The Return Of Chandu (1934, 12 episodes)

When an attempt is made to abduct the Princess Nadji (Maria Alba), she leaves Egypt for California, staying at the home of Dorothy Regent (Clara Kimball Young) and her children, Bob (Dean Benton) and Betty (Phyllis Ludwig). The four of them eagerly await the arrival of Dorothy’s brother, Frank Chandler (Bela Lugosi), also known as “Chandu the Magician” for his mastery of the mystical arts. Dorothy plans a lavish reception for her royal guest, but evil forces are gathering… Though two men are sent to kill him when he arrives at the airport, Chandler evades them by use of his magic ring and reaches the house in time to stop Nadji drinking wine drugged by the butler, Nito (Frazer Acosta). Under hypnotic influence, Nito reveals that Nadji is being pursued by the Sect of Ubasti, whose members practice black magic. Chandler tells the others that the preserved body of the sect’s High Priestess, Ossana, was recently found; and that her followers believe she can be resurrected by the sacrifice of an Egyptian princess… When the title character of Chandu The Magician returned to the screen two years later in serial-form, he was literally a new man—with the film’s hero, Edmund Lowe, replaced by its villain, Bela Lugosi. Amusingly, no effort is made to explain away – or even acknowledge – Frank Chandler’s striking new accent, or why it differs so drastically from that of his family. The major change here, however, is that “Chandu” is now capable of real magic, not just illusion, with his jewelled ring not only connecting him with his yogi like a primitive mobile phone, but allowing him to become invisible (or, I guess, to be invisible to others); while his mind-control powers have increased and expanded. More unexpectedly, the bad guys’ powers are also real and dangerous, so it’s a fairer fight than we’re accustomed to, with evil often in the ascendancy. The first half of The Return Of Chandu is about the attempts of the Ubastians to abduct Nadji, in which they finally succeed—-carrying her off to Lemuria, where Vitras (Jack J. Clark), the High Priest of Ubasti, plans to transfer her soul into the body of Ossana. The entire second half finds Nadji “awaiting sacrifice”, as Our Heroes try desperately – and mostly unsuccessfully – to save her… Notwithstanding Lugosi’s presence and rare hero role, and an interesting if cheaty final chapter, overall The Return Of Chandu is disappointing. In spite of all the hocus-pocus the plot is rather dull, production values were low, and the cliffhangers are weak to non-existent; while the increasing focus upon the “half-human savages” who co-occupy Lemuria is distasteful. Most of this serial’s entertainment value is to be found in its marginalia—like the tiger-pit, which comes complete with stripped but still-articulated human bones; or the Ubastians’ version of the pit and the pendulum, with a descending scimitar instead; or the array of hats with which Chandler / Chandu accompanies his actions (I particularly like him swapping his yachting cap for a turban when he uses his crystal ball…and back again afterwards). The best touch here, though, is that “Ubasti” was clearly a play on Bast / Bastet: for no plot reason the cultists are cat-worshippers, with a huge cat-statute overhanging their altar and a cat motif on their robes, which makes it really hard for some of us to consider them the bad guys—and has landed their wardrobe over in WANT!!

(Switching on the YouTube captions adds another bit of entertainment to this serial: they really struggled with the heroine’s title / name, which is variously rendered as “Snoggle”, “Snozzy”, “Nazi” and “Nigel”. Meanwhile, Ubasti is apparently a bit of a bastard…)

Arctic Flight (1952)

Based upon the story Shadow Of The Curtain by Ewing Scott. After flying his friend Dave Karluck (Thomas Richards Sr) on a wolf hunt, bush pilot Mike Wien (Wayne Morris) returns to his base in Kotzebue. Expecting his next client, Mike walks into the small guest cabin to find it occupied by Martha Raymond (Lola Albright). Scrambling into her robe, she berates him for his rudeness before revealing that she is the new schoolteacher assigned to Little Diomede Island in the Bering Strait. She is unimpressed by Mike’s reluctance to fly anywhere near the Soviet sentry-posts on Big Diomede Island and insists upon being conveyed to her destination—giving Mike, who has a government contract, no choice but to comply. Nevertheless, he sets his plane down short and forces Martha to finish her journey by dog-sled, even though this involves the two of them riding out a storm under the flimsy shelter of the sled. On Little Diomede, Martha is welcomed by Father François (Kenneth MacDonald) and Miksook (Anthony Garson), a resident; and it is only then that she learns her predecessor unknowingly crossed the border and was shot dead… Following on from Red Snow (which was made first despite its obviously hasty production), Arctic Flight is another early Cold War drama dealing with the contentious situation existing at the Alaskan / Soviet border—although it takes its own sweet time about making that its focus. The film was partially shot on location, and pads out its brief running-time with much aerial footage of the region, and also, alas, with hunting scenes. The wolf hunt is to protect a reindeer herd, at least, but Mike’s next client, John Wetherby (Alan Hale Jr), wants to hunt polar bear just for “sport”—with the script perhaps acknowledging the dubious nature of this pursuit by making the bear kill an Eskimo family before Wetherby gets to shoot it. Meanwhile, a wholly unconvincing romance develops between Mike and Martha, despite her taking the wrong political side—or rather, no side at all. Repeatedly expressing disinterest in the proximity of the Soviets, even after she learns about the previous teacher, and waving away Mike’s efforts to warn her of the danger, Martha is presumably intended as a stand-in for any American oblivious – or hostile – to the need for a hard-line stance. There is some peculiar writing in this aspect of the screenplay. When Martha sneers at Mike’s seeming romance with a local girl he lectures her on her intolerance by sneering back, “You call yourself a liberal”—when in fact she has said and done nothing to give that impression—and later follows up by suggesting that she is likewise, “A Commie sympathiser.” (So of course they fall in love.) Eventually – and I mean eventually – Martha learns the error of her ways when it turns out that John Wetherby may have more on his mind in visiting far-west Alaska than just taking his wife home a polar-bearskin rug…

Back From Eternity (1956)

Ruthlessly moved on from her place of employment, Rena (Anita Ekberg) faces an uncertain future at a notorious casino in Boca Grande. As she waits at the airport, she makes a play for businessman Jud Ellis (Gene Barry) but, though momentarily distracted, he then hurries to his arriving fiancée, Louise Melville (Phyllis Kirk): the two had planned to marry immediately, but Ellis explains to Louise that he needs to travel to Boca Grande and that they can be married there instead. Newly hired co-pilot Joe Brooks (Keith Andes) meets flight attendant Maria Alvarez (Adele Mara) and learns to his surprise that the pilot is William Lonagan (Robert Ryan), a highly regarded flyer now fallen on hard times. As the passengers begin to board, racketeer Thomas J. Malone (Tol Avery) hands his young son, Tommy (Jon Provost), to right-hand man Pete Bostwick (Jesse White), promising to join them as soon as possible; but fate is on his tail… The plane is delayed during its first stop by the need to take on board political assassin Vasquel (Rod Steiger) and bounty-hunter Crimp (Fred Clark). The unexpectedly erudite Vasquel connects with Professor Spangler (Cameron Prud’Homme), who is travelling with his wife, Martha (Beulah Bondi). As the plane flies over the South American jungle, it encounters a violent storm and is forced into a crash landing… Back From Eternity is John Farrow’s own re-make of his his 1939 film, Five Came Back. It is a longer film than its model, spending more time over establishing character scenes at the outset and longer in the air after that, before its disaster strikes; though it cannot be said that it is the better for doing so. It is also a bit more heavy-handed in its moralising and, somewhat surprisingly, less edgy than its forerunner, with several of the characters markedly softened down from their original conception; though Ellis and Crimp are arguably worse here. (The latter suffers from not being John Carradine, who of course we can forgive almost anything.) Louise starts out being snotty towards Rena and blatantly “protecting” young Tommy from her influence, but – in one of the few original touches here – after the two have a cat-fight in a river, they emerge good friends. Rena is a victim of post-war displacement, document-less and vulnerable; but, as played by Anita Ekberg, she doesn’t come across as convincingly “shopworn”. Lonagan, meanwhile, is more soul-weary than angry and opens up to her fairly easily; while the Ellis – Louise – Brooks triangle plays out as expected. The film’s biggest shock comes during the storm sequence, with the abrupt death of the unfortunate Maria (which you could argue is Brooks’ fault, not that the film seems to realise it). After the crash landing, each of the survivors begins to display his or her true character in the face of the demands of survival and the increasing dangers of the surrounding jungle—which, as Vasquel and the Professor know, includes a tribe of head-hunters. Working together, the survivors succeed in repairing the plane and preparing it for a risky takeoff; but with only one functional engine, the reality is that it cannot bear the weight of the whole group—and some must stay behind…

