HOUND receives 8 Planet Connections Theater Festival Nominations!

HOUND, written by John Patrick Bray and directed by Rachel Klein (GO-GO KILLERS!, SOMETHING WEIRD IN THE RED ROOM...) recently finished its run with rave reviews and outstanding notices. Now, it has received eight nominations from the committee at the Planet Connections Theater Festival, including Best Director Rachel Klein, best Costumes/Makeup by Rachel and Anita Rundles (who also collaborated on GO-GO KILLERS! and SOMETHING WEIRD), and best Sound Design by yours truly, Sean Gill.

The awards ceremony takes place on August 2nd in NYC at the Triad. More details can be obtained here.

Film Review: FROM A WHISPER TO A SCREAM (1987, Jeff Burr)

AKA: THE OFFSPRING.
Stars: 3.5 of 5.
Running Time: 99 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Clu Gulager, Miriam Byrd-Nethery, Vincent Price, Terry Kiser, Lawrence Tierney (SILVER BULLET, RESERVOIR DOGS), Susan Tyrrell (BIG-TOP PEE-WEE, TAPEHEADS).
Tag-lines: "Fear......Times Four."
Best one-liner: "One thing I've learned, my dear, is that one is never too old for nightmares. "

"Welcome... to... Oldfield...eckk..." Wow. All is not right in the little hamlet of Oldfield, Tennessee, and what should clue you in is that its denizens include the legendary Vincent Price, a couple of members of the Gulager clan, Lawrence Tierney, and Terry Kiser (Bernie from WEEKEND AT BERNIE'S). But this film, from STEPFATHER II director and Gulager family friend Jeff Burr, is closer in character to an anthology of depressing O. Henry stories than TALES FROM THE CRYPT. And my nearly four-star rating is probably a bit misleading since it garners some extra stars from Clu and Vincent, and they're hardly in it. But I'm gonna go ahead and focus on the parts of the film they are in, cause, by gum, they're the best parts. Vincent functions here as Debbie Harry from TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE, if you will. He's just there for the frame story, which is kinda weak, and he's pretty decrepit, but goddammit, he's still VINCENT, and he's always amazing.


So let's get on to the meat of things, the segment which showcases the demented Gulagers, Clu and his wife Miriam Byrd-Nethery.

Their performances as elderly siblings are heartbreaking, and dripping with pathos: Clu the sad old man who pines for a young woman so much that he kills her and rapes the corpse, and Miriam the sad old woman who is in love with and demands to be frequently bathed by her brother. Instead of being delightfully demented or totally twisted, this piece is agonizing, somber, and it makes you feel kind of dirty.

It's art, to be sure, but damned if I could watch it again. And the Gulagers are so 'effin good that you empathize with each one to an absurd degree.

By the time Clu offs his sister, and the demon baby from the necrophilia session returns with a bone to pick, the rest of the movie doesn't matter.

This is all you need to know: the Gulagers are brilliant, and Price is still a legend. RIP Vincent and Miriam. Clu continues to appear with family members in totally whacked out films (most recently, the FEAST series).

-Sean Gill

Film Review: ROADGAMES (1981, Richard Franklin)

Stars: 4 of 5.
Running Time: 101 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Stacy Keach and Jamie Lee Curtis (both John Carpenter favorites, with the former in BODY BAGS and ESCAPE FROM L.A. and the latter in HALLOWEEN and THE FOG).
Tag-lines: "The truck driver plays games... The hitchhiker plays games. And the killer is playing the deadliest game of all!"
Best one-liner: "Hors d'ouevre, Boswell?"

A lot of people like to blather on about how Brian de Palma is the most noteworthy Hitchcock disciple, but I gotta say that the Aussie Richard Franklin (PSYCHO II, CLOAK & DAGGER) seriously deserves his due. I find myself increasingly impressed by his engaging stories (which exquisitely blur the line between paranoid fantasy and reality), his obsessive attention to aesthetic and aural detail, and his ability to duplicate that elusive Hitchcock atmosphere with such confidence that he doesn't need to pour in gratuitous heapings of sex and violence to mask his own insecurities (like de Palma).

But on to ROADGAMES: Stacy Keach is brilliant as our jocular, overeducated truck driver, or, I should say, a man who at the moment happens to drive a truck. He lives only to share his internal monologue with his dingo, Boswell, and to dazzle the unsuspecting hitchhiker with his encyclopedic knowledge of Bronte and Pope, his rapier wit, his stylish innuendo.

