THE DEADLY BEES - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Brit horror from Hammer rival Amicus features Bees That Kill

The Deadly Bees (1967) **1/2
dir. Freddie Francis
Starring: Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Patrick Wymark, Jill Bennett, Michael Gough, Patrick Magee, Peter Woodthorpe, Nigel Green, George Coulouris

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Can any movie featuring a whole passel of deadly bee attacks AND a cameo appearance by the inimitable Ron Wood be all bad? The answer is a resounding, “No!” That said, The Deadly Bees, a fun Freddie Francis-helmed thriller for British Hammer Horror rival Amicus Pictures is one of many pictures that received derisive scorn from those agog alien movie critics on the legendary spoof show MST3K - Mystery Science Theatre 3000 (where, for the uninitiated, a feature length movie is screened whilst the aforementioned non-humans barf out a steady stream of mocking verbal wisecracks as the picture unspools).

Frankly, I’ve never understood the appeal of MST3K. It’s a one-note joke and not an especially funny one – ridiculing a bunch of supremely easy targets like Grade Z horror and sci-fi and even occasionally mocking genuinely good fantasy pictures like Alexander Rou’s exquisite Russian fairy tale Morozko.

The Deadly Bees, another in a series of pictures from the Paramount library that have been farmed out to the cool, little company Legend Pictures for DVD release, is not, I suppose, an especially good picture, but it does pass the time amiably and is definitely not without entertainment value.

Vicki Robbins (played by a scrumptious Suzannah Leigh, Elvis Presley’s squeeze in Paradise, Hawaiian Style and the girls’ school dance teacher in the immortal Hammer Karnstein classic Lust For a Vampire) is a British pop star suffering from exhaustion and ordered by her doctor to a rustic locale on an island in northern UK for some much needed rest. While there, she becomes embroiled in a strange rivalry between her host Ralph (Guy Dolman), his harridan wife Mary (Catherine Finn) and their neighbour Professor Manfred (the always-great Frank Finlay). Ralph and Manfred, it seems, are rival beekeepers. I kid you not.

On an island – in northern England, no less – with a population that appears not to exceed the low budget the picture allowed, there are two – count ‘em – two beekeepers. One, Ralph, appears to have no reason to raise bees. The other, Manfred, is a scientist who is studying them. And what of the rivalry between them? Well, it appears as if both are accusing each other of raising strains of psycho bees to attack and destroy their respective bee farms – and ultimately, each other.

Excuse me, MST3K, but why, pray tell is such a picture worthy of your pea-brained, one-note derision? This is rich material. Stupid, yes – but it is most certainly entertaining and often so ludicrous that there really seems no point in mocking it. In fact, I always find people who dump on pictures like these to be snobs who get off on shooting fish in a barrel. The Deadly Bees is NEVER boring and is ALWAYS engaging.

It is, as I said though, unbelievably stupid – especially when our comely pop star turns into Nancy Drew and begins to delve into the mystery of the bees and their decidedly odd keepers.

The team behind this picture has obviously done better work. Freddie Francis, the legendary cinematographer and director will not be forever remembered for The Deadly Bees, but he handles the action with considerable proficiency. Co-writer Robert (Psycho) Bloch can rest assured that he’s written better pictures than this, but the plot and dialogue in this one are still exactly what the doctor ordered when it comes to genre amusement-value. The special effects, while old fashioned, have a fun retro quality to them and frankly, I found the bee attacks to be reasonably effective with the blend of makeup and optical printing.

The Deadly Bees is not, in any way, shape or form exceptional work. It is, however, not worthy of mockery and if one has 90 minutes to waste, there are many other ways to spend them less entertainingly. Its sting is definitely intact.

And have I mentioned that Ron Wood cameo yet?

“The Deadly Bees” is available on DVD from Legend Films.

OIL SANDS KARAOKE - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Documentary Puts Human Face To Environmental Devastation

Director Charles Wilkinson and producer Tina Schliessler return to the subject of energy and environmental devastation in their engaging and surprisingly buoyant followup to the powerful "PEACE OUT". This time, the energy is Oil Sands workers letting off steam in a local karaoke joint. The environment continues to be assaulted, but this time, the filmmakers put a genuinely human face to the devastation of the planet. It's an entertaining, poignant AND important film - an unbeatable combination.

Oil Sands Karaoke (2013) dir. Charles Wilkinson ****

Review By Greg Klymkiw

One of the most devastating assaults upon Canada's environment continues to take place in the Alberta Oil Sands. For the faceless corporations lining the deep pockets of the very few, one of the largest deposits of petroleum on our fair planet is in - you guessed it - the Alberta Oil Sands. Fort McMurray, Alberta used to be a city until it was amalgamated with a good chunk of the region of the Oil Sands once referred to as (don't laugh, I'm not kidding) an Improvement District. Once the city and the nameless district became one, the city of Fort McMurray was no longer a city, but rather (again, don't laugh, I'm really not kidding) an urban service area.

It seems tax dollars were hard at work coming up with all that in order to more adequately serve the interests of oil companies that would find it more convenient to strip the land of its natural beauty if they only had to deal with one civic bureaucracy. Fort McMurray and surrounding areas are, you see, a major cash cow.

This area is alone responsible for generating two million barrels of oil every single day. This isn't a bad haul considering the world uses 90 million barrels of oil a day.

It is Fort McMurray where Director Charles Wilkinson and Producer Tina Schliessler, the makers of Peace Out, last year's stunning, award-winning documentary on energy consumption, have aimed their lenses. This time, the subjects are not corporate CEOs and environmental specialists, but rather, the people - the real people of Fort McMurray. Including migrant workers, the population of the amalgamated R.M. can hit heights of well over 70,000 and most of them either work in the oil business or are beholden to it with their own non-oil toils.

