Reviews
Some Jerk with a Camera (2011)
It IS possible to love something - and snark at it!
Tony Goldmark is the aforementioned Some Jerk. He loves theme parks, but it is a love with eyes wide open. Through some sophisticated filming with his friends, he's able to show theme park attractions and shows in detail, without getting thrown out. (Hint: he intentionally NEVER says anything upsetting or contemptuous in the parks. Anything like that gets added in post. Watch the episodes closely to see how this works.) More than anything else, he observes how corporate decisions affect what you see and experience in theme parks. This is most apparent in his two-part review of the Captain EO attraction, showing how Michael Jackson was suddenly in favor, then out, then back in favor when he died.
My personal favorite is his review of the revised Star Tours attraction. Every mixed feeling or questionable decision of Lucasfilm and Disney gets its due...with his soliloquy about a certain floppy-eared resident of the planet Naboo his greatest performance of all.
He's wise enough not to take himself too seriously. But, no matter how pointedly he critiques attractions, he cares deeply for the theme park experience. He knows Disney and Universal history, enough so that he can illustrate his reviews with appropriate (and deliberately inappropriate) film clips and music. If you've ever attended a park, and especially if you've ever worked at one, you'll love these reviews.
A word about content; Mr. Goldmark does get scatological at times. These reviews are not for little children. Teenage and above will find them okay, at least teenagers not raised in the more backwards parts of our nation.
The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes (2010)
Earth's Nerdiest Heroes?
This new series has several virtues. It starts out with the small roster of heroes that Lee and Kirby put together in the 1960's. They're drawn in a clean, uncomplicated style that owes a lot to anime. The voice actors work well, with Eric Loomis trying to sound as much like Morton Downey Jr. as he can.
The main problem is that Film Roman, Marvel Animation and ultimately Disney decided to fling as many villains as they could onto the screen as fast as possible. This is a flood of characters, whom only a dedicated Marvel comics nerd could recognize and appreciate. I'm guessing it was done to establish copyright or something, but it makes dramatic hash out of the show's story line.
Over the first thirteen episodes, the story line jumps between characters and time lines. There's little sense of growth or dramatic coherence as the team is formed in the first episodes. Jumping around in the time line also makes continuity a mess.
And in a stupid, politically correct move that Steven Spielberg might have inspired, they took out the Nazis. In the story line it's the terrorist organization Hydra that fought World War II against the Allies. This obviously helps the series to run in Germany (which still bans the use of Nazi iconography) but it betrays the connection of comics to real-world evil.
Comics were largely created by Jews, one of their great contributions to American culture, and they put their anger at the Holocaust and the prejudice they faced in America into their stories. To get rid of the Nazis and their real evil is a betrayal of their source material.
If Disney was hoping this would get kids interested in their upcoming live-action Avengers movie, they will be disappointed.
ABC Afterschool Specials: My Mom's Having a Baby (1977)
Fondly remembered....but troubling in retrospect.
I worked at an ABC affiliate when this After School Special (or A.S.S. as we used to call them) aired. I thought it was an outstanding way to explain pregnancy and childbirth to children. Years later, I wanted to look this up on DVD or VHS, or even YouTube. I got an unpleasant surprise.
When the video proved to be unavailable, I searched the name "Dr. Lendon Smith." I came upon a web site called Quackwatch that gave the history of Dr. Smith in the years after "My Mom" and its sequel "Where Do Teenagers Come From?" I advise you to read the information there, but in summary, Smith had his medical license limited for improperly prescribing drugs.
Later, instead of facing charges of trying to defraud insurance companies, Smith surrendered his medical license and "retired." By that time he was involved in the Food Terror movement: he wrote a series of books blaming flour, white sugar and other "non-natural" foods for medical problems with children. Before his death in 2001, he was part of the cult of non-doctor "doctors" who pushed food additives and vitamins instead of legitimate medical care.
What troubles me is that this video - which, again, I couldn't find for sale anywhere - is reportedly still used in schools to teach reproduction and birth. Perhaps it's accepted because it almost completely ducks the sex act; it's as close to "sex without sex" as fearful conservatives can get. But given Dr. Smith's history, a person might want to think twice about using this for teaching kids.
