55 years ago, Gene Roddenberry, the creator of "Star Trek" wrote the screenplay for an MGM sexploitation comedy/mystery. Roddenberry may have been out of work, but I would have never guessed he wrote this taboo breaking, goofy, sexy comedy. PRETTY MAIDS ALL IN A ROW stars Rock Hudson (a long way from Doris Day and "Pillow Talk" here) as high school football coach Tiger. Whenever Tiger turns on that red neon TESTING sign above his locked door, he's supposed to be testing students. But he's actually bedding an endless line up of high school girls, played by a bevy of gorgeous, obviously-of-age young women. Student body indeed. Very much of its time in the early 70's, the nudity is frequent and anything but shy. Playboy famously did an article (with lots of photos) entitled "Roger Vadim's Pretty Maids." Vadim directed the film as his follow up to the 1968 sex farce "Barbarella", a huge hit starring his then wife, Jane Fonda. By 1971, he and Fonda were separated and his mistress recommended Hudson for the role. The gorgeous students of Oceanfront High put student Ponce de Leon Harper, played by an actor with an equally long name in his film debut, John David Carson, into a stupor. He's too shy to get laid, and has a hard time standing up to go to the blackboard due to his constant state of high alert. When he escapes to the boys bathroom, he finds a recently murdered young woman, much to the concern of Principal, fussily played by Roddy McDowell. Detective Surcher, a fan of Tiger's football team arrives on scene, played by Telly Savalas with all the wit of his famous TV detective Kojak, without the lollipop. Savalas has a very unique way of holding a cigarette that I first noticed when he played Blofeld in OO7's "Oh Her Majesty's Secret Service". He's got the same approach here, which made me laugh in its eccentricity. In many of his scenes, the way he held his cigarette is the most interesting thing happening on screen. Local yokel Sheriff Poldaski (Keenan Wynn) is the most inept lawman since Barney Fife and Savalas just keeps sending him outside to direct traffic. Tiger is committed to getting substitute teacher Miss Smith, played by Angie Dickenson (Dressed to Kill) to teach Ponce the ways of the bedroom. Any subject of the being a bad idea is never addressed. What planet did Roddenberry set thing thing in? The film becomes a loop of Tiger banging a hot student, Ponce fumbling his way to fourth base and gorgeous students turning up as hot corpses all over campus. Hudson seems to be having a very good time embracing the groovy early 70's as the coach with unrelenting libido and an endless stable of repeat partners. James Doohan (Scotty from Star Trek) even shows up as Surcher's loyal law sidekick. Modern audiences are likely going to really struggle with the free love and sexuality of 1971. Vadim didn't care then and he wouldn't care now, he always wanted to bust through what he thought of as American's puritanical attitudes toward sex. There is very little mystery around who the killer is, I'm not even sure that Roddenberry was trying to hide it. This is the only screenplay he ever wrote. Based on this one, its fairly easy to see why. Joe Namath was originally considered for the role of Tiger, that would have been great casting! Just when you think It cant get any stranger, The Osmonds start singing the main title and return for the end title Theme Song. I can only assume that Mom and Dad Osmond did not see this movie or the script in advance. Those boys would not have been singing a note. As a bizarre, one-off relic from Roddenberry, its fascinating. As a movie, it's too goofy to be anything but a throwaway. All those Pretty Maids notwithstanding, it gets a D. Or a double D....but I digress....

