CONFESS, FLETCH: Jon Hamm’s Fletch Chases Chevy’s Lazily

CONFESS, FLETCH (Dir. Greg Mottola, 2022)

After decades in development hell, investigative journalist Irwin M. Fletcher returns to the big screen, albeit in a limited release that will largely not be noticed. For those not in the know, Fletch is a character created by Gregory Mcdonald for a series of popular comic mystery novels that kicked off in the mid ‘70s, and is best known from his incarnation as Chevy Chase in two movies in the ‘80s - one a comedy classic, FLETCH (1985); the other, FLETCH LIVES (1989) not so much.

 

For the last three decades, the concept of rebooting FLETCH has come and gone a bunch of times. From all accounts, it began with Kevin Smith in the late ‘90s planning a project dubbed SON OF FLETCH, which would’ve involved Chase, but that fell through when Chase was an asshole to Smith or something. Then the project later became FLETCH WON, based on the tenth book in the series, and names like Ben Affleck, Ryan Reynolds, and Jason Lee (Smith’s choice) were batted around. 

 

That’s how it would go – every now and then, word would spread about a FLETCH reboot, some names like Zack Braff (yeah, right), John Krasinski, Justin Long, Jason Sudeikis, and even Dave Chappelle are thrown around, then the project disappears. But out of the blue last summer, a trailer appeared featuring Jon Hamm of Don Draper/Mad Men fame smarming his way through some decent one-liners in a new comic thriller, and 33 years later, Fletch lives again.

 

But is Fletch really such an iconic character that needed resurrecting? His detached, above-it-all master of the sarcastic arts demeanor has been done to death by dozens of comic actors in countless comedies – it was an archetype long before Fletch came around, but Chase’s straddling of the line between being a witty, yet edgy charmer, or being an sexist, inappropriate asshole has branded the role. I’m not saying that Fletch as a character concept is problematically out-of-date, just that his persona just isn’t that appealing or funny as Mottola’s film thinks he is. 

 

This is despite a valiant effort by Hamm to fill Chase’s shoes. In the film’s first moments, we watch our the preppy-attired Lakers fan enter a luxury apartment in Boston to find a woman’s dead body lying on the carpet. This cold opening, involving Fletch trading forgettable banter with police detectives played by the slightly embarrassed looking actress, Ayden Mayeri, and The Daily Show’s Roy Wood Jr., sets the movie’s stylishly lackadaisical tone. When Fletch ques the film’s title card with the line “I’m an open book,” it doesn’t have any impact or sense of any excitement – it’s almost as if the film wants us to react to it with a “meh.”

From there we are taken into a plot concerning the kidnapped father of Fletch’s girlfriend Angela Di Grassi (Lorenza Izzo), with the ransom being a Picasso painting worth millions. While a suspect for murder, and switching identities more often than his underwear (not really, but that was the tagline on the original’s poster), Fletch does his unctuous, self-amused thing in talky set-pieces engaging quest stars like Kyle MacLachlan as a snooty germaphobe art dealer who has a cringy EDM dance scene, Annie Mumolo as a flighty free-spirited train-wreck of a neighbor (the film’s oddest scene tone-wise); most embarrassingly, Marcia Gay Harden as the horny cliché of an Italian Countess; but most thankfully, Hamm’s Mad Men co-star John Slattery as Fletch’s former editor for a welcome newsroom, and drink at a bar bit cameo.

The stakes with the stolen art, the murder mystery, whatever, feel so low that it’s hard to care or remember details while the movie rolls on. In Ritchie’s first FLETCH, the premise was simple, but had teeth, and the film lived from quotable quip to quip (the Onion even once satirized its reputation with “Area Insurance Salesman Celebrates 14th Year of Quoting Fletch”) but here, the lines are so-so, with maybe every fourth or fifth one being slightly chuckle-worthy, and the whole vibe, and energy doesn’t even try to gel.

I still like the idea of Hamm as Fletch, and feel that there could’ve been something more here if there was more of a spark or fresh take on the material as the 1976 novel it came from was an acclaimed award winner, and could’ve served for a weightier adaptation. I bet director, and co-writer Mottola, and first-time screenwriter Zev Borow’s script could’ve gotten there in a few drafts.

While this is a certainly a sturdier, and better crafted film than Chase’s last turn as Fletch was given, that lame film actually had more laughs. CONFESS, FLETCH is a half-assed reboot that probably would’ve been better as a Hulu series or on some such platform as Fletch just doesn’t feel like it could or should be a cinematic deal these days. This type of snarky storytelling with its lazy plotting, light twists, and jaded jokery is the stuff of television anyway.

And that’s where you can find Hamm’s first foray as FLETCH - on a bunch of streaming services (Apple TV, Amazon, Google Play, etc.) now for $19.99, then next month on Showtime (premieres on Oct. 28, 2022) for whatever that service costs.

I’d suggest putting it on the Underhill’s bill. 

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CLERKS III Is For The Hardcore, While The Rest Of Us Will Cringe Hard

CLERKS III (Dir. Kevin Smith, 2022)

“Whatcha looking at? That’s how we did it in the ‘90s, son!” yells Jason Mewes through his creepily perfect white AF teeth in what feels like his 1000th performance as the obnoxious drug-dealer Jay early on in the third installment of Kevin Smith’s CLERKS, releasing this week through Fathom Events (Sept. 13-18).

 

Thing is, everything in this, maybe the most unnecessary sequel in the history of unnecessary sequels, is how Smith did it in the ‘90s. Smith’s filmmaking skills have barely progressed from 29 years ago, nor has his dialogue which revels in the same old scatological concerns designed for teenaged senses of humor, and we’re just yet again given characters going through the get-your-shit-together motions with a lazy, yet good natured run through skit-like scenes.