Deadgirl (2008)
Almost a moral story about being a teenage boy.
I detest the modern horror film, especially those with gratuitous violence. I watched this one because the violence was reported to be NOT gratuitous. It wasn't, but it fell short of being good.
It's obvious that the two boys are frustrated in dealing with girls. They understand that to play the game, you have to be "nice" to girls and "obey" them, and if you're poor, ugly and awkward you have to debase yourself even more. Thus the discovery of a "living dead girl" is a dream come true; a girl they can have sex with, without pretending to be "nice." It's been suggested that the film is actually a fantasy, or a metaphor playing out in the boys' heads. Maybe so, but the filmmakers didn't wish to make that clear. In fact, we don't really get to understand the boys enough to figure out why they might turn sadistic and violent. Is this what is inside every rejected, lonely nerd? Are we all Harris and Klebold just waiting for an occasion to strike? We don't know, and the film doesn't want to tell us.
Incomplete, fragmented and unclear storytelling do not make a film "deep." If this film had been more coherent, it might have been celebrated despite the gore, cursing and near inaudible audio engineering. As it is, a 4 is generous.
SpaceDisco One (2007)
A dark and almost suicidal production.
A lot has been said about Packard's dark view of the film industry, and how he wrecked himself financially by giving away free copies of his earlier films. Despite his personal eccentricity, he has a point to make about film culture. By making it explicit in this film, he sheds light on his earlier productions like "The Untitled Star Wars Mockumentary" and "Reflections of Evil."
The big SPOILER is Packard's belief, stated overtly in this film, that the world was scheduled to end in 1985. He says mankind's ideas were supposed to run out at that point, and by continuing to exist, our creative efforts are just bad copies of mankind's last intended works. I don't think Packard means this ironically or comically. All his "mashups" of old video seem to worship the sex, violence and exuberance of 70's movies. I think he believes he would have thrived in that environment, and also believes that contemporary movies and cultural products are worthless.
Having said that, aside from just trying to make a buck, why would anyone with Packard's philosophy continue to make movies at all? Once you get through the silliness and oblique references (Packard seems to think we know as much about cultural history as he does, a severe miscalculation) "SpaceDisco One" leaves you feeling pity for Packard. He seems lost in the past and can't find any satisfaction in the present or future.
The Outer Limits: Nightmare (1963)
Joseph Stefano vs. Rod Serling.
This episode brought Joseph Stefano, the series creator and writer of this episode, into conflict with Rod Serling. Serling fully supported the military and authority, and many of his "Twilight Zone" episodes revolved around the military. In Serling's script for "The Rack," a man who broke under torture in the Korean Conflict is blamed for being weak and failing America. In Serling's view, the military was always right.
"Nightmare" is a new view of this situation; the quotes of the general in the episode are essentially correct about the number of American prisoners who were broken in the war. Serling couldn't imagine American soldiers permitting torture, especially on other Americans. This despite such things as the Tuskeegee Syphillis Project and the exposure of soldiers to atomic blasts to determine the effects of radiation. One wonders how he'd react to Abu Gareb, water torture, and the show "24" in which torture is approved as standard American heroic action.
For those who think these "old TV shows" were simplistic compared to today's shows with CGI, sexual content and viral-marketing web sites, consider this; have there been any modern shows that dared raise a debate about their premises like the ones raised by Stefano and Serling? Would anyone produce a series arguing against the right-wing paranoia presented in "24?"
The Lost Continent (1968)
Possibly the British Ed Wood film???
The principal quality of the movies of Edward D. Wood Jr. was that he had far-reaching ideas, but no ability to write them down, explain them or put them on film. That's how this film works.
For instance, in the first part of the film, where we meet the motley groups of passengers, we learn some of their secrets and intrigues. In a well-done picture these would have paid off in the conclusion. The idea of these worn-out, ruined people with their regrets, coming together to become heroes at the climax, would have been great. They do have a bit of heroism halfway through (during the lifeboat sequence) but in the conclusion, their personalities seem to disappear and it's all generic action. All that preparation, no payoff.
