Census Bloodbath: Each And Every Day Of The Year

Year: 1984

Director: William A. Graham

Cast: Tom Skerritt, Sharon Stone, Robert Culp

Run Time: 1 hour 35 minutes 

Plot: Calendar Girl Murders follows a faux-Playboy magazine called Paradise that is run by Richard Trainor (Robert Culp). When their calendar girls for January and February are murdered, homicide cop Lt. Dan Stoner (Tom Skerritt) must try to find out who is targeting the girls while also discovering the mysterious secret behind former Angel of the Year Cassie Bascomb's (Sharon Stone, who was still in the slasher trenches after Deadly Blessing) departure from the company. She also keeps crossing his path and trying rather desperately to fuck him despite the fact that he's married, which is really the plot of the movie if we're being honest.

Analysis: The TV movie format should be an absolute killer for the slasher genre, which thrives on blood, guts, and nudity, all things that were not allowed to be broadcast on network TV in the 1980s. However, I have found that those restrictions tend to empower the slasher movie to aim for better plots and more layered characters (especially for women), so TV films including Fantasies, Dark Night of the Scarecrow, Deadly Lessons, and last week's Till Death Do Us Part have been delightful breaths of fresh air. If anything, Calendar Girl Murders being boring is the exception that proves the rule.

Even so, it's only boring because it favors a format other than the "Lifetime movie" vibe that a project like this demands. Instead it's a bland police procedural without much new to bring to the table. At least that element requires many characters who only show up in 1 or 2 scenes, allowing the cast to be even more stacked than the typical entry, including appearances from Robert Morse, Alan Thicke, Robert Beltran, and Barbara Parkins. 

The procedural is quite bad, not really committing to any proper red herrings and losing the organizing principle of women being killed in calendar order by the halfway point. It is then intermittently intercut with scenes that prove that Sharon Stone needed some practice before she could claim her seductive hold over cinema in the 1990s. I don't blame Stone for being unappealing here, she's struggling with an impassive love interest in a schlubbed-up Skerritt, a trite script, and the overall confusedly horny atmosphere that makes it feel like the film was produced by 12-year-old who haven't actually had sex.

Obviously, a TV movie about nude models isn't going to show actual naked people. But it also didn't have to show us the photo shoots, where the women are donning outfits they could get away with wearing into church. It undercuts the sense of lusty fantasy the film is trying to indulge in, and that lack of heat is felt in no place more than the slow motion firefighter photo shoot that is the lead-out to a scene where Dan learns that his wife's life is in danger, instantly deflating whatever modicum of tension the scene had established.

Its kills are similarly lackluster, as must be expected from this vein of the slasher. Still, I might not be expecting blood, but I was definitely expecting there to be an actual kill in the second half of the movie rather than a woman failing to be drowned and a man who has his life support machine shut off, which I think can claim the record for history's least interesting slasher movie murder.

The film isn't aggressively bad by any stretch of the imagination, it's just content to be a bland bit of programming you can ignore while falling asleep face down in your TV dinner. It briefly livens up with a car chase that is by far the single best sequence of the film, but then it has the gall to leave us on one of the worst final scenes I have ever witnessed, half of which takes place with the characters blocked behind a closed door before it cuts to credits.

Killer: Cassie Bascomb (Sharon Stone)

Final Girl: Nancy Stoner (Barbara Bosson), but really only because she's the last woman we see

Best Kill: There's not much to choose from, but Miss February is stabbed while getting a snack and falls into the fridge which is kinda neat.

Sign of the Times: The dreadful synth cover of Neil Sedaka's "Calendar Girl" this movie opens with.

Scariest Moment: Cassie is accosted by a strange man in a parking garage.

Weirdest Moment: A random dude who hasn't shown up before and won't be seen afterward does a midair splits at an otherwise relatively sedate party.

Champion Dialogue: "What am I supposed to wear to an orgy?"

Body Count: 3

Pamela (Miss January) is pushed off a tenth story balcony.

Kara (Miss February) is stabbed in the gut.

Albert has his life support switched off.

TL;DR: Calendar Girl Murders is a passable TV movie effort but has a lot of wasted potential.