 

These characters, our returning leads Dante (Brian O’Halloran) and Randal (Jeff Anderson) begin the trilogy finale where they left off in CLERKS II, working at the QuickStop, bitching about pop culture, and passing time playing hockey on the roof with what looks like the cast of Smith’s AMC show, Comic Book Men. In the 15 years since the second one, Dante’s wife Becky (Rosario Dawson) has passed along with their unborn daughter so there’s that potential emotional element.

 

In the middle of a sloppy religious discussion (including a “Bourne Nativity” trailer joke), Randal suffers a heart attack and is rushed to the hospital where he’s operated on by Amy Sedaris as a wise-cracking doctor. While recovering, Randal has the impulse to find his purpose in making the movie of his life, a movie about a guy who works in a convenience store with “all of the shit you and I have said sitting at this counter, they’re all scenes now,” as he tells a skeptical Dante.

 

Obviously, the low concept premise is that Randal is going to make the original movie CLERKS, so the film goes all meta with bits that recreate the making of the 1994 production but with Randal in the Director’s chair (Smith’s Silent Bob serves as the cinematographer). Meanwhile, a long grief-stricken Dante visits his wife’s grave for a pep-talking cameo by Dawson, which triggers major O’Halloran crying action, the waterworks of which flow through a lot more of the movie than a CLERKS sequel should allow.

 

Speaking of cameos, we’ve got a slew with the obligatory wacky auditions sequence in which the immortal CLERKS line “I’m not even supposed to be here today,” and then other random movie lines are spouted by slumming-it celebrities Fred Armisen, Danny Trejo, Sarah Michelle Gellar, and Freddie Prinze Jr., with an appearance by longtime Smith crony, Ben Affleck, who always pops up in every View Askewverse entry, to do some lines from MEET THE PARENTS for some reason.    

 

When Marilyn Ghigliotti returns as Dante’s ex-girlfriend, Veronica, from the original, she is seen shooting her scene as her 61-year old self, but Randal’s film captures her and O’Halloran in their grainy black and white youth in, of course, footage from CLERKS. Other bit players from CLERKS show for similar b & w scene recreations, and it’s a cute conceit, not without its charms, but it can’t help from feeling icky in an overly sentimental, self-celebratory way.

Dante really nails it when he says Randal’s film project will “cinematically suck his own dick,” so at least Smith is up front with this self love intent. And maybe all this revisionism its so that Silent Bob can now be skinny in his redone part as Smith hasn’t been too fat to fly Southwest in a long while.

 

The third act involves more trouble in bromance land as Dante and Randal get into a climatic argument about their strained friendship, and this results in another epiphany for about the real subject of Randal’s CLERKS redux. This is all very talky material which mostly rolls along, but there’s a tone deaf and forced feeling to interactions when other people enter the main duo’s frame.

 

That aside, the ginormously overriding issue with CLERKS III is how achingly unfunny it is. The overly hip talk falls flat, lame one-liner after another, and every attempt at gags, like a subplot about QuickStop co-worker Elias (Trevor Fehrman, an unfortunate holdover from CLERKS II) selling Christ-themed crypto-kite NFTs, just resulted in some of the biggest cringes I’ve experienced in my entire movie-watching history.

 

However, if CLERKS is a favorite movie of yours, then this style of fan service might just be your thing. I enjoyed the amusingly raw 1994 original, and a few of Smith’s other films over the years, but I don’t have the emotional connection needed for this final (I hope) hang with the convenience store crew to resonate. The fates of Anderson, who largely doesn’t have a film career apart from his work as Randal in this franchise, and O’Halloran as these supposedly lovable losers just doesn’t hold much weight for me these days, especially with the lack of genuine laughs. 

 

But while I found CLERKS III to be an ultra cringe-fest of masturbatory movie-making, the one endearing takeaway I can gather is that at least Kevin Smith never forgets who his friends are.

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RED STATE Now Out On Blu Ray, DVD, and Netflix Instant

RED STATE (Dir. Kevin State, 2011)

Last month, I went to a one night only special showing of Kevin Smith’s new film RED STATE at the Galaxy Cinema in Cary. I was a bit hesitant to go because tickets were $20, which is a bit much for a movie even with the event featuring a live interactive Q & A with Smith via Twitter.

Remembering that in response to the negative critical reaction to his previous film COP OUT, Smith tweeted that critics should have to pay to see his films like everybody else and even held up a sign at this year’s Sundance that said “God hates press screenings,” I decided I should pony up the money to see RED STATE.

I figured that I had seen his last several movies free, and it was payback time. I strongly disliked COP OUT and agree with Roger Ebert’s quip: “Kevin Smith thinks critics should have had to pay to see COP OUT. But Kev, then they would REALLY have hated it,” but dammit I’ll still take the bait.

If I didn’t know Smith had made RED STATE, I never would’ve guessed. It’s refreshingly out of his cheap comedy comfort zone and smack dab into the world of scrappy cheap horror, with Smith taking chances in a way I thought he never would. It starts out like PORKY’S with a few high school kids trying to get laid, and winds up like Waco, with a compound of extreme religious fundamentalists under siege.

Michael Angarano, Kyle Gallner, and Nicholas Braun are the teens who are captured by members of the Five Points Church led by Michael Parks as Pastor Abin Cooper. As the frightened captives squirm – Angarono in a cage, the others in a crawl space beneath the church’s stage – Parks sermonizes at grueling yet enrapturing length with gravely-voiced intensity about the homosexuals being Satan’s instrument on Earth hastening the demise of us as a species, then dismisses the children present: “It’s gonna get grown up in here!”

