Merry Christmas, Ya Filthy Animals!

.... and a Happy New Year!

 

 

Note: This will be the first of a planned series of Christmas entries I will be making over the next couple of months. If you're saying to yourself "But, Quiggy, it's not even Halloween yet", I say "Get over yourself, Ebenezer!"

 

 

So, what if you had that fantasy come true, that of most young kids, that you could be on your own and do what you want, without  the interference of those pesky adults and older siblings?  That is the setup here, and that's all we really need. Other than that, there really is no plot. Sure, there is that threat of having your home invaded by would-be thieves, but even that is just a setup for the layout of what is essentially a live-action version of a Looney Tunes cartoon.

I mean, think about it. In both of these movies, the bad guys could be substituted with Elmer Fudd and Yosemite Sam, with the character of Kevin being Bugs Bunny. No matter what happens to the bad guys, they aren't really damaged much more than if a 100 lb. anvil was dropped on Elmer Fudd's head. Just a quick "Ow! That hurt!" and then back to trying to capture that "wascally wabbit" (I mean, bratty kid).

 

 

 Home Alone (1990):

The McAllisters are going on vacation for Christmas. Rather than spend it in boring old Chicago, they are going to Paris. And life at the McAllister household is hectic as a result. Not just Peter (John Heard) and his wife, Kate (Catherine O'Hara) and their 5 kids, but also a perennial hanger own and total mooch of an older brother, Frank (Gary Bamman) and his wife and five kids are all running around like chickens with their heads cut off, trying to get ready to catch the plane early the next morning.

Our hero, Kevin (Macauley Culkin), is frustrated because, being the self-centered type, he thinks everybody is out to get him. To his credit he does get treated a bit like an unruly child, but then basically he IS an unruly child. However, the only one who really seems to have it in for Kevin is his older brother, Buzz (Devin Ratray) who, in typical movie older brother fashion, does everything he can to make Kevin's life hell.

The setup begins when dad Peter unplugs the clock to check on a charger and plugs it back in without resetting the clock. This in effect sets up the next morning when the entire house awakes to realize they overslept and the shuttle service they hired to take them to the airport is waiting outside. Long story, short, they rush to the airport and just manage to make it on the plane before its departure.

Except a foul up in the process occurs when Kevin is left behind.  And in typical fashion, mom is the first to realize that Kevin didn't make it with them and is still home alone. 

 

Kevin wakes up to discover his whole family is gone. Shock eventually segues into elation that his dream of being able to do what he wants without interference is a dream now come true. As any 8 year old would do he initially starts doing things he had previously not been allowed to do, like jumping on the bed and pillaging his older brother's room.

 

Eventually he does settle down somewhat.  He even goes grocery shopping.

 

One of the scenes that gradually makes Kevin grow up a little is when he has an encounter with Old Man Marley (Roberts Blossom). Marley is a recluse in the neighborhood, and as such, is the subject of some pretty sinister rumors from the neighborhood kids, such as the fact that he murdered his whole family with a snow shovel. Kevin is at first scared s**tless of Marley, but he eventually learns that Marley is a nice old man who has had problems of his own with his own family. Both Kevin and Marley eventually learn something from each other and depart as friends.

 

In time Kevin realizes that a pair of suspicious characters he has seen hanging around the neighborhood are in fact home burglars. Harry (Joe Pesci) and Marv (Daniel Stern) have been casing the neighborhood for weeks, figuring out which houses were going to be vacant during the holidays so they can rob them blind.  Of course, one of the houses on their list was the McAllister house, since everyone was supposed to be going to Paris.

 

But when they see little Kevin they become confused and think maybe the family didn't go after all. But it gradually begins to dawn on them that Kevin is all alone, so their plans go back to the original stage. Meanwhile Kevin becomes aware of the pair and determines that he, and he alone, is the only block between a successful robbing of his family home and a defense from the robbers.