The Ipcress File (1965)

Based upon the novel by Len Deighton. Dr Radcliffe (Aubrey Richards) is abducted and his security escort murdered: one of numerous recent cases of British scientists “disappearing” one way or another. Despite his dubious army record, Harry Palmer (Michael Caine) is transferred from his Ministry of Defense post under Colonel Ross (Guy Doleman) to the security division led by Major Dalby (Nigel Green). He becomes one of a team trying to locate Radcliffe, who it is believed is in the hands of British-Albanian operative Eric Grantby (Frank Gatliff), code-named “Bluejay”. Ignoring orders, Palmer finds a shortcut to Grantby and confronts him, but an altercation with his right-hand man, “House martin” (Oliver MacGreevey), allows Grantby to get away. “House martin” is later arrested but is murdered in his cell by men posing as Palmer and his associate, Jock Carswell (Gordon Jackson). The circumstances of the arrest prompt Palmer to call for a full-scale search of an abandoned factory where he suspects Radcliffe is being held. The scientist is not found, provoking the ire of Ross; but Palmer and Carswell do find a piece of imperfectly destroyed audiotape labelled “IPCRESS”… The Ipcress File is a tense and cynical spy thriller that, like the works of John le Carré, expresses an air of weary disillusionment with respect to the realities of Cold War-era espionage. The original story was conceived by Len Deighton as a riposte to the Bond films, and likewise, Harry Palmer is a protagonist provocatively different from Bond himself: one whose clearly working-class origins and regular army background as much as his habit of insubordination put him at odds with his Eton-and-Oxford (or I guess that should be, Cambridge) superiors. While overall this is a powerful if downbeat drama, it is Michael Caine’s wry, nuanced performance as Palmer that remains its most memorable aspect. Meanwhile, far from playing glamorous games, the screenplay’s focus is upon the deteriorating British-US relations of the time, and the increasing commodification of espionage. One possible criticism is that the film does not make enough of the “brain drain”, the ongoing loss of British scientists, voluntarily or otherwise, as it could have done. In a fairly low-key way, much of what happens in The Ipcress File is shocking; but its most shocking touch, for what it conveys about the state of political play, may be the scene in which Dalby and Palmer meet with Grantby and simply arrange to buy Radcliffe back. The deal is done, but it is soon clear that Grantby has sold the British “damaged goods”, when it is discovered that the scientist no longer has any memory of the cutting-edge research that made him so valuable. Carswell unearths information about a proposed new system of brainwashing known as “Induction of Psychoneurosis by Conditioned Reflex under Stress” – IPCRESS – but is killed soon afterwards, possibly in mistake for Palmer. As for Palmer himself, the apparent spy he shoots and kills at the Radcliffe exchange turns out to be a CIA agent on the scene without due notice. When a second agent sent to shadow him ends up dead in his apartment, he tries to flee upon Dalby’s advice, only to find himself in the hands of Grantby and his associates, and undergoing the same conditioning that destroyed Radcliffe’s mind—though in this case, the object is to turn him into someone who will follow any order without question, even an order to kill…

(Feeling an urge to watch Goldmember…)

House Of Evil (1968)

Also known as: Dance Of Death. In 1900, near Morhenge, two women are found dead with their eyes missing. Though the police downplay the latter’s significance, at Morhenge Manor the owner, the elderly Matthias Morteval (Boris Karloff) and his friend, Dr Emery Horvath (José Ángel Espinoza Aragón), make ominous reference to similar killings in Vienna and Budapest, and to Matthias’ brother, Hugo… Lucy Durant (Julissa) receives an invitation to a family reunion of sorts at Morhenge Manor. Though he is involved in the investigation into the killings, Charles Beasley (Andrés García), Lucy’s fiancé, is persuaded to accompany her. At first Charles is forbidden the house by Matthias’ loyal servant, Fodor (Arturo Fernández), but Lucy insists upon his admission. Inside, they find Matthias playing the organ to an uncomfortable gathering consisting of Cordelia Rash (Beatriz Baz), Ivar Morteval (Quintín Bulnes) and Morgenstein Morteval (Manuel Alvarado): all, like Lucy, Hugo’s descendants. Charles is again ordered away, this time by Matthias, and escorted to an inn by Fodor—who is later found dead, eyeless. Matthias collapses in shock. Later, Dr Horvath reports to the others that, although seriously ill, Matthias has succeeded in making a new will… The third of Boris Karloff’s Mexican-produced, Juan Ibáñez / Jack Hill-directed horror movies, House Of Evil manages to be creakily old-fashioned and ahead of its time all at once. The long-established plot of gathered relatives, a will and a rising body-count plays out here in conjunction with an eye-obsessed serial killer and a family fortune built on life-sized dolls—apparently designed as luxury “toys” for the very wealthy, but actually capable of killing on command. Yet somehow, with all of this going on, the film still manages to be dull. In fact it rather feels like an Albert Pyun film, with a complicated back-story and lots of bizarre marginalia, but not much actually happening—and when it finally does, the darkness of the available prints makes it hard to see exactly what. Once Matthias succumbs to his heart condition, the relatives – one or more of whom we are led to believe has inherited Hugo’s madness – are left to salivate over his last-minute will. While waiting for the reading, they amuse themselves by messing with the numerous dolls left standing around the manor—and not all of them live to regret it… Though Matthias / Boris seems to have departed House Of Evil less than halfway through, we are not much surprised when later reappears; and as previously, his last-act ranting is a highlight. A bonus for this viewer was the presence of a very young Andrés García, albeit he somewhat disappointed me by – spoiler alert – living to the end credits. I was also disappointed that it was never entirely clear whether the dolls were autonomous, remote-controlled or just someone in a suit. Possibly all three. It’s that kind of film.

