Only now does it occur to me... THE NEW KIDS (1985)

Only now does it occur to me... that Sean S. Cunningham has more up his sleeve than merely dead camp counselors, rip-offs of THE ABYSS, or haunted house movies with CHEERS cast members. No, he's an, um, sophisticated filmmaker capable of crafting an elegant revenge-drama/thriller/'80s bully movie. Allow me to present: the six most remarkable things about Sean S. Cunningham's THE NEW KIDS. 

#1. He chooses to begin with a workout/strength-training montage set to the sultry tunes of Lalo Schifrin. 

 

A bold move, because it's the sort of thing that usually occurs at the end of a movie's second act, right before the heavyweight champion bout or whatever. You'll note that we're looking at FULL HOUSE's Lori Laughlin, there on the left (and on the far right is Shannon Presby, essentially a poor man's Michael Biehn, who is playing her brother). In the center is their dad, played by

#2. Tom mutherluvin' Atkins, of "John Carpenter/LETHAL WEAPON/NIGHT OF THE CREEPS/everything good in this world" fame.

Don't get too excited, though, because he's not long for this world. That's right––General Tom Atkins gets a heart-stringy farewell

 

before being killed, offscreen, in a car accident. The now-orphaned siblings leave to live with their sketchy uncle at his dilapidated creepy Christmas theme park in the middle of nowhere. As transplants in a small southern town, they have now become the eponymous... "new kids."

#3. James Spader. When I heard James Spader played a bully in a film called THE NEW KIDS, I assumed that it was set at a Bret Easton Ellis yuppie/boarding school/douchebag academy.  I was picturing LESS THAN ZERO, I guess.

Nope, here he has a spotty southern accent, a subpar dye job, a car on cement blocks in his yard, and spends his free time tormenting new kids and taking potshots at pesky varmints. As everyone knows, '80s Spader is the Platonic ideal of "bully," though, so obviously he really turns it up to eleven. You could even say his entire performance is the embodiment of the moment in Tim Burton's BATMAN when Michael Keaton says, "You wanna get nuts? Let's get nuts!"

And was there any question that his character would be a cokehead?

This is a very subtle movie, is what I'm saying.

So Spader and his bully gang launch a campaign of terror against the new kids, at one point even killing their beloved pet bunny in a moment that is very proto-FATAL ATTRACTION. As a part of this campaign, the movie must reckon with

#4. Toxic masculinity. So Spader's gang o' yuppies-attempting-Southern-accents is meant to be sexually inappropriate in their interactions with Lori Laughlin. Because this was the same decade that brought us plenty of sexual misconduct and outright assault packaged as the acceptable teenage experience (i.e., SIXTEEN CANDLES, PORKY'S, REVENGE OF THE NERDS, et al.), this meant that they really had to overplay it to signify that these were Bad Guys. Because, for instance, almost every '80s teen movie had a scene where a guy asked out a girl and refused take "no" for an answer––and often was rewarded and lauded for his persistence––how could THE NEW KIDS possibly demonstrate an example of said behavior being "bad?" Well, this particular member of Spader's gang begins with dogfight invitations,

moves on to hair-licking,

and quickly escalates with death threats.

Here's how they differentiate Spader's stalking from, say, John Cusack's in SAY ANYTHING:




The only real difference between these scenes and the ones from, perhaps, a John Hughes film, is of degree.

#5. Eric Stoltz. As the "ginger nerd" who romances Lori Laughlin and attempts to save her from a gang of would-be rapists at a school dance, this sort of affords us a glimpse of what it would have been like to see Eric Stoltz play Marty McFly in BACK TO THE FUTURE.

Though I count myself a Stoltz fan, I absolutely think Zemeckis made the right call in replacing him with Michael J. Fox––Stoltz has a sweet, hangdog vibe that doesn't quite match the likability Fox projects so effortlessly. I imagine a Stoltz BACK TO THE FUTURE would have been a slower burn, with its Oedipal scenarios turned excruciatingly awkward. It would probably have a cult following, but I really don't think it would have been the epochal sort of classic that it remains today.

Anyway, that's just rank speculation. So here's a screengrab of Stoltz falling victim to "the ol' crouch n' shove."


#6. Finally, you know what, this gets its own slot: James Spader lighting the stream on a gas pump and turning it into a makeshift flamethrower for purposes of trying to murder Aunt Becky.



That about sums it up, ladies and gentlemen. THE NEW KIDS.

Only now does it occur to me... STORYVILLE (1992)

Only now does it occur to me... a few things about STORYVILLE.

STORYVILLE is the only feature film to be written and directed by Mark Frost, co-creator of TWIN PEAKS. I watched it because I am a TWIN PEAKS die-hard. Here's what I learned:

#1. It can't decide whether it wants to be a John Grisham-style courtroom drama or a Cannon Film. Think that sounds ridiculous? Then just let me lay the plot synopsis on you, and you can tell me the exact point where Grisham gives way to Golan-Globus:

Clay Fowler (James Spader) is a young Louisianan whippersnappuh and ace lawyer running for Congress.