And the bad guys - the religious fanatics, made pretty ridiculous to avoid angering any present-day religions - didn't make much sense. If they went around killing anybody who violated Vatican...er, the fanatic's morality, there wouldn't be a lot of people left to do all the work. And are we to believe that our crew is the only 20th century ship to be caught by the Lost Continent? To me, this is Britain's Ed Wood film (although British readers could probably come up with better examples).
It is probably the best "bad" film Hammer ever made, still watchable no matter how ridiculous it gets. In fact, recent TV series like "The Lost World" and the Xena-Hercules shows aren't any less ridiculous. A producer and director of genius could remake this film as a TV series, improving it tremendously with just a little bit more thought. I'm thinking of Gene Roddenberry's "The Fantastic Journey" short-run TV series as a model.
The Untitled Star Wars Mockumentary (2003)
Is it satire, or is it vitriol?
The story of how Damon Packard went broke making his movies and distributing thousands of DVD's for free is legendary. He not only left piles of them on top of ATM machines, he not only hired the homeless to hand them out to people at conventions, he reportedly received restraining orders from celebrities to whom he mailed multiple copies. I wasn't lucky enough to get a freebie; I purchased this film twice, once on VHS (long lost) and once on DVD, along with his new film "SpaceDisco-1."
Packard is a die-hard nostalgic for films of the 1970's. On the same tape/DVD as this movie is a segment...I can't really call it a "short film" or a "featurette." I guess the best description of it is "noodling around." It's Packard inserting himself into the movie "Winning," with that film's magnificent main theme blasting away and footage of Formula One racing spliced in. I think in a way, Packard is saying he wished he had directed "Winning," in that era, and hates the fact that he's working outside the industry as an unappreciated independent filmmaker in the 21st Century.
And since the movie industry as it exists today was largely shaped by George Lucas, of course Packard hates Lucas. His criticism of Lucas - voiced by a character in the film - includes the charge that Lucas has never filmed a sex scene. Yes, eroticism and visual sex has pretty much disappeared from movies, but is that Lucas's fault or a change in society? (Or maybe because sex isn't so much a mystery to us any more?)
Packard does poke some important and needed holes in Star Wars and Lucas. Yes, Lucas has aggressively merchandised his films, and much about his film-making and authorship should be questioned. That's why I bought this film twice. But after multiple viewings, I can't shake the suspicion that Packard is simply expressing envy about Lucas and bitterness about his own place in the film industry.
The Jet Benny Show (1986)
Now cut that out!
There was a good idea at the heart of this movie. Jack Benny used to do parody sketches based on movies and stories on his show. What if he had done a parody of Star Wars? That would have been okay as a sketch on a TV show, the same length as Benny's sketches. That's the heart of the error in this film: trying to make it a full-length movie. Not only did the filmmaker have to create a pastiche of an "evil space empire" with no relation to Lucas's creation, but he had to have the Jack Benny character appear on screen for a long time. The actor, Steve Norman, did a passable Benny impression. But it started getting tiring after a few minutes.
Some people have noted that the Benny character seemed gay. This was a persistent rumor during the real Benny's life, mostly because his peculiar walk seemed feminine. This apparent gayness, as shown by Norman, is about all a viewer can focus on in this movie, since all the other qualities Benny was known for - the slow burn, the supposed miserliness, the egotism, the bad violin playing - weren't referenced at all. The central bit of Benny business - the song played throughout the film called "All By Myself," a self-pity song vaguely resembling Benny's theme "Love in Bloom" - is wrong, since Benny nearly never sang as a performer.
Someday, someone may make a great film putting a Jack Benny-like character in an adventure movie. Before they do it, they had better see this film, and do a lot more research and thought about what made Jack Benny what he was.
Fireball 500 (1966)
The unofficial end of the Beach Party.
For all the previous comments - yes, it was a typical American-International programmer, so cowardly it used "moonshining" as a safe substitute for drug-running - this film is sad to someone who was amused by the Beach Party series of films.
