From Harry's Desk: WICKSBORO INCIDENT, SO CLOSE, DOUBLE VISION, RUNAWAY TRAIN, T2, MILLER'S CROSSING, SORUM & much more

Harry here with another FROM MY DESK report. I’ve gone a bit DVD crazy recently and my desk currently looks like that tiny wall in China. I had a pass to go see DUMB & DUMBERER tonight, but instead I watched SO CLOSE and RESURRECTION OF THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL, and feel like I won the goddamn lottery! You couldn’t drag me to see DUMB & DUMBERER… it just looks like a lab experiment gone terribly wrong. So instead here’s what I’ve been watching for the past 10 days or so on DVD.

THE WICKSBORO INCIDENT - This DVD was sent to me and I figured it’d probably suck. From the description on the packaging it looked like a BLAIR WITCH PROJECT knock-off and in some ways it is… Having said that though, I put this sucker on in the dead of night, all the lights off, all alone, and I’ll be damned if it didn’t get to me. The premise is this. Back around 1953 the entire population of Wicksboro, Texas just upped and vanished, with the exception of a sole survivor that booked the hell out of Wicksboro and found that everyone with even a vague connection to the city, the people that lived there… well they’re all dying. 50 years goes by and this Electronics Genius, that had been working for the government comes forward to a pair of “Documentarians” that are doing a cheesy “UFO / ALIENS” documentary type thing and this ol coot tells them the wet dream of “Mulder” stories. They decide to go with the old fart back to Wicksboro, Tx – only to discover it isn’t on any maps, new or old. It’s like it never existed. He assures the guys it exists and they set out to uncover the truth. Cuz, um… ya know… it’s out there. Ok, go ahead, hiss and boo… I’m far cornier than this film. The whole thing is shot on DV and frankly, they do a great job. There’s one shot in this thing that I’ve looked at about 30 times trying to figure out how they did… unless its real… But I do know I have no plans whatsoever to drive out to West Texas to try and find WICKSBORO… Creepy shit, bad karma dude.

SO CLOSE – Ok, here’s a DVD that my brother-in-law handed me and that my sister told me about. HOLY SHIT DOES IT ROCK BALLS! Corey Yuen, director of the absolutely fantastic THE TRANSPORTER earlier this year. This thing is essentially an Estrogen Soap Opera with HOLY SHIT action and 5 gallon jugs of drool hot Asian women. Remember Shu Qi from THE TRANSPORTER – she’s here playing the part of a hit woman that takes professional hits and works them out with her sister. There’s a cool satellite science fiction device that gives the younger sister a Matrix-like “Operator” status of being able to guide Shu Qi through situations. Shu Qi is just one of the most beautiful and charismatic Asian actresses out there – and in this film, she gets the showy part of kicking ass hardcore. Very much in the tone of CHARLIE’S ANGELS, but does have serious twists and the violence is FAR MORE INTENSE, and in typical Hong Kong fashion… it isn’t predictable in the Hollywood fashion. I.E. nobody is safe in this thing. Very fun film.

DOUBLE VISION – Bought this DVD for the Cover box. It had this double-iris / horror film look to it. Noticed that it was shot in Taipei, Taiwan plus that it starred Tony Leung (a great Hong Kong actor) and David Morse (yeah as in 12 ft tall great character actor!). Apparently it was some sort of Serial Killer flick set in and around the strange Taoist Realm of Mysticism that the F.B.I. sends an investigator to bring scientific techniques to the investigation process. WOW! This movie kicks all manners of ass. If you seek it out, make sure you’re getting the UNRATED VERSION, cuz this SEVEN meets BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA type of film just kicks ass. The “fish out of water” aspects of the film brought in by David Morse lend a completely different flavor to this film from most Asian cinema – and should play very well for Western Audiences because of it. The unrated version is VERY GRAPHIC and when Taoist shit begins happening – WATCH OUT! This isn’t cel animation mysticism like Egg Shen uses – this stuff is far more brutal. Great uncompromising little movie. Can’t recommend enough.

RUNAWAY TRAIN -- The DVD has like no extras, but it is in Wide-Screen and it happens to be one of my all-time favorite movies. Not real sure the exact depth at which the AFI had their collective heads lodged in their colons, when they left off Jon Voight’s ‘Manny’ Manheim off the greatest screen villains of all time. Hell, this is just plain one of the great films period. From an Akira Kurosawa story, directed by Andrei Konchalovsky. The film is about a pair of convicts striving for freedom after escaping a maximum security Alaskan prison. However, the film is about man against man, man against machine and man against the elements. It features career best performances by Voight and Eric Roberts – with Voight taking on all past and future escape cons – for best Escape Con ever. Double Feature this with WHITE HEAT some night and you’ll be mainlining cool through your eyes and ears.