Corporations often think about their scads of employees as faceless hordes, but Oil Sands Karaoke seeks to give faces and names to those who break their backs out in the oil fields - haul truck drivers, small business owners and scaffolders to name but a few.

This is a movie about people, the people - working people.

Wilkinson's film treats all of them with the respect corporations don't. Focusing on five primary individuals, Wilkinson's camera eye captures who they are, where they came from, what their work is and what they hope their futures hold. Most of all, it captures their one true passion.

Bailey's Pub is a popular magnet for oil workers. It's a Karaoke Bar where the backbone of the oil industry, the hard labourers, come to express themselves through song, through music, through fellowship and camaraderie - Karaoke!

Bailey's bartender puts it simply and best - the working people of the oil industry come there for a small section of limelight, to focus themselves on pure musical (and in a sense, spiritual) expression. "It's a big escape from reality," the bartender states succinctly.

Escaping the reality of toil in the Oil Sands might be the only thing to maintain one's sense of self-worth. Yes, the wages are great, but Wilkinson cannily displays the working conditions. On the surface, all seems fine - state of the art equipment, an accent on workplace safety and the ability to learn and work a trade to the best of one's ability.

This is all, however, skin deep.

Wilkinson uses shots of the land itself as both transition points in the narrative, but to also expose the ruination of the environment, the bleak, manmade hell that is the Oil Sands. Land scorched and scraped beyond recognition, a hazy treeless wasteland and worst of all, endless smokestacks belching clouds of filth into the air are what comprise the world these workers must live in.

It ain't pretty, but every night in the karaoke bar, all that changes. With lights in their eyes and the sounds of genuinely appreciative audiences, the workers who partake of the nightly forays into musical expression get to experience the thrill of connecting with others using their innate talents to perform.

Life transforms into a thing of genuine beauty.

We've had our share of fictional renderings of this phenomenon - whether it be John Travolta's Tony Manero tripping the light fantastic on the disco floors of Saturday Night Fever or Jennifer Beals gyrating ever-so artistically to Michael Sembello singing "Maniac" in Flashdance - but with Oil Sands Karaoke we get the real thing.

Seeing these genuinely decent working class heroes spilling out their innermost dreams through song and knowing they are the real thing - not a construct of imagination, but rather, what and who they are in life - is what provides the sort of resonance that fiction can't always deliver. Sometimes you just need to train your lens on reality.

This is what Wilkinson does so expertly and poignantly.

And yes, he tells a story. The narrative arc involves an upcoming karaoke contest at Bailey's - an event that grips Fort McMurray by the veritable short hairs - especially those who will participate in it.

One of the revelations in Oil Sands Karaoke is the alluring, passionate and genuinely talented Iceis Rain. By day, a small business owner, but by night a chanteuse of the highest order. He claims to have been the first gay person in Fort McMurray to come out and though he might, in other similar working class towns in other countries - oh, let's say, the United States - he might well be taking his life in his hands. As we come to know and love those who patronize Bailey's, he's in good hands (most of the time) - surrounded by warmth and good cheer.

All that aside, Iceis (pronounced like "Isis") Rain delivers one show-stopper after another. By the time we get to the big Karaoke contest, Iceis knocks us completely on our collective asses. The performance is infused with a strange blend of sadness and elation - a kind of melancholy that has the power to lift our spirits to the Heavens - and does so with a virtuosity that captures it so indelibly that many will be moved to tears. I know I was.

Oil Sands Karaoke is quite unlike any documentary about the environment that you'll ever see. It's about the people. And as is my wont when compelled, I'm always happy to paraphrase that great line Jimmy Stewart has in It's a Wonderful Life. With taste and genuine emotion, Wilkinson sheds light upon all those "who do most of the living and dying in this town."

It can't get more environmental than that.

"Oil Sands Karaoke" launches on a limited theatrical run beginning in Toronto November 8 (4pm and 9pm daily) at the Magic Lantern Carlton Cinemas via Avi Federgreen's Indie-Can. Free to visit the Carlton Cinema website directly by clicking HERE.


HERE ARE SOME FANTASTIC DOCUMENTARIES YOU CAN PURCHASE DIRECTLY FROM HERE (AND SUPPORT THE MAINTENANCE OF THIS SITE) BY CLICKING THE HANDY AMAZON LINKS BELOW:

CHARLIE CHAN'S MURDER CRUISE - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Old Chan Magic Blends Humour with Darker Tone

Charlie Chan’s Murder Cruise (1940) ***
dir. Eugene Forde
Starring: Sidney Toler, Sen Yung, Lionel Atwill, Leo G. Carroll and Cora Witherspoon

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Most years saw 20th Century Fox releasing three feature-length Charlie Chan mysteries annually. After several pictures with Warner Oland in the role of the famous Honolulu-based Asian detective created by Erle Derr Biggers, the torch was passed to character actor Sidney Toler after Oland’s death. Toler acquitted himself magnificently and by the year 1940, he had created – what some might argue – the definitive Charlie Chan. Most importantly, Fox, as the studio generating the series, were able to keep the creative juice going so that the films, in many cases, got better and better.

By 1940, rather than succumbing to the usual law of diminishing returns, the Chan series saw three of the best released all in the same year.

Charlie Chan’s Murder Cruise is as entertaining and engaging a Chan picture as one could imagine. Directed by one of Fox’s prolific B-and-small-A-picture stalwarts, Eugene Forde, the movie opens with the grisly strangulation of Chan’s best friend Duff, a Scotland Yard inspector who meets his fate in Chan’s office no less. Duff has been investigating a murder amongst a group of passengers on a round-the-world cruise. Chan joins the tour for its final journey from Honolulu to San Francisco where, in typical fashion, he not only solves the murder, but also in so doing, avenges his friend’s death.

