Article: Taking a walk with Wild Side

As a co-host of an Erotic Thriller podcast, I rented Wild Side with a hopeful amount of expectation. I first caught wind of the film when listening to an episode of Katrina Longworth’s ever exemplary You Must Remember This. A film podcast dealing with the secret of forgotten histories of Hollywood’s first century. This entry, which appeared in the middle of the show’s season on Erotic Thrillers, placed particular emphasis on Wild Side alongside Bound. Wild Side and Bound both found themselves released in 1996 with similar plots. The two films centred their noir-styled stories around female same-sex relationships that were looking to escape the tyranny of male-dominated worlds. Longworth had felt a strong pull towards Wild Side over Bound due to its unpredictable and volatile nature.

A film with a dogged and tragic history, Wild Side was directed by Donald Cammell, who fashioned the feature as a love letter for his wife and co-writer of the film China Kong. Cammell had sights on the film premiering at the Cannes Film Festival, however, the film distributor Nu Image, saw things differently when they viewed the product. Cammell was fired during postproduction with distributors re-editing and marketing the film with a heavier focus on the homosexual interplay. Cammell, who was already suffering from long-term depression, killed himself soon after the film’s release. The scant coverage on Cammell attributed his death to Wild Side being taken away from him and re-shaped. However, in listening to the detailed podcast episode which focuses on Wild Side, the story is more depressing.

The distribution meddling was considered a truncated mess by those who saw the shorter cut of the movie. A film which was focused on something that was never Cammell’s original intention. Kong along with Frank Mazzola the editor of the film, was granted permission to re-edit Wild Side 3 years later. This allowed a “director’s cut” which aligned more with Cammell’s vision.

The director's cut, the version I streamed via Amazon, is still a mess, albeit more of a hot one. It’s a film which has bright intentions being an Avant-garde noir which melds a tender love story between two women, with a satirical outlook on the banking system. The possible notion is that within the financial world, nobody knows who’s fucking who.

Anne Heche plays Alex, an investment banker who moonlights as a call girl at night to make ends meet. Her nocturnal activities have her mingling with a volatile money launderer named Bruno, played by a truly unhinged Christopher Walken. Bruno has a penchant for being dominated by Alex but also employs her for her day job; with designs to launder money through Alex through some convoluted, yet typically 90s means of computer fraud. Alex is pushed into further trouble by the aggressive sexual advances of Bruno’s driver Tony (Steven Bauer), who is an undercover cop looking to blackmail her into helping him arrest Bruno. At this point, Alex is introduced to Bruno’s wife Virgina (Joan Chen) and soon builds a strong attraction to her. This is the most basic way of detailing a plot that folds in more twists than a pretzel factory.

Wild Side’s tonal inconsistencies and bonkers plotting have garnered a few fans after it was salvaged from a rather unsanctimonious dumping on cable T.V. The likes of Katrina Longsworth and Mark Kermode enjoying the film's unpredictable nature and fluid attitude towards sexuality. It is a film in which all four main characters seem to proposition each other at least once. There is a devil-may-care attitude to proceedings which only a bohemian artist like Cammell could perhaps produce. Wild Side’s saturated colour scheme and near arbitrary non-linear cross-cutting are welcome creative decisions, with the film giving an unpredictable energy that can often invigorate a well-trodden noir.

The best reason to watch Wild Side however is perhaps for the two-eye catching central performances. The first is a masterclass in derangement from Christopher Walken, who by the end of the film is chewing scenery in galaxy-consuming proportions. The less showy, yet more potent display, however, comes from the late Anne Heche. This early role for Heche isn’t just revealing the amount of untapped talent the actress held away from audiences, but how strong the performance is by an actress who by her account straight up hated her time on the film. Heche, an actress who had escaped an abusive family life, recalled in her memoir ‘Call Me Crazy” that Cammell had sexually abused her on the set of the film. Despite her behind-the-scenes issues with the film, she delivers a fierce performance. Brimming with sexuality, determination but also vulnerability. Heche mentioned that her film choices were affected by aspects of her personal life. Her turn here should have a viewer wonder what could have been.

In addition to this individual performance, her chemistry with Walken and Chen is equally strong. Her scenes with Chen are particularly effective. The intimate sex scenes that the distributors were clamouring to exploit work here not because of titillation, but due to tenderness displayed by the actors. Cammell’s monstrous behaviour doesn’t translate in this instance. The ugliness doesn’t transcend the sweetness.

