Jabberwocky (1973)
Jabberwocky (1977)
Jacinta (2020)
Jack Attack (2024)
Jack Pierce: The Man Behind The Monsters (2000)
Jackals & Fireflies (2023)
Odds Against Tomorrow (1959)

Jabberwocky (1973)

“Jabberwocky” is a poem by Lewis Carroll, about a monster called the Jabberwock. It’s considered a classic, but Carroll invented a generous number of nonsense words for the poem, and my preference is words that make sense, so it’s never been among my favorites. To be honest, I don’t have many favorite poems, so for help understanding this one, I’ve turned to this 15-minute stop-motion animated adaptation, from the great Jan Švankmajer.

Over images nearly as far beyond as the poem’s words, a girl who sounds about Alice’s age reads the poem, and yup, hearing it instead of reading it helps sidestep my frustration with the nonsense elements. Švankmajer’s imagery has nothing really to do with the words, but adds so much, and so do the musical choices.

What it all means I still couldn’t tell you, but it’s not unpleasant, the animation is lovely, and I watched it again immediately.

Verdict: BIG YES.

♦ ♦ ♦

Jabberwocky (1977)

After sharing director’s credit for Monty Python and the Holy Grail with Terry Jones, this is the first feature directed solo by Terry Gilliam. It’s very loosely taken from the poem, though only a few lines of verse are recited.

Gilliam’s Jabberwocky is the story of Dennis, a cooper’s apprentice in the Dark Ages, who fancies himself an efficiency expert, and jaunts across the countryside, surviving several brushes with the monstrous Jabberwock.

The film is sort of a warm-up for Gilliam’s later, more visually and thematically imaginative works — Brazil, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, The Fisher King, etc — but the bizarrities aren’t yet Gilliam-level bizarre, and the eccentricities are only semi-eccentric. It settles in as being comfortably strange, which is enough. Michael Palin stars, and he’s charming, and the movie is good but not great, with flashes of brilliance.

Verdict: YES.

♦ ♦ ♦

Jacinta (2020)

Deep documentary dive into the life of a 30-something woman who’s a drug addict, sometimes trying not to be, but that’s damn difficult and some days you just gotta have a hit.

Getting to know Jacinta Hunt, we also meet her mother (incarcerated) and her daughter (exasperated), and the film shows a few years of Jacinta’s life. None of this is easy, watching or living, but it’s the way things are for millions of addicted Americans.

Jacinta’s story is set in Maine, and it’s startling to see how white, clean, and courteous are the jails, cops, and courts there. She has family that tries to help, and social workers do what little they can, but whether it’s possible to fix someone like Jacinta remains to be seen. The film only observes, offering no happy ending and no answers. You’re left to wonder for yourself. A few tough thoughts came to me, watching.

First, for a sliver of a moment, I was glad that I’ve never had any addictions, until remembering that I weigh 300 pounds, eat four meals a day, and ice cream is usually on my shopping list. I’m as addicted as Jacinta is, only to a drug that ruins me less dramatically.

My main takeaway from the film is, each of us learns the basics of being a member of society when we’re very young, but if your parents are defective or absent, maybe you never learn those basics at all. Jacinta’s mother smoked crack with her, and sent her out whoring when she was 15. My parents made me go to school and church and youth group, asked me once in a while what I wanted to be when I grew up, and never once whored me out. Lucking into a good family makes all the difference, between Jacinta and any of us.

Verdict: YES.

♦ ♦ ♦

Jack Attack (2024)

Jack is a beach bum, nearly out of money and offering surf lessons. He has a dog that’s a good girl, unspecified legal problems, and a friend who’s a little loud and annoying. And then stuff happens, in this 15-minute short, written and directed by Ben Warhit.

Never heard of Mr Warhit, and he seems to have worked mostly in sports, so there’s nothing on his resumé that I urgently want to see, but I’m glad I saw this. It’s a pleasure to find a modern indie movie that simply knows what it’s doing, and does it well. This is easy to watch, always interesting, mildly disturbing at the end, and very well-put-together.

