VAL: A Personal Portrait Of Val Kilmer That He Helped Make

Now airing on Amazon Prime:

VAL (Dirs. Leo Scott and Ting Poo, 2021)

Since I first saw Val Kilmer as an ‘50s Elvis-eque pop star charm his way through the zany comedy TOP SECRET back in 1984, I’ve liked the guy. He was matinee idol pretty, but he was a talented presence in film after film. Cut to now, and Kilmer has lost his ability to speak due to throat cancer and speaks in a twisted rasp through a voice box.

This is very sad, but in the new documentary, VAL, the actor appears to be making the most of it. First-time directors Leo Scott and Ting Pooh have fashioned a biodoc that has the edge on many artist’s portraits as since the ‘80s, Kilmer has constantly been recording his life with a home movie video camera. 

 

Whether he was capturing backstage Broadway shenanigans with fellow thespians Kevin Bacon and Sean Penn (who pushed Kilmer out of a leading role), hanging on film sets with co-stars, and playing with his kids - Jack and Mercedes, the products of his marriage to actress Joanne Whalley – Kilmer’s scores of footage makes his memories come alive.

 

The rest of the narrative concerns Kilmer’s current condition as he travels around with Jack as they go to events like Comicon, and visit his old drama school, Julliard in New York.

 

Because of Kilmer’s vocal ailment, his son, the 26-year old Jack narrates the film, reading his father’s words. Since Jack’s voice is stunningly similar to his Dad’s, the effect is so successful that at times I forgot it wasn’t his Dad speaking. 

 

Kilmer takes us through his filmography, albeit only briefly touching on each movie. He calls TOP SECRET “fluff,” TOP GUN “silly,” and WILLOW is seemingly only significant because he hooked up with Whalley, who he’d soon marry (come to think of it, that is more significant than the movie).

 

THE DOORS gets more coverage perhaps because it contains one of Kilmer’s most immersive performances as the Doors’ Jim Morrison. Oliver Stone’s 1991 epic rock biopic is too ridiculously over-the-top for it to make a real connection, but Kilmer’s take on the Lizard King is a true tour de force.

 

The ‘90s brought the anquished actor meatier roles in such modern classics as TOMBSTONE, in which he stole the movie as Doc Holliday; and HEAT, yet his one-time turn as Bruce Wayne/Batman in BATMAN FOREVER was far from a classic. But as Kilmer said, “You don’t turn down Batman, you don’t.”

 

Another notable bit is about making John Frankenheimer’s THE ISLAND OF DOCTOR MOREAU (1996), principally because it stared a bloated, uninterested Marlon Brando, who Kilmer long wanted to work with. We see how the doomed production left little time for Brando and Kilmer to have much of a meaningful collaboration, but there is a moment in which Kilmer pushes Brando back and forth on a hammock.

In one of the movie’s most emotional moments, Kilmer laments being on the autograph junket: “I’m selling basically my old self, my old career. For many people, it’s like the lowest thing you can do is talk about your old pictures, and sell photographs of when you were Batman or The Terminator…” Note: He has never played The Terminator; he was just generalizing.

I was skeptical about Kilmer playing Mark Twain in a one man play that was filmed and released as the movie, CITIZEN TWAIN, because Hal Holbrook owned the role for 60 or so years. But seeing clips of Kilmer’s version left me intrigued, so I may seek it out.

VAL is a terrifically touching look at a unique, and intense method actor maneuvering though a career that’s more commercial than he’s comfortable with. Now he’s struggling the side effects from throat cancer, and may be unable to return to acting again. I may have just spoken too soon, as I hear he's gonna to reprise his iconic role as Iceman in the TOP GUN sequel this fall. That's great because In these times of crazy confusion, damned diversity, and lack of artistic aventure, we need Val Kilmer more than ever.

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PALO ALTO: Franco Adapted Aimlessly

Now playing at an art house near me:

PALO ALTO (Dir. Gia Coppola, 2013)

James Franco's 2010 book of short stories that you didn't read gets adapted by a member of Francis Ford Coppola's family that you've never heard of in this aimless depiction of aimless Californian high school kids that you should skip.

The directorial debut of Coppola's grand daughter Gia, PALO ALTO introduces us to a small group of characters, neither of which feel fully fleshed out.

