TiVoPlex
By John Seal
March 7, 2005
From the obscure to the obscurest to the merely overlooked or underappreciated; they all have a home in the TiVoPlex! All times Pacific.
Tuesday 03/08/05
12:25 Starz!
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring (2003 ROK): Kim Ki-duk's earliest films made him a bit of a controversial figure in Korea, marking the artist as someone unafraid to explore unsettling tales of sex, violence and criminality. These themes still continue in his latest work, but with significant changes in setting and character: the place is now the bucolic countryside and the protagonists are Buddhist monks. Pulling back from the more confrontational aspects of his style allows the filmmaker to imbue his story with a quiet beauty and power, and the contemplative pace shows off a maturation of skill that puts the director now among the world's best. Add in some tremendous dramatic performances by the cast and the stunningly gorgeous cinematography of Dong-hyeon Baek and the end result is quite simply one of the best Asian films that came to the States during the last year.Also airs at 3:25am. (With thanks to Chris Hyde for this recommendation.)
3am Turner Classic Movies
Tension (1949 USA): This first-rate noir stars Richard Basehart as a meek house-husband whose shrewish wife (Audrey Totter) is cheating on him. The cuckolded Basehart snaps and makes plans to knock off his rival, only to have a mysterious someone else do the job first. With police detective Barry Sullivan on the case, you know the coppers will hound the killer to the ends of the Earth (or at least the furthermost corners of the San Fernando Valley), and all the clues are pointing in Basehart’s direction. Helmed by blacklist victim John Berry, Tension also features William Conrad, Cyd Charisse, and Lloyd Gough, and is one of MGM’s few bona fide films noir.
Wednesday 03/09/05
10:30pm Sundance
A Certain Kind of Death (2003 USA): A Certain Kind of Death takes a look at the unavoidable phenomenon of those who selfishly shuffle off this mortal coil without benefit of next of kin, leaving it to local governments to cope with the disposal of their remains and belongings. The film follows the misadventures of three John and Jane Does as the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office tries to determine their identities and whether or not there are friends and family to be contacted. If you’ve always wanted to be the fly on the wall in your local mortuary and are curious about cremation and mass burial, here’s your film. It’s all a bit less glamorous than your average Thomas Noguchi autopsy. Also airs 3/13 at 11:50pm.
Thursday 03/10/05
12:45am The Movie Channel
Dolls (1987 USA): I have a funny feeling I actually paid to see this on the big screen way back in the Big ‘80s; director Stuart Gordon was on a post-Re-Animator roll at the time, and Dolls got a pretty wide release in theaters. Gore mavens were disappointed, however, as it’s a relatively low-key effort from the normally garrulous Gordon, who also turned the black comedy down a notch in an effort to create an atmospheric Gothic horror story about children’s toys that come to life…and kill. Yes, it’s a precursor to the endless series of Puppetmaster films (four of which feature this film’s co-star, Guy Rolfe), and though it’s not one of my favorite Gordon efforts - his next feature, 1990’s The Pit and the Pendulum is much better - it’s still reasonably entertaining, especially for those who get a kick out of Trilogy of Terror’s Zuni fetish doll or the ventriloquism segment of 1945’s Dead of Night. As an extra added bonus, Dolls is making its wide-screen television debut this evening. Also airs at 3:45am.
3am Turner Classic Movies
Laugh and Get Rich (1931 USA):The great Edna May Oliver stars in this RKO B feature about a landlady (Oliver) with a head-in-the-clouds husband (Hugh Herbert) and a household of wacky (and extremely overdue) tenants. It’s pretty creaky stuff, but Oliver and Herbert are always watchable and make an excellent comedy team. Directed by Gregory La Cava (Gabriel Over the White House), Laugh and Get Rich is a lightweight Depression-era comedy about the extreme measures folks take to get by when times are hard, including ditch digging and cow painting, if you can believe that.
3:35am More Max
Balseros (2002 ESP): This interesting, if overlong, Spanish documentary focuses on seven Cuban citizens attempting to flee their homeland for the green grass of the United States. Granted access to ordinary Cubans that would never be given to American filmmakers, directors Carlos Bosch and Jose Maria Domenech offer balanced criticism of both the Cuban and US governments, but their film concentrates on the personal stories of the seven Balseros, beginning with their 1994 decision to negotiate the dangerous waters of the Caribbean to their new lives years later in America. The film would have been more effective shorn of about 20 minutes, but it remains a fascinating look at the hopes, dreams, and cruel realities of the lives of seven intrepid rafters.
6:30pm HBO
Dope Sick Love (2004 USA): This HBO original documentary, which premiered at New York’s Frame By Frame film festival last autumn, makes its first television appearance this evening. Directed by the Renaud Brothers, a pair of young filmmakers from the indie hotbed of Arkansas, the film takes a look at two couples living on the streets of New York City, hustling for dope, selling their bodies, and smoking crack in public restrooms, whilst also trying to maintain fervid, flimsy and frequently abusive relationships with their equally addicted loved ones. Sounds like a non-fiction take on Panic in Needle Park, which makes this one essential viewing in my book. Also airs at 9:30pm and 3/14 at 8pm and 11pm.
