Reviews

Just popped in Cartoon Marathon Vol. 1 and this is the first short on the disc. After watching the short I checked IMDb to see if there was any trivia, reviews, etc. about the short. Something wasn't right. I did not remember seeing the names of either Seymour Kneitel or the legendary Otto Messmer appear during the credits. (This is a faded, non-remastered 16mm print from National Telefilm Associates, Inc.) The year jibes with the title and studio, but the credits as listed on IMDb appear to belong to another cartoon. According to the film's opening credits, the cartoon was directed by I. Sparber. The three animators listed are Myron Waldman, Morey Reden & Nick Tafuri. Story credit is given to Bill Turner and Larry Riley.

First-time writer/director Jim Hemphill has captured the spirit of Roger Corman's New World Pictures in this very entertaining revenge picture. Anyone who remembers Stephanie Rothman's fine work for the studio should run to check this out. Shot on a shoestring budget, the film looks and feels like a classy 'B' picture. The cast of unfamiliar faces does a great job with this tale of a virgin who suddenly finds herself branded town slut. The dialog is clever and strictly first rate and any film that depicts sports and jocktards in such a negative light is to be devoutly cherished. Arguably the most reviled genre of all, Hemphill has a ball spoofing slasher films. But this isn't simply Wes Craven warmed over - this film has loads of style and a great sense of humor to back it up. For fans of the genre as well as those of us who might normally leapfrog over this on a rental shelf.

Bored to distraction by a classroom lesson in Mother Goose, Little Audrey pulls out a copy of "Phony Funnies" to take the edge off. We follow a few panels of Pinhead and Bird-Brain as they attempt to knock over Fort Knox. When called upon to read by her extremely hot teacher, Audrey hits her with a few lines of comic book noir. Donning a dunce cap, Audrey sits in the corner and daydreams. The differences between Audrey (Famous Studios) and Ralph Phillips (Warner Bros.) are incredible. Ralph daydreams to escape, while Audrey's teacher becomes Mother Goose and acts as her tour guide. Ralph's daydreams are fueled by his own imagination, not some cheap comic book device geared to capitalize on a national craze. The rest of the short finds Audrey and Mother Goose flying above storybook land, the latter singing nursery rhymes as they watch the locals enact lame puns. One amusing moment has a twenty-something Mary dancing to the jewelry store with a seventy-something sugar daddy, complete with shopping cart, in tow. The fact that Audrey knows enough to find this funny is rather telling. Frank Sinatra emerges from behind a broom to croon a chorus of "Let's Get Lost." At the fair grounds, Pinhead and Bird-Brain morph into Audrey's dream. In order to show just how mean this pair is, they roll a somewhat fey piglet for a penny. Stealing from Warners, we find a goose that lays golden eggs to the tune of "Turkey in the Straw." (An egg slicer cuts the hen fruit into coins.) Realizing that the crooks do not belong in this dream, Audrey grabs a trumpet and takes flight on Mother's goose. The highlight is Edward G. Robinson as a "hard berled" Humpty Dumpty the no one can crack up. No sooner does Audrey get her hands on them, she wakes up wrestling a stool in her classroom. Suddenly, Audrey is hep to the jive and spewing jazz lingo. A bird, similar to the one in Bird-Brain's head, pops out from behind Audrey's hair ribbon to sing the finale.

Remind to check the IMDb.com specs before subjecting myself to any more "escapist" summer fare. Had I been aware of the combined threat of the Farrelly Bros. and think-free screenwriters extraordinaries Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandell I'd have stayed home and listened to the radio. It was bound to be more visually stimulating.

A die-hard Boston Red Sox (Jimmy Fallon) fan has to choose between his love of the game and that of a beautiful woman (Drew Barrymore). Everything in this dimwitted remake of a British Colin Firth comedy is telegraphed scenes ahead of time. And shades of Ed Wood - these glaucomic dolts even use the same establishing shot twice! I quickly picked up on that nuance, but being an avid professional-sports-are-for-mongoloid-jocks detractor, I was probably the only one in America that didn't know Boston went on to win the World Series. Fortunately for the filmmakers, my ignorance added a bit of suspense to this otherwise snot-filled romantic balloon.

Rated ** strictly for Drew.