However, this is only in certain scenes. Elsewhere the film's erratic tone delivers a rape scene early on which is distressing in its vulgarity. The scene is shocking as not only does it come out of nowhere, but the unpleasantness of what happened to Heche on set, suddenly hits home incredibly hard. Her convincingly raw performance also brings forth the burden of knowledge.  And while it is easy to dismiss the matter as an actress “doing what she was paid to do”, kudos for Heche is most certainly earned. The actress was digging deep into her history and then present. Not every actor should need to do that. Furthermore, not every actor can.

The predatory behaviours that inhabit the men in Wild Side clash with the softer tone the film approaches with the women. In a way it makes sense when the plot is considered, this is similar to Bound in which two women find love with one another within an aggressive, male-dominated world. However, in terms of watching Wild Side as a slice of entertainment, Cammell’s piece never really gels. The tones are too schizophrenic. The narrative is too incoherent. There are fun performances, but all seem to belong to four different movies. The story's pacing is erratic and lacks the right connective tissue to make things engaging.

Wild Side had me thinking of another dark, Avant-Garde, lesbian noir: David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive (2001), a baffling puzzle box of a movie, which bypasses its seemingly incomprehensible narrative for an emotional experience which, over two decades on, still heart-wrenching to watch. Moreover, Bound, which had its homoerotic sexuality judged, sometimes crudely, when the film was believed to be made by two straight men, delivers a similar story of ill-gotten finance and same-sex with more energy, style and crucially, more consistency. Bound has more fun with what it’s doing, it’s more playful with its noir stylings and doesn’t have the awkward verbiage Wild Side has which distracts the interplay between its performers. However, while the dialogue is bad, the actors know how to deliver it.   

With respectful concern for the deceased who made the movie, it’s easy to see why Wild Side was almost lost to annals of cinematic history. It’s a film which has cult written all over it. Some areas are fascinating, while other aspects are farcical. Seriously.  Look at Christopher Walken in this. It looks like Tommy Wiseau nabbed Walken’s appearance for his unintentional tragicomedy The Room (2003). Also, those two men could easily do battle in the unhinged stakes which their turns in these two movies respectively. Wild Side seems to owe more to The Room than expected. You watch it once to see if there’s a reason to gain from it other than its history. You marvel at the unpredictable nature of the text and some of its aesthetics. But after that first watch, you may question if there’s a need to revisit it ever again. For myself as a Co-Host of an Erotic Thriller podcast, however, I may have to.

 

Wild Side is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video

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Article: The Perception of Class

 Did you hear what that film critic said about the other? Well, it all started with a cryptic tweet from one Mark Kermode stating:

"That moment when you fall out of love with a film mag about which you once cared passionately. Oh well …"

In the latest issue of Sight and Sound (Oct 2018), Danny Leigh’s article on film criticism and class seemingly alluded to the idea that fellow film writer Kermode's private school education holds a certain aspect of gatekeeping:

The whole thing felt a little odd to me. A misguided pot-shot to some, a benign reference to others. In all honesty, I joked with a film friend that both were joyfully sharing a brandy and a cigar as they did enough to raise Film Twitter's love for gossip and perhaps got another couple of Sight and Sound copies out the door. Although Kermode feelings to the comments and Leigh's self-removal from Twitter state otherwise. 

Strangely, this reminds me of when Gawker broke the news of Hulk Hogan’s sex tape and rampant racism in which the Hulkster mentioned not only his wishes of his daughter to not date certain types of Black men, but also liberal use of the N-word. I remember when this news broke, the social media audience was more bothered at Hogan's use of a racial slur as opposed to his far more disturbing view on interracial relationships. I'm also reminded of the 2014 Sony hack in which then Sony Entertainment Chief Amy Pascal joking remarked on Obama's film tastes being somewhat stereotypical. While the information leaked was founded on dubious grounds, it displayed the problematic relationship between ideas of race and film production. This was not conversed about in The Discourse, because this was criminal gossip which shouldn't be looked into in any way or form. Although now we don't mind discussing pee tapes. 

