Arrivals:
Mr. Pants is flying in from NYC today. He will be going out for food with me tomorrow, after a day spent with Glenn Gould. I am pretty excited. Excited to see my good friend, and excited to see my vast internet orders of quilting cotton.
Departures: My respect for Christian Slater.
After watching a “movie” on TMN called ‘Alone in the Dark’, starring Mr. Slater and Tara Reid last night, which was clearly scripted by a room full of masturbating 13-year-old boys with A.D.D. and a *gigantic* collection of Hellboy, Blade, Alien and Preacher comics, all respect earned from such projects as ‘Name of the Rose’ and ‘Heathers’ is dead to me. It was on its way out with ‘Bed of Roses’, but this really nailed the coffin shut.
Where does “Untamed Heart” fall in the Christian Slater Hall of Sh/Fame? Cuz I really love it. I did a presentation today on heart transplantation and was able to include some gems from the movie!
My respect for Christian Slater never diminishes — I just feel bad for him that he’s been reduced to accepting roles in movies like Mindhunters and Alone In The Dark to keep himself in rent and Master Replicas Lightsabers.
AITD, by the way, was written and directed by a guy called Uwe Boll, who is universally despised in both the horror and gaming communities for films like this and House Of The Dead. It was also made years ago and only recently pulled off the shelf to release, as amply evidenced by Tara Reid’s lack of fake breasts in the film.
I should just like to echo the revulsion of Mr. Boll, and in particular AITD, which I know i have reviled elsewhere. It is at the top of my worst movies list, which is saying something considering the crap you’ve made me watch, and the double feature of Battlefield Earth I willingly sat through.
For myself, it is in the top ten, but not number one. Don’t get me wrong — this movie is terrible, and should be arrested on about 12 billion points of plot thievery and bad writing. But there are other films, that sadly, have sucked marginally worse. However…
You could make a drinking game out of Tara Reid’s one and only line “You guys, come over here!” It’s like being trapped in a really badly scripted computer RPG where you can’t control the characters.
And I simply could not believe that they copped the drooling alien-head-slowly-descending-from-above scene when the last of the 713 members finds his female teammate with her head repulsively split in two. Note to writers: any sci-fi audience who breathes oxygen without assistance is going to know where you stole that from. Making the alien/beast/creature have two heads is NOT COVERING UP YOUR CRIME.
Also? Try some consistency, you bastards. Your beast creatures are EITHER fast-moving, uncontrollable destroyers of men OR patient, intelligent predators. Not both. Have you ever seen a zombie flick where half the zombies are lumbering, drooling, moaning and the other half are running and attacking at blinding speeds? No. Because you choose how your zombification process works, and then that becomes the physics of the movie. What you need more of, is science.
I mean, the makeup alone should have won some sort of Bulwer-Lytton-L’Oreal prize or something. If I cared enough to really engage in wondering, I might muse as to why the “infected” orphans looked okay when they were doing their initial attacks on Mr. Slater, but when they went boogaloo en masse, attacking the 713 squad, suddenly they were all pale and veiny, like extras from “Interview with the Vampire”. Seriously, WTF?
Absolutely it is in the top ten, but all-time worsts are still reserved for such gems as the *unbelievably* bad “The Pallbearer” with David Schwimmer and that Paltrow girl, “Mr. Nanny” (Hulk Hogan’s pro-wrestler-turned-babysitter flick that is the unfortunate precursor to other abominations like Arnie’s “Kindergarden Cop”, ” or Eddie Murphy’s godawful “Vampire in Brooklyn.”
Eddie Murphy is the most impossibly hit-or-miss actor I have ever seen. He can make a bad or weak concept good (Coming to America WHICH I LOVE, Beverly Hills Cop, The Golden Child, 48hrs., Trading Places), or he can annihilate all joy from a movie by overacting as though he’s trying to be the black Jim Carrey (Vampire in Brooklyn, Nutty Professor, Dr. Dolittle) or he can be a total neutral factor, neither adding nor detracting from the film he is in (Haunted Mansion, Daddy Day Care, Boomerang, etc).
And that’s my bad-movie rant for this morning.
Perhaps I *am* judging Mr. Slater a little too harshly – I’ve certainly done things I’m not proud of in order to pay the rent. Librarianship. Comic book retail. Desk jobs.
No, wait; I’m proud of almost all of those things. Except the self-imposed life in a cubicle. No pride there.
But still… couldn’t he have stood up for himself in at least a few small ways? Perhaps he could have said:
“Listen, I may have fallen so low as to have to work on the set of this insult to intelligence and good taste, but there is NO WAY I will permit you to attire me in this brown trenchcoat and black, scoop-necked tank top for the duration of shooting.
No, I don’t care what you say about how women will want to ogle my biceps and fleshy, hairless pectorals when I begin disrobing for the grotesque sex I will have to act out with Ms. Reid in scene 4. There’s no call for a man my age to be wearing a scoop-necked wife beater. I look retarded in it, and I will not put it on.
Also, the audience for this film, if there ever is one, will undoubtedly be able to relate to the brown trenchcoat. But should we really be encouraging them in this sort of sartorial suicide? Should we not give them a role model, by permitting my deluded-paranormal-obsessed-nerd character to have landed his hot blond girlfriend by virtue of his snazzy, crisp white button-downs and fitted blazers? Let’s think Duchovny in X-Files, Steve McQueen, Sir Michael Caine… if the movie can’t have class, at least let my wardrobe loan it some dignity!
I hate you all! I spit on you for giving me these clothes! Pthoo!”
Frankly, it’s the least he could have done. That, and issued a public apology to his fans.