Realizing that they are going to be murdered by the crazy cult for being immoral fornicators, the frantic trio try everything they can to escape.

The always awesome John Goodman as an agent for the A.T.F. gets called in by a Sheriff played by Stephen Root, who is a closeted homosexual, and a shoot-out bloodbath results.

There are sloppy edits and some jarring set-ups, but this is easily Smith’s best work in ages. In the Q & A afterwards Smith said that he “got tired of making ‘Kevin Smith movies, as much as people were tired of seeing them.” Here he proves that he’s not a hack with a powerfully paced, engagingly plotted film that features some of his best dialogue and, in Parks, actually has a performance worth nominating for an Oscar. Can’t think of another Smith film you could say that about.

It looks like Smith raided the casts of Breaking Bad and Treme for RED STATE as Anna Gunn, Matt L. Jones, Goodman, and Melissa Leo (playing the woman that is used to lure the teens in with an online sex ad) are on hand.

Although I see that a lot of critics aren’t as enthusiastic about it, I really enjoyed RED STATE and think many will take to it too now that’s available on Blu ray, DVD, and Netflix Instant starting today. I’m not sure it was completely worth the 20 bucks I spent to see it, but I can honestly say I didn’t feel ripped off. Now, if I had paid to see COP OUT at any price mind you – that would REALLY be a different story.

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Good Cop/Goofy Cop

COP OUT (Dir. Kevin Smith, 2010)




"It's a homage." So says goofy rubber faced plainclothes cop Tracy Morgan of his unorthodox interrogation methods to his partner of 9 years, a stonewalling yet smirking Bruce Willis.

These methods are going to be familiar to anyone who's ever watched 30 Rock - Morgan does his patented crazy shtick. As Willis watches through a one way mirror, Morgan freaks out their suspect by yielding a gun and yelling movie quotes like "they call me Mister Tibbs," and "these aren't the droids you're looking for" even going for "Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker!"

Willis, in his definitively detached manner, says: "I never saw that movie." If that sounds funny to you, ignore the rest of this review and go see this movie - more such supposedly uproarious self-aware referencing awaits.

Cool, now that those people are gone I can tell the rest of you that this is one painfully unfunny film. Though it wasn't written by Kevin Smith (the screenplay is by Robb and Mark Cullen) it feels like it was in the worst way - at Smith's most hammiest and hackiest. It strains with every cut to elicit laughs, but cringes are what result from this tired and truly tiresome material.

What there is of a premise involves Mexican gangsters headed by Guillermo Diaz, Seann William Scott as an annoying thief, and a stolen baseball card worth 80 thousand dollars. The card belonged to Willis, who was hoping to use it to pay for his daughter's (Michelle Trachtenberg) dream wedding. Otherwise Smith regular Jason Lee as Willis' wife's smarmy new husband will pay for it and humiliate him. Ho hum.

Morgan meanwhile deals with his wife's (Rashida Jones) possible infidelity with a neighbor by placing a nanny cam in a teddy bear in their bedroom. So both cops drive around Brooklyn from one poorly constructed plot point to another bitching about these hardships while barely creating an audible chuckle from the audience.

One of the only inspired elements present is the soundtrack. It was a savvy move to employ famed electronic composer Harold Faltermeyer to do the score. His "Axel F"-ish waves of synthesizer and jaunty rhythms work better than anything else in the film to capture the genre aesthetic.

A new Patti LaBelle song ("Soul Brothers") accompanying the end credits also hammers home the 80's mindset. You're better off sticking with watching Morgan on 30 Rock from which he even does some of the same lines ("you're sweet like bear meat") and renting HOT FUZZ if you haven't seen it. Now there's a sharp satire of the buddy cop action movies.

COP OUT is a lot like Morgan's misunderstanding (and mis-pronouncing) the word "homage" - it's not a send up or anything close to a fresh take on the formula, it's just formula.

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ZACK AND MIRI MAKE A PORNO - The Film Babble Blog Review

ZACK AND MIRI MAKE A PORNO (Dir. Kevin Smith, 2008)



Seems like the world of movie comedy has passed Kevin Smith by these days.

From the many Judd Apatow approved projects to the likes of Ben Stiller, Will Ferrell, and Adam Sandler dominating the raunchy guy genre is there really any place or need any more for Jay and Silent Bob? 


Well, thankfully they’ve been left behind (though Jason Mewes does show up) for Smith’s new chance to play catch-up and show he can still make with the crude and rude gross-out gags. 


Highjacking major Apatow-player Seth Rogen and basking in the low budget roughness in which he created his best work, Smith gives us Rogen and Elizabeth Banks (also a Apatow veteran) as broke best friend room mates who...oh, you know the title.


The use of the word “porno” has caused mild controversy with some markets refusing its title and original promotional images were changed to feature stick figures to both appease the MPAA and make cheap fun of it.


The film was heavily edited to avoid a NC-17 but I doubt any of that material was any dicier or outrageous as the film wants itself to be.


The lowdown is that it’s filled with scads of scatological humor, which is mostly tossed of in casual banter, and a lot of nudity (filmed in probably the most unsexy way I’ve ever seen) but nothing that would shock anybody who hasn’t seen the trailer and got already the gist.


That’s not to say it isn’t fairly funny and very watchable - Rogen and Banks are good together with amusing turns from the obligatory real porn star cameo by Traci Lords, Smith stock company member Jeff Anderson (Randal from CLERKS), and the bemused Craig Robinson (The Office, PINEAPPLE EXPRESS).