He is a man with boundless imagination, capable of transforming his cab into Madame Geoffrin's salon, his harmonica noodlings into 'Eine kleine Nachtmusik,' and a fellow traveler into Jack the Ripper- or maybe he's not imagining things at all...

Teaming up with hitchhiking runaway heiress Jamie Lee Curtis, Keach becomes an amateur sleuth par excellence- he just needs some sleep, or perhaps a few more pills, to avoid the frame and unravel the enigma.

Franklin tautly and gleefully imparts his tale with little slices of pure cinema: the killer lurks behind a victim as she tunes a guitar- the pitch rising with each step- this diegetic sound cleverly replacing what could have involved a cliched musical score.


A 360-degree pan in a roadhouse (as Keach tries to call the cops) is a mini-master's course in filmmaking- a natural rhythm is established by the inviting noises of a pinball machine, the reactions of the patrons are gradual and believable, and a macabre mural is revealed at the perfect moment. Bravo! I know Hitch would be proud. Four stars.

-Sean Gill

Film Review: MR. MAJESTYK (1974, Richard Fleischer)

Stars: 4 of 5.
Running Time: 103 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Charles Bronson, Al Lettieri, Paul Koslo (LOVE AND BULLETS), Lee Purcell (THE GAMBLER, BIG WEDNESDAY), written by Elmore Leonard.
Tag-lines: "He didn't want to be hero... until the day they pushed him too far."
Best one-liner: "You make sounds like you're a mean little ass-kicker... only I ain't convinced. You keep talking and I'm gonna take your head off. " (said by Bronson)

A. Knuckleheads mess with Bronson:


B. Knuckleheads get what they deserve:


Simple, right? Well, not always. MR. MAJESTYK was made in an era when action films weren't afraid to be socially relevant: films like COFFY, PRIME CUT, and CHARLEY VARRICK; films that hit hard and were well made. [And MAJESTYK's influence has reverberated from Soderbergh's THE LIMEY (the one-man assault on a luxury home finale) to QT's DEATH PROOF (Bronson hangs on to the bed of a pick-up truck in a thrilling chase punctuated by 'horror film’ reveals).] The grittiness was inherent, not a CGI filter added in post. The stars' bodies were chiseled by backbreaking work and war injuries, not by elliptical machines and the Master Cleanse diet.

As Vince Majestyk, Bronson strides into this film with a brown cloth flat cap and a jeans jacket caring about one thing, and one thing only: getting his watermelon crop in on time. "Oh-ho-ho snarf snarf he's a MELON FARMER." Well, before you say anything else, you child, have you ever hoisted a SINGLE watermelon into a truck in 100 degree heat, much less 1,000 of them?

Majestyk doesn't give a shit about the status quo.

He pisses off cops, the mob, and rednecks alike (including a swarthily intense Al Lettieri - Sollozzo in THE GODFATHER-

and the simpering Paul Koslo, the over-the-top villain from ROBOT JOX). He gives smartass winks, he headbutts through a windshield to escape a car, and he lies in wait like a real pro.

When offered a bribe, he calmly retorts, "I've been to L.A., and I've been to Mexico. And I've been laid." He stands up for the rights of migrants who are denied use of a bathroom, pays a fair wage to non-whites (angering the good ole boys), and it's a powerful moment when he realizes that the slew of injustices perpetrated against him are just par for the course for his Hispanic friends. And in an age where Chipotle is still senselessly abusing tomato pickers in Florida, a document like MAJESTYK is still a blast to watch, but goddammit, it's important. Four stars.

-Sean Gill

Film Review: TWINS (1988, Ivan Reitman)

Stars: 3.5 of 5.
Running Time: 105 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Danny DeVito, Heather Graham, Kelly Preston, Chloe Webb, Maury Chaykin (THE ADJUSTER), Frances Bay, David Caruso, Bonnie Bartlett, Peter Dvorsky. Music by Georges Delerue and Randy Edelman.
Tag-lines: "Only their mother can tell them apart. "
Best one-liner: "The pavement was his enemy."

When TWINS debuted in 1988, nearly 3,000 years of comedy- from Aristophanes to Dorothy Parker- culminated with Arnold sniffing a microwave dinner and exclaiming, "YUHMMY!" And somehow, I'm kind of okay with that. TWINS is a film about eugenics. It's a film about 'nature vs. nuture.' It's a film about Arnold wearing a bath towel and singing "Yakety-yak, don't talk back!" with reckless abandon. Here's 6 reasons why TWINS is better than your average fish out of water yarn:


#1. Gotta love that the entire movie is built around one joke (How could Arnie and Danny DeVito be TWINS?!), but somehow it's a tenable joke, and between Arnie's rubbery mug and DeVito's gleeful desperation, well...here we are.