While it might not hit the highs of his "The Haunting of Hill House" or "The Fall of the House of Usher", Mike Flanagan's THE MIDNIGHT CLUB still delivers occasional thrills & chills. Spread over ten episodes (probably two or three too many from a story telling standpoint) the story structure is clever. We meet Ilonka (Iman Benson) just as she's about to enter college. After receiving a terminal cancer diagnosis, she instead travels to Brightcliffe, a strange and mystery laden hospice for teens. The collection of young patients in Brightcliffe covers a wide range. This isn't the Breakfast Club, and that's a great thing for us, the viewer. As always, Flanagan casts a stellar bunch of newcomers, as well as reliable members of his acting troupe that appear in many of his superb horror miniseries on Netflix. (If you haven't seen "Midnight Mass" drop everything and go watch it. NOW!) Ruth Codd (so memorable in "House of Usher") plays Anya, a fiery, in-your-face patient who has zero tolerance for sympathy or false hope. Codd breathes incredible fire into Anya. This was Codd's first acting role and she kills it. As in the memorable series, "Lost" each character is embellished by flashbacks, but smartly here, they are also informed by the stories they take turns telling to each other, every night at Midnight in the fireplace lit library, hence the title. The stories are pure fiction, but they reveal a lot about each narrator. Flanagan is in fine form telling most of these fiction stories as tales within the tale. Some are funny, some are clever and some are packed with scares. Igby Rigney ( Midnight Mass) is very good as Kevin, Chris Sumpter shines as Spencer and Sauriyan Sapkota delivers as Amesh. Each week tends to spotlight a character and their tales of fiction and some were far superior to others. When they don't work, things slow down and its the ONLY Flanagan series that I grew a bit tired of in its cushy middle section. I'm spoiled by his hard driving narrative that kept me glued to my screen for hours in "The Haunting of Bly Manor" and the previously mentioned "Hill House" and "Midnight Mass". Those series were so fast, so compelling, so incredibly involving that you couldn't walk away. This one took me over two months to finish and I began to question if I would. It is the only series so far that Flanagan has adapted from a modern, YA series of novels, by Christopher Pike. Haven't read it, don't plan to, but I can only assume that the core story was less inspiring to the writer/director than the brilliant works of Shirley Jackson on "Hill House" and Poe for "Usher". There are bright spots. They include Zach Gilford as Mark, one of the med caretakers at Brightcliffe, whose relationship with the patients is special. Some of the trips down that forgotten elevator to the basement are classic Flanagan, with taut suspense and horrors just out of reach of every flashlight. But nothing here matches the storytelling propulsion of his other series. The entire subplot with Samantha Sloyan as Shasta, Brightcliff's neighbor, could be dropped without consequence and would only help the flow. Even when that part of the tale reaches its big climax, its thrown away so fast it's of zero consequence to anyone at the manor. Sloyan was fantastic as Bev Keane in "Midnight Mass", it is one of the most compelling performances of the past decade. But she's given little to do here but collect herbs and mushrooms. Nightmare on Elm Street fans will also like seeing Heather Langenkamp who played young Nancy Thompson, Freddy Krueger's main target in the original 1984 hit. She was a horrifically bad actress in that role. More than 40 years have passed....and some things remain constant.... Overall, the whole thing just goes on way too long before wrapping up with a sweet bow on its final episode. Even lesser Flanagan is better than plenty of other options, so I'll just drop THE MIDNIGHT CLUB a C and move onto every other brilliant series that Flanagan has created for Netflix, all of which are world class. Skip this one and dive into one of the others now. You won't be disappointed. MASS first, HILL HOUSE second, USHER third, BLY MANOR fourth. All superb.

Have you ever watched an "Airport" movie and wished the cast would get eaten by sharks? Your dream just came true with DEEP WATER, a disaster movie hybrid with some bloody great action but waterlogged special effects. The cast of characters is straight out of a 1970's Airport sequel. Aaron Eckhart (The Dark Knight) is Ben, the committed First Officer trying to get one last round-trip done so he can get home to his wife and ill son. Ben Kingsley (Gandhi, Schindler's List) plays Rich, the fun loving Captain of the flight who's the relaxed commander to Ben's by-the-book co-pilot. We meet Chinese and American sports teams all boarding the flight from LA to Shanghai, along with an American businessman who is so obnoxious and rude he actually takes the plane down. You'll see how. Angus Sampson (Mad Max:Fury Road) plays Dan, the ugly American with such disgusting vigor that you spend the entire film hoping he gets eaten. For a film that's half air disaster and half shark movie, the air bound half is far superior. We've seen various plane crashes on film, from the emergency landings in the Airport films to the incredible third-person view in "Knowing", one of Nicholas Cage's best films. Kudos to Director Renny Harlin being incredibly well positioned to make this movie. "Die Hard 2" showed us he knows his way around an airport