Rating: 5/10

Word Count: 826

A Room Of Our Own

Note: I wrote this review of The Disaster Artist over a year and a half ago, after I saw a preview screening of the film. I watched it on opening night to learn that not only was it not substantially changed, not a frame other than the opening and closing credits was touched. On a second viewing, I'm a lot colder on the film, but I stand by the feelings I express in this review. It just doesn't have a lot to offer other than a one-time gimmick. Once that's used up, there's no reason to return to that well whatsoever.

Year: 2016

Director: James Franco

Cast: James Franco, Dave Franco, Sharon Stone

Run Time: 1 hour 45 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

I’m a huge fan of oddball auteur Tommy Wiseau’s bad movie masterpiece The Room. So much so that it’s not even listed on my index in the section that’s sorted by rating, because that would have broken the system entirely, not to mention my credibility. I’m also a huge fan of Greg Sestero’s behind-the-scenes book The Disaster Artist, which is hands-down the most fascinating nonfiction book I’ve ever read. It’s not only an insight into the twisted mind that birthed The Room, but the story of a man rattling against the bars of the cage of normalcy who would eventually become that twisted mind's best friend.

So when I heard they were adapting that very book into a movie, I was mighty intrigued. When it was announced that stoner comedy icon by day/berserk artistic soldier by night James Franco would be directing, I was concerned, but realized there’s hardly anybody better to bring that madcap, deranged nightmare to life.

I was wrong.

You’re tearing me apart, James Franco!

In The Disaster Artist, Greg Sestero (Dave Franco) is a young aspiring actor in San Francisco who meets the mysterious, ineffably accented, appallingly dressed Tommy Wiseau (James Franco) in an acting class. The shy young man comes to respect Tommy’s bravado and total lack of elf-awareness. They become fast friends and move to L. A. to pursue their dreams. However, Greg’s success at finding an agent (Sharon Stone) and a girlfriend (Alison Brie) makes Tommy dangerously jealous.

When they decide that the industry isn’t ready for them, they agree that they should make their own movie. They assemble a crew (Seth Rogen, Paul Scheer, Charlyne Yi…) and a cast (Ari Graynor, Josh Hutcherson, Zac Efron, Jacki Weaver…) with Tommy’s bottomless pit of money and it’s off to the races!

Oh hi, cult classic.

At its heart, The Disaster Artist is about the relationship between Greg and Tommy more than it’s about The Room itself. This is as it should be. And as a movie adaptation of said story, some details are changed to smooth the narrative along. This is also as it should be. As much a fan as I am of the book, I understand and respect that certain choices had to be made when adapting the material. However, the end product is both completely unrecognizable as the original true story and kilotons less interesting. The quasi-horror story of a dark, twisted friendship between a bipolar lunatic and an insecure ingénue has been transformed into a wacky, whitewashed buddy picture about never giving up on your dreams.

It lurches so hard to fit a three-act structure that it’s gut-churning. And again, to make myself clear, I’m not upset that they streamlined the casting process or combined multiple characters into one or cut out the subplot about Retro Puppet Master (OK, maybe I’m a teensy bit upset about that one). I’m upset they capsized years of bizarre behavior, manipulation, homoeotic tension, and drama in favor of a bog standard “girlfriend jealousy,” man-child, Apatow-approved plot structure, which they go ahead and totally ignore in the third act, arriving at zero resolution for either character. And this is not a “true stories don’t have endings” situation. By this point, everything true about this story is rotting under a stack of old TV Guides at the landfill.

I guess they were too chicken to commit to their story. Cheeeep, cheepcheepcheep.

That’s not to say that The Disaster Artist isn’t funny. It completely misses the point of its own story but it still has the juice to be pleasantly amusing. It’s not an uproarious affair, but there is plenty of that awkward comedy that’s rampant in The Room itself, especially in any scene where Tommy has to interact with people out in the real world. It certainly helps that James Franco completely disappears into the role, delivering a pitch-perfect imitation of Wiseau’s haunting strangeness. His comic timing is on point, and frankly he saves the movie from itself, the cuckoo center of the maelstrom of muddled plot elements.