This sets up the last third of the movie as Kevin goes from an 8 year old kid to the equivalent of a mix of McGyver and a Rube Goldberg creator. He sets up an elaborate series of blockades, including hot wiring a door knob, painting grease on ladder rungs, and icing up the sidewalk out front. You might get the idea that Kevin watched a hell of a lot of Wile E. Coyote / Roadrunner cartoons and learned how to avoid the mistakes that Herr Coyote made so he could be successful. 

 

Of course, the family eventually returns home just in time on Christmas Day. Mom first, since she refused to wait for a direct flight and had to use all her wiles to get home to her son.  But she only beats the rest of the family by 10 minutes. The rest of the family having waited for the direct flight Mom would not wait for. 

 

One of the better parts of the movie is when Kevin uses a VCR tape of an old (fictional, BTW) film noir film called Angels with Filthy Souls. A tough gangster named Johnny (played by Ralph Foody) has some bad words with another character named Snakes and Kevin uses this film to convince a pizza delivery guy to be satisfied with a 20 cent delivery tip. An interesting tidbit for you if you've seen the fake movie scene: Originally the parts were going to be reversed with the parts of Snakes and Johnny being played by the other actor.

 

Also a great cameo in this movie by John Candy as the leader of a polka band who gives Mom a ride to Chicago. Candy did this movie for almost free as a favor to John Hughes (having previously made Planes, Trains and Automobiles and Uncle Buck with the director).  I read on wikipedia that because Candy came on board for so cheap that Hughes just let him ad-lib his whole role, and his parts are pretty funny.

Robert De Niro turned down the role of Harry, and as a result the part went to Pesci. As good as De Niro is, even in movies where he is required to be comedic, I am thankful he chose to pass. I can't imagine anyone in that role but Pesci.  

So, the movie was pretty successful upon it's release. It raked in $476 million dollars against a budget of on $18 million and was surpassed only by Ghost that year in terms of ticket sales.  It currently has a 66% rating on the Tomato-meter. Among some of the critics who didn't like it was Owen Gleiberman, who apparently missed the homage I saw in it as a tribute to those old Looney Tunes cartoons. He called it a "sadistic festival of adult-bashing". And note: I wrote the comparison of Kevin's blockades above as "a mix of McGyver and a Rube Goldberg creator" before I read it, but apparently me and Roger Ebert were on the same wavelength... A quote from wikipedia article on the movie: He compared the elaborate booby-traps in the film to Rube Goldberg machines, writing "they're the kinds of traps that any 8-year-old could devise, if he had a budget of tens of thousands of dollars and the assistance of a crew of movie special effects people"...

Home Alone was such a huge hit that it inspired a sequel, Home Alone II: Lost in New York.

 

 

Home Alone II: Lost in New York (1992): 

This film segues from the fist movie and pretty much starts out the same way. This time the McAllisters and the rest are on their way to spend Christmas in Florida. I think it is supposed to be taking place the following Christmas after the debacle of a trip the family tried in the first film, so the maturity that Kevin garnered from the first film didn't apparently last long, since he is still being the same rather obnoxious little kid he was being last year.

 

This time the family is going to Florida. As usual, the family wakes up late and has to rush to get to the airport. No, the family does not end up leaving poor Kevin behind this time. Instead a bit of confusion happens as Kevin gets separated and chases after a man he thinks is his dad and ends up on a plane to new York instead of the one the rest of the family is boarded to go to Florida.

Fortunately for Kevin he has his dad's carry on which has his wallet. After wandering around new York for a bit and realizing he has to find some place to stay he books a room at the Plaza Hotel, using his portable recorder to convince the hotel booking agent on the phone that is dad is making the reservation. (Something that can't be encapsulated by writing about it... you have to see it. It probably wouldn't work in real life, but this is the movies).

The hotel concierge, played by Tim Curry, is suspicious and does many attempts to try to catch the non-present father, but of course, since dad is really not there he has no success. Kevin uses the portable recorder, as well as an inflatable Bozo the clown to hide the fact that he is there alone. As well, he has a tape of the film noir sequel to the previous movie, Angels with Filthier Souls. (The title of this blog entry comes from a quote in that faux movie...)

