No One Lives (2012)

Director: Ryûhei Kitamura
Writer(s): David Cohen
Starring: Luke Evans, Gary Grubbs, Adelaide Clemens, and Derek Magyar

Pretty much the only thing you need to know about No One Lives, and the type of person it was created for, occurs within the first thirty seconds, even before the opening credits start to roll. That’s when a familiar, and rather unexpected, logo pops up from one of the production companies: WWE Studios. Yes, that WWE; as in, “World Wrestling Entertainment”, where big meaty guys fake beat on other big meaty guys.

Well, obviously that describes pretty much every action movie, but it especially describes this action movie, which, just like wrestling, frequently alternates between “wow, that was incredibly stupid” and “wow, that was kinda cool”—oftentimes within the same five second span. A perfect example: there’s a scene where a character, hiding from some bad guys who want to do him in, hides inside the dead body of another criminal. It’s one thing for someone to come up with that idea, but what kind of person would actually include it in the script? And yet, as completely illogical and ignorant as it is, there's a small part of me that can't help but think it's a ballsy move that borders on brilliant.

I can’t divulge much information about the plot, which offers up an initial twist just a few minutes in that completely changes the story (and that you should probably avoid reading about until after a watch), but basically it involves Luke Evans playing an untitled character (known only as “Driver”) who kills anyone who gets in his way. However, unlike Downrange, also directed by Kitamura, the violence is meant to be so over-the-top that you can't possibly take it seriously (as you can tell from the above example).

That's pretty much it. Think of it as an action movie by way of slasher: the movie gets all its kicks from delivering a variety of ways the Driver can off the stereotypical collection of bad guys. While that might sound pretty cool (and will no doubt appeal to a certain percentage of the masses), the unfortunate side effect of this is that there's literally no tension whatsoever. None. The Driver dispatches his foes with the utmost ease at every turn, making you wonder just why anyone thought dragging this out to feature length was a good idea. The end result is an uneven blend of boundless stupidity and occasional brilliance, simmered in a broth of almost mind-numbing monotony.

The one thing that still impresses me about Kitamura is his propensity to “play” with the material, and challenge audience expectations in a way few filmmakers seem to want to these days. For example, you think this is just going to be a straightforward “couple gets abducted and he fights back” tale, but there are so many story shifts—both major and subtle—that you eventually just stop guessing what's going to happen next, and submit yourself to Kitamura's wiles. Granted, his “twists”, while unpredictable, don’t actually always work within the confines of the story, but bless him for at least trying to tread new life into tired ideas…that’s more than I can say for many of these cookie-cutter “action” directors working today. (Also, at least it's not another officially-licensed superhero movie.)

I suppose I can kind of see its appeal, and how some people can be won over by its formula, but ultimately, I simply found it to be too stupid for its own good. So much so that not even a solid director with a unique approach—and admirable visual flair—can save it from itself.

RATING: 4/10

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Parasite (2019)

Director: Bong Joon Ho
Writer(s): Ho and Jin Won Han
Starring: Kang-ho Song, Sun-kyun Lee, Yeo-jeong Jo, and So-dam Park

What could I possibly add to this conversation that the 400+ critics on Rotten Tomatoes (plus hundreds of others outside that network), many of whom are far more educated than I, haven’t already said?

This is impeccably-crafted, transcendent cinema; that rare movie that tears down global lines and proves that, at the end of the day, we not only belong to one world and not just one continent, but that we are all human. What other foreign movie, perhaps since Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon two decades prior, have forced large quantities of mainstream American cinemagoers to face the unimaginable torture of having to read subtitles for two hours? And, even more amazingly, left them wanting to discuss it with anyone who will listen immediately thereafter?

That alone should tell you everything you need to know about Parasite. Forget whatever qualms you have about the director, or subtitles, or foreign cinema in general, or whatever else is stopping you from watching it, and just go see it. The only tip I have is to go into it as clueless as possible. You may watch the below trailer, because it does a good job of piquing interest without revealing any spoilers (surprisingly), but outside of that, read nothing else; let director Bong Joon Ho be your guide through his twisty, genre-bending mashup.

It doesn’t matter where your movie preferences lean, because Parasite has a little bit of everything. There’s some suspense, creepiness, and violence, but all those things play second fiddle to the human aspect; almost every single character, no matter what “side” their on, feels like a real person that we could get to know. This gives them a natural likability that is only strengthened by the frequent moments of (sometimes dark, but often hilarious) humor. It also gives us a wider net to forgive the more far-fetched ideas that Joon-ho presents, which largely go unnoticed (or, at the very least, unscrutinized) thanks to the film’s many strengths; it’s almost as if he somehow programs his scenes to bypass the “logical” center of our brain, and head straight for the “emotional” section…and it works.