and crashing jumbo jets. His "Deep Blue Sea" is a brutally fun Jaws take off with leaping sharks that take down people at any moment. Harlin and team create a unique air crisis, as a fire starts in the luggage hold and explodes outward, creating so many flying metal projectiles that the inside of the cabin looks like the Normandy beaches. A long sequence from when the fire starts until the aircraft touches the sea is Harlin at his best. Eckhart and Kingsley are exactly who you want at the helm, a couple enrolling in the Mile High Club have a hell of a journey and explosions reign everywhere you look. The effects budget was wholly spent here because it looks great and keeps you on the edge of your seat. The plane breaks up, cleverly separating the survivors into different locations across the debris field. It's as if the filmmakers wanted to have one group in an "Airport 77" scenario, with the plane stuck on a coral reef with air at the top of the fuselage, and another group floating in the front section with the cockpit, just so they had to get to each other at some point. Sharks show up. And this is where the film really fell off that coral reef for me. The effects are second rate CGI and don't serve up anything new. Harlin's last shark flick, way back in 1999, "Deep Blue Sea" was a ground breaker and my favorite shark movie of the era after Jaws 1 and 2. His sharks were lethal, they came out of the water like Shamu and ate any one of the above-the-title stars at any moment. It was funny, fast and furious. This time out, the sharks are a bit more predictable and have less bite. Lots of limbs get torn off in R rated gore, but predictably so. The biggest surprise in this half was Harlin's ability to get me to invest in young Cora, the daughter of that amorous couple in the lav. Molly Belle Wright is the third best actor in the flick behind Eckhart and Kingsley. Never boring, the second half just alternates between different groups of survivors and their plight. It gets a bit mired down in shouting matches between passengers that reminded me of Ernest Borgnine's constant shouting in "The Poseidon Adventure". Harlin also manages to throw in the dumbest helicopter rescue scene since Bruce the Shark took down the helicopter in "Jaws 2". The final ten minutes also seems to jump forward through a major potential sequence. Budget crunch? Gene Simmons from Kiss is one of the producers and this isn't the first time he's bankrolled a Harlin movie. Anyone remember Andrew Dice Clay's movie debut in 1990's "The Adventures of Ford Fairlane"? Woof. I have a bad feeling SImmons may go 0 for 2 with this second pairing. As a airline disaster flick, its pretty good. As a shark movie, from Harlin, it's disappointing. In a pitch room, this must have sounded fun. On the big screen, its bloody meh. DEEP WATER offers only shallow thrills and only thanks to that plane crash, manages a C-.

Twenty years after the original, THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 struts onto the runway dripping big laughs, stunning locations, prime Meryl Streep and plenty of surprises. As we're dropped back into present day Manhattan, Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) has carved out a two decade career as a journalist. Just as she's winning an award for an expose, her entire team is fired and the publication they work for is shuttered. Print and Magazines are dead (yep!) and that's not good for Miranda Priestly (Streep) either. She's battling HR complaints AND dwindling numbers alongside loyal sidekick Nigel (Stanley Tucci). Streep has never been better, more snarky or lethal, it's a hell of a lot of fun to watch, especially as her assistant Amari (Simone Ashley from "Broadchurch") calls her out every sixty seconds in meetings on words, terms or comments she can't say in today's snowflake workforce. After a glowing article in Miranda's magazine "Runway" turns out to glorify a company mired in overseas sweatshops, her stock is at an all time low. The owner of the conglomerate of which Runway is but a small piece, Irv Ravitz (Tibor Feldman) and his son played by BJ Novak from "The Office", decide drastic measures are needed. They hire Andy to be the Features Editor of Runway, setting up a lot of twists, turns and laughs. Novak is terrific as a new generation of businessman more concerned with numbers than legacy. The dynamic between Miranda and Andy is perfectly executed by Steep and Hathaway. Miranda spends the first half of the movie insisting she has no idea who Andy is. Emily Blunt delivers big laughs as Emily, another former Miranda assistant who now runs design for Dior's new showroom in NYC. Blunt drops one liner after one liner, barbs that land even more sharply with that accent. Sequels can be hit and miss and they always need to justify their right to exist. The best of them actually build on the characters. I was surprised just how well this one does exactly that. Loyalty and ambition make strange bedfellows, but it's the partners of our leads that bring new nuance to the leads. Kenneth Branagh (Dead Again, Murder on the Orient Express) is excellent as Miranda's husband Stuart, her fourth spouse. Watching two pros like Streep and Branagh interact improves any movie around it. Only after the film did I realize how great Streep is in those scenes. Her persona at home with Stuart is wholly another character. Streep makes it look easy. Patrick Brammall (Evil) plays Peter, the Australian architect behind the new NYC apartment building that Andy is