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BrainWaves (1982)
Another Frankenstein Update
And a self-admitted one to boot. At one point the doctor's assistant refers to himself as Igor.
Working with the increasingly plausible idea that computers could be used to replace or reconstruct brain functions, this movie doesn't spend enough time exploring the premise. Most of the screen time is split between girlfriend-in-a-coma domestic strife and chasing down the brain donor's killer. It attempts to be a sci-fi/drama/thriller but fails to deliver on any of the three.
As a Frankenstein remake this one is missing everything that made the original good. Nobody calls the doctor insane or even threatens to kick him out of the hospital. The transformation scene consists of a coma victim opening one eye and the amazing computer that makes it happen isn't even shown. When the experiment works there is no praise, and when it starts going wrong there is little reaction.
Any suspense over who the killer might be is shattered by progressively showing him in the same room with all of the possible suspects. Finding the killer is as easy as opening one file and interviewing one person.
San Francisco as a setting is both overplayed and underused. The opening sequence hammers home the point that this is happening in SF, a cable car plays a significant role, the leads live in a hilltop Victorian, Pier 39 makes an appearance, and the final showdown happens at Golden Gate Park. More specifically along ten feet of cliff side at the park - just enough to keep the bridge in the picture at all times. Once the obvious scenery bases are rounded no other attempt is made to explore the city.
The acting is the only saving grace here. Keir Dullea shows a good range and pulls off a couple of genuinely emotional scenes. Suzanna Love portrays recovery from a coma well. Tony Curtis only gets a handful of lines and twice as many evil guy stares with most of the Frankenscience explained away by his assistant. The little blond kid hits his cues fairly well also.
I also gave it one extra star for the scene where the husband drives south from the bridge, it cuts to a U-turn in an unrelated parking lot, and then he's instantly back on the bridge driving north. It takes a whole lot of something - bravery, ignorance, deadlines - to try and slip that one by the viewer during the one single car chase.
Ellie (1984)
Four funerals and a wedding
Shelley Winters. Pat Paulsen. Music by Charley Pride. You'd think with that much talent a film would be at least watchable. You would be wrong.
As a fan of amateurish movies I am immune to bad dialogue, poor acting and awful camera work - all of which this movie contains. What really sinks this one is repetition and a lack of characters to identify with.
*spoiler warning* The cycle repeats itself five times. Ellie's father is seduced, murdered, jump cut to the funeral. As revenge Ellie seduces, murders, and jump cuts to the funeral her stepmother's three sons and alleged brother.
There's a B plot about the town Sheriff (Paulsen) lusting after the stepmother, Cora (Winters), that provides the "happy" ending where Ellie blackmails Cora into marrying the Sheriff as her final act of vengeance.
Calling this film a sex comedy is misleading. There's no actual sex, just a lot of teasing and running around in various stages of undress. The comedy in the film comes in two flavors: attempted rape and poorly executed slapstick.
The VHS is thankfully out of print. If you must have it, it is part of a triple feature on a Troma DVD entitled Sgt. Kabukiman's Southern Fried Comedy Jam along with Preacherman (B-grade goodness) and Hot Summer in Barefoot County (B-grade okayness).
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
Should be nominated for a Daytime Emmy (spoilers big time)
First off, the consensus that this movie is unique is bogus. Anyone thinking that need look no farther than Total Recall. Memory manipulation is well-traveled territory in sci-fi and simply removing the action does not a unique movie make. Not to say a fresh take on the potentials of the technology is impossible, but this movie fails to do so. Here memory removal plays a very small role that does no more than exaggerate the classic "I'm throwing out your stuff and moving on" routine, an event so thin it can barely maintain a jeans commercial much less a motion picture.
The core failure of this picture is that it tries to force together two people who obviously should not be. She's a flaky hipster prone to severe mood swings and he's an introverted nebbish with zero social skills. At these two extreme ends of the spectrum there's no chance of working it out by meeting in the middle. All they have in common is personality disorders and that's a poor basis for a relationship. Spiderman 2 has a similar failing.
Speaking of Spiderman 2, we are once again subjected to the screen presence of Kirsten Dunst. This time she's the center of a B-plot (straight out of soap opera textbooks) that hijacks the third act. Girl has affair with married man, gets "amnesia" and forgets affair, has affair reintroduced to her memory and - oh-so-conveniently - confronts married man in front of a well-lit window facing the street where his wife has just pulled up in her car. The wife, as has been played out thousands of times, misinterprets this as infidelity and screeches away with the exasperated husband chasing the car.
(Side note: Considering that disposing of all reminders of the removee is required for the memory wipe to succeed, how does Kirsten's character manage to work daily in the same office as her removee with no recall whatsoever?)
Tacking on this subplot was unnecessary, but it serves as a welcome break from the excruciatingly slow flashbacks that comprise the bulk of the film. Carrey and Winslet's scenes are well acted and scripted but amount to nothing more than lengthy snippets of a mostly bad romance. More negative drama that only a soaps fan could enjoy. As for reuniting them at the end...
There are two lessons to this movie. One is removing your memory (or simply forgetting the past) is a bad idea - a point made several different ways with no subtlety. Two is don't ever give your panties to a guy who works at a fly-by-night brain wiping operation. Let's focus on lesson one. Kirsten and the doctor both learn it the hard way. Carrey and Winslet don't learn it at all; although at their expense the audience does. By getting them back together with no memory of each other the audience knows they are doomed to repeat history. In conveying that point the movie succeeds. Unfortunately there is a long, boring, clichéd, needlessly convoluted road to travel to get there.
3/10