Love Actually (2002) Yes, Actually, Love Actually!

For many years, five in fact, I’ve thought about writing a review of Love Actually, one of my favorite Christmas films and romantic comedies, but I wasn’t sure what really to say about the film. This year, I’m trying to take the spirit of the season more into my heart. Working in retail as I do by day, it can take the Christmas spirit right out of you, and gentle solaces in films like Miracle on 34th Street, It’s a Wonderful Life, and Silent Night Deadly Night can be the thing that puts it back in. While I wouldn’t add Love Actually to the vaunted status of those films, there’s something sweet and romantic about Richard Curtis’ film that appeals to the humanist in me during a season that is dominated by religious imagery. There’s no doubt that it is a bloated and flawed film that both exploits the viewers emotions and dabbles in cliché however I forgive it its trespasses. After all Christmas is the time to tell the truth, and the truth is that I love Love Actually.

It would take more time than I want to spend to write a full synopsis of the film as it concerns ten separate love stories that intersect and overlap over the month leading up to Christmas. As you can see by the chart after the jump, it could be quite confusing, but with a two and half hour running time, there’s plenty of space to get to know everyone. However there are still relationships and minor notes that I have picked up even after many viewings over the years. So I’m going to count off a few of the stories by their importance to me in the film.

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.

Deadly Doll's Choice Baltimore Edition: Step Up 2: The Streets (2008)

In only a few short days, I, along with several other bloggers, podcasters, and other assorted ne’er-do-wells, will descend upon Baltimore for a weekend of conversation, BBQ, and assorted silliness at the home of a generous (though possibly foolish) friend. One of those attending the weekend is none other than Emily of The Deadly Doll's House of Horror Nonsense. So for this month's movie swap, we decided to swap movies set in our destination, Baltimore, Maryland. The easy way would have been to trade a couple of movies from Baltimore's sleaziest son, John Waters, but who wants to do it the easy way. Instead, we swapped a couple of lesser known Charm City based titles. For my pick, I selected the dramady Tin Men, starring Richard Dreyfus and Danny DeVito as rival aluminum siding salesmen in 60's Baltimore. So head over to The Deadly Doll's to check that out.For Emily's selection, she picked a movie I never thought there would be any set of circumstances in which I would need to view it. She chose for me Step Up Number Two Colon The Streets. I know the filmmaker chose a briefer name than I have given it, but I think my version may well be more accurate.

Hey, Girl. Hauer You Doin'?: Ladyhawke (1985)

Welcome back to the second week of Rutger lovin' that I'm calling Hey Girl. Hauer You Doin'? If you missed last week, go back and catch up on our man Mr. Hauer in New World Disorder.as he struggles as an out of step gumshoe in a technical world  This week whisks Rutger off to another time and place, a land of mystery and wonder, a place where you might meet a lady who is also, get this, a hawk. I have a very distinct memory of being at one of the first science fiction conventions I had ever attended and sitting around a hotel room, with a bunch of strangers, watching Ladyhawke. This was around 1991 or so folks, and I have to admit that while I liked Ladyhawke okay, I had another thought in my teenage mind. Chicks dug Ladyhawke, and the room was packed with a gaggle of girls, most of whom would have shared the last name Half-Elven. Now I was about as cool as a Halfling back then, so I didn't even get half-way to talking to any of the gals in cloaks and fringed boots. However, it was the last time I remembered watching Ladyhawke before this week, and while I thought back on the film fondly, my memory might have run more toward young ladies in poets blouses with daggers on their hips than the actual flick.

C'Mon Attractions: Nic Cage, Harry Potter, H.G. Lewis, Cuba Gooding Jr & The Vibrator walk into a Bar.....

Another week, another batch of trailers. Surprisingly, they aren't a weak batch of trailers, well, at least not all of them. So c'mon with me as we give Harry Potter the creeps, see if George Lucas can take the TIE out of TIE-fighters, find a telling title with H.G. Lewis, hold Nic Cage hostage, and invent the vibrator. Yeah, it's going to be a busy week.

 First up, check out Daniel Radcliffe in James Watkins' follow up to Eden Lake, The Woman in Black.
 