Krakatoa, East Of Java (1968)

In the year 1883, the steamer Batavia Queen begins to load in the port of Anjer, on Java. In addition to its usual cargo transport, the ship’s captain, Chris Hanson (Maximilian Schell), is preparing for a private salvage operation, hoping to locate the wreck of another steamer that went down near the island of Krakatoa. The Arianna is believed to have been carrying a fortune in pearls—and something else. To prepare for this venture, Hanson has hired balloonists Giovanni (Rossano Brazzi) and Leoncavallo Borghese (Sal Mineo); a team of Japanese pearl divers led by a woman called Toshi (Jacqueline Chan); deep-sea diver Harry Connerly (Brian Keith); and inventor Douglas Rigby (John Leyton) and his diving-bell. Also boarding is Connerly’s mistress, chanteuse Charley Adams (Barbara Werle); while the source of Hanson’s information is Laura Travis (Diane Baker), his own lover, whose abusive husband reacted to the affair by taking away their young son and his own collection of pearls. At the last minute, Hanson is forced to take onboard convicts bound for Madura Island. One of them, Danzig (J. D. Cannon), is an old acquaintance, who Hanson allows on deck in exchange for a promise of good behaviour. As the Batavia Queen prepares for departure, an official tells Hanson that the volcano on Krakatoa is threatening eruption, but he ignores the warning… Yes, yes: west. This apparent blunder was actually the clever idea of one of the film’s producers, who thought it made things sound more “exotic”; but all it got him was the mockery of critics already underwhelmed by this adventure-drama. Krakatoa, East Of Java was filmed in “Cinerama” and, if you can find a good widescreen print, is certainly worth looking at; but its characters and its plot just aren’t interesting enough to sustain its running-time. The screenplay by Bernard Gordon and Clifford Newton Gould is also annoyingly obscure at the outset regarding Laura Travis’s back-story, which involves a year spent in a mental hospital after the loss – and possible death – of her son; a situation which raises doubts about even the existence of the pearls in which so much has been invested. Despite this, the film offers some welcome maturity with respect to both the Hanson / Laura and Connerly / Charley relationships; though alas, it seems that even in 1968 an interracial love-affair was a bridge too far, with one-half of a would-be couple “removed” during the final act. Krakatoa, East Of Java is not actually a disaster movie, despite what some people will try to tell you; and in fact, while the eruption of Krakatoa and the tsunamis it created form a naturally extended climax to the narrative, if anything these events are downplayed from reality. The film’s best scene finds the Batavia Queen trying to escape a downpour of flaming debris when the eruption begins, though this is offset by the stupidity of staying so close for so long in the first place. Later, the imminent tsunami forces the characters to decide how best to try and survive, with some heading for land and high ground and others riding it out on shipboard… The special effects in these two sequences are convincing, but the eruption / explosion of Krakatoa itself at times looks a bit like a school science project. Nevertheless, the film scored an Oscar nomination. This being 1968, Krakatoa, East Of Java also forces on the viewer an entirely unnecessary musical number written by Mack David; though it does try to offset the cringe by having Charley strip (to a point) while singing it. Young Peter Travis is played by Peter Kowalski, the son of director Bernard L. Kowalski. Meanwhile, Peter Graves is listed in the opening credits but not actually in the film.

Whistle And I’ll Come To You (1968)

In my usual one-minor-question-leads-to-a-major-project way, a quick search for background information on a particular production has led me down the rabbit hole of what may be thought of collectively as “BBC ghost stories”; though not all of them actually emanated from The Beeb, with the other networks later trying to copy their success. After a couple of false starts a tradition of sorts was established, with a ghost story filmed each year for screening on Christmas Eve—often with scheduling that allowed the program to finish just at midnight. Curiously, however, the first venture in this area was (i) part of a documentary series, and (ii) first screened in May.

Based upon “Oh, Whistle, And I’ll Come To You, My Lad” by M. R. James. Cambridge academic Professor Parkin (Michael Hordern) chooses for his holiday an off-season hotel on the windswept East Anglia coast. Eschewing the golf that is the main local attraction, he declares his preference for “a hard trudge”, and perhaps an inspection of a ruined Knights Templar cemetery in the district. In the latter, where the edge of the burial ground drops away to the sea, Parkin discovers an ancient bone whistle which seems to have been unearthed from a crumbling grave. Back at the hotel, he cleans the object up and discovers upon it an inscription: Quis est iste qui venit—“Who is this who is coming?”… Though this adaptation does tamper somewhat with the text, thematically it is a sound rendering of James’ famous 1904 story. Instead of an arrogant young scholar, Michael Hordern (who had already played the role in a radio version) presents the middle-aged Parkin as a bundle of tics: an absent-minded mutterer to himself and a pedantic hair-splitter in conversation—if you can call it “conversation”; yet no ivory-tower intellectual, with his taste for hard cross-country walking, his defiance of the weather, and his hearty enjoyment of his food. Around this central portrait builds a scenario of growing unease. Parkin’s troubles begin the moment he pockets the whistle, with the deserted beach behind him suddenly no longer deserted. When he blows upon it briefly back at the hotel, it seems to summon up a wind-storm—and then something else… Filmed around Norfolk, Whistle And I’ll Come To You is a low-key and creepy mood-piece highlighted by its locations and stunning black-and-white cinematography by Dick Bush—with one brief scene landing this adaptation in Moments.

(You know what you don’t want while watching ghost stories in the dark? Possums in your crawlspace.)

The Exorcism (1972)

April and May of 1968 also saw the broadcast of British TV’s first attempt at a horror series. Late Night Horror consisted of six episodes of approximately 25 minutes each, adapting stories by Roald Dahl and Richard Matheson, among others. It was the brain-child of producer Harry Moore, who was less interested in horror per se than in testing out the possibilities of the new colour television technology—famously insisting that plenty of blood be spilled. Sadly, only one episode out of the six, The Corpse Can’t Play (from a story by John Burke, and directed by the legendary Paddy Russell), now still exists, and is by no means readily accessible. Legend has it that viewers found the series so very horrifying, the BBC responded to their protests by destroying it—but it is far more likely that it was simply yet another victim of the catastrophic tape-purge that (among many other things) cost the world over 100 episodes of Dr Who, and very nearly Monty Python’s Flying Circus in its entirety.

The next attempt at a series came in 1972, with Dead Of Night consisting of seven episodes of around 50 minutes each. Here too there has been attrition, with only the first, second and seventh episodes of the series surviving.

Edmund (Edward Petherbridge) and his wife, Rachel (Anna Cropper), invite their friends, Dan (Clive Swift) and Margaret (Sylvia Kay), to their country cottage. The formerly derelict building was acquired cheaply after no previous owner could be identified, but its new owners have since spent a small fortune, as Edmund admits, on renovations and luxurious features including central heating. Reference is made to a previous, disastrous visit from Edmund’s father, who considers his son a sell-out for his money-focused ways; but Dan laughingly responds that, as long as they are forced to live in a bourgeois society, they might as well enjoy its perks. As the four begin the lavish dinner prepared by Rachel, the power goes out. When no fuse is found blown, they assume it is a blackout; although Edmund is disturbed to discover that the phone isn’t working either. As they settle down again to eat, Dan opens a bottle of expensive wine—which to the horrified Edmund tastes like blood… While 1973 changed forever our ideas of what an “exorcism” should consist of, this teleplay evokes the older and broader sense of the word. Written and directed by Dan Taylor, The Exorcism manages to be both a ghost story and an excoriating piece of social criticism which argues that, however much society changes overtly, the nature of injustice never does—nor the need to redress it. The four characters aren’t terrible people – none of them are really “asking for it”, in the usual horror-movie sense of that phrase – they’re just complacent and a bit selfish, smug about their social advantages, and not allowing themselves to be bothered by what doesn’t directly impact their extremely comfortable lives. There are unsympathetic references in passing to the contemporary British miners’ strikes, and conversely sympathy with Edmund’s rejection of his (implicit) working-class background and his father’s politics. Perhaps the most infuriating thing here is the characters’ insistence upon the phrase “the cottage”—while its owners show off every conceivable mod. con. But complacency soon gives way to mounting terror, once the power goes out – once the clocks, as they later discover, have stopped – once they find that their cosy retreat has become a deadly trap… Though of course it came first, it occurred to me at one point that The Exorcism plays rather like a twisted, evil-twin version of The Good Life (it is, at any rate, amusingly in line with the view of that show offered up by Vyvyan in The Young Ones). It is remarkable for both its political awareness and the anger towards its characters that underlies it. The main problem here is that ultimately the screenplay had to go either with a flashback or an info-dump—and it chose the latter, with mixed success. The film survives this necessary stop-dead thanks to following it with a double climax which among other things offers up a moment of (BBC TV circa 1972, remember) genuinely shocking physical horror.