The tale is a tad familiar (beyond the successful Chan formula) as the picture borrows a very significant item from Charlie Chan in Paris. It is also, most notably a remake of the earlier Warner Oland Chan vehicle Charlie Chan Carries On (one of the lost Chan pictures that hopefully will one day turn up) and both the original and the remake are based upon the hard-boiled Biggers novel. A Spanish-language version filmed simultaneously with the Oland version, entitled Eran Trece remains extant and can be seen on Volume One of the Fox Charlie Chan DVD series. Murder Cruise is, possibly because of its relative adherence to the Biggers novel, reasonably hard-boiled. The murders are not only pretty intense and almost serial-killer-like, but the first on-screen murder includes the dead character possessing the killer’s curious calling card – thirty pieces of silver. This becomes a tale of both betrayal and retribution.

In spite of the darker tone, the film is still imbued with the wonderful sense of humour that became a hallmark of the Toler Chan pictures. Many of the laughs come from the delightful interplay between Chan and his Number Two Son, the bungling, wide-eyed, prat-falling Jimmy (the always delightful Sen Yung), but there’s also a magnificent comic turn from the daffy Cora Witherspoon as a scatterbrained socialite whose ludicrous, confused descriptions of various suspects raise more than a few eyebrows.

And as always, the Chan films would not be complete without a clutch of sinister supporting performances and Murder Cruise provides not one, not two, not three, but four such great actors. Claire Du Brey and Charles Middleton are on hand as an American Gothic-styled couple (resembling a cross between funeral home owners and bible thumpers). The great Leo G. Carroll appears as a seemingly benign archeologist and rounding things out is the astoundingly perverse Lionel Atwill (whom will forever be remembered as the wooden-armed inspector from Son of Frankenstein so gloriously parodied in Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein). Atwill portrays the somewhat Franklin Pangborn-like cruise director. This, I assure you, must be seen to be believed.

Ultimately, though, like most of the Fox Chan pictures, Murder Cruise simply has to be seen.

“Charlie Chan’s Murder Cruise” is available on DVD as part of Volume 5 of the Charlie Chan Cinema Classics Collection from 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment.

TORONTO AFTER DARK 2013 - ROUNDUP - THE BEST OF THE FEST - KLYMKIW ACCOLADES - By Greg Klymkiw

Another year of Toronto After Dark Film Festival has ended. Recently TADFF 2013 announced their audience awards and I've decided to hand out a few of my own. Here then are the Film Corner's Accolades and Excretions. The accolades receive my citation appropriately named The Val Lewton Oblation for Genre Excellence and the more dubious films receive my hallowed excretions in the form of my very special "Turd Behind Harry's Char Broiled Burgers and Dining Lounge" - a genuine artifact discovered by myself and "Project Grizzly" director Peter Lynch. Both seem ideal ways to celebrate the best and worst. So, without further delay, here are the Greg Klymkiw Accolades and Excretions for the 2013 Edition of TADFF 2013. ENJOY!

GREG KLYMKIW'S ACCOLADES AND EXCRETIONS

2013 TORONTO AFTER DARK FILM FESTIVAL

Greg Klymkiw's "Film Corner Accolades" By Film:

SEPTIC MAN - Winner of 10 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Best Canadian Feature Film: SEPTIC MAN, Jesse Thomas Cook
Best Screenwriting: Jesse Thomas Cook, Tony Burgess, SEPTIC MAN
Best Art Direction/Production Design: Jason David Brown, SEPTIC MAN
Best Makeup: Alex Rotundo, SEPTIC MAN
Best Actress (Supporting): Nicole G. Leier, SEPTIC MAN
Best Social Commentary: SEPTIC MAN
Most Disgusting Movie: SEPTIC MAN
Best Movie Demanding a Sequel: SEPTIC MAN
Best Line of Dialogue: "I’m a civic-minded shit sucker." SEPTIC MAN
Best Babe Taking a Shit and Vomiting: Nicole G. Leier, SEPTIC MAN

EEGA - Winner of 7 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Best Foreign Film: EEGA, S. S. Rajamouli
Best Editing: Venkateswara Rao, Kotagiri, EEGA
Best Musical Score: M.M. Keeravani, EEGA
Best Special Visual Effects: Makuta Arts, EEGA
Best Comedy/Laughs: EEGA
Best Villain: Sudeep in EEGA
Most Original Film: EEGA

WILLOW CREEK - Winner of 6 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Best Feature Film: WILLOW CREEK, Bobcat Goldthwait
Best Horror Film: WILLOW CREEK
Best Director: Bobcat Goldthwait, WILLOW CREEK
Best Actress (Lead): Alexie Gilmore, WILLOW CREEK
Best Ass Cheeks: Bryce Johnson, WILLOW CREEK
Best Movie To Watch With An Audience: WILLOW CREEK

FOUND - Winner of 5 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Best Actor (Lead): Gavin Brown, FOUND
Most Promising Young Director (Feature): Scott Schirmer, FOUND
Best Opening Title Sequence: FOUND
Best Gore: FOUND
Best Necrophelia: FOUND

BOUNTY KILLER- Winner of 4 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Best Action Film: BOUNTY KILLER
Best Action Scenes: BOUNTY KILLER
Best Hero: Christian Pitre as "Mary Death" BOUNTY KILLER
Best Killing: BOUNTY KILLER

THE GUEST - Winner of 2 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Best Short Film: THE GUEST, Jovanka Vuckovic
Most Promising Young Director (Short): Jovanka Vuckovic, THE GUEST

THE MACHINE - Winner of 2 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Best Science Fiction Film: THE MACHINE
Best Babe: Caity Lotz, THE MACHINE

WE ARE WHAT WE ARE - Winner of 2 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Best Cinematography: Ryan Samul, WE ARE WHAT WE ARE
Best Ensemble Cast: WE ARE WHAT WE ARE

THE BANSHEE CHAPTER - Winner of 1 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Scariest Movie: THE BANSHEE CHAPTER