It appears from the duo’s ideas for a adult movie effort to help pay their bills that Smith’s pop culture reference lingo has really dated - enough with the STAR WARS whatnot! “Star Whores”? Really witty, Kevin. The Star Bucks stand-in “Bean ‘N Gone” that Rogen and Banks work and are forced to film their porno project at (further echoes of CLERKS) reeks of left-over retail complaints you’d think that Smith would be over at this point.


Smith delights in characters and premises that refuse to mature and that's fine, I just wish his film-making would grow up. Crude, badly cut, and just barely holding the narrative together, this movie is not the work of a polished confident director, but I bet he would take that as a compliment.


Rogen carries a lot of the film on his affable back, rolling with a laid back nature while Banks’ spirit and go-with-it timing are a welcome contrast to her current portrayal of Laura Bush in W. They're both big reasons to see this movie whatever your views on the View Askewniverse. ZACK AND MIRI... has the soul of an 80’s teen movie, most definitively the oeuvre of John Hughes.


Its heart and motives are a pastiche of well worn tried and true predictability - the funny audition sequence, the on-the-fly dance number, the aim to make a distinction between sex and “making love”. The fact that it has a heart probably won’t concern those who want old school Kevin Smith shenanigans so the best I can say there is that this is much better than CLERKS II. 

ZACK AND MIRI MAKE A PORNO has too much worthy competition (PINEAPPLE EXPRESS, TROPIC THUNDER, FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL) to be considered one of the best comedies of the year yet it is still likable enough even though it’s not as laughable as I would’ve liked.

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Pop Culture 101: Today's Class - KNOCKED UP

I finally got to see Judd Apatow's hit comedy KNOCKED UP (newly released on DVD) which I really regretted missing last summer in the theaters. I thought it was very funny though it was more of a James L. Brooks style drama than I expected - the 2 hour 13 min. running time should have tipped me off. What really got to me about this anti rom-com about slacker stoner Ben (Seth Rogen) unintentionally impregnating way-out-of-his-league Allsion (Katherine Heigl), is the incredible amount of pop culture referencing going down. The abundance of name dropping, bad impersonations, and snarky wise-cracks would put Kevin Smith and Quentin Tarentino to shame! It's almost like without these media touch points these people would have nothing to talk about at all. Since I would have nothing to talk about without them let's take a look at the cinematic schooling KNOCKED UP provides us in pop culture profundity: WARNING : Many Potential Spoilers A large percentage of the riffing comes from Ben's room-mates (Jason Segel, Martin Starr, Jay Barachel, and SUPERBAD's Jonah Hill - who all use their real names in the movie). They all have a what they call "the dirty man competition" - a bet that air-headed Martin can't grow his hair and beard without cutting or shaving for a year. If he lasts that long they have to pay his rent for a year - If he caves and shaves he'll have to pay all of their rents for a year. So they hurl insults relentlessly at him - calling him SERPICO, Charles Manson, Chewbacca by way of Jay's horrible impression, and Jonah asking him if he had a hard time changing his name from Cat Stevens to Yusef Islam. Martin: "yeah, it was awkward." The gang has a website in the works - Ben's pitch: "only at fleshofthestars.com * will customers be able to find exactly into what movie their favorite stars are exposed". It seems to be a premise created soley to riff on Jamie Lee Curtis' infamous full-frontal in TRADING PLACES, Julianne Moore's pantless appearance in SHORT CUTS , we actually see them watch the Denise Richards/Neve Campbell lesbian love scene in WILD THINGS on TV, and Meg Ryan's nude scenes in IN THE CUT. To their later dismay Pete (Paul Rudd) tells Ben there is already a celebrity nudity website called Mr. Skin. Ben rationales - "Good things come in pairs you know? VOLCANO, DANTE'S PEAK. DEEP IMPACT, ARMAGEDDON, right? WYATT EARP, TOMBSTONE." To which Jay adds - "Panda Express, Yashinoya Beef Bowl." * Yep, it's a real site now. Random Reference Riffing : Shortly before Ben and Heigl meet, the guys discuss Speilberg's MUNICH - all agreeing on its awesomeousity. Ben : "Dude, every movie with Jews we're the ones getting killed. MUNICH flips it on its ear. We're capping motherfuckers!" They all drink to Ben's proclamation - "if any of us get laid tonight it's because of Eric Bana in MUNICH!" Paul Rudd's character Pete is a A & R guy for some never named record label. Photos of him with Elvis Costello and framed album covers (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers "Damn The Torpedos" can be seen a few times) decorate the walls of his suburban home. Pete does a number of impressions throughout the film including Robert Deniro (not bad) and in the deleted scenes - Austin Powers (awful). He and Rogen disagree on music - Ben: "If I ever listen to Steely Dan, I want you to slice my head off with an Al Jarreau LP!" The most defining straight-forward statement that Pete makes of course is encased in pop culture - "marriage is like that show, Everybody Loves Raymond but it's not funny." Pete and wife Debbie (Leslie Mann - Judd Apatow's real-life wife) have kids (played by Apatow's daughters Maude and Iris) who argue over whether to listen to the soundtrack to "Rent" or the band Green Day from the back seat of Allison's car on the way to school. Not far from the tree obviously. Of course you've got to have a "boy loses girl" 3rd act conflict development with both couples spliting temporarily. Ben and Pete take a trip to Las Vegas in which they plan to take mushrooms (acquired by Pete from a roadie for The Black Crowes no less) and go see Cirque de Soleil quoting SWINGERS all along the way - "you're so money!" On a hotel room TV a scared Ben, tripping out of his mind on those Crowes roadie 'shrooms, watches CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN (we see shots of Steve Martin running around surrounded by his kids' wacky shenanagins) and remarks "He's got 12 kids...that's a lot of responsibility to be joking about. That's not funny." When Ben starts getting his life together and moves out of what was essentially a clubhouse into a respectable apartment he replaces his framed Bob Marley smoking a big ass spleef poster (obviously pictured on the right) for a ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND poster which he hangs in the soon to be nursery. Dr. Kuni (Ken Jeong) who delivers the baby angrily tells Ben in the hallway - "if you want a special experience go to a Jimmy Buffett concert!" In the bonus features there is a line-o-rama feature that has dozens of alternate lines for many scenes. There's an amusing run with trying out variations on the Jimmy Buffett line - some examples: "go to Disneyland", "go to freaking Busch Gardens", "go to Korea", and "go to my apartment, it's phenomenal." Another run on the line-o-rama has Jonah Hill saying "Mr. Skin is like the Beatles and we're like the Monkees" and "Mr. Skin is like Alec Baldwin and we're like Billy Baldwin." The opening credits sequence shower scene from CARRIE is viewed by Ben and Allison for further fleshofthestars.com research. Loudon Wainwright III plays Dr. Howard and also contributes the songs "Daughter", "Grey In L.A.", and "Lullaby" to the soundtrack. One of the deleted scenes has Jonah spouting out a hilarious rant about BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN which he says "was made by, like, fuckin' homophobes in my mind!" He drags MASTER AND COMMANDER and Bruce Willis's full frontal in COLOR OF NIGHT down into his profanity filled diatribe. Harold Ramis makes a nice (albeit too brief) showing as Ben's father. He attempts to console his son in an extended scene with an Indiana Jones analogy - "So, he could be like little Indy and you could be Sean Connery." Ben: "Or, I could be the guy that got melted when he looked in the Ark." Uncredited cameos by obvious Apatow and Co. friends Steve Carrell, James Franco (plugging SPIDERMAN 3 which was released at the same time as KNOCKED UP and is mentioned several times), and Andy Dick are brief blips on the reference radar - helped by Heigl's character being a reporter for E! Entertainment Television. That definitely hooked up the attitude-infused Ryan Seacrest appearance. Also swift bit parts from SNL's Kirsten Wiig and Bill Hader should be noted too. Whew! That's a lot of TRAINSPOTTING for one movie. I didn't even mention the mentions of Robin Williams, Taxicab Confessions, Martin Scorsese, Cartman from South Park, Doc Brown from BACK TO THE FUTURE, Ben's Mr. Bill T-shirt, Pete's Tom Waits "Rain Dogs" T-shirt, Vince Vaughn, Matthew Fox from Lost, Fellicity Huffman from TRANSAMERICA, as well as Ben and gang's posters of Pink Floyd, Hunter S. Thompson, and Fraggle Rock. Okay, now I 've mentioned them. There will be a test on all this so I hope you took good notes. 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10 Movie Moments That Broke The 4th Wall