Seriously, if you consider yourself a fan of movies at all—whether in a spectator or creator role—just see it. There’s inspiration here for almost everyone, thanks to a prodigious filmmaker who, we have to assume, is at the very peak of his craft—and at a level far beyond what many could ever hope to achieve.

RATING: 10/10

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REPETITIVE ROMANCE: Runaway Romance (2018)

Director: Brian Herzlinger
Writer(s): Emily Golden and John-Eliot Jordan, from the novel by Miralee Ferrell
Starring: Danielle C. Ryan, Trevor Donovan, Galadriel Stineman, and Tatum O'Neal

I feel like I’m starting to become a lame holiday movie, because reviewing them has made me feel like the repetitive robot all of them aspire to be: I find myself using the same words and phrases, trying to convey just how bland and repetitive they all seem to be.

For example, I could open every single plot synopsis with “Stop me if you’ve heard this one before,” because they all follow the same ten or so basic plot outlines, with just enough minor variations to slightly distance themselves from one another. And Runaway Romance is certainly not one to buck that trend. In it, Danielle Ryan plays Ann Stanway, a popular reality star on the popular reality show, “Life With the Adsons”, where she plays the girlfriend opposite Beau Davidson’s Scott Adson, while wearing a godawful wig.

Behind the scenes is Veronica Adson (Tatum O’Neal), Scott’s domineering mother who also controls the show, under the guise of wanting to do “what’s best” for her son—assuming it improves ratings, that is. So when numbers are staying stagnant with Ann, Veronica feels it’s time to replace her with another up-and-coming star, a notion that doesn’t seem to bother Scott one bit. (At least until the idea fails, but we all knew that was coming.)

In response to this, Ann flees L.A., winding up in Cave City, KY after her car breaks down, which is much closer to her hometown of Pennsylvania than the spotlights of LA. She bumps into an inn owned by Sarah Miller, a young Amish woman who annoyingly never uses contractions, and whose sentences seem to take a full decade to fully spit out (do the Amish really speak like that these days?) Annoying traits aside, she is kindhearted, allowing Ann to stay there until she can get her situation worked out, which of course, she can’t reveal to anyone because she has to hide her true self. (Thankfully, though, she loses the wig, which makes her look much more natural.)

The first character she meets is Jimmy, an awkward little man who is clearly interested in Ann from the outset, although Ann seems (rightfully) apprehensive. Just when I thought this might be a chore to wade through, I learn this is about the closest thing to a red herring you’ll ever find in a Hallmark-ish movie: he’s not the love interest after all! Instead, that honor goes to Hunter, an architect who checks all the boxes of a male lead: single, attractive, and successful. And who wouldn’t want a piece of that? As it turns out, even reality stars can be wooed by normal peasants!

Ann and Hunter’s blossoming relationship takes a hit, though, when that little weasel Jimmy—who himself dreams of being a reality star—takes her rejection a little too personal, and rats out her location to the press! Oh Jimmy, that’s not the way to a girl’s heart! Mild, family-oriented hijinx ensue.

This movie is actually one of the better non-funny holiday movies that we’ve seen up to this point, thanks to a good cast, who all band together to help detract from an idea we’ve all seen a thousand different times. Beau Davidson is perfectly douchey as Scott, while Tatum O’Neal’s Veronica is slimy as his domineering mother. The main stars are likable enough to cheer for, and the remaining cast manages to be competent, which can’t always be said for these clichéd love tales.

Ken Strunk, though, deserves special mention in a thankless role as Abraham Troyer, the old bishop, or whatever the hell Amish “masters” are known as; he rides around on his horse, chastising Sarah for wasting her time and energy running a failing inn when she should be married and settled down, and threatening to close the joint down after she takes in the non-Amish Ann. Although he could be seen as a villain, Strunk injects just enough humanity into his caricature that he merely seems like what he is: an old man steadfast and unwavering in his beliefs, rather than a one-note character who’s merely out to create obstacles for the main stars to overcome. (There’s a scene later on where the media, tipped off by Jimmy (which I guess could count as a spoiler, but you should already know that was going to happen), descends upon the small Amish town. Abraham’s reaction—one of complete devastation and disbelief—is so genuine that you actually feel bad for him, despite the culture-based “crudeness” of his character.)

Even though this was better than some, it’s still little more than a by-the-numbers romp through formulaic territory that certainly won’t port any new fans over to these saccharine gag-fests. There are much better out there no matter your thoughts, but you can do worse if this is what you (or, more likely, your significant other) decides to force down your throat.

RATING: 6/10

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Downrange (2017)

Director: Ryûhei Kitamura
Writer(s): Kitamura, and Joey O'Bryan
Starring: Kelly Connaire, Stephanie Pearson, Rod Hernandez, and Anthony Kirlew

Downrange is a movie for people who aren't interested in wasting time on things like “characterization” or “context”: within the film's first five minutes, the story is completely set up for us. And a simple story it is: Six carpoolers, most of whom don't know each other, and who are each headed to their own unspecified locations, blow a tire in the middle of nowhere (with—surprise!--no cell phone signal) and are then picked off one by one by a former military sharpshooter hiding somewhere in the surrounding trees.