SILENT RETREAT - Winner of 1 Greg Klymkiw "Film Corner Accolades"
Best Actor (Supporting): Robert Nolan, SILENT RETREAT

Greg Klymkiw's "Film Corner Accolades" By Category:

Best Feature Film: WILLOW CREEK, Bobcat Goldthwait
Best Short Film: THE GUEST, Jovanka Vuckovic
Best Foreign Film: EEGA, S. S. Rajamouli
Best Canadian Feature Film: SEPTIC MAN, Jesse Thomas Cook
Best Action Film: BOUNTY KILLER
Best Horror Film: WILLOW CREEK
Best Science Fiction Film: THE MACHINE
Best Movie To Watch With An Audience: WILLOW CREEK
Best Director: Bobcat Goldthwait, WILLOW CREEK
Best Movie Demanding a Sequel: SEPTIC MAN
Best Screenwriting: Jesse Thomas Cook, Tony Burgess, SEPTIC MAN
Best Cinematography: Ryan Samul, WE ARE WHAT WE ARE
Best Editing: Venkateswara Rao, Kotagiri, EEGA
Best Art Direction/Production Design: Jason David Brown, SEPTIC MAN
Best Musical Score: M.M. Keeravani, EEGA
Best Makeup: Alex Rotundo, SEPTIC MAN
Best Special Visual Effects: Makuta Arts, EEGA
Best Actor (Lead): Gavin Brown, FOUND
Best Actor (Supporting): Robert Nolan, SILENT RETREAT
Best Actress (Lead): Alexie Gilmore, WILLOW CREEK
Best Actress (Supporting): Nicole G. Leier, SEPTIC MAN
Best Ensemble Cast: WE ARE WHAT WE ARE
Most Promising Young Director (Feature): Scott Schirmer, FOUND
Most Promising Young Director (Short): Jovanka Vuckovic, THE GUEST
Scariest Movie: THE BANSHEE CHAPTER
Most Original Film: EEGA
Most Disgusting Movie: SEPTIC MAN
Best Action Scenes: BOUNTY KILLER
Most Original Film: EEGA
Best Social Commentary: SEPTIC MAN
Best Comedy/Laughs: EEGA
Best Monster/Creature: SEPTIC MAN
Best Babe: Caity Lotz, THE MACHINE
Best Hero: Christian Pitre as "Mary Death" BOUNTY KILLER
Best Villain: Sudeep in EEGA
Best Babe Taking a Shit and Vomiting: Nicole G. Leier, SEPTIC MAN
Best Line of Dialogue: "I’m a civic-minded shit sucker." SEPTIC MAN
Best Ass Cheeks: Bryce Johnson, WILLOW CREEK
Best Opening Title Sequence: FOUND
Best Killing: BOUNTY KILLER
Best Gore: FOUND
Best Necrophelia: FOUND

Review Links:

SEPTIC MAN
EEGA
WILLOW CREEK
FOUND
BOUNTY KILLER
THE GUEST
THE MACHINE
WE ARE WHAT WE ARE
THE BANSHEE CHAPTER
SILENT RETREAT

Greg Klymkiw's "FILM CORNER EXCRETIONS" - Worst of the Toronto After Dark Film Festival 2013

Worst Films: STALLED and ODD THOMAS

Most Disappointing Narrative, but with Promising Direction: SILENT RETREAT

Most Mediocre Display of Calling-Card Competence: SOLO
Worst Direction: Stephen Sommers, ODD THOMAS
Worst Screenwriting: Corey Brown, Tricia Lee, SILENT RETREAT
Worst Movie with Decent Lesbo Action: STALLED

Review Links:

SILENT RETREAT
ODD THOMAS
STALLED
SOLO

FULL LIST OF OFFICIAL TADFF 2013 AUDIENCE AWARDS HERE

ZOMBIELAND - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Zombies, babes and Bill Murray. What's not to like? Sadly, a lot.

Zombieland (2009) *1/2
dir. Ruben Fleischer
Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone, Abigail Breslin, Bill Murray

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Zombies.

Babes.

Bill Murray.

What’s not to like, right?

Well, lots, but the big one is mighty simple – the movie’s just no good.

And it’s too bad, because all the elements – in addition to those mentioned above – are in plain view. A great title. Two nicely matched actors. Two terrific actresses. Lots of carnage. A road trip across a post-apocalyptic zombie wasteland. An amusement park with cool rides and filled with zombies (a nice – on paper – substitute for Romero’s mall in Dawn of the Dead). A blend of humour and horror.

And most importantly:

Muscle cars.

With all these elements popping up throughout the picture, my constant inner refrain was, “Please, oh please – say it ain’t so! Please let this get better.”

Unfortunately, these sure-fire elements are not presented with the kind of intelligence, control and style they needed. The picture is a flaccid mess. The super-talented Jesse Eisenberg of The Squid and the Whale fame plays a young Woody Allen-like schlemiel who delivers deadpan narration on how he’s managed to survive a worldwide onslaught of flesh eating living dead. The casting, content and delivery is reasonably inspired; the rules of the world are set-up nicely, there’s some terrific zombie killing and a few lines actually manage to elicit some smiles and a couple of chuckles.

Enter Woody Harrelson as a zombie killing cowpoke extraordinaire who takes an instant dislike to Eisenberg, but grows to like him. The two characters have their differences, but they bond by their mutual love and prowess at killing zombies. Not a bad thing to bond over in a zombie movie, but it seldom goes beyond a by-the-numbers nod to a depth that doesn’t really exist.

The opening minutes are not too bad, but the style and presentation of the film’s inaugural un-spooling is pretty much dropped and tedium starts to set in until the fellows meet up with two babes; the sinfully sexy Emma Stone and the younger and thoroughly delightful Abigail Breslin. The two chicks are in peril, but in reality they’re cleverly using the cliché of weak women who need their men to con our two zombie killers into giving up their wheels and guns. Eventually all four team up and the fun should really begin. It doesn’t.