Let's see, there's a couple of stoner buddies, Teddy and Fred, played by Jack Kilmer (Val Kilmer's son) and Nat Wolff; who get in a hit-and-run accident early in the film. Teddy was driving so he ends up with community service, while Fred hooks up with Zoe Levin - a girl derided by her classmates as a “blowjob whore.”
 
More importantly there's Emma Roberts as a sensitive soccer playing virgin who baby-sits for her flirty coach (Franco, slyly stepping into his own material).

We've also got Val Kilmer as Robert's stoner stepfather, Jacqui Getty as her disconnected mother, and Coppola family friend Don Novello (Father Guido Sarducci, to fans of classic SNL) as an art teacher who may have the key to the film's supposed message.

Novello, in an anecdote devised as a criticism of Wolff's tossed off artwork, speaks of having a near death experience in which he realized he was in somebody else's shoes. It was somebody named Bob's “tunnel of death” and he could reverse the trajectory.

That message is all well and good, but the film's loose structure and artsy montages of these folks' meaningless existence doesn't earn the film the weighty conclusion its going for. It's as half baked as any of the threads here.

Because of the rowdy party scenes throughout, I felt like the film itself was a party; albeit one that I wasn't a friend of anyone there and didn't want to stick around. You know those lame parties where suddenly somebody cool shows up and you think 'hey, this might good'?

Well, that's how it felt here when Chris Messina (The Mindy Project, ARGO, JULIE & JULIA) appeared as Wolff's stoner father (yes, everybody is a stoner here) who appears to try to put the moves on Kilmer's Teddy. But after one brief scene that doesn't amount to much, Messina is gone and we're back with these dull, drifting drones.

PALO ALTO doesn't seem to have anything to say about these people. The theme of waste comes to mind when seeing Kilmer toss his just complimented on art into a hallway trashcan, or in the way the camera lingers on a pink milkshake thrown onto the pavement, but that idea is just one of many that isn't followed through. I will say that Autumn Durald's cinematography is often stunning, however.

Franco's creepy coach character, whose pleading to Roberts to be with him may be one of the hardest to watch moments in his entire career, has no depth either. Its a small sideline role that gives us no insight to who the guy is, except that he's a pedophile, but that we could guess rat off the bat.

Roberts, who should be given credit for doing her best with this dire material, blankly says in one party scene: “I think all movies and TV and video games these days are pointless.” Well, not all, but this one sure is.

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MACGRUBER: The Film Babble Blog Review

MACGRUBER (Dir. Jorma Taccone, 2010)



MacGruber! Making a movie out of a flimsy SNL sketch!

MacGruber! Which will most likely be clobbered by SHREK FOREVER AFTER's opening weekend grosses!

MacGruber! His movie actually doesn't suck!

MacGruber!!!!!

The first film derived from a Saturday Night Live sketch in a decade (the last being 2000's THE LADIES MAN) accomplishes something surprising - it's much better than the sketches on which it's based.

With a few exceptions, like when Betty White famously appeared as MacGruber's grandmother earlier this month, I've found the sketches to be irritatingly repetitive. They always concern a countdown in a control room in which Will Forte's MacGyver take off fails to halt a bomb's detonation because of whatever neurosis of the week he's dealing with.

Of course, you can't make an entire movie out of repeatedly blowing up the hero so borrowing heavily from the 80's action movie handbook we get a something resembling a plot. Which is - the ridiculously over decorated special operative MacGruber is called out of retirement because his arch nemesis, named...wait for it...Dieter Von Cunth (Val Kilmer), has stolen a nuclear warhead and threatens to, in his words, "turn Washington D.C. into a pile of ash."

Brought back into action by the always welcome Powers Boothe as Col. James Faith, the mulleted MacGruber assembles a team of beefed up "American heroes with over 100 years of combined combat experience." The early fate of this team is one of the better jokes in the film so I'll just say MacGruber has to make do with Lt. Dixon Piper (Ryan Phillippe) as his second in command, and Forte's fellow SNL-er Kristen Wiig as Vicki St. Elmo who is just as stuck in the '80s hairstyle and fashion-wise as our uber-unlikely hero.