Operation Thunderbolt (1977)

Original title: Mivtsa Yonatan (Operation Jonathan); also known as: Entebbe: Operation Thunderbolt. Well, here we are again, for the third time in four months (hmm: just realising that this timeframe applies to both the films themselves and my comments on them); so rather than re-hashing events yet again, I think I’ll just stick to noting the differences in the approach of this Israeli-produced telling of the Air France hijacking and the commando raid that followed, compared to its American competitors, Victory At Entebbe and Raid On Entebbe. Naturally enough, the biggest difference is in the tone: Operation Thunderbolt is unapologetic to the point of jingoism in its pro-Israeli attitude; and far from fearing to offend anyone, it goes past the politics of the situation into some uncomfortable touches of bigotry. Once again, the two Palestinian hijackers are left unidentified and almost faceless, while the focus stays on their German collaborators (Klaus Kinski and Sybil Danning, the latter a co-producer). In its depiction of the woman, this film follows Victory At Entebbe by making her the prime mover in both the violence and the separating out of the Jewish hostages; but this version is the first to make its Wilfried Böse stand-in almost as hardline, whereas the general agreement is that Böse was (in terrorist terms) the weak link. With their permission, Operation Thunderbolt included the real Yitzchak Rabin and his ministers in the film via stock footage. Because this approach eliminated the possibility of scenes of the politicians agonising over their choices, instead we spend much more time with the Israeli commandos led by by Brigadier General Dan Shomron (Arik Lavie) and “Yoni” Netanyahu (Yehoram Gaon) as they prepare for the daring mission to Entebbe. Much of the second half of the film is devoted to glorifying the latter, who was the only military fatality. The depiction of the raid forms an extended climax, and includes some suspicious softening of the facts—with the hostages who were killed shown as having been shot by the terrorists, not the commandos, and orders issued to try and avoid killing the Ugandan soldiers who were guarding the airport. (In any event, that edict doesn’t outlast the fatal wounding of Netanyahu.) Elsewhere, Operation Thunderbolt does do a few things differently, and better: it allows all the characters to speak in their own language, with a language barrier adding to the terror of some; it includes a German doctor amongst the passengers, who makes his stance on the hijacking and the isolating of the Jewish hostages perfectly clear; and the scenes of celebration at the end are punctuated by moments in which those people whose loved ones did not survive are given the news. At this distance, our reaction to Operation Thunderbolt may be somewhat coloured by our awareness that it was a Golan-Globus production, and directed by the former—and that the two then rushed to exploit the situation by fictionalising it in Delta Force. It was, from all points of view, a dubious nomination for Best Foreign Film, with politics clearly outweighing art.

Murder By Decree (1979)

Based upon the characters of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and The Ripper File by Elwyn Jones and John Lloyd. Sherlock Holmes (Christopher Plummer) and Dr Watson (James Mason) attend the theatre, where the performance is delayed by the late arrival of the royal couple. Princess Alexandra (Pamela Abbott) is warmly received by the audience, but a radical faction in the the gods loudly expresses its disapproval of the Prince of Wales (Victor Langley) until drowned out by a chorus of ‘God Save The Queen’ led by Dr Watson. Outside the theatre, handbills are distributed announcing a third brutal murder in Whitechapel. Dr Watson comments upon how strange it is that, though the police are clearly stumped, Holmes’ assistance has not been requested. That evening, three men claiming to represent the shopkeepers of Whitechapel do call upon Holmes and beg for his help in bringing the killer to justice; though to Watson’s surprise the detective responds coolly: later he explains that he recognised one of the “businessmen” as a leading radical, and that he suspects the committee’s motives. Still, he promises Watson that they will begin looking into the murders in the morning—though by that time, a fourth woman is dead… On the scene of the sickening crime, Holmes is welcomed by Inspector Lestrade (Frank Finlay) and Inspector Foxborough (David Hemmings), but met with angry disdain from Sir Charles Warren (Anthony Quayle), the Commissioner of Police—who then takes it upon himself to destroy a piece of evidence… The idea of a showdown between Victorian London’s most famous real-life killer and its most famous fictional detective now seems so obvious, and so appealing, that it is somewhat surprising that it took until 1966’s A Study In Terror before it happened. Over the following decade, the world was flooded with non-fiction re-examinations of the case of Jack the Ripper and theories as to his identity—culminating in this second face-off in 1979. Officially based upon The Ripper Files but with a good deal of Stephen Knight’s Jack The Ripper: The Final Solution mixed in too, Murder By Decree is an interesting though flawed piece of Holmes-iana hampered, as all such reworkings must be, by the need to work around the official status of the case as “unsolved”. The screenplay by John Hopkins – which is frankly slanderous with regard to its handling of several real personages (there’s a reason neither the Prime Minister nor the Home Secretary is named) – uses as its framework the growing anti-monarchical sentiment of the period, with a radical faction intent upon exploiting the murders and the failure of Scotland Yard for its own purposes. At the same time, Sir Charles Warren has his own agenda for handling the case, one which also supersedes the identification of the killer. Sherlock Holmes therefore finds himself impeded and attacked from both sides as he pursues a solution to the murders in his usual single-minded way—which is, in this instance, perhaps too single-minded… Having played Sherlock Holmes before, in 1977’s Silver Blaze, Christopher Plummer was obviously trying to retain the eccentricities and self-absorption of the character while making the detective rather warmer and more human than is often the case. Nevertheless, it is James Mason who steals the film—giving us a Dr Watson who is not only long-suffering and loyal as expected, but intelligent and dignified as well. (Though my favourite aspect of Mason’s performance is the way he conveys how exhausting living with someone like Holmes must be.) We might also care to note that it is actually Watson who does all the real grunt-work of the investigation, while Holmes is off pursuing more esoteric theories. These central performances help hold the film together, but Murder By Decree does stumble with respect to its subplot involving the psychic Robert Lees (Donald Sutherland), which just feels like cheating; and more seriously with Holmes’ habit of forcing witnesses to talk before he has them in safety: a tendency which costs at least one life. Still more troubling is that Holmes – admittedly for what he considers good reason, though at this distance we may disagree – finally makes himself a part of the very cover-up that he was fighting to expose. Though the internal art direction of Murder By Decree is a delight, the film’s main street set looks very artificial (in this respect the production now suffers from Whitechapel having been done so convincingly so often since). The cast overall is excellent, however, also including Susan Clark, Geneviève Bujold and John Gielgud.