The story turns into a series of comedy and action set pieces that are not funny or suspenseful enough. Add to this an annoying A.D.D.-challenged approach to shooting and cutting (director Ruben Fleischer, not surprisingly, comes from music videos and commercials). He has no feel for suspense and his timing on the comedy front is always just off the mark.

While the leads are attractive to look at, they go through the obligatory ropes of most multiplex fodder, adding little spin to the proceedings save, perhaps, for Eisenberg’s performance which is delightful in its incongruity with the genre. This would all be fine if the writing had been better, but the screenplay by Fleischer and co-scenarists Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick delivers mostly frat boy humour gussied up with some wiseacre-speak from the wonderful Eisenberg. Woody Harrelson is not without amusement value, but again, he’s pure good ole’ boy without the kind of heart that might have lifted the picture beyond the perfunctorily machine-tooled variety. The ladies are perky and cute; especially since they’re allowed to kick some ass, but they too are cardboard cutouts without the shading that could have made them more interesting and engaging.

I also love the IDEA of the Texas backdrop to much of the proceedings, but there’s really no sense of place beyond the fact that we’re told the setting is Texas. The movie feels like it could be pretty much anywhere.

The overall pace of the picture is also problematic. Given the fact that the running time is a perfect 80 minutes, the annoying style of Fleischer’s approach, still manages to bung up the works and the picture feels far longer than it actually is. Zombieland wants to be Shaun of the Dead, but the writing is not good enough. It craves to be “Dawn of the Dead”, but the direction is lifeless and bereft of any weight.

All this said, I do suggest eventually renting the movie since there is one truly great element to find pleasure in. Bill Murray’s supporting role is an absolute delight. His performance and the material he’s working with rises above the pedestrian level of everything else in the picture. If the movie had been up to Murray’s greatness, I’d have been singing a much different tune. I’m not, though. Instead of belting out “Yellow Rose of Texas”, I’m just a-humming “Old Black Joe”.

"Zombieland" is available on DVD and Blue from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.

TOKYO STORY - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Ozu Masterpiece Gets Deluxe Criterion BD

One of the great, if not the greatest of all films ever made about family by one of cinema's true masters. Tokyo Story often feels like it stands alone in its indelible and consummately perfect portrait of lives well lived to lay a groundwork - for better or worse - for future generations to benefit and carry on from the love and sacrifices of those who came before and that life, in all its joy and sadness is a never-ending cycle of growth and regeneration through death.

(Top L to R) Setsuko Hara, Haruko Sugimura, Sō Yamamura, Kuniko Miyake
(Bottom L to R) Mitsuhiro Mori, Chieko Higashiyama, Chishū Ryū, Zen Murase 

As Noriko, Setsuko Hara, Japanese Cinema's greatest actress
and one of its biggest and most beloved stars.

Tokyo Story (1953) *****
Dir. Yasujirō Ozu
Scr. Kōgo Noda, Ozu
Starring: Chishū Ryū, Chieko Higashiyama, Setsuko Hara
Review By Greg Klymkiw

Is there anything sadder than children living their own lives at the expense of forgetting their parents, or worse, acknowledging their parents' "mere" existence as something which, annoyingly, impedes upon their own growth, their own lives? Is there, finally, anything more selfish? Probably not, but is it simply a terrible truth we all must accept as the normal course of life, love and death? Is forgetfulness an act of thoughtlessness or is it that thing we ultimately need to keep living?

These are questions that face us during and after seeing Yasujirō Ozu's perfect film, Tokyo Story. It is a film that instills considerable pain in us, yet it's not one we experience solely within the context of viewing the lives of others - a deep sorrow that we can toss off as one experienced by watching sad figures on a celluloid landscape belonging to fictional characters or, indeed, dramatic recreations of those we know exist, but that we can feel a complacent disconnect from by the act of passively witnessing their actions up on a screen. No, these are finally real people and in Ozu's masterful hands, they are, indeed, all of us.

The tale told here is as simple, and as such, as complex as life itself. Shūkichi and Tomi Hirayama (Ryū, Higashiyama) are the elderly parents of three sons (one of whom never returned from World War II), two daughters and two grandchildren. They have never left their rural enclave and in their waning years, they decide to visit Tokyo, the city they've never seen and the home of their married children.

Their presence, however, is merely tolerated and the greatest welcome and kindness they receive is from their widowed daughter-in-law Noriko (Hara). The elders' vacation is a bittersweet affair - some sightseeing, an uneventful stay in a spa, less than hospitable treatment from their children, a madcap night of drinking for Shūkichi and an old buddy, several warm visits with the daughter-in-law who still carries a torch for their deceased son and finally, a sad journey back to their home far away from the bustle of Tokyo - a sojourn that ends in an unexpected loss.

There aren't any beats in this narrative bereft of emotion. As seemingly straightforward as the events are, Ozu manages to touch us more deeply than any film seems to have the right to do. He achieves this by employing the same deft simplicity in his style as he and his screenwriting collaborator Kōgo Noda bring to bear upon their gorgeous script.

Ozu compliments the writing perfectly by training his camera steadily upon the life of the story, allowing the events to unfurl naturalistically within the frame of a fixed position - never moving, except for one shot, and another that feels like it's moving, but isn't - and rooted in low, yet eye-level perspectives that resemble the position taken by the characters as they sit upon their traditional Japanese tatami mats. Dialogue never seems to overlap, nor does Ozu cut away (at least not so we notice) from characters when they are speaking.