dragged to by her friend Lily, well played by the returning and always reliable Tracie Thoms (Rent, Death Proof). Andy and Peter's meeting delivers laughs, but the path of their relationship provides an interesting subplot here. Always believable. But come on, fans of the first film are here to see Miranda, Nigel and Andy jet set to Milan and every fashion house in Manhattan. The settings, especially Lake Como, Milan and The Hamptons are drop dead beautiful and well shot by Florian Ballhaus. Layered with Theodore Shapiro's score and the right selection of songs, the film moves quickly and stylishly through the story. The back half of the film dives into a lot of corporate intrigue as Billionaire tech boy Benji Barnes enters the picture. Justin Theroux (American Psycho, The Girl on the Train) plays Barnes as an absolute idiot savant, with a heavy lean on the idiot. Secrets and mysteries and surprise major star appearances abound and I won't divulge any of them here. They made me laugh out loud many times and one for that Milan Fashion Show is a jaw dropper. Director David Frankel (Band of Brothers) and screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna are back from the original, providing a sure hand for these characters in 2026. THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 is going to be a huge hit, based on the sold out audience at last night's early showing and early reviews. It's one thing to pack a theater, its another to over deliver on a much anticipated sequel. Crowd pleasing might be an understatement. It's a runway packed with laughs that gets an A. Who needs a Marvel movie to open the summer movie season? Turns out, no one.

MUNICH is brilliant. It's no revelation that Steven Spielberg has made a lot of great movies that we all know and love. This is one of my favorite Spielberg films, and it's also one of his lesser known. Through incredible recreations and stellar casting, MUNICH opens with the Black September terrorists infiltrating the Olympic Village in 1972, holding the Israeli athletes hostage and killing them as the world watches. Spielberg deftly weaves actual news footage into his recreations, blurring the lines and immersing you in the terrorist attack. In response, Golda Meir (Lynn Cohen) and the Mossad hire a lesser known but devoted operative named Avner (Eric Bana) to assemble a team of five to hunt down and kill those responsible. Avner's team is an eclectic bunch. A pre-James Bond era Daniel Craig is Steve, the most emotional and hair-triggered of the bunch. Ciaran Hinds (Midwinter Break) is the business like Carl, the oldest of the gang with deep passions beneath his calm, business-man exterior. Mathieu Kassovitz is Robert, a toy maker turned bomb-maker and Hanns Zischler is Hans. All expendable, invisible low-level operatives, they become an efficient killing machine under Avner's leadership. But at what cost? The son of a well known war hero, Avner wrestles with his family legacy, as well as his guilt and concern over the pregnant wife he leaves behind for the mission. Spielberg is a master at creating action set pieces and he's at his best here, with each target of our team's vengeance providing a different scenario for their assassination and a unique set of challenges for the team and Spielberg to build suspense. Like a cross between the best of Hitchcock's political thrillers and early seventies classics like "The Day of The Jackal" or "The Odessa File", MUNICH is a terrific film. Bana is excellent, dealing with the intricacies of their plans while doubts about their methods and his moral compass begin to cloud his drive. Craig and Hinds are fantastic, providing the ying and yang of patriotic duty and business-like neutrality. The team of five grows into a family-like unit, making the loss of their members even more powerful when they unfold. Two-thirds of the way through the film and well into their mission, Avner meets a wealthy father and son team that deals in information. For the right price, they will tell you where anyone is at anytime. They have NO political loyalties and refuse to work with governments. The brilliance of this portion of the film is in its sudden shift in tone. Avner has been working with the son Louis (Mathieu Amalric) for months when a murder goes wrong and Louis' father suspects that Avner is working for a government. Avner is brought to their family estate to meet Papa, (Michael Lonsdale in a brilliant performance that lifts the entire film) the bond they form challenges everything Avner thinks he knows. John Williams provides a haunting music score, continuing his long partnership with Spielberg. The screenplay is fantastic, with playwright Tony Kushner (Angels in America) and Eric Roth (Forrest Gump) weaving a true story with fictional elements, creating characters you care about and placing them in a ticking bomb of suspense that keeps you wound tightly for just short of three fast hours. After their partnership in this movie, Spielberg abd Kushner worked together again on "Lincoln", their underrated "West Side Story" and "The Fabelmans". All four films received Oscar nominations for both men. Complicated, intelligent and suspenseful, MUNICH is one of Spielberg's best and gets an A+. It also earns a spot in my ALL-TIME TOP 100 FILMS. If you haven't seen it, I envy you experiencing it for the first time. "The race is not for the swift, nor the battle for the strong, But time and chance happens to them all. Fate's hand falls suddenly, who can say when it falls?"

