All nudity is gratuitous, Roger Ebert often said. In House Of The Dead, Uwe Boll proves his point.
Point the camera at a dancing fool? She’ll flash you. Crank up a jam she likes? Off comes her top. Her seasick boyfriend just blew chunks on her blouse? Well, she can’t wear it and wash it at the same time now, can she? Guy she’s been dancing with all day would rather stay on the beach? No thank you. She’ll jump in the water wearing just a thong. She only jumps out when it’s suddenly unsafe. This isn’t a frothy teen romp, honey. Wake up.
House Of The Dead is a patchwork of recycled hackery, an unoriginal horror movie that doesn’t know how to shock or startle. Random titty shots aside, it only knows how to bore.
Two dumb storylines come crashing together here. First, there’s the lure. A bunch of twentysomethings are invited to the party of the summer. (Sadly, it’s not SummerSlam). The way this event is billed you’d think at the very least thousands of people would be in attendance, grooving and frolicking away on this isolated island in British Columbia.
Instead, it looks like maybe three dozen people are here bopping around in a small, designated space to undanceable techno courtesy of silent DJ Bif Naked (who did film an acting scene but it was excised). It inspires an unintentional laugh. This is supposed to be a heavily wooded area but it might as well be someone’s backyard.
While this rave is decidedly not raging, another small group of partiers are bummed the boat has left without them. This is what you get for being 15 minutes late. So, one of them attempts to bribe a couple of conspicuous smugglers to take them all to the island.
Clint Howard, who’s dressed like the heel from I Know What You Did Last Summer, plays the wildly inconsistent first mate Salish while Jurgen Prochnow is Captain Kirk. Yes, he’s heard all the bad jokes and no, he doesn’t like them. (Neither do I.) I think he’s supposed to be a Southerner but I don’t know any who say “reckon” with a thick Teutonic accent. Despite a long career of playing heavies, Prochnow is surprisingly unintimidating and stiff here, even when he suddenly brandishes that large knife out of annoyance. Whatever you do, don’t say Spock.
When first approached, Salish is cranky and unwilling to help. At first reluctant to take on horny ravers as passengers, that all changes when money is offered to the captain. Sweetening the deal is the sudden arrival of boat inspectors demanding to come onboard. Suddenly, a thousand bucks to play boat taxi sounds very appealing indeed although Kirk stupidly blurts out after the fact that the money wasn’t necessary. He would’ve taken them for free! Sure, dick.
Meanwhile, Salish dramatically goes from being hostile to paternal worrywart, going so far as to offer a crucifix necklace to one of the girls “for protection from evil spirits”, this after warning everybody about the bad mojo they’re about to experience on the Island of Death. Wrong subgenre cliche, pal. This isn’t a possession movie. It doesn’t matter anyway. She never wears it. The power of Christ does not compel her.
Upon arriving ashore, Salish privately pleads with Kirk that he doesn’t want to turn back without the kids. Does a thousand bucks really make you more compassionate? The Captain just wants to unload the goods they’ve been smuggling. Because ravers are always looking for black market grenades.
By the time they actually show up to the rave, the party’s over. And this gang is either in denial or completely clueless. But we know what’s happening, just like Salish and Kirk. The place is infested with the undead and they are insatiable. They manage to eliminate all but a handful who the stragglers eventually bump into during a brief moment of reprieve. A cameraman shows them what happened on his camcorder but his work is hopelessly shaky and sloppy. You can barely see anything. You feel nothing.
Eventually all the partiers learn the full backstory. A bald Spaniard from the 18th Century wanted to live forever and figured out a way to make it happen. It involves mutated blood and other people’s body parts. (We are sadly spared the flashback revelation of a eureka moment which might’ve been fun.)
Aesthetics be damned, he doesn’t seem to care that he looks like De Niro in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein dressed like The French Lieutenant’s Woman. Unless he brings hot babes back to life, what is exactly the point? Shouldn’t have hung yourself when you looked good, ya knob.
Now about 200 years old, it must be exhausting to be constantly hunting for new victims through his growing zombie army just to keep him going. Again, what is the point? One unfortunate face tonguing aside, he doesn’t exactly like to get down. He doesn’t need more time to catch up on his reading. He just doesn’t want to die. As a result, his isolated life seems so dreary and unfulfilling.
