Month: July 2020

Review: Meridian

On By E. A. SolinasIn reviewsLeave a comment

If Laurell K. Hamilton ever wrote a straight romance novel, it would probably be something like “Meridian” — lots of flowing shirts, rape… and sex with a furry werewolf.

And if you aren’t a fan of those things, then “Meridian” won’t have a lot to recommend itself. This movie tries to be both a sexploitation movie AND a “beauty and the beast” gothic romance, but just ends up being painfully slow-moving and incoherent. Not to mention that the constant rape and furry sex completely neutralizes any hint of actual sexiness to be found.

The story follows Catherine Bomarzini (Sherilyn Fenn), an American art student who returns to her family castle in Italy. Then her idiot friend Gina (Charlie Spradling) invites a troupe of wandering magicians to dinner at the castle, led by the arrogant Lawrence (Malcom Jamieson). Then the troupe drugs the two women so Lawrence can rape them, followed by him handing off Catherine to his twin brother Oliver (Jamieson again).

Apparently we’re supposed to view THEIR sex as being real lovemaking, but she still seems rather dopey. Oh, and Oliver turns into a werewolf while raping Catherine.

The following day, Catherine begins seeing strange visions from the past — a dead girl in a flowing white dress, a werewolf (guess who it is!) and a secret passage filled with red light. She also begins to figure out that there is a longtime curse associated with her family, and that Oliver (whom she thinks is the same person as Lawrence) can only be freed by her.

The first half of “Meridian” is pure sexploitation (rape, boobies, Sherilynn Fenn naked), with every possible excuse to show boobs bouncing out of tight shirts. But after our first glimpse of the werewolf, director Charles Band starts trying to turn it into an atmospheric gothic romance with curses, a werewolf, a tormented Byronic hero in flowing white shirts and a mysterious painting. It fails. A lot.

The movie sludges along at a painfully slow pace, with awful dialogue (“I have no world without you”) and a lot of things that are never explained (that giant secret passage leading directly into a bedroom? Never explained). It drapes itself with scarlet velvet, moonlight, silver jewelry and shirts straight off of a romance novel cover, but Band can’t hide the wretchedly contrived story.

And the climax is fascinatingly ludicrous: a werewolf holding a crossbow is thwarted by a whip-cracking dwarf in Elizabethan garb. I felt like someone had slipped drugs into MY drink.

One of the biggest problems is the rape. Not only does the villain date-rape the heroine and her friend, but it’s shot in a slow-motion, erotic manner, as if Band was trying to make it alluring. And it’s made even worse because the HERO also rapes her. Yes. While the heroine is meant to be coming out of her drugged stupor, her lack of reaction to having sex with a werewolf shows she was still pretty out-of-it.

Oh yes. There is sex with a werewolf in full furry form, and we’re supposed to find it erotic. It’s not erotic. It’s actually rather grotesque to those without furry fetishes, and it negates any slight hints of sexiness that the movie might produce.

And despite Fenn’s decent acting, the characters are just awful. Catherine is a walking blank who reacts instead of acting, and Spradling’s entire purpose in the movie is to clean a painting and pick up a crossbow. As for Jamieson’s double performance as Lawrence and Oliver (oh, cute), he’s a little too excessive as both the evil mustache-twirling rapist and the brooding sad-eyed woobie.

“Meridian” is a disaster in every way — a rapey sexploitation movie that tries to transform itself into a gothic romance. As anything other than a showcase for slow-motion boobs, it fails.

Review: The Mummy (2017)

On By E. A. SolinasIn reviewsLeave a comment

Since every movie franchise now has to be a cinematic universe, Universal decided to dig up up all their old movie monsters and fling them into new, flashier films.

And their most recent dead-on-arrival attempt to revive their shared universe was “The Mummy,” a remake/reboot-but-not-really of previous films about an undead horror rising from the tomb… except they pretty much abandoned any actual material from those movies except “there’s a mummy, and a giant screamy face.” Instead, they present a mass of action cliches without a hint of irony, dressing it up with a “sexy” mummy and a crammed-in starting point for the Dark Universe.

During an airstrike, soldier-of-fortune/looter Nick Morton (Tom Cruise) accidentally uncovers an Egyptian tomb buried under a town… in Iraq. Even the movie is aware of how strange that is. They just happen to have an archaeologist (Annabelle Wallis) on hand, who discovers this was the tomb of Ahmonet, an Egyptian princess whose lust for power caused her to sell her soul to Set, murder her family, and be mummified alive for her crimes. Never mind that the process of mummification would kill you.

But things immediately start going wrong — the plane carrying her sarcophagus crashes, Nick temporarily dies, and then he is haunted by visions of a bandaged woman stalking him through the mist. He’s been cursed by her, and she wants to use him as the vessel for Set. And even when Ahmonet is captured by a Super-Sekrit Organization (like S.H.I.E.L.D., but less competent), Nick finds that he may have no hope of escaping her grasp.

