FILM FRENZY

Joseph Quinn and Lupita Nyong’o in A Quiet Place: Day One (Photo: Paramount)

By Matt Brunson

(For a review of the new Blu-ray release of both 1980’s Caligula and 2023’s Caligula: The Ultimate Cut, go here.)

(View From The Couch is a weekly column that reviews what’s new on Blu-ray, 4K and DVD. Ratings are on a four-star scale.)

CLOCKWATCHERS (1998). Write what you know. And so off went sisters Jill and Karen Sprecher to pen a script that drew on their time as office temps. The result is a movie of curdled wit and bilious temperament, the sort of exposed-nerve endeavor that simply cannot be faked. Set at the fictional conglomerate Global Credit, it follows a quartet of temp workers who are humiliated and demoralized on a daily basis. Iris (Toni Collette) is the mousy newcomer, immediately accepted by her more seasoned co-workers: Margaret (Parker Posey), whose exuberance can’t mask her self-destructive tendencies; Paula (Lisa Kudrow), whose lofty ideas regarding career and romance never come to fruition; and Jane (Alanna Ubach), a posh sort biding her time until her upcoming wedding to an apparent louse. Their 9-to-5 routines are marathon bouts of boredom, with the monotony punctuated by encounters with bosses who don’t know their names, an office-supply drone loathe to hand out even one pencil or staple, and a monstrous HR matron whose pleasant tone drips with cruelty and condescension. The four remain tight until someone embarks on a crime spree by lifting petty items around the office — the corporate caste system decrees that the culprit must be one of these temps, the lowliest of the low, and their union begins to fray. It’s all very funny, and it’s all very sad. Posey provides plenty of off-kilter energy, but Collette is no less impressive in a more internalized turn.

There are no Blu-ray extras.

Movie: ★★★

CONFLICT (1945). Humphrey Bogart headlines this noirish murder-mystery as Richard Mason, an architect unhappily married to Kathryn (Rose Hobart) but in love with her younger sister Evelyn (Alexis Smith). Convinced that Evelyn would reciprocate his feelings if Kathryn wasn’t around, he decides to murder his wife. His plan seems to have succeeded until he begins seeing evidence that Kathryn is very much alive — are his feelings of guilt starting to manifest themselves in ways designed to strain his sanity, or did his spouse somehow survive and now stalks him? Hardly one of Bogie’s best — a status even more pronounced since it arrived one year after To Have and Have Not and one year before The Big Sleep — Conflict is rarely believable but nevertheless maintains interest throughout. The pop psychology injected into the story, with Sydney Greenstreet coming in handy as the Masons’ psychologist friend, is never very convincing, but the movie does satisfy in the manner of an Ellery Queen (or Encyclopedia Brown) mystery: The clue that cracks the case is carefully placed within one scene so that armchair gumshoes can play along.

Blu-ray extras consist of the Oscar-nominated 1945 cartoon Life With Feathers, starring Sylvester; the 1945 Porky Pig cartoon Trap Happy Porky; the 1945 live-action short Are Animals Actors?; the 1946 live-action short Peeks at Hollywood, with an appearance by Errol Flynn; the 1945 radio broadcast of Conflict, also starring Bogart; and the theatrical trailer.

Movie: ★★½

JOURNEY INTO FEAR (1943). Tobe Hooper may have been credited as director on 1982’s Poltergeist, but the influence of story creator, co-scripter, and producer Steven Spielberg was so overwhelming that everyone has always assumed he directed the picture himself. A similar scenario happened far earlier with Journey Into Fear: Norman Foster is tagged as director, but with Orson Welles on board as co-scripter, co-star, and producer, and with the cast largely made up of his Mercury Theatre troupe … well, you figure it out. As usual, the studio suits ultimately kept Welles at bay and cut the film themselves, but the result is still a robust watch, with Welles regular Joseph Cotten not only handling leading-man duties but also earning his only scripting credit (he and Welles adapted Eric Ambler’s novel). Cotten is Howard Graham, an American munitions engineer who survives an assassination attempt while passing through Turkey with his wife Stephanie (Ruth Warrick). Howard learns from Haki (Welles), the head of the Turkish police, that his would-be killers are Gestapo agents — seeking to thwart them, Haki stashes the Yankee on a ramshackle freighter, a plan that goes spectacularly wrong. Cotten’s Everyman status is perfect for his part as an ordinary guy confronted with impossible situations, and select sequences, like the itchy opening and the exciting climax, feel like prime Welles (sorry, Norman Foster).