There's all sorts of corruption and family history and bayous and rockin' chairs and microfiche––


Most films of this kind make you wait about an hour for the microfiche montage sequence, but STORYVILLE delivers it in the opening shots of the movie!

and there're backroom deals and suspenders and an irascible performance by Jason Robards,

and pathos exuded by Woody Strode in browline eyeglasses,

but then––ladies and gentlemen, just when you think you're watching THE CLIENT or THE PELICAN BRIEF, James Spader finds himself in hot water (literally) when he is blackmailed after being videotaped having sex with a martial arts instructor in her studio's (ninja) hot tub:

And this is after they've already 'sexy-sparred' like Grace Jones and Christopher Walken in A VIEW TO A KILL.


A VIEW TO A KILL meets A TIME TO KILL?

Allow me to reiterate two things. One: I am not making this up. Two: ninja hot tubs are a staple of 1980s cinema, and I don't know why. I call them "ninja" hot tubs and not "martial arts" hot tubs (or even "jiu jitsu jacuzzis"), because they first appear in the Cannon classic REVENGE OF THE NINJA, where three separate hot tubs involving ninjas are made integral to the plot. In Cannon's NINJA III: THE DOMINATION, a ninja hot tub makes a notable appearance as a site of possessed ninja murder. In BLIND FURY (not a Cannon film, but starring Cannon's Sho Kosugi), there is a climactic martial arts and swordfighting duel over a hot tub. Later on in STORYVILLE, Spader returns to the scene of the ninja hot tub and battles a martial arts assassin. What does all of this mean? I was hoping you could tell me.



#2. If you're looking for TWIN PEAKS, you found it... (kind of).

There's a small town, quirky characters, and a dead body floating in the water in the opening scenes.

He's dead... Wrapped in... the clothes he was already wearing, I guess. 

It shares with TWIN PEAKS its casting director (Johanna Ray), cinematographer (Ron Garcia), production designer (Richard Hoover), set decorator (Brian Kasch), second-assistant director (Randy Barbee), and co-producer (Robert D. Simon).  It features a small, weirdo role for Catherine Martell herself, Piper Laurie:

and a villainous turn (obviously) by Renault brother Michael Parks:

 

who is sort of playing the same corrupt cop he played in THE HITMAN, though in this role he is permitted both the Cannon flourish of beating up James Spader while wearing a terrifying mask:

as well as the Grisham flourish of testifying in a courtroom that the judge "will not allow to turn into a circus!"

Michael Parks was a national treasure, by the way.

In closing, this is a strange (and, I'll be honest, often mediocre) little movie that may find appreciative viewers among TWIN PEAKS enthusiasts, hot tub fans, Grisham die-hards, and, I daresay, aficionados of the Southern Fried Crawdad-Lickin' Sleaze-O-Rama genre.

Film Review: BOB ROBERTS (1992, Tim Robbins)

Stars: 5 of 5.
Running Time: 102 minutes.
Tag-line: "Vote first. Ask questions later."
Notable Cast or Crew:  Tim Robbins (THE PLAYER, TAPEHEADS), Giancarlo Esposito (DO THE RIGHT THING, THE USUAL SUSPECTS), Alan Rickman (DIE HARD, MICHAEL COLLINS),  Ray Wise (TWIN PEAKS, SWAMP THING), Gore Vidal (GATTACA, MYRA BRECKINRIDGE), Harry Lennix (TITUS, DOLLHOUSE), Tom Atkins (THE FOG, HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH), David Strathairn (THE RIVER WILD, SNEAKERS), James Spader (TUFF TURF, Pamela Reed (TANNER '88, THE RIGHT STUFF), Helen Hunt (TRANCERS, PROJECT X, TWISTER), Peter Gallagher (THE UNDERNEATH, MALICE, THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO LITTLE), Lynne Thigpen (WHERE IN THE WORLD IS CARMEN SANDIEGO, SHAFT '00), Jack Black (THE NEVERENDING STORY III, DEMOLITION MAN), Susan Sarandon (THE HUNGER, THELMA & LOUISE), Fred Ward (REMO WILLIAMS: THE ADVENTURE CONTINUES, THE PLAYER), Fisher Stevens (SHORT CIRCUIT, MY SCIENCE PROJECT), Bob Balaban (CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND, MOONRISE KINGDOM), John Cusack (TAPEHEADS, THE GRIFTERS), Jeremy Piven (DR. JEKYLL & MS. HYDE, THE PLAYER).  Cinematography by Jean Lépine (THE PLAYER, TANNER '88).
Best One-liner: "The times they are a-changin' back!"

I'll begin this review with a quote from IT CAN'T HAPPEN HERE, a 1935 novel novel by Sinclair Lewis, which imagines America's first Fascist president. He's a fellow by the name of "Buzz Windrip," and his coronation takes place at a convention in Cleveland. I'll let Lewis describe him for you:

"[Buzz] was vulgar, almost illiterate, a public liar easily detected, and in his 'ideas' almost idiotic, while his celebrated piety was that of a traveling salesman for church furniture, and his yet more celebrated humor the sly cynicism of a country store. Certainly there was nothing exhilarating in the actual words of his speeches, nor anything convincing in his philosophy. His political platforms were only wings of a windmill. 