Double Impact (1991)

Hong Kong, 1966. A ceremony is held to mark the opening of the Victoria Harbour Tunnel, linking the island to the mainland. Afterwards, Paul Wagner (Andy Armstrong) and his wife, Katherine (Sarah Jane Varley), head home with their twin baby sons and the boys’ nanny. Along the way they are ambushed by Triad members. Paul and Katherine are killed, but the nanny escapes with one of the babies. Alerted too late, the Wagners’ bodyguard, Frank Avery (Geoffrey Lewis), drives off the attackers and saves the second child. As he leaves the scene, he catches a glimpse of the man behind the murders: Paul’s business partner, Nigel Griffith (Alan Scaefe)… Twenty-five years later, Chad Wagner (Jean-Claude Van Damme) is running a martial-arts studio near Hollywood with the man he believes to be his uncle when Frank reveals that he also owns a business in Hong Kong. When the two arrive there, Chad has a series of strange encounters with people who seem to know him, culminating in the intimate attentions of Danielle Wilde (Alonna Shore). Their moment comes to an abrupt end when another man arrives and dispatches Chad with a head-butt. Dazed, he looks up into his own face… Introducing Alex (Jean-Claude Van Damme), Frank tells the twins about their parents’ murders and points the finger at Nigel Griffith and his criminal associate, Raymond Zhang (Philip Chan)… When too much Van Damme is barely enough— Directed by Sheldon Lettich and co-written by JCVD himself, Double Impact is an amusing exercise in excess, with the overt plot – the twins reclaiming their financial interest in the tunnel – forgotten as soon as it has paved the way for their escalating conflict with their parents’ killers. While there are plenty of fight scenes, gun battles and explosions along the way, it is of course the film’s twin-gimmick that holds the focus here. On the whole it’s very well-executed—with only the occasional obvious use of a double (when the two have to touch) and misaligned composite to spoil the game. The visual distinction is achieved easily enough, with Alex’s slicked-back hair and black leather aesthetic set against Chad’s bouffant ’do and fluoro leisure-wear look (and black silk underwear, mustn’t forget THAT); but there are also more thoughtful touches such as Alex being more comfortable with guns while Chad relies first on his martial-arts skills, which distinguishes them during the fight scenes. The real challenge here was excusing two accents, not just one—so we have Chad raised in France for no particular reason, and Alex being dropped off at a Hong Kong orphanage run by French Catholic nuns. This allows for another degree of differentiation, with the street-smart, criminally engaged Alex understandably resentful of his much more comfortably situated brother. Naturally when the two meet, it’s hate at first sight – allowing the film to keep its tacit promise of the twins facing off – but when Chad is mistaken for Alex, abducted by Raymond Zhang’s thugs and beaten to a pulp—well, of course you know THIS means war… While the framework of Double Impact is a perfectly serviceable action film, the devil is in the details—the most welcome / terrifying being Bolo Yeung returning after Bloodsport to flex his pecs as Raymond Zhang’s chief enforcer, Moon. A real bonus here is former Ms Olympia Corinna Everson as Nigel Griffith’s bodyguard, Kara—who wields a knife, but also a pair of literally killer thighs. Meanwhile, the film shoehorns in an hilariously stylised sex scene, when Alex torments himself with visions of Chad and Danielle getting it on. However, when Frank and Danielle are both captured and held on the ship Zhang and Griffith have acquired for drug-trafficking purposes, the twins put aside their differences and mount one final offensive…

Evil Spirits (1991)

Ella Purdy (Karen Black) runs a boarding-house, providing accommodation and care in exchange for her tenants signing over their welfare cheques. Only the local mail deliverer (Hoke Howell) seems to notice that Ella takes in more cheques than there are people in her house… When a boarder called Matt Stevens fails to appear at breakfast, Ella explains to the rest – would-be author Mr Balzac (Michael Berryman), alcoholic Willie (Mikel Angel), practising psychic Vanya (Martine Beswick) and mute dancer Tina (Debra Lamb) – that he is, “No longer with us.” Two new boarders, John Wilson (Bert Remsen) and his wife, Janet (Virginia Mayo), arrive: the latter is hostile to the arrangement from the beginning and finds the atmosphere in the house disturbing, though her husband persuades her to try and get used to things. An agitated Vanya tells Ella that she senses Mr Stevens is actually dead, and insists upon holding a séance. Reluctantly, the rest participate—and are alarmed when, speaking in a voice not her own, Vanya insists that there is danger to them all in the house… When you start a film with a knife to the eye, where is there left to go? Nowhere much, as it turns out. Evil Spirits ought to be better, or at least more fun, than it is. The bits and pieces are there but they never really gel; and the film overall is too content just to drift along on the strength of its admittedly remarkable cast, a general air of weirdness and the occasional murder—several of which occur off-screen. Loosely based, evidently, upon the real-life case of killer landlady Dorothea Puente, Evil Spirits does at least give each of its cast members a chance to hold the screen; no-one is wasted. As Mr Balzac – he has writer’s block – Michael Berryman divides his time between hogging the breakfast eggs and spying on Tina – Debra Lamb bringing the gratuitous nudity – before becoming the film’s second victim of eye-violence. (Thanks…) Screenwriter Mikel Angel enjoys himself as friendly drunk Willie, unknowingly evading several schemes against his life; while Martine Beswick’s Vanya is not so fortunate, falling foul of whoever – or whatever – is chained up in the basement. There are also cameo appearances by Anthony Eisley as a detective and Robert Quarry as a doctor. Above all, though, Evil Spirits provides an armchair ride for Karen Black, who cheerfully chews the scenery as Ella Purdy, chattering away to her parrot and her wheelchair-bound husband, and catering to her guests’ peculiarities in between cashing their cheques and planting them in her backyard. The latter draws the attention of a nosy neighbour (Yvette Vickers); but it is welfare investigator Lester Potts (Arte Johnson) who threatens to bring the whole scheme crashing down…

Air Force One (1997)

General Radek (Jürgen Prochnow), leader of a neo-Soviet regime in Kazakhstan, is captured during a joint US-Russian special forces operation. Three weeks later, in Moscow, US President James Marshall (Harrison Ford) is lauded during a celebratory dinner; though he dismays his Chief of Staff Lloyd Shepherd (Paul Guilfoyle) and National Security Advisor Jack Doherty (Tom Everett) by going off-script in his speech, declaring that from now on the US will be more proactive against terrorism. The President’s party, including First Lady Grace Marshall (Wendy Crewson) and twelve-year-old Alice (Liesel Matthews), prepares to depart Moscow on Air Force One. Among those boarding are a party of Russian journalists headed by Ivan Korshunov (Gary Oldman); Deputy Press Secretary Melanie Mitchell (Donna Bullock) takes the party under her wing and offers them all assistance. Shortly after takeoff, Special Agent Gibbs (Xander Berkeley) of the Protective Division slips away and opens the plane’s weapons cache to Korshunov and the others, who are Radek loyalists. In the bloodbath that follows, Grace and Alice are taken hostage along with the rest of Marshall’s inner circle; but to Korshunov’s fury, the President is hustled into the plane’s escape pod. Korshunov is quick to decry Marshall’s cowardice in fleeing, not knowing that he is in fact still on Air Force One—and now armed… Yet another 90s political action thriller – featuring yet another set of screenwriters having to work their way around that pesky glasnost thing – Air Force One has a lot going for it but finally leaves me unsatisfied. On the positive side we have Harrison Ford at the peak of his suit-and-tie-thrillers phase, effortlessly believable as he says things that would get any other US President, real or fictional, hooted off the screen—like, “From now on, the US will do what’s right, not just what’s expedient.” (The manoeuvring to give Marshall the “right” background is amusing: he’s a Vietnam vet, so tick on the military experience; but then he was a helicopter pilot, presumably to keep his hands clean, plus the flying thing.) Ford is well-matched by Gary Oldman, who is terrifying as Korshunov yet manages also to convey his conviction about what he is doing. The film’s central philosophical conflict, and its examination of how far the dictum “We will not negotiate with terrorists” actually goes in reality, are presented with commendable even-handedness. The escalating battle between Marshall and the hijackers is both tense and entertainingly absurd, with Air Force One’s classified status allowing the writers to get away with pretty much anything, from the escape pod onwards. But ultimately, the film just has a few too many false steps. The screenplay never reveals the motive behind Gibbs’ actions which, given how extreme their consequences, leaves too big a hole in the plot. But even this pales beside the very fact of the hijackers’ plot—which must have been thrown together in the three weeks following Radek’s capture yet (even allowing for a mole) succeeds in granting them access to perhaps the second-most secure facility on the planet. (Ahem. We’ll get to the most secure one in a minute.) My main problem with Air Force One, however – and I say this as someone who bows to no-one in my love of a stricken plane film – is that the whole final act just feels like a pile-on, and one that crosses the acceptable absurdity line. I also find the tone shift that accompanies it inappropriate. Of course there’s nothing wrong with a Die Hard-esque ho-ho-ho-you’re-all-going-to-die attitude – if that’s been established – but the switch to that after how grim and serious the first two-thirds of this film are is jarring. Meanwhile, the debate on the ground over who is actually in charge of the country, featuring Vice President Kathryn Bennett (Glenn Close), Defense Secretary Walter Dean (Dean Stockwell) and Attorney General Andrew Ward (Philip Baker Hall), is funny when I don’t think it was intended to be (at least to outsider eyes). My other grudge against this film is that there was one person I really wanted to make it to the end credits—but who I knew wasn’t going to from the moment I laid eyes on him…