 

While wandering around Central Park Kevin encounters a homeless woman, credited as The Pigeon Lady (Brenda Fricker). Once again circumstances cause Kevin to rethink his initial reaction, which is fear, to finding out that the pigeon lady is really a nice person after all. And both of them, as in the previous movie with Kevin and Marley, come away with a new outlook on life.

 

Meanwhile, it turns out that our bad guys from the previous movie, Harry and Marv, have escaped jail and are planning to hit a local toy store, which has thousands of dollars of it's sales that is going to be donated to the local children's hospital. The two spot Kevin and recognize him, but since they are focused on their crime they mostly just try a half ass attempt at accosting Kevin, but end up just forgetting about him.

 

Not a good idea. Since Kevin has found out about their plan he makes an attempt to foil the robbery. And then, much as in the first movie, he sets up an elaborate trap that plays out much as it did in the first movie: Rube Goldberg traps and Looney Tunes hijinks.

"But wait...!" you are thinking. "He's not at home..." Well, it turns out that dad has a cousin living in New York, one that is conveniently out of town while his house is being renovated. (and, BTW, that house looks like it's been condemned and abandoned to me, so just how much renovation did it need...?)

 

Harry and Marv are looking for revenge. Might have been better if they just hightailed it out of town since they already had a satchel full of loot, but these two mental giants think that getting that kid is a more important goal than anything resembling prudence. And of course, they failed to learn their lesson when dealing with Kevin the first time.

 

Eventually Kevin foils these two geniuses and wins the day, as well as garners the thanks of the toy store owner, Mr. Duncan (Eddie Bracken). And, as they say, all's well that ends well.

Just wondering. Is there anyone besides me that thinks Brenda Fricker (the Pigeon Lady) looks a lot like Susan Boyle? Have to admit I had a little crush on Fricker after that movie. Sure, she's about 15 years older than me, but who says you have to have crushes on younger women?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Home Alone 2 was not the smash that the first one was, but it still managed to come in third in ticket sales behind Aladdin and The Bodyguard. It was made for $28 million and pulled in almost $400 million at the box office.  However, it was not the big favorite among critics... what do they know? It ranks only 35% on the Tomato-meter. Audiences begged to differ, however. It has an average of A- on a scale of A+ to F with those of us who actually paid to see the movie rather than have our tickets bought for us by our employer/newspaper. 

Home Alone 2 also has a phenomenally better musical soundtrack. The first movie had very little Christmas music in it, it was mostly the score of the film with a small number of songs. On this movie you get quite a number of favorite melodies accompanying the film, including "Sleigh Ride" sung by TLC, "Silver Bells" sung by Atlantic Starr, the classic favorite "Jingle Bell Rock" as sung by Bobby Helms and my favorite, "A Holly Jolly Christmas", sung by Alan Jackson.

  

 

Late breaking news! Remember those two film noir movies I mentioned above that Kevin puts to ingenious  use? I just found a clip that includes his first watch of both of those films and the subsequent pranks he plays on various people with them. You don't need to watch the whole movie to understand what's going on, they are self-explanatory. Enjoy!

 

 

Well, folks, Christmas is almost upon us. Have a happy holidays. And be sure ALL your family is present before you start on a journey, even if it's just across town to grandma's house.

Quiggy

 

Time and Time Again

This is my entry in the It's a Young World Blogathon hosted by Pop Culture Reverie

Back to the Future (1985), Back to the Future II (1989) and Back to the Future III (1990):

Marty Mc Fly (Michael J. Fox) is a typical teenager of the 80's.  He has dreams of being a rock star, getting into the panties of his girlfriend and just surviving high school.  That third part may not be so easy since Principal Strickland (James Tolkan) has an abiding dislike for slackers.  Strickland was around when Marty's father was a student at Hill Valley High School and doesn't think much of his family.

Strickland also looks down on Marty because Marty has a habit of hanging around the town weirdo, Dr. Emmett Brown (Christopher Lloyd).  "Doc" has a lot of eccentric ideas, and his latest thing is a time machine.

