The Cinema 4 Pylon

The Tower of Film: Just for the Hell of It [1968]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 13:57:00 +0000

Another Herschell Gordon Lewis false screed, decrying the sort of violence that was putting extra green in his pocket at the time. A gang of young adults wander about causing mayhem, starting with juvenile pranks and then eventually escalating their violence to assault, rape and murder. Most of the film consists of long scenes of the gang literally destroying everything in their path (their horrible theme song is titled "Destruction"). For a very select audience (but not me).

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No Shelving Left: Do Not Adjust Your Set [1967]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 13:45:00 +0000

The other Brit comedy and Python precursor I snagged last week, this one featuring Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin. However, the chief draw for me is the inclusion in each episode of musical segments featuring the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band (Neil Innes, Vivian Stanshall, Rodney Slater, Vernon Dudley Bohay-Nowell, Roger Ruskin Spear, Sam Spoons, "Legs Larry Smith, etc.), including "Death Cab for Cutie," the song from which that popular current band swiped their name.

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The Tower of Film: Blast-Off Girls [1967]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 23:20:00 +0000

The Godfather of Gore himself, Herschell Gordon Lewis, took some time out from carving up Playboy models in his usual fare to lens his own version of A Hard Day's Night, with a rock band (played by real band The Faded Blue) running afoul of an unscrupulous talent manager. (Yes, that is meant to sound redundant.) Mega-cheap, too long but weirdly fascinating... and believe it or not, Kentucky Fried Chicken's Colonel Sanders makes a cameo appearance! Remember: "You're nuthin' without Boojie Baker!"

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The Tower of Film: My Week with Marilyn [2011]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 22:45:00 +0000

Not sure how much I believe Colin Clark's story in My Week with Marilyn, but it was grand watching Kenneth Branagh as the slowly unraveling Laurence Olivier as he is forced to deal with Marilyn Monroe on the set of The Prince and the Showgirl. It seems like the natural approach would be for romantic comedy, or even a farce like the similarly themed My Favorite Year (one of my favorites), but this is much more of a drama. Michelle Williams is dead on as the greatest sex symbol in movie history.

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The Tower of Film: A Dangerous Method [2011]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 22:06:00 +0000

I usually hate giant head posters (especially in multiples), but the implication seems to be that the three characters represented -- from left, Carl Jung, Sabina Spielrein, and Sigmund Freud -- are all inside each other's heads within the story. Which is exactly what happens in this engaging if perhaps too slight take on the early days of psychoanalysis by my favorite current director, David Cronenberg, so the giant head usage is entirely apt.

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The Tower of Film: Hostel Part 3 [2011]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 01:01:00 +0000

Yeah... I know better. And I didn't like the first two films all that much either. It's just sometimes I feel a duty as a supposed "horror nut" to keep up on these things. The move to Vegas from Eastern Europe is a nice touch, though a pretty obvious move once you realize they are picking up "The Hangover" vibe. I'm sure there is a critic somewhere who has said "This one should have stayed in Vegas" and they would not be wrong. And that sickening sound? Just a little bit more of my soul dying...

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No Shelving Left: At Last the 1948 Show [1967-68]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 23:54:00 +0000

Another Brit comedy series added to my DVD library recently was this collection of rediscovered episodes of At Last the 1948 Show, featuring pre-Pythons John Cleese and Graham Chapman. Marty Feldman is in the mix as well. The original recordings were wiped (a normal BBC practice back in the day), so it is very lucky these scant few episodes have been found in other places.

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The Tower of Film: Boston Blackie Goes Hollywood [1942]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 22:42:00 +0000

Fourth film in Columbia's Boston Blackie series from the 1940s. Slightly above serial level antics and still good fun. Chester Morris is our wisecracking but determined hero and George E. Stone is his sidekick known as The Runt. The twist of this series is that Boston Blackie uses his skills from his former life as a thief to help him solve crimes, all the while dealing with the suspicions of the police department.

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The Tower of Film: Immortals [2011]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 21:56:00 +0000

300 minus about 292. If you like classical painting, you might get a kick out of director Tarsem Singh's imagery, and you still might even if you don't like painting. If you like mythology, forget everything you ever learned, because it ain't in here. Some decent action is overwhelmed by some hammy acting and the script is just too, too dull. At least it has Freida Pinto as Phaedra and John Hurt as Zeus disguised as an "old man" (though some of that hamminess I mentioned emanates from him...)

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The Tower of Film: The Driver [1978]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 19:52:00 +0000

It had been 20 years since I last saw this absolutely riveting 1978 Walter Hill crime flick, and man, did it ever hold up. Because it had been so long, when I saw Drive a few months back, I wasn't sure what relationship they held. Seeing The Driver again proved to me that Drive exists only as a thematic remake, in the same way that The Driver borrowed its prevailing mood from the earlier Melville classic Le Samourai. Oh yeah, this is Ryan O'Neal's best role, chiefly because he barely speaks.

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The Tower of Film: The Mechanic [1972]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 18:49:00 +0000

Try this on for size before you tackle the recent Statham remake (which wasn't bad at all). This is one of Bronson's best roles, even if you have to put up with the rather bland (and rather blonde) Jan-Michael Vincent as the assassin-in-training. The last 20 minutes or so is pure action movie heaven, and there is one hell of an abrupt ending to boot.

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No Shelving Left: I Go Pogo [1980]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 23:49:00 +0000

Not sure of the legality of this disc, and it also appears (upon viewing) to be the HBO cut where some of the dialogue was revised, but I haven't seen this fun stop motion animated version of Walt Kelly's classic comic strip in over 20 years (until now). The reason: my original copy (which I still own) is a Betamax tape released by Walt Disney Home Video in 1984.