With this simple setup, director Ryûhei Kitamura subverts audience expectations, delivering a devilish film that's a grueling exercise in bloodshed and tension, even for more “advanced” horror fans. I imagine many of the poor reviews of this are from people who expected a more “lighthearted” killing spree, but Kitamura's focus on the heartless, cold-blooded killer who, we can only assume, lies in wait for “prey”, allows him a virtually blank canvas to destroy long-held taboos: children are murdered, a dying character gasps for breath (which I've since learned is a Kitamura trademark), people helplessly look on as loved ones die, and every murder is carried out in excruciating, almost-too-graphic detail, from a nameless murderer with no feeling or remorse or sense of mercy, and whose backstory and motives are never revealed. It's almost the antithesis of what horror movies have become, but what they should always have been: actually horrifying.

Unfortunately, Kitamura's commitment to the visceral aspects don't translate to the writing, which presents the same standard collection of cardboard cutouts for its characters: there's the token black man, the young lovers, the good-looking single guy, the tough knowledgeable woman, and the timid, shy female. Many of these characters are so annoying that you're begging for the killer to off them as quickly as possible. (And, of course, the two worst offenders are the ones that make it the farthest, adding a dose of anger to the proceedings on the part of the viewer.) The acting is also hit-or-miss, though I would venture to say that, at least for a horror movie, the cast is above-average overall.

While those issues certainly knock the film down several pegs, preventing it from being the classic it could have been with a more experienced cast, there's no denying that this is a brutal film that takes horror back to its roots. It's primitive, ugly, and violent, and overall accomplishes the basic things that it sets out to do.

RATING: 7/10

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Midnight Meat Train (2008)

Director: Ryûhei Kitamura
Writer(s): Jeff Buhler, based on the story by Clive Barker
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Leslie Bibb, Vinnie Jones, and Brooke Shields

Well we’re just continuing down the Kitamura rabbit hole, aren’t we? After being moderately impressed—and in mostly different ways-- with the previous two efforts I’ve seen out of him (Downrange and No One Lives), I was somewhat looking forward to seeing his most well-known effort. After all, my biggest consistent complaint from the two movies I saw was related to the B-grade acting: I even wondered aloud in a previous review how much better his movies would be with a better cast.

You know, it’s funny how things work out sometimes, because he was finally given an A-list actor (in Bradley Cooper), and even some A-list material (it is based on a short story by none other than Clive Barker), only to let us down with a final product that’s relatively pedestrian, at least as far as Kitamura is concerned. It occasionally bubbles to life in fragments, hinting at something worthwhile that never fully develops, and ultimately leaving us with a disappointing final product that falls well short, especially given the considerable talent involved both in front of, and behind, the camera.

Cooper plays Leon, a wannabe photographer looking for his first big break. He’s referred to the owner of an art gallery (Susan Hoff, played by Brooke Shields), who sees promise, but is ultimately uninspired by the bland presentation of his photos. She urges him to get to the “heart of the city”, because that’s where she feels he will start to see success.

He does as suggested, wandering the streets—and eventually the subway—of New York at night (that’s a death wish) to find darker, more “raw” material. That’s when he eventually crosses paths with Mahogany, a brutal murderer who stalks a nightly train and offs its inhabitants with a meat hammer. Leon eventually becomes so obsessed with stalking the murderer that it creates more than a little tension between him and his girlfriend, Maya, a supportive gal who is being dragged beyond her breaking point.

The murders, while incredibly graphic, are placed sparingly and sporadically throughout, and also suffer from one of the worst fads of the 2000s: CGI blood. As much as I hate the stuff (it’s ruined many a movie), I feel like it almost works here, with such copious amounts of it that it looks like a digital painting—although probably unintentional, it certainly fits with the “artist” motif that surrounds Cooper’s character. But notice I said “almost”, because it’s still computerized, and it’s still completely hokey; I’d be interested to see just how much of an improvement practical effects would be. (Although in one ingeniously disturbing moment, a woman is decapitated in first person, her head laying to rest within sight of the rest of her body, before the camera pans out of her eye to reveal the disembodied head making one final groan.)

Unfortunately, outside of the kills, the rest of the story feels half-baked. There are no reasons offered up for why Mahogany does what he does; only vague “hints” that are never even lightly explored. On the “human” side of the equation, Leon’s descent into madness feels sudden and forced, and wastes the talents of both Cooper and Leslie Bibb as Maya, who would have been more than capable of putting more humanity into their roles. There's no gradual buildup in tension between the two: it's just her going from encouraging to disgusted by his actions, with no growing sense of alarm in-between. And while I’m a huge proponent of leaving as much to the imagination as possible in film, there are moments when it’s absolutely necessary; I would say centering a movie around a killer, and then even going through the trouble of offering up some clues as to why he’s doing what he’s doing, would be one of those cases. Instead, we’re just left out in the cold, with nothing to really even go off; it doesn’t feel so much a mystery as it does complete laziness.