So clearly, Radcliffe is trying to show he's ready for grown up roles, and happily he didn't have to get naked and have sex with a horse as he did on Broadway.  Instead he's wisely chosen something not too far out of his wheelhouse and with a real "The Others" vibe making it appear to be classy and shit. I've never read Susan Hill's 1983 book on which the film was based, but if Hammer Films (Yeah, that Hammer Films) can score with this one, then it might be a return to form.Creepy vintage toys and scary kids abound, and we all know that if Dementors couldn't break Harry Potter, then a ghost or two should be no problem at all.

Next Up
A Long, Long
Time Ago In Europe
World War II Was Fought.
Spielberg Gave Us Private Ryan,
And Now His Bearded Bro George Has
Penned and Produced This WW II Dogfighting
Film Starring Cuba Gooding and Being Directed By A
TV Director. (Granted of The Wire and Treme), but the
Question is this. Will the full weight of ILM and Skywalker Ranch
Behind it matter or will no one care about a CGI aeronautical recounting
of the story of the Tuskegee Airmen. Only time and the adjusted grosses will tell....



Let's move on to something a little more in my area of expertise, the films of H.G. Lewis. Well, back when I was a young Bugg, Herschell's films were some of the first to get me into gore films, and I've kept up steadily with the news of new projects over the years. In 2002 he made Bloodfeast 2: All You Can Eat, and it not only held up to the original it added a little something to the myth of H. G. Lewis. He came back after 30 years and really released a greats film. Sadly. it's only been nine years since last we saw H.G. and he's arrived back on the scene 21 years too early for this to be any good.


I want Herschell to go out with a great one, but a satire on how reality TV is headed toward violence, I'd rather just watch The Running Man again.

Now,Joel Schumacher, Nichole Kidman, Nic Cage, and a pair of big ass glasses.

While I do want to see this one as a guilty pleasure, what I'm really fascinated by is how many movies the cash strapped Cage is going to spurt out. What is this 67 in two years? That's Gene Hackman kind of numbers. Anyway, this time Kidman is along for the ride, I suppose cashing a check to pay for Keith Urban's highlights. Schumacher is hit or miss, but pairing Nic and Nic might be an entertaining ride.

Speaking of an entertaining ride, I'm going to make like the Bugg I am and buzzzzzzz on out of here before you roll this one. It's the spiritual brother to The Road to Wellville, but with a naughty twist that's sure to get some knickers in a bunch. Instead of telling you what it's about, I'll let the imdb synopsis speak for itself.....

"A Romantic Comedy about the Invention of the Vibrator"

Yeah, and I'm willing to look over Maggie Gooseface's presence because that premise in and of itself would get my ass in a theater seat every time! See you folks later, and when you get done don't forget to turn out the lights.... it'll wear out the batteries.

The Graydon Clark Bar: The Forbidden Dance (Is Lambada) (1990)

I attended several dances in high school, but I can’t think of one of my alma mater’s functions that I attended stag. However once, I went to the rival school’s Homecoming Dance in the early spring of 1990. I was a freshman, and there is no telling who talked me into going, that detail is lost to the ages, but the fact remains that I did. I wasn’t attending the enemy’s dance with a master plan to shame their school in some sort of Breakin’ style dance off or to steal all their women. Then I met this girl, an “alternative” type (back when there was such a thing to be) in a Jessica Rabbit style velvet dress. Yeah, I don’t know why she was wearing such a thing, but she was and had the assets to match. (As I recall, I was wearing an unstructured jacket from Chess King, a printed shirt buttoned all the way up “Parker Lewis” style, and pleated slacks, quite overdressed for the after the football game in the cafeteria affair, but who am I to judge.) Somehow, we started dancing if that’s what you want to call it. Later, when it was the stuff of teenage legend, people went on to describe it in many ways, dirty dancing, shocking, an atrocity, crimes against nature, scandalous, and etc. and so forth. At the time though, there was one word on the lips of the zeitgeist that I remember hearing repeatedly that night, and that word was Lambada.