(The production date of Air Force One tends to catch me off guard, because Executive Decision has always felt to me like a film made to correct its errors.)

Murder At 1600 (1997)

Late one night, the body of a young woman who has been murdered is discovered in a lavatory at the White House. Metropolitan Police homicide detective Harlan Regis (Wesley Snipes) is summoned to the scene, and immediately finds himself at loggerheads with Secret Service Director Nick Spikings (Daniel Benzali). However, National Security Advisor Alvin Jordan (Alan Alda) intervenes, revealing that he was the one who brought in the DC police. The dead woman is identified as Carla Town, from the Office of Protocol. Under pressure from Jordan, Spikings reluctantly reveals that at the estimated time of death, another thirty-one people were in the White House; though the First Family had left the day before for Camp David. Nevertheless, the incident is a disaster for President Jack Neil (Ronny Cox), who is already under fire for his handling of an incident involving American servicemen captured in North Korea. Spikings assigns former Olympic sharpshooter and now Secret Service agent Nina Chance (Diane Lane) as Regis’s liaison; though it is soon clear that her main duty is to keep an eye on him. The Secret Service’s own investigation swiftly targets and arrests janitor Cory Luchessi (Tony Nappo), and the case is declared closed; but a dissatisfied Regis persists and soon finds evidence implicating Kyle Neil (Tate Donovan), the President’s son… Evidently, when Clint Eastwood learned that Murder At 1600 was in production at the same time as his own Absolute Power, he had the latter rushed to completion and into cinemas first—and his tactics seem to have succeeded, with audiences largely rejecting this second dose of White House shenanigans. Nevertheless, though the two share a number of faults in addition to the similarity of their premises, Murder At 1600 is the smarter of the two films. Whereas Absolute Power uses sexual misconduct in high places in a fairly straightforward (and rather heavy-handed) manner, the screenplay here by Wayne Beach and David Hodgin more often plays upon the expectation of such misconduct—and therefore succeeds upon occasion in leading its viewers astray; while the film overall remains good fun despite (to put it mildly) its increasing issues with credibility. Harlan Regis recognises at once that Luchessi is being railroaded by the Secret Service, begging the question of why they wouldn’t want the real killer caught; and the detective’s suspicions turn to justified paranoia when he discovers that his apartment has been burglarised and bugged. Despite the interefence, Regis and his people succeed in collecting – and concealing – two vital pieces of evidence. First, the list of people on the scene supplied by Nina Chance has thirty names on it, as opposed to Spikings’ tally of thirty-one; and in a photograph of Carla Town, Regis identifies Burton Cash (Nigel Bennett), the agent assigned to Kyle Neil—which leads him to the discovery that Cash’s predecessor in this assignment was Nina… Though it works as a police procedural, Murder At 1600 eventually goes off the rails where these things usually do—becoming increasingly absurd as it morphs into a chase thriller in which Our Heroes have to evade teams of murderous Secret Service agents who leave a trail of corpses all across DC…though never the right ones. Harder still to swallow is the film’s climax, which finds Nina, Regis and the latter’s colleague, Stengel (Dennis Miller), having collected their evidence and identified both killer and motive, having to break into the White House in order to deliver the news to the appropriate parties. Wesley Snipes is effective here as Regis (“1600 what!?”), and Diane Lane seems to have enjoyed her Action Girl role. She also gets one of the film’s best moments when, in response to Spikings’ ominous pep-talk, Nina points out wryly that sharpshooting isn’t a team sport…

A Perfect Murder (1998)

Based upon the play Dial M For Murder by Frederick Knott. After a meeting with her lover, aspiring artist David Shaw (Viggo Mortensen), Emily Taylor (Gwyneth Paltrow) returns to her apartment where she unexpectedly finds her husband, Steven (Michael Douglas), ready to accompany her to a charity benefit. At the benefit, she encounters David again and hastily signals him not to approach her. When the two do find a moment together, they are swiftly joined by Steven: Emily hurriedly covers by presenting David as an artist whose work she admires, though this prompts Steven to express a wish to see it too. Meeting her best friend, Raquel Martinez (Sarita Choudhury), Emily confesses that she is thinking about leaving Steven, who is controlling and treats her like a possession. Meanwhile, after learning that his business is facing a dire financial crisis, Steven does arrange to meet David—but not to talk about his art. Revealing that he knows David’s real identity and all about his criminal past, Steven offers him half a million dollars to murder Emily… This updated version of Dial M For Murder is a fair, twisty thriller, though it founders somewhat in failing to establish much sympathy for its beleaguered protagonist. In fact it isn’t clear at all how we’re expected to feel about Emily, whose background of extreme wealth and privilege and current position amongst New York’s elite is insufficiently offset by her unhappiness in her marriage; besides the fact that, though apparently brilliant at her demanding job at the UN, Emily is dumb as a bag of hammers when it comes to judging men. That said, the screenplay by Patrick Smith Kelly is interestingly non-judgemental about Emily’s affair—and given that David is played by a young and rather scruffily gorgeous Viggo Mortensen, the viewer is not much inclined to blame her either. Over its first act, A Perfect Murder sticks reasonably close to its source, with Steven blackmailing David into disposing of his wife so that he may inherit her vast fortune. As expected, the attempted murder goes very wrong, with Emily killing her masked assailant during the violent attack. (Though the scene is grim, the specifics are hilarious: Chekhov, but not a gun…) Arriving just before the police, Steven rebounds from his shocked discovery of Emily’s survival and hastily re-stages the scene. From here all bets are off, however, as the police peel back the dead man’s mask to reveal the face of a stranger… The parting of company of A Perfect Murder from its source is both the film’s strength and its weakness. The latter phase of the film is largely focused upon Steven’s response to discovering that David outsourced the hit on Emily, and is now intent upon blackmailing him in turn. While this is all darkly amusing, the fact that Emily is in no legal danger – the police swiftly and rightly rule the killing justified – removes much of the tension, even though we know Steven still needs her dead. An even bigger problem is that this plot-turn reduces the fourth-billed David Suchet, as homicide detective Moe Karaman, to a disappointingly minor presence in the film: eliminating the original detective’s simultaneous role as threat and saviour. The tiny, intimate moment between Emily and Karaman while she is being questioned is one of the film’s best touches, but it is also misleading—hinting at a more interesting and complex Emily than we ever meet, and a more prominent role for Karaman. As Steven and David play their escalating power games, Emily’s recognition of the unanswered questions about the attack leads her to play detective on her own account—and soon she must confront the reality that her life is still in danger…

