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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 10/27/09

7:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Power (1968 USA): Give credit where it's due: producer George Pal cooked up a pretty decent plot for this science-fiction film, even if he couldn't get much in the way of a screenplay from scribe John Gay. George Hamilton stars as Jim Tanner, a scientist collaborating with half a dozen other boffins on experiments involving telekinesis. When their work reveals one of them possesses mental "super-powers", the scientists begin to drop like flies, and suspicion falls on Jim, who, after all, isn't dead yet. Unfortunately, the film tends to underplay its fantastic elements in favor of murder mystery tropes, but there's a pretty impressive cast to compensate, including Suzanne Pleshette, Nehemiah Persoff, Richard Carlson, Arthur O'Connell, and Earl Holliman (all as Hamilton's colleagues), Michael Rennie as the security bigwig guarding the proceedings, and Gary Merrill as a gumshoe called in to investigate the murders. If that's not enough star power for you, Yvonne de Carlo puts in an appearance as Mrs. Arthur O'Connell, and if you don't blink you'll also catch a glimpse of Aldo Ray! Best of all, The Power appears tonight in glorious widescreen Panavision.

7:30 PM Flix
Clean, Shaven (1993 USA): A strange little film that always reminds me of Martin Scorsese's completely unrelated The Big Shave, Clean, Shaven is a shot-in-New York indie about the struggles of a schizophrenic man to live something akin to a normal life. Peter Greene (Pulp Fiction) plays Peter, a young, homeless fellow trying to regain contact with his daughter but encountering all sorts of difficulties thanks to his complicated health and financial situations. Needless to say, both his family and the authorities take a dim view of his efforts, and Peter struggles to maintain his equilibrium. An impressive debut from writer-director Lodge Kerrigan, who's since picked and chosen his projects carefully and is clearly the furthest thing from a Hollywood career man, Clean, Shaven isn't an easy film to watch or enjoy: it's filled with ambiguity, random noise, and general discomfort. If you don't mind shifting uncomfortably in your chair tonight, though, you'll find the effort worthwhile.

Wednesday 10/28/09

3:05 AM IFC
Iron Monkey (1993 HK): This terrific martial arts epic makes its widescreen television debut this morning. Directed by Woo-ping Yuen, who later worked with Quentin Tarantino and the Wachowski Brothers, Iron Monkey stars Rongguang Yu as the title character, a homeopathist by day/masked superhero in his off hours who engages in battle against the corrupt leaders of a Chinese village. Governor Cheng (James Wong) hires Wong Kei-Ying (Donnie Yen) to neutralize the Iron Monkey—but the two ultimately unite in common purpose after the delightfully named evil monk Hin Hung (Sai-Kun Yam) appears on the scene. It's been described as "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon without the boring bits", which is a bit of an oversimplification, but considering Iron Monkey's spectacular wirework finale, not a million miles wide of the mark.

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