Drew Barrymore is nothing short of adorable. She always is. One facial movement conveys more subtle warmth than anything the dopey directors she chooses to work with can muster. Her character has looks, talent and a very promising career, although we are never sure exactly what it is she does for a living. Focusing even a little on her would detract from our man/boy romantic lead. God forbid after several features the Farrelly's might have learned something about character construction and storytelling.

Unfortunately, Ms. Barrymore subscribes to the "eeny-meeny-miney-mo" school of script selection. Why she lends her considerable talents to help bolster the careers of SNL lightweights is a question for the ages. Her character is the most love-worthy cime-women this side of Juliette Lewisin "What's Eating Gilbert Grape?" None of her allure comes from the script or direction. Drew's sense of romance is innate. What she sees in a slovenly, tunnel-visioned dweeb is beyond comprehension to both filmmaker and audience alike.

The fact that Fallon's mania fails to surface in the off-season is yet another telling sign of the director's/screenwriters' inabilities to shape a convincing romantic comedy. Before opening day she had ample time to observe Fallon in his natural setting. She even goes so far as likening his apartment to a Red Sox gift shop. What did she think she was getting into? Sorry, but I never turn my love for cinema off. The choice between a weekend in France and missing Oscar night would definitely present a major schedule conflict. However, if it were Drew doing the asking my bags would be packed yesterday.

The Farrelly's approach is as sloppy and maudlin as they come. Cheap sentiment, cuddly cripples, bodily fluid gags and sudden burst of sadistic violence are their stock in trade. Why am I not laughing? I counted four times in the film where a female character takes either a fist or a foul ball to the face. Funny stuff or the Farrelly equivalent to a liet motif? Luckily, this time around the tyke with a leg brace who throws out the first pitch on opening day is quickly dismissed. In the past we have witnessed a parade of handicap-able Farrelly types. Usually the boys goof on them for four reels only to embrace their differences in the end. Aside from playing it both ways, there is no other way for the Farrelly's to frolic. The ability to humanize players through satirical prodding is so far out of their grasp that it frequently becomes their film's funniest component.

If you are in the mood for a soggy, half-baked cupcake, look no further - you have met your mush.

There's an old maxim about censorship in Hollywood: If you show a naked woman in the act of making love it's filth and should be rated 'X.' However, if you take a chainsaw and disembowel that same woman, it's rated 'R' and the kiddies can attend if mommy and daddy can't afford a babysitter.

As the sniggering title suggests, don't come expecting too much in the way of sexual politics or modified feminist thinking in this soft-core examination of the world of hard-core. This is the work of producer Brian Grazer, Ron Howard's spiky-haired partner and the head of Imagine Entertainment. From the man who bankrolled "Parenthood," "My Girl" and "Kindergarten Cop" comes the first (and hopefully only) feel-good documentary ever made about the porno industry.

With the exception of a handful of exhibitors, the mob and one evangelically enlightened 'actor,' everybody associated with "Deep Throat" hasn't exactly profited from the experience. The first player we meet is director Gerardo Damiano. Only a former hair stylist turned smut peddler would attempt such a hideous salt and pepper (now entirely salt) weave on his head. This, coupled with a pair of hiked-to-the-nipples Sansabelts, gives the impression of a retired furrier, not a revolutionary adult filmmaker. Claims by the director that he was a radical on the front line of the sexual revolutions are nonsense. If ever a guy landed in the right place at the right time, it's Damiano. Judging by the finished product, the director didn't know which end of the camera he was looking through.

Then there's the film's male lead, Harry Reems who signed on as one of the crew and wound up a star. He also came closest to serving hard time but was spared, the film argues, by a new democratic administration. Long before Traci Lords, Reems was the first porn actor that tried to cross-over into mainstream cinema. Producer Alan Carr wanted to give Reems the role that eventually went to Sid Caesar in "Grease." When Paramount studio execs caught wind of of a porn star sullying their retro-teen musical they immediately put the kibosh on the casting. After years of self-medication, Reems not only went straight, he became a minister in Utah.