“What a pisser” - Ted Striker (Robert Hays) turning to the camera after being told off by girlfriend Elaine (Julie Hagerty) in AIRPLANE! (Dirs. Jim Abraham, David & Jerry Zucker 1980)

Here I go again with another meta-movie list! The phrase “breaking the fourth wall” has been around for over a century. Though as a concept it's been around since before Shakespeare the phrase itself originates from the theater of Bertolt Brecht. It simply meant that a character makes an aside to the audience. Through the invisible wall those watching are addressed, acknowledged and made to feel a little more “in on the joke” so to speak. It’s a device used a lot more in television than on film.


In the '80s it even became fairly fashionable on such shows like Moonlighting and It’s Garry Shandling’s Show – a show that had as its entire premise comedian Shandling talking directly to the studio audience and the viewers at home. The Marx Brothers may have pioneered the concept in cinema with Groucho’s many knowing winks but Bob Hope really nailed it in the seminal road movies he made with Bing Crosby which is where we’ll begin:

1. ROAD TO MOROCCO (Dir. David Butler, 1942) 

Bob Hope is the reigning king of breaking the 4th wall for this classic alone. His character Oliver ‘Turkey’ Jackson has an immortal momment when he loses his detached wiseacre demeanor when he desperately declares “I can't go on! No food, no water. It's all my fault. We're done for! It's got me. I can't stand it! No food, nothing! No food, no water! No food!” As the voice of reason his friend Jeff (Bing Crosby) says “What's the matter with you, anyway?…We'll be picked up in a few minutes.” Hope in all his irrefutable glory responds “you had to open your big mouth and ruin the only good scene I got in the picture. I might have won the Academy Award!” That’s par for the course in a movie that actually has a camel comment - "This is the screwiest picture I was ever in."

2. ON HER MAJESTY’S SECRET SERVICE

(Dir. Peter R. Hunt, 1969)

This is seriously significant because breaking the 4th wall was used to break in the new Bond. George Lazenby had one of the hardest jobs in cinema history – to be the first to fill the shoes of Sean Connery in the iconic role of 007. To make matters even more intimidating this was a Bond adventure with substance – one that he gets married in for Christ’s sake!

Bond's intro had to matter – it had to have him make a mark and it had to acknowledge the audience’s incoming notion that this guy wasn’t the guy they were used to.

So in what every Bond picture has - a cold opening - we see Bond tooling around Portugal in his classic Aston Martin having an instant of near road-rage (we don't see his face in close-up), parking to watch the driver (Diana Rigg) that cut him off attempting suicide by walking into the ocean. He watches through a gun sight mind you. He frantically pulls his car down and runs out to the beach to save her. He drags her out of the water and we get to see his face as he does the customary intro “Bond, James Bond” but immediately adversaries are on his back.

