Glenn Walker is a writer who knows pop culture. He loves, hates, and lives pop culture. He knows too freaking much about pop culture, and here's where he talks about it all: movies, music, comics, television, and the rest... Welcome to Hell.
Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde ~ We saw this on last year's TCM Classic Cruise, which of course is the way to see any movie, in the company of passionate like-minded individuals, introduced by industry professionals, and in this case - of a classic silent film - accompanied by a live orchestra.
The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra is no stranger to this kind of stuff as their name might imply. They've produced soundtracks, and performed live similarly, for The General (I even bought the DVD with their score while on board), The Mark of Zorro, and one of my favorites, as well as one of the first, movie serials - Les Vampires.
The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra compiles and performs the film music, called 'photoplay music' in the lost vernacular, just as it was done back in the day. Silent films never had official soundtracks as we know today. Each theater had a house band that had a repertoire of various types of music appropriate to each scene. Mont Alto continues the tradition.
I can't tell you all what an amazing experience it was to arrive early for the showing in the Walt Disney Theatre to get a good seat and see and hear them performing. Wonderful to both see and hear them before they recessed below the stage so the film could be seen. The music played came from an assortment of composers like Gabriel Marie, Gaston Borch, and Wilson Smith.
The music was seamless. The Bride noted at times she had forgotten there was a live orchestra performing because the film and the score interacting in concert was so involving. Of course the music merely set the background for perhaps one of the most thrilling and frightening of the silent horrors - Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde from 1920.
New York passes well for Victorian London, but then again, it had to. Shot around John Barrymore's schedule to accommodate his title role as Richard III and you can see the character in both his Jekyll and Hyde, as well as a hearty dose of overacting. The work schedule must have been crazy, wearing pounds of armor on stage every night and then filming this flick during the day with so much strenuous physical acting.
His transformations are wonderful and his Hyde with the scarily long fingers and his simian Yeti-like head is terrifying. Notably, each transformation was designed to make Hyde appear more dominant and monstrous, but that first transformation was all Barrymore - no make up, just him. Bad girl Nita Naldi is hotness embodied, for me at least, and good girl Martha Mansfield is suitably porcelain and unspoiled, for the moment at least.
It's not just that this is the 1920 silent version of the story, or that it's John Barrymore giving one of his greatest performances, this one showing on the TCM Classic Cruise on board the Disney Magic was special for another reason - its score was being performed by a live orchestra. This was not just a classic film, this was a once in a lifetime experience.
Normally when one thinks of the Universal Monsters, there are five biggies one thinks of - Frankenstein, Dracula, the Wolfman, the Invisible Man, and the Creature from the Black Lagoon. Of course there are second tier monsters like the Phantom of the Opera, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, the Bride of Frankenstein, Dracula's Daughter, the Invisible Woman, and other derivatives.
But does anyone remember the lost Universal monster? Who knows the Gorilla Girl, a monster so popular in her time that her film spawned two sequels? 1943's Captive Wild Woman starred John Carradine, and introduced Acquanetta as the Gorilla Girl. Jungle Woman and The Jungle Captive quickly followed in 1944 and 1945, yet no one seems to remember the lost Universal monster.
The gist of the series is one of surgical terror and mad science. Would the transplanting of human glands into a gorilla create a more human gorilla or a half-human beast that would haunt your nightmares? Your guess is probably right. This precursor to theoretically Planet of the Apes is moody, atmospheric, campy, and a perfect fit into the Universal horror mythos.
Yet, no one remembers. Was it because she was a woman? Even in the horror world were women second-class citizens? Let's look at that list above again. The only females in the bunch are derivative of male major players. Perhaps the powers-that-be ignored the Gorilla Girl on purpose to keep women down.
You can still see these movies, and I suggest you check them out if you can. It's like finding a new Universal horror, and in a way, it really is.
Pre-season publicity talked about Rutina Wesley of "True Blood" coming to "Arrow." The character she would supposedly be playing would be Liza Warner - Lady Cop.
Lady Cop was one of a number of unique ideas showcased in a DC Comic called First Issue Special. Warlord was launched out of the book, but many of the characters - Starman, Codename: Assassin, Atlas, Manhunter, and Lady Cop - would languish in limbo for decades before being used again. After Liza Warner's first appearance as Lady Cop in 1975, she next appeared a chief of police in All-New Atom in 2006.
And now here in "Arrow." Based on her actions here in the opening, she might want to change her name from Lady Cop to Cop Killer.
Elsewhere, Oliver has announced his intention to run for mayor to Team Arrow, despite my argument against it in my review for "The Candidate," and they're not impressed either. His campaign headquarters will be the same as Sebastian Blood's office, and that's where the other surprise comes in. Oliver has, with the help of Cisco and S.T.A.R. Labs over at "The Flash," built a new Arrowcave in Brother Blood's old lair.
Curtis is still in the dark as to who the Green Arrow is and so he takes a guess - is it Neal Adams in data processing? Is Neal Adams the Green Arrow? Um no, but he is one of the comic book character's best artists. Curtis is coming off more as a cool version of Moss from "The IT Crowd" than Mr. Terrific. And speaking of Mr. T., am I the only one noticing how close Diggle's outfit is to his, without the Fair Play logos, of course?