#2. An eclectic, talented supporting cast. It includes Chloe Webb (SID & NANCY), David Caruso, Peter Dvorsky (Harlan in VIDEODROME), Frances Bay (David Lynch's favorite little old lady), and Heather Graham.

#3. References to other Arnie movies- even ones that hadn't been made yet! ("Coookies!"- JINGLE ALL THE WAY, "I'll be back!"- THE TERMINATOR, "Mr. Ice!"- BATMAN & ROBIN, etc.)


#4. The latest salvo in the Schwarzenegger vs. Stallone rivalry: Arnie looks at a poster for RAMBO III, squeezes his own bicep in wonderment, shrugs off- Pshaw!- and playfully scoffs. It's even a greater slap in Stallone's face because it reminds us all that Sly never could quite nail intentional comedy (RHINESTONE, OSCAR).


#5. "You have no respect for loh-gic! And I have no respect for those who have no respect for lohgic!"

#6. Musical score by Georges Delerue and Randy Edelman. Georges did JULES AND JIM, CONTEMPT, and HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR. Randy did XXX, DROP DEAD FRED, and OSMOSIS JONES. I wonder who did the tranquil, reflective strings versus who did the zany honkeytonk piano with 80's reverb-heavy bass riffs?

Annnyway, if you're in the mood for double-takes, spit-takes, and other screwy antics, give TWINS a spin.

If you're not, may I recommend David Cronenberg's 1988 less-than-zany twin flick, DEAD RINGERS.

-Sean Gill

Film Review: PATTY HEARST (1988, Paul Schrader)

Stars: 4.5 of 5.
Running Time: 108 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Natasha Richardson, William Forsythe, Ving Rhames, Dana Delany (LIGHT SLEEPER, TOMBSTONE), Frances Fisher (UNFORGIVEN, WAITING FOR GUFFMAN), Jodi Long (THE EXORCIST III, ROBOCOP 3).
Tag-lines: "Heiress... kidnap victim... turned urban terrorist... bank robber ."
Best one-liner: "It's just like pigs to glorify a mouse."

Yet another extraordinary biopic from writer/director Paul Schrader, whose biographical output includes MISHIMA, AUTO FOCUS, the screenplay for RAGING BULL, and, to some extent, his screenplays for THE LAST TEMPTATION OF CHRIST and BRINGING OUT THE DEAD. Schrader's biopics stand alone, in my mind, as he not only epically and completely immerses you into his subject's lives, but also into their very minds. And despite this complete immersion, he also manages to involve you in HIS mind, HIS thought processes. His narratives unfold with at once the simple asceticism of Bresson and the slam-pop-bang mise-en-scene of Scorsese. Yet there's a sense of claustrophobia to all of this as well; almost an imprisonment, and indeed, almost all of Schrader's films end with a psychological or literal incarceration- and PATTY HEARST is no exception.

Her first confinement is brilliantly illustrated- you can almost feel the heat of the sun baking down on the California rathole that is Symbionese Liberaton Army headquarters, even as we, like Patty, are cramped, constricted, and entrenched in darkness.

Her eventual coercion, collaboration, and arrest are just natural steps along the path wrought by her initial trauma, seemingly par for the tragic course. Natasha Richardson (RIP) is terrific as Patty; she is our gateway into the film, and indeed into the mind of Patricia Hearst herself.

Bill Forsythe showcases his abilities as a powerful chameleon, as at ease here as a self-loathing white revolutionary as he is as the nerdy buddy in CLOAK AND DAGGER or as the government flunky in THE ROCK. He's one of Americas greatest underrated working actors. Ving Rhames, as always, is robust and frequently terrifying as the commanding leader of the SLA- until, that is, you realize there's no wind in his sails- only the rotely memorized cliches of revolutionaries past. A top-notch examination of one of Americas most notorious pariahs, and a criminally unavailable American classic.