Anytime I see "Authentic Paranormal Tales" in a film's description, I raise an eyebrow. Am I going to sit through 2 hours of Ghost Hunters where every shadow, pipe creak and cold spot is a tunnel to Hell? No thanks. I was drawn to Netflix's Documentary series TRUE HAUNTING due to its pedigree. Executive Producer James Wan has been behind some of my favorite horror of the past decade, including (as a Producer) Lee Cronin's The Mummy and The Conjuring films. OK, you've got my attention. Maybe it's the five episode format, but the scares never reach much of a pitch in the two "true-life" hauntings that are depicted here. The first three episodes are called "Eerie Hall" and are devoted to a college runner whose dorm room seems to house a very evil roommate. It's 1984 and Freshman Chris de Cesare is barely unpacked when he starts hearing voices and feeling an evil presence in his room. Toga parties be damned, this thing even follows him into the shower. Nothing worse than a ghost perv. But he also feels it when he's running. And BOY, does he run. A lot. Over and over. Over the hills and through the woods. Again and again. Note to self. Running isn't scary, no matter how much spooky music you layer over it. The three episodes wander through that experience and feature an amateur cast portraying the real-life subjects. The only creepy feelings are the ensuing dread that you've been sucked into one of those third rate "Dateline" knockoffs where really bad actors reenact the "actual happenings". At one point, perhaps knowing that viewers might be questioning sticking with this dreck, Wan even inserts budget rate actors as Lorraine and Ed Warren from "The Conjuring" films. Oye. It smells and tastes desperate. By the time Chris's Dad ends up sleeping in his dorm room and feeling like there's something in that very dark closet, I'm not sure if I was anxious or just anxious for it to be over. The last two episodes are better, (not a Herculean hurdle) even though you've seen the story a million times before. A young family moves into a beautiful Victorian house that's way too cheap, from a realtor all to anxious to sell it. ( Smells like Amityville around here.....) "The House that Murdered Me" at least conjures up some scares, but virtually nothing you haven't seen before. Bumps in the night? Check. An ancient history of death and abuse in the house? Check. Flashbacks to an old time with folks holding candles hiding from someone? Check. The most interesting, I hesitate to say "Best" part of the series is the fact that we see new filmed interviews with the actual people depicted in the chapters. When it works, it works. A few seem genuinely haunted to this day. This landed on Netflix right before Halloween in 2025. I imagine it found a receptive audience looking for new horror content. However, if you're looking for entertaining or scary horror, you wont find any here, just a bargain basement, meandering tale that feels way cheaper and longer than it is. The scariest thing would be if there was actually a second season of this watered down, third rate Poltergeist. Hey, everything can't be a winner. We'll chalk this up as a rare James Wan miss and move on to the real scares. This goofy, unscary schlock gets a D.