TERMINATOR 2: JUDGEMENT DAY – that new Artisan Ultimate Edition thing with the metal sculpted T-100 case. I’d read reviews around the net on this one and figured… I just had to check it out. Of primary interest to me was the James Cameron & Bill Wisher commentary. First off – YOU MUST HEAR THIS THING. Personally, this is the best look at James Cameron and how he thinks… just listening to him talking with Wisher about the film and why decisions were made, how they were writing without a net, hoping the technology could enable their imaginations to be unleashed on camera and hearing about that from them… priceless. The subtle (or not so subtle) dig at T3 made me laugh for a couple of minutes, but hearing about how Rodney King was beat right outside of the Bar that the Terminator storms into at the beginning of the movie, and how the “video” of Rodney King was cued up right after the footage that the same person capture a week before of the T2 shoot… WEIRD. As for the image quality, the best yet – though the super high quality version on the second disc won’t play on a Mac, so that kinda sucks ass. Actually, it REALLY SUCKS ASS! Hehehe.

MILLER’S CROSSING – The best film from the Coen Brothers is still this one for my money. I love MILLER’S CROSSING – and when I took my nephew by Target to pick him up a Hulk toy after we saw HULK, the DVD screamed, “TAKE ME HOME” and so I picked it up. Have I mentioned that I’m a compulsive DVD buyer. It’s not a problem till you buy more than a 1000 DVDs in a 3 day period, right? I’d kill for a Coen Commentary on this sucker, but instead we get a Barry Sonnenfeld Featurette which was quite informative. Listening to how both he and the Brothers just sort of dove into filmmaking together all because he happened to have his own 16mm film camera was beautiful, and I have to say I really miss Barry Sonnenfeld the cinematographer. His long lens usage on MILLER’S CROSSING is startlingly handsome. And I’m always surprised how much John Turturro’s character in this film reminds me of Moriarty. Heh. The little Cast Interviews with Gabriel Byrne, Marcia Gay Harden and John Turturro were kinda lame, but hey… I still thought they were kinda cool. Ok, I admit it, I love extras.

SORUM – Very nice crime / supernatural flick from Korea. In some ways it reminded me of the absolutely fantastic NIGHT AT THE GOLDEN EAGLE from last year (though this film came out in 2001 and has that supernatural aspect going for it). The title means GOOSEBUMPS in English, and that’s very apt. In a rundown dilapidated tenement in South Korea, there’s a 5th Floor from Hell. Everybody on the floor is broken somehow. Abused, Surviving, Widowed, Dysfunctional. A young cab driver that loves Bruce Lee takes residence in room 504, turns out someone had burned to death in that room – the widow of which now lives in a different room on the floor. He meets a writer, that’s working on a Ghost Novel about this 5th Floor and the people that live there. Piecing together the sadness and haunts of the place. Are there ghosts? I’m not so sure. Like HAUNTING, the original Robert Wise, the mere fact that you have a writer on the floor claiming to be writing a ghost story on that floor – well, it’s putting the idea into these people’s heads as well as ours. The lights flicker, you hear noises and bad shit happens. Closer to a descent into madness film, but I highly DON’T RECOMMEND watching this alone at night. Damn thunderstorm outside had me up the rest of the night waiting for the boogeyman. Wonderful film. Brilliantly directed by Jong-Chan Yun, can’t wait to see what he does next!

1941 -- Wow, watching this film post-9/11 is a trip. A comedy about mass hysteria in the wake of Pearl Harbor and the absurd rampant Americanism gone wild that puts a “jap” in every plane overhead and creates a brutal nationalistic rah-rah jingoism and mayhem. Well, 1941 was never particularly hilarious, but now… In some ways, it is dealing with themes more pertinent to today than nearly any other Spielberg flick. I’ve always been fond of 1941, it’s a schizophrenic glorious mess of a movie that seems to be missing something other than just more laughs. I’ve never been able to really put my finger on the problem with the movie till I started watching the Documentary about the making of the film. One – Steven wanted to turn it into a Big Band Canteen style musical comedy – and frankly – that’s exactly what is missing. The Jitter Bug contest was always my favorite non-Belushi scene, and it seems that there were just too many cooks in this particular kitchen. Zemeckis, Gale, Milius and Spielberg are a helluva combination, but I would have loved to have seen the Zemeckis/Gale version of 1941 or the Milius version of 1941 and finally the Spielberg version of 1941… But their group mix just didn’t taste right. Too many STRONG PERSONALITIES in the Story department all pulling in different directions. The result is a very fun and interesting movie that never quite finds that groove it was tapping its toe towards, but this DVD’s extras and the expanded cut really do make it worth having.