Wait a minute, Doc... Are you telling me you built a time machine...out of a DeLorean? -Marty:

Doc has a time machine, yes. Made out of a DeLorean.  (For those of you who were born post 1983, the DeLorean Motor Company made a brief blot on car history, but it was basically just a classy looking dud )

Doc built it based on an idea he had in 1955, and it took him 30 years to do it, but it works.  Unfortunately, he made it by hoodwinking some Libyan terrorists into thinking that the plutonium they stole was going to be used for a bomb, but he gave them some defective stuff and is using the plutonium to power the time machine.  And of course, the terrorists come looking for him.

Marty uses the car/time machine to try to escape, which, when it hits 88mph turns into the time machine.  Which sends Marty back to the day that Doc came up with the idea of a time machine back in 1955.

It also happens to be the day that Marty's mom and dad first met.  But along with the typical fish out of water flick as Marty deals with an 80's mentality in the 50's, there is an added twist.  Marty interferes with the meeting of his parents and instead of Mom falling in love with Dad, she falls in love with Marty.  (uh-oh).

Now Marty and his history is gradually disappearing as he has created a classic time travel paradox.  Before he and the 1950's Doc can arrange to somehow get him back to his future, he first has to arrange for his parents to fall in love, otherwise he won't have a future to get back to.

As a window into 50's teens, it does have some flaws.  (my parents were teenagers in the 50's, so I had some background to research it.  It seems more like an 80's view of what the 50's were like rather than an actual window into the 50's, but it is still fun.)

Of course, eventually Marty does manage to get his parents together and return to the present, although there are a few changes.  Nothing drastic like the future the time traveler returned to in Ray Bradbury's classic story A Sound of Thunder, but in terms of his own present there are a few changes.

Back to the Future II picks up where the first movie left off, with Doc, having returned from the (then) future of 2015 to get Marty to go with him to help save his kids.  The future of 2015 had flying cars (and imagine the disappointment when 2015 has come and gone and I still don't have a flying car...) and a myriad of other neat little things, some of which we do have.

The future Marty is living a life not quite unlike his father in the pre-time travel present of the first movie.  It is established that his dream career of being a rock star went down the tubes after an accident that occured when he was a teenager.  (Marty hates to be called "chicken" and gets into a lot of trouble throughout the second and third movies as a result.)

Marty's son, Marty, Jr. (also played by Fox) is on the verge of ruining his future because he is going to get into an illegal act with the local bully.  Marty has to pose as his son, which he can do since he is the same age.  But in the process of doing so, his girlfriend, who came along for the ride, ends up at his future home and they have to rescue her.

As an added twist, Marty, thinking only of himself, buys a copy of a sports almanac which tells the results of every sporting event from the 50's to the 200's.  But Doc makes him throw it away.  Only Biff (Thomas F. Wilson), a nemesis of his father in the 50's, now an old man, fishes it out of the trash, and using Docs time machine, takes it back to the 50's and gives it to his younger self.

Which makes for an extremely tough time when Marty and Doc return to the present.  Because they return to a present in which Biff has become top dog of Hill Valley, and the "present" is nothing like the present that Doc and Marty left when they went to 2015.  They determine that the only solution is to go back to 1955 and prevent future Biff from giving past Biff the book.

Potential paradoxes abound as Marty not only has to interact with some of the same characters but he also has to avoid running into the other Marty who is also still in the 1955 scenario.  Confusing?  Well, not if you are up on time travel theories.  Michio Kaku, a astrophysics theorist who has written about such things says they got the whole thing right in an interview on my DVD.

The second movie ends with a cliffhanger as Doc, in the time machine, is zapped by a lightning bolt and ends up in the Old West of the 1880's.  Marty is seemingly stranded in 1955, until a Western Union man delivers a message that has been held for the past 70 years to direct Marty in to how to return to the future (his present).

But in Back to the Future III, Marty ignores the future Doc's request that he not come back to get him, because he finds out that Doc was to be killed by an outlaw.  So using the 1955 Doc's help, Marty goes back to 1885.  Talk about a fish out of water.  Marty, who has decided to use the alias of "Clint Eastwood" gets together with Doc and tries to finagle a way to get the time machine back to the present.  Which is inhibited by the fact that there is no gasoline in 1885, thus no way to get the car up to the requisite 88mph on its own power.

