Film Review: HIGHLANDER III: THE FINAL DIMENSION (1994, Andrew Morahan)

Stars: 2 of 5.         
Running Time: 99 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Christopher Lambert (HIGHLANDER, SUBWAY, HAIL CAESAR!), Mario Van Peebles (RAPPIN', HEARTBREAK RIDGE), Deborah Kara Unger (CRASH, THE GAME), Mako (CONAN THE BARBARIAN, PACIFIC HEIGHTS).
Tag-line: "One man was chosen to protect all that is good. Now an enemy from the past journeys time to challenge him in the present."
Best one-liner: "There can be only one?"

HIGHLANDER III: THE FINAL DIMENSION must partake in some majestic retconning and narrative gymnastics to even justify its existence. For the uninitiated, HIGHLANDER the First depicts a challenge among immortals called "The Gathering" with the operating tag-line "There Can Be Only One."
 
 ...three HIGHLANDER movies. Er––make that six, and counting. Plus two television series. Live action, that is. And three animated series. And a handful of novels.

They commence beheading each other (the only way to kill an immortal) until there is indeed only one left (sorta like BLOODSPORT, I suppose, only with more immortal beheadings), whereupon the winner (Christopher Lambert's Connor MacLeod) undergoes "The Quickening" and brings balance to the force or whatever. HIGHLANDER II at least has the good sense (?) to imagine a whacked-out future scenario where aliens, global warming, and a long-haired Michael Ironside join forces to keep the plotline going. However, HIGHLANDER III––a prequel to part 2 that I'm certain no one asked for––takes a full step backward and imagines that "The Quickening" was actually a sham, because Mario Van Peebles (RAPPIN', EXTERMINATOR 2) was a top-seeded Gathering contestant who happened to be accidentally trapped in a cave in Japan the whole time, and therefore The Gathering ain't over till Van Peebles licks all the blades
 
wears all the samurai armor

(This ain't KAGEMUSHA)

does all the eyebrow indicating

(To be fair, he's good at it)

gets zapped with all the '80s lightning


and turns into all the birds.




His name is Kane, like from 'Cain and Abel,' which is a very artistic way of letting us know that he has a brotherly relationship with our hero, except, of course, he's the "bad one." (See also: all the other times a character was named Kane for similarly embarrassing, crypto-philosophical reasons.)

Frankly, however, we should all be glad that Van Peebles shows up to do things like 'look like Dave Navarro playing CONAN THE BARBARIAN' and––because he's been trapped in a cave for centuries and doesn't know what they are––'eat condoms.' This is probably the high-water mark of the film.





"No glove, no love" is actually said aloud during this sequence. Also, is this some kind of oblique reference to Van Peebles' father Melvin not using a condom and contracting gonorrhea on set of SWEET SWEETBACK'S BAADASSSSS SONG (for which he obtained Worker's Compensation)?

Is this a good movie? No. No, it is not. There are lapses in continuity, hilariously stilted dialogue, and incomplete mattes.

We are forced to endure tableaux such as a yuppified Connor MacLeod wearing dumb shirts, playing catch, and bonding with his son

as well as redonkulously dumb drawing room flashbacks to 18th Century France that feel like scenes deleted from ANGEL, or at least HELLRAISER IV.


Not even Lambert deserves this

You're probably wondering if this is all worth your time. It's not––but it's also not entirely without value. For instance, the female lead is Deborah Kara Unger (David Lynch's HOTEL ROOM, David Cronenberg's CRASH, David Fincher's THE GAME),

a Canadian actress who probably could have achieved more mainstream success, booking romantic comedies and the like, but who chose to fully embrace the "bizarro character actress" route. She always brings an unpredictable dark edge to her roles, in the vein of a Willem Dafoe or Crispin Glover or Susan Tyrrell.