The reason that "Deep Throat" was such a mainstream hit had little to do with pornographic content. Basements across America were already equipped with portable screens, Super 8 projectors and stag reels. The one major point "Inside Deep Throat" completely overlooks is the fact the Linda Lovelace was the first reasonably attractive woman to appear in pornography. Say what you will about the film's attempt to incorporate a story, its "ground-breaking" sense of humor and the fact that it was shot on 35mm film. This film hit it big because prior to it, all you saw were zaftig maidens servicing plumbers framed in uncomfortable long shots.

There are a few nuggets of gold gossip to be mined along the way. Helen Gurley Brown loves a protein-enriched facial and horror hack Wes Craven got his start in pornos. Why am I not surprised? The only true pornographic artist was the great Russ Meyer, yet even he knew to stay soft core.

The directors keep the interviews moving with loads of cute, flashy bridging shots. Not surprisingly, the film offers up more than a few behind-the-scenes oddballs. Aside from Damiano there's his assistant director, an unhealthy cross between Charlie Callas and Prof. Irwin Corey. who is all too kind when confessing that as a filmmaker Damiano is a safe distance from "Luke Goddard." Then there's location manager Lenny Camp, a cantankerous, stone-deaf octogenarian with his hand permanently cupped to his ear. Not one for revisionist thinking. Lenny"s mantra is simple: "It was s**t then and its s**t now!" Showing Ms. Lovelace doing what she's most famous for was a must, yet I'm still surprised by the film's overall timid depiction of sexually explicit material. There is one quick shot of Linda swallowing. Even though the title explicitly refers to oral sex, the filmmakers' rapid editing approach to the more overt sexual material comes off a bit cowardly.

The film is crammed with witnesses to the time. Norman Mailer, John Waters, Helen Gurley Brown, Dr. Ruth, Erica Jong, Gore Vidal, Larry Flint, Dick Cavett and Camille Paglia, Hugh Hefner all add insight, but alas, the film's major player died in a car crash in the early nineties. Initial interviews with Lovelace show an "actress" proud of her work and notoriety. With the publication of her autobiography "Ordeal," Lovelace changed horses and began riding a feminist bandwagon. A key target in her book is Hugh Hefner, a man who Lovelace claimed like to force Playmates to have sex with dogs while he watched. The only thing more offensive than his calm, fatherly presence here is the filmmaker's refusal to call Hef on the carpet, presumably in exchange for his compliance to appear.

One of the first times we see Lovelace is in a clip from the "Donahue" show where she claims that everyone who saw the film basically watched a rape. By all accounts, husband Chuck Trainor drove Linda almost as hard as Paul Snider pressured Dorothy Stratton. Indeed, at various times in "Deep Throat" one can detect bruises on Lovelace's body. Sadly, her testimony is dubious as several years prior to her death she once again turned to the world of porn, this time doing a spread in ultra-skanky Legshow Magazine.

So if it's not sexual politics or feminist thinking that sparked curiosity about this nostalgic bit of smut, what is it? Before mentioning politics, before we're introduced to the film's motley band of players, even before the opening credits are done rolling, we are hit with the point that I think impressed producer Grazer the most: a film that cost a paltry $25,000 went on to gross over $600 million.

Even with a running time of just over ninety-minutes, when the closing credits roll you'll find yourself repeatedly (and gratefully) shouting the film's title.

"At Last," a vanity piece based on the real life romance of the film's screenwriters, never rises above the level of a made-for-TV families-in-crisis melodrama. Set in Bayou country, Martin Donovan, doing a fine mid-period Fred MacMurray, plays an unhappily married father of two. Rummaging through a box of memories, Donovan happens upon a stack of romantic correspondence between himself and a teen flame that was denied the couple by his prison warden of a mother (Brooke Adams). Of course Donovan and Kelly Lynch meet, of course they are both in miserable romances, and of course they make it work in the end. If only this path to true love was not paved with so many pothole-sized clichés.

Each actor is assigned two or three instantly recognizable characteristics that define them. Donovan sells cars, lives in his father's shadow and longs to chuck it all and sail around the world. His wife (Jessica Hecht) is a cold, bottled up workaholic whose bun hairdo reflects her tightly-wound personality. Lynch is a social worker who constantly fights with her daughter while despising her husband's (Michael Arata) alcoholism. Aside from being a drunk, Arata loves practicing his golf swing, and when pressed, is able to let loose a powerful backhand across his daughter's cheek. Mother Adams chain-smokes and drinks. If her profound inability to apply eye make-up is any indication, this is one mama with a bad case of the shakes.