Octopus 2: River Of Fear (2001)

Also known as: Octopus II. As tourists pour into New York for its 4th of July celebrations, a couple walking by the river are dragged underwater by huge tentacles… NYPD Harbor Patrol cops Walter McNair (Fredric Lehne) and Nick Hartfield (Michael Riley Burke) bust the owner of a boat they have been surveilling for suspected drug activity, only to discover him to a local judge. This blunder brings the wrath of the mayor (Duncan Fraser) and their captain (Paul Vincent O’Connor) down upon them. Their confrontation with the latter reveals that Walter has asked for a transfer to a desk job: he admits it, but tells Nick he has also recommended him as the new squad leader. Sent out to investigate damage to a power cable, Walter and Nick instead find the remains of the woman killed the night before. At the scene, they are met by Rachel Starbird (Meredith Morton) of the mayor’s office, who tells them that with so many tourists arriving, there is concern over safety on the river. Evidence at the scene of the disappearance sends Walter and Nick to an underground community of the homeless, where a man known as Mad Dog (Clement Blake) admits that he saw the couple killed—and insists they were pulled into the water by a huge octopus… Octopus 2 bucks the trend of these Nu Image killer animal films by being slightly better than its predecessor—but only because it would pretty much have to be. At least one lesson was learned from Octopus, with the critter introduced early here – in fact in the first scene, which isn’t ordinarily a good sign – and far more octopus action throughout, if not enough to offset the exceedingly dull character scenes. With its rubber tentacles (suckers always pointing outwards) and its glow-in-in-dark eyeball, the octopus is never remotely convincing, but we’ll take what we can get—which includes stock footage from the earlier film cut into some of the attack sequences. (They may have been assuming, reasonably, that no-one was paying close enough attention to Octopus to notice.) Octopus 2 is also guilty of an outrageous bait-and-switch, with the image plastered all over the advertising of a gigantic beastie climbing the Statue of Liberty turning out to be a dream sequence; albeit it’s still the best bit of the film and actually (intentionally) pretty funny. Along the way we get a whiff of Jaws, with the mayor refusing to cancel the 4th of July celebrations on the river, though you can’t actually blame him too much in spite of some reporter-babbling about “The East River Killer”; and perhaps of Alligator too. No explanation is ever offered for the octopus’s presence beyond Nick’s suggestion of it being “swept down from Nova Scotia” – where in fact most of the cephalopods are on the small size – nor for its repeated attacks upon solid objects including a tugboat which goes inflammabilis as a result. And if you’ve deduced that (i) that judge was drug-smuggling, and (ii) he gets his tentacley comeuppance, give yourself a gold star. Walter’s transfer is this film’s version of “three days until retirement”, giving Nick a personal grudge against the octopus; while the tiresome “romance” that develops between him and Rachel also adds a personal edge to a running-time-padding sequence in which she and a busload of Cute Kids^TM get trapped in an underwater tunnel. The climactic disposal of the octopus is perfunctory and disappointingly helicopter-free.

Evil Eyes (2004)

With his career in tatters after “the incident”, screenwriter Jeff Stenn (Adam Baldwin) is relieved to be summoned to the office of producer George Truman (Udo Kier) and offered a job. Handing over a bundle of newspaper clippings and videos, Truman explains that Jeff’s task will be to develop a script from a real-life case in which, thirty-five years before, a film director called Gary Gramm (Eric Casselton) inexplicably murdered his pregnant wife and her parents and then killed himself. When Jeff meets with Truman again to seal the deal, he is given the keys to the house where the murders took place. He calls his friend, true-crime buff Nina (Kristin Lorenz), and invites her to join him there, and later to his house to develop some ideas. Nina agrees, once she is assured that Jeff’s wife, Tree (Jennifer Gates), won’t have a problem with that. After dinner, Jeff shares more information with Nina about Gramm, including the strange incident of an actress who he filmed “dying” from a fall from a moving car, dying the same way in reality a week later. On one video, the two watch footage of Gramm himself, who asserts that, “Just by imagining something, you actually make it happen.” After Nina insists on driving home despite an offer of the couch, Jeff begins toying with ideas for a scene of the actress’s death—and as he writes the words, Nina is killed in a car crash… Evil Eyes is a fair low-budget horror movie whose ideas are better than its execution, and which eventually falls apart under the weight of its own plot twists. There are also too many draggy scenes, and too much inadequate acting. Still—you can certainly get some enjoyment out of it if you focus on the meta-qualities that are the film’s strongest aspect, with Jeff’s real life, his dreams and his imaginings for his screenplay increasingly blending into one another, and his circumstances beginning to mirror those that preceded Gramm’s killing spree. In this respect, the film bears a resemblance to Stephen King’s short story, Word Processor Of The Gods: when Truman urges him to ramp things up, Jeff begins to invent ever-more outré fates to inflict upon his characters—which in turn begin to inflict themselves upon the people around him who have earned his ire. (Including eye-violence for the agent who dumped him. Really, universe? Again??) There are cinematic allusions here too: David Lynch is name-checked early, and the videos of Gramm have something of a Lost Highway-ish vibe to them; but the main running joke is a series of references to Dreamworks and a certain “Steven” – neither of whom would touch these people with a ten-foot pole but oh well – which is just too bad for Jeff’s friend, Peter (Mark Sheppard), who gets the gig they both wanted—and immediately falls victim to a grotesque accident…

The Villainess (2017)

Believing that her husband has been murdered, Sook-hee (Kim Ok-vin) goes on a rampage that leaves most of the gang she holds responsible dead. She is apprehended by the police but then delivered into the hands of a covert agency where Kwon-sook (Kim Seo-hyung) tells her that if she will be trained as a government assassin and carry out missions for ten years, afterwards she will be free to live her own life. Sook-hee agrees—though her training is delayed by the discovery of her pregnancy… After giving birth to a daughter, Sook-hee undergoes plastic surgery and is given a new identity: Chae Yeon-soo. She is trained both for the covert missions ahead and as an actress for the “real” life that will provide her cover. Moving into an apartment with her toddler daughter, Eun-hye (Kim Yeon-woo), Yeon-soo attracts the attention of friendly neighbour, Jung Hyun-soo (Sung Joon)—unaware that he is a “plant” sent to keep an eye on her. In time Hyun-soo falls for Yeon-soo for real and asks the agency’s permission to marry her; while not knowing his secret, she accepts his proposal chiefly out of concern for Eun-hye’s future. Yeon-soo is then given an assignment to be carried out on her wedding-day, and from her wedding-venue. She prepares to take the shot as ordered—but botches the job upon realising that her target is her first husband, Lee Joong-sang (Shin Ha-kyun)… Another riff on the scenario of natural born killer turned professional assassin – writer-director Jung Byung-gil freely admits the influence of La Femme Nikita – The Villainess is a violent action thriller that ultimately falls victim to its own complexities—or rather, to the way in which they are presented. The film uses a fractured, flash-back / flash-forward structure that, along with all the multiple and shifting identities, makes it difficult for the viewer to grasp all the implications of its narrative and keep up with just who is doing what to whom. In essence, the film offers past and present in parallel, with Yeon-soo and Hyun-soo’s growing trust and intimacy set against the unfolding of Sook-hee’s tragic past. Having as a child witnessed the murder of her father, Sook-hee is later sold to a prostitution ring. She is rescued from this by Lee Joong-sang who, recognising her rage and her thirst for vengeance, decides to train her as a killer. During this brutal process, Sook-hee becomes devoted to Joong-sang. Eventually the two are married, and Sook-hee begins to contemplate a normal life—until Joong-sang disappears… The Villainess is ultimately a story of betrayal piled upon betrayal, and how you really can’t trust anybody—or if you do, it will probably get you killed. The violence is high level, though at times too over the top to be really convincing. (During the opening sequence of Sook-hee’s rampage, I kept expecting the camera to pull back and show someone playing a video game.) The emotional violence, however, is unrelenting—with the film finally crossing a line that most Western films wouldn’t dare to. Kim Ok-vin does an excellent job conveying the two different faces – physically and literally – of her character; while Shin Ha-kyun gives us a truly evil villain in Lee Joong-sang. The final phase of The Villainess consists of the escalatingly bloody battle that unfolds between Sook-hee / Yeon-soo and Joong-sang as the whole truth of both their pasts is revealed…