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No Shelving Left: Beyond the Fringe

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 23:42:00 +0000

Seeing Not Only But Always recently reminded me how much I love Peter Cook and Dudley Moore (especially Derek & Clive). It got me in the mood for finally adding a few "fringe" titles to my collection, including this, the farewell performance of the original quartet from 1964 (long thought to be lost). Can't wait...

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Son of Terrible Movies: Frankenstein Created Woman [1967]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 15:31:00 +0000

Promo ad for the Son of Terrible Movies' airing of Terence Fisher's Frankenstein Created Woman [1967], starring Peter Cushing. Dr. Frank-N-Furter wasn't the first mad scientist to go all "transgender-y" in the laboratory...

Son of Terrible Movies was the sequel show to The World's Most Terrible Movies, a late night movie package show that was shown on ABC affiliate KIMO (Channel 13) in Anchorage, Alaska in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Son of Terrible Movies: Frankenstein Created Woman [1967] from The Cinema 4 Pylon on Vimeo.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: The Night of the Sorcerers [1973]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 13:25:00 +0000

Promo ad for the Son of Terrible Movies' showing of Amando de Ossorio's The Night of the Witches, aka La Noche de los Brujos [1973], known in this clip by its American dubbed release title as The Night of the Sorcerers. Washed-out colors, bad wigs, and jungle garb abound...

Son of Terrible Movies was the sequel show to The World's Most Terrible Movies, a late night movie package show that was shown on ABC affiliate KIMO (Channel 13) in Anchorage, Alaska in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: The Night of the Sorcerers [1973] from The Cinema 4 Pylon on Vimeo.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: Horror Rises from the Tomb [1973]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 13:19:00 +0000

Promo ad for the Son of Terrible Movies' airing of Carlos Aured and Paul Naschy's Horror Rises from the Tomb, aka El Espanto Surge de la Tumba [1973]. Son of Terrible Movies was the sequel show to The World's Most Terrible Movies, a late night movie package show that was shown on ABC affiliate KIMO (Channel 13) in Anchorage, Alaska in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: Horror Rises from the Tomb [1973] from The Cinema 4 Pylon on Vimeo.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: Dracula, Prince of Darkness [1966]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 04:37:00 +0000

Promo ad for the Son of Terrible Movies' airing of Terence Fisher's Dracula: Prince of Darkness [1966], starring Christopher Lee, Barbara Shelley and Andrew Keir. Son of Terrible Movies was the sequel show to The World's Most Terrible Movies, a late night movie package show that was shown on ABC affiliate KIMO (Channel 13) in Anchorage, Alaska in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: Dracula, Prince of Darkness [1966] from The Cinema 4 Pylon on Vimeo.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: The Creeping Flesh [1973]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 04:30:00 +0000

Promo ad for the Son of Terrible Movies' airing of Freddie Francis' The Creeping Flesh [1973], starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing. Son of Terrible Movies was the sequel show to The World's Most Terrible Movies, a late night movie package show that was shown on ABC affiliate KIMO (Channel 13) in Anchorage, Alaska in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: The Creeping Flesh [1973] from The Cinema 4 Pylon on Vimeo.

Into Un-Flickchart-ed Waters: Halloween Alien Invasion Edition

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 00:50:00 +0000

For someone who has the second highest quantity of total films seen on Flickchart and spends an undue amount of time ranking films there, I have not commented very much. I only have around 30 comments after 18 months on the site (not counting comments to other users of the site), and for someone that likes to blab on about films as much as I do, that's an odd thing. It's probably because Flickchart comments are better suited to brevity, which is something that I don't normally like to approach in my own time. I save that for work.

Some of my comments on Flickchart have essentially been entire essays, such as the type I used to post on here in days past before I was systematically calculating my own demise due to an unbearable recent depression. In a dual effort to pique my interest in writing personally again and to maintain a healthy presence on that site, I have determined a single, firm ground rule be applied to my next round of Flickchart posts and beyond. The ruling shall stand that I may use no more than 250 words -- TOPS -- on any comment where two films are pitted against each other. Personal posts on the site are different, but for the bread and butter of Flickchart -- that of the film vs. film ranking battle -- I must heed this rule.

And now, since the intent of The Cinema 4 Pylon this month is to serve as a Halloween Countdown destination (and I apologize for not being as committed to the cause as I was last year, when I posted every day in October), I will use Flickchart's Genre ranking tool to have several alien invasion films climb into the ring and go at it, uh, film-o y film-o...

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) vs. War of the Worlds (2005)

This one was an easy decision right off the bat. These titles are from two of my favorite books, but only one book also stands as the progenitor of two of my favorite movies. Snatchers has been made twice into one of my favorite movies, as I also love the 1978 Philip Kaufman version with Donald Sutherland, and especially because it takes the same basic concept (that of the loss of identity to emotionless alien interlopers) and also makes it into a satire of the then burgeoning New Age trendiness. It the original Don Siegel version, however, that rules my universe, not least because it has Dana Wynter in it as my all-time favorite damsel-in-distress. I zeroed in on the film as a teenager after growing hearing about the film from my parents, and it hasn't failed to break my heart since, even if I am tired of the discussion about the film's true political intentions. An interesting discussion, yes, but after a while, I just want to watch it again to be scared to death. H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds also has a version in my list of favorite films, the 1953 original by George Pal, but Spielberg's 2005 re-do is only marginally successful, though it has much visual appeal. I really should give it another look one of these days.