While the Lambada had built a dance craze throughout Central and South America though the late ‘80’s, it didn’t reach American shores until the very end of the decade. The song “Lambada” by Kaoma began to work its way up the charts (peaking at #46), Somehow the idea that the craze was going to take root all across America where people (who may or may not have been at Homecoming dances) sparked not one, but two, films on the subject released the same day in March 1990. The first film, Lambada, directed by Breakin’ and Rappin’ auteur Joel Silberg, stars J. Eddie Peck as a high school teacher who moonlights as a Lambada dancer (opposite The Office’s Melora Hardin) and gets in trouble for it. I know. That sounds awful silly. This is of course nothing at all like tonight’s feature, the competing Lambada flick from the mind of Greydon Clark, The Forbidden Dance (Is Lambada). I put the “Is Lambada” in parentheses because while it may have been in the original title, the producers of the Silberg Lambada film sued to have it taken off. However, only one movie was clever enough to get the Kaoma song for that film, and in that regard, Clark's film comes out on top.

Now, for that far more plausible plot. Lara Harring (Mullholland Drive, Silent Night Deadly Night III) stars as Nisa, a princess from the Amazon jungle. When her tribe is threatened by Benjamin Maxwell (Richard Lynch), she and medicine man Joa (Sid Haig) travel to the city with a plan to confront the head of the evil corporation. This naturally ends up with Joa landing himself in jail and Nisa ending up working as a maid. After going out to dance with her employer’s son Jason (Jeff James), Nisa soon finds herself without a job. Jason, on the other hand, finds himself intoxicated by Nisa’s exotic Lambada dance. Dancing leads Nisa to her next gig, working in a go-go bar as a private dancer (a la Ms. Turner), and when Jason finds her there, he thinks she’s started hooking. Convinced that the princess’ honor is still intact, Jason and the ecological warrior begin to practice to win a dance contest that will allow her to save the jungle or something.

I have to admit by that point it gets a little convoluted, but it also doesn’t matter. Here’s a film that has it all; montages, magical explosions, fighting scenes, cheesy love scenes, dancing, more montages, and even more dancing. You even get a rival for the star-crossed Lambada dancing pair that features a female dancer who would be the perfect match for William Zabka. Once again, Graydon Clark manages to pull all these elements and tenuous trend together into a movie that is a silly good time. Working from a script by Monster High scripters John Platt and Roy Langston based upon a story by uber-schlock producer Manheim Golan, I can’t imagine on paper the Forbidden Dance looked like a good idea. For some when they see the picture, it will still look like a bad idea, but genre fans who love the offbeat and strange will find tons to love here.

I have to start with what I consider the biggest hook for anyone I would want to tempt with this film, Sid Haig as the mute medicine man Joa. Haig, best known now for his Captain Spaulding role, is an actor who has been in everything from Coffy and Spider Baby to Jackie Brown and Boris and Natasha, but I’ve never seen him so tragically miscast. Towering over the other “tribesmen”, Haig looks about as much like an Amazonian as I look like Bradley Cooper (bad example, I know, but you get the point), and his mute performance leads to plenty of laughs both intentional and unintentional. Likewise, Lara Harring doesn’t look so much like she’s come out of the jungle as off the runway. Harring’s performance, like most, is pretty off, but as the film is constantly a little off, it seems to fit and her beauty overcomes plenty of her shortcomings. The film is littered with great supporting performances as well, I especially would like to mention Miranda Garrison (who was also the choreographer) for her role as the predatory club owner Mickey, Richard Lynch for showing up and actually giving the film a heavy, and Barbra Brighton for being the perfect blonde, bitchy, poofy haired rival for innocent Nisa.

If I wanted to (and believe me I want to), I could go on about The Forbidden Dance for much longer. I haven’t even gotten around to little moments like when Nisa tears her skirt off to dance, the final dance showdown, or gotten to talk about the clothes (so many men in giant vests featuring giant blocks of color!) However, these are the kind of things best shared with a few friend and a few drinks. I highly recommend this as a compliment to any dance themed double feature. So pair it with Showgirls, Burlesque, Dirty Dancing, or any of the Step Up films for a night of dancing and strangeness. That about summed up that Homecoming as well, dancing and strangeness. I recall hordes of teens staring as the girl I had just met and I grinded against each other, and little did I know the calf high slit in the back oh her dress has continued to split until it was just shy of showing off her goods. I’ve never danced like that again, and I can’t imagine what possessed me to do so. Years later, when I ended up in a writing class with her, it was a story I was asked to repeat many times, my experience with the Lambada. Now I have finally found a story of The Forbidden Dance that I will speak of in my own hushed tones, and while that Homecoming memory is a faded moment of “glory” from 21 years ago, Greydon Clark’s The Forbidden Dance is the kind of film I can cherish forever.