When she first meets Kane (he breaks into her museum, after hours), the blocking and dialogue play out almost exactly the same as a seminal scene from TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE 2 when Chop Top (Bill Mosely) breaks into Stretch's (Caroline Williams) radio station and, posing as her biggest fan, proceeds to intimidate and weird her out.


It's a pretty deep cut as far as homages go, though I think any fan of TEXAS CHAINSAW 2 would spot the parallel immediately.

Eh. What else? At least we get to see Connor McCloud beat the guillotine. You know, between the French Revolution, The Wars of Scottish Independence, World War I, World War II, the American Revolution, The Napoleonic Wars, etc., etc., the dude is essentially the Forrest Gump of your Western Society class, and I'm honestly surprised he never crossed paths with Bill and Ted.



I'd say that none of this is essential viewing, and I'm one of those people who will wholeheartedly recommend HIGHLANDER II.

In other words, watch HIGHLANDER, HIGHLANDER II, and then, in lieu of HIGHLANDER III, just watch the Michael Ironside Labatt Blue Maximum Ice beer commercial that was an official HIGHLANDER II tie-in.

Only now does it occur to me... HAIL, CAESAR! (2016)

Only now does it occur to me... that the Coen Brothers must be closet HIGHLANDER fans. Why else would they cast Clancy "The Kurgan" Brown:

and Christopher "Connor 'The Highlander' MacLeod" Lambert:

in the same film? (aside from the fact that they're both great, and wield a mean broadsword).  With Sean Connery retired, I suppose my only complaint is that Michael Ironside didn't make the cut.

Regardless, this film does not in fact revolve around HIGHLANDER sequel/prequel fan-fictions, though from the standpoint of a character-actor fan, it has much to offer. Amid the pastiche of Busby Berkeley and Vincente Minnelli-style musical numbers, there are wonderful bits by Robert Picardo as a finicky, test audience rabbi:

Fisher Stevens (who really knows how to make an entrance) as a furtive, blacklisted screenwriter:

Tilda Swinton in dual roles as twin-sister gossip columnists:

and Dolph Lundgren as the silhouette of a Russian submarine captain:

(since it's the 1950s,  I can't tell if he's Ivan Drago's father, or the father of his henchman from A VIEW TO A KILL). 

Sure, it's no BARTON FINK, but I enjoyed it.

The return of Michael Ironside... on eBay?!

Longtime readers of this blog know of my deep appreciation of all things Michael Ironside.  So you can imagine my shock/delight/jealousy upon seeing this fantastic eBay listing for the actual sword that Ironside used in the masterpiece HIGHLANDER 2.  

I've written about the glories of Ironside in that film before (albeit in the context of a tie-in movie beer commercial) as General Katana, the irritable, ratty-long-haired, possibly alien villain of the piece.  Now I'm desperately wishing I had the $9,500.00 necessary to make this obscure piece of movie ephemera from a notorious bomb my very own.

You gotta love lasher33's listing, though:

"Have you seen the "Highlander Katana"?  Of course you have...

Up close & personal probably, because there are so many copies out and about it isn't even funny anymore...

The Kurgan sword?

Sure...

Strong & stylish & brutal & well... boring... (but that is just MY impression...)

There is, however, ONE sword that had it all: style, design, power, size and a nice twist...

Unfortunately, it was lost...

The battle was fierce, the clashes real and one after the other was destroyed until there wasn't any left.

Or so they thought... 8 were made, but only 7 were destroyed during the filming of the movie.

The sword Michael Ironside used in the fighting scenes of Highlander II: The Quickening has proven to be immortal itself.

Granted, the movie itself was erm... crap... and yet, the sword is the most powerful ever made. Period.

As far as I can tell, it has never been on display anywhere as I bought it straight from the guys that made it way back in 1991, right before the film was released.

Interested?

Remember: "There can be only ONE!"

Anybody who bellows "THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE!" in regard to a HIGHLANDER 2-related eBay auction probably deserves your $9,500.00.

