Shaun Berk's 10 Movie Recommendations- 115th Edition

Welcome to the 115th Edition of my blog. It's very sad to hear about Heath Ledger and in the coming weeks, you will see a movie selection on him. I already had everything covered for this installment and I can see that everyone is anxious for the Oscars. Just about every reader I am subscribed to has an oscar blog, I might do an Oscar edition after the Oscars where I will use past or current work from the winners but here are the 10 for this week.

Dracula (1958): I finally saw the Hammer version of the Bram Stoker which is a different story from the book and even the 1931 version. Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee become stars as both Dr. Van Helsing and Count Dracula. The characters in this story have different fates than usual and there is no Renfield nor is one needed in this story. This also focuses on the sexual feelings after a bite to the neck. I was also more creeped out by Lee moreso than I was Legosi though both performances are great. The final battle between Van Helsing and Dracula is more exciting than the one between them in the 1931 version which there really wasn't a battle. This one probably was too violent for American Cinema at the time but director Terrence Fisher created a great version.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007): I FINALLY SAW IT!!!!! It took a month for this to come to the Muncie theaters and when I found out, I was there right away. Christopher Lee was going to be in this movie as well but things didn't work out and Tim Burton went into a little different direction anyways so this can be featured on this installment. This is probably my favorite musical and I have seen it both in Muncie and in Anderson. In Anderson, my friends Sean (Beadle Bamford), Daniel (Tobias), Glenn (Mr. Fogg), Kristin, Kelsey, Tyler, Pat, and Ashlee were in it and in Muncie, my friends Kristen C (Johanna), Kerry (Beggar Woman), Sean (Beadle once again), Corey (Tobias), Pat, Catlin, and Lauren. I don't go to the theaters often but this was absolutely worth it. Johnny Depp (of course) plays the title character and Helena Bonham Carter plays Mrs. Lovett. I had a lot of concern about Johnny Depp's singing abilities but surprisingly I ended up liking him, even singing. Both leads were very good. My next part of interest was with Alan Rickman as the corrupt Judge Turpin and I was interested in his approach to that role and he was good as always. Sacha Baran Cohen plays Pirelli, Sweeney's rival barber and was great in that role. I also liked the unknown casting of Anthony, Johanna, and Tobias. Jamie Brower plays the idealistic Anthony who saves Sweeney Todd's life and forms a dangerous crush with the Judge's daughter Johanna. Jayne Wisener plays Johanna, the adopted daughter of the Judge and actually makes a great film debut. Ed Sanders plays Toby which is referred to as Tobias on stage. This is one of the few times a child has been cast in this role. They don't usually do it on Broadway due to the work ethic but Tim Burton found a good kid to play this role and one who could sing pretty well. All three great casting choices. Now I'll get to the basic story. Sweeney Todd who was first Benjamin Barker had a great life with a wife and child until a corrupt judge stole his daughter, killed his wife and falsely exiles Sweeney to prison. Barker escapes, returns to London to take his revenge and people who are in the wrong place at the wrong time but his main revenge is towards the Judge and Beadle Bamford. He then goes to his old building to see that Mrs. Lovett runs a meat pie shop and forms a friendship with her while he has a barbershop upstairs and I'll say no more on that. This is partly based on a true story. Steven Sondheim wrote this musical and he ended up really liking this movie. If you liked this movie, and you see a stage version in or near your local town, I suggest you go check it out because it will be a great experience. Originally, Tim Burton was going to do THE BALLAD OF SWEENEY TODD and its many theater reprises with both Christopher Lee and Anthony Stewart Head but Burton felt it would be too theatrical and that might be true which will get mixed opinions. It still has the instrumental of the song. Thank you Tim Burton, if you ever read this, I had a lot of concerns but you did great and this will be a DVD purchase when it comes out.

Shane (1953): Now we go the route of the western and this one-word name title is arguably the best western of all time. Alan Ladd plays the title character who is a retired gunman with a seemingly dark past running into town and befriends a humble family of a husband, wife, and son. Van Heflin plays the father who is already having issues with some of the locals and takes in Shane for some help on the farm. Shane becomes a second-father figure for the young boy who develops a liking to Shane. Jack Palance plays a hired gun who now has Shane to deal with. It's interesting to watch the effect that Shane has on the family and sees that his life doesn't come to an end so easy and the means he will go to in order to save the family from death. Jean Arthur plays the wife who is fed up with the violence. It also has one of the most famous endings of all time.

Across the Pacific (1942): This movie reunited many people from THE MALTESE FALCON including director John Huston, Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, and Sydney Greenstreet. This movie does not live on with the same notoriety or quality but it still is worth watching. Bogart plays the role of Rick Leland who has recently been court-martialed out of the army and then boards a Japanese boat in 1941 which is where he stumbles onto a plot by the Japanese. This movie has an interesting anti-patriotic message to it though Leland is not an American traitor. I do not know when shooting began, this strangely happens around the time of Pearl Harbor and this movie has quite a bit of action for a movie of this era.

The Naughty Nineties (1945): This is an Abbott and Costello film which gave birth to the famous WHO'S ON FIRST routine which was performed by my friend Martin in the show BEEN THERE, SCENE THAT which I was in. Besides the title stars, Henry Travers plays the owner of a riverboat who is swindled out of his boat by some gamblers and Abbott and Costello must make things right leading into some hilarious moments. Possibly the best of the Abbott and Costello films.

The Emporer Jones (1933): I found this in my search for movies from the 30s on TCM and what a strange choice I ran into. Paul Robeson, possibly the best black actor of this era, plays Brutus Jones a railroad porter who ends up killing someone in a gamble dispute. He then does hard labor for a chain gang who escapes and finds his way to a Carribean island and becomes emporer of this island but is haunted by his past misdeeds. I was amazed by the number of times he said the N-word and the stir this might have caused towards the black race and even the white race. This is based on a play by Eugene O'Neil and is apparently quite different and it starred Robeson as the same character here. This is mostly of interest of how daring this movie was at the time.