Predator 2 (1990) vs. Not of This Earth (1988)
I am not a fan of either one of these films, but I can still make a pretty easy choice on this match-up. Predator 2 was no match for its original (though that film's appeal has definitely worn off on me since its original release, when I was excited to see it initially), but the second iteration is still a pretty worthwhile monster movie. Some good urban warfare, and I liked Danny Glover just fine in the role as the cop hero. An interesting assemblage of actors as well: Blades, Paxton, Alonso, and Busey the elder. I couldn't wait for Not of This Earth to come out on video in 1988 as we were still in that era when there was great interest vested in our part (my boys and I) in seeing Traci Lords' cans... and legally as well. To this date, I have still not seen the 1957 Roger Corman original (odd for me, yes, but it is now out on DVD and I will have my copy in mere days), so I cannot compare the two yet, but I remember being both mildly amused by the intentionally mega-cheap remake and rather bored at the same time. In the end, the scenery was nice but too brief, and by this point, I no longer care about that scenery. I will take Predator 2 for being an actual film, not just a publicity stunt.

The Creeping Terror (1964) vs. V: The Final Battle (1984)
OK, I will admit a massive fondness for the ridiculously terrible The Creeping Terror, a film so low-budget that they had to hire a newsman to read narration over most of the film because of the poor sound quality of the dialogue throughout (though there is actually still a lot of contention over why this occurred). A monstrous shag carpet-laden space creature with a downed spaceship, dines on various citizens of a small town, and eventually attacks a dance hall and swallows teenagers whole (and spits out their shoes)... oh, it is just so anti-awesome. Watch the MST3K version if you do, if only to keep you awake, but the regular film is a wacky, crappy time on its own. I loved the original mini-series V when it was first on television, and I stuck with it through its run in the mid-'80s, if only to chiefly ogle Faye Grant and Jane Badler. (Honestly, I lost the plot early on in the regular series.) Regardless, I have rewatched the two original minis (of which this was second) in the last few years, and still had a pretty good time. Not so with the newer remake series. I am flashing V for Victory...

Body Snatchers (1994) vs. The Faculty (1998)
Abel Ferrera directed the third official screen version of Jack Finney's seminal science fiction novel, and the story still holds up well in its relocation to an army base. Third in my heart, though, after the first two, but this effort is still rather creepy and the special effects are pretty well done. I was really excited for The Faculty from Robert Rodriguez and Kevin Williamson when it came out. In a slightly different sense, it is also a "body-snatching" film -- this time, teachers are taken over by alien parasites -- but the results are decidedly mixed. The cast is fun, especially the teachers, and it is more than a tad hammy in presentation. Seeing it recently, it is a serviceable enough sci-fi thriller, but no more than that. It seems to have been lost in the Rodriguez oeuvre, though there are other films on that list (Sharkboy or Spy Kids 3, anyone?) that deserve relegation far more. I am snatching "Body" on this one...

Returner (2002) vs. The Mysterians (1957)

Twin Japanese alien invasion films, but only one really connected with me. Returner, while fun for portions of its run, was far too much of a hodgepodge of just about every science fiction film that ever came down the pike, and I just grew weary of its dodging anything genuinely original in order to get to its underwhelming finish. Cute stars, though... The Mysterians, on the other hand, crosses over into that treasured kaiju era of the late '50s and early '60s, and I crossed paths with this and the rest of its Toho ilk as a teen. Moguera, the crazy-looking, pointy-nosed mecha controlled by the Mysterians, is a particular favorite of mine (its supposed to represent a giant robotic mole). It doesn't have a star nose like my favorite moles, but it gets the gold star out of this pairing. As candy-colored silly as it looks, it's The Mysterians for me.

The Twonky (1953) vs. The War of the Worlds (1953)

Arch Oboler's The Twonky is one of those films that seems, as you are viewing it, that you are lost in the course of a particularly devious but playful fever dream. (I resist describing things as "an acid trip," first because it is stupid, and secondly, because I have never been on one.) When I first saw it years ago on a UHF channel, it was in the middle of the night, and I actually was barely conscious due to illness. I kept images of a walking, manipulative but loyal television set tormenting poor Hans Conried in my head for ages, always wondering "what the hell the name of that movie was?" I would tell people about it and they would think I was crazy. I have seen it a couple of times recently, and while I treasure having the film in my knowledge, it is almost best remembered as that very fever dream. No matter my joy over The Twonky, it can't compare for my long-standing adoration of George Pal's still scary version of H.G. Wells' sci-fi classic. Many of the scenes still define screen science-fiction for me, despite years of directors trying to outdo it. It's not just sight, but the sound of the film, that live in my memory. If you don't know what I mean, then you haven't seen it.

Village of the Damned (1995) vs. Monsters (2010)

John Carpenter pulled off a remake (The Thing) that was equal to (and sometimes better) than the original over a decade before he tried to do the same thing to one of the creepiest films of the 1960s, Wolf Rilla's The Village of the Damned. All those eerily staring, blond-haired kids... I can't even think about it. And yet, this time, Carpenter really dropped the ball to such an extent, that I think it really affected the way that I viewed him. Everything is off in this film, and all even five minutes of this version does is remind me of exactly why I grow nauseous when I hear the word "remake." Hollywood has "Clockwork Oranged" me into turning fearful every time they decide to savage the culture of previous generations. Which is why I cling ferociously to a film like Monsters, which, despite a couple of missteps, is still one of the more original visions I have seen in several years. All the film did is make me want to know more, at every portion of the journey, and I was able to shake off the "Blair Witch"-style shooting of the film, which by this point has been done to death. But as long as the occasional good comes out of the style, then I guess that I will just have to learn to accept it.