Millie Warhit co-stars as the dog.

Verdict: YES.

♦ ♦ ♦

Jack Pierce: The Man Behind The Monsters (2000)

Jack Pierce (1889-1968) was the makeup man who created the look of Universal’s “big three” monsters of the ’30s, Dracula, Frankenstein, and The Mummy, along with their sequels and scores of other films, horror and not-so horror.

This is a documentary about Mr Pierce and his career, but unlike a thousand other behind-the-scenes moviemaking documentaries, there are no talking heads, and no clips. Instead it’s a play, filmed on stage, in which actor Perry Shields (wearing intricate old-man makeup) portrays Pierce in his latter years, remembering moments and people from his career. His monologue is interrupted by recreations of scenes from his movies, with more than a dozen actors in elaborate makeup performing scenes you’ve seen if you’ve seen Pierce’s movies.

Rob Burman created the play’s makeup, which is excellent and almost literally makes the movie, as a tribute to Pierce’s creations.

Beyond the makeup, this is an impassioned and winning production. The acting and staging are spotty, and the sound is boxy and untweaked, as you’d expect from a videotaped play with a few minor tech glitches, but the script is factual and highly enjoyable, especially if you’re an old movie buff.

At one point, Pierce reads a very complimentary letter he received from a young fan in the late 1950s, and when he finishes, and reads that the letter was signed by Dick Smith, the audience at the playhouse gasps and applauds. Everyone involved in making this, and everyone in the audience, were doubtless movie makeup geeks who know Dick Smith’s name, but the movie doesn’t explain, so allow me: Smith (1922-2014) was perhaps the most prominent movie makeup man from the latter half of the 20th century (Altered States, The Exorcist, Scanners, etc).

Trivia: In addition to being Mr Makeup at Universal Studios, Pierce was also coach of the company’s rec-league basketball team.

Verdict: YES.

♦ ♦ ♦

Jackals & Fireflies (2023)

Poetic, personal observations of New York City, written by Eva H.D., and filmed lusciously while the poet recites the poem, and plays the poet on screen.

Is the poem good? I dunno. I wanted to read it after seeing the film, but gave up when every internet search led back to the movie instead of the poem.

There’s something about speaking poetry that, if great care isn’t taken, tends to subtract. There’s often (and in this case, definitely) a literary cadence that, to my unpoetic ears, renders the words ‘arty’ instead of connected to the world.

This 20-minute short is directed by Charlie Kaufman, who wrote the marvelous Being John Malkovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and is perhaps a better writer than director. The film is very cinematic, but so polished it wipes away some of the poem’s potential impact.

Verdict: MAYBE.

♦ ♦ ♦

Odds Against Tomorrow (1959)

Bad cop Burke is putting together a bank robbery, and his partners in crime are Earl Slater and Johnny Ingram. Slater is an ex-con who killed somebody and enjoyed it, and Ingram is a jazz singer who’s in dangerous debt to his local bookie. And Slater is racist to his fingernails, while Ingram is black and tired of taking society’s shit.

Ingram has the only bright idea in planning the heist, but Slater of course isn’t impressed. He’s just angry, all the time, and angrier as he’s stuck working with an n-word, so unlike most heist movies the tension doesn’t wait for the robbery. Slater and Ingram are always simmering, ready to boil. Burke tries turning down the heat, but can’t, and the film’s climax doesn’t disappoint.

Harry Belafonte, Robert Ryan, and Ed Begley (Sr) star, with Shelly Winters and Gloria Grahame in sadly small supporting roles.

Based on a novel by William McGivern (The Big Heat, Hell on Frisco Bay, Shield for Murder), and directed by Robert Wise (The Andromeda Strain, The Day the Earth Stood Still, West Side Story), this is top level old-style movie-making.

Verdict: BIG YES.

12/15/2025

Logo illustration by Jeff Meyer. No talking once the lights dim, and only real butter on the popcorn, not that fake yellow stuff.

If you can’t find a movie I’ve mentioned, drop me a note and I’ll hook you up.
         

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