Inhuman Kiss (2019)

Original title: Sang Krasue; also known as: Krasue: Inhuman Kiss. As four children from a Thai village play hide-and-seek in the forest, one of them opens an old chest located in a ruined house—and has a frightening encounter… Years later, with the staff of the local clinic called away to treat casualties in Bangkok, Sai (Phantira Pipityakorn) does what she can to go on providing medical care for the villagers. She is both helped and hindered in this by Jerd (Sapol Assawamunkong), who has a crush on her. Sai’s friend Ting (Darina Boonchu) encourages a relationship between the two, but Sai is reluctant. Meanwhile, the village itself is in upheaval over a series of animal killings, which is being attributed to a demon known as a krasue. The men, led by Phaen (Sahatchai Chumrum), Sai’s father, patrol the surrounding area by night. Also out in the forest, Sai encounters a party of men led by Noi (Oabnithi Wiwattanawarang), another childhood friend whose family left the area. The others with him are introduced as krasue hunters but, with their wild appearance and violent behaviour, the villagers doubt their intentions. However, the leader of the gang, Tad (Surasak Wongthai), clearly knows a great deal about krasues; perhaps too much. One night, the men do hunt and kill a krasue, whose host turns out to be a little girl called Kaew (Makhasiri Thepsittha). The question becomes how she could have been “infected”; and when the villagers learn that she was taken to the clinic for treatment, their suspicions turn to Sai… In the wonderful array of Asian supernatural entities, the krasue is one of the most mindboggling. By day the demon’s host may live the normal life of a girl or woman; by night, her head will detach and, trailing eager tentacles, fly off in search of prey—animal or otherwise. Inhuman Kiss is an effective horror-drama – one might even say, horror-romance – that employs a slow-burn narrative as concerned with the human character dynamic at its centre as with the bloody activities of its monster. With respect to the latter, Sai is as much victim as villain—facing retribution as an inherent part of her “curse” as well as for her immediate actions. Infected as a child, for a long time Sai is unaware of what she is and what she does. When, as a young woman, she wakes up to blood spots on her sheets, she only smiles wryly, thinking the obvious; but as the bloodstains get larger daily, and as the villagers’ outrage and panic over their slaughtered livestock grows, she must finally confront the truth about herself… Meanwhile, Inhuman Kiss also dwells upon the love-triangle at its heart. Jerd is overt in his pursuit of the reluctant Sai; but there is no reluctance on her part when she is reunited with Noi—not until she understands what the consequences for him might be. A medical student, Noi is initially a sceptic about the prevailing monster stories but, after discovering Sai’s secret, he turns his research skills to finding a way in which she may be, if not cured, at least kept under control. He has some success, but other dangers are looming large… Inhuman Kiss is perhaps longer than it needed to be, with some pacing issues and a few confusing missteps along the way. However, the way in which it presents the lore of the krasue and its male equivalent, the krahang, is fascinating. We don’t see quite as much of the krasue in action as we would like, but when we do the effects work is quite good; as is the makeup work in conveying the aftermath of the demon’s bloody depredations (animal as well as human, so ew). Increasingly, the main point of interest here is the extraordinarily broadminded Noi, as he pursues a relationship with Sai in spite of everything and tries desperately to protect her. The final scene between him and krasue Sai is both delightfully creepy and strangely moving (albeit somewhat spoiled by being used on the film’s poster).

Secrets In The Building (2022)

Also known as: Killer Condo. For a fresh start after the death of their husband and father, Michelle Green (Shemeka Wright) and her teenage daughter, Norah (Kia Dorsey), move cross-country to California and into a top-floor apartment. Almost immediately, they clash with the building’s angry and officious maintenance man, Lawrence (John J. Jordan), who berates them for making too much noise. Downstairs neighbour Helene Mathieson (Katelin Chesna) takes the Greens’ part and tells Michelle not to take too much notice of Lawrence. She also introduces her daughter, Channing (Tori Griffith), who is the same age as Norah. As the two girls talk in Norah’s bedroom, the latter is perturbed when, after she mentions her migraines, Channing casually offers her “something stronger” than her usual medication; and she becomes genuinely angry when Channing introduces her at school as, “A real party girl.” New friend Amanda (Allison Ye) reassures Norah that Channing’s behaviour is well-understood—but also warns her not to provoke her. This becomes more difficult when Aidan (Noah Fearnley), briefly Channing’s boyfriend, takes an interest in Norah. Meanwhile, Michelle is bemused though flattered when building contractor Josh (Justin Berti) asks her out. Soon afterwards, life takes a dark turn for both of the Greens… What I want to know is—how does Lifetime get that tone in all their movies? Do you know what I mean? – that sense of everything being just slightly off, of no-one talking or acting quite like a real person. Secrets In The Building has that tone in spades, which adds an amusingly off-kilter note as the seemingly on-the-upswing life of the Greens begins to implode, with the two together – even more so, Norah on her own – subject to an escalating campaign of persecution. All of this film’s fun is in trying to decide who it is who apparently wants to ruin the Greens’ lives; much more than ruin them, after an opening sequence that shows the two succumbing to poisoning. The most obvious suspect – and we know she is responsible for some of it – is Channing: described by Amanda as, “A Stage 5 clinger”, she proceeds to prove it by deciding that Norah is her new bestie—or else. However, some of the persecution seems out of character or beyond her capabilities. Eventually Helene too starts to show a darker side; while mother and daughter together have reason to resent the Greens, when it is revealed that they used to occupy their much-larger apartment-with-a-view but had to move into a cramped downstairs one when Helene’s marriage fell apart. This, in turn, brings Helene’s violent stalker ex – and Channing’s father – into the picture; in addition, of course, to Overtly Suspicious^TM Lawrence. Meanwhile both Michelle and Norah begin dating Overtly Nice Guys^TM—so naturally we suspect them too… There are a couple of bright spots in Secrets In The Building in addition to its dumb-fun quota. Shemeka Wright and Kia Dorsey are convincing as mother and daughter, and it’s refreshing to have their relationship presented in a positive way. The screenplay by Maninder Chana and Barbara Arsenault takes pains to convey that Channing has genuine mental-health issues, rather than just being a bitch, and Tori Griffiths does a pretty good job conveying her struggles.