What Can Be Trusted? - Aug 13 - Friday Video Distractions with Mike Norton

 

       Something that landed a week ago on Amazon Prime: Director and producer Leo Scott and Ting Poo have put together a biography of actor and cancer survivor Val Kilmer. They've tapped decades of the star's home movies and video, which are paired with new footage and input from Kilmer, to produce Val (1hr 49m.) Here's the trailer.

     It's an often artful, thoughtful use of the wide swath of material Val accumulated, not only of himself and some family, but of his acting contemporaries.
     A recent (Aug 6th) addition to Netflix is a horror film from France - The Swarm (2020  1h 41m). (Not to be confused with the 1978 Michael Caine movie about the swarm of Africanized honey bees that we were repeatedly warned were coming for us throughout the '70s.)  In this new film, a woman and her two children have a business, running a farm where they raise locusts as a high-protein food. Money is tight, tensions are high due in part to low production... until she discovers that they have an appetite for blood.
     Haven't watched it yet, but the early pool of reviews were (surprisingly) encouraging. Can't always go by that, though, as often this sort of fare will be funneled early to a very targeted audience.

     Arriving today (again on Netflix) is supernatural horror (limited) series - a revenge story with a very '90s feel - Brand New Cherry Flavor.

     If you'd prefer a mystery thriller series, also arriving the same day is a French thriller series based on a Harlan Coben novel: Gone For Good.

     A man who had dealt with twin losses a decade before, has just begun to fully re-engage with life when his new love disappears, and he faces a deepening wall of conspiracy as he searches for her and answers.

   TCM's Summer Under the Stars (click on that to get a page with all of the month's info), their August spotlight, with 24 hour blocks devoted to the star du jour, continues. As noted last week, today's a run of Jane Fonda films, and Saturday is for Gregory Peck. Next week's Sunday-Saturday run is:
     Sunday Aug 15: Judy Garland
     Monday Aug 16: Robert Young
     Tuesday Aug 17: Gloria Graham
     Wednesday Aug 18: Robert Redford
     Thursday Aug 19: Setsuko Hara
     Friday Aug 20: Van Helflin
     Saturday Aug 21: Katherine Hepburn

     A wonderful, if often skewed toward the adolescent, resource for info on Hollywood and the famous of screens is Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast. Generally steered by the deep research of Gilbert's podcast partner, Frank Santopadre, they usually make for very good interviews with stars, directors, etc., building an archive of memories that otherwise might be lost. (This week's example is a good one, as John Schuck provided nearly two hours of memories and comments from his six decades of stage and screen, and is one of the many examples of a guest one might not expect much from, but will be pleasantly surprised by the anecdotes.) I always enjoy the show when I get around to it, but I haven't yet gotten into the routine of making regular time for it.

     If a given celebrity's name is dropped during an episode of the podcase, there are often one or two immediate, go-to, running jokes for that person. In the case of Abbot and Costello, particularly for Lou Costello, their go-to is the 1978 made-for-tv biopic Bud & Lou, and most often a mention of the "besht" strawberry malted.
     Starring Harvey Korman and Buddy Hackett, with Michele Lee, Arte Johnson and Robert Reed, the humor's generally not intentional. As fondly as I recall Korman and Hackett from their separate work, it feels as if they were cast based purely on physical types - tall & thin and short & round. A&C's material doesn't flow well from the duo, as their pacing's seldom rapid and nuanced enough, and the comic timing never meshes. The acting chops simply aren't there, especially for key dramatic moments for Hackett, making those same moments unintentional comedy mines.
    It's based on Bob Thomas' biography, also titled Bud & Lou, which paints Costello as veering between childlike and reflexively petty & vindictive, with a long memory for any perceived slights, resulting in a vindictive streak once he had the upper hand. Thomas reportedly based much of it on a single source: Abbott and Costello's fired agent, Eddie Sherman, though to watch the film you'd think that Eddie (played by Artie Johnson) was their staunch, stalwart ally.
     At 98 minutes -- and at no expense save your time, thanks to YouTube -- here's Bud & Lou.

     I've enjoyed digging up new-to-me sci fi and horror films, particularly of the 1950s and '60s, that are free to watch. Here's another one I'd somehow only seen recently, which (again) seems as if it would have been a Saturday afternoon, UHF horror host movie standard save perhaps that it has a shortish run-time. In this case it's The Day Mars Invaded Earth (1963  70m).

     A paranoiac tale reminiscent of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, it turns out energy beings from Mars have distinct problems with the idea of Earth's space program, and decide to do something about it.
     A moody, talky film, with lots of driving and walking around in order to have often awkward conversations. The effects budget is essentially nonexistent, though to be fair the story doesn't require one. The impressive Graystone Mansion estate is the setting for all but the first nine and one half minutes of the film, and it's almost worth watching just to take the place in. The scenes by the empty pool are guaranteed to raise the blood pressure of insurance estimators and parents, as it's a man-made chasm. With no water in it it's difficult to believe anyone would survive the fall to its deepest point.
     As mentioned above, the film has a paranoid vibe, and it's one that slowly ramps up. It's mostly about as much the opposite of an action movie as is possible without going full My Dinner With Andre, but the implicit mystery and growing threat of the doppelgangers is marginally effective if given the chance.
     Watching it took me back to my late teen years, when a buddy and I shot and edited together a few films using a Super-8 camera. The series of cuts to an establishing shot, then action, then cut to the next shot, all generally with little movement of the camera itself aside from the occasional slow pan, I was soon back into that early process and the perhaps too precious handling of the camera, knowing that you only had the one and couldn't begin to afford getting a replacement.
     So, here it is -- The Day Mars Invaded Earth.

     That's a good spot to stop for this week.
     I will remind readers to revisit last week's post, where in many instances I've added postscripts to several of the things that at the time were upcoming but that I've watched in the interim. These include Stargirl, What If..?, Titans, and Star Trek: Lower Decks. The added text is in red. I have good reasons for handling things that way, which I hope to eventually reveal.
     It's difficult for me to grasp that we're nearly at the middle of August already!
     Take care, do your best to keep cool, and I'll see you back here next week.   - Mike