In my opinion, this is Kitamura’s least engaging movie, and one that really shows more of his weaknesses as a director: he just doesn’t seem all that interested in developing the scenes in between the moments he can cause hell to break loose. And considering he doesn’t get as many chances to do that here as he does in his other films means Midnight Meat Train is every bit as bad as its title.

Okay, maybe not that bad, but pretty darn close.

RATING: 4/10

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BONUS CLIP (Aforementioned POV Decapitation)

MARVEL-LESS MARVISTA: A Student's Obsession (aka Dangerous Lessons) (2015)

Director: Jacobo Rispa, Damian Romay
Writer(s): Romay, and Blaine Chiapetta
Starring: Louise Lombard, Alex Esola, Ella Wahlestedt, and JoMarie Payton

Here we go again with one of MarVista’s favorite subjects: Obsession. They seem to dwell on it a lot, essentially using it as a “paint by numbers” style template for their movies: Just change the names, sexes, ages, and professions of the characters, and voila! Instant obsession movie!

This one, though, gives us not one, but two obsessions! Think of it as a BOGO deal that no one ever asked for. Stephanie is a married, middle-aged high school teacher who instantly becomes the focus of new student James. On a field trip to the Florida Keys (what kind of budget does this school have?!) Stephanie gets caught up in a moment of weakness and kisses him, something which she instantly regrets, despite the cold detachment of her worthless workaholic husband back home.

Despite her best intentions (and suggestion from her best friend, played by JoMarie Payton from Family Matters!) to sweep it under the rug and move on, James seems to take the kiss as an open invitation to go all psycho on her, stalking her and stopping at nothing to make him the object of her affection. Muddying the waters further is the creepy, disgusting old science teacher Richard, who also desperately wants her to be his, making one cringeworthy and ill-advised show of affection after another. Because, you know, he's old, and therefore a creep.

And that’s where the movie attempts to offer some intrigue and suspense as the two storylines bleed into one another. Who’s the one that sent her poisonous flowers? Which one of them are taking pictures of her through her window at home? And what’s the identity of the young boy her teenaged daughter has taken a liking to? Or most importantly, how come their expensive house doesn’t have a damn driveway? (Seriously, they park their cars in the grass on the front lawn).

As it all gets sorted out, of course we learn that the good-looking child has mommy troubles, and lives in a trailer outside of an abandoned home, and that the man who the daughter has fallen for (and who the mother invites to dinner) turns out to be James, who’s just using her to get to her mother. But the daughter not only can't decipher that, but also can't decipher her own mother's intense discomfort upon seeing James, lashing out in naive fury when Stephanie throws him out of the house and tells him never to come back again, and chalking it up as just a case of overprotective mom syndrome. Uh, no sweetheart, it's for her safety just as much as yours, something you'll learn the hard way later on.

Unfortunately, Stephanie—who’s completely comfortable with having a talk with her daughter when she says she’s ready to lose her virginity—apparently doesn’t feel the same way about talking to her daughter about vicious psychos: Rather than spell everything out for her daughter, and admit that he’s the one stalking her, she skirts around the issue, making vague comments about how he’s not who he says he is, which sound like broad, generalized accusations that only fuel the daughter's hatred even more. And of course, the daughter doesn’t believe her mom until she’s loosely tied up (there must not have been enough money in the budget for actual rope) and held at weaponpoint by James, who, as it is clear by this point, is a psychopath.

You can always count on the obligatory “twist” ending, usually involving a cliffhanger hint that the killer isn't actually dead, but in the one example of a cliche the writers must have missed, we don't get that here. While I was initially happy to see that, I have to say that, now that I've experienced it, I can say with 100% certainty that a “happy” MarVista ending is somehow even worse than the predictable cliffhanger, as this one proves, by featuring a forced scene where the entire family –who were all on the brink of disaster just a few short months ago—all share a wonderful meal full of laughter and smiles together, as if it serves as proof that all of the traumatic wounds have fully healed. Sorry, but I just don't buy that Stephanie's husband can't not be a tool, so this scene rings hollow for me. Although, to be fair, so did everything else.

This has some entertaining moments of unintentional hilarity—most of which involve poor Richard's embarrassing attempts to woo Stephanie--but despite the “double obsession!” shakeup, it still manages to be below average on the whole.

