The American Friend (1977): Hopper Hops to Hamburg

Synopsis: When Tom Ripley (Dennis Hopper) comes to Hamburg, he is approached by a French mobster to perform a hit. Instead, Ripley proposes to convince humble frame maker Jonathan (Bruno Ganz) to commit the murders instead by spreading a rumor that his terminal medical condition has taken a turn for the worse. When the plan works and the mobster makes plans to continue to use Jonathan, Ripley has a change of heart about his newfound friend.

Review: The American Friend is my first Wim Wenders movie. So I have nothing to compare it to in that arena. In all honesty, I didn't realize it was based on a Patricia Highsmith Ripley book until I had already got the film. I wanted to see it based solely on the cast which included two of my favorite directors, Sam Fuller and Nicolas Ray, in supporting roles alongside Hopper and Ganz. Their appearances, especially that of Fuller as a mobster and pornographer, were enough on their own to make me adore this film. However, there was much more to unfold here in The American Friend’s neo-noir tale of betrayal and friendship.

The American Friend moves with a sleekness though a world awash with an exaggerated color palate that brings the feeling of Noir without sacrificing the spectrum of tones. Since it moves so effortlessly, Wenders chooses wisely what to show the audience and what to leave out. Certain portions are hard to follow in a spacial sense with characters moving across countries or continents suddenly. Ganz and Hopper both bring the goods, and they deliver on the relationship between the two men with an effortless ease.

Final Note: With a dreamlike quality, a complex relationship between two male leads, and a crime story, The American Friend is recommended for True Detective fans who need some cinematic methadone.

Rating: 9/10

Going Home (1971): Mitchum Strikes

Synopsis: Fifteen years ago, Harry Graham (Robert Mitchum) murdered his wife in front of his three year old young son. Now, Harry is out of jail, and his eighteen year old son Jimmy (Jan-Michael Vincent) tracks him down for reasons that don't seem to even be known by Jimmy. As the two begin to know each other, Harry doesn't seem to know how to be father, despite putting in some effort, and Jimmy doesn't know if he wants to hug or stab his Dad.
 
Review: Going Home isn't an easy sell of a movie. Beginning with Mitchum’s character murdering his wife, it’s hard to feel sympathy for him. On the other hand, Vincent’s character is sullen and moody, not really the hero type either. Then again, this isn't a movie about heroes and villains. It’s about an unlikely relationship and the emotional scars that murder leaves on a family. It really boils down to a character study, and a somewhat haphazard one at that.

It is hard to say where the blame lies. Mitchum had just come out of retirement (and he claimed he signed the papers for the wrong film intending to star as a San Francisco jazz musician), and he’s as solid as ever, but the role of the son might have been neurons Vincent whose expressions range from blank to has to poop and back to blank. He does finally work up enough Oedipal rage to merit the Golden Globe for which he was nominated. Director Herbert Leonard definitely believed in the project, waving his fee entirely, but, as his second (and last) feature film, the material might have been too complex. The final blame may lay with the producers who cut 12 minutes from the film, reassembled it, dumped it into theaters for a week, and then pulled it into obscurity. This one is mostly for Mitchum fans.

Final Note: Mitchum’s character kills his wife with a bowling trophy, and then continues to talk to his grown son about bowling and going to bowling alleys. Ummm, insensitive much?

Rating: 5/10

You Don't Know Shat !?! : Impulse (1974)

Through a lifetime of Shatner fandom and four years of running the You Don't Know Shat !?! feature in honor of The Once and Future Kirk's birthday, I felt like I had seen every wild and wacky thing that William could throw at me. I've seen him fight with Andy Griffith, play paintball, teach kids about sex, and fight invading spiders, but I don't think I've ever seen William Shatner quite so gloriously in the throes of doing that thing, which can only be described as Shatner-ing, all over today's film. Like many stars of the 60s whose fame had waned, Shatner took on a great many TV film roles to provide work, and I've covered a number of those over the years. What I didn't know is that he ever starred in a grindhouse style picture from the director of Stanley, The Hooked Generation, and Mako: The Jaws of Death. So join me as William Shatner gives in to his impulse to be involved in a strange plot, his impulse to overact in an astounding way, and his Impulse to murder. 