“The Mummy” is very much a MOAR action movie. Moar mummies. Moar crashes. Moar fistfights. Moar ‘splosions. Moar attractive women. Moar boogity-boo scares. Moar moar moar. This movie feels almost like a parody of a Hollywood action-horror movie, ticking off all the cliches and never bothering to do anything that we haven’t seen before… but without a sense of humor or self-awareness that everything in its story has been done before.

Instead, we’re pelted with so many cliches that it feels like the studio raided TV Tropes. And as a result, its massive, bombastic nature seems like a storm conjured up to try to hide the fact that the plot is as thin as papyrus — and it’s definitely not scary, or as funny as it thinks it is (haha, Nick is naked!). There are a few spooky moments here and there, mostly when we see Ahmanet scuttling around in her undead state, looking like an arthritic Gollum. But more often we just careen from place to place, following Nick and Boring Blonde as they lurch from one crisis to another, building up zero momentum as they go.

And as if to show the lack of care that went into it, there are also blatant fails at Egyptian mythology (Set as the god of death), ancient Egyptian culture, etymology (Jekyll claims “Satan” is an alternate name for Set) and history (what would the Crusaders have been doing in what is now Iraq? Being horribly lost?).

Tom Cruise is… Tom Cruise. Despite playing a looter, liar and thief, we’re clearly meant to be charmed by his roguish one-liners and occasional moments of not-totally-self-centered-ness. But when you boil him down, there isn’t really anything about the character to like or be interested in, which makes Wallis’ Boring Blonde’s transition from contempt to love seem even more ridiculously artificial. And Russell Crowe plays a woefully unimposing Dr. Jekyll, who predictably transitions into a ludicrously unscary, scenery-chewing Mr. Hyde.

Sofia Boutella does an excellent job with what little material she has; she seems to have been hired mostly because she can scuttle, scamper and bend a lot. Unfortunately, she’s simply not frightening here — her version of a mummy is too wriggly, weak and ALIVE to ever be a properly undead fright. She looks and acts more like a gymnast in a mummy-themed unitard.

“The Mummy” has a few good spots that haven’t been totally dried out, but the withered hulk is just a standard Hollywood blockbuster — lots of sound and fury, signifying that the Dark Universe was dead on arrival.

Review: Psycho

On By E. A. SolinasIn reviewsLeave a comment

“Psycho” is one of those rare movies that needs no introduction, by a director who also needs no introduction.

It’s one of the greatest horror movies of all time, and it deserves to be. Alfred Hitchcock’s magnum opus is a clean-cut, low-budget affair that lulls you with its slow, uneasy pace, only to shock you with bursts of bloody violence that practically make you jump out of your chair. And the acting — especially by Tony Perkins — is absolutely brilliant.

Secretary Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) is entrusted with $40,000, which she’s supposed to deposit in the bank for her employer. Instead, she steals the money for her impoverished boyfriend, Sam Loomis (John Gavin). She ends up staying overnight at a remote motel, where the only other people are the owner Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) and his crazy invalid mother.

Then someone kills Marion in the shower. Believing his mother is responsible, a desperate Norman cleans up the crime scene and hides the body.

Meanwhile, Marion’s sister Lila (Vera Miles) is doing her best to find both her sister and the $40,000, hiring a private eye and trying to figure out where Marion went before her disappearance. Teaming up with Sam Loomis, she begins seeking out whoever saw her last — but neither of them are prepared for the true horror of Bates Motel.

The biggest problem with “Psycho” is probably that, like most legendary movies with a twist, the brilliant twist ending is so well known that its impact is lessened. Pretty much everybody knows what’s going to happen and what is going on, so it isn’t as shocking as it probably was back in 1960. It’s sort of like “I am your father” or “You blew it up!” — everybody knows the twist.

But that doesn’t mean that “Psycho” isn’t still freakishly scary and beautifully-made. Hitchcock’s direction is clean, smooth and elegant, painting the screen with light and shadow like a master painter. He fills every scene with a slow-building sense of unease, even if nothing bad is actually happening at the moment. It’s quiet, restrained…

… until suddenly a shadowy figure lunges out and starts stabbing somebody, while the screeching violins stab right along. The violence isn’t very graphic, but it’s incredibly shocking.

As Norman Bates, Tony Perkins gave one of the greatest performances you’ll ever see in a film — he comes across as shy and boyish, with an ineffable charm. He comes across as a harmless momma’s boy who’s probably never even talked to a girl before. But even from the start, there are hints that he can abruptly transform into something dark and twisted.

In fact, his is probably the only performance you’ll truly remember from the movie. Not that the other actors aren’t good — Miles and Leigh give brilliant low-key performances as a pair of desperate young women — but Perkins is just SO perfect and chilling that you can’t get over him.

“Psycho” doesn’t need a recommendation from anyone at this point — it’s one of those brilliant movies that has achieved a mythic status. Go see it. Now.