It Conquered the World (1956) vs. Without Warning (1980)

This one comes down to choice of monsters. Do I go with what is widely considered to be one of the worst examples of an alien costume in Corman's It Conquered the World (which I genuinely enjoy as a goofy '50s sci-fi film despite this) or with the deadly alien Frisbee things with tentacles and teeth that devour their victims throughout Greydon Clark's neglected Without Warning? I saw this film for the first time on cable television at a friend's house late one night. Then I had to walk home about two miles alongside a forest that never seemed quite that creepy until after I watched these evil alien Frisbee things fling about and kill people. Without Warning was shot with the proper amount of spooky menace by Dean Cundey, who lensed Halloween just before this film and then broke through to the big leagues. The makeup effects by Greg Cannom, who would also go on to bigger things, are pretty nifty as well. Man, I want both of these films on DVD, but between the two, Without Warning is my choice.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: Hatchet for the Honeymoon [1970]

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 22:40:00 +0000

Here's another promo ad from the Son of Terrible Movies, this time for their airing of Mario Bava's Hatchet for the Honeymoon [Il rosso segno della follia] [1970]. Son of Terrible Movies was the sequel show to The World's Most Terrible Movies, a late night movie package show that was shown on ABC affiliate KIMO (Channel 13) in Anchorage, Alaska in the late 1970s and early 1980s. For more about these promo ads and their background, as well as their influence on me as a teenage monster movie fan, click here.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: Hatchet for the Honeymoon [1970] from The Cinema 4 Pylon on Vimeo.

Countdown to Halloween: Son of Terrible Movies - Fury of the Wolfman

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 03:30:00 +0000

To kick off October, here's another promotional clip from Son of Terrible Movies, this time featuring Paul Naschy's The Fury of the Wolfman (1972), otherwise known as La Furia del Hombre Lobo. Son of Terrible Movies was the follow-up to The World's Most Terrible Movies, a late night movie package show that was shown on ABC affiliate KIMO (Channel 13) in Anchorage, Alaska in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Son of Terrible Movies Promo: The Fury of the Wolfman [1972] from The Cinema 4 Pylon on Vimeo.

What is The Cinema 4 Pylon?

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 04:06:00 +0000

[This post was written to serve as the new Overview page on the tabs bar. I felt that I should post it in the regular stream as an introduction to those who are new to the site. Because I have been gone for so long, it serves as a re-affirmation of the philosophy behind the site.]

The Cinema 4 Pylon is a reservoir for the collected musings and writings of Rik Tod Johnson.

The true reasons behind the name of the site have yet to be fully revealed to anyone outside of its creator, who would be myself, though some small clues have been given to something short of a handful of friends over the last few years. None of these people actually cared about these clues, even those that have feigned the most interest in my pursuits, and those scant few clues likely went the way of most trivial discussions... swiftly and unceremoniously flushed from each listener's mind and straight out through their ears.

The Pylon was originally meant to serve (as I would mention time and again in its early days) as a form of writer's notebook. The initial driving philosophy behind the Pylon, aside from its largely cinematic bent, was that each successive revision posted on the site would link to earlier drafts, so that the evolution of an essay, story or review being written could be tracked from start to supposed finish. I had also originally intended for the blog to be totally private. It would soon turn out that all of these early intentions would be pushed aside as simply too constraining. Even I do not want to re-read old versions of anything I have written once I have pushed them forward to their maturity, and as for the privacy issue, if I wanted to keep a notebook for myself, why not stick to pen and paper? Why go online at all?

And thus The Cinema 4 Pylon gradually evolved into an open portal for my various meanderings online, whether writing reviews on other sites or merely indulging in rounds of tweeting. It has changed here and there in focus of material depending on the nature of my then-current discontent with how I was presenting said material, or to try out new series of posts (most of which I never paid enough attention to fully develop the concept even halfway, after which they were rather absentmindedly dropped from the rotation).

This current version of the Pylon really should be appended with a 2.0 (perhaps even a 3.0), as it is now involved in a massive process of being transformed closer to how I had wished for my eventual full website to appear once upon a time. After being absent from the blogging world since November 2010, Blogger underwent several changes that have now made it possible to get that process rolling. This is why an Overview page such as this now exists on this site. Blogger's most recent revision almost perfectly aligned with my need to get back in touch with my various creative outlets, after months of depression and basic loathing of the outside world. So, there will be many more changes at work here in the coming months. In the meantime...

...WHY HANG OUT HERE?

Regarding the approach of content on the Pylon, while some pieces are clearly written with the intent to inform the reader as best that I can (I have some friends that refer to me as Rikipedia, and while I do not agree with this nickname wholeheartedly, I do understand the reasons as to why I earned it), this site is not meant to be a historical reserve for cinematic fact. I do, however, go to great pains to research my posts as fully as possible. The Cinema 4 Pylon is merely meant to reflect my varied interests, and if you happen to share those interests and find this site enjoyable or enlightening, or end up being engaged in anything I have written, please leave a comment or two. That is all I ask.

I am no one important, nor do I pretend to be. I am merely a fellow with a great regard for the nonsensical, an appreciation for the carefree among us, but little of either regard or appreciation for those who sour the lives of everyone around them with their fearfulness or oppression. While I can engage in seemingly intellectual discussion about a variety of topics, I believe deeply in being as silly as possible in almost any circumstance. As my brothers and I have recognized in ourselves for a very long time, we are very serious about our silliness. Room should always be cleared in any social or business situation for the absurd to occur (while recognizing, of course, that such situations are already patently absurd from the outset).