RATING: 4/10

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Braid (2018)

Director: Mitzi Peirone
Writer(s): Peirone
Starring: Madeline Brewer, Imogen Waterhouse, Sarah Hay, and Scott Cohen

Braid has a good cast, excellent production design, and gorgeous photography: all it’s missing is an idea. It feels like a random collection of images and partially-realized sequences, held together by an ambiguous, threadbare plot, and an ending that never actually seems to arrive. I don’t like to throw the term “pretentious” around very often, and while I think I would stop short of actually putting that label on this one (I think it's at least trying to be genuine, rather than being artsy for artsy's sake), I have to admit it’s a word that popped in my head more than once.

Two girls--who are on the run from the police after a drug bust destroys their only source of income—decide to revisit their psychotic friend with whom they have fallen out of touch. The reason? Somewhere within her oversized mansion is a safe, and inside that safe is a lot of money. Enough, they figure, to pay back all the money they owe for their confiscated stash, while also leaving some to live off of, at least for a while.

But Daphne isn’t a typical friend: she’s a full-on psycho. And in order to get the money, they must enter the imaginative world the three of them created when they were younger. This world has three rules, which we are repeatedly beaten over the head with, lest we forget: Rule #1: everyone must play; rule #2: no outsiders; and #3: no one leaves.

Well, that doesn’t sound like a very fun game, and it only takes us about ten minutes before we first realize that this was probably the least practical way they could have accessed the cash. I mean, robbing a bank would probably be a more simple approach than having to deal with Daphne, who clearly gets macabre joy out of watching others suffer, and who pretends to be the mother she could never be, what with her barren womb and all. And while the final “twist” seems to excuse many of the film’s narrative weaknesses, it doesn’t change anything at all about how boring it is to slog through.

Unsurprisingly, it’s a critical darling, because it’s exactly the type of movie to appeal to that crowd: a story with great visuals, and an ambiguous story that they can discuss at length over rounds of craft beers and overpriced wines. The kind of movie that they all pretend to “get”, so they can continue to appear “hip” and “trindie” (a mix of “indie” and “trendy”) to their fellow peers. Yet what's on screen seems like the end result of a group of friends shooting random footage in a cool location they secured for a day, then attempting to piece together a sensical narrative based around those random sequences at a later time. It’s rarely gripping, and even by the time we get to the obligatory bloodshed—which just feels like it was thrown in to “wake-up” its dozing audience—it’s long past the point of redemption.

I’m completely shocked writer-director Mitzi Peirone hasn’t worked on music videos (at least, per her IMDb page), because there are many sequences that recall the type of quick-cut editing and visual flourishes from that type of media. I think she would flourish in a medium like that, where stories have to be summed up in around five minutes, and she can run wild with the visuals. Indeed, she has an eye for composition and production design because—no matter what you personally think of them—you can't deny she produces some striking imagery.

However, she seems to think that all you need to create a dreamlike atmosphere are bright colors and altered audio effects. Actually, in some ways, creating an “accurate” dreamland is even more difficult than creating a linear reality, in that the random sequences have to feel like they make sense together, even if they don’t (to the viewer). Take the works of David Lynch as one example: A film like Mulholland Drive works because, even through its fractured, confusing storyline (that may or may not even exist), there are enough “callbacks” and similarities between scenes that not only do you get to know the main characters (or at least think you do), but you can tell they are a part of the same cinematic universe.

That's not so here, and it's also the main reason why Braid's 85 minute runtime somehow manages to not only feel stretched by at least twenty minutes, but also longer than some that run two hours. 

RATING: 4/10

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MARVEL-LESS MARVISTA: Dance-Off (2014)

Director: Alex Di Marco
Writer(s): Amy George and Mark Goodman
Starring: Shane Harper, Kathryn McCormick, Finola Hughes, and Carolyn Hennesy

On the surface, Dance-Off is your typical “two dancers fall in love” movie. But dig a little deeper, and you’ll find—okay, that’s really all this is at its core: A movie with far too little “dance” and plenty of “off”. But there’s an almost endearing incompetence behind the whole production that makes it far more interesting than it should be, thanks to a complete lack of direction or understanding of basic compositional techniques: punchlines are offered to jokes without set-up, characters are introduced without explanation, and the narrative story is so abysmally cobbled together, that parts of it feel like a fever dream.

Our protagonists here are Brandon and Jasmine, two dancers from rival dance schools who are competing in a nationwide competition to decide the best of the best. Of course, they will fall in love, but there’s at least some history behind them: as children, they were dance partners, until Brandon’s mother suddenly moved him out of town. Jasmine blames him for not saying goodbye to her (the tone-deaf opening scene finds Brandon’s mom driving away from Jasmine, who chases after the car), while Brandon blames her for not reaching out at any point during the intervening years.