Although not Frankie and Dee Dee, Avalon and Funicello are playing the same basic characters; he trying to be an adventurous stud (and succeeding far more than he ever did on the beach, getting into implied clenches with a couple of women) and she fiercely protecting her virginity. But they're connected to other people; Funicello is in love with Fabian and thinks Avalon's an annoying creep. She only shows some positive response to him briefly. The conventional dramatic plot doesn't allow the happy coincidences and contrived happy endings that used to follow these guys around.
By playing straight characters, both were trying to grow beyond their "teenage years" and into more mature roles. Neither one made it, even when Frankie changed his name to "Frank Avalon." Especially not after a career of playing in drive-in bottom-bill films like this one.
The first appearance of Frankie and Dee Dee in "Beach Party" had them driving towards their bungalow, singing happily as their beach blast was just beginning. In the end titles of this film, Frankie is singing while driving off with a completely DIFFERENT girl, a melancholy closure to the whole series. They didn't even end it by driving off together. I remember seeing this on a TV station as the last movie before they signed off on a lonely Saturday night, and I bid a farewell to their youth, their innocence, and their careers as optimistic teen icons.
Universal Soldier (1992)
Way too stupid, even for a Lundgren film.
Even dumb action films should have standards. This one has all the clichés. The bubble-headed bleached blonde reporter is insensitive and incapable of seeing things that are clear to any audience member above six years of age. The mercenary techs who run and maintain the zombie soldiers are cold and unfeeling, but when their creations turn on them they get all fearful and whining.
But the following, which I guess you could call a SPOILER, is an indication that nobody did their homework when putting together the script...
The Unisol project is supposed to be top-secret, and in fact not approved by any civilian or military authority. So how is it that Bimbette, the female presence in the movie, is reporting on the rescue operation that starts the film? Since this is a successful military unit (given the times, perhaps the only successful one) why didn't the President, or any of the Joint Chiefs, or anybody wonder where this unit came from and what was happening in it? Don't they watch the news, too?
There are lots of action movies like this one, admittedly without even the B-list beefcake that was this film's major promotion factor. But they're more logical than this hunk of cheese. Many filmmakers work in these films, hoping to prove their worth to direct better films. That Carolco spent so much money on this, without having anyone check the plot for gaping holes, may be one reason the company went under.
Insight (1960)
Without video pirates, you'll never see it again.
I remember the series fondly as a kid. In my early years as a TV engineer in a little Public TV station in Newark, Ohio, I got to run the episodes on film (we didn't have standard videotape in that station).
Except for those video pirates who have copies of the shows, "Insight" will remain buried forever. The reason is that the show represented Catholic theology of its time. Those episodes don't represent current Church doctrine on a lot of things. I think the Church doesn't want some of them publicized today. Some episodes also had very insistent bits of Catholic doctrine that make many people wince these days - I recall an episode that drably covered adultery in marriage that ended in suicide, with the priest/narrator suggesting this was the expected end of such immorality.
Even if you agree with the opinion that this was "the Twilight Zone of religious television," it was at least heartfelt. This show, and "Davey and Goliath," were made by people who honestly believed in the morals they promoted. I don't believe that's true of the expensive, show-bizzy, money-begging religious shows of today.
International Showtime (1961)
One of the most peculiar summer replacement shows.
This was a summer replacement show aired by NBC. Basically, Don Ameche (using his slightly sophisticated and elegant reputation) sat in the bleachers of a European circus, and occasionally added voice-over narration to some of the acts. I was too young then to know if this was videotaped in Europe and scan-converted to US standards, or whether someone had dragged US-standard video vans to Europe. However, it was held in a standing arena facility with an orchestra, and not in a tent. I didn't particularly care for the animal acts, but the European clowns were lots of fun. At least twice each summer, the circus would have the "audience participation" of someone riding a horse around a ring, and attempting to stand on the horse's back - assisted by a long rope hoist from the center of the ring. And always, one of the clowns would try the ride, and he'd be hoisted twenty feet in the air in a circular orbit. I suppose that, like many American movies made in Europe, this was a way to use "frozen assets" from the showing of NBC programs. Like most summer replacement shows this was cheap, but it was one of the few looks at European entertainment we got in the 60's.