There's a back story involving Kilmer's killing of MacGruber's fiancee (Maya Rudolph) 10 years previous which ups the stakes - MacGruber threatens Kilmer with his signature "throat rip" among other, uh, unsavory things. Apart from that it's what you'd expect, not that that's a bad thing, from an over the top action comedy directed and co-written by one of the minds behind SNL digital shorts like "Lazy Sunday." It's a hard R with more F-bombs than actual bombs, scads of crude juvenile humor, and the most hilarious sex scene since TEAM AMERICA.

By no means a comic masterpiece since it's a little too sloppy and choppy to qualify; MACGRUBER is funnier than it has a right to be.

Forte's fearless gusto - which means he'll even go nude for a laugh - and his mock egotistical line readings make for a performance that's maybe not a tour de force, but certainly a minor comedic triumph.

As his meek but eager love interest, Wiig registers much more favorably than in her recent blank slate roles such as EXTRACT, WHIP IT, and DATE NIGHT. This is sort of odd due to the purposely shallow nature of Wiig's character, yet she has some of the funniest bits in the film.



Kilmer comes off beautifully as the oily bad guy in Euro trash threads sporting a slimy smirk. It's the kind of role he's perfect for as it tweaks his former 80's it boy status and gives him big artillery backdrops to chew on.

Phillippe, apart from some celery silliness which I won't spoil, plays his role straight as if he's in an actual action movie and that's the right idea.

True satire movie-wise is hard to come by these days so don't really expect any of it in MACGRUBER. It has spoofery in its genes, but it's more content to exist in the margins of immature buffoonery.

For folks looking for a mindless summertime diversion with more than its share of decent jokes, it should do just fine.

More later...

Nick's Un Caged Fury

BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL - NEW ORLEANS 
(Dir. Werner Herzog, 2009)


So is this a remake? A re-imagining? 

Is it connected to Abel Ferrara's 1992 corrupt cop cult classic in any way than the title? The answer is that it is, and it isn't. Both films concern a police detective summed up by the first film's tagline: "Gambler. Thief. Junkie. Killer. Cop." 

Herzog claims that he never saw the '92 version, and that the title is a marketing ploy. 

Whatever the Hell it is, this is for certain: It's a weird wild ride through the cracked psyche of, well, a very bad lieutenant and it's Nicholas Cage's best work in nearly a decade. Unlike Harvey Keitel's character in Ferrara's film, only credited as "The Lieutenant," Cage is given a name: Terrence McDonaugh.

He is also given a new location - post Katrina New Orleans. His first case after being promoted involves the brutal slaying of five Senegalese immigrants. He follows the leads sometimes with his partner Val Kilmer, but mostly alone abusing his power at every opportunity, shaking down almost everybody for drugs and seeing iguanas and alligators that aren't there in light fractured shots that are as disturbing as they are wickedly funny. 

Take away the crazy Cage character and this would be a routine cop drama going from one witness to another on the trail of the killer, but this is completely about the crazy Cage character with the plot a hazy afterthought. You wouldn't expect or want a standard cop thriller from Herzog, but this doesn't exactly qualify as a genre deconstruction either - it's more like genre destruction. 

There are no high speed chases or violent fist fights and when the story circles back on itself in the last reel it feels surreal - a satire of dream logic almost. 

Though Kilmer barely registers in a walk through of a role there is a strong supporting cast aiding Cage. Eve Mendes (a former Cage costar in GHOST RIDER) is on hand as Cage's strung out hooker girlfriend, Brad Dourif puts in a sharp turn as a cranky bookie, and Jennifer Coolidge (Stiffler's Mom!) has an uncharacteristic part as Cage's father's (Tom Bower) partner. Also look for Michael Shannon, Fairuza Balk, and Xzibit as a drug kingpin aptly named "Big Fate" if you can actually take your eyes off Cage. 

Cage's outrageously off kilter performance fills the screen with kinetic energy that wonderfully erases the horrible memories of such dreck as the NATIONAL TREASURE movies and the other crappy commercial fare that has plagued his career of late. It's a gutsy gripping piece of acting that made me giggle throughout. He takes hits from what he calls his "lucky crack pipe" and spouts such baffling bat-shit insane phrases as "I'll kill all of you. To the break of dawn. To the break of dawn, baby!" 

Cage engages in the kind of sordid behavior that makes Harvey Keitel's take on the character look positively subdued. 

BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL - NEW ORLEANS (a horrible title whatever its reasoning) is an intoxicating surprise, but I'm sure it'll rub many moviegoers wrong. 

It makes no apologies and has no moralistic message so it really stands out in this otherwise saccharin season. It's an unruly and unhinged work by a master of obsessed cinema. It's an experience that will linger long after like a vivid nightmare and while that might not sound like a recommendation - believe me it is.

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New DVD Diatribes For A Dreary Rainy Day

Yep, a few NetFlix envelopes torn open and their contents digested on a cloudy drizzly May day goes somethin' like this: 

MY KID COULD PAINT THAT (Dir. Amir Bar-Lev, 2007)

Is Marla Olmstead just a regular 4 year old who likes to paint or is she a artistic genius on the scale of the great masters? Bar-Lev's documentary filmed a few years back follows the Olmsteads - a family from Binghampton, NY whose youngest daughter's abstract canvasses cause a sensation in the art world. 

Her paintings are sold for thousands attracting media attention and then controversy. A 60 Minutes piece claims that Marla's father (Mark Olmstead) actually coached the work out of her or actually produced the paintings himself. This is where the narrative arc becomes “a story about a story” as Elizabeth Cohen (the columnist who first broke the original story of Marla as child prodigy) says. Parents Mark and Laura Olmstead are outraged at the accusation that they are exploiting their child and attempt to prove that Marla is the sole author of her work by filming her with a hidden camera. The plot thickens even more as filmmaker Bar-Lev has growing doubts and voices them, at first alone to his camera in the car driving from the Olmstead home then directly to the parents in an extremely uncomfortable but still compelling scene in their living room. 

The cleverly named MY KID COULD PAINT THAT is one of the best of the current crop of documentaries and one that leaves you guessing about what really went down much like CAPTURING THE FRIEDMANS or the more recent THE KING OF KONG. Having been introduced to these folk through these visual essays, whether or not they are balanced portraits, we can follow up through the further internet coverage and make our own conclusions. In Marla's unique case we are shown many of her paintings and much footage of her at work. Her father Mark does seem to have a controlling influence and her work when filmed on her own appears to be different by style and method to the previous examples. 

Mark Olmstead also seems overly defensive and makes some 'digging a hole' type comments like: “I don't want this documentary to be about 60 Minutes although everybody wants to talk about 60 Minutes but I'm not! Because I don't talk about it ever until you guys are around!” 

Still, as Bar-Lev sensitively stresses through-out the film Marla and her family seem like nice people who got caught up in the craziness of modern art marketing and manipulation. It's hard not to have sympathy for their situation but if the attacks on the arts authorship have truth to them it's pretty damning nonetheless. 

Mother Linda at a frustrated moment says “documentary gold” right before tearfully walking off camera - she says it extremely sarcastically but it may be the most truthful remark made in this movie. When Marla comes of age it will be interesting to hear what she says about her parents and painting dominated childhood - a prospect that I'm sure Bar-Lev is looking forward to.

CONSPIRACY (Dir. Adam Marcus, 2008)

I've been working on a book about conspiracy movies for some time so I feel obligated to see every such related movie so it's obvious why this made my NetFlix queue.

A quasi-remake of BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK, this awful unimaginatively titled film features a chunky Val Kilmer acting as wooden as possible returning from Iraq to seek out a fellow soldier friend from the war. He travels to a town in the South West which is being re-built as a corporate-run old timey tourist trap by an evil millionaire played by the slimily charming Gary Cole. 

Kilmer, suffering from constant over dramatic Iraq flashbacks, finds that his friend is missing and everybody is mum on the subject and of course that Cole wants him out of town. 

One cowboy hatted cliché even says: “ Throw in local hottie Jennifer Esposito, a Keystone cluster of corrupt cops, the most predictable shoot-outs this side of YOUNG GUNS II and the result is craptacular. 

Cole, an under-rated actor (TALLADEGA NIGHTS, OFFICE SPACE, THE BRADY BUNCH MOVIE), is the only one who seems to be having fun with his hackneyed character. His smirking scene stealing makes me think that they should have handled this material satirically. 

Kilmer can do comedy too, as his performances in TOP SECRET, THE REAL McCOY and even in his overblown impression of Jim Morrison in THE DOORS (well, I laughed) attest so really I wish they had gone that route. 