Also blaming Brandon is Jasmine’s domineering mother, JoAnn, who is that ridiculously over-the-top villain these movies seem to find humorous. You know the type: complaining to the dance instructor when her daughter isn’t front and center in a routine, critiquing anyone and everyone down to the tiniest detail, and flashing her money around, as if self-justifying her terrible behavior. I imagine characters such as these started as a biting satire of rich folk, but by now that bite has been shaved down to a butterknife; they’ve just become a tired retread of one another, and a lazy by-the-numbers villain for writers who don’t have the mental capacity to come up with an original one of their own.

And with that setup begins one of the most tone-deaf love stories in history, with Jasmine seemingly unable to decide if she likes him or loathes him (seriously, she goes from obsessively watching YouTube videos of his past performances, to being a stone-cold cunt to him in person; it goes so quickly from one extreme to the other that you really just want to see him move on). Brandon, meanwhile, is clearly infatuated with her, much to the chagrin of fellow group member Simone, who shows she’s infatuated with him by being a complete bitch and trying to control every aspect of his life.

Of course, not only do they drag this whole substanceless relationship out for 90 minutes, but it also just so happens to come down to their two teams in the finals, with the winner foreshadowed with all the subtlety of a bullet to the skull: Brandon’s school, Shockwave Studios, is struggling so bad financially that the lights go off during practice, they have to get financial assistance to travel, liquid that looks like chocolate milk sprays from the pipes, and the school’s owner, one Mr. Ray, can’t even afford sweaters that don’t fall apart at the slightest nudge of a thread. Gee, I wonder if they’ll win enough money to save the school at the expense of the other school who is loaded with money!

The only time the movie even has a pulse are during the surprisingly solid dance numbers, which are either far too infrequent, or just feel that way, with the multitude of issues the movie faces when it has to rely on developing its characters frequently standing front and center. It’s like a tale of two movies: Brandon and Jasmine lack complete chemistry when they’re talking, but put on some music and the two explode and sparkle like they’ve longed for each other their whole lives. And Kathryn McCormick is gorgeous as Jasmine, which at least gives viewers something to latch on to when nothing else interesting is happening on screen.

Unfortunately, “nothing interesting” takes up about 80% of its duration, leaving you with a lot of time to wonder where your life went wrong. Even with the admittedly solid dancing and surrealistic environment—which only provides sudden unexpected moments of non-sequitur “humor” that wear off almost as quickly as they appear—Dance-Off is a complete turd.

STRAY OBSERVATIONS

• Adding to the fever dream atmosphere: Mr. Ray’s indescribably bizarre assistant, who lurches around lankily and stares at him so frequently, that I think we’re supposed to gather that she is infatuated with him, even though it's a sidestory that’s never even slightly acknowledged. Probably because Mr. Ray has no interest in a woman that looks like she was created in a lab.
• JoAnn’s other daughter, a chubby young girl named London (Marlowe Peyton) who is frequently the butt of her mother’s jokes, is by far the most genuinely likable character in this whole mess.
• Speaking of which, JoAnn’s constant fat-shaming of her young daughter is pretty harsh, and will be way out-of-bounds with today’s audiences (I’ll admit to being a terrible person: I actually found some of the comments funny, but it’s unnecessarily unrelenting.)
• An example of what the writers think is a funny idea: One of the judges during the final dance sequences is always eating something different every time we see him. No explanation, no set-up: it's just baffling.
• Also baffling: the random appearance of a red-headed character, who just suddenly appears alongside JoAnn during a scene, and laughs hysterically at everything she says. She somehow ranks up there with London as being one of the best characters, even though she should be annoying as hell.
• Could they not afford music for the obligatory “pre-finals staredown”, in which characters from both warring sides do random dance moves against each other one-on-one? It’s kind of a bizarre scene considering they do it in complete silence.
• There’s no commitment to any of this material: At one point, Jasmine catches Brandon hugging a female dance partner (in an obviously platonic exchange), and storms off in apparent disgust. This is never brought up again.
• I don’t understand the reasoning behind having the final dance numbers—which are being performed in front of an audience live on stage—be interspersed with cuts of the same characters performing the same number on a raining city street. I guess that it was probably for visual flair, and probably could have worked in the right movie, but this one ain’t it.

RATING: 3/10

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LAUGHABLE LIFETIME: Mommy Group Murder (2018)

Director: Nick Everhart
Writer(s): Everhart, from a story by Samantha Shear, Michael Shear, and Dave Hickey
Starring: Helena Mattsson, Leah Pipes, Nichole Galicia, and Ryan Carnes

Wow…in ten years, will we look back on 2019 as the “breakout” year for Lifetime movies? Sure, they’ve been around for a couple of decades now, and been “popular” for much of that time, but I would imagine (and hope) that most of their appeal has been from people who love to laugh at the straight-faced absurdity of their increasingly-bizarre plots, and idiotic titles (exhibit A: this one).