Blu-ray extras consist of the first three broadcasts of the 1938 radio series The Mercury Theatre on the Air, starring Welles in the leading roles: Dracula, Treasure Island, and A Tale of Two Cities.

Movie: ★★★

KILLERS (1996) / THE CONVENT (2000). Two early titles from cult horror helmer Mike Mendez are being offered in new editions from Synapse Films.

Killers, Mendez’s debut as writer and director, opens with brothers Odessa and Kyle James (Dave Larsen and David Gunn) murdering their parents to the musical melody of “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida.” It’s probably the most competent sequence in the film, and yet it’s still 20,000 leagues under the scene in Michael Mann’s Manhunter that uses the Iron Butterfly song to brilliant effect. The rest of the movie is absolutely awful — I won’t get so hysterical as to borrow Rex Reed’s famous dig for Blue Velvet (see From Screen To Stream below), but this made for one miserable viewing experience. As the James brothers escape from prison and take hostage a family whose members turn out to be even crazier, it’s obvious that one of the primary themes is this nation’s irrational obsession with criminals — you know, that theme that had been milked dry only two years prior by Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers. The film expands — and somehow gets worse — with a misshapen mutant who needs a friend, zombies in the basement, a discussion of kids’ movies, and dialogue like (from the oldest daughter) “You’re a shitty fuck, Kyle. Daddy’s much better.” Larsen (who also co-scripted) and Gunn are passable as the James bros — mainly mugging and posturing — but the turns by C.T. Miller (as Dad), Damian Hoffer (as Mom), and Nanette Bianchi (as oldest daughter) are nails-on-the-chalkboard levels of terrible.

Unlike Killers, The Convent is at least watchable, but quality control still remains in seriously short supply. Playing like a grade-Z version of such grade-C ‘80s horror romps like Night of the Demons and Ghoulies, this finds a group of college kids heading to an abandoned convent for an evening of pranks and sex. As luck would have it, that’s the night that a group of imbecilic Satanists manage to unleash the demons that have long resided on the property. It’s up to a tough lady (Adrienne Barbeau) who vanquished the demons 40 years earlier to return to the venue and kick some otherworldly ass. Barbeau provides some late lift to the proceedings, and some of the effects are bizarre enough to stand out, but this is pretty derivative stuff, barely punched across by a lackluster cast (including rap star Coolio as the least likely policeman ever). It figures that the most interesting character is the first to go, and anyone who doesn’t predict the final gotcha clearly hasn’t seen enough horror films — perhaps a blessing when it comes to junk like this.

Blu-ray extras on the unrated director’s cut of Killers consist of audio commentary by Mendez; an alternate ending; and the original trailers. Extras on the unrated 4K + Blu-ray edition of The Convent include cast and crew commentary; a vintage making-of featurette; a deleted scene; and gore outtakes.

Killers: ★

The Convent: ★½

MOBY DICK (1956). Director John Huston and screenwriter Ray Bradbury teamed up (and feuded aplenty) to wrestle Herman Melville’s literary classic Moby-Dick to the screen, with results both fascinating and flawed. Gregory Peck stars as the imposing Captain Ahab, determined to destroy the titular white whale no matter the toll on his own sanity; along for the voyage (and serving as narrator) is Ishmael (Richard Basehart), who watches the saga unfold with careful attention. Despite its relative box office success, the soaring production costs kept it from making much of a profit. And while its critical standing has been elevated over time, it met with a mixed reception in its day, with many harping that Peck was simply too young to play the role of Ahab. Peck is fine (although, yes, a wee bit too young) — truthfully, the only weak performance comes from Leo Genn as second-in-command Starbuck, with the best work courtesy of Austrian actor Friedrich von Ledebur as the friendly cannibal Queequeg. For all the naysaying, Huston did manage to snag Best Director honors from both the New York Film Critics Circle and the National Board of Review. Incidentally, Orson Welles appears in a small role as Father Mapple; decades later, Peck would nab an Emmy nomination and a Golden Globe award for playing the part in a 1998 miniseries starring Patrick Stewart as Ahab. Amusingly, Moby Dick was re-released theatrically in the post-Jaws ’70s with the tagline, “Before The Shark, There Was The Whale.”

There are no Blu-ray extras.

