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From the obscure to the obscurest to the merely overlooked or underappreciated; they all have a home in the TiVoPlex! All times Pacific.

Tuesday 01/22/08

7:00 PM Fox Movie Channel
The Star Chamber (1983 USA): Here's a yuppie take on the Death Wish trope featuring card-carrying Hollywood liberal Michael Douglas as a gun-totin' judge. Does anyone else think it's weird that a leftie like Douglas made not one, but two right-wing fantasies (this and the far more repugnant Falling Down) about the white man's revenge against (mostly) people of color who have managed to evade truth, justice, and The American Way? Anyhoo, The Star Chamber features Mike as Steven Hardin, a distressed Judge who finds himself forced to let several psychotic criminals go free thanks to legal loopholes. Luckily, the great and good of the city have formed their own vigilante committee, where they retry cases and issue punishments that truly fit the crime. Hardin is recruited to this 'star chamber' by fellow bench jockey Ben Caulfield (Hal Holbrook), and soon he's chasing bad guys around warehouses with the help of cop Harry Lowes (Yaphet Kotto). The film tries to have it both ways by painting the members of the Star Chamber and the criminals they pursue as two sides of the same coin, but the characters are such caricatures that it really beggars belief. Nonetheless, the acting is uniformly good (yes, even Douglas isn't horrible), and the film is making its widescreen television debut this evening, so we'll make an allowance and let this one into the TiVoPlex for one week only.

Wednesday 01/23/08

10:05 AM HBO Family
Drakmar: A Vassal's Journey (2006 USA): If you've ever spent a few too many hours immersed in the fantasy worlds of Dungeons and Dragons - or, for those of you a little younger, World of Warcraft - you'll want to take a look at this mildly cautionary tale about adolescence and role-playing games. Thankfully, Drakmar: A Vassal's Journey isn't a fundamentalist polemic raging against the dangers posed by pretending to be a level 10 cleric, but a quietly effective look at 14-year-old RPG enthusiast Colin Taylor, who spends most of his spare time traipsing around the mythical 'Kingdom of Terre Neuve', where he tries to come to terms with the absence of his father and his status as chief nerd at a San Diego-area high school. This bittersweet tribute to the angst of adolescence also airs at 1:05 PM.

6:00 PM Sundance
Four Sheets to the Wind (2007 USA): Confronting head-on the stereotype of the Native American who loves to knock back firewater, this low-key but very worthwhile drama makes its small screen debut this evening. Written and directed by Sterlin Harjo, the film stars Cody Lightning (previously seen to good effect in 1998's Smoke Signals) as Cufe Smallhill, whose life on the res is going nowhere fast. When his father commits suicide, Cufe decides it's time to do something more than just hang around street corners, and heads off for life in the big city of Tulsa, where his sister Miri (Tamara Podemski) is partying pretty hard herself. Will Cufe fall into the grip of substance abuse - or will his new relationship with next door neighbor Francie (Laura Bailey) open some new doors for him? A redemptive drama about establishing lines of communication where none previously existed, Four Sheets to the Wind netted a Special Jury Prize at Sundance 2007 in honor of Podemski's performance, as well as a Grand Jury Prize nomination for Harjo.

Thursday 01/24/08

5:00 AM Encore Dramatic Stories
The Italian (2005 RUS): A brutally frank exposition on the decaying social structures of post-Soviet Union Russia, The Italian will hopefully encourage you to take a second look at that fly-by-night adoption agency you just hired. Six-year old Kolya Spiridonov headlines as Vanya, an orphan abandoned in the remote vastnesses of the steppes by his beleaguered mother. He lives in a Dickensian orphanage run by scheming ne'er do wells Madam and Grigori (Maria Kuznetsova and Nikolai Reutov, respectively), who are hoping to sell him to the highest bidder: in this case, a rich Italian couple out child shopping. Not at all happy about the arrangements being made on his behalf, Vanya decides to do a runner and go in search of his birth mother - but Madam and Grigori aren't about to let their cute-as-a-button meal ticket get away without a fight, and they're soon hot on his trail. Young Spiridinov delivers a spirited and believable performance as the feisty lad, and the film is beautifully shot by Aleksandr Burov, who captures the lay of the landscape (and the chill of the weather) to superb effect.

1:00 PM Fox Movie Channel
To Catch a Yeti (1995 CAN): Did you know that Meatloaf had made a kid-friendly feature about hunting for the Abominable Snowman? Me neither.

10:50 PM Encore Dramatic Stories
The King is Alive (2000 DEN): Perhaps the most unusual of the films produced according to the rules of the Dogme Manifesto - and that's saying quite a bit, of course! - The King is Alive tells the story of a group of tourists stranded in the desert when their bus breaks down. What would YOU do if you were in the middle of nowhere, short on food, and extremely hot? Why, stage an impromptu version of King Lear, of course! Amongst the cast are Janet McTeer, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Bruce 'Senator Kelly' Davison, and (in one of his last roles) Brion James, so if you were previously scared away from Dogme films by the subtitles, you've run out of excuses. Superbly shot on video by Jens Schlosser and well-directed by Kristian Levring, this is wonderful fun for arthouse mavens.

