, Sam Neill, David Wenham, Anthony LaPaglia, Richard Roxburgh, Abbie Cornish, Bill Hunter, Deborra-Lee Furness and Leigh Whannell.