Franco has also assemble a veritable A-Team of essential comic actors for lightning quick cameos, though – mysteriously – some of them (including Dirty Grandpa-redeemer Jason Mantzoukas) aren’t even given any real gags to work with. My favorite would be John Early, who plays a major agent's assistant and needs to get noticed by more people immediately. But frankly, the non-Tommy/Greg cast of The Room are given short shrift in a series of rapidfire scenes that blast through the actual making of the film. Only Ari Graynor (as Juliette Danielle, who played the blonde temptress Lisa) and Zac Efron (as Dan Janjigian, who played the psychotic drug dealer Chris-R.) make any sort of impression as the film completely ignores them. Seth Rogen also livens up several scenes from the peanut gallery, eking comedy around the edges.

To be completely honest, the film’s only acting liability is Dave Franco, who puts almost no effort into crafting a distinct personality out of Greg Sestero. Where James is playing Tommy Wiseau, Dave is just playing Dave Franco, coasting on his looks, his stock mannerisms, and a truly pitiful fake beard that looks like he got tarred and feathered by Fozzie Bear.

You are NOT my favorite customer, Dave.

The film has its ups and its downs, but it’s only half bad. It feels more like a home movie of celebrities hanging out than an actual work of cinema, but there’s certainly a place for that. I do wish it spent more time on the process of creating The Room (in fact, the longest segment of the film is the totally pointless premiere scene, where we get to sit with the actors and watch their weird facsimiles of actual scenes from The Room for what feels like hours. I’ve already seen The Room. I don’t need to watch fans watching a fan recreation of it, celebrities or not), because that’s where the more interesting story lies (in this watered-down version, anyway). And as it stands, if you haven’t actually seen the film, you’ll be flummoxed by the whole process. But I don’t mind spending 90 minutes with these people in this setting. If you’re a Room acolyte, seek this movie out. If not, leave your stupid wallets in your pocket.

TL;DR: The Disaster Artist is an oddball biopic that misses the story mark but lands the humor.

Rating: 6/10

Word Count: 1189

Census Bloodbath: Amish Paradise

Year: 1981

Director: Wes Craven

Cast: Maren Jensen, Sharon Stone, Ernest Borgnine

Run Time: 1 hour 40 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

Wes Craven directed four slasher films in the 1980’s. Two of them were forgettable piffle, and one of them changed the genre forever. Really, that’s not a bad track record. But today we’re here to talk about that fourth slasher, a little-discussed 1981 flick called Deadly Blessing.

Deadly Blessing was Craven’s third theatrical outing following the grisly grindhouse duo The Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes, and it finds him flexing a lot of the same muscles he would later use to carve out the more refined Nightmare on Elm Street. Though it is notable mostly as a breeding ground for the more sophisticated ideas he would mull over in the future, Deadly Blessing nevertheless has its share of indelible horror moments.

Like that outfit. Ick.

Deadly Blessing regales us with the tale of Martha (Maren Jensen), a young city woman who is celebrating her first anniversary with her husband Jim (Doug Barr of The Unseen) in their country home. Their property is located close to a group of devout Hittites, a religious group that “make[s] the Amish look like swingers,” who have banished Jim from their town for going to college and embracing modern technology. The group is led by this father Isaiah (Ernest Borgnine), who insists that Martha, Jim, and their secular neighbors - Louisa (Lois Nettleton) and her daughter Faith (Lisa Hartman) – have been brought here by the Incubus, a demonic boogeyman he uses to frighten people into following his rules. 

After Jim mysteriously perished in the middle of the night, Martha’s friends Vicky (Susan Buckner) and Lana (Sharon Stone of Calendar Girl Murders and, you know, Sharon Stone) come to visit. Before long, the ladies and the Hittites find themselves beset by a shadowy killer. Both assume that the murders are being perpetrated by the opposite group.

But just like Lost fans, it’s dubious if they’ll ever discover what’s really going on.

The core of Deadly Blessing is 100% grass-fed Craven, from the diad of opposing mirror-image families to the callous and controlling father figure and the repressed truths in a community erupting into violence and terror. In this film, he tackles the organized religion that dominated his sheltered early life and cements in his intent to flush all the skeletons from the closet of the American family. Unfortunately, the halting, stop-and-go pace prevents the film from being thoroughly entertaining, but as an intellectual catalyst it’s superb.