The mucky discussions that should really be discussed are dismissed for something more palatable. The same thing will happen here. The more important aspects of Leigh's commentary will be overshadowed via a smaller, less important area of discussion. There are no winners here. The comments made will now be viewed by some as a grudge on a film writer who is currently the most prominent national voice on cinema. While another film writer will disappear from social media at a time we actually need folk to discuss cinema in a boarder sense. Something Leigh was happy to do. A shame. In the brief conversations I've had in the past with both writers, the most important element that came across from both of them was their passion for cinema. 

A couple of sentences between two prominent white film writers is simply not as important as the talk of class. We’re still in a labouring world in which London based critics and film writers chirp over "essential" screenings that they can see due being able to afford an array of rep cinemas that they can just fall into. Working class actors are disappearing. Films which highlight the varied range of cultural landscapes flitter on by due to poor distribution and yet we see have more to say about twitter beef. This ain’t Sarris vs Kael. This isn’t even White vs Baumbach and yet we are invested. The issue that lingers is that there IS a class concern that remains in film criticism like a repugnant stench. However, the concern is being masked by folk grinning and nodding in acknowledgment to MUBI’s smug advertising campaign or doubling down on their recent tweets about the state of Cinema culture, so much of which safely ignore any real insights on socio-political areas. The online film community can often give off an ivory tower demeanour about itself. All it takes is a glance at the right message boards or tweet threads to see it. There is a problem with how class, as well as race and gender,  is viewed in criticism. It goes far beyond the two writers mentioned in this piece. The fact that we will again ignore it is pretty classless.

Review: Entourage: The Movie

Year: 2015
Director: Doug Ellin
Screenplay: Doug Ellin
Starring: Kevin Connolly, Adrian Grenier, Kevin Dillon, Jerry Ferrara, Jeremy Piven

Synopsis is here

“Do you actually think that way about movies?” The voice queried at the end of the line. I was left stumped. A brief exchange from a friend in Wales had my mind in a particular conflict.

“If I had to think like that about movies” He continued; “My head would just hurt.”

My friend was talking about an article I shared about the strange, extravagant death which featured in Jurassic World. He was quite astonished that someone would place such thought into something which in the grander scheme of things, is so trivial. He claimed that he meant the writer of the article, but the tone clearly included me, the sharer, the cohort.

I smiled, but for a brief second, I was mildly stumped. While I often challenge my own thoughts on the films I watch, the sheer simplicity of how the question was put across to me, along with a long conversation with friends over Jurassic World and Entourage, had my eyebrow well and truly raised To quote Heath’s Joker: “Why so serious?”

Am I Dothery, believing in the hologram, while Toto is there to show me there’s not much behind the curtain? Am I over thinking these blockbusters, which are only out to entertain? Should one just sit there and mindlessly soak in whatever images that you’ve just happened to pay for? Such questions, don’t keep me up at night, but they do catch me every so often while I do my day job. Movies are just movies, see? And despite nearly everything we watch, read and listen to holding a certain amount influence over us, we should just quieten down and just take it in. The real important stuff is in what you do.

This brings me, in a roundabout way to Entourage, a movie in which the four lead characters do very little and are heavily rewarded. So while the nameless audience should work hard and pay good money to sit down, shut up and take in whatever the entertainment says it is, Entourage is more happy to state that these guys, do nothing get rewarded more and fuck you, because dudebros.
That’s actually quite harsh of me. I was actually pretty fond of the antics of Vince and his crew. The TV show, despite some of its baser elements, was an entertaining romp about Hollywood. The boys were juvenile, but they were mostly harmless. What these guys lacked in airs and graces, they made up for in knock around charm and comrade. The Hollywood namechecking and film scheming were slick and glossy enough to make fans feel like they were “in” with the boys. The always sunny, totally money, world view held by these Hollywood homeboys was never one I could fully subscribe to. But I would quite happily spend 22 minutes engaging a cringe worthy Johnny Drama meltdown or a ball busting Ari Gold tirade. Guilty pleasure? No, just an effectively fluffy time waster.  

In the four years that Entourage came off the air, a lot has changed. TV has now entered a new so-called golden age and the audiences’ demands have been raised to match the quality. The (pop culture) world has now become even more aware of and engaged in gender politics. Argument and debate have spread across sword and sandals sex in Game of Thrones through to Gamergate. Whether you were a feminist before the Twitter landscape shifted or a newly pledged member of the mens rights club. It’s safe to say that the conversation has become louder since 2011.