Perverse Preachers, Fascist Fundamentalists and Kristian Kiddie Kooks (1991)
Aside from the title, the video clips speak for themselves.
This was compiled by a science fiction fan magazine called "Zontar" which has gone out of print, and whose publisher has dropped out of sight. (Is this paranoid proof of how dangerous this video is? Your call.) It is a pure documentary, showing the most ugly examples of Christian evangelical TV from the "Jim and Tammy" years.
With these videos played straight through, it is devastating, especially because there is no commentary within the film. The first segment is of "Captain Hook, the Christian Pirate," a paraplegic victim of a motorcycle accident whose kiddie show includes the "autopsy" of a sinner and him making sinning children "walk the plank." It continues with evangelical shows from the boring ("Christian Economics," anyone?) to the hellfire-inspired. Features include the many charges right-wing churches make against popular culture - how the Dungeons & Dragons game is a secret way to worship Satan, how rock music is Satanic, how abortion will lead to "secular humanist police" machine-gunning children, and worse.
As a kind of fairness, the middle of the tape includes videos from "new age" cults, including flying saucer cultists, pitches for "miracle liquid" (yes, tap water in a fancy bottle) and a "new age comedian" who's even more unfunny than his Christian counterparts. The same manipulation, just space aliens substituted for Jesus.
Eventually, there's coverage of the scandals of the Bakkers and Jimmy Swaggart, but that's not the end. The tape ends with post-scandal evangelicals continuing to pitch (the "Take It Back Telethon" that claims it was Satan, not the law, that wrecked the Bakkers) and we sail off into the night with Captain Hook once again.
I said there is no commentary on the tape. When I bought my original tape, it included a multi-page photocopied pimple that described these videos, along with some pungent commentary and back history of featured players. I lost it years ago. If someone has it, I'd like a copy. But without any printed supplement, the video is a harrowing look at the insanity of unquestioned, unthinking fundamentalism - which is still affecting our government's national and international policies.
The God Who Wasn't There (2005)
Very disappointing attempt to critique modern Christianity.
What distressed me about this film was its director's belief that his personal problems had some universal application to Christianity. It was his fundamentalist upbringing that wound up on the screen.
I also have a problem with what is undoubtedly the centerpiece of the film, his extensive "quotations" from Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ." Although the MPAA might complain, I feel that as a documentary filmmaker he has a right to critique the film's violence and single-minded sadism. Even if he has to swipe large portions of that gory mess to document it. But I don't like the fact that he refused to discuss or even refer to the comments Gibson and the other participants in "Passion" said about it. That film was not created in a vacuum.
The director might have examined how and why "Passion" came about, how it was marketed to Christians, reactions by Christians and the like. He might have even tried to approach Gibson personally, as Moore did to the people who outraged him - a gauche tactic, but one that might have provided meaning. All he did was show how brutal the film was. Which, for those who've seen "South Park: The Passion of the Jew," has been better documented and much better placed in context. (And funnier.) I could overlook the entry-level video effects and editing, and the stumbling narration was kind of touching - it made it clear the director was just an ordinary guy. But in the end, I just couldn't see this as anything but a personal scream of agony at what Christianity has become. As such, it won't convince anyone else, and even people who agree with it won't like it much.
American Masters: Rod Serling: Submitted for Your Approval (1995)
A sympathetic, if brief, look at Serling's life.
I saw this PBS production on Christmas week - December 25th being Serling's birthday, it was appropriate. The opening sequence is shot in the same expressionistic, tense way as the best Zone episodes. And in all honesty, it focused on Serling's "Twilight Zone" work because it was the best and most available of his TV work.
There is little talk of his post-Zone work; he loathed "Night Gallery" and pretty much despaired of TV after that. His movie work, such as his screenplay for "Planet of the Apes," showed little of the boldness of his Zone scripts. I'd also hazard a guess that these parts of his career work was unavailable to the producers. (Some of Serling's works, such as his anti-Semitism episode of the Catholic show "Insight" and his UN-brotherhood fantasy "Carol for Another Christmas," are just plain unavailable.) Given what they had, the producers did a remarkable job, using sequences of "Zone" to illustrate Serling's worldview and state of mind. They gave him a fitting tribute, far better than what his industry gave him.