THE LAST SEDUCTION – If you’ve never understood the attraction to Linda Fiorentino… well you’re a eunuch or you haven’t seen THE LAST SEDUCTION by John Dahl with the dynamite screenplay by Steve Barancik. This DVD sucks, but for nine bucks – I got it just because I love the movie so much I just wanted it at home. One of the very few films I can tolerate Bill Pullman in… it’s probably due to just how wondrously fucked over he gets in this film, and how I completely delight at every single move that Linda Fiorentino makes in this sucker… This and RED ROCK WEST are the reason why I will go to my grave looking forward to John Dahl kicking my ass one more time. I love Film Noirs – especially NON-REMAKES, and when I put this on as a double feature with FEMME FATALE – I was in nirvana. Now where’s my copy of BODY HEAT?

TREASURE PLANET – Well, I finally got around to seeing this thing and it just doesn’t work for me. I love the Wallace Beery style they gave to their Silver, but I HATE their Jim Hawkins. He’s WAY TOO OLD – as a result the situation isn’t nearly as frightening as it should be. The reason the Disney TREASURE ISLAND is a complete and utter classic is that little Bobby Driscoll was so small and helpless that when he has to blast that pirate – it is one of the scariest, most frightening moments I’ve seen for a kid on screen in my life. I loved Emma Thompson’s Captain Amelia, but that Martin Short half-crazed robot sucked the peanuts right out the Eisner cavity. I mean YUCK! What on earth were they thinking? Michael Wincott’s Scroop should have been allowed to just get scary as hell. And had Jim been about 5 years younger as a character, we might’ve had something. Gorgeous animation, but essentially they fucked up a classic story by not being smart enough or true enough with their adaptation process.

RESURRECTION OF THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL – WoW! Just watched this tonight, what a great little science fiction/action flick out of Korea. First heard about this movie back in September on ASIA-AICN and then Elaine, who does our Rotterdam International Film Festival reports kept making it a point to say I needed to see RESURRECTION OF THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL. Ok… Imagine if Tim Burton made THE MATRIX… just kidding… kinda. Imagine you’re walking through the streets one day a girl with a basket of cheap disposable lighters comes up to you and with all the sadness of a crippled Tiny Tim asks you to buy one. You do, and you’re instantly haunted by her sad, yet beautiful looks. You follow her, another man takes her to a boat for an act of prostitution. Suddenly, you’re back where you originally met her, wondering if following her was a dream. You run back to the pier, nobody is there. You look at the cheap lighter and you notice a phone number along the side of it. You call… It asks you if you want to take part in “THE RESURRECTION OF THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL” game. “Press One to Enter The Game!” The game that follows is fantastic. The movie is beautiful and lyrical… violent and absurd… In all caps the movie is CULT COOL. And the Little Match Girl… what a great hair cut, what a cutie, what a trip!

20,000 LEAGUES BENEATH THE SEA – God I love it when Disney puts out a great DVD set. This 2-DVD set is just perfection. Getting to see the SUNSET SQUID FIGHT FOOTAGE was a quasi-religious geek experience. The immense load of behind the scenes information on this movie is a geek trove of joy. Over 14 video extra features, unused animation that is breathtaking… PETER LORRE’S ADR session. WOW! Hooow Cooool… Then you just get the classic film by Richard Fleischer, who has a feature length Audio Commentary on this disc too! If I may, I recommend picking this disc and Fleischer’s THE VIKINGS DVD up as well. Now if only Fox would get on the ball and produce an amazing DVD for COMPULSION, so we can hear Fleischer talk about Welles! Get Richard and Dean Stockwell chatting about this amazing movie… PLEASE! Anyway – a great DVD for a truly timeless movie.

That’s all for this session of FROM MY DESK – coming up next time will be my looks at SAMURAI FICTION, PING PONG, JUVENILE, THE INCREDIBLY STRANGE PEOPLE SHOW and much more. I hope you enjoy these little reports – I have fun putting them together for ya. And remember – when seeking DVDs – get obscure, its fun!

Oh, one last thing on my desk… bought one of those $7.99 14 inch Hulk toys from Target…. Damn that’s a fun toy to pose on the desk… He’s currently straddling my Green Lantern Lantern. Way cool!