TiVoPlex
By John Seal
November 28, 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 11/29/05
1:40am Encore Action
Trick Baby (1973 USA): A rarely-seen crime drama, Trick Baby returns to television for the first time in a decade or more this morning. The story revolves around a pair of con men (Kiel Martin and Mel Stewart) who parlay a handful of cut glass masquerading as diamonds into $10,000 in cold, hard cash. Unfortunately, one of the guys they fleece turns out to have ties to organized crime, and the two are forced to flee for the anonymity of Chicago, where an even bigger deal - this time involving real estate - awaits them. Though marketed as a "blaxploitation" film - the story was based on a story by Iceberg Slim, and the lead characters are African-American - in reality it's a caper flick, and a pretty good one at that. Look for former Love Boat star Ted Lange - you remember, he played Isaac the Bartender - as Melvin the Pimp.
9:45pm The Movie Channel
Toolbox Murders (2004 USA): In a famous debate in 1860, agnostic Thomas Huxley claimed that six monkeys with six typewriters would, over the course of eternity and in the fullness of time, eventually reproduce the complete works of Shakespeare. He was debating the existence of an intelligent designer with anti-slavery clergyman William Wilberforce, and his monkey bon mot helped him win the argument that day. Over a hundred years later, the veracity of his apocryphal statement has been disproven by computer models, and until very recently his subsequent and much less publicized assertion - that Hell would freeze over before a remake of a motion picture ever improved upon the original - had stood unchallenged. Enter Tobe Hooper's Toolbox Murders, a reworking of a cheap and sleazy 1978 slasher flick featuring a gurning Cameron Mitchell as a mad killer with a tool chest full of murder weapons. And surprise, surprise; not only is the remake far better, it's also Hooper's best film in many, many years. Set in a decaying Hollywood apartment building plagued by a series of gruesome killings, Toolbox Murders stars the wonderful Angela Bettis (seen to great effect in the much-admired TiVoPlex favorite May) as a new tenant who finds her home has more serious problems than leaky toilets and broken elevators. The film's supporting cast is exemplary, Jace Anderson and Adam Gierasch's screenplay takes time to develop characters and atmosphere, and the film, though gory, will appeal to horror fans of all ages. A pleasant surprise for genre mavens, Toolbox Murders also includes a welcome appearance by Rance (father of Ron) Howard as one of Bettis' fellow tenants. Also airs 11/30 at 1:45am.
Thursday 12/01/05
3:30pm IFC
The Sum of Us (1994 AUS): In a flagrant example of typecasting, The Sum of Us features girly man Russell Crowe as Jeff, a gay Aussie plumber searching for Mr. Right in modern-day Sydney. He's still living at home with his widowed dad (Jack Thompson), who is also ready for a new relationship when he isn't spending time meddling in his son's love life or buying him porno mags. Adapted for the screen by playwright David Stevens, The Sum of Us is a typically off-kilter, blood-is-thicker-than-water Antipodean comedy/drama, and airs in wide screen tonight. It re-airs 12/2 at 1:45am.
Friday 12/02/05
8:30am Turner Classic Movies
Wives Under Suspicion (1938 USA): It's 1938, and director James Whale is no longer the hot Hollywood property he had been only a few years earlier. 1936's lavish Show Boat had not been a box office success, and Universal was no longer assigning him to its plum projects. Wives Under Suspicion is one of a handful of features the dispirited Whale helmed in the late 1930s, and though it displays precious little evidence of its director's authorial hand - and is a remake to boot - is still worth a look. Originally filmed by Whale as The Kiss Before the Mirror in 1933, this version features the great Warren William as a district attorney who suspects his wife may be cheating on him, and starts considering murder as the solution to the problem. Technically, the film is a shadow of its predecessor and looks every bit the quickie it was, but William always delivered solid performances, and he's at the top of his game here. It's followed at 9:45am by another William feature, 1934's Upperworld, which features the actor as an adulterous railroad executive subjected to blackmail by his underhanded gal pal.
8pm Encore
Bullets Over Hollywood(2005 USA): This Encore original documentary takes a sweeping look at the evolution of the gangster film from the days of the silent era to the present. Though not as good as the network's well-focused Midnight Movies (also 2005), Bullets Over Hollywood is still a decent overview of the genre, with special care spent exploring the archetypes developed by actors Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, and Edward G. Robinson. Enlivening the proceedings are interview subjects such as Smilin' Leonard Maltin, former goodfella Henry Hill, and - my favorite - nonagenarian actor Marc Lawrence, who still looks good in a fedora.