Lately, though, there seems to be a rather alarming trend threatening to muck all of that up: actual talent has been seeping in to more and more of these projects. I don’t know, maybe it’s just me and we’ve been blessed with enough good luck to pick all of the good ones out of 2019’s releases. But when even a movie called Mommy Group Murder can actually be pretty good, I would say there’s a good chance the talent is rolling through all of them.

Leah Pipes (a career in porn is never too far away with a name like that) plays Natalie, a woman who suffers from postpartum depression after giving birth to her baby. Her hunky husband, Ryan, seems to be too busy with his new career to handle a crying child, and so she is left to her own devices, struggling to maintain the façade of happiness while balancing the needs of her child, and mounting feelings of loneliness.

All that changes when, through a rather horrifying (read: actually hilarious) accident involving a runaway stroller headed for a body of water, she meets Grace, a blonde woman who eventually invites her to join her “mommy group”, which is just her and two other mothers, in various stages of unhappiness, who lean on each other for support. There’s Roz, the token black woman whose husband is curiously never seen, and Maria, a nurse who suspects her husband, Tony, is cheating on her.

Despite following the Lifetime formula for the most part, this one actually seems to have enough self-awareness to throw in some red herrings: by the midway point, we really had no idea where it was headed. Sure, in hindsight it’s still the same ol’ linear Lifetime murder mystery, but there are enough twists and turns and unexpected surprises that it’s worth a watch…for about three-quarters of it, anyway.

Unfortunately, once the typically overprotective Natalie gets so obsessed with finding answers that she leaves her baby at home—with the back door left ajar (because apparently she doesn’t have an extra set of keys and can’t wait for her husband to get home)—that’s when it reverts back to the expected collection of groan-inducing clichés. It really feels like the final twenty minutes were written and filmed by someone else entirely; gone is the enticing unpredictability, in favor of a by-the-numbers psycho-stalker finish that, by the time you get there, delivers exactly what you know it’s going to, and nothing else. It’s a shame it has to end on its weakest note, especially considering it had quite a bit going for it before it hit the wall.

In what seems to be the new par for the course, the cast is uniformly strong, but special kudos must be granted to Leah Pipes, who carries much of the early picture on her shoulders. Considering the whole first ten or so minutes consists of her going through her daily routine, looking sad and crying a bunch, it could have easily been a laughingstock from the start, but she gives it her all, lending some surprising credence to her character. (The intense cheesiness of the slow-motion “runaway stroller” scene notwithstanding, but that’s not entirely on her.)  Ditto for Kate Mansi as Megan, who has a couple scenes requiring her to break down, and does so believably.

While the guys don’t have the same level of acting chops, nor the same level of emotional requirements, they manage to be an attractive bunch, giving those Lifetime-obsessed women something to marvel at as the story develops. As is usually the case, it’s the uniformly solid cast that carries the story from point A to point B and, for the most part, prevents it from devolving into (easy) self-parody.

Again, if it weren’t for a below mediocre ending, this would have been a solid contender as one of the best Lifetime movies we’ve seen; as it stands, it will just have to settle as an above-average entry that is worth a watch if you’re bored.

RATING: 6/10

STRAY OBSERVATIONS

• We saw this about two weeks ago, and I didn't take my usual set of notes; it's amazing just how little I remember of this entire experience.
• The runaway stroller scene has to be seen to be believed--it's peak Lifetime.
• When viewed in hindsight, the story is too obvious, but credit to the cast and crew for doing their best to sell it.
• The titular murder scene is surprisingly bloody for this kind of fare.
• The marketing for these movies is very inconsistent: some seem to get full-length trailers and talk show appearances, while others (like this one) are confined to :30 trailers on Lifetime's Facebook page.

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This is the only one I could find.

MARVEL-LESS MARVISTA: Trapped Model (aka A Model Kidnapping) (2019)

Director: Damian Romay

Writer(s): Andrea Canning

Starring: Lucy Loken, Wes McGee, Katherine Diaz, and Jessica Galinas

Lucy Loken—perhaps Marvista’s most visually appealing actress—is back again! We last saw her in My Teacher, My Obsession (aka Dad Crush) where, as you may remember, she played the titular character who was obsessed with her teacher, and would stop at nothing to make him hers, with deadly consequences. Or you may just be getting it confused with one of the hundreds of other similarly-plotted movies that Lifetime seems to release every minute. It happens to the best of us.

Anyway, she was attractive as the bad girl in that one, but now she gains some experience playing a completely different role: a dumb, naive victim. Here, Ms. Loken plays Grace, a naïve teenaged girl who seems to be obsessed with the idea of becoming a model, even though she seems completely bored and unmotivated in the one photo shoot we see that opens the movie.

