Skip to main content

Sunday Double Header

Due to severe boredom, rainy skies and no kickball, yesterday became a movie double header of Bananas and Danger: Diabolik. I gotta say, I enjoyed both of them, but for very different reasons.

I've only seen a few of Woody Allen's "classic" movies: Manhattan, Annie Hall and Everything You've Ever Wanted to Know About Sex * But Were Afraid to Ask. Great stuff, but Allen has done so many movies that you have a hard time keeping up if you're a casual fan. Bananas is more of a slapstick satire than a dramatic comedy but it still has a heart. I want to see more of these kinds of Allen flicks. Looks like I'll be bumping up Play it Again, Sam and Sleeper on my Netflix queue . . .

Like a lot of people, I was first exposed to Danger: Diabolik through the Beastie Boys' "Body Movin'" video. When I saw the film on Mystery Science 3000, I thought it was a really terrible movie that looked really good. The sets are really cool but the acting was really ham-handed and campy. Well, I don't think my opinion has changed since yesterday's viewing, but I found more things to appreciate. Bava's direction is very cool with his use of wild colors and crazy angles. Combined with Ennio Morricone's score, these things are advantages. Probably the biggest distraction is the film's looping: the words you hear are rarely in sync with the actors' lips. So add that to very little character development and the over-the-top acting, you have a great B-movie.

Some of the next movies on my list are Slacker, Waking Life and Catching the Friedmans. Hopefully I'll have something to do next weekend and not feel like watching movies is my only alternate.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Ohhh, now. How could you have been bored with Juliet around?

I think I'm still trying to recover from the shaggy dog's visit!

Popular posts from this blog

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Catherine Wheel

Originally posted: Tuesday, August 29th, 2006 Despite managing to release five proper albums, Catherine Wheel was one of those bands that always seemed to slip past the mainstream rock crowd. Yes, they got some nice airplay in their day, but people seem to have forgotten about them. You may hear “Black Metallic” or “Waydown” on a “classic alternative” show on Sirius or XM or maybe even on terrestrial radio, but that’s about it. For me, they were one of most consistent rock bands of the ’90s, meandering through shoegazer, hard rock, space rock and pop rock, all while eluding mainstream pigeonholing. Led by the smooth, warm pipes of vocalist/guitarist Rob Dickinson (cousin of Iron Maiden’s Bruce Dickinson), Catherine Wheel featured Brian Futter on lead guitar, Dave Hawes on bass and Neil Sims on drums. They weren’t a pretty-boy guitar band, but they weren’t a scuzzy bunch of ragamuffins either. Though the band hailed from England, Catherine Wheel found itself more welcome on American air

Best of 2021

  Last year, my attention span was not wide enough to listen to a lot of LPs from start to finish. Too much went on in 2020 to focus on 10-15 albums, so I went with only a couple to spotlight. Well, 2021 was a little better, as I have a list of top four records, and a lot of individual tracks.  (I made a lengthy Spotify playlist ) So, without further ado, here’s my list of favorites of the year: Albums Deafheaven, Infinite Granite (listen) Hands down, my favorite album of the year. I was not sure where Deafheaven would go after another record that brought My Bloody Valentine and death metal fans together, but they beautifully rebooted their sound on Infinite Granite. The divisive goblin vocals are vastly pared-down here, as are the blast beats. Sounding more inspired by Slowdive, the band has discovered a new sonic palette that I hope they explore more of in the future. It’s a welcome revelation. I still love their older material, but this has renewed my love of what these guys do.  J