Saturday 12/03/05
Midnight Sundance
Imagining Argentina (2004 USA-GB-ESP): I don't really care much for this Antonio Banderas drama about tragedy in 1970s Argentina, but after spending the last few weeks hyping every Argentinean film under the sun, how could I ignore it? Strictly speaking, it's not an Argentine film (it was funded jointly by US, Spanish, and British companies), but it WAS shot on location in Buenos Aires and it DOES have the A word in the title, so allow me to bend the rules a bit. Banderas plays Carlos, a theatre director whose journalist wife (Emma Thompson) is arrested by the Videla military government after she starts prying the dirty underwear out of their right-wing closets. The twist in the tale is that Carlos then develops a mystical power that allows him to probe the secrets of the universe and "find" missing people, but, alas, his special talent is unable to help him locate his spouse. Perhaps she's made of kryptonite? At any rate, if you admire the Gabriel Garcia Marquez school of "magical realism", or simply think Banderas is a hunk, you'll enjoy this film. All others should proceed with due caution.
5am Turner Classic Movies
He Ran All the Way (1951 USA): Sam Ross' novel of the same name is a decent work of suspense, but casting John Garfield in the lead role - as a murderer on the run who doesn't quite know how to deal with his predicament - elevates the story to a new level. A young and pretty Shelley Winters is on hand as his unwitting pawn, and Norman Lloyd (still spry today in his late 80s!) is Garfield's slimy accomplice who really starts all the trouble. Terrific black-and-white photography by James Wong Howe is the icing on this intriguing cake, which also features Wallace Ford and Gladys George as Winters' kind-hearted parents.
4pm Sundance
Two-Lane Blacktop (1971 USA): Wimpy singer/songwriter James Taylor and Beach Boy Dennis Wilson star in this road movie about two unnamed car enthusiasts who drive across the nation looking for automotive kicks in their ‘55 Chevy. Along the way they run into a gearhead named G.T.O. (perennial hardass Warren Oates) and challenge him to a race to Washington, DC, at which point the loser must relinquish his cherished vehicle to the winner (or winners, as the case may be). This existential drama from director Monte Hellman doesn't have the visceral energy of the similar Vanishing Point (also 1971), and Taylor and Wilson aren't much in the acting department, but Oates is great and the location photography - which encompasses highways from California to Oklahoma - is impressive. One caveat: Two-Lane Blacktop needs to be seen in its correct aspect ratio, and it's not clear to me whether or not Sundance is airing it wide-screen this afternoon.
Monday 12/05/05
4pm Sundance
An Injury to One (2001 USA): This documentary about the miners and capitalists of Butte, Montana, is pretty good, considering it was produced as part of someone's dissertation. Comprised mostly of lingering landscapes, stills, and narration, the film details the efforts of IWW activist Frank Little to organize the workers of Butte in 1917. The film also takes some surprising diversions regarding novelist Dashiell Hammett and McCarthyism and ends with a brief update on the dire condition of Butte and its environs in the 21st century. Though imperfect - the deadpan narration is a little too self-important, the utilization of Butte mining songs disengaging, and some camera shots tend to linger several seconds too long at times - this is a fascinating document of a little-known period of American history. The soundtrack, provided by artists such as Low, Dirty Three, and Will Oldham, is particularly noteworthy.
10pm Sundance
Torture: The Guantanamo Guidebook (2004 GB): If you still aren't convinced that, Presidential denials to the contrary, "we do torture", then consider the evidence presented in this chilling documentary produced for Britain's Channel 4 television. Director Tim Carter found himself an East London warehouse, some declassified US military documents, and seven volunteers (including three Muslims) who responded to advertisements looking for "hard men'. He then proceeded to subject the seven to some of the interrogation techniques used at Gitmo, albeit not the nastiest or harshest ones, because he didn't want to kill them. Sleep deprivation, exposure to extreme heat and cold, and white noise are just a few of the tools at the disposal of the defenders of democracy, and now you can witness first-hand the horrors that go on every day in the American Gulag. It's something we should all be deeply ashamed of, and hopefully this film will help shake a few more people out of their complacency.
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