House Of The Dead is a colossal dud. At times, it wants to be The Matrix so bad even going so far as to mimic those slow motion bullet time effects during woefully uninspired fight sequences. Boll has a huge hard-on for that rotating camera shot that he uses as a showcase moment for every remaining babyface fighting for their lives which just adds to the pretentiousness.
How convenient that the late arriving partiers and the initial rave massacre survivors all have access to Kirk and Salish’s crates of automatic weapons which help them reduce the threat somewhat until they’re all out of ammo. How lucky that they all know how to aim and fire them perfectly with just split second instructions beforehand. And how miraculous that two of the women can summon the power of the martial arts when a gun is unavailable.
What’s really stupid is the opening scene which reveals in the film’s first minute who the sole survivor will be, the one who’s not going to turn into a monster. This deflates any potential for suspense and surprise. This character acts as an occasional narrator who quickly introduces the heroes right at the top and later openly mourns the murdered, including a couple of lovers. I didn’t care.
Based on the popular arcade game series from Sega (the “sponsor” of the doomed “gathering”), quick shots of The House Of The Dead, as it is called, are randomly inserted for no good reason multiple times throughout. It’s distracting while also reminding you that playing games is almost always more enjoyable than watching their misguided screen adaptations. Time has not been kind to the game’s less than stellar graphics.
“House Of The Dead isn’t Citizen Kane,” the film’s co-writer and executive producer declares in the DVD liner notes.
No shit.
Dennis Earl
Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Sunday, March 24, 2024
3:25 a.m.
Oppenheimer Squashes Barbie At 96th Oscars
The bomb obliterated the toy. The doll with the blonde hair might have made more money back in the summer but that didn’t mean anything to the motion picture academy.
The three-hour historical drama Oppenheimer was the big winner at the 96th annual Academy Awards taking home seven golden gongs in total including the big one. Although disheveled Best Picture presenter Al Pacino seemed a little loopy during his unnecessarily oddball appearance at the end of the night, at least he was given the right envelope and said the correct title, a genuine worry since the La La Land/Moonlight debacle of 2017. (Where was Warren Beatty?)
As expected, Christopher Nolan was named Best Director. He thanked his wife Emma Thomas for not only producing all his films but all of their children as well. Oppenheimer also won for its cinematography, its original score and for film editing.
“Proud Irishman” Cillian Murphy was named Best Actor who was the first winner to actually acknowledge his fellow nominees (“I’m in awe of you.”), a practice that used to be routine but was rarely employed this time for some reason. Noting how we’re all living in the world that his title character unfortunately created, he dedicated this prize “to the peacemakers everywhere”.
His co-star Robert Downey Jr. was easily the funniest recipient as he collected his golden naked man for Best Supporting Actor. Already making me laugh when he tapped his once coke-filled nose during host Jimmy Kimmel’s typically uneven monologue, he facetiously thanked his “terrible childhood” and even got a solid dig in at co-presenter Tim Robbins who had a Freudian slip while kissing up to nominee Robert De Niro during the presentation. (He said “Oscar-winning” instead of “Oscar-worthy” which was funny in its own right.) Downey thanked his second wife and dedicated his win to his kids.
Yes, instead of showcasing clips from their respective movies, the Oscars brought back the ass-kissing gimmick that Roger Ebert would’ve loved but for me instantly inspires ridicule, although the delightfully weird Nicolas Cage didn’t disappoint. I mean I was amazed none of the acting nominees were thanked for their extraordinary farts and courageous dumps. Retire the sucking up and bring back the clips.
It was a surprise to me that Emma Stone secured her second Oscar for her lead role in Poor Things but not for those who were paying much closer attention to industry insiders. Briefly overwhelmed and concerned about a possible wardrobe malfunction, she was gracious in thanking her family and her fellow cast and crew members, correctly noting it takes a team to make a movie. Besides Murphy, she was the only other winner to acknowledge her fellow nominees, even going so far as to “share” her prize with Lily Gladstone who didn’t get to make history herself. Hollywood must still be pissed at Sacheen Littlefeather.
Poor Things won three additional technical Oscars for its costumes, its make-up & hairstyling and for its production design, taking away two more possible gongs from Barbie.
Da’Vine Joy Randolph was named Best Supporting Actress, the only award handed to The Holdovers which lost Best Original Screenplay to the critically acclaimed Anatomy Of A Fall, its only trinket. “God is so good,” she exclaimed multiple times as she went on to thank her mom for convincing her to be more than a singer and give theatre a try. Gracious and emotional, she once “wanted to be different” but ultimately realized “I just needed to be myself.” She also thanked her publicist which led to a couple of other winners, including Downey, making tongue-in-cheek references to this moment during their own promos. (Downey thanked his stylist and the guy who tried to get him insured during his darker days.)