Remember folks, you can pick up almost any of Greydon's films over at his HOMEPAGE

Bugg Rating

Love, The Lair-ican Style- The Bugg's Top 10 Romantic Films

With Valentine’s Day tomorrow, I wanted to take this edition of Love, The Lair-ican Style to countdown my favorite romantic films. That’s right. The Bugg likes more than exploitation films, eyeballs being gouged out, and explosions. Sometimes I like to sit back with a film where no one dies, gets shot, or eviscerated in any way. Ok. That’s a lie. There’s some of that on this list as well. Without any further ado let’s get this started.

10. The Flintstones: Viva Rock Vegas (2000): Ok, sure, it’s not the best made, best written or best acted film, but there’s something here that really plucks the heartstrings. Viva Rock Vegas tells the story of when Fred (Mark Addy) and Wilma (Kristin Johnston) met, and Fred had to vie for Wilma’s affections with Chip Rockefeller (Thomas Gibson). Throw in a budding romance between Barney (Stephen Baldwin) and Betty (Jane Krakowski), the Great Gazoo (Alan Cumming), and Wilma’s conniving mom (Joan Collins), and you’ve got a recipe for a movie that will suck me in every time I see it on. Say what you will, but this is a sweet, funny movie that more people should give a shot.

9. Knight’s Tale (2001): I don’t know what it is about Mark Addy, but here he is again showing up on this list. This time he’s not the romantic lead, but rather the comic relief along with two of my other favorite actors Paul Bettany and Alan Tudyk. The film’s star, of course, is Heath Ledger, and the first time I saw this film I was unsure what I thought about it. The pop soundtrack (especially Bowie’s Golden Years) really put me off of it, but something kept me coming back. That thing was the romance between Ledger’s wannabe knight and Lady Jocelyn (Shannon Sossamon). Sure it’s the age old story of star-crossed lovers, but there’s a reason that ago old stories got that way.

8. Love, Actually (2003): Years before Judd Apatow made his series of bromantic blockbusters, Richard Curtis, the screenwriter behind Bridget Jones’ Diary, made his directing debut with this man-centric romantic comedy. With a cast of great male actors including Colin Firth, Bill Nighy, Liam Neeson, Alan Rickman, and Hugh Grant, Love Actually guides us though an interlocked group of romantic interludes each feeling very original. My favorite has to be Colin Firth who falls for his Spanish maid played by Lucia Moniz even though neither speaks the other’s language. It’s an extremely sweet story that tugs at my heartstrings in the end. Each of the stories is about love in a different way, and this film never gets old to me at all.

7. Mallrats (1995) When Brodie’s (Jason Lee) girlfriend Rene (Shannon Doherty) dumps him for being too immature and TS’s (Jeremy London) gal Brandi (Claire Forlani) cancels plans to go with him to Florida, the pair hang out at the mall and plot a way to get their girlfriends back. Kevin Smith’s follow-up to Clerks tore a page right out of my life. I was a serious Mallrat in high school. I knew all the asshats and freaks that hung out there, and it’s also where I met many of my dates. The film is full of gross humor, sexual innuendo, and more snoochie boochie than you get in most films, but at its core, this is a film with a ton of heart.

6. The Thin Man (1934) Myrna Loy and William Powell made the best couple as Nick and Nora Charles, and I have to pick this film because of the great portrayal of married bliss. Only recently my wife and I sat down and watched the Thin Man series from start to finish, and one of the things that stands out in each movie is what a great couple the Charles are. While there is no wooing falling in love in this film, I find the portrayal of the two characters and their interactions with each other to be the definition of romantic. Oh yeah, you get a ripping mystery as well.

5. The Getaway (1972) Sam Peckinpah isn’t known for his romantic films, and The Getaway is probably not everyone’s idea of a love story. Hang with me here for a second though. The Getaway is the story of “Doc“ McCoy (Steve McQueen) whose wife Carol (Ali McGraw) gets him spring from jail so he can take part in a bank robbery. When everything goes wrong, they go on the run, and the couple must confront cops, baddies, and the problems in their own relationship if they want to make a clean getaway. McQueen and McGraw have a great chemistry (probably because they were in the throws of a real life affair), and the McCoys play out like a Bonnie and Clyde type fantasy that I think runs through every married couple’s mind.