Not only that, but Doc has acquired a love interest in the person of a local schoolmarm (Mary Steenburgen).  A schoolmarm who, by the way, was supposed to have died in a wagon accident, but was rescued by Doc before said accident occurred.

The whole Back to the Future saga will keep you on your toes in terms of it's scientific theories.  But fear not.  Even if you aren't quite up-to-date on potentials for paradoxes, it is still a hoot.

This old Plymouth couldn't get up to 88mph even with a shove by a jet engine, but it will get me home.  Drive safely, folks.

Quiggy

Robots With Guts

This is my entry in the Duo Double Feature Blogathon hosted by The Flapper Dame and Phyllis Loves Classic Movies

Science fiction movies are always better when you place them in a dystopian future.  Of course, that defines about 99% of all sci-fi movies set in the future.  After all, how long could you last sitting in a movie theater where everything was hunky-dory and life was beautiful all the time.  Personally I'd doze off after about 10 minutes....

Peter Weller is the star of several movies in my list of the top sci-fi and horror movies  A look at his oeuvre of films shows that he is a prolific actor in the genre,  The same goes for Nancy Allen.  She had been in several movies before this role, some of which I had seen, but this was the first one in which I had ever noticed her.  Both of these went on to do many more movies after the RoboCop movies, and I will list some other appearances you can check out later.

The chemistry between the two on screen is great.  They start out as partners in the police force, but gradually come to respect each other. 

RoboCop (1987)



In the near future (an unspecified year), the city of Detroit is in turmoil.  Crime is rampant.  A company called Omni Consumer Products (OCP) has bought the Detroit Police Department and runs it as a corporate entity.  Officer Alex Murphy (Peter Weller) is transferred to the inner city division and is assigned as a partner to Officer Anne Lewis (Nancy Allen).

Meanwhile, at corporate headquarters of OCP, a senior executive, Dick Jones (Ronny Cox), introduces a concept of a robotic cop called ED209.  The ED209 is a disaster as it malfunctions, killing an executive.  The head of OCP, called 'The Old Man" (Daniel O'Herlihy), is "disappointed" with the results.  Bob Morton (Miguel Ferrer) immediately takes initiative in proposing his idea for "RoboCop", which would involve taking a human officer and imbuing him with a vast array of cybernetics.  Jones  is not very happy with the usurping of his authority, however.

On patrol, Lewis and Murphy chase down a criminal mastermind, Clarence Boddicker (Kurtwood Smith, who endows the character with MUCH more menace than he did as Red Forman on That 70's Show).  Boddicker and his gang trap Murphy and literally pour an entire armory of bullets in him while Lewis watches in horror from a hiding place.

Murphy is taken to a hospital where OCP officials take over, and in the name of enterprise, convert him to the prototype for the RoboCop program.  The faceless corporation (which isn't exactly faceless, per se, but you get the point) commandeers the former Murphy and makes him essentially a product owned by OCP.  They send him back to his former precinct, where several incidents show that he is a superior force with which to be reckoned.

Lewis observes RoboCop do a fancy move with his gun and realizes that the robot has the personality and memories of Murphy, since she had seen Murphy perform the same maneuver.  She approaches RoboCop and calls him Murphy, which triggers some memories in the machine, remembering not only his life as a married man with a kid, but also his death at the hands of Boddicker and his men. Meanwhile, Dick Jones has taken an extremely vengeful dislike for Bob Morton, and has his stooge, (guess who?  If you said Boddicker, you've been watching just about the right amount of these kinds of movies) to kill Morton, but not before Jones tells Morton via video why... Because he's a mean vindictive SOB, that's why.