Jug Face (2012) Is a Horror Movie, While Facejugs Is a Strip Club Activity

A Jughead is Archie's best friend who can't eat enough burgers, and a Jarhead is a nickname for a Marine. However, a Jug Face is something entirely different. The term generally refers to a tale of Appalachian pottery where an ugly face as sculpted into a jug that often contained moonshine or poison. In the instance of today's film, these same kinds of jugs are depicted as omens, and if your mug shows up on one, well, it's not a good thing. I actually got clued in on this movie by an artist friend of mine who specializes in making jug face pottery (and Goatse coffee mugs, best not to dwell on what that looks like), and it is my sincere hope that he never gets captured by a band of backwoods people who want to use him as their seer. Jug Face is at its core a backwoods thriller, but what it has to say about the dangers of blind devotion, well, it's a mixed message, but one I think doesn't get said often enough. So come with me while I explore whether Jugface had a good head on its shoulders or if it’s merely the pits. 

A Horrible Way to Die (2010): A Hell of A Way to Live

When someone is called "the future of horror", I generally scoff and say, "Yes, yes, I'm familiar with Ty West.", but I think for a change I've found someone who I may tentatively apply the dubious title. The director I'm talking about is Adam Wingard. After being impressed but his storytelling in the V/H/S 2 segment Phase 1 Clinical Trials, I went looking for what other films he had directed. Turns out, I had already seen on,  Home Sick with Bill Mosley. While that film had some coherency problems as I recall, I didn't rather enjoy the dark spin on wish fulfillment. Poking around through my streaming services, I noticed that Wingard's A Horrible Way to Die was being featured and without even checking the synopsis I gave it a shot. What I got was not at all really what I expected, but rather something more mature and stylish than I would have thought a young director, or even one with moderate experience, could undertake. 

Calendar Girl Murders (1984) Don’t Startle the ‘Stache, You’ll Skerritt

I remember a Christmas, when I was about twelve or thirteen, and one of my gifts from my Grandparents was a calendar of ladies in swimwear on the beach. This gift made several things go through my mind including will my mom let me keep it, how cool is my Grandpa for picking it out, and I wonder if you can see any nipples. Hey, what can I say, I was an adolescent horndog. (Who. coincidentally is grew into a middle aged horn dog, but that’s an entirely different matter.) My mother did indeed let me keep the calendar, and it hung by my bedside for the next twelve months providing me some beautiful, tan, sexy, barefoot fantasy girlfriends who obviously were on the coldest beaches of all time. Today’s film, Calendar Girl Murders, brought the memory to mind due to its title, but it really should have been the Centerfold Girl Murders to be accurate. More on that later. I chose the film because it stars one of the unsung heroes of the movie mustache  Tom Skerritt, who sadly is overshadowed by that other mustachioed Tom, Mr. Selleck. Today though, is Skerritt’s time to shine. So join me as I turn the pages of Calendar Girl Murders.

House of Clocks (1989) Lucio Fulci Knows What Time It Is

Back again with another slice of horror, and after tipping my hat to Dario yesterday, I thought it only fitting to talk about the other big name in Italian horror, Lucio Fulci.. The Godfather of Gore's career was winding down by the late 80s after a disastrous turn directing Zombi 3, and I expect he readily jumped at a job making a pair of Made for Italian TV films. He made two for the series, today's film House of Clocks (La casa nel tempo) and The Sweet House of Horrors. While late in his career, this is a Fulci trying to regain his game, and he did such a gory good job they wouldn't air the movies. So these went straight to a video release, which is a real shame because Fulci indeed did know what time it was. it was time for one last shot of adrenaline in a career that had hit many stumbles. So, Fulci took a moment to roll back the clocks to an earlier sharper flavor whole keeping plenty of murder, mayhem, and killer geriatrics in the 1989 film House of Clocks.