-Sean Gill

Film Review: SURVIVAL QUEST (1989, Don Coscarelli)

Stars: 4 of 5.
Running Time: 96 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Director Don Coscarelli (PHANTASM series, THE BEASTMASTER, BUBBA HO-TEP), Lance Henriksen (APPALOOSA, ALIENS, HOUSE III), Catherine Keener (BEING JOHN MALKOVICH), Dermot Mulroney (YOUNG GUNS, ZODIAC), Ben Hammer (JOHNNY GOT HIS GUN, MANNEQUIN), Reggie Bannister cameo (Reggie in the PHANTASM series), Steve Antin (Troy Perkins in THE GOONIES).
Tag-lines: "In the wilderness you can't dial 911 ."
Best one-liner: "Take a good look around you. Because when you come back from this trip, nothing will look the same to you again."

"Survival in the wilderness is a matter of heart, not hardware. You're not that far gone, are you? There's a lot more going on out here than meets the eye." Don Coscarelli's SURVIVAL QUEST embarks on a most difficult task: making a movie about survivalism, orienteering, and teamwork, without making it seem like a lameass weekend at camp Y-NOAH. And he avoids these pitfalls due to two important elements:
1. Inserting action movie narrative devices. Coscarelli decides that the elements of nature are not enough of a villain, so he inserts a paramilitary training cadre to terrorize and provide contrast to the yuppies turned hippies on their survival quest.
2. Lance Henriksen.

As the nature-loving hippy leader, this is a side of Lance that I, for one, had never before really seen. And I like it. He exudes a calming peacefulness through his very pores and is this film's center, his presence lifting it from possibly mediocre to very well done. And one monologue about his childhood especially rings true: Lance's real-life story is particularly fascinating. It includes a troubled childhood without much parental guidance, several vagrancy charges, and illiteracy until the age of 30, all of which he was able to overcome, and, from my understanding, his real-life personality is closest to his character in SURVIVAL QUEST.

Now, this is not to say that this is a perfect film: many of the characters are rather two-dimensional (but it helps to have them portrayed by talented actors such as Catherine Keener, Dermot Mulroney, and Ben Hammer), and the film sometimes bleeds into triteness (i.e., trust falls). But anyone who has been on a similar quest cannot deny the incredible experience and the lifelong bonding that issues forth from just a few days in the wild. And as much as I adore the PHANTASM series, I'd like to see Coscarelli tackle some material similar to this in the future. Four stars.

-Sean Gill

Film Review: STROKER ACE (1983, Hal Needham)

Stars: 1 of 5.
Running Time: 96 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Director Hal Needham (HOOPER, RAD, CANNONBALL RUN), Burt Reynolds, Loni Anderson, Jim Nabors (Gomer Pyle), Ned Beatty,
Tag-lines: "BURT'S BACK... With car crashin' & party crashin' as the hassled hunk who drives his car upside down & his women round the bend!"
Best one-liner: "What's a scrotum?"

Alright folks, I was disappointed. 'Well, what did you expect?,' some might say. Well, let's take a look at the poster, shall we? Probably the most blatant depiction of 'goosing' ever depicted in promotional material. Burt: giggling away and goin' to town. Loni: shocked and appalled, but with the underlying knowledge that this is par for the course in a relationship with Burt.

It says so little and yet so much. It sparks the imagination. Can you imagine a GONE WITH THE WIND poster where Clark Cable is behind Vivien Leigh, goosing away? Perhaps I digress. But, regardless, NOWHERE in this movie––a film called 'STROKER Ace'––is there any goosing. The audience isn't asking for much––just a little- SCHWINK––followed by Burt chewing his gum and giggling. Is that so wrong? So deviant? No more deviant, I would argue, than this ill-advised mélange of celebrity hucksterism that Burt chose to do instead of TERMS OF ENDEARMENT.

There's a lot wrong here. First, there's Jim Nabors where Dom DeLuise ought to be. There's overuse of 'wuh WUHHHH' horn sections and underuse of Bubba Smith. There's terrible stock footage, "What's a scrotum?" is a one-liner, and some near-necrophilia is played for laffs with the line "This would be so much more fun if you were here!" Burt pulls off zany pranks like submerging a man in cement and flinging a rival through a plate glass window. It's frequently unclear if Loni Anderson realizes that she's in a film, or if she just thought it was 'one of those weird days where Burt calls me by another name and there's a camera crew around.' There's the consummate '40 person bar fight' and Burt gets to punch out the D-bag at the end and smile. (See also: HOOPER.)

Note the 'Okay' sign.

All of this is followed by the worst blooper reel in Burt's career (though it does reveal that when Dom is not around to smack in the face, Burt smacks HIMSELF in the face).

One star. And that's kinda generous.

Lesson: Ya don’t substitute a good goose with bad chicken?