4 The Princess Bride (1987) Rob Reiner’s film based on William Goldman’s book is full of the mushy stuff, and doesn’t hold back on the action either. The fairy tale love between Westley (Carey Elwes) and Buttercup (Robin Wright) is perfectly captured in the film, and this is a film that appeals to men and women just as well. While Fred Savages’ character might have been a little squeamish about the “kissing parts” at first, by the end of the tale even he comes around. Plus you get Chris Sarandon as a baddie, Andre the Giant as, well, a giant, and Mandy Patinkin as a Spanish swordsman. As far as romantic films go it doesn’t get much better.

3 Heartbeeps (1981) When this movie came out, it was a massive flop. No one was interested in Andy Kaufman and Bernadette Peters as robots who fall in love, but even as a child when I saw this one, I was sold. It’s a sweet story that I won’t go too much more into because I reviewed it in full last year for Valentine’s Day so check out my review of it here.

2 Jackie Brown (1997) Tarantino is another film maker who isn’t known for his romances, but his 1997 film based on the Elmore Leonard book Rum Punch contains one of the most subtle and unrequited romances ever put to film. The relationship that develops between Max Cherry (Robert Forrester) and Jackie (Pam Grier) is built with a subtle touch. From the moment that Cherry pops his tape of the Delphonics song La La (Means I Love You) into his car stereo, you know he’s fallen for Jackie, but the film, like Max, never brings it out in the open.

1. Casablanca (1942) I guess I like love stories that don’t end up the way I hope they will. Like Max Cherry, Bogart’s Rick has to let the woman he loves walk away in the end. Casablanca goes back to that old adage that if you love someone, set them free, and from the look in Rick’s eyes as Ilsa boards the plane at the end is heartbreaking. Bogart had the ability to be a tough customer and still portray softness with his eyes. Director Michael Curtiz used this to high effect in this film, and Bogie was never better. The problems of two little people “might not add up to a hill of beans in this world”, but thankfully we’ll always have Casablanca to remind us that sometimes the most romantic love is love that is lost.

So there you go. If you’re looking for something to watch with the one you love on Valentine’s Day, there are my ten selections. No matter if you want action, mystery, or just a classic tale of love, there’s something for everyone to like here. I hope you all have a great Valentine’s Day, and if you’ll excuse me, my wife and I have a few movies to watch.

Love, The Lair-ican Style- Cat People (1982): A Love That Could Not Be

How does one put out fire with gasoline? Not very well I would imagine, but that is the suggested method included in David Bowie’s theme song to Paul Schrader’s Cat People. More on that song later, but for now, I want to welcome everyone to the first installment of Love, The Lair-ican Style, four weeks of romances that don’t fit the mushy norm. After all, not everyone wants to watch sappy stuff for Valentine’s Day. I’ll be the first to admit that deep down I’m a big softie. I like to see hearts swell with love, but if they occasionally burst open into a bloody mess that‘s not a bad thing. One of the first movies that came to mind when I thought of this feature was Cat People. While Jacques Tourner’s original 1942 version of Cat People is a certified classic, Paul Schrader hit the mark with the erotic, the gory, the strange, the sick, and the romantic with his 1982 remake.

As the film begins, Irena (Natasha Kinski) arrives in New Orleans to meet her brother Paul (Malcolm McDowell) who she was separated from when her parents died and they were placed in foster care. Shortly after she arrives, Paul disappears just before a panther is captured in a seedy motel after attacking a prostitute. The panther is taken to the zoo, and while seeing some of the town, Irena is drawn to the zoo and the panther in particular. She meets zoologist Oliver Yates (John Heard) and takes a job working at the zoo. The panther continues its violent behavior and escapes the zoo. Only then does Paul reappear. He reveals to Irena they are both members of a race of cat people, and if she makes love to anyone other than her brother, she will also turn into a vicious cat and the only way to change back is to take a life. Now she must choose between Oliver, the man she loves, and becoming an uncontrollable killer.