The Other Andy: Murder in Coweta County (1983)

Hello again, and welcome back to another installment of The Other Andy. Today’s film might just show Andy as the farthest from the kind hearted Mayberry sheriff as I have seen, and the scary thing is that the character he plays was a real guy. Culled from the 1979 book Murder in Coweta County by Margaret Anne Barnes, which was based on real events, the TV movie shines a light on the very real problems of racism, corruption, and the good ol’ boy system that existed in Georgia in the late 1940s. This is a movie about the South in a period after slavery had been done away with and replaced with the servitude culture of sharecropping. It’s sad to say, but as a Southerner, the problems exhibited in the film have yet to gasp their last breath. While the sharecroppers are long gone, the culture of racial division and cronyism still persists to this day. Examining these problems in a warts and all kind of way, paired with great performances from Andy Griffith and his co-star, country legend, Johnny Cash, combine to make Murder in Coweta County not only a fascinating film, but also the best Made for TV movie I have ever seen. 

The Irrepressible Miss Stanwyck: The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)

Welcome back to week two of The Irrepressible Miss Stanwyck, my month long tribute to one of my favorite leading ladies. Last week, I looked at Jeopardy!, a film which saw Barbara going all the way to save her dying husband. While it showed off her ability to deliver hard edged, risky performances, it is a role tempered with tenderness. This week, despite the title that both hints to amorous adventures and sounds like a lost gialli, tenderness is secondary to self preservation as Stanwyck shows off her tough side in The Strange Love of Martha Ivers. Along with Barbara, Strange Love is the first film role from an icon of cinema, Kirk Douglas, and it also marks her first collaboration Van Heflin, who would co-star with her twice more. The trio, along with blonde bombshell Lizabeth Scott, gets mixed up in a tale of murder, blackmail, and revenge coloring Film Noir with shades of grey.

Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988): "The Shape" of Things To Come

First, he came home on Halloween. Then he continues his carnage late that night at the local hospital. Then he, well, he appeared on a TV in the background of a scene while the world was almost annihilated by druids with masks, and finally, despite being shot twice in the head and blown up during his last real appearance, he comes back again in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers. So how did everyone’s favorite Shape come back from having his noggin blown off and being incinerated? He had the ultimate protection, poor box office receipts for the previous un-Myers edition of the franchise. So producer Moustapha Akkad wanted to go back to the well again, and Cannon films approached John Carpenter about penning a sequel, which he did, with Dennis Etchison who had penned novelizations of the series. Their script, detailing a Haddonfield reeling from the killings after banning Halloween, was rejected, and it soon lead to Carpenter, and longtime collaborator Debra Hill, exiting the series. Instead, what came next is a film that would shape the series’ arc for a number of installments and redefine Michael Myers as more supernatural force than man.

Fuller Himself: The Naked Kiss (1964)

Hello, everyone, and welcome to August’s third new feature, Fuller Himself. We all know that I adore Hitchcock, and he is easily my favorite director, but you might wonder who comes in at the number two spot. Well, that’s none other than the titular director that this whole feature will be about, Mr. Samuel Fuller. In the past I have looked at several of his films including Shark, I Shot Jesse James, Forty Guns (which stars The Irrepressible Miss Stanwyck), and Pickup on South Street, but I wanted to delve deeper into his catalog and share some more favorites with you, both new and old. Today’s film is a first time watch for me, and how I went so long without seeing this gem I’ll never know. Throughout Sam’s career he stayed on the cutting edge. No matter if it was the rough and ready female ranch owner, examining racism, or the integrity of cops and crooks, Fuller was willing and able to post the envelope, but with today’s film, The Naked Kiss, he found out just how dangerous to a film maker that could be.