First time (and does it show) director Tom Anton can't resist cheap linking devices: Lynch in the kitchen dousing her onion-stung eyes with cold water, match cut to Hecht over a basin trying to cool down after discovering her home pregnancy test came up positive. Nor is the director skilled at side-stepping hackneyed plot devices: the lovers' first kiss is interrupted by the wake of a passing boat. Anton even has the giggly film school chutzpah to have his name paged over the airport loudspeaker.

Donovan and Lynch give it their all, but the film's only salvation arrives in the form of M. C. Gainey. From Swamp Thing in "Con Air" to the bouncer in "Terminator III" to the full-frontal rampaging hubby in "Sideways," Gainey has carved his niche as a character actor willing to take chances in the most ungainly roles. As Donovan's pot-smoking, law defying older brother, Gainey has the role of his career as a Cajun artist whose gravelly, booze-bathed voice plays Jiminy Cricket to Donovan's guilt-ridden adulterer.

The film's most disturbing element has nothing to do with its dutiful structure. Timing is everything, and in light of the recent devastation in New Orleans the couples' climactic shipboard reunion backed by the bouncy ditty "Hurricane Party" gave me chills.

Not to be confused with Michael Ritchie's nasty 1975 beauty pageant spoof, this "Smile" is a down-turned example of those good intentions paving the road to hell.

The film parallels two stories: an impoverished Chinese father sacrifices his wife and son to raise a facially-deformed orphan named Ling (Yi Ding), and a TV-spawned Malibu family act out "Gidget Get Birth Control." Katie (Mika Booram, the third Olsen twin) plays a spoiled, self-absorbed high schooler distanced from reality. Her teacher (Sean Astin) paves the way for a school trip to China aimed at showing students how to work with deformed children.

The film uses deformity as a means of suspense by treating Ling like the Frankenstein monster. Kramer continually masks her deformity through hats, hoods and camera placement. This approach exploits the freak show quality inherent in the material. She may be uncomfortable with the way society views her and Kramer's answer is to cover her up until the big reveal. Why disturb your audience with such unpleasantness? We see her face briefly at the end and only minutes before closing-credit snapshots of her after surgery disclose a swan beneath the harelip. It is not good enough to give the girl a reason to live; what is imperative is Ling being equally as hot and popular as Katie.

Funding for the film came from a trust established by the late Roy Rogers and Dale Evans. They envisioned a heritage of quality family films. Give me "Son of Paleface" any day.

After breaking with Walt Disney, Ub Iwerks opened his own studio and introduced the world to his first solo cartoon creation, Flip the Frog. Flip would go on to appear in 38 cartoons, over half the output of Iwerks' studio. From the opening pan left we are introduced to a horizontal universe with nothing to offer in the way of depth construction. Our hero begins by hopping lily pads, a realistic trait that is quickly eliminated as Flip spends the rest of the short walking (and dancing) upright. A couple of buttons and a red bow-tie further undermine Flip's resemblance to a real frog. Without a plot to speak of, this Paleozoic venture into sound and color had only its star to rely on. Flip's sole raison d'etre in this short is to entertain two audiences: the one in the theater and an animated woodland gathering of insects, skunks and rodents. Credit Iwerks with completely avoiding repetition. Flip may cavort a bit too long, but he never makes the same move twice. At the piano, Flip is accompanied on the violin by a Mickey lookalike while interrupted by the spit from a tobacco-chewing robin. This is about as funny as the short gets, but as with the pioneer efforts of the Lumieres, Iwerks was more interested in movement (and characterization) than narrative storytelling. Besides, there are few things more charming at this point in cartoon history than the joyful dance that Flip, the mouse, the piano and its stool put on. Flip and his piano carry on a rather perverse relationship. Initially Flip offers a handkerchief to blow its keys on during a sad interlude. This compassion goes one step further as the frog begins to rub one out on the piano's leg. This causes the baby grand to give Flip a well-placed boot, only to have the frog finish by punching out a crescendo and ultimately kicking its teeth out. Long on seamless execution but lacking in character personality and development. A Disney cartoon void of Uncle Walt's flair for personification and storytelling.