Radioland Murders (1994)
George Lucas shouldn't try to be Mel Brooks.
It's amazing the number of directors who try to make fun of "the golden age of radio." Woody Allen's done it, and David Lynch tried the same thing for the early days of TV in his "On the Air." The big problem with this film is the attempt to copy the rapid-fire dialog of the Marx Brothers's movies. Even the Marxes had to learn to slow it down; their films only became popular when they learned to slow down so that people could finish laughing.
There are good comic performances here (look for Bobcat Goldthwait and Christopher Lloyd) but they're swamped as everyone else tries to slam out lines like Walter Winchell on crack. Perhaps it was Lucas's influence that insisted on cramming more and more on the screen, as if set dressing would substitute for real wit and humanity.
The one good thing I can recommend is the soundtrack to this movie; the score is evocative, and the theme song "Love Is On The Air" should have been the theme song to a better movie.
Team America: World Police (2004)
Forget politics; this is an anti-Hollywood film!
Parker and Stone are on the record as being ambivalent about politics. However, they have definite opinions about show business. "Team America" perfectly mocks the bread and butter studio production, the action/disaster film. They didn't need to specifically mock Schwartzenegger/Stallone/Willis/Keanu to make that point.
They do, however, take on the brand of celebrities that are pretentious and pontificating. They ask, "Who made Alec Baldwin the moral exemplar for America? Or Susan Sarandon, or Ethan Hawke, or any of these overpaid idiots?" And the anger Sean Penn showed at this film - simply because he can't stand to be mocked - shows Parker and Stone hit their target precisely.
And most interestingly, the "marionette sex" scenes and the gleeful use of obscenity has a point, too. Movies have become less sexy and more fearful. In most films, a nude love scene is prelude to Freddy Krueger killing people, or the woman stabbing the guy with an ice pick. The joy of sex is not to be enjoyed, and Hollywood makes that point regularly. Parker and Stone didn't get that memo, thank God. The movie dictatorship's fear of sex shows in giving an R-rating to a film where the nude characters have no genitalia.
Hair High (2004)
THIS is why we keep watching animated movies.
This story is in the same mode as Rod Serling's original "Twilight Zone," except with much more heart and soul, and less Old Testament style revenge. You learn to love the characters, even the ones you initially think are cruel.
After all the overproduced and overhyped animated films, that promise wonders but give us the same old thing - THIS is the reason we come back to watch animation. I've seen several of Plympton's short films, but they didn't prepare me for the beautiful characters, the simple and clear story, and (most amazingly) the 50's - 60's style teen music.
See it in the theatres AND buy it on DVD when it comes out. Be aware, though; there's some violence and messy stuff that very little kids probably shouldn't see. Kids above age 12 should be able to handle it, though.
Elephant (2003)
The old blind men joke, told at length.
The old joke about blind men trying to decide what an elephant was by feel (It's like a rope! It's like a wall! It's like a tree!) is told at length in this story. Too much length.
Worse, they tapped into the curiosity about Columbine. The story of that tragedy hasn't been told...and no, Michael Moore didn't tell it either in "Bowling for Columbine." This simply, dispassionately describes what happened in a similar incident. The point was that no one knew what these boys were doing, or what they were capable of. That's the elephant joke, writ large.
I wouldn't tell spoilers about a GOOD film...so, I have no problem that the dark-haired killer kills the blonde one, his apparent lover, after asking him who he shot. For no reason, except perhaps he was a lousy lay. We don't know. Van Sant isn't interested in telling us a story. He's doing a tone poem about school violence.
AS such, I have no doubt that some idiots who see the film will think it's a celebration of what the killers did and imitate them. The director can claim he was only creating art, but art always has a moral component to it, whether the artist admits it or lies about it.
Eight Crazy Nights (2002)
Wasting the last of his celebrity.
All right, I'm not a fan of Adam Sandler. (The ones who are, that are posting here, seem to admit they are all preteens.) But you sometimes have to do things that aren't pleasant, like seeing this film. Sandler's one big radio song was his "Chanukkah Song," and he saw a chance to make an animated film out of it. (Saturday Night Live performers don't have a lot of celebrity, and they have to spend it quick before they disappear.) However, the film is tied to his low, burlesque taste and his egotism.