Friday 01/25/08

7:30 AM Sundance
Everything's Cool (2007 USA): If you're a fan of filmmaker Judith Helfand (Blue Vinyl), you'll want to check out Everything's Cool, her take on the global warming brou-ha-ha. Ms. Helfand, whose previous films deftly mix the deadly serious with doses of gallows humor, brings the same touch to this recent effort, which examines why it has taken so long for the realities of the greenhouse effect to sink into the American political consciousness. The answer? The oil companies, of course, who have managed to maintain the fiction of a scientific 'debate' around the issue well beyond the 11th hour. Everything's Cool is neither poker-faced polemic nor Michael Moore gotcha-thon, but a surprisingly light-hearted think piece that tries to get beyond the apocalyptic tone of similar documentaries and spur folks to take action. Also airs 1/27 at 12:35 PM.

Saturday 01/26/08

3:15 AM Turner Classic Movies
The Outrage (1964 USA): An American version of Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon adapted to the peculiarities of the Old West, The Outrage stars Paul Newman as Mexican bandito Juan Carrasco (yes, please stifle your laughter), recently sentenced to death for the murder of a man (Laurence Harvey) and the rape of his wife (Claire Bloom). Carrasco has been convicted despite the contradictory testimony of three witnesses, and the story revolves around the re-telling of the event from the perspectives of a preacher (William Shatner), a confidence trickster (Edward G. Robinson), and a prospector (Howard da Silva). It's all beautifully shot by James Wong Howe, and though long overlooked and still unavailable on DVD remains one of the better Hollywood remakes you're likely to see - Newman's casting notwithstanding. As additional incentive, The Outrage airs in its essential 2.35:1 aspect ratio this morning.

7:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
Thunder Rock (1942 GB): This very rarely seen British fantasy stars Michael Redgrave as David Charleston, a journalist who has retreated to the wilderness in search of inspiration. Charleston, whose warnings regarding the rise of Nazi Germany have fallen on deaf ears, is convinced he can only find solace far from other people, and now lives on the shores of Lake Michigan (presumably on the Canadian side), where he tends a remote lighthouse. He finds himself with some uninvited guests, however, when the ghosts of those lost in a nearby shipwreck start to drop by and prick his conscience. Co-starring a very young James Mason as Streeter, Charleston's one concession to contact with the outside world, as well as Lilli Palmer and Finlay Currie as sepulchral visitors, Thunder Rock is one of the most impressive flag-wavers of the period, with an intelligent and thoughtful screenplay (based on a play in which Redgrave also appeared) and magnificent black and white photography from Mutz Greenbaum, who would later change his name to Max Greene and lens such classics as Night and the City and I'm All Right Jack. This forgotten gem is followed at 9:00 PM by another patriotic Redgrave effort, 1945's The Way to the Stars, which features the future knight as an RAF bomber pilot. The film also features a who's who of 1940s British cinema, including John Mills, Stanley Holloway, Trevor Howard, Joyce Carey, and a 16-year-old Jean Simmons.

Sunday 01/27/08

10:30 AM Sundance
Forest for the Trees (2006 USA): Judi Bari was an 'eco-terrorist' who accidentally blew herself up whilst transporting a car bomb through my adopted hometown of Oakland, California, in 1990. Well, that's what the FBI and their ever loyal minions in the Oakland Police Department wanted you to believe - but the evidence suggests that Bari and her driving companion Darryl Cherney were actually targets of the timber industry, who deeply resented and feared the couple's efforts to lead non-violent protests against the clear cutting of virgin forest in Northern California. A year after the FBI started an investigation, Bari filed suit against the feds, but the case didn't make its way to court until 2002, five years after her untimely death from breast cancer. This film documents that trial, which ended with a jury awarding Bari and Cherney a $4.4 million dollar award for damages, and was directed by Bernardine Mellis, the daughter of a lawyer who established his credentials by defending the Black Panthers and the Weatherman.

9:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
West Point (1928 USA): Matinee idol and latter-day gay icon William Haines stars in this large-scale silent feature from MGM director Edward Sedgwick. Haines plays Brice Wayne, a child of privilege whose manner and ways ingratiate him with few of his fellow Cadets. Brice, however, also happens to be a jim-dandy football player, but his arrogant attitude find him booted from the team just before the big Army-Navy game. Will he chow down on humble pie and acquire the requisite team spirit - or will he burn his bridges and return to his well-manicured mansion? Joan Crawford stars as the down to earth gal who must help him mend his ways and return to the old alma mater. Of additional interest is the shot-on-campus location footage, rendering West Point a fascinating time capsule of military life between the wars.

Monday 01/28/08

9:00 AM Sundance
Heaven Come Down (2006 USA): Get the lowdown on snake-handling Pentecostalism in this eye-opening documentary, which also takes in speaking in tongues, fire dancing, and - best of all - the drinking of poison in order to prove one's faith in God! Some folks like water, some folks like wine, but these folks like the taste of straight strychnine! Not surprisingly, not everyone survives this rite of passage, but you can rest assured that their demise resulted from a lack of Christian fastidiousness and has nothing to do with the massive amounts of toxins they ingested.

6:00 PM Sundance
The Monastery: Mr. Vig & the Nun (2006 DEN): Mr. Vig is an octogenarian bachelor who owns and lives in a rundown castle in the Danish marshlands. He wants to donate it to a church - of any denomination - and finds a potential taker in the Russian Orthodox Church, who send a gaggle of nuns under the command of Sister Ambrosija to work out the details with him. No, this isn't some bizarre Scandinavian comedy, but a documentary about an elderly man wanting to ensure himself a place in heaven by ceding his property to God. Unfortunately, his property is in terrible shape, and the Brides of Christ must break the bad news to Mr. Vig: his manor is not up to diocesan snuff. Proving once again that real life trumps fiction every time, The Monastery will have you swearing off the contemplative life for good.