...Aside from his dramatic glory, Buzz Windrip was a Professional Common Man. Oh, he was common enough.  He had every prejudice and aspiration of every American Common Man. ...But he was the Common Man twenty-times-magnified by his oratory, so that while the other Commoners could understand his every purpose, which was exactly the same as their own, they saw him towering above them, and they raised hands to him in worship."

BOB ROBERTS––Tim Robbins' equally prescient 1992 political mockumentary––essentially picks up where Sinclair Lewis left off. It tells the story of a populist Pennsylvanian singer, Bob Roberts (Tim Robbins),

who is running for the U.S. Senate against a stereotypically intellectual incumbent (Gore Vidal).

Apparently Gore Vidal improvised much of his dialogue by reciting his own political positions.

Equally inspired by the panoramic satire of Robert Altman (with whom Robbins collaborated three times) and the comedic sensibilities of THIS IS SPINAL TAP, Robbins creates one of the more perceptive, mean-spirited, and amusing political films of our time. ...And, at the risk of quoting Richard Nixon, we need it "now more than ever."
 
This movie had been on my to-see list for some time, and when I read J.D. at Radiator Heaven's wonderful take on it this March, I knew I had to track it down.

A breezy corporate "folk" singer with the trappings of Bob Dylan and the lyrics of Jordan Belfort,

Bob Roberts traffics in yuppie syllogisms, evangelical pandering, white pride dog-whistling, and priggish sanctimony. The Sixties' pendulum has swung back; Bob (semi-sincerely?) considers himself a rebel patriot, and his campaign possesses all the civil apparatus of a social revolution, but he's fighting against ideals like tolerance, enlightenment, and general civility. This brash refutation of Sixties' youth movements feels like the natural outgrowth of the contemporary corporate "nonconformists" who brought us the profundity of a Nike ad using The Beatles' "Revolution" in 1988.

The lyrics of Bob's songs are brilliant in the way the lyrics in THIS IS SPINAL TAP are brilliant––what they're mocking (hair metal and nativist movements, respectively) already exists on such a plane of absurdity that it's nearly indistinguishable from the genuine article. Whether he's firing broadsides at the "nation of complainers" addicted to entitlement culture:

"Like this: / It's society's fault I don't have a job / It's society's fault I'm a slob / I'm a drunk, I don't have a brain / Give me a pamplet while I complain / Hey pal you're living in the land of the free / no one's gonna hand you opportunity..."

engaging in colonial cosplay:


or singing the dangers of letting "Godless men" in past our walls, who'll "take the jobs of the decent ones":




we've sort of moved beyond satire, and into "reenactment," a mirror reflection of the worst angels of our nature (with the fringe fantasies of 1992 existing in the limelight of 2016).

Tim Robbins perfectly inhabits the role of the neighborly fanatic, the apple-pie extremist; excellent at glad-handing, even as he lines you up against the wall. Certainly every politician carries a bit of the "poseur" about them, but the cold-blooded strain that flows through Bob Roberts is chilling, and all too real. The rest of the cast is wonderful, and fully in tune with the grotesque tendencies of the American political system––it's a veritable playground for character actors and glorified cameos, like:

Alan Rickman, as Bob's campaign chairman (and Oliver North stand-in), whose performance is filled with serpentine acting choices that hint at hidden menace:



Ray Wise as Bob's campaign manager, who's able to play off of Rickman's terrifying energy with one of the best glossy, soulless smiles in film history:

It's a veritable 'soulless smile' showdown.

Tom Atkins as Bob's jovial/oddly intimidating personal physician:


Giancarlo Esposito as an obsessive progressive journalist, who could very well be a character from an Oliver Stone film:


Jack Black as an unbalanced teen (you know the kind, the kid who carves swastikas into desks and burns you with paper clips) who finds in Bob Roberts what TAXI DRIVER's Travis Bickle could only dream he'd get out of the Palatine campaign:


Bob Balaban as a thinly-veiled version of Lorne Michaels (during a controversial Bob Roberts television appearance, with SNL transformed into "CUTTING EDGE LIVE") and John Cusack as a politically outspoken actor:


Peter Gallagher, Helen Hunt,  Lynne Thigpen, James Spader,

Fisher Stevens,

Susan Sarandon & Fred Ward,

and Pamela Reed as newscasters.

Pamela Reed, star of Robert Altman's political mockumentary HBO miniseries TANNER '88. Clearly, the Gary Trudeau-penned series was a major influence on BOB ROBERTS (though it is considerably less mean-spirited), and Robbins even hired the same cinematographer, Jean Lépine.

Essentially, Bob Roberts' candidacy begins as a joke, builds momentum,

balloons to a size that the responsibly rational can no longer ignore,



Roberts' goons rough up the protesters...

and ends in a dark, dark place––far darker than most satirical comedy dares to go. As usual, the true horror is in the way these Fascist tendencies mushroom and flourish among the mob, like a night-flowering vine, or at least like an episode of THE TWILIGHT ZONE:


Five stars.

––Sean Gill