MICHAEL absolutely floored me, blowing away my expectations with at least three historical recreations that soared in Dolby Cinema. It's an absolute thriller. Ignore the naysayers that approached the film with their own agenda, mostly social media warriors that didn't see their own issues addressed. The film takes place from Michael's early years to the kickoff of his BAD Tour in London, before any accusations began surfacing. I'm watching the film as a lifelong fan of MJ's and someone who was in their early 20's when the Thriller album hit stores. The impact of that album on the cultural zeitgeist is hard to comprehend if you weren't there at the time. It was brilliant, fresh and jaw dropping. But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, The Magnificent Seven) crafts an unflinching look at the 1960's childhood of young Michael, his brothers and their abusive, power hungry father Joe Jackson. Colman Domingo (The Color Purple, Selma) is relentless as Joe. Some of the scenes of his beating of Michael are very hard to watch. Young Juliano Valdi is excellent as the Michael we all first remember, the youngest and most obvious superstar of the Jackson 5. Nia Long (The Best Man, Stigmata) is very good as Katherine Jackson, who's always there for the boys, but stands by to watch Joseph's abuse, a decision she comes to regret. The film's first musical stunner is a montage that recreates the Jackson 5's initial club and fair appearances, followed by an appearance with Gladys Knight (Liv Symone) that gets the attention of Motown. When the boys head to Motown to record for legend Berry Gordy (Larenz Tate), his coaching of Michael and emotion as he hears young Michael sing "Who's Lovin' You" is powerful. Valdi and Tate's moments on screen together are the first spark of magic in a well cast film that's full of them. We soon jump forward to Michael (Jafaar Jackson) ready to cut his own record deal with Sony and write his first solo album. From this point forward, the film takes off with behind-the-scenes history I didn't know and historical events that I remember well. All are lovingly re-created via a great production team and the startling performance of Jafaar as Michael. After seeing the trailers, I approached the film thinking, "well he doesn't really look like Michael, I guess I'll roll with it...." Jafaar absolutely blows the doors off the joint. He is, in real life, Jermaine Jackson's son and Michael's nephew. DNA is an amazing and magical thing. There are moments as the film went on that Jafaar's resemblance in looks, voice and movement are so spooky that he seems to be channeling his uncle. I'd be shocked and disappointed if Jackson isn't nominated for his performance. It is chill inducing, especially in his recreations of the most famous moments and songs of Michael's career. The entire "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough" sequence is fantastic, down to the Tower Records appearance on Sunset and his creating of the song behind the scenes. The dynamic between his disgusting, power hungry father and Michael's caring personality creates dramatic tension throughout. The moments we all remember are here. The large section of the film dealing with Michael's second album, Thriller, is fantastic. Kendrick Sampson is very good as Quincy Jones, MJ's second mentor after Gordy that truly guided some of the best selling albums of all time, to this day. Miles Teller (Top Gun: Maverick, The Offer) is very good as John Branca, Michael's handpicked lawyer on the Sony/Epic team that never left Michael's side and was MJ's backbone against Joe until Michael found the time to break loose. When he does, its a great moment of the film. KeiLyn Durrel Jones (Succession) is a standout as Bill Bray, the driver and bodyguard Joe hires to watch over Michael. The arc of that relationship is a powerful one to watch and Jones is excellent in the role. Mike Myers is almost unrecognizable, sincere and hilarious as CBS/Epic President Walter Yetnikoff. He and Michael changed the music landscape when they convinced MTV to show Michael's videos, the very rare black artist at the time to achieve that. They changed the world overnight. I remember all my friends at that time making sure they were home or having our VCR's (a brand new device at that time!) set to record the premier of Michael's "Thriller" short film on MTV when it premiered. The entire country came to a halt to watch, re-watch and love that video. The film re-creates it stunningly here, down to amazing lookalikes for Michael's girlfriend in the video, Director John Landis and the historic dancing of Zombie MJ and those ghouls. My favorite moments of the film include the behind-the-scenes sequence around Michael with rival LA gang members developing the music video for "Beat It". The Dolby Cinema mix, Jafaar Jackson's exacting replication of Michael's creative process, dance moves and attitude gave me chills. The film then ups the ante with an uncanny recreation of Michael's live performance of "Billie Jean" at the 1983 Motown 25 celebration. If you were alive in '83, you remember that creative firestorm as Michael moonwalked for the first time, creating a sensation that changed the music world and elevated his global presence. We're dropped into Dodger Stadium for the final night of the Jackson's tour in a special effects wow that equals the Freddie Mercury Live Aid performance recreation in the 2018 Queen biopic "Bohemian Rhapsody". Graham King produced both films, impressively. He's joined as Producer by the real life John Branca and much of the Jackson family. Then, in the films final moments, we are transported direct from Dodger Stadium and that incredible live performance to Michael's opening night in London on the "Bad" Tour. The sound and visuals of the entire sequence deliver, recreating the moment with thundering bass, kinetic movement and the absolute perspective of a front row seat across the pond. I got chills again. Jafaar Jackson is an incredible find and brilliant casting. He brings Michael back to life in a powerful tribute to his uncle, recreating the moments that made him one of the biggest music forces of the past 50 years. After two hours of flawless Dolby Cinema visuals and sound, I feel like I was there again. Talk about taking you back. MICHAEL is a THRILLER of the highest order, a box office record breaker and gets an A+. See it in the best sound format you can find, you won't be disappointed. Unless your a social justice warrior, then there's nothing to see here.