Instead all we have is this predictable retread through the leftover plot devices of the before mentioned BAD DAY... mixed with the lowbrow aesthetics of the WALKING TALL series and severely sucky remake. 

As a lover of both good and bad conspiracy themed movies I couldn't even make counting the clichés a fun game with this being just downright dreadful and well deserving of its Direct-To-DVD status.

I WANT SOMEONE TO EAT CHEESE WITH (Dir. Jeff Garlin,  2006)

Garlin's debut as triple threat leading man, writer, and director is somewhat slight but like Garlin himself - it's a lovable schlub of a movie.

Best known as Larry David's manager Jeff Green on Curb Your Enthusiasm Garlin has a long list of credits in comedy and casts lots of longtime buddies from his Second City days and sitcom background in this film. 

Garlin plays a guy not unlike himself - had he never left Chicago and lived with his mother (Mina Kolb - an original Second City Player). He hears about a remake of the classic Ernest Borgnine movie MARTY, a film he's convinced he's perfect for, and pines for an audition. He meets a quirky ice-cream parlour clerk played by comedienne Sarah Silverman and he pines for her too. 

Then there's Bonnie Hunt as a “chubby chaser” school teacher (as Amy Sedaris labels her in a nice cameo) who actually may be a more sensible choice for Garlin.

That's about it for what we've got here plotwise but Garlin makes it a breezy affable affair at an economical 80 minutes with a nice helping of heart. I'm glad that I watched MARTY (Dir. Sydney Lumet, 1956) for the first time not long ago. I think it's the definitive good, not great, movie to win the Best Picture Academy Award. Garlin's I WANT SOMEONE TO EAT CHEESE WITH references MARTY so often that it posits itself as a companion piece.

It indeed would make a good double feature. If you want to make it a triple feature throw in John Candy in ONLY THE LONELY (1991) - another film about a frustrated fat man that owes something to Ernest Borgnine's turn. I, like many, can relate to Garlin's struggles with his weight, love-life, and crumbling career.

The tone and timing with so many recognizable comedy folk including Dan Castelletta (Homer Simpson!), Tim Kazurinsky (SNL in the 80's), and Richard Kind (Mad About You, Spin City), all hitting their marks is right on the money - and I mean the low budget money. 

Jeff Garlin says on the commentary that he feels he made a good, not great movie. He's right - like the movie he's giving props to (MARTY of course) it is good and while it would never get an Oscar I'm sure it'll gain a lot of fans. Now I'm gonna go check out if I have any cheese...

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Kissing Off KISS KISS BANG BANG

"Were you at the cinema? Did you go to the the cinema? 'Cause I went to the movies." - Shane Black questioning Val Kilmer on the commentary for KISS KISS BANG BANG Yep- that's the only flick I've seen since my last post. So here goes : KISS KISS BANG BANG (Dir. Shane Black, 2005) Its title comes from a phrase coined by an Italian newspaper critic in 1962 referring to James Bond: "Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" and the whole tone of this movie is just that self consciously hip - well smartass really. It even has a detective film type voice over by Robert Downey Jr. of the smarmy variety (Man, ROMEO IS BLEEDING did the "hey, wait I'm getting a little ahead of myself" fractured narration so much better!) and a convoluted plot which is annoyingly a homage to Raymond Chandler (like what LA crime caper isn't?) it even quotes the man directly in sequence heading titles. There is some good work here in both the writing and acting - Val Kilmer as Gay Perry (that name is not an example of good work in the writing - just to be clear) makes the smarm work for him and Michelle Monaghan amusingly plays with her lines just like her character toys with her men. Its just that the whole thing is so drenched in smartass sarcasm that it made me think repeatedly "this movie is sooo ten years ago!" George Burns once said "the secret of acting is sincerity. If you can fake that, you've got it made." Wish Shane Black had learned to fake a little better on this project. Now here's an email I got from a filmbabble reader about my last post : "I don't know...the Silverman thing? some of it's funny but there's a line between being funny and just being an arsehole. But I guess that's pretty much all comedy. I guess i don't know which side i'm on. Like that lemonade joke, pretty damn funny, mighty clever, but i feel like there's no real empathy or anything to give it weight; just an easy joke. Actually really looking forward to Superman, don't really know why. Haven't kept up with it in years. hey, ever accidentally lock your keys in your...motorcycle? Now see, that's sharp and empathetic -who hasn't been there? Sorry, Drunk Thanks Drunk for your comments. Keep on reading Film Babble Blog! More later...