Executioner 2 (1984): This is my Grindhouse selection for the week and no I have never seen EXECUTIONER PART 1. I'm not even going to name off any actors or directors, this is exactly what it sounds, a grindhouse selection on my DVD set I bought and you get some good laughs out of it no matter how unintentional. A vigilante going by the title nickname is going around and killing criminals which lowers the crime-rate to the dismay of both the police force who are being made to look bad and the criminal underworld. The acting was noticably horrible but that's why this is Grindhouse right? When people make these types of movies, I don't know what they are trying to get out of it, maybe just a way to make money but do they not see how bad these are? Watch this with some friends and have a night of laughs and if you're looking for your grindhouse selection, here you go. Expect more of these selections in the coming weeks.

The Loss of Sexual Innocence (1999): I found this strange Mike Figgis film on I believe HBO and this movie has some very mixed opinions. Maybe I enjoyed it more because I watched it shortly after my last selection. This is from the same director of LEAVING LAS VEGAS and while this movie is not as good, it's a pretty daring film and I admire Figgis for his guts to do a movie like this knowing he would not satisfy everyone but some might get something out of it. This is a non-linear story of a movie director from his childhood to his adult life and his sexual exploits among other things. This might need to be watched more than once. Julian Sands plays the role of the older Nic and has a lot of instrumental music including from Beethoven and limited dialogue. BOSTON LEGAL co-star Saffron Burrows plays one of his love interests.

Marvin's Room (1996): This is a screen adaptation to an Off-Broadway play written by Scott McPherson. This is a movie about a family who has been separated for years and are brought together because of cancer. Meryl Streep and Diane Keaton play sisters who haven't seen each other in years. Bessie (Keaton) comes down with Leukemia and needs to see if her sister Lee (Streep) is a match. Lee has her own troubles as a single mom trying to get her life together. Her oldest son Hank, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, is heading down the wrong path in life and starts to connect immediately with Bessie. Robert De Niro plays their doctor who is looking for a bone morrow transplant. This was a good, subtle performance from him. I like that he doesn't mind supporting roles, as long as they are good and this was one of his good roles even if short and reunites with many people he has worked with including the first three people mentioned. Look for SEX AND THE CITY alum Cynthia Nixon and also for Kelly Ripa as a soap star. This is a great movie about a family coming together that does not hit the label of depressing.

Bully (2001): I did not purposely choose this Brad Renfro film, I was just looking for something from this time period and thought this was perfect to watch. Brad Renfro, Nick Stahl, and Rachel Miner star in this movie where Brad Renfro plays Marty, a high school dropout and stoner and Nick Stahl plays Bobby, Marty's long-time friend and the one who is always degrading him both verbally and physically. Marty, his girlfriend and others get fed-up with his bully ways so they hatch a plan to kill him. This is apparently a true story of a middle to upper-class neighborhood showing that these kind of things can happen there. I will say there were some comedic moments that maybe I shouldn't have laughed at, I also had no idea this was based on a true story until I started writing this paragraph. I found this on the great IFC channel that we just got and I love this channel.

Honorable Non-Movie Mention: The Complete Calvin and Hobbes Collection: I did this with Bruce Campbell a couple weeks ago so now I do it with the complete book trilogy of my favorite comic strip growing up. I read these a lot as a kid and got the humor out of them but I didn't realize until reading them now how philosophical and political these cartoons are and which are just right for both kids and adults. Calvin is a elementary-school boy with an intelligence ahead of his time and an extreme imagination including his best (and seemingly only) friend Hobbes which is his stuffed tiger but he just seems to real. Bill Watterson wrote this comic-strip from 1985-1995 and never ran out of ideas but quit at the peak of its success. Some of my favorite moments are with Rosalyn the baby-sitter. Calvin hits home a lot with me to some of my beliefs. I always love the December comics where Calvin becomes morally-torn trying to be good for Santa Claus while still being himself. Long live Bill Watterson for managing to voice his frustration to society ideals of environmentalism, public education, and commercialism and still keep it pretty clean who also to my knowledge never had it aired as a cartoon special on television though it might have been interesting. He also never had toys of any kind released. Watterson also created some entertaining supporting characters like the mom, dad, Miss Wormwood, and Susie Derkins, could that have been a crush to the extreme that he had on her? Hey, go check some of this for you younger people who might only know Calvin by the car stickers with calvin pissing on a company or some other logo because those are just counterfeit.

Well, that is it for this week, leave your thoughts, what did you like, what do you not like and so on. RIP Heath Ledger and Brad Renfro. It's always sad when these people seem to have everything just throw it away, especially these youngsters. I'm sure Heath was a kid before he started acting and obviously Brad was a child actor and look what has happened to them. River Phoenix seemed to have caught whatever this is and why? One actor featured on here started as a kid and that is Leonardo DiCaprio. Some of you may not like his pretty-boy looks though he is a versatile actor but he never seemed to have any real extreme issues and has managed to have a very good career in film and earlier in television and is an environmentalist. Also, Nick Stahl who I also featured, started as a child, and I have never really heard anything about him in public either. A current child actor that I named was Ed Sanders who played Toby in SWEENEY TODD. He was quite good in that role and I hope he doesn't end up like many child actors have but many of the child actors have done fine but their stories just aren't as interesting but it is possible. And besides, you don't have to be a high-paid actor to be on drugs, it can happen to anyone. Those probably aren't the only two people of their age to have died a drug-related death in the last couple weeks. Well, I've said enough so I'll just leave it at that and I'll be back next week. Thank you to everyone once again who read my blogs.