Television Review: KENNY ROGERS AS THE GAMBLER (1980, Dick Lowry)

Stars: 4 of 5.
Running Time: 94 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Kenny Rogers, Bruce Boxleitner (TRON, BABYLON 5), Clu Gulager (TAPEHEADS, THE KILLERS), Harold Gould (THE STING, SILENT MOVIE), Lee Purcell (MR. MAJESTYK, VALLEY GIRL), Noble Willingham (CHINATOWN, NORMA RAE, THE HOWLING). Song "The Gambler" written by Don Schlitz and performed by Kenny Rogers.
Tag-line: "You Got To Know When To Hold 'Em, Know When To Fold Em... "
Best one-liner: "The question is... which two of you are willing to take the bullets?"

It was bound to happen. One of the great narrative songs of the modern era had to be turned into one of the great television movies of the modern era. And what a song it is. Written by a man named Don Schlitz, it sees a meeting between two gamblers on a train bound for nowhere, fast. The elderly gambler offers the younger cardsharp some (now legendary) advice in exchange for his last swallow of whiskey. After taking that final swig, the elderly gambler dispenses his advice, puts out his cigarette, and dies. For the record, Kenny Rogers sings the song in character as the younger man, yet in the movie he plays the older character with Bruce Boxleitner as the up-and-comer. Also, the whole 'dying' bit was excised (there were four sequels).

Kenny Rogers petitions Boxleitner for his final sip of whiskey.

Anyway, Kenny Rogers stars as Brady Hawkes, a dude who knows when to hold 'em, knows when to fold 'em, knows when to walk away, knows when to run, and who never counts his money when he's sitting at the table because there shall plenty of time to calculate one's winnings after the game has drawn to a close.


Personal hero Clu Gulager co-stars as a woman-stealin', kid-nappin', gunslingin' Kenny Rogers nemesis. Gulager, as always, shines like a artistic supernova, packing the surly 'Rufe Bennett' with so much pathos that you nearly are rooting for him. Bruce Boxleitner even gets in on the action as the up-and-comer gambler ready to take up Kenny's mantle. But when the cards fall, the chips are down, and there's no more aces left in holes, things aren't as black and white as you'd think. THE GAMBLER ends up being about how tough life is for us all– no heroes here. No villains here. Just regular folk tryin' to catch a break.

And now I shall end with a montage of screen captures of Clu Gulager in his natural habitat.

CLU GULAGER RUNS A SALOON AND EXUDES PATHOS


CLU GULAGER GETS THE LADIES AND GRINS LIKE A SMART-ALECK


CLU GULAGER WILL MIX YOU A DRINK


CLU GULAGER WILL STRIKE A CHILD IF HE HAS TO



CLU GULAGER WILL...get punched out by Kenny Rogers?- Ah, well, Clu was always subject to ignominious defeats, just watch THE KILLERS.

So alright, gents, I'm gonna raise you four stars. And then I'm gonna fold. Gonna walk away and leave you with 'em. Why? Cause you earned 'em, goddammit.

-Sean Gill

Film Review: KUFFS (1992, Bruce A. Evans)

Stars: 4.5 of 5.
Running Time: 102 minutes.

Tag-line: "When you have attitude - who needs experience?"

Notable Cast or Crew: Written and directed by Bruce A. Evans (writer of STARMAN, STAND BY ME, and JUNGLE 2 JUNGLE). Christian Slater, Milla Jovovich, Bruce Boxleitner, Ashley Judd, Don S. Davis (Major Briggs on TWIN PEAKS). Music by Harold Faltermeyer (TOP GUN, FATAL BEAUTY, TANGO & CASH).

Best one-liner: "Now I hate to repeat myself, so, you're all under arrest, come out in front of the cars, and lay down on the ground or something."

'Why are we doing so much running? Aren't we all going to be in cars?!' Personally I never thought that the Slater Factor could eclipse the zenith it reached in HEATHERS. Well, guess what? I was wrong. What we have here is somehow the love child of DIRTY HARRY and FERRIS BUELLER'S DAY OFF.

With a healthy sprinkling of TURNER & HOOCH?

And Slater is somehow the exact median point between Eastwood and Broderick. Man, this day is full of firsts- I just compared Slater to other performers and never once mentioned Jack Nicholson! Plus, the movie is called KUFFS. And Slater's character is named George Kuffs. If you can't appreciate the simple bone-headed beauty in that, then you probably shouldn't be watching Slater movies anyway.

Now you might've already heard that KUFFS breaks the fourth wall. You hear that a lot- then, as it turns out, there's a throwaway line directed at the camera, or a wink and a nod here or there... maybe something at the very beginning, or something at the tail end, or something similarly half-assed. Now I must inform you that KUFFS does not break the fourth wall– it SMASHES it into a thousand shards and bits of plaster, arches its eyebrows, then says with a smarmy grin, "Am I gonna be tested on this later?"