This makes the Entourage movie feel only a tad less prehistoric than the Jurassic World Dino’s in the screen next to it. A barrage of think-pieces and caustic reviews have had the cast fighting back with exclamations of: “It’s not Citizen Kane!” This is true, but in my eyes, lines like that only really suggest that the film in question is pretty rubbish.

Despite some of the shrillness of the think-pieces and twitter attacks from the internet abyss aimed at Entourage. They’re not completely incorrect. While not the sleaziest film I’ve seen, Entourage has some moments that do make you question the thought process and reasoning on why such elements had to be in the film. It’s more gratuitous moments are the most noticeable and senseless. A pivotal moment involving two prostitutes happily pleasuring themselves orally while two characters converse would perhaps fare better in an exploitation film than a mainstream summer movie. Same goes for Johnna Drama (Dillon), whose constant juvenile chatter about “banging” was far less distracting, when A: he had actual story arcs to navigate in the series. B: He gained more comeuppance.

The fact is Entourage is pretty much what one would have expected from the TV show. Which isn’t great considering that this is a movie. We’re now in a world in which the likes of Game of Thrones can be happily screened on cinema screens. With good reason. Entourage, much like the How I Met Your Mother finale, tries too hard to shove a season’s worth of plot into an extended episode of the series. Unfortunately, rather than the scale, the only thing that feels bigger is the obnoxiousness of the characters. Once you realise that the stakes have never been lower with nothing truly at risk the film’s outcome is uninteresting. With no decent story to speak of, the only thing to observe is the indulgent (and fun) cameos and just how the crass these guys actually are.

To make matters worse, the film’s main cast (Piven aside), lack any command on the big screen in comparison to the home monitors they co-opted in the past. The flaccid four’s weak performances (along with the televisual set ups) help demonstrate the differences between films and TV that some of the stronger television shows have been fighting to blur.

As the film’s box office return slowly claws back its budget (marketing budget unknown), it’s pretty clear that Entourage, much like recent TV-movie adaptations, only really attracted its core fans and that the many articles attacking it, will probably get one or two more tickets through the door. To me, the volume of the Kermode rants and articles hint at a slow release week more than anything. Not that many people gave a damn when Entourage finished. The amount of time past and the change of scope have given a forgettable film slightly more prominence. Yet while the film works in short bursts – the odd funny line, an amusing situation or two – Entourage does very little to show that it’s more than it’s worse faculties. Much like The Sex in the City Movies, the film’s focus on the most facile elements, in a far more socially aware environment, has provided a disappointed outcome. That said, the films musical choices, which have always been well picked for the lifestyle that it’s showcasing, still made my head nod.

The friend I mentioned at the beginning of this piece once asked me to pick a film for him as he was taking someone out on a date. I forget what I suggested, but he took my advice. He married the same girl soon after. He’s thanked me for the choice I made and jokingly stated that I helped solidify the relationship. Yes, at times the way I watch films hurts my head. However, the outcome can be stories like how he met his wife. Something I found more enjoyable than Entourage the movie.

Review: Insidious: Chapter 2

Review: Insidious: Chapter 2

Year: 2013

Director: James Wan

Screenplay: Leigh Warren

Starring: Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Barabra Hershey

Synopsis is here:

My viewing relationship with James Wan (director) and Leigh Whannell (writer) isn’t a great one, but it’s not a terrible. Despite originally being a massive fan of Saw upon its release, the two have done little to wow me since their début. There’s no doubt that the relationship is a fruitful one. Between them; their films have made serious bank at the box office.  It also didn't surprise me that due to Wan’s ability to wrap action orientated shoots quickly, he’s taking on the next Fast and the Furious film in time for next year. I do hope however, that Wan gives us a stronger effort with that massively budgeted franchise than the limp wristed entry we’re given here. I found Insidious: Chapter 2 not only nonsensical (time travel? Honestly?), but it’s also tedious as a horror movie.