Elvis Impersonation On Film: 10 Pretenders To The Crown

Inspired by the inspired casting of cult legend Bruce Campbell (The EVIL DEAD movies) as Elvis Presley in BUBBA HO TEP (2002) (to be released on DVD on May 25th) we thought it would be fun to take a look at:

ELVIS IMPERSONATION ON SCREEN: 10 PRETENDERS TO THE CROWN

1. KURT RUSSELL

Russell took on the roll of the King in the 1979 made-for-TV ELVIS : THE MOVIE (his first of five films for director John Carpenter), and also voiced Presley in FORREST GUMP. His uncanny likeness to the King was further exploited when he played an Elvis impersonator in Demian Lichtenstein’s 3000 MILES TO GRACELAND (2001). Amazingly Russell's first feature film role when he was only a child was in an Elvis movie, Michael Taurog's IT HAPPENED AT THE WORLD'S FAIR (1963). The best Elvis on this list for sure.

2. MICHAEL ST. GERALD: Also a convincing look-a-like, Gerald did a brief cameo as Elvis in Jim McBride's unfortunately lame-as-Hell Jerry Lee Lewis bio-pick GREAT BALLS OF FIRE (1989, but he had better material and a more respectful forum in the sinfully short-lived Elvis TV series (1990). Like with Russell's turn as the King, Gerald's vocals were provided by Ronnie McDowell.

3. NICHOLAS CAGE: Never played Elvis on film but appeared as Tiny Elvis on Saturday Night Live in 1992, disguised himself as a sky-diving Elvis impersonator in HONEYMOON IN VEGAS, was a curled lipped Elvis fanatic in David Linch’s WILD AT HEART, and he was briefly married to Lisa Marie Presley. Whew!

4. ANDY KAUFMAN

Only on stage and SNL did Kaufman do his full blown Elvis impression but he’s one of a kind on this list because he was approved by the King as his own favorite impersonator. In Milos Forman's 2000 biopic MAN ON THE MOON when Jim Carrey did Andy doing Elvis I heard that somewhere in the cosmos John Belushi's caller ID exploded. I have no idea what that means.

5. VAL KILMER: Not content with having nailed the Lizard King, Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's THE DOORS (1991), Kilmer inhabited the character of Elvis' ghost who counsels Christian Slater in Tony Scott's Quentin Tarantino-scripted TRUE ROMANCE (1992).

6. DAVID KEITH: An awful unconvincing portrayal in Chris Columbus' awful unconvincing 1988 comedy HEARTBREAK HOTEL, a severely misguided attempt to theorize that Elvis’s last sad years in Vegas could have been turned around by idealistic teenager who kidnaps him as a gift for his depressed mother Tuesday Weld. Weld was actually in a movie with the King, Philip Dunne's WILD IN THE COUNTRY (1961), but I digress.

7. DON JOHNSON: What the…?!!? Yep, that's right. In Gus Trikonis' long forgotten 1981 TV movie ELVIS AND THE BEAUTY QUEEN, the later stubbled, sockless, pink T-shirt wearing Miami Vice superstar was actually cast as the King. 

8. DALE MIDKIFF: Who?!!? I dunno, just a guy who played the King in ELVIS AND ME, another bad Elvis made-for-TV movie based on Priscilla Presley’s book of the same name. Shame shame shame.

9. RICK PETERS

Any Elvis impersonator would be doomed in Allan Arkush's extremely lowbrow 1997 cable movie ELVIS MEETS NIXON, but this guy doesn’t cut it at all.

10. STEPHEN JONES: Just for a haunting moment in Jim Jarmusch’s MYSTERY TRAIN (1989) Elvis’s ghost appears to Nicoletta Braschi giving this execellent movie another layer in it’s depiction of late 80’s Memphis. Also in the same movie the late great Joe Strummer spouts: “Don't call me Elvis! If you can't use my proper name, why don't you try "Carl Perkins, Jr." or something? I mean, I don't call them "Sam & Dave", do I?”

Until next time: Elvis has left the building.

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