Seven Movies You Could See

So my sister and I are lucky enough to live in a town with a really good video rental place - Flicks & Picks in Eugene, OR - and have a decent background in film literacy, thanks to our father's WATCH THE DAMN MOVIE coaching in childhood.

Here's the problem: we are out of things to watch. Not exactly out; we've got a little to-see notebook, but the movies we haven't seen are movies like Radioactive Dreams and Breakin' 2 and Glengarry Glen Ross, which is to say: either movies that we suspect are not going to be very good or movies that are culturally significant but for which we somehow cannot muster any enthusiasm; it took us months to get around to The Last Temptation of Christ (which was pretty okay, but nowhere near as controversial as Matie and I had expected; the moral of the story is that God has not, apparently, read Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge. Anyway, as Matie says, "Jesus Christ! It's Willem Dafoe!" Then we laugh.).

Anyway, we are trying to watch every good movie and every important movie and every movie that has an interesting-looking box and every movie that some crazy reviewer puts in the same breath as Repo Man. Along the way, we have found some obscure but good movies, and in hopes we can help others like us (jaded, video store-membershipped) we have assembled a little list.

First off: do not see Zardoz. Matie and I had seen it before, but didn't remember too much beyond some catch phrases and the set design, so we thought we could do worse. Oh, man, that is one terrible movie. I think our mother originally recommended it to us, and while our mother is a decent judge of science fiction she is not without her biases; one of them is a shirtless and mustachioed Sean Connery. If you like movies about the future, provided that future is really stupid, you will like Zardoz. Otherwise, you will fall asleep or become enraged.

Okay, actual good movie number one: A Taxing Woman (1987). It's a Japanese crime movie about a plucky tax inspector who - okay, she does look for tax fraud, but it's interesting tax fraud. The intro claims that taxes in Japan can get up to 90%, so there are a lot of people trying not to pay. Most of the movie is about her investigation of the owner of a "love hotel," as well has his maneuvers to hide his money. It's humorous, but not so much that it sacrifices dramatic tension or believability. The sequel was nice, but not as good.

The Kingdom (1994): Twin Peaks except shorter, more coherent, set in a hospital and Danish. Totally excellent - I am terribly sad that no place locally has the 1997 sequel. Matie's favorite characters are the two Down's Syndrome dishwashers who comment on the plot from the hospital's kitchen. I like the Swedish exchange doctor, who regularly finds it necessary to escape to the roof and shriek about how much he hated Denmark/Danes. Apparently Denmark was "shat out of water and chalk," while Sweden is chiseled from stone. Udo Kier shows up late, but with the absolute best entrance in all of cinema history. They're making an American version, but it doesn't look too promising.


On a lighter note, I found The Stuff (1985) on a list of "Lovecraftian Films." Hahahahaha. It's basically a heartwarming story about a white substance that oozes up from the ground, becomes a health food sensation overnight and then turns people into zombies and/or hollowed out husks. It's not very scary or well-written (although it is pretty funny); what I like about it is how much fun it seems. The monster, if you can call it that, is sometimes played by marshmallow fluff, sometimes by soap suds and other times clearly just shaving cream. There's a lot of film being run backwards and a lot of people being drenched in various innocuous substances and trying their hardest to act frightened. I like it.

Scotland, PA (2001) is simply the best Shakespeare adaptation since Strange Brew. The Mcbeths are employees at Duncan's, an alternate-universe McDonald's, and off the owner before he installs the first fast food drive-through, claiming the idea for themselves. Lieutenant McDuff (Christopher Walken) investigates. Hilarity, as far as it goes, ensues.

Another lighter movie is Man of the Century (1999). I'm going to tell you the idea, and you're going to think it sounds stupid, and it does, but the movie is really good: a man who acts like a 1920s person lives in the 1990s. Doesn't that sound terrible? But the writing is brilliant - the 20s-isms alone are crisp and funny - and the actor playing the 1920s guy is really, really good at it. We made Mom and Pop watch this movie.

Brother from Another Planet (1984): Imagine if E.T. were a magical black man with six toes. Also, imagine if E.T. were good. The title and the box art make this movie look terrible - Matie was dead against me renting it - but the truth is, it's moving where other "noble alien visitor" movies are mawkish, and pretty funny to boot.

Oh, yeah, while I was looking up the dates for these movies on IMDB, I also checked out their "recommendations" section, which reminded me to tell you: don't see Liquid Sky. People always say "Repo Man, Buckaroo Banzai and Liquid Sky," but those people are crazy. Liquid Sky is a meandering, muddy-looking movie about a bunch of glittery androgynous punkers and some tinfoil aliens. There's a lot of wandering and writhing, not so much plot. Avoid.