Critic Mark Kermode has noted that film’s like Insidious: Chapter 2 are horror films for people who dislike horror and I’m inclined to agree, to a point. Wan is clearly cine-literate and Chapter 2 borrows liberally from the likes of The Shining (1980), The Astronauts Wife (1999), The Entity (1982) and Poltergeist (1982) for many of its scenes but does so in such an obvious way that you feel that Wan is hedging bets that his audience doesn't know or no longer care about the films that he’s borrowing from.  Wan then strips each reference of the atmosphere that made the films what they were and instead fills very sequence with protracted BOO moments that annoy rather than unsettle.

It’s strange that one of the producers on this feature was Oren Peli; a man whose claim to fame was orchestrating the extremely popular Paranormal Activity, a film’s tension was provided by capturing those disturbing hours where seemingly nothing happens. Peli knew just how uneasy someone could feel due to the power of stillness. Insidious: Chapter 2 betrays this by manhandling the viewer whenever it can. The camera pans, scans and zooms to absolute distraction, while the films score and loud bangs invade your eardrums at very moment. It’s all more than a little too much.

This may not have been an issue if the characters and story we were observing were compelling. The films confounding screenplay is never particularly interesting when Wan actually utilises downtime. Not only happy to rip off nearly every cliché in the book, the films cardboard characters have to utter some extremely tin eared dialogue. A conundrum soon appears. We have a film that’s often too loud to get the best of out of it, yet when it actually quietens down...it’s not worth listening to.      

Going back to the idea established in the second paragraph, films like Insidious: Chapter 2 seem to be catering to a generation who believe that true horror is how high the popcorn flies. The worrying aspect is not that these people dislike horror, but that the factors behind what is considered a scary movie have shifted. With one of the current arguments about cinema being the “second screen experience” and whether or not there should be special requirements for those who can’t be torn away from their social networks. It is no surprise that we are given a film with no real narrative, but exists to make the viewer jump to attention every other minute? 

Review: Total Recall

Year: 2012
Director: Len Wiseman
Screenplay: Kurt Wimmer, Mark Bomback
Starring: Colin Farrell, Kate Beckinsale, Jessica Biel, Byran Cranston, Bill Nighy, Bokeem Woodbine, John Cho

Synopsis is here:

After finishing The Good, The Bad and The Multiplex by Mark Kermode (light and witty), one of the main points that stayed with me was the chapter about Mainstream movies being better. Kermode believes that due to the fact that films no longer truly flop and merely "under perform", and that the studios that finance said production don't actually risk that much as they don't really lose money, should we be getting better quality movies? Now of course "better" and "good" are of course to the eye of the beholder, but as always I feel that the bequiffed one has an interesting point.

Kermode's words ring particularly true when it comes to the likes of something like Total Recall; an unbelievably, unremarkable and not at all daring Total Recall remake. However I would trade the word better with "stranger" for this particular entry. Reason being; if you're going to remake a Paul Verhoven adaptation of a Philip K Dick short story, you should make it stand out. Unfortunately, safe bets the talking in Hollywood, and they do it louder than middle aged bass playing critics, or live T.V producers who blog about movies for a hobby. Hence why Total Recall is a completely average footnote of the cinematic book of 2012.

The main issue is Total Recall has the used stench of other films hanging off it like burnt offal although it will smell like sweet pork to someone who may not be too bothered about their sci-fi or never got the fuss of the big dumb Arnie original. This film shows the generational gap between film-makers more than you think. We are now plunged fully into the directors who plunder and pilfer from other films and video games for no other reason than they remember it and it looks cool. Wiseman nabs all the artificial elements he can find from the likes of the original film, Blade Runner, Minority Report, I-robot and whatever Xbox games he had in the house at the time but does little else to the film to make our time with the mish mash world he's created fulfilling. This remake thinks it's a decent idea to discard the ambiguity that made Verhoeven feature such a stand out. Arnie is a naff actor, but Verhoeven is a learned director, with his original, wanting the viewer to second guess the intentions of it's lead and situation.  TR2012 cuts all this for the "simple" approach, as if the audience couldn't comprehend the identity crisis that featured in the original.