The same year that John Carpenter delved back into classic horror for inspiration for his film The Thing, Paul Schrader and writer Alan Ormsby (Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things, Popcorn, My Bodyguard) raided producer Val Lewton’s catalog for Cat People (1942). They made quite a few changes, giving the cat people an incestuous back story, amping up the sex and violence, and changing the setting from New York City to New Orleans (Go Saints!), but on the whole, they stayed fairly true to the structure and some of the iconic portions of Tourner’s film. That’s not to say that the two films are not wildly different. After all, the cursed young woman in the 1942 film didn’t spend the last half of the film topless like Ms. Kinksi does, but the remake really gets it right, honoring the original and putting a very modern spin on it.

When it comes to edgy modern spin, there was a time when Paul Schrader was the go to guy. In the early ‘70’s, he made his name with screenplays for films like Taxi Driver, Obsession, and Raging Bull, and then by the end of the decade when he turned to directing, he maintained his edge with films like Hardcore and American Gigolo. By the time the early eighties rolled around, Schrader was on a creative roll, but he was also on a ton of drugs. The director himself even admits to losing a whole day of filming on Cat People because he was too high to come out of his trailer. How he managed to make a film as coherent, interesting, and visually interesting as Cat People is beyond me. Working with cinematographer John Bailey, Schrader captured a melancholy, mysterious feel similar to Tourner’s original and infused an eroticism that made the film his own.

I’m sure many people feel the driving force behind the film’s sexuality is star Natasha Kinski. While Klaus’ daughter is quite lovely, I found her performance much more interesting than her nude scenes. Throughout the film it is really interesting to watch her to see how she subtly incorporated catlike behaviors into her performance. There is only one time that she took it a little too far, and thankfully it was near the end of the film. Otherwise her performance was pitch perfect, and her chemistry with love interest John Heard is wonderful. Their scenes are really the core of the film, and the explorations of the themes of female sexuality are very interesting. Heard’s zoologist Oliver is trained to be able to handle the wildest of beasts, but the panther inside of Irena is beyond his control. By the end of the film, Oliver has no choice but to literally restrain the woman he loves in order to control her wild side. While the message is not delicate, it is well scripted and doesn’t feel either too obtuse or try to beat you over the head with it.

One of the greatest things about Cat People is the supporting cast. Then, as now, if you need someone to be a massive creep in your film, the man to call is Malcolm McDowell. As the crazy eyed, murderous, incest desiring brother Paul, McDowell is the instrument that Schrader used to build tension in the first half of his film, and as usual Malcolm delivered. While many other actors can be creepy, there is a certain look that McDowell can get that will just send shivers up and down your spine, and in Cat People he uses it to full effect. There are several other actors that make brief appearances that are worth mentioning even though they have very small roles in the film. I was happy to spot Ed Begley Jr. (Transylvania 6-5000, Best in Show), John Larroquette (Night Court), Ruby Dee (American Gangster), Ray Wise (Swamp Thing, Twin Peaks, Reaper), and Annette O’Toole (48 Hours, Superman III) all showing up in minor roles.

My first exposure so Schrader’s film came in the mid-eighties through the theme song, Cat People (Putting Out the Fire) by David Bowie. While Bowie recorded the song for the movie, he also laid down a more rocking version for his Let’s Dance album (featuring guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughn). The score by Giorgio Moroder was nearly complete when Schrader approached Bowie about adding lyrics to a closing theme that Moroder had already written. Bowie accepted, but the song he penned had precious little to do with the film. Even so it’s tons of fun to think of other things to end the lyric “Putting out fire with gasoline”. My wife and I went back and forth on this for quite some time, and I think my favorite was “Putting out fire with Martin Sheen”. (If you used Charlie, it would no doubt just get worse.) The other interesting thing about the song is that it was the only modern pop song that Tarantino pulled for his film Inglourious Basterds. Used during the theater fire scene, it fit strangely well into the film and felt a little more pertinent than it did in Cat People.

Cat People is a love story, but it’s not without throats getting ripped out and Ed Begley Jr. getting his arm ripped off. It would be 20 years before Schrader had another successful film, 2002’s Auto Focus which also dealt with sexual perversions, and these days he is a director that is somewhat forgotten. Cat People is a film that certainly should not be forgotten. While many will disparage the film in comparison to the original, Schrader’s film stand fully on its own, and it’s the perfect kind of film for those of us who like a like a little bit of guts and gore mixed up in their romance.

Bugg Rating