Friday 03/11/05
11:15am Encore Action
The Chief (1933 USA): I suspect this is a listing error in the program guide, but just in case (and because there’s not much else of interest on today) I’m including it in this week’s column. Vaudevillian Ed Wynn recreated his radio character Henry Summers for The Chief, and the result is a low-voltage comedy about a fireman (Wynn) running for office in Manhattan’s corruption-riddled Bowery circa 1890. It’s minor league stuff, but is noteworthy for the presence of 13-year-old Mickey Rooney as a juvenile troublemaker. Caveat emptor: this hardly seems like a prime programming choice for Encore Action, but DirecTV thinks otherwise.
Saturday 03/12/05
1:05pm Flix
Hair (1979 USA): There are a lot of problems with Milos Forman's adaptation of the wildly popular stage musical of yesteryear- not least the fact that only three of the songs are any good - but Hair has enough going for it to warrant a tempered recommendation. John Savage is excellent as Claude, the Oklahoma farm boy thrust into the heart of hippiedom in New York City, and Treat Williams is fine as freak ringleader Berger. The film saunters along lackadaisically, confirming many of the Establishment's worst impressions of spoiled and selfish counterculture America, but hits its stride in the final half-hour as Berger switches places with the newly inducted Claude and gets on a plane bound for 'Nam. The downbeat finale makes up for the previous 90 minutes of general silliness, and the letterboxed print looks great, so even if you’re not a fan of movie musicals you may want to take a look at this one.
Sunday 03/13/05
Midnight Sci Fi
Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2001 JAP): To the best of my knowledge, this is the US television premiere of the (supposedly) penultimate Godzilla film. Sadly, it’ll be burdened by copious commercial breaks on the Sci Fi Channel, who, going against type, don’t seem to be utilizing a letterboxed print. On the bright side, though, this is the best of the recent Godzilla cycle, with the Big G battling against Mothra and Ghidorah, plus Barugon, who for some reason didn’t get his name included in the film’s wordy title. Time to get a new agent, Barugon, or at least consider sleeping with producer Hideyuki Honma. Giant Monsters All-Out Attack fills in the mythology and back-story of Godzilla, blending the established tale of his nuclear origin with a supernatural (but still anti-war) twist involving the souls of dead World War II soldiers, and it also returns him to his rightful place as a primal force of nature, stripping him of some of the accumulated anthropomorphism that blighted earlier series entries. Required viewing for anyone who grew up waiting to see Destroy All Monsters for the umpteenth time on the Million Dollar Movie.
7pm Turner Classic Movies
Winning (1969 USA): Husband-and-wife team Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward star in this paint-by-numbers drama about life on the professional race-car circuit. There aren’t too many surprises here story-wise; this is the old chestnut about the handsome fellow overcoming adversity and winning the heart of his best girl in the process. Luckily the film looks great and features spectacular racing footage, as well as cameos by real-life racers Bobby Unser and Dan Gurney. You know exactly what’s going to happen from the first frame of Winning, but this glossy Universal production looks marvellous and is getting the wide-screen treatment tonight on TCM.
Monday 03/14/05
3am Turner Classic Movies
Homicide (1949 USA): This minor RKO police procedural features Robert Alda, father of Alan, as a diabetic barman entangled in the murders of a farmer and a migrant worker. Investigating the killings is Canadian detective Michael Landers (a badly miscast Robert Douglas, newly arrived in the US after a lengthy film career in Britain) on loan to the LAPD. His partner (the prolific James Flavin) thinks the second death was a suicide, but Landers opines otherwise, which is just as well for the sake of the story. Written by the recently deceased William Sackheim, who went on to pen Rambo: First Blood with Sly Stallone, this is a fun little obscurity featuring some nice Los Angeles location work.
6 pm Sundance
Das Bus (2004 USA): I wasn’t a huge fan of Benjamin Meade’s previous film, the overly intrusive 2002 documentary Vakvagany, but he seems to be on firmer ground with lighter material such as Das Bus. It’s a blend of fiction and non-fiction, with Meade focussing his camera on those who work for and those who use the public transportation system in Kansas City, Kansas (Yes, this coastie was surprised to learn that Kansas City has a public transit system). More than just a series of interviews, this film also offers recreations of some of the juiciest (and perhaps apocryphal) bus ride tales, as portrayed by the storytellers with a little help from some semi-professional actors. For those of us who actually take the bus to work most days, this is a hilarious and at times disturbing look at some of the characters you meet after you’ve boarded the coach, wiped your seat clean, and penned some graffiti on the seatback in front of you.
Print this column