The pace is slow, but always riveting in spite, or rather, because of the stillness. In fact, what tends to move us in the deepest ways is how we watch, ever-so painstakingly and painfully as we see a family torn by time, space and finally the sort of differences inherent in all the characters and their sense of individuality. There are no shrill screaming matches or barbed verbal sparring - instead it is both time and silence that provides us with an ineffaceable sense of decay.

Life, as it unfolds, is death - one that creeps slowly, yet inexorably to where all our lives do. Is there disappointment experienced and expressed? Of course and it's conveyed with both delicacy and the kind of matter-of-factness that we all recognize as the way things are.

At one point, Shūkichi notes: "We can't expect too much from our children." On one hand, it feels like he's almost sighing this notion in defeat and disappointment, but the character is also someone who observes life pass almost like a wry Cheshire Cat. Rather than betraying inscrutability, he expresses a truth that seems less terrible and rather one of acceptance. This is finally what's so heartbreaking. He does not say this with resignation, but with the kind of truth that can only be gained by a lifetime of both observation and just plain living.

Shūkichi's consideration of the reality of what parents must or rather, must not expect from their children parallels the equally powerful moment in Tokyo Story when Kyōko (Kyōko Kagawa), the youngest (and unmarried) Hirayama daughter asks, "Isn't life disappointing?" and the wise, warm Noriko offers up a knowing smile and replies, so simply and so tellingly, "Yes, it is."

And damned if Noriko isn't right! Life is disappointing, but so it must be to allow for those momentary bursts of joy and elation to shine like the light sparkling upon us in the clear of a night sky. When youngest son Keizo (Shiro Osaka) says, "No one can serve his parents beyond the grave," he delivers yet another of the film's seemingly terrible truths, but in the end, it's actually not so terrible - our parents ultimately never want us to serve them beyond or even before the grave.

The glorious (and yes, somewhat melancholy) truth Ozu delivers is that it is our parents who selflessly serve us, and if we're doing the right thing, what we must all do to preserve the regeneration and perpetuation of life is to selflessly serve our children, but to never expect or demand that it be reciprocated.

This then, is love and Tokyo Story is nothing if it's not about that.

"Tokyo Story" as presented in the glistening new Criterion Collection dual format package is yet another home entertainment package to own and to cherish. In addition to the exquisite film itself, Criterion has pulled out all the stops and gone well above and beyond the call of duty and included the following supplements to our enjoyment and appreciation of this truly great film: a new digital 4K restoration and transfer to Blu-Ray, a commentary track by Ozu expert David Desser, "I Lived, But . . .", a feature length 1983 doc about Ozu’s life and career, "Talking with Ozu", a forty-minute 1993 "Tribute to Ozu" by Lindsay Anderson, Claire Denis, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Aki Kaurismäki, Stanley Kwan, Paul Schrader and Wim Wenders, a 1988 doc on actor Chishu Ryu, a trailer, an all-new English subtitle translation and a lovely booklet featuring an essay by David Bordwell. It doesn't get better than this, folks!

THE LAST POGO JUMPS AGAIN - Review By Greg Klymkiw - See this history of Toronto Punk or DIE, motherfucker!

THE LAST POGO JUMPS AGAIN is a thrilling epic journey into Toronto's legendary punk rock scene. It's a Joseph-Conrad-like boat ride into some kind of Hell that always feels like a Heaven as imagined by Anton LaVey. Directors Colin Brunton and Kire Papputs are the two halves of Willard on a mission that seems to have no real end. And if there is a heart of darkness on display, a Kurtz, if you will, it feels like every Status Quo fuck-wad that ignored this exciting scene. "The Last Pogo Jumps Again" is playing theatrically in Toronto at the Big Picture Cinema, 1035 Gerrard St East, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M4M 1Z6, Tel. 416 466 3636. Friday November 1 through Wednesday November 6 at 7:30 pm. Matinees on Sunday November 3 and Thursday November 6 at 3:30. (NB: No 7:30 pm show the evening of November 7.) Tickets are $10.00; Thursday November 7 matinee at 3:30 is $5.00 for students and the unemployed. The fuck else you doing this week anyway? Jerking off? Thumbing your asshole? Or sticking your dick through a glory hole to get some chump to slaveto the fuck out of it? Just see the fuckin' movie!!!

The Last Pogo Jumps Again (2012) ****
Dir. Colin Brunton, Kire Papputs

Review By Greg Klymkiw

PREAMBLE - Winnipeg's Punk Scene

So, like, some dude who works on the docks, his name is Réjean, corners you in a stall at Jilly's and says: "Suck my dick". We've all been there before. Right? Both parties are too skint to hit the V.I.P. room for some private dancing and before you can say, "Gimme summa lovin'", you're greedily gobbling the knob of this bearded, seven-footer with a plaid shirt and hoping for a nice reach-around. We've all been there. Right? So, okay, what if the same dude traps you in the shitter and growls, "Slaveto my dick!" - you're going to be, like, "The fuck, Réjean? You want me to WHAT?" From the late 70s until I can't remember when, the aforementioned conversation played out in my mind whenever I drove by an old garment district building in the Market Square area of Winnipeg that featured this spray-painted graffiti prominently displayed on its grey cement wall:

 SLAVETO

 MY DICK

Moments after I first read those words (in double-take, mind you) I knew the graffiti was that great song "SLAVE TO MY DICK" by Vancouver punk band, The Subhumans. Some moron with a can of spray paint was shit-facedly inspired to splooge the words via aerosol in a prominent location. The bonehead placed the words "slave" and "to" too fucking close together. This might not be true, but I remember the graffiti remained for decades after it first appeared - a beacon at the entranceway to this 7 or 8 square blocks in downtown Winnipeg that had become the stomping grounds of artists, actors, filmmakers, junkies, drunks, hookers and, of course, punks. It was a scene, know what I mean? And for about four years, the punk scene fuelled the crazy alternative film making scene at the Winnipeg Film Group. I can't think of a single person in their mid-40s-50s from the 'Peg who makes movies and WASN'T part of that scene. Great 'Peg punk and new wave bands - and I mean GREAT bands - belted out the coolest sounds imaginable. Bars like the Royal Albert or, my favourite, the "Chuckles" (or to malcontent veterans, the St. Charles Hotel) featured gig upon gig with local Winnipeg Punk/NewWavers like the Popular Mechanix, Personality Crisis, Dub Rifles, Lowlife, The Stretch Marks, Discharge, The Psychiatrists, The Bristow Hoppers - the list goes on and on - and bookers (often Winnipeg band members themselves) peppered the local acts with whatever punks from Toronto, Vancouver or the USA who could get their shit together enough to play the 'Peg. I was running a West-End movie theatre that played mostly cult films, sometimes sprinkled with live acts ("Nash the Slash VS. Eraserhead" read one of the immortal handbills). The "Scene" would come see a movie or two, blast down to the garment district, catch a punk band, then head to Walter and Megan's Lithium Cafe to belt back joe with tired hookers and their hopped-up pimps. This happened pretty much every night for many moons.

It's funny now, how many film or media people frolicked about the punk scene. John Paizs directed the quaintly perverse cinematic equivalent to 'Peg Punk with his brilliant short film The Obsession of Billy Botski and, years later he used the great Popular Mechanix song "IceBox City" during a joyous dance sequence in his immortal feature length cult classic Crime Wave. Guy Maddin blew his inheritance from Aunt Lil (her beauty parlour became the studio set for Tales from the Gimli Hospital) on 78 recordings of fruity 20s/30s tenors from this amazing store in Minneapolis, but also collected the most amazing number of punk albums which he purchased from Winnipeg's immortal Pyramid Records. Guy would gather everyone round to his place, quaintly adorned with his late Aunt Lil's doilies, and spin Richard Crooks singing Stephen Foster's "Old Black Joe", then switching from 78 to 33rpm, he'd announce something a bit more "challenging" was on its way - code for: this is some good shit I got from Pyramid Records and it's going to blow you the fuck away. In delicious contrast to "Old Black Joe", the needle gently found its groove and the room swelled with the aural explosion of Feederz crooning "Jesus Entering From The Rear". Radio producer John Copsey (he wears suits now) led a punk band that devoted themselves to worshipping the survivalist movement as preached on Winnipeg's community cable station TV show "Survival" featuring yours truly and Guy Maddin as apocalypse-welcoming rednecks. Lead singer of several great Winnipeg punk bands was none other than heartthrob Kyle McCulloch who starred in virtually every early John Paizs and Guy Maddin film and eventually became a head writer on TV's South Park. And lest we forget, Canada's highly esteemed journalist and political pundit in all media, Mr. Andrew Coyne, took to the stage with several other burgeoning writers from the University of Manitoba newspaper and in punk tradition, nary a one of them could actually play, but they gave their all as The Nimrods.

Happy times for many. Times that led to even happier times - for some. All were ultimately inspired by Winnipeg's punk scene, but most of all, the brilliant local artists - the musicians who made you soar higher than a kite with kickass punk/new wave music were the big motivators who instilled a more anarchic, freewheeling, devil-may-care spirit in so many of us to push the limits of our own lives and artistic pursuits. The music, unlike the arts inspired by it, had NO outlets of support to take the music and musicians to the next natural level. There were a few limited tapes or EPs cut, a handful of extremely indie albums, but this genuinely brilliant period of Winnipeg music - post The Guess Who and pre The Crash Test Dummies - lives in the minds, memories and movies of all those who loved it deeply and were fuelled by seeing it LIVE - night after night after blessedly blasphemous night.

THE MEAT & CORNMEAL OF THE POGO STICK CALLED TORONTO PUNK: YEAH, NOW YOU GET YOUR FUCKING FILM REVIEW OF

THE COLIN BRUNTON & KIRE PAPPUTS EPIC DOC

It took about 30 seconds of screen time for me to feel a surge of the old excitement I used to get in my late teens and early 20s in the aforementioned Winnipeg Scene. Here I was, watching The Last Pogo Jumps Again, the alternately thrilling and depressing but ultimately powerful story of the Toronto Scene de la PUNK and it mattered not that it was Toronto. Hell, I kind of felt like I was back in Winnipeg all over again.

I embraced the crazy, scrappy, downright dangerous insanity of this terrific documentary and fully accepted its body, its blood - like an unholy sacrement drained and scourged from the everlasting soul of Sid Vicious himself who died, NOT for OUR sins, but for his own and for the rest of us who were willing to commit our own - no matter how heinous or benign. This downright wonderful picture by Brunton and Papputs is a sacrament and I accept its fuck-you-filmmaking-moxie as much as I allow its people, places and music into my very soul as if they were my very own.

On the surface - this is a movie that shouldn't work - at least not by the standards of many un-cool fuck-wads who make cultural decisions in this country at both the public and private sectors - propped up comfortably on the nests they feather atop the podiums they take their dumps-a-plenty from as if they were showering the Great Unwashed with gold. It shouldn't work, but it does. Some might say it is solely about a subject only 100 or so people might get into. They'd be wrong. Others will complain (usually without seeing it) that the movie is too long - 3 hours and 20 minutes PLUS an intermission. Again - WRONG. I saw a much longer version and then this shorter version and frankly, I wish the filmmakers stuck to the original length. In fact, they could have made it even longer for some extra-sweet fuck-you cherries on the ice cream sundae.

Some might say the movie is a mess. Yeah, it is - sort of, but brilliantly and subversively it's a documentary equivalent to the punk scene itself and that's one of the many things I admire about it.