Movie: ★★★

A QUIET PLACE: DAY ONE (2024). While this Quiet Place may be Day One, it’s also Movie Three — and not the tale many expected. The 2018 hit A Quiet Place and its successful 2021 sequel A Quiet Place Part II both centered on the Abbott family and its efforts to survive in a world now dominated by nasty extra-terrestrials with the ability to locate their prey via sound. Part II ended in a manner that had me pumped for a thrilling wrap-up to what I assumed would be a trilogy — instead, we get a prequel that has nothing to do with the Abbotts (however, series creator John Krasinski stated that there most likely will be one more film to conclude the Abbott saga). A pivot such as this would normally be annoying — could we not have imagined, without actually seeing it, how the alien invasion looked from Ground Zero on Day One? Clearly, this movie stood a chance of feeling completely pointless (besides, we had glimpses of the invasion in the Part II prologue). But writer-director Michael Sarnoski, working from an idea he concocted with Krasinski, pulls it off by giving us two protagonists absolutely worth our empathy and investment (three if you include Frodo, the most chill cat in a stressful situation since Jones watched Harry Dean Stanton get eviscerated aboard the Nostromo). Lupita Nyong’o is excellent as Sam, a terminally ill cancer patient whose own condition has her viewing circumstances from a unique perspective, and she’s ably supported by Joseph Quinn as Eric, a British law student who ends up rising to whatever challenges are placed in his path. Switching the setting from a rural to urban landscape also allows for some variety in the hide-and-stalk scenarios.

Extras on the 4K + Blu-ray + Digital Code Steelbook edition include a making-of featurette and deleted scenes.

Movie: ★★★

REDNECK MILLER (1976). Here’s a drive-in programmer that was forgotten by everyone on the planet except Quentin Tarantino, who of course owns a print and showed it to an appreciative Alamo Drafthouse crowd back in 2007. As the box copy reads, “This regional U.S. feature film has never had a formal home video release or been screened outside the U.S.” On the local front, this was largely filmed in Charlotte, with sites including Reflection Sound Studios (where many major acts like R.E.M., James Brown, and the Dixie Chicks recorded before it closed its doors in 2014) and Country Underground (which transformed into The Cellar in the 1980s). I’m not gonna say the film reflects well on the city, but hey, I’ll still take it over Days of Thunder any day of the week. Geoffrey Land stars as Miller, a disc jockey who loves the ladies but loves his motorcycle even more. When it’s used without his knowledge in the theft of a drug shipment, he finds himself butting heads with a bumbling crime boss known as Supermac (Lou Walker). Like genuine moonshine, Redneck Miller is 120 proof hicksploitation, although the filmmakers make some clumsy attempts at adding some blaxploitation as well. It’s all rather amateurish, which I suppose was largely the point when it came to the Southern fried circuit.

Blu-ray extras consist of film historian audio commentary and a new trailer. A booklet is also included.

Movie: ★½

WIND RIVER (2017). After penning the excellent scripts for 2015’s Sicario and 2016’s Hell or High Water (earning an Oscar nomination for the latter), Yellowstone co-creator Taylor Sheridan went 3-for-3 with this dense and disturbing drama. While Sicario and Hell or High Water were directed by others (respectively, Denis Villeneuve and David Mackenzie), Sheridan opted to tackle this one himself — he proved himself a natural, with his ability to manufacture and maintain an unsettling aura of dread working perfectly in tandem with his sober-minded script. In snowstorm-battered Wyoming, on the edge of the Wind River Indian Reservation, the corpse of a young Native American woman is discovered by Fish and Wildlife Service hunter Cory Lambert (Jeremy Renner). Clearly a victim of foul play, her death leads to the arrival of Jane Banner (Elizabeth Olsen), a greenhorn FBI agent who ends up working closely with both Cory and the local sheriff (Graham Greene). What on the surface can pass as a standard murder-mystery instead becomes a remarkably complex exploration of various malaises, including the agony of familial loss, the systematic disenfranchisement of Native Americans, and the ever-present evil of toxic masculinity. Wind River’s storyline can be ugly and uncomfortable, but its perspective is clear-eyed, compassionate, and even a bit cathartic.

Blu-ray extras include deleted scenes — one worthy enough to have remained in the finished film (a conversation between Jane and an unpleasant motel owner played by Tara Karsian) — and a behind-the-scenes video gallery.