As you may well surmise from even the merest glance at the content on this site, I am possessed of a massive love for films. At times, it may be possible that I am actually more in love with the very idea of film itself -- the fact that such an art form even exists -- than I am gripped with a fascination for any one specific film. And I watch films in droves... hundreds of films per year. All while holding down a full-time job and maintaining a home life. That said, if you do not come to an acceptance of the concept that the films which I do treasure most in this world are far, far more important to my well-being than the bulk of the human relationships through which I have bungled in this life, then there is little chance we would get far enough to create the next bungled human relationship on my list.

THE PYLON-OSOPHY

While at times, certain writings on this site might seem overly amber-colored when observing beloved items from my distant past, that fuzzy side effect of "nostalgia" is not my intention at all. I am not enamored of my childhood at all, nor do I believe that any period in the past (especially those that pre-dated my existence on this planet) was better than the time in which we live now.

However, I do look to the past to inform my present. I recognize that the foundation of my feelings towards film now began to be built due to my early exposure to the movies. I have been fortunate in that I realized that this particular obsession was developing at a relatively young age and began to take notes of the films I saw. I accepted any opportunity to see films in those pre-video days where our town lacked a movie theatre of its own. I watched films in evening school showings, hung out in church pews to watch various movies, and hardly ever missed a movie matinee or late night show on television in my teens.

I also devoured film criticism books as a teenager and began scouring libraries and bookstores for other volumes on the subject [you can read more about this here]. After ages of breathing in the dust of these pages, the result is that I can barely read movie reviews in newspapers or on websites anymore, unless there is a very personal touch at play within the reviewer's words. And rarely is any TV review worth even a first glance. I can't just take the blather of So-and-So from Action News Fear-Report on Channel 87 telling me how great the latest chick flick is. And if you are movie fan with any sort of integrity, then neither should you.

The point is that I now need to know that reviewer as much as possibly before I will accept their opinion of a film. Would you trust the opinion of a stranger who just walked up to you on the sidewalk and told you that you simply had to eat at a certain nearby restaurant? If so, then mister, you are a better man than I, and are probably a far more naive one who will end up in the back of a van someday. I would rather the person telling me that information is someone who knows me, knows my peccadilloes, and is more apt to weigh first whether I really would enjoy the food at that establishment.

Look, you may not agree with everything your friends say or do, but they are your friends and it is more than likely that they are going to weigh their experience with you before they invite you to something that you have a more than fifty percent chance of hating outright. When I was much younger, I would make my entire group of friends sit down and watch something like Eraserhead, which even I will admit is probably something that only a very select group of individuals should attempt to watch with some preparation. The only prep I gave my friends was my absolute thrill over discovering the film not long before. The first result of this is that many of them do not trust my opinion of a film to this day, and in fact, will bring it up a quarter century later if I were to tell them they "simply have to watch this film!"

The second result, after several other attempts to get various groups of people or even individuals to watch a current favorite of mine, is that I no longer recommend any movie to anybody, except on an individual basis and with intense knowledge of that person's background and interests. I can recommend titles to my pal The Working Dead (and vice versa) because we are roughly tuned into the same wavelength regarding films, comics, music and television. If something turns out to be a dud, then no harm and no foul.

But, I would never recommend something to anyone with whom I worked or just met until I got to know them for a while. I get asked all the time "Are there any good movies out right now?" and I always answer "There are always good movies and bad movies out at any given time. What type of movies do you like?" Sadly, the response is "All types of movies!" (which is a fucking lie in almost every case), because then I will say "Do you like horror films?" and the usual response is "Oh, not really." (Don't get me started on "all types of music" people...)

I caught flack for recommending or force-viewing the wrong films to the wrong people, and I amended my ways. Most people, though, employ a form of blanket acceptance of film reviews in the media. People will take in a critic's opinion of a film without really considering who it is that is giving that opinion. They know nothing of the person, but they accept their word simply because that review is in, for example, a "legitimate" paper. And they rarely bring to mind previous reviews that critic may have written, because the words in the review are purposely made to be generic and acceptable for the widest possible audience. Confusing the issue even more is the trend of the last decade or so of fake movie reviewers getting their paid, hack opinions into movie posters and trailers. The point is that the average person doesn't want to work too hard when choosing a movie, and the level of critical reviews in the world has sunk to meet that anti-demand.

Which is truly sad, because we would all be better off if people took just a little more responsibility in choosing their entertainment. Want to stop Hollywood from putting out shitty movie after shitty movie? Stop going to those shitty movies. The studios are only supplying what a largely uncritical public, too concerned with filling their spare time with any form of entertainment at all as long as that time if filled somehow, seems to demand.

Sure, I like to be surprised by an unexpected joy of a film, but I at least know what film I am going to spend my money on before I hit the theatre. The only information I need to know about a film before sitting down is who made it and who is in it, though I have certainly seen a trailer or two beforehand, because it really can't be avoided in this day and age if you have even the minimum amount of exposure to TV and the internet. And I rarely read any reviews outside of those film critics for whom I have developed a backlog of experience in gauging their work. I read Ebert on his website on Friday mornings, because I have read most of his books, have followed him on television for 30-plus years, and I have gained a deep understanding of his likes and dislikes, know a lot about his nature, and can put any one of his film reviews in perspective when placed against his others.

Likewise, for the past few years, I have read Scott and Dargis at the NY Times site, and have begun to create a similar backlog. Until recently, I did the same reading the critics in The New Yorker, having grown up reading Kael's collected review books, and also reading John Simon. The point is not that I agree with any of their reviews; in fact, more often than not, I don't. The point is that I understand where they are coming from due to continued exposure and study of their writing, and use it to determine the worth of their opinion. On a literary level, I have gotten to know them and trust them, whether agreeing or not.

