The Tingler

If you know me, then you probably know that I'm a big William Castle fan.  And, if you've never seen a William Castle movie, there's no better place to start than with The Tingler!

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The Tingler might have one of the flimsiest plots of all time.  From the idea that something appears on your spine when your frightened, to the idea that a man, who's wife just died is hauling her body around town and no one even thinks twice about it, this movie is just plain weird.  But that's also what makes it charming!  There's a fun about The Tingler, or any William Castle movie really, that captures a moment in American film history.  The place in time between the Universal monsters and the 'realistic' monsters like Leatherface or Jason.  

While it won't make you frightened or even tense, The Tingler will entertain you completely!  I'm giving The Tingler 4 out of 4 cigars, it's one of the best William Castle movies and it's just plain fun.  Check it out ASAP!

I Spit On Your Grave 2

If you know anything about me, then you probably know that I'm a big fan of the 'dare' movie.  Any movie that basically dares you to make it to the end, whether it's so terribly bad or so terribly disturbing, it's a dare that I'm almost always up for.  So, when I saw that the remade I Spit On Your Grave had a sequel, I knew that I had to check it out!

The premise here is basically the same as the original, a naive young girl falls into the sights of very bad men and then....let's just say very, very bad things happen!  This sequel is set in New York City, so I was interested in how exactly it might play out, but this movie takes a weird turn and winds up in Bulgaria!!!!  So, it's sort of a cross between I Spit On Your Grave and Hostel.  Other than the setting change, this is exactly what you'd expect.  Young girl is assaulted and abused, young girl is left for dead, young girl nurses herself back to health, young girl rains hell down upon the people who did this to her!

If you love revenge movies, you might like this...if you can manage to get through the first half of the movie, which is the 'dare' portion of our  film!  If you don't know what the 'dare' might be, then I'd just avoid this...and, as I've advised friends in the past.  NEVER watch this movie around or near women, this is a movie that will make you uncomfortable sitting alone in your living room, let alone with someone of the opposite sex watching with you.

I'm giving I Spit On Your Grave 2 3 out of 4 cigars, if you're in the mood for being uncomfortable and then cheering on some much deserved vengeance, then you'll love it.  If you just want another slasher movie, then don't get this movie, it might be too intense for you!

The Bad Seed

One of my all time favorite horror movies, isn't really a horror movie at all.  Originally a stage play, The Bad Seed might be the original serial killer movie.

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Rhoda is the perfect little girl, a right angel, but she has a bit of a temper.  A temper that, if you find yourself on the wrong side of it, might lead to very bad things for you!

I think what makes this movie so creepy is that Rhoda is such a sweet girl when we meet her, then she kills a schoolmate who has a spelling bee medal that she wants. And, when the apartment's caretaker figures out what's going on, Rhoda has to get rid of him too!  

The movie is layered with creepiness on top of creepiness.  On top of the serial killer with the baby face, there's the couple who's child Rhoda murdered, so we have one couple who've lost a child and another single another single mother who knows that her child isn't what people think she is.  And, the glee with which Rhoda gets rid of 'problems' gives The Bad Seed a tone of pure evil.  There's a terrific scene where the apartment caretaker is set on fire, while Rhoda plays the piano and Rhoda's mother and a neighbor both talk about what's going on, Rhoda's mother raving about her daughter murdering the man and the neighbor talking about how good it is that poor little Rhoda didn't see the horror.  And, while we never see anything horrific, the reaction of the women makes this all the more terrible.

If you never seen The Bad Seed, then you're missing a true horror classic!  The acting is good, the story is years ahead of it's time and the ending will have your skin crawling!  It's from 1956, but this movie is like watching an episode of Leave It To Beaver...if Beavef we're burying body parts in the back yard!  I give The Bad Seed 4 out of 4 cigars, it's a movie that I've seen dozens of times and I'll still sit and watch it if it comes on TCM...it's a movie that will stay with you for a long time!

Lovelace

Everyone's heard of Linda Lovelace but most of us don't know much about her, aside from her starring in, arguably, the most famous porn movie of all time.  But a new movie, Lovelace, takes this strange, tragic figure and tells us a bit of her story, from her perspective.

The story here begins with Linda, as a 21 year old, meeting the man who would lead her into the dark world she's about to enter.  Her home life is less than perfect, her mother is a cold, religiously zealous woman and her father, while nicer, isn't exactly assertive.  We follow Linda from the making of Deep Throat on through her final media appearance, promoting her autobiography on the Donahue show...and if you know what the Donahue show is, then you're as old as I am!

What you might imagine is a bit titillating, turns out to be just the sad story of a girl who needed a bit more attention and guidance than she got!  I'm giving Lovelace 4 out of 4 cigars, it's got some amazing performances in it and it's always interesting to see what happened behind the scenes of any infamous movie!

The Lone Ranger

I can still hear the words in my ears, 'A fiery horse with the speed of light, a cloud of dust and a hearty hi ho Silver, away!  The Lone Ranger!'.  Now, today that sounds a bit 'quaint' and 'dated', but if you allow yourself to remember the time, and be drawn into the story just a bit, then it's a little piece of magic!  For full disclosure, I've been a fan of The Lone Ranger since I was a kid, I'm not old enough for the original radio shows, or even the first run TV shows, but it was still in reruns when I was a kid and, to me, this was a 'wild west Superman', someone who embodied all the 'big blue boy scout' niceness of Superman, but was actually a human.  The Lone Ranger was never mean or cruel, he wasn't interested in gunning down the bad guys, he was a law man, and embodied the best of what we should be, and he was a Texas Ranger, so how cool is that?

So, when I saw that Disney was making a big budget Lone Ranger movie, I was pretty excited, even with Johnny Depp as Tonto, I was still excited.  Then the reviews started rolling in, and they weren't that good, and the audience wasn't there, so it left theatres pretty quickly, and I just never got to the theatre to see it.  So, thank God for VOD, because I finally got the chance to sit down and see if The Lone Ranger was really as bad as they said, and if they'd done one of the heroes of my youth a big disservice.....and you know, they didn't.  This movie isn't nearly as bad as everyone pretended it was!

This is really an origin story, and, if you don't know, the story is an interesting one, a group of Texas Rangers head into the badlands to capture Butch Cavandish and his gang, but are ambushed and all but one is killed, that ranger is nursed back to health by Tonto, who becomes the Ranger's loyal companion.  In this version, all the rangers are killed and Tonto, who apparently has some spiritual power, brings him back from the dead.  The ranger than sets out on his quest for justice.  Another big difference is that, in this version, it's not just the outlaws who are the bad guys, this time the railroad company's executives are in on the scheme too!

Really, this isn't as bad a movie as everyone made it out to be.  Are there problems?  Yes, the focus being on Tonto was a bit strange, and making Tonto some sort of deranged medicine man was odd, but Depp does a excellent imitation of Jay Silverheels, and Armie Hammer is pretty good as the Lone Ranger.  Was this the best movie I ever saw?  Not by a long shot!  And, it did sort of feel like Pirates Of The Caribbean meets the wild west, but the story isn't terrible, the acting is strong and it's a terrific homage to a mostly forgotten franchise!

I'm giving The Lone Ranger 3 out of 4 cigars, it's not going to be your favorite movie, but, unless you're a lemming, you're not going to bash it as the worst thing ever, either!