I've never seen a fourth wall pummeled quite so aggressively- Slater was constantly talking to ME.

He was telling ME about his life, he was narrating to ME, he was revealing to ME his innermost thoughts.

And sometimes said innermost thoughts are uttered in the presence of Don S. Davis.

He was cracking jokes with ME, he was yelling for ME get the hell out of his bathroom.

It was a singular experience.

But just when you think this movie is all about dismantling the fourth wall, it reveals that it's additionally all about Slater dancing around the apartment, wearing only stonewashed, tapered 90's jeans.

Dancin with Jovovich.

Dancin' with the champagne.

Dancin' on the bed.

A dance session cut short.

And just when you think that between the fourth-wall shenanigans and the jeans dancin', they can't possibly introduce any more rich visual tropes- BOOM- they blow up some turkeys.

Two of 'em. Why? Gives Slater somethin' to arch his eyebrows about.

Kinda Heyyy what's this, they blew up my dinner!

I get the feeling that Bruce A. Evans had been watching a lot of Peckinpah and Argento before making KUFFS, as he demonstrates a heartfelt devotion to breathtaking, super-slomo action photography. One scene in particular follows the trajectory of an actual bullet, shot at a frame rate much higher than your average Hollywood slo-mo. I wouldn't be surprised if they'd used a special high-speed camera designed for scientific use, because the film stock doesn't even quite match the rest of the film.

The result is an incredibly elegant sequence which admittedly feels a touch out of place in a film that also contains the following frame:

...

In any event, after 100 minutes of crass Slater irreverence, misogyny, and all-out misanthropy; the movie abruptly ends on a possibly sincere pro-women message picture note with Slater saying: 'Women. If it weren't for them, there'd be no civilization.'

Whaaaaaaat?! Congratulations and bravo, Mr. Kuffs. Here's four and a half stars. Wait, don't squint your eyes, lower your sunglasses, and arch your eyebrows all shocked-like . You can't possibly be surprised. Wait, are you laughing?! Eh, you got me again, ya likable smart aleck!

-Sean Gill


Junta Juleil's Summer '10 Movie Series
1. HELL IN THE PACIFIC (1968, John Boorman)
2. KUFFS (1992, Bruce A. Evans)
3. ...

Film Review: TRON (1982, Steven Lisberger)

Stars: 4 of 5.
Running Time: 96 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Jeff Bridges, David Warner (TIME BANDITS, WAXWORK), Bruce Boxleitner (KENNY ROGERS AS THE GAMBLER, GODS AND GENERALS), Cindy Morgan (CADDYSHACK, MATLOCK), Peter Jurasik (ENEMY MINE), Dan Shor (Billy the Kid in BILL AND TED'S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE, RED ROCK WEST), composer Wendy Carlos (A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, THE SHINING).
Tag-lines: "A world inside the computer where man has never been. Never before now....Trapped inside an electronic arena, where love, and escape, do not compute!"
Best one-liner: "It's all in the wrists."

How to describe TRON?

The "Money for Nothing" music video


+
ZARDOZ?

Perhaps a more apt analogy would be "THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI for the Atari generation," for this is pure circuit board, neon, pixelated expressionism. And it's not just a gimmick picture, either. It's a genuine attempt to look back at human oppression through history in order to see where our increasingly (and exponentially) mechanized human society just might be headed.

With allusions from Ancient Rome's Circus Maximus to the Spanish Inquisition to Orwell's 1984, we're entreated to a rich universe soaked in meta-history; and Wendy Carlos' synthesized New Age meets Switched-On Bach score is the perfect accompaniment to this 'you must know the past to know the future' sentiment. But it's also quite fanciful. It imagines that perhaps when you get the mundanely annoying "spinning wheel of death" or a frozen screen, your search engine (represented by a tank) is fighting off hordes of giant floating robots or something.

The acting is top-notch, as well. Fresh off of TIME BANDITS, David Warner is a rather convincing as Master Control (and as his human and computerized minions), which is sort of a Big Brother/Darth Vader hybrid with a touch of ALTERED STATES. Jeff Bridges and Bruce Boxleitner (!), exude likability, pathos and truly carry the film's human element.

With perfect doses of eye-candy, intellectualism that kids can grasp, action, and adventure, TRON is everything that THE BLACK HOLE wanted to be, but wasn't. Sadly, TRON suffered the same fate as that picture, however, and Disney didn't finance another 'live-action' flick for about ten years. But with subsequent popular reevaluation and a TRON 2.0 (with most of the original cast!) in the works for 2011, it seems that maybe it's succeeded after all. Four stars.

-Sean Gill