Seeing this film, he really seems to be a Scrooge - only instead of foreclosing on orphans, he knocks over menorahs and tumbles a nice old man over in a porta-potty. Him "learning his lesson" at the end is insincere and phony. (After all, Sandler has to be a jerk for his next movie.) Add the unapologetic, gross product placement, more cliched Jewish jokes than a Borscht Belt comic would use, and the attempt to sell this thing as a KID'S movie, and you have one of the most hideous things ever released at Christmastime. As a rabbi once said about a really bad yeshiva boy, "Better you should be a Unitarian."
Peter Gunn (1958)
The predecessor to anime heroes.
It's true that anime series like "Cowboy Bebop" have elements never considered in 1950's TV, like a definitive end to the series, foreshadowing and tragedy. But the mood of "Bebop", its music, its eccentric characters and the cynical humor of the hero can all be traced to "Peter Gunn." (And to show that nothing is completely original, some have said that "Gunn" was derived from Will Eisner's classic comic strip character of the 40's and 50's, "The Spirit.")
Gunn had a great supporting cast. There was the old jazz lady Mother, whose jazz bar just happened to attract the best West Coast jazz artists of the day (occasionally mentioned by name in the episodes); her house singer Edie Hart, whose love for Gunn was remarkably passionate; and Lieutenant Jacoby, who had a love/hate relationship with Gunn. There were equally weird characters involved. One episode in the second DVD volume has Gunn protecting Timothy - who happens to be a sea lion, with his own cute little theme song. More typical, in the first volume, was a story about a dead body found in Edie Hart's apartment, which is being painted. The attitude of the painter of all these police and goons in the apartment, and making his job harder, goes beyond comic relief to a featured comic part.
Hank Williams: The Show He Never Gave (1980)
Portrait of a lonely, famous man
I saw this about a decade ago, at Christmas, on HBO. I don't follow country music, but I knew of Williams from my sister. The story is almost a "Twilight Zone" tale; even as Williams, dying in his alcoholic haze, imagined an ideal concert, his fantasy is plagued by the demons that haunted his real life. The demons include the casual racism of country music of that time (although black music and country were intertwined), the celebrity-hungry fan who wants to seduce a famous person, and (as I recall) the basic despair of the audience, who have no other way to spend Christmas than to go to a bar and get drunk. The end of the fantasy, with Williams's haunting song about being deserted even by God, was devastating. I knew country music was nearly always sad, but I never thought it could approach existential despair. An unforgettable character portrait.
Auto Focus (2002)
Like it or not, Bob Crane types do exist.
Some people writing reviews here deny that Bob Crane was this sleazy. I didn't know Crane, but I know someone who idolized Crane. He was a lot like Crane in many ways. For instance, he bought the entire collection of "Hogan's Heroes" tapes - with my money. He spent his life pretending to be a great person, but did very little with his life, wasted his opportunities and alienated all his friends. I saw "Auto Focus" at a late show, midweek, and I was absolutely alone in the theatre. It was the creepiest theatre experience of my life, compounded by the similarities between Crane and my friend. There was no respite from watching Greg Kinear's Crane march towards destruction - no way to miss his inability to see anything in life beyond the next sexual encounter or the next videotape. For those poor fools who think that hacking up teenagers or seeing women mutilated is the essence of horror, they're missing the boat. "Auto Focus" is a genuine horror film, and most people don't have the courage to face it.
Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964)
Quibbles about science ignore the impressive, lonely mood.
The science in this film was considered iffy on its release, although the Monument Valley location is about as close to Mars as Earth can get. The film's worth lies in its moodiness. Unlike most science fiction epics, this one has long stretches of quiet, punctuated by almost frightening noise. The astronaut has the supplies in his orbiting module, agonizingly out of reach. He slowly goes nuts from lonliness. That lonliness is relieved by the arrival of interstellar slavers - gee, how fortunate! No other science fiction made in the decade, and precious little since, reproduces the sadness and creepy tension this astronaut experiences.