Deadly Blessing teeters on a dangerous precipice between the jagged mountains of insightful fright and the loamy valley of early 80’s mediocrity. For every step up (Craven’s audacious ideas and sterling kill sequences), there is an equal and opposite slip down (low budget TV movie-esque sets, plodding conversational scenes). But we all have our flaws. Hell, I’ve seen Jason X three times. This flick certainly has its share (and damaging ones, at that), but there are a handful of moments so unequivocally stunning that I want to et the negatives out of the way right now before we push on.

First off, man oh man does Ernest Borgnine not give a crap about this movie. He goes through the motions, puffing himself up like an indignant frog, but one gets the sense that his soul has completely vacated his body and is currently 30 feet away at the craft services table deciding between a raspberry of cheese Danish. Then the film is assaulted by an opening narration so cheesy you could melt it and pour it over nachos and a smattering of gaudy effects that would hardly impress in a community theater production.

That said, if anybody wants to produce a musical based on the collected works of Wes Craven, I will buy a ticket for opening night.

But for all that Deadly Blessing feels like a low-fi slog, there’s a sinister power that fuels the horror sequences. Craven elegantly frames a chilling nightmare that directly informs his future dream logic aesthetic for Freddy Krueger’s domain, and every death hits with the impact of a cannon blast. Whether it’s the delicate reversal of the sinister William Gluntz (returning Cravenite Michael Berryman) finding a knife sheath on a window sill before being butchered, or a hideously prolonged snake attack in a bathtub, every single moment of terror excels, jam-packed with thrilling switcheroos and hair-raising layers of tension added with each passing moment. One scene in particular, a knock-out, drag–down fight between two women, is the most kinetic, fast-paced, harrowing combat sequence of the year, hands down. With its strict realism and maniacal energy, it wouldn’t be out of place in a kung-fu movie.

Every one of these sequences is remarkably crafted, proving Craven’s acumen for high-wire thrills, but they are scattered at great distances between long swaths of stuffy religious drama. Until the absolutely bonkers final twenty minutes, watching the film is akin to the experience of sitting through a History Channel documentary with shoddy period reenactments, during which random scenes from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre have been spliced in. It’s decidedly off-kilter, but the sheer power of those moments when they finally arrive is worth every politely strained second.

And though the Hittite scenes are a challenge to get through, there is at least a slight reprieve in the form of the three women, whose chemistry is top notch. There are some genuinely sweet undercurrents about the strength of female friendship and each woman has her own distinct, shaded personality. Mind you, it’s not Little Women, but Craven has always had a specialty for strong female characters and eloquently expresses that.

When it comes down to brass tacks, Deadly Blessing is certainly one of the weaker Wes Craven efforts, but there’s enough stimulating material to keep a seasoned viewer invested. If you’re a horror newbie, stick with the Nightmares and the Screams, but for anyone of an irrationally analytical bent, this flick might just answer your prayer.

Killer: [Faith (Lisa Hartman) and Louisa (Lois Nettleton)]

Final Girl: Martha (Maren Jensen)

Best Kill: [Martha is abruptly dragged into Hell by the Incubus who, it turns out, actually exists.]

Sign of the Times: Martha digs up a grave while wearing a fringed patent leather jacket.

Scariest Moment: Sharon Stone has a nightmare about a spider falling into her mouth while a grey-skinned demon caresses her.

Weirdest Moment: Faith says she understands Martha’s grief because her pet bird died once.

Champion Dialogue: “You are a stench in the nostrils of God!”

Body Count: 7; not including a snake beaten with a poker.

1. Jim is run over with a tractor.
2. William Gluntz is stabbed to death.
3. John is stabbed to death.
4. Vicky dies in a car explosion.
5. Louis is shot to death.
6. Faith is stabbed in the back.
7. [Martha is dragged into Hell.]

TL;DR: Deadly Blessing is an intellectually stimulating, if slow, early Craven effort.

Rating: 6/10

Word Count: 1161