The Holocaust drama The Zone Of Interest was named Best International Feature and inspired the only direct acknowledgment of the ongoing genocide in Gaza as the film’s director actually mentioned the word “occupation” in his acceptance speech which was slightly undermined by him also seemingly knocking the resistance’s successful October 7 attack that caught an arrogant white supremacist army sleeping at the wheel. Both-sidesing a lopsided massacre just to make a point about dehumanization misses the point entirely. The film also won Best Sound over Oppenheimer.
The lone win for Barbie was for its hit song What Was I Made For?, the second songwriting Oscar for its creators, the whorephobic Billie Eilish and her brother Finneas O’Connell. They previously won for penning the Bond theme No Time To Die a couple of years ago.
Speaking of good nights for double winners, the Japanese anime legend Hayao Miyazaki, who wasn’t in attendance, received his second Best Animated Feature Oscar for The Boy And The Heron, 21 years after first winning for Spirited Away beating the likes of Elemental and Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse.
Cord Jefferson, the Best Adapted Screenplay winner for American Fiction, its only prize, made a good point about the “risk-averse” nature of Hollywood, how they’ll easily spend 200 million on a supposedly surefire smash (which lately hasn’t worked out so well) when they could make many more smaller budgeted films that would generate far more buzz and ultimately more profit. I don’t expect anyone to listen to him.
As for the broadcast itself, there were genuine moments of hilarity like Danny DeVito calling out Michael Keaton, his Batman Returns co-star, who responded with a perfectly stern deadpan; John Cena getting into an otherwise uneven argument with Kimmel over whether he should go through with a 50th Anniversary tribute to the infamous streaking incident and then slowly walking across the stage with a giant envelope across his crotch while humourously presenting Best Costume Design (not to mention him wearing a makeshift dress and then shaking hands with The Rock backstage); Steven Spielberg paying off a Kate MacKinnon joke about being sent “tasteful nudes” by simply nodding as well as selling a Kimmel reference to The Fabelmans with just a bemused look; and The Fall Guy co-stars Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt roasting each other and their respective movies over the whole Barbieheimer phenomenon.
I also enjoyed the fact that some presenters did two awards at once which greatly saved time. But what was with the In Memoriam segment? Because they never went to full screen, you had to strain your eyes to see some of the names. The camera was too far away, there were no close-ups at all. It was aggravating and insulting.
While it was wonderful that there will finally be a best casting director Oscar next year (MAY 5 CORRECTION: Actually, the award will be presented for the first time in 2026.), the best the academy could do for long suffering stuntmen was a clip package? Where’s their fucking Oscar category, you heartless assholes?
The complete list of winners:
BEST PICTURE – OPPENHEIMER
BEST DIRECTOR – Christopher Nolan (OPPENHEIMER)
BEST ACTRESS – Emma Stone (POOR THINGS)
BEST ACTOR – Cillian Murphy (OPPENHEIMER)
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS – Da’Vine Joy Randolph (THE HANGOVERS)
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR – Robert Downey Jr. (OPPENHEIMER)
BEST ANIMATED FEATURE – THE BOY AND THE HERON
BEST INTERNATIONAL FEATURE – THE ZONE OF INTEREST
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE – 20 DAYS IN MARIUPOL
BEST VISUAL EFFECTS – GODZILLA MINUS ONE
BEST SOUND – THE ZONE OF INTEREST
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE – OPPENHEIMER
BEST FILM EDITING – OPPENHEIMER
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY – OPPENHEIMER
BEST ORIGINAL SONG – What Was I Made For? (BARBIE)
BEST COSTUME DESIGN – POOR THINGS
BEST MAKE-UP & HAIRSTYLING – POOR THINGS
BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN – POOR THINGS
BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY – ANATOMY OF A FALL
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY – AMERICAN FICTION
BEST ANIMATED SHORT – WAR IS OVER! INSPIRED BY THE MUSIC OF JOHN & YOKO
BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT – THE WONDERFUL STORY OF HENRY SUGAR
BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT – THE LAST REPAIR SHOP
Dennis Earl
Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Monday, March 11, 2024
4:05 a.m.