But it is still not enough for me, which is where my philosophy of critical therapy comes into play. At the beginning of this section, I mentioned using the past to inform the present. It goes even further than that. The reason I write is to engage my mind and fight the series of depressions that have plagued me for many years. I finally learned how to combat that depression, and if I had recognized twenty years earlier that my only escape was through personal engagement through art ("art" described in whatever terms you wish to give it), I would be a far different person today. The problem is that every time I dig myself out of a hole, I will get comfortable in a new situation, and then not notice as I slowly fall back in again. Thus it happened last November, and now I making a new attempt to climb back out.

What you will discover here is that I don't simply watch a film and say "It was good. I liked that actor. The camerawork was kind of crappy, but it was really funny." I am not interested in thumbs up or thumbs down. That is a terrible way, with no apologies to Siskel and Ebert, to approach a film or decide the worth of a gladiator's life. Because not everyone brings the same baggage to a film. You and I can go into a movie, and one of us might have had a run-in with the boss or gotten a parking ticket, and the other one of us might have gotten blown an hour before, and our opinions of the movie we are seeing, no matter how much we try to remain impartial and open-minded, are definitely going to be colored by what happened to us earlier in the day. People say they use movies to escape, but no one can ever really escape from life. The mind can't help but wander to personal matters, and damn it, I want to know that in a review. I want to know what the critic carried into the film.

I let you know. With rare exception, I don't consider the way that I write a film critique to really be about the film in question. I am always writing about myself. While I deeply appreciate film technique and history, I am really more interested in how I approach a film, what I got out of the film, what I can learn from a film, and how it might have affected me days, weeks and even years after I have seen it. It might seem egotistical, but you try and live your life without your ego getting in your way. And it may seem rude, but I don't really care about what anybody else -- whether a close friend, a professional film critic with an English degree, a trumped-up weatherman thrown into a celeb spot on the local news, or a mouth-breathing lardass who likes to have the endings of films spoiled for him -- cares about any film. In the end, I really only care what I think, because that is the opinion with which I must live. Just as yours is all you really need.

THE FINAL QUALIFIER...

If you don't love Buster Keaton, Preston Sturges, Bugs Bunny, Kurosawa, Fritz Lang, Val Lewton at RKO, kaiju eiga, Universal monsters and Hammer horror films, Ray Harryhausen, or the Marx Brothers, well... then goodbye, sir or madam. The Cinema 4 Pylon is not the place for you. But if it is, please enjoy looking around while I fully renovate everything on here. I will be introducing some new topics and features in the coming year, and am currently busy creating new sections as well. Please weigh in with your comments good or bad as you see fit, and I am always eager to engage in conversation about any film.

Narwhal,

Rik Tod Johnson

Flickchart Comment #30: Career Opportunities (1991) vs. The Coca-Cola Kid (1985)

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 22:54:00 +0000

vs.

I don't think it would be out of bounds to state that most of us who engage routinely in cinematic discourse live somewhat of a lie. The same could be said of anyone who delves into any art form deep enough to begin to believe that their selections within their chosen medium are bred solely from a studied and intellectual set of criteria. Sure, it's fun to puff oneself up with pretension and attempt to convince others that the reason one attended a certain film was because of the director's mise-en-scène, the subtleties of framing used by a particular cinematographer, or one's appreciation for the underrated mumblings of the film's scruffy, cult figure of a star.

But, sometimes it just comes down to the boobs.

Possibly the truest models of the range of my youthful lust, Career Opportunities and The Coca-Cola Kid both came out within my twenties, and I saw them both in theatres. I saw The Coca-Cola Kid first, in what would now be described as an "arthouse cinema," but which was really the only true form of alternative movie theatre in my hometown at the time (they also showed pornos back in the day, so it was only part-time in its art leanings). And I didn't go to The Coca-Cola Kid for the boobs, but rather because the film had garnered some decent press on its way to being released in the States, and I wanted to see something different than that which I had been practically force-fed up to that point in time by Hollywood. (OK, I wasn't force-fed -- I qualified it with "practically" -- but when you are a film fanatic, you takes what you can gets sometime, and back then, Hollywood flicks were pretty much, outside of video, the only game in town.)

When Kid came out, Eric Roberts was young and freshly scrubbed and rather oddly interesting in his acting choices, and for a brief period, could actually get people to plunk down into a movie seat (briefly). He wasn't that great, but he could get you to pay attention. (My personal favorite film with him is Larry Cohen's truly absurd The Ambulance, where he is teamed up in the over-the-top but low-budget thriller with the great Red Buttons.)

I went to The Coca-Cola Kid with the hopes of seeing a halfway decent film... and I came out with Greta Scacchi on my mind. I have fallen in love a hundred times or so looking at a movie screen, and in that tiny movie theatre in 1985, the immediate object of that desire was Ms. Scacchi, so different from that which I was used to, but absolutely adorable. She also happened to be naked in the film, which cut out a lot of mystery (chiefly, answering the question "Would she get naked in a movie?")

Scacchi invaded my brain enough for me to rent Heat and Dust (one of the first Merchant-Ivory films I saw), and see White Mischief, Good Morning, Babylon and Shattered in theatres. After Altman's The Player in 1992, I pretty much lost track of her, but as she has matured yet still retained her classic Italian beauty over the years, I have caught her in a role here and there. And each one reminds me of when I first saw her in The Coca-Cola Kid, which still holds up as a fine, offbeat comedy to this day.

Career Opportunities, like many of John Hughes' offshoots, really doesn't hold up in the same way 20 years after its release in 1991, nor is it of the same quality by any measure of the Scacchi/Roberts film. At the time though, fresh off dragging some friends to Dennis Hopper's The Hot Spot the a few months earlier (which they hated), they at least agreed with me that the ample nude footage of Jennifer Connelly and Virginia Madsen were to be commended. All we knew is that the teen star of Labyrinth, whose name we really had not committed to memory, had truly grown up.

