Guns Akimbo (2019)
Streaming free at The Roku Channel
"This is not another story about a nerd trying to get the girl like she's an Xbox achievement to be unlocked. This is not a love story."
No, it's not a love story, and not a movie made for old farts like me. Guns Akimbo is build around video games, so everything on screen bubbles over with flashy beeps and bops, quick cuts, jump cuts, etc.
Usually I hate bright lights and loud noises, and the last video game I played was first-generation PacMan, but guess what? This is not a headache. It's a hoot.
Daniel Radcliffe stars, as a guy who sits at home alone in his bathrobe playing video games that have his avatar running down streets and alleys shooting at 'people', blam blam blam.
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| NEVERENDING FILM FESTIVAL #313 [archive] JULY 19, 2024 |
With guns that can't be removed from his hands, dude can't even piss straight, can't get dressed, but he can't refuse to play the game, because an opponent is trying to kill him and win.
There is nothing for your brain here, but if video games are like this, I can begin to see the appeal. I'm still not playing, though.
Verdict: YES.
♦ ♦ ♦
Guns, Girls, and Gangsters (1959)
Streaming free at Internet Archive
B-movie blonde bombshell Mamie Van Doren plays a night club singer named Vi, in this sleazy movie about sleazy bad guys planning a heist in Vegas.
Bad Guy #1 has a plan to steal a week's worth of cash from a Vegas casino — he's going to use a high-powered rifle to blow out a tire on an armored truck.
Bad Guy #2 is going to launder the money, but first he's going to show you he's tough.
Bad Guy #3 is Vi's insanely jealous husband, who's in San Quentin but about to be released.
Bad Guy #1 looks too much like Bad Guy #2, which got me confused, but I'm easily confused. Bad Guy #3 is the great heavy Lee Van Cleef, early in his career, so he doesn't have his familiar slow sneer yet, but he's mean and violent.
The movie is drowned in narration — there's probably more narration than dialogue — and it's super-serious narration. It's like they were trying to out-Webb Jack.
This is a cheap movie, amusing even when it sucks, and Van Doren delivers the va-va-va-voom. She sings two so-so songs, and looks better than she sings but she sings OK.
Directed by Edward L Cahn (Creature with the Atom Brain, It! The Terror from Beyond Space).
Verdict: YES.
♦ ♦ ♦
The Guns of Navarone (1961)
Streaming free at Internet Archive
Peck is terrific, always under pressure but trying to keep his humanity. David Niven and Anthony Quinn co-star — Niven in the Steven McQueen role of "brash American" except that he's British, and Quinn as a Greek officer who's seething with hatred for Mallory, which makes things tricky, them being co-workers and all.
"Anything can happen in a war. Slap in the middle of absolute insanity people pull out the most extraordinary resources: ingenuity, courage, self-sacrifice. Pity we can't meet the problems of peace in the same way, isn't it? It would be so much cheaper for everybody."
There are surprising setbacks, doublecrosses, even some serious questions about the morality of war, and it makes no pretense of being "based on a true story."
Instead it's from a novel by Alistair MacLean, with screenplay by Carl Foreman (who wrote High Noon and, while blacklisted, The Bridge on the River Kwai). Directed by J Lee Thompson (Cape Fear 1962), it's in widescreen CinemaScope, filmed on location in Greece, and there's a grand score by Dimitri Tiomkin.
Flashing back 50 years to when I was a kid, I loved reruns of The Dick Van Dyke Show — it was funny, and Mary Tyler Moore was hot. (Trust me, this is going somewhere.) In one episode, Rob (Van Dyke) says that he'd fallen asleep at a movie theater while watching The Guns of Navarone. Everyone is aghast at this, and Sally says, "You slept through The Guns of Navarone?" The punchline being, this movie is so thrilling that nobody could sleep through it.
Never forgot that line, so the movie's been on my watchlist ever since, even before there was really a 'list'. Now, finally, I've seen The Guns of Navarone. I emphatically did not fall asleep, and agree with Sally — nobody could.
Verdict: BIG YES.
♦ ♦ ♦
Guns of the Apocalypse (2018)
$1.99 rental at Vimeo
He meets a woman and her daughter, who've been on the run in the wilderness. Mom knows what she's running from, but Grizzly guy thinks he can handle anything. The little girl is the wild card; she has a power.
"It's not every day you get to kill a man twice."
Homemade movie maestro Christopher Mihm does most of the work himself — writer, director, producer, cinematographer, editor, etc — with friends and family as actors. His 'studio' is Kickstarter, so his films shouldn't be judged by Tarantino standards.
Nobody in the cast looks like a movie star, the acting is spotty, the visual effects are Casio-level, and no Oscars will be handed out, but for about 0.0001% of even a cheap movie's budget, Mihm's made another sci-fi flick that works. Some slightly 'Italian western' themes have been added, so it's spaghetti science fiction.
After watching Guns of the Apocalypse, I immediately watched it a second time, partly to help figure out the raggedy plotline, but mostly because it's fun.
Verdict: YES.
♦ ♦ ♦
Guns of the Trees (1961)
Free on DVD from your library
Everyone grapples deeply with modern life, and we hear poems written (and read) by Allen Ginsberg, and watch two businessmen in suits and pancake makeup, who've escaped from a silent film.
The 'musical score' consists mostly of the same note played for a minute or two, often piercingly; it stops but comes back over and over. When the film threatens to become interesting, the 'music' returns, as if daring you to continue watching.
There is something going on here, ideas and pieces of a movie worth watching, but making sense wasn't what filmmaker Jonas Mekas wanted.
Anyway, he surrenders in the very first frames, with the on-screen announcement that "the sad heart of the insane world has prevented me from finishing this film." Alas, me, too.
Verdict: NO.
His IMDB bio calls Mekas "the Godfather of
American avant-garde cinema," which might be all you need to know about avant-garde cinema. I'm going to watch a few of his later
works, to see whether the insane world ever allowed either of us to
finish any of his 59 movies.
♦ ♦ ♦
• Ben Hecht: The great Hollywood screenwriter who hated Hollywood
• Jonas Mekas's "Movie Journal"
7/19/2024
• • • Coming attractions • • •
The Guru (1969)
Gutter Girls (1963)
A Guy Named Joe (1943)
Guys and Dolls (1955)
The Guyver (1991)
... plus schlock, shorts, and surprises
especially starting with the letter 'H'.
Just add a comment, below.
I had never heard of Christopher R. Mihm until you reviewd one of his movies a year ago. What I like about his movies is that you can tell everyone is having fun making the movie. It's great.
ReplyDeleteYay man, I *love* turning people on to fabulous movies! Have you tried any Damon Packard? He's another DIY filmmaker, but Mihm does it with love and Packard does it with anger.
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