Felicity and Curtis have also discovered some sort of signal coming from 'the late' Ray Palmer's phone. Now we know he's not dead and just trying to get their attention from sub-atomic size, but they don't. He might also be responsible for the new Arrowcave's power glitches as well.
Speaking of things we already know but they don't, Laurel is studying bad idea theater again, and tells Papa Lance about Sara. And of course, just to show that terrible judgment runs in the Lance blood, Quentin goes to Damien Darhk for help. Seemingly helpful and commiserating, Darhk tells him if it was his daughter, he'd put her down. Of course, later in the episode, he just can't do it.
Lance and Oliver's little meetings are becoming more and more frequent. I keep waiting for old Quentin to throw his hands up in the air and just arrest him. It's really odd that these two have such a contentious relationship when they're on the same dude, while over on "The Flash," archenemies Captain Cold and Flash are almost a bromance. Strange contrast.
When Oliver learns that Quentin has been working with Darhk, it sarks a fire beneath the next meeting between the two. We find exactly how Oliver does look to the elder Lance as a father figure, and how the whole mayoral deal, and possibly the whole change from Arrow to Green Arrow were all about him. Quentin is not a good daddy, perhaps another reason that he is the one in that grave at the end of the season's first episode. Throw in the fact that Oliver showed him the new Arrowcave, and Quentin practically has a target on his back.
This episode also features the return of the real star of "Arrow," Stephen Amell's bare chest as he dies the salmon ladder. Even though I'm straight, I had hoped these aspects would return to the series. I do kind of miss the tattoos however. And I'm waiting for the storyline that both requires, and mentions that he kept, the Bravta tattoo.
In the end, this episode spins on two radically different points. One, that Oliver actually is going to run for mayor, and two, that somehow Lady Cop is the villain of the episode. I didn't really like that last part. Maybe she was misguided, and we did see some interesting tech like the canary cry canceler (I hate the new cry however) and the arrow deflecting gauntlets, but Liza Warner super-villain did not sit well with me.
The stinger at the end shows that Sara has broken free, but that's cool because next week, John Constantine returns to television. I cannot wait!
The Island of Dr. Moreau ~ In prepping to watch Lost Soul, the documentary about writer/director Richard Stanley's aborted attempt to make this very film - I sought out and watched the 1996 version of The Island of Dr. Moreau for the first time. I must confess that I have not read the H.G. Wells novel it's based on, one of more than a few holes in my Wells reading, but I have seen the 1977 version, and I know the basic story.
First, this is a period piece that has been updated to modern times, introducing the idea of genetics into simpler concepts of Wells' beast men. Sometimes change is not good. Other than the idea of genetics this updating does little for the story. I was disappointed in the make-up, primitive even for 1996, face masks not much better than the 1977 movie.
With the inclusion of Marlon Brando as the titular role of Dr. Moreau, comparisons can't help but be made with Apocalypse Now, in both character and story. In fact, these similarities drove a wedge between once friends H.G. Wells and Joseph Conrad, who wrote Heart of Darkness, on which Apocalypse is based. The presence of Brando, as well as his performance, do not help that situation one bit.
I was also very disappointed in the cast, Val Kilmer and Fairuza Balk simply walk through the film. David Thewlis, so wonderful as Remus in the Harry Potter movies, has no charisma as our POV character, and the great Marlon Brando is... is... I don't know what the hell Brando is in this movie. I never realized until seeing this how dead-on the "South Park" parody of Dr. Mephesto was. Wow.
I was also surprised that I saw nothing special or spectacular here visually. I usually enjoy John Frankenheimer's work, in fact, I think this is the only one of his movies I did not love. Now I can't wait to watch Lost Soul, to see what may or may not have gone wrong. Because this, is so wrong.
Paul Blart Mall Cop 2 ~ The film seems to take the first few minutes to completely undo the happy endings of its predecessor, almost as if it didn't want to think about it, or acknowledge it, or possibly the flick was written without knowledge of the first movie. This struck me as a bit odd as both were written by star Kevin James and frequent collaborator Nick Bakay. It's okay however, as this is a whole new adventure for Paul Blart.
Despite its juvenile comedy reputation, I was quite fond of the first Paul Blart Mall Cop movie, with its cunningly subtle remaking of Die Hard. In this installment, six years after the original, Kevin James' Blart has been invited to a security officers convention in Las Vegas. He thinks he'll be a star because of his actions in the first movie, but that was a long time ago. He's joined by a cadre of oddballs in his field, including his former "King of Queens" cohort Gary Valentine with a very disturbing hairpiece.
Besides dealing with his daughter trying to leave the nest, a less than exciting B plot, there is also something funny going on at the Wynn Hotel (getting lots of free publicity), as a gang of art thieves are planning a major heist. Yeah, hilarity ensues, and only Paul Blart Mall Cop and his new comrades can save the day. Kevin James is adequate, Valentine steals all the scenes he's in, but Ana Gasteyer and Loni Love are criminally underused here.
I did have a hearty laugh a few times at Blart's comic book superhero kryptonite weakness of hypoglycemia. And I loved the Mini-Kiss cameo. Beyond that however, this was still a decently amusing passage of time. The heist scenes are top notch. Good for the kids.
Don't forget to check out my interview with the director of this flick, Andy Fickman, here at Biff Bam Pop!, and be sure to see his new movie, The Scout's Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse.