Then the poster for Opportunities showed up, and while I am not necessarily all that focused on what Zappa termed "mammalian protuberances" (I am an elbow guy), if ever there was a poster designed to sell tickets to me instantly at that moment in the universe, it was the one for Career Opportunities. If there was a guy in the theatre lobby in that period who saw that image and didn't dream of being in the same exact position that Frank Whaley was in that one-sheet (see above), then it would have been immediately evident the guy wasn't batting in even the same league, let alone team.

My friends, male and female, would have gone to the film even without the poster such as it was, since we pretty much were attending en masse any film with John Hughes' name on it. But, for the boys in my little gang, the poster made it a sure bet we would be there opening weekend. I distinctly recall being only mildly amused but roundly disinterested in the film outside of the actors, and Connelly's part in the film really can't be chalked up as a performance. Performance art, perhaps... but acting was not her strong suit in the early days of her career. In fact, despite her ample charms and the various means by which they are exploited in Opportunities (and yet, in a very PG way), her character was almost vapid enough to almost dispel the notion from my mind at the film's close that I adored her absolutely earlier in the film. Talk about a 90-minute stand.

Of course, I recovered my initial adoration once I was left to my own devices (ahem...) to reflect upon what I had seen in the film, and after The Rocketeer solidified my feelings later that year (playing the part named and designed in the original comic book after Bettie Page), Connelly became my gold standard for film beauty for a good decade. (At least until she read her Oscar speech a few years later from a piece of yellow legal pad paper. Improv is apparently not her strong suit...)

To recap: two beauties from my past, who have turned out to have lengthy, distinguished careers, starring in two movies that I watched a lot back in the day. In the end, as always, the overall quality of The Coca-Cola Kid tips the balance in its favor. See, it's doesn't always come down to the boobs. But it is a damned attractive way to reach such a decision.

Gamera Vs. All Mankind - Act III: Requiem

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sat, 20 Aug 2011 14:09:00 +0000

An impromptu storyboard page by my brother for Act III

A little, long-unfinished business here to which I must attend...

Under the Cinema 2 tab that now adorns the top of the Pylon, alongside the brace of other tabs to which I was recently given the means of installation, I have built a page featuring the initial sketch version of Gamera Vs. All Mankind, a short, operatic, animated film that my brother and I contrived based on somewhat of a dare from my best pal Leif.

I will dispense with the full story here, as I will be adding it to the Cinema 2 screen in the near future, where I have also placed the libretto for Acts I and II for those interested in what the wholly synthesized voices in the cartoon are singing. However, as all of this business was initially published on the website that I had built as the ultimate destination for those who visited the Pylon, it seems that I neglected to published Act III of Gamera vs. All Mankind here as a regular post.

If you are at all interested, click here to watch the very rough sketch version of our would-be kaijû opera cartoon and read the first two acts. We never got around to doing the sketch version of the third act, and the music for it was never completed either, but you can read the lyrics to get the general idea of how it was to be concluded. At some point in the future, I would love to finally get around to fully producing the short to completion, but there are a lot of obstacles to work out first.

Gamera Vs. All Mankind

A kaijû opera in three tiny acts

Music by Mark Otis Johnson
Libretto by Rik Tod Johnson

ACT III: Requiem

[As the two ships head furiously for the island’s shore, the pirates/scientists have turned their theme “Bigger and Better Things” into a near-sea shanty, which they indulge themselves in as they prepare their weaponry for landfall... ]

Pirates/Scientists
Yo Ho! Ho Yo!
To bigger and better things!
Yo Ho! Ho Yo!
To bigger and better things!

We’ll add Gamera to the extinction list
And put wads of money in our fist!
Yo Ho! Ho Yo!
To bigger and better things!

[The ships reach the island at positions far down the beach from each other. Hasigawa, now seemingly mad in love with a girl he has never really met, lifts his eyepatch to search down the beach for Rainbow. As it turns out, each of the major players is searching for something at this time…]

Hasigawa
Where?
Where did she go to?
Once I thought my heart would fill
Now I fear it’s empty still…

[Rainbow is searching her cabin desperately so she can doll up for Hasigawa; Mr. Aoyagi, the translator, stands behind her trying the missing object out on himself, smacking his lips and dabbing them on a tissue in a mirror.]

Rainbow
Where?
Where is my lip gloss?
I want to plant one on that hottie!
What the hell! I want his body!

Morimoto
[Peering through a telescope]
There!
Far down the shore!
In that quay there lies our quarry!
Men, we must hurry
Or poor Gamera may die
And we’ll all be--!!

Takada
[Peering back through his own telescope, reading Morimoto’s lips…]
Sorry??!!
Why must he worry?
He doesn’t realize
That everything I do
Is for our country’s greater glory!
I will lead us…

Pirates/Scientists
[Wheeling cannons, howitzers and all manner of arms across the beach…]
Yo Ho! Ho Yo!
To bigger and better things!

[All of the parties start rushing across the sands towards each other, each one singing their part of the quartet…]

Hasigawa
Where?
Where is she now?
Rainbow
Here!
I'm ready for him!

Morimoto
Now,
I fear the worst, men!
Hasigawa
Where?

Rainbow
Here!

Morimoto
[pointing at the pirate/scientists]
There!

Takada
[pointing at the Greenpeace team]
There!

All
NOW!!