Commercial Review: LABATT MAXIMUM ICE (1993, Michael Ironside)

Stars: 5 of 5.
Running Time: 30 seconds.
Notable Cast or Crew: Michael Ironside.
Best one-liner: “The creators of ice brewing…now LABATT MAXIMUM ICE."

EXT- SCOTTISH CLIFF- NIGHT. Waves crash, lightning flashes in the darkness. You can almost feel the icy spray of seawater, feel the cold chill of the ocean wind. Ministry’s “New World Order” begins to blast away.

A long-haired figure, his robe fluttering in the wind, pivots toward us– this is perhaps the most evocative opening two seconds of a beer commercial that the world has ever seen. In fact, this is not just a commercial– it's a thirty second movie.

There is a lot to like here, so let’s get down to brass tacks: Ironside, wearing his General Katana costume from HIGHLANDER 2, is laying down a few facts about Labatt Ice. It is not a ‘request’- this is not some slack-jawed Canadian huckster: this is IRONSIDE. And he does not make suggestions, he commands things of you. And note that I say “Ironside wearing his Katana costume.” It is my contention that General Katana alone is not quite terrifying enough to compel us to try Labatt Maximum Ice. Ironside, however, perhaps while taking a break from filming (and thus still in wig and robes) is taking a moment of his valuable time to explain something to you, so, by God, you’d better listen.

He solemnly intones: “History teaches that the strong survive by becoming stronger… this lesson has not been lost on Labatt.”



“The creators of ice brewing…”



Ironside strides up to a Stonehenge-style construction, surrounded by ivy-covered ancient columns. To one side, a stone jar- brimming with FLAMES. Beside it is the main altar- filled with LABATT MAXIMUM ICE and surrounded by regular ice, just to keep the maximum ice even colder.

[I should probably take this opportunity to mention exactly how many lightning strikes happen in the thirty seconds of glory that are this commercial. If you’re of the school of thought that only one lightning strike can exist at any given time, there are ten. If you’re of the school of thought that ‘multiple-bolted strikes’ should count as more than one, then there’s at least twenty.]

Now is this ONE lightning strike, THREE lightning strikes, or SEVEN?


“…now Labatt Maximum Ice. Only Labatt possesses the power of ‘ICE BREWING.’ And only ICE BREWING can create..."

Mind those sleeves around the flaming urn, Mike!


"...Labatt Maximum Ice."

“Now, hold on a second!" some pencil neck in the back is whining. “What does that even mean?… ‘ice brewing…’ Pshaw.” Well, allow me to tell you: IT DOESN’T FUCKING MATTER JUST SHUT UP AND LISTEN TO IRONSIDE. But for those of you who resisted the urge to interrupt Ironside with your shrill, uninformed questions, I’ll tell you for real: during the finishing process, after the beer has been brewed, it’s cooled to approximately twenty to twenty-eight degrees Fahrenheit, which creates small frozen crystals (of water), but merely chills the rest of the alcohol. The ice (purely water at this point) chunks are removed, which ups the alcohol percentage of the remaining concoction. Now, next time, just take Ironside’s word for it.



“The ultimate balance of smoothness and strength.” [We could say the same about you, Mr. Ironside. But we won’t, because we’re afraid to speak in your presence.] “Who says lightning doesn’t strike twice?” Ironside calmly, and casually concludes the commercial with this question, but it’s almost a warning, because immediately, lightning does, in fact, strike twice.

I’m not sure what that proves, or why Labatt Maximum Ice is evidence of lightning striking twice, but I’m not going to ask any silly questions like that while Ironside is around, I can tell you that.

Wow. Now, lucky for us all, they still make Labatt Maximum Ice, but its availability is pretty dependent on your region. I’ve had no luck thus far on finding it thus far in the Big Apple, but our buddies down at the 40 oz. Malt Liquor archive have provided a measured overview.


-Sean Gill