Shortly thereafter, RoboCop goes on a vengeance raid of his own, tracking down Boddicker and his men in an abandoned factory.  He proceeds to extract his revenge, all in the name of the law, f course, since his directives (program) prevent him from becoming a true vigilante.  Boddicker, in a panic, trying to save his ass reveals that he works for Jones at OCP.  RoboCop arrests him instead of executing him.  He then goes to confront Jones, but finds that he has a hidden directive in his program that prevents him from acting on his evidence against the OCP executive.

The final third of the movie is very entertaining as RoboCop and Lewis try to stop Boddicker (who was bailed out by Jones) and a final confrontation with the executive board which will make you stand up and cheer, if you haven't already left the theater because of the violence... 

Which brings me to a final point.  This movie is ranked as one of the most violent movies ever made.  I think even Sam Peckinpah would have cringed at this movie.  And surprisingly, director Paul Verhoeven's original cut was even much more violent.  According to my research, it was originally rated X for violence, and Verhoeven had to re-cut the movie an astounding seven times before the movie review board finally gave it an R rating.  Admittedly the movie is over the top as far as violence is concerned.  The question as to whether it is worth it is up to the viewer.

 RoboCop II (1990)

The movie takes place sometime after the events of RoboCop.  Detroit has gradually fallen on hard times financially, and the mayor (Willard Pugh) has taken some financial assistance from OCP to keep the city in the black.  But they are about to default on their loan, which would allow OCP to have complete ownership of Detroit.  Part of OCPs plan to financially ruin Detroit involves the cut in pay to Detroit's police, which causes the police force to go on strike.

.OCP has designs to create a new RoboCop to help curb the rampant violence and crime in the inner city.  "The Old Man", who still runs the company, has become a less attractive character by this time.and wholly desires the outcome of control of Detroit, and is behind the plans of Dr. Faxx (Belinda Bauer) to create her new RoboCop 2.

Her plan is to fully integrate a personality with the cybernetics and she seeks a willing volunteer to be the human portion.  Enter drug lord Cain (Tom Noonan), a despicable character who is trying to engineer a worldwide addiction to his manufactured drug, "Nuke". 

He is helped by his associate, a young kid called Hob (Gabriel Damon).  RoboCop assualts the drug plant, where his programming stops him from shooting the kid who actually shoots him instead.  The criminals then dismantle RoboCop and send him back to police HQ in pieces.

Faxx and company rebuild RoboCop, but they screwith an army of new directives which basically turns him into a politically correct dumbass.  Lewis is frustrated with her new partner and tells him so.  RoboCop uses an electrical grid to fry his circuits, which eliminates all his directives, then goes after Cain, enlisting the help of his fellow striking officers.  They raid Cain's factory an in the ensuing melee, Cain is severely wounded.  Faxx decides that Cain is the perfect specimen for her RoboCop 2 program and turns him into the new cyborg.  To help matters, Cain has an addiction to Nuke which she feels will commit him to helping out.  But Cain, still with part of his own personality still in place, has other ideas.

Once again, this is a violent movie, and as opposed to the first one, this one just seems to relish in the violence for it's own purposes.  It doesn't have Verhoeven's touch to help it along so it basically just becomes something like one of those ultraviolent video games where the point is just to notch up the violence just for titillation.    I recommend it only because of Weller's presence, and suggest that you avoid RoboCop III, because without Weller to balance the violence, it was just a mess of hash.

Well folks, that ends this session with the ballad of the gun.  Drive safely.  I end with the promised list of Weller and Allen movies:

Peter Weller Movies: (Only ones I have seen, and like... not a complete list)

Of Unknown Origin (1983)
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension (1984)
RoboCop (1987)
RoboCop II (1990)
Naked Lunch (1991)
Screamers (1995)
Top of the World (1997)
Star Trek: Into Darkness ( 2013)

Weller also appeared briefly as a chacter in an episode of my favorite TV series Monk.


Nancy Allen Movies: (again, only ones I have seen, and liked...not a complete list)

The Last Detail (1973)
Carrie (1976)
1941 (1979)
The Philadelphia Experiment (1984)
 RoboCop (1987)
RoboCop II (1990)
RoboCop III (1993) (This one had a different actor as Murphy/RoboCop)
My Apocalypse (2008)