Here's the deal, when legendary Canadian film producer Colin Brunton was a teenager, he worked as an usher at the Roxy Theatre in Toronto - a deliciously fucked joint on the East End that combined 99-cent double features of art films and art sleaze with a kick-ass music scene. This temple of all things anti-peace-love-and-prebyterianism-a-la-Toronto was the jumping off point for so many who would contribute to one of the most thrilling music in the country.

Eventually the Scene moved further west in the otherwise Presbyterian pole-up-the-ass city. Pockets of fuck-you exploded at the New Yorker Theatre, along Spadina, in Kensington and, of course, Queen Street West when it wasn't full of fuck-wit rich people pretending to be poor. And the biggest fuck you explosion in Toronto was the exciting punk rock new wave scene.

Brunton and Papputs focus on a two year window - beginning at the Roxy and New Yorker Theatre gigs and ending with the famous Last Pogo when the Horseshoe Tavern on Queen decided to flush punk off its stages forever and a legendary concert that eventually culminated with a visit from Toronto's Finest Porkers with their night sticks and guns to boot the bands off the stage and patrons out onto the street. In reality, the window of this history is probably a wee bit larger, but what happens within the period the filmmakers choose to focus on is pretty much the trajectory that occurred not only in Toronto, but Winnipeg, Calgary, Vancouver, Montreal - anywhere in Canada that had a vibrant punk scene, lots of devoted fans and absolutely no support from most of the mainstream media and a total fucking from the music business (like, what else is new?). The music business - virtually non-existent in Canada anyway - chose to ignore the Scene and for the one or two bands they took a passing fancy to, they basically sucked them RAW and DRY.

Uh, and like, what else is new?

NO REACH-AROUND!!!

Brunton was fully enmeshed in the whole Scene and chose to document the Last Pogo concert at the Horseshoe with a 16mm camera ('natch). This resulted in a scrappy little movie called ... come on, give it a guess ... come on, you can do it - Yesiree-Bob!!! You win the fuckin' Kewpie Doll - it was called The Last Pogo.

That was then - this is now and during the past six years the filmmakers embarked on an odyssey to interview as many members of the Scene as possible and create a document that would serve as an artistic and living testimony to a slice of Canadian popular culture that many would prefer to forget and/or even refuse to acknowledge it even (or ever) existed.

And The Last Pogo Jumps Again is a joy - a real joy. Blending new and archival interviews and footage with all the onstage and behind the scenes players, the movie tells a tale as inspiring as it is sad - but what keeps the whole thing buoyant is the mad genius on view in both the words and performances of the likes of D.O.A., The Viletones, Teenage Head and all the rest of this Scene of gloriously talented purveyors of fuck-you-and-the-horse-you-fucking-rode-in-on. Some of those interviewed keep playing, others have morphed their love of music into other areas of the music business while some have chosen to grow up and get real jobs - and it's a testament to the obsessive qualities of the filmmaking itself that it's simply impossible to NOT like anyone in the picture.

Some of the interview highlights for me were poignant moments with the late Frankie Venom of Teenage Head, the brilliant, erudite Andy Paterson of The Government and without question, the vitriol-and-venom spewing Steve Leckie from the Viletones - a poet, an artist, a gentleman curmudgeon of the highest order.

The Last Pogo Rides Again definitely feels like a Joseph-Conrad-like boat ride into some kind of Hell that always feels like a Heaven as imagined by Anton LaVey. Brunton and Papputs are the two halves of Willard on a mission that seems to have no real end. And if there is a heart of darkness on display, a Kurtz, if you will, it feels like every Status Quo fuck-wad that ignored this exciting scene.

And it's an important film. So much of Canada's truly vibrant culture has been squashed or ignored. Here's a film that holds up a slice of it that not only created great work in and of itself, but was an inspiration and seed for so much that followed in a variety of artistic mediums.

Never mind the cornucopia of great artists, filmmakers, writers, playwrights, actors and other truly gifted iconoclasts who sprouted from Toronto's Punk Scene - they're out there, doing their thing - they know who they are and so do we. But a word about the visionary Colin Brunton: he might well be the true soul and pulse of indie filmmaking in the Toronto Scene and even to this day, one feels his visionary influence upon the first two great rock pictures directed by Bruce McDonald. Roadkill and Highway 61 feel very much like they're as much Brunton's sensibilities as they are McDonald's. What sets Brunto apart from most producers in this country is that he doesn't come from some bullshit rarified place - he's the real thing. He's been there. He's done that. And all his collaborations feel like they're moulded and charged by his love for film, his knowledge of ALL the rules - artistically AND practically - so he can motherfucking break them when necessary and finally, his genuine life experience which he injects into every project he undertakes.

He's all over The Last Pogo Jumps Again, but he clearly has a collaborator in Paputts that shares this crazy-ass vision. They clearly make a great team because they've made a great movie.

See it. Or die, motherfucker!

"The Last Pogo Jumps Again" is playing theatrically in Toronto at the Big Picture Cinema, 1035 Gerrard St East, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M4M 1Z6, Tel. 416 466 3636. Friday November 1 through Wednesday November 6 at 7:30 pm. Matinees on Sunday November 3 and Thursday November 6 at 3:30. (NB: No 7:30 pm show the evening of November 7.) Tickets are $10.00; Thursday November 7 matinee at 3:30 is $5.00 for students and the unemployed.

The fuck else you doing this week anyway? Jerking off? Thumbing your asshole? Or sticking your dick through a glory hole to get some chump to slaveto the fuck out of it? Just see the fuckin' movie!!!

I, for one, can hardly wait for some kind of deluxe Blu-Ray - a numbered limited edition Box-set with the full version of the movie I originally saw - maybe even a LONGER one, tons of the good shit that hit the cutting room floor, commentaries galore and, for good measure a two-by-four-across-the-teeth soundtrack. I expect someone like Kino-Smith or Indie-Can to do this. If they don't, I assume Brunton will do it himself anyway. Better that, actually. He and Papputs can divvy up the profits without a middleman.