A moon-lit beach fight ensues and of course Bond defeats his attackers but Rigg departs eschewing all pleasantries. After picking up her discarded shoes Lazenby remarks “this never happened to the other fellow”. Priceless for many reasons but chiefly because it acknowledged that there was a much loved “other fellow” and while Lazenby didn’t look directly into the camera ‘til after he said the line – the self consciousness was reigned in. Didn’t save him from being a Bond one-termer but still.

3. ANIMAL HOUSE (Dir. John Landis, 1978)

According to IMDb this is a Landis trademark : “He often has his characters look into camera lens to make eye contact with the audience or 'break frame'". It’s true – it is all over his film work but most definitively when the late great John Belushi climbs up a ladder to view naked sorority girls and when getting what he thinks is a “money shot” turns to do his eye brow signature right at us.

Another trademark breaking the 4th came a few years later in SPIES LIKE US – this time Dan Aykroyd and Chevy Chase were trying to do their version of a Hope/Crosby road movie. During a stressful scene when our beloved SNL bumblers were pretending to be medical staff in Soviet Central Asia - the king of 4th wall demolition - Bob Hope himself appears as if in perpetual golfer mode - "Ah! Mind if I play through? (acknowledges Ackroyd and Chase) Doctor.. Doctor.. I'm glad I'm not sick." * While this is indeed a Landis trademark on the TRADING PLACES commentary Eddie Murphy says it came from being so used to mugging at the camera on Saturday Night Live.

4. FERRIS BUELLER’S DAY OFF

(Dir. John Hughes, 1986) 

There are many instances of Hughes’s characters talking directly to the camera but Ferris Bueller (Matthew Broderick) is purely definitive as a narrator, commentator, and chastizer – like Animal in THE MUPPET MOVIE he even tells the audience to go home at the end. Bueller's great moment in breaking the 4th walldom is when he informs us on the best methods of faking sick to get out of going to school (as if you didn't know the premise). I believe this is one of the reasons that this is former Vice President Dan Quayle’s favorite movie.

After his parents exit Ferris looks us in the eye and says “Incredible! One of the worst performances of my career and they never doubted it for a second.”

Special mention goes to PRETTY IN PINK (1986) At the prom conclusion Ducky (Jon Cryer) looks directly in the camera and knowingly nods after being given a come-on look by a girl on the dance floor.

5. JAY AND SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK

(Dir. Kevin Smith, 2001) 

As a self pro-claimed Hughes disciple Smith has to work the ‘to camera asides’ but in this movie he may have overdone it a tad. For example – playing themselves Ben Affleck and Matt Damon have a fight on the set of the fictitious GOOD WILL HUNTING 2 : HUNTING SEASON (Yes I know, another film within a film) in which Affleck tries to school Damon : “You're like a child. What've I been telling you? You gotta do the safe picture. Then you can do the art picture. But then sometimes you gotta do the payback picture because your friend says you owe him.” They both turn and look at the camera for an obvious dig at Smith.

The overdoing it comes from this bit in the same film also involving Affleck who this time plays his CHASING AMY character Holden who warns - “I mean, I don't think I'm alone in the world in imagining this flick may be the worst idea since Greedo shooting first. You know it, but... a Jay and Silent Bob movie? Feature length? Who'd pay to see that?” Holden, Jay (Jason Mewes), and Silent Bob (Smith) all look right at us – and to really set things off - Silent Bob gives a smiling double thumbs-up.

6. TOP SECRET (Dir. Jerry Zucker, 1982) 

There are many audience acknowledging nods throughout the Zucker Brothers canon like the one quoted at the top of this blogpost but this Zucker scene really drives the point home: Val Kilmer’s Elvis derived '50s heart throb singer Nick Rivers pours his heart out: “Listen to me Hillary. I'm not the first guy who fell in love with a woman that he met at a restaurant who turned out to be the daughter of a kidnapped scientist only to lose her to her childhood lover who she last saw on a deserted island who then turned out fifteen years later to be the leader of the French underground." Hillary (Lucy Gutteridge) responds “I know. It all sounds like some bad movie.” They both recoil then look our way as if to say ‘did you get that?’ And speaking of 'getting that':

7. SPACEBALLS (Dir. Mel Brooks, 1987) 

After being given the plot synopsis Dark Helmet (Rick Moranis) looks at the camera and says "Everybody got that?" but most notably is the scene in which he and his minions actually put in a videocasette of SPACEBALLS to see what happens next and see themselves looking at themselves onscreen. Dark Helmet says : “what the hell am I looking at? When does this happen in the movie?” Colonel Sandurz (George Wyner) responds : “now. You're looking at now sir. Everything that happens now, is happening now.” Too bad this didn’t help this decade too late STAR WARS satire to be more “in the moment.”

8. JFK (Dir. Oliver Stone, 1991) 

I know, I know – every list I make has this film on it. Not only because it’s one of my all time favorite films but it does hold the monopoly on movie extras – deleted scenes, cameos, edits, and cinema contrivances galore confirm that it’s forever bloggable. That aside I really couldn’t leave out the moment that Garrison (Costner) wraps up his lengthy court summation by saying : “We, the people, the jury system sitting in judgement on Clay Shaw represent the hope of humanity against government power. In discharging your duty to bring a first conviction in this house of cards against Clay Shaw ‘ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country.’