Movie: ★★★½

FROM SCREEN TO STREAM

BLUE VELVET (1986). At the end of the 1980s, American Film magazine polled 54 critics to determine the best movies of the decade. Placing third, just under Raging Bull and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and just above Hannah and Her Sisters, Atlantic City, and Raiders of the Lost Ark, was David Lynch’s Blue Velvet, which went unnoticed by the masses (it grossed a mere $8 million) but was certainly on the radar of critics, cultists, and Lynch’s fellow filmmakers. Woody Allen declared it the best movie of 1986, critics’ groups honored it with various awards (mainly for Lynch and supporting actor Dennis Hopper), and even the timid Academy nominated Lynch for Best Director (Hopper was nominated that year for his less threatening turn in Hoosiers). Still, not everyone was enamored: Roger Ebert famously gave the movie one star while Leonard Maltin managed to give it two, although my favorite blurb came from Rex Reed, who fumed, “It should score high with the kind of sickos who like to smell dirty socks and pull the wings off butterflies, but there’s nothing here for sane audiences.” Decades later, the film continues to stir healthy debate, often within the same individual. I’ve seen the picture at least six times since its debut, and unlike most great movies, this one loses some of its power with each subsequent viewing. Scenes that were once shocking now seem silly (most involving Hopper’s turn as the deranged Frank Booth, who says “Fuck” about as often as the rest of us blink), while much of the story doesn’t even make sense. But Kyle MacLachlan is still appealing as the clean-cut youth whose discovery of a severed ear exposes the seedy underbelly of picket-fence America, the symbolic gestures (love those bugs!) still resonate, and Lynch’s directorial choices retain their demented edge.

Movie: ★★★

HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH (1982). While 1981’s Halloween II picked up immediately where the 1978 original left off, this third franchise flick is a different beast altogether. After Halloween II, writer-director John Carpenter and company decided to make a series of Halloween films that each told a different story, none involving masked maniac Michael Myers. Unfortunately, Halloween III: Season of the Witch was such a commercial and critical bust that the idea was scrapped and Myers returned for the next installment (called, logically enough, Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers); we’ve been stuck with damn sequels, spin-offs, and rip-offs ever since. Too bad, since Halloween III, while not a complete success, at least offers something different from the norm. The fanciful story was conceived by renowned British writer Nigel Kneale, who was so offended by the violence and gore director Tommy Lee Wallace added to his script that he had his name removed from the project. The plot concerns the efforts of a toy manufacturer (Dan O’Herlihy) to use his company’s best-selling Halloween masks in a diabolical scheme that would wipe out scores of children across the country on All Hallows’ Eve. As the two people who stumble across his plan, Tom Atkins and Stacey Nelkin make for dull, one-dimensional heroes, but some of the set-pieces — the opening chase, the Kupfer family’s mishap, and more — deliver the goods. And if you do see this, just try to get that Silver Shamrock commercial jingle out of your head.

Movie: ★★½

ISLAND OF LOST SOULS (1932). It’s safe to say that the British Board of Film Censors was a rather squeamish lot during the first half of the 20th century, considering that its members banned outright five films that dealt with misshapen people and/or scientists conducting gruesome experiments on human flesh. The infamous five consisted of 1914’s Dr. Zanikoff’s Experiences in Grafting (a film so obscure that it’s not even listed on the all-inclusive IMDb!), 1932’s Freaks, 1935’s Life Returns, 1946’s Bedlam, and this adaptation of H.G. Wells’ classic novel The Island of Dr. Moreau. It took 25 years — yes, a full quarter-century — before the Board lifted its ban, a long time to have to wait to see a film as good as this one. Charles Laughton, whose next film (The Private Life of Henry VIII) would earn him a Best Actor Oscar, is pure purring menace as Dr. Moreau, who employs vivisection in order to turn various animals into humans in his aptly named “House of Pain.” The resulting mutations shuffle around his island lair, repeating the points of the Law (“Are we not men?”) and trying to steer clear of the doctor’s whip. After a shipwreck survivor (Richard Arlen) ends up on the island, Moreau decides to breed him with his most successful creation, the alluring panther woman Lota (Kathleen Burke). Prolific makeup artist Wally Westmore created the excellent “manimal” designs, and that’s Bela Lugosi buried under all that facial hair as the Sayer of the Law. This was remade twice under the title The Island of Dr. Moreau: The 1977 version, starring Burt Lancaster and Michael York, is worthwhile; the 1996 version, starring Marlon Brando and Val Kilmer, is not.

Movie: ★★★½