She’s so enamored with the idea that she can’t even commit to her boyfriend, who tells her he loves her, only to get coldly declined. Also declined is her mother, who wants her to go to college to make something of herself, rather than spend all day answering shady modeling ads on shady modeling websites. (Can you believe most of them want her to get naked, despite never mentioning that in the text?!) Then one day, she finds another opportunity that she can’t pass up: an all-expense paid gig! Paid room and board, paid travel…if she gets this one, then she’s hit the jackpot! (“This sounds too good to be true,” she explains out loud before eagerly submitting her resume.)

Mere minutes later, she gets a text saying she’s been the one chosen for the modeling gig. This doesn’t raise any red flags? She clearly was already apprehensive about the listing, but an immediate acceptance allays all of her fears instead of adding to them? Apparently so, because she sneaks out at night to go to her gig so that no one can stop her, leaving a note for her sleeping mom, and a text for her dumb boyfriend.

Do I have to keep going? Can’t you already see where this is headed? She is grabbed from the train station (another red flag…who uses trains these days?) by a woman named Nicole, who drives her to a luxurious mansion “in the middle of nowhere”, even though it’s clearly in a normal upscale neighborhood surrounded by tons of houses. This is where she meets a man named Hunter, who will be her photographer. But things don’t take long to take a turn for the weird, as she is fed a number of excuses when inquiring about the apartment she was promised in the ad, eventually being forced to settle for a room within Hunter’s own house for the evening. That wouldn't be so bad, if it weren't locked from the inside. Oh Grace, you dumb bitch.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to piece together the rest: she is held captive in the bedroom, which is filled with cameras, and forced to perform provocative numbers by the most understanding, patient psycho in movie history, who streams the feed to his thousands of followers. As her popularity grows—and as she pisses off Hunter more and more with her uncalculated, uncunning decisions—she is eventually forced to pose nude, which is about the maximum possible sentence for a character in a Lifetime movie.

Really, I don’t get the point of the movie because there’s very little in the way of threat: Poor Grace just doesn’t seem to realize that, as far as trafficked women go, she actually has it pretty well: the man never lays a hand on her, and rarely even raises his voice, nor does she have to do anything sexual (besides pose nude). Hell, Grace is even lucky enough to have this happen to her in a MarVista movie, which ensures that she doesn’t have to endure repeated rapes and beatings, and that her captor is actually attractive! C’mon Grace, can’t you see a silver lining when you're given one?

Speaking of Hunter, he sounds like quite the businessman, doesn’t he? Keeping a house full of women locked up in soundproof rooms with shatterproof windows, and forcing them to heed your every command—that is no doubt a pretty lucrative business. Except that he only keeps one girl at a time, and tends to...dispose of them after they outlive their usefulness. Oh, and he keeps his live-in girlfriend with him, too! Can’t see how this could possibly end up bad, especially when said girl, Nicole, is obviously jealous of Grace immediately—a feeling that only gets stronger when Hunter calls Nicole “Grace” as they are about to bang on a bathroom counter. Ouch. Maybe this guy isn’t so smart after all.

Thankfully for him, Grace is even stupider: So many times she does something that’s actually kind of smart—at least in terms of MarVista standards—only to completely squander it by making an absolutely stupid decision that suddenly puts her life at risk. For example, she talks him into taking her out shopping (what would poor Nicole say?) but then squanders it when she is caught trying to write “Help” on a fitting room mirror in her own blood. 

This movie works best in a way I don’t think it was designed to: as a kind of modern-day “Monkey’s Paw”. Here’s a girl who, in the only two scenes of character development that we get before she moronically responds to that fateful ad, tells her boyfriend she doesn’t love him, and tells her mom she’s going to become a model at any cost. Well, in one fell swoop, she gets exactly that thing she wants, immediately regrets it, and then we're just automatically supposed to feel sorry for her? Be careful what you wish for next time, Lucy...er, Grace! I’m sorry, I know victim blaming is so passe, but c'mon...there just has to be a “dumbness” line somewhere, where if you cross it, you basically deserve whatever happens to you, and Grace doesn't hesitate to jump over that line any chance she gets.

As with most of these Lifetime dramas, Trapped Model comes off as a cautionary tale only for elderly people who retweet and believe everything they see on Facebook, and who have five different accounts because they keep creating new profiles every time they forget the password for their previous one. For everyone else, it's just stupid enough to be a fairly entertaining waste of time...which I guess is a recommendation? I don't even know anymore.

STRAY OBSERVATIONS

• “I'm not wearing any makeup,” Grace says, attempting to get out of an impromptu photo shoot by Hunter, an unlikely story given the obvious coral eyeshadow she's sporting.
• Couldn't Hunter have pretended a little harder to find Grace a rental car?
• Going right up someone's driveway usually isn't a great way to sneak up on them.
• Whoa, this old boyfriend of hers sticks by her side after getting dumped in favor of a modeling scam? What a pussy.
• Another one of their "inspired by true events" stories, which essentially means they take the basic outline of a real-life case, and make it as dumb as they possibly can.

RATING: 5.5/10

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