Do not forget your dying king. Show this world that this is still a government ‘of the people, for the people and by the people’ Nothing as long as you live will ever be more important – it’s up to you.” As the camera goes upward but still holds Costner’s direct camera gaze we get a feeling that this breaking the 4th wall stuff isn’t just comedy kids stuff. Which brings us to:

9. WAYNE’S WORLD (Dir. Penelope Spheeris, 1992)

Like Eddie Murphy, Mike Myers has a SNL mugging at the camera background and the characters here come from a cable access show in which they talk directly to the camera so of course they would continue to bash holes in the ever so fraglie fourth wall. Funnily enough they use it to satirize product placement at the same time. Wayne tells sleazy TV exec Rob Lowe that he"will not bow to any sponsor" as he poses with a bag of Doritos, a piece of pizza from Pizza Hut, takes some Nuprin, and tops it all off with a swig of Pepsi. He grins at us and even says the slogan "it's the choice of a new generation."

10. THE MUPPET MOVIE (Dir. James Frawley, 1979)

Kermit and the other Muppets (my word program insists this should be capitalized) regularly consult the screenplay on their journey to stardom so it's unsurprising but still hilarious when Floyd Pepper (Jerry Nelson) says "well, if this were the movies..." and Dr. Teeth (Jim Henson) adds "which it is", Floyd continues "...we'd think of a clever plot device" then Scooter (Richard Hunt) energetically finishes "like disguising their car so they won't be recognized!"

Yep, when in doubt just think of how it would be done in the movies. It'll save you every time. Okay! That's enough meta-movie mania for right now - gotta go star in my own movie. Good luck with yours.

More later...

Apatow Arrives Again

So apparently from just about everything I read on the internets writer/producer/director Judd Apatow is the new king of cinema comedy. Apatow, whose credits include the cult TV series Freaks And Geeks, the 2005 hit THE 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN, and KNOCKED UP which was an early summer smash, now has another #1 movie - SUPERBAD (reviewed below). But wait a minute – he didn’t direct SUPERBAD. As this amusing New York Magazine blogpost tells us Greg Mattola did – Apatow was the producer. So why does it seem so much like Apatow was the director? Well, interviews with the cast members who pretty much were all in KNOCKED UP talk about taking notes from Apatow as much or more than they do Mattola and the film has more than one critic considering it part of Apatow’s series of immature-male-moves-forward-movies. Makes some sorta sense for this mass confusion I guess.

So on to the movie itself :

SUPERBAD (Dir. Greg Mattola, 2007) If you’ve heard anything about this movie you know the drill – we spend the day with a few foul mouthed teenagers trying to get laid. Yep - it’s like a zillion 80’s sex comedies as well as a homage to them at the same time. Seth Rogan and Evan Goldberg wrote the semi-autobiographical screenplay when they were teenagers but got too old to play the parts themselves. So now we’ve got Seth (Jonah Hill) and Evan (Michael Cera) filling in and a great pair they are. Their kind of chemistry can’t be faked and when joined by Fogle (more referred to as McLovin because that’s his name on his fake ID) played by Christopher Mint Plasse, a lot of hilarious riffing flies through the air. McLovin has his own sideline adventure when he bemusedly befriends a couple of inept cops played by Rogen (he had to put himself in the movie somehow) and Saturday Night Live’s Bill Hader. That bit, while it contains some big laughs, feels more like a comic convention than say, some of the other true to life sloppy shenanigans on display. Much better than your average teen flick these days (and better than anything Kevin Smith has done in ages) SUPERBAD isn’t for those who dislike lots of profanity and dick jokes but just about everybody else will find it really funny.

And Now A Recent Release DVD :

THE LOOKOUT (Dir. Scott Frank, 2007) After a prom-night joyride turns deadly, survivor Joseph Gordon-Levitt lives a quiet life with a blind mentor room-mate (Jeff Daniels) spending most of his time dealing with his guilt and trying to get his sequencing in order. You see - his mind still hasn't recovered from the accident and he has to constantly take notes to remind himself of the order of his day's events. He's not as extreme a case as the guy from MEMENTO but far from fully functional. Gordon-Levitt works as a night-shift janitor in a small bank and is being targeted to be an unwilling participant in a bank heist by a gang of pure movie thugs led by Matthew Goode. This is where the conventions of Gordon-Levitt's condition are exposed as just another piece in the contrived plot puzzle. It seems to take place in a world with only a handful of characters including a friendly bumbling cop who brings Gordon-Levitt doughnuts and whose fate we can see coming way in advance. Also annoying is the thunderous rumbling sound that’s dubbed onto just about every scene. You know, the sound from so many thriller trailers – usually paired with quick cuts to underscore tension and jar us. It’s a suspense string pulling manipulation – CUT IT OUT! Despite the good acting and some solid direction throughout (the sequencing is in perfect order) it's unfortunate that a routine heist plot is the order of the day. Gordon-Levitt is good though - he proves that like his intense turn in BRICK that he can handle weighty material. With hope next time around he'll get something weightier than this.

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DVD Babble Blurb Bash-tacular!

I have seen a lot of recent DVDs over the last few months that I haven't been blogged about so I thought it would be good to take a break from the summer sequel season and round up a handful and square them off. I tried to keep it in a brief blurb format but since this is film BABBLE the reviews of course wind on and on. Let's start with -

New Release DVD Recommendations :

LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA (Dir. Clint Eastwood, 2006) Word was that this was vastly superior to FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS but this politically correct companion piece is roughly the same quality in my estimation. Told from the Japanese point of view entirely in their language with sub-titles LETTERS has the same sense of earnest honor and the same grey overcast tint. The standout characters are General Tadamichi Kuribayashi (Ken Watanabe) the young Saigo (Kazunari Ninomira) who run into each other more than once in the tunnels between Mount Saribachi and the north side of the island as bombing and ground attacks by the American troops rage above. The melodrama involving the sympathy that emerges is handled deftly by Eastwood while the sentiment - such as the sunny Speilbergisms that sadly have defined the modern era war-film is kept in check. It may be too much to watch both FLAGS and LETTERS in one sitting or some double feature setting but both even with their glorified old-school faults (most likely from the screenplay written by CRASH * director Paul Hack-ish, oh - I mean Haggis) should not be missed.