[There is a beat as Hasigawa and Rainbow come face to face in front of the two warring factions. Rainbow jumps at Hasigawa, throws her arms around him and knocks him into some nearby bushes. Clothes come flying out into the air. Another beat, as the translator looks at the warriors, and then he, too, jumps into the bushes. The battle commences, with much bloodshed and death and general gnashing of teeth. After several moments, the noise and din of the battle is broken up by something even louder… the terrifying cry of Gamera, the giant flying turtle.

All of the survivors stop to stare at the creature, who is standing there holding a giant cup of tea, and wearing fuzzy bunny slippers on his feet, looking as if his solace has been disturbed. In the palm of one giant turtle hand sits little Toshio, who has at last found his protector. The pirate/scientists raise their weapons and charge Gamera, putting up siege towers and blasting cannons at him; the Greenpeace warriors raise their weapons at the pirate/scientists and charge them at the same time.

Gamera, however, having no need for either side, shoots flames out of his mouth, incinerating the whole lot of them. Soon, every human on the island is a charred pile of ashes except for Toshio, Rainbow, and Hasigawa, who have come up for air from behind the rock where they were making out, and Mr. Aoyagi, the Translator, who pops up with them. Gamera growls at the Translator.]

Toshio
I beg you, Mister Man,
What did Gamera say?

Mr. Aoyagi, the Translator
He, uh, asks what brings you here today?

Toshio
Oh, you see…
My daddy told me,
Because he works in the Diet…

[Gamera raises an annoyed eyebrow, and then burns Toshio to a crisp, either because he hates politicians or the kid’s annoying sing-song voice or both.]

Toshio

AAAAHHH!!!

[Gamera then starts to spin about, jets blasting from the four limb-holes in his shell and jets off into the sky.

[As he and an ever-smiling Rainbow get dressed behind the bushes, Hasigawa lights up a cigarette from the flaming skull of a nearby burnt body, puts his eyepatch back on (but over the opposite eye), grimly looks at Rainbow, and walks away without saying a word. He climbs aboard the IKR ship and sails off.]

Rainbow
Wait! Tadashi!
Where are you going?
Why must love bring such stings?

[The translator walks up behind her, also smoking a cigarette that he lit from the charred remains of Toshio. He stares at the boat sailing off and looks unblinkingly at the sad, skimpily dressed girl.]

Rainbow
I don’t understand.
How could he ever go?

Mr. Aoyagi, the Translator
It’s… it’s…

Rainbow
Complicated.
Yes, I know.

Mr. Aoyagi, the Translator
[winking at Rainbow]
To bigger and better things?

[Rainbow grabs him and throws him behind the bushes. Clothes go flying into the air.]

FINE

Gamera Vs. All Mankind, Copyright © 2006-2011 Silly N' Serious Productions.
Libretto, Copyright © 2006-2011 Rik Tod Johnson.
Music, Copyright © 2006-2011 Mark Otis Johnson.
All Rights Reserved.

The Return of the Blogger Named Me

noreply@blogger.com (Rik Tod Johnson) — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 14:27:00 +0000

Yes, that is Marley and Me in the background.

My apologies to anyone setting down here briefly over the next couple of weeks. Having gone AWOL from the blogging scene for roughly ten months (not entirely of my own choosing), and after weeks of telling myself that I just needed to jump back into it, I finally ran smack-dab into yesterday.

Luckily, yesterday was a Saturday, so I had the time I needed to deal with what I found when I opened up Blogger for the first time in ages. If it had been a weekday, I would have been in trouble. I would have gone to work thinking about everything I needed to do on Blogger instead of concentrating on my job (and right now, concentration is rather the most important weapon in my work arsenal, given that we are trying to complete the next issue of our magazine).

I returned to discover that Blogger had undergone several major changes. Thankfully, they were all to my liking. A cleaner, more efficient user interface and immediate access to site statistics were nice additions, and there are several others I won't mention. The actual editor for creating posts is now far more pliable, with more room given to write (I have never understood why so many WYSIWYG editors give you such a tiny box to write in that makes it possible to see only the barest portion of your post. The original Blogger editor only allowed me to see about a paragraph and a half. Frustrating...) But my favorite new item was the ability to build stand-alone pages that create tabs which you can display across the top of your homepage. Suddenly, your blog could get a little closer to looking like a real website!

This is something I had long wanted, and had spent a good amount of time a couple of years back trying to get a regular website up and running which would get me closer to my original vision of what I wanted to do. The problem was that I already had the Pylon going for several years at that point, and I became frustrated in trying to devise a way to merge both sites properly. I had so much material on the Pylon and on its then-current sister site, the Cinema 4 Cel Bloc, that I didn't see the point of transporting all of it to a new site. The logistics of such a move made my head swirl. And with time and money at a premium in my life, I gave up the proposition.

But now that I had pulled a Rip Van Winkle on blogging, and woke up several months later to find that the entire Blogger world had changed (but without seeing weird little men playing nine-pins or my having grown a massive white beard), I could consolidate my efforts into just improving The Cinema 4 Pylon.

And thus, you will discover that changes are at hand. After posting for the first time since mid-November (and I will not recount the reasons at this moment), I started messing around with the layout for the site. Because I ran into this just yesterday, I still haven't quite worked out exactly how things will look, but first I corrected the banner on my header (one small reason I gave up on the site for a while was that I could not locate my original art files, which I also found going into this weekend) and also resized the site. I began to build the stand-alone pages, but I have not quite put up (or created, in some cases) the material that will eventually go into these, so please be patient.

And now I will celebrate with a round of figurative nine-pins and the dancing of a sprightly jig (also figuratively, since my back will not allow it) for posting two days in a row. Hopefully, my interest is piqued enough to keep me going.