In fact, so much is hollowed out from the original film that the film becomes frustrating. For instance; Quaid's exotic relationship with Melina, the girl of his dreams/reality, was so different from his blonde haired, blue eyed wife it caused an entertaining dynamic. Melina 22 years ago wasn't just different in looks but in personality. A head strong rebellious latina, supported by a feisty performance from Rachel Ticotin. Fast forward to our remake and we get a bland portrayal by Jessica Biel whose only characteristic is to look slightly forlorn that Farrell's Quaid can't remember his own birthday. Such lazy reimagings crop up everywhere as Wiseman's film decides to take the road most travelled. Character actors such as Nighy and Cranston are wasted and the only person seeming to have any fun is Beckingsale's Lori. But then again that is the directors wife we're once again watching in tight clothing holding weaponry (see also Underworld) .

For all the arguments placed on Christopher Nolan's head for his two recent blockbusters (Inception and The Dark Knight Rises) and Ridleys Scott's hyped yet flawed return to sci-fi (Prometheous), Both directors can at least say that their far reaching influences allowed to bring more to proceeding than just the plain surface. Their films have brought months of argument and debate, but at least they have something in there to rouse such heated talk. They have the main source yet manage to bring more to the game.

Total Recall 2012 gives us nothing but gloss and sheen. Verhoeven knew the power of ultra violence and the general insanity of the whole thing. This retread however, is happy to contend with platform game pilfering and Blade Runner cloning. The film doesn't even seem to understand why it's taking certain aspects. Case in point, a three breasted cameo that find its way into the film early on. If you took away the original reason for said cameo to be there in the first place (Mars) why bother with the hark back? Nostalgia be damned, not even the slick action that takes place, can shift the annoyance.

Review: Storage 24

Year: 2012

Director: Johannes Roberts
Screenplay: Noel Clarke, Davie Fairbanks, Marc Small
Starring: Noel Clarke, Colin O'Donoghue and Antonia Campbell-Hughes

Synopsis is here:

Storage 24 is a MacDonald's meal of a movie, in which it won't be particularly nourishing to a cinephiles palette, but at a stretch, it fills a hole. There's no need for bush beating here. The film is not original and wears, its love of Alien/Aliens on it's sleeve. It would have been nice for the film to have as much invention as Attack the Block, as it would have been great if its Roberts took full advantage of it's setting. However, I didn't have any animosity to Storage 24 as other website reviewers have had. Possibly because I'm the red headed stepchild of this blogging game.

Clarke himself has stated on the Kermode and Mayo wittertainment podcast that he had his own reservations and concerns on the opening segments of Joe Cornish's ghetto sci-fi feature and with fair point. The opening gambit of AtB wishes for a leap of faith that some may not be willing to take. We meet those protagonists as willing participants of a mugging. Storage 24 has Clarke writing himself as a suited sad sack, whose just been dumped out of a long term relationship. It's easier to take, and Clarke placement of himself in the lead role strives to show a similar element of turning convention on it's head as Ridley Scott's seminal creature feature. Clarke's Charlie is not something we often see of Black British characters in such genre cinema. In comparison to Cornish's aggressive Block characters, one can see what Clarke is trying to do. 


I kind of enjoyed this, along with many of the characters and their traits. I found enough conviction in them and their relationships to be invested in them. The film takes a mistake with a stock character, whose final quote doubles up as reference to Aliens, becomes their only worthwhile moment. Apart from this however, no one offends. Perhaps they should, as to perk the film up slightly. Every character follows the tropes as they should, which is fine, but also helps display why AtB polarised and appealed the way it did. 


The film does suffer from Johannes Roberts' clumsy visual direction, hack and slash editing and Clarke's sometimes ill advised humour. The humour screws with the overall tone and is sometimes badly timed. It also doesn't help distract from Roberts wish to shoot nearly all the film in awkward extreme close up. It's clear that the production value isn't too high but it seems that Roberts couldn't find enough ways around gaining atmosphere other than short focused face shots. It's a clear attempt to create a claustrophobic atmosphere, but the film itself doesn't gains a proper geography. The storage centre never becomes the labyrinthine entrapment it could be, merely becoming a one or two dusty rooms and a basement. You get the feeling that more could be done.

 However, as a low budget B movie, the film more or less delivers. Cheap CGI aside, I enjoyed the creature design and its mostly scant appearances. I didn't mind the practical effects either. Clarke is a little too charming for his misery guts character and yet his charisma does pulls us through the film. That Clarke has managed to work with Universal and get this produced says more about the film than the film itself. As flawed as Storage 24 is, Clarke's involvement reminds us of his intent.