The Other Andy: The Girl in the Empty Grave (1977)

It was only a little over a month ago that entertainment lost a real legend, Andy Griffith. Since then, I’ve found myself taking quite a few trips to Mayberry to catch up with a number of episodes of The Andy Griffith Show that I had missed, but my mind often drifted to The Other Andy, the one that isn’t as strong in the zeitgeist as the folksy character Andy Taylor. I’m talking about the actor Andy Griffith who made some really interesting, and, yes, campy, genre filled films both before and after his career as a TV lawman. After beginning his career as a singer and storyteller, Griffith found his way to the Broadway stage in No Time for Sergeants which quickly became a successful film property. This lead to his casting in Elia Kazan’s tale of fame gone awry, A Face in the Crowd, a film which is nearly universally regarded as a classic. It wasn’t too long after this heavy hitting film that the backdoor pilot for The Andy Griffith Show appeared as part of The Danny Kaye Show. The segment proved popular, and Griffith assumed the role which would define his career. Unless, that is, you run into one of those rabid Matlock people, and then I advise you to use all applicable caution

The Hot Spot (1990): Is Located Between Jennifer Connelly and Virginia Madsen

The scorching heat of summer is truly upon us. Yesterday, here at The Lair, it reached 106 degrees, and there’s no relief in sight. However, I must count my blessings. I generally get to stay in the confines of an air conditioned area, I don’t live somewhere crazy, stupid hot like Texas, and I’m not caught in a love triangle between Jennifer Connelly and Virginia Madsen. Wait, scratch that last one. No matter the external temperature, a situation like that would surely heat me up. Though when you’re Don Johnson, riding high on the star power garnered from six seasons of the pastel hued Miami Vice, you can afford to act blasé about two of the hottest women to ever grace the screen vying for your affections. While the onscreen sexy time is only one portion of today’s film, The Hot Spot, it definitely heats up a cool noir story from director Dennis Hopper. 

Mental Health Awareness Month: Deranged: Confessions of a Necrophile (1974)

If there was such a thing as a poster boy for Mental Health Awareness Month here at The Lair, I think that Ed Gein might be in the running for the job. Not only was he a cannibal and ruthless killer with  a flair for home décor that included human skin, Gein has served as the inspiration for a host of horror titles throughout the years.  The most famous flicks inspired by the Butcher of Plainfield are, of course, Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho and Tobe Hooper’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Psycho turns Gein into a cross dressing mama’s boy while TCM spins the killer into a whole family of miscreants with strange thoughts about interior design. Today’s film, released the same year as Texas Chainsaw, took a more straightforward approach to the subject, and presents a documentary style that is reminiscent of The Legend of Boggy Creek. However, with Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things and Popcorn director Alan Ormsby behind the camera, the movie throws out more than a few crazy moments.

It Came From TCM: Niagara (1953) Slowly I Turned, Step by Step

After a month long affair with Turner Classic Movies and their awesome horror programming in October, I thought I could kick the habit in November, but it seems like I'm more locked in than ever. With a steady stream of noir, comedy, horror, and the just plain obscure and weird, my DVR seems to constantly fill up with selections from the TCM vaults. So what better way to clear some of these up than by talking to you folks about them, so check back here each Wednesday in November for another classic film from the cable network. Usually in a given month, TCM puts the spotlight on a star or director, but occasionally they'll throw together a theme. This month is one of those occasions with each Monday and Wednesday night featuring films from famous blondes. Over the month the network will feature platinum classics from May West, Veronica Lake, Ursula Andress, Grace Kelly, Carol Lombard, and Jayne Mansfield. Naturally no celebration of Hollywood blondes would be complete without Marilyn Monroe, but tonight's film features a Marilyn many may not recognize. The ditsy sexpot of The Seven Year Itch and Some Like It Hot is nowhere to be found and instead Marilyn slips into the cool, crisp skin of a femme fatale for a trip to Niagara (1953).