* Incidentely my least favorite Best Picture Academy Award winning film ever!



49 UP (Dir. Michael Apted, 2005) The 7th in the excellent documentary series that began in 1964 with the bold statement - "Give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man" and followed 14 British children catching up with them every (yep) 7 years. Since most people I know haven't seen any of these movies I'd highly recommend the Up Series box-set which has the previous 6 films but honestly that's not absolutely necessary to enjoy this movie. Plenty of clips from all the films inform and enhance the new material and don't come off as redundant for those who have kept up. It would be too much for me to recount all the names, stories, and economic backgrounds so check out this Wikipedia entry if you are curious. Seeing this group of real people at the various stages of their lives through turmoil and peace makes for extremely satisfying viewing. Bring on 56 UP!

ROCKY BALBOA
(Dir. Sylvester Stallone, 2006)

It's hard for me to believe this is making my recommendations list. I mean as a kid I hated the ROCKY movies, ridiculed them with other snotty pimpled faced friends, and grew up to believe them to be populist Narcissistic America at its most lame brained epic-wannabes. At some point when I got older I caught the original Best Picture winning ROCKY and found myself liking it. It came from my favorite era of cinema (the 70's dummy!) and it was grittily touching in its portrayal of the boxing underdog making a name for himself. Then sequel-itis set in and the character became a machine who could never lose in glitzy gimmicky match-ups with Mr. T (III) and that evil Russian powerhouse played by Dolph Lundgren (IV) - yes that's right - Rocky was going to win the Cold War! I never even saw ROCKY V (1990) - so why do I like and recommend ROCKY BALBOA? Because we have Stallone at his most likable - an aging humble simpleton running a restaurant named after his deceased wife Adrian (Talia Shire - who is not deceased; she just didn't return to the series), telling the same fight stories, and brushing off daily indignities. It seems oddly necessary for Stallone to return to his Rocky roots - this is his best and most definable character and even with the contrived 'inspired by a video game simulation Rocky gets an exhibition match with the current troubled champ Mason 'The Line Dixon' (Antonio Tarver)' scenario, I hate to admit it but it works. Bring on JOHN RAMBO! Okay, no wait - that's a bit much.

And now :

New Release DVD Disses :

BOBBY (Dir. Emilio Estevez, 2006) I had heard the news upon its theatrical release that this was a NASHVILLE remake - relocated to the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles with the RFK assassination the backdrop to a convoluted mishmash of over 20 cliched '60s stereotypes. I held out 'til it came in that red Netflix envelope because of my love for political period pieces but damn was that description right on the money! The Altman derived framework doesn't disguise the awful screenplay with ham-fisted base dialogue like Nick Cannon playing an insufferably idealistic Kennedy staffer emoting "now that Dr. King is gone - no one left but Bobby. No one." Cannon joins an ace cast including Anthony Hopkins, Lawrence Fishborne, William H. Macy, Harry Belfonte, Christian Slater (one of the few non-idealist characters - he plays a base racist), and Estevez's Daddy Martin Sheen. Not so ace actors here include Elijah Wood, Lindsay Lohan, Demi Moore and Estevez himself. The cringe inducing cliches pile up - Ashton Kutcher does his worst acting ever (can't believe that was possible) as a hippy that would look phony on Dragnet 1967- during a horrifyingly stupid acid trip sequence actually sits staring at an orange in his hand saying "no, you shut up!", every TV set has a perfect quality picture of carefully chosen clips of RFK speeches and there's even a MAGNOLIA-esque montage going from strained close-up shots actor to actor. Can't deny the heart that went into this movie but all we have here is an A-list cast, B-list production values, C-list cliches, D-list overused soundtrack standards, and an F-list script. Somebody revoke Estevez's cinematic license! He should be exiled to the TV movie circuit after this film felony.

SMOKIN' ACES (Dir. Joe Carnahan, 2007) Another better than average cast slumming it through derivative drivel. Flashy Vegas gangster caper in which every one in the cast is after sleazy magician soon to be snitch Buddy Aces (Jeremy Piven - pictured on the left). Some are trying to protect him - (lawyer Curtis Armstrong, FBI agents Ryan Reynolds and Ray Liotta under the supervision of chief Andy Garcia) but everybody else is trying to kill him including Alicia Keys, Ben Affleck, Jason Bateman, and rapper Common - okay yeah so it's not A-list but most of them are still better than the material in this worn entry into the PULP FICTION-GET SHORTY-LOCK STOCK-GO sweepstakes that expired over a decade ago. Kind of like Shane Black's also post-dated glib witless KISS KISS BANG BANG (2005) SMOKIN' ACES is a lesson in how quick cutting and hip-hopisms don't ensure a clever crafty meta-movie. Just say Tarenti-NO to this piece of pop-nonsense.

This post (especially the disses) is dedicated to Good Morning America critic Joel Siegel (1943-2007). He became a film babble hero when he walked out of a screening of CLERKS II last summer. Knowing his days were numbered he figured he didn't want to waste his last hours on that crap. The fact that it pissed off Kevin Smith was the icing on the cake! Check out Roger Ebert's heartfelt tribute.


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