Polly and Ray Cutler (Jean Peters and Max Showalter) arrive in Niagara Falls for a belated honeymoon only to find their cabin is still occupied by another couple, The Loomis', Rose and George (Marilyn Monroe and Joseph Cotton). Rose is blonde, beautiful, and overtly sexual, but her husband is an older man, jealous, and possibly mentally unstable. Accepting another cabin, the Cutlers try to settle in, but Polly finds herself drawn into George and Rose's world. After seeing Rose cheating on her husband and tending to George's hand when he cuts it in a fit of rage, Polly begins to feel sympathy for the blonde's put upon hubby. What neither of them suspects is that Rose is planning his demise. Rose's lover attacks George under the falls, but falls to his own death instead. Collecting the lover's shoes in instead of his own on the return trip, soon everyone, including Rose, thinks George is dead, and he's got a murder of his own on the mind.

If someone described this movie to me, visions of black and white scenes sharply filmed would dance in my head, but even though Niagara was filmed in color it doesn't get much more Noir than this. Thematically it fit right in with Film Noir. The film's events hinge on the sexual powers of one woman while another, more conservative, woman is pulled toward that shadowed world. There are also no easy answers, no heroes, and the bad guys get what bad guys have coming to them. Stylistically it also comes through. Though color inhabits every frame, there's a deft use of shadow and framing to set the tone for the film. Director Henny Hathaway perfectly translated the classic '40's Noir look of his films Kiss of Death, The Dark Corner, and Call Northside 777 and brought it into the color era. The transition from black and white to color was a challenge for many directors, but Hathaway was clearly up to the task. Several of the scenes I'd like to mention specifically come late in the film and would spoil the film, but there are some particular stunners where the melding of color into the shadows and light push the Noir form into full color fruition.

While Jean Peters and Max Showalter were the main characters of the film, Niagara clearly belongs to the less savory pairing of Cotton and Monroe. Peters seems like the literal 'girl next door' when compared to Monroe, but she holds her own and even shows off some sex appeal. (In her next film, Pickup on South Street, Peters would inhabit the dangerous female lead instead to great effect.) Showalter (Sixteen Candles, '10') seems like he has the least to do, and all that is expected of his character is to be a solid, stand-up guy. If Peters and Showalter represent middle America of the 1950's, then Cotton and Monroe must be the decadence of city life. Cotton gets to show off rage early in the film, but when he gets to go full psycho, he summons the same inner evil he channeled in Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt. I love to see Cotton in these kind of roles because he has the ability to turn on a dime. On the other hand, Monroe plays a character unlike any other I've seen from her. The film clearly relied on her sexuality, which was on full display. (I would say they don't make gals like that anymore, but they do, they just starve themselves instead of looking like a woman.) Niagara falls into Marilyn's career just as she was becoming known as a sex icon (Playboy would publish their first issue the same year), and for the next decade, Marilyn's looks were emphasized beyond her acting ability. For another role of this caliber from the blonde bombshell, I also suggest 1961's The Misfits co-starring Clark Gable and Montgomery Clift.  

Niagara doesn't rank as one of the all-time best Noir films, but it does make for an interesting late entry into the genre. The film's use of color, its meditations on sexuality going into the '50's, and solid performances from the villainous stars make it more than worth watching. It's easy to remember Marilyn Monroe in one way, and generally that way is in a white dress with air blowing up it, but Niagara proves that she could play more than the spaced out sexpot if given the chance. It also proves a good point about TCM. I've probably seen this title in the store more than a few times. I've noticed it's stars and made note of it, but the underwhelmingly bland title didn't inspire me to check it out. Turner Classic is the type of place where it's easy to give films a chance, and while Niagara didn't get me over the barrel, it did make me falls for it somewhat.(Plus I got to use a completely unrelated Three Stooges reference in the title. So my work here is done. )

Bugg Rating