They don't make them like this anymore. Thank the film gods. Stately, dull and a complete waste of Bisset & Bergen, RICH AND FAMOUS is a 1981 melodrama that manages to even make sex boring. Director George Cukor (My Fair Lady, The Philadelphia Story, Gaslight) turned out his fair share of film classics in the 40's and 50's, but this was his last, tired film. It's gasping on fumes as it reaches out to a past era of two hankie melodramas. Jacqueline Bisset (Bullitt, Airport) more than does her part as famous novelist Liz Hamilton. Her hugely successful novel was an important, artistic novel and she's struggling like hell to write her next one. Her friend since college, Merry Noel Blake (Bergen) is the opposite of artistic. She's loud, flamboyant, proudly Southern and newly Rich. Bergen struggles in the part, often mistaking loud and over-the-top with character building. But in all fairness, she's playing a proud woman of the south (with an accent that seems to vary in intensity) named Merry Noel. That doesn't leave much room for nuance. Gerald Ayres screenplay, adapted from a play by John Van Druten, plays like a two actress stage play, no matter how much he jet sets the settings and moves from penthouse to beach house in a style that drips TV's "Dynasty" and "Dallas". David Selby isn't very good as Merry Noel's husband Doug, who seems to flit from bar to bar and secretly long for Liz, who is everything Merry isn't. I really liked Selby on "Dark Shadows" as a kid, but wow his acting is.....bad. He damn near sunk "Raise the Titanic" by himself and he struggles here. It's awkward. When Merry Noel decides to write a great Southern novel, loaded with gossip and trashy melodrama, it becomes a HUGE hit and her fame skyrockets. This should create tension between Liz's artsy writer's block and Merry Noel's schlock, but honestly it just bores. Every time Cukor feels like the film is slowing down, he throws in a fairly graphic sex scene between Bisset and a parade of men that come her way. He makes a serious casting mistake in casting the most important two with actors that look so much alike, its confusing. Or at least it would be if I really was that drawn into the story. Hart Bochner (Die Hard) plays a Rolling Stone reporter who falls in love with Liz while a young NYC gigolo, played by Matt Lattanzi (Grease 2, Xanadu) chases her all over Manhattan, but mostly to her suite at the Algonquin. It's all goofy, takes itself way too seriously and goes on forever. Meg Ryan is good in her film debut as Merry Noel's 18 year old daughter Debby, who shows far more intelligence and good judgement than her mother. When the best scene in the film is Liz's Mile High Club adventure on a 747, it says a lot about the rest of the movie. The film jaunts across time with chapters in 1959, 1969, 1975 and 1981. The only thing it proves is that boring plays the same in any decade. The cocktail parties in the film are kind of fun and at least give you the chance to play "spot the famous author or director" with folks like Ray Bradbury and Roger Vadim wondering in and out in search of champagne. Dick Cavett and Merv Griffin actually show up to host Merry Noel on their respective talk shows of the day. I feel like Bergen got punked by Academy Award winning Costume Designer Theoni V. Aldredge (The Great Gatsby). Her outfits are laugh out loud funny. I was waiting for her to bust out the Carol Burnett/Scarlett O'Hara drapes at one point. With nearly a $12M budget and a $15M gross at the box office, audience of the day were pretty indifferent and it's easy to see why. This feels like the kind of film MGM would have made three decades early, sans the nudity and sex of course. There are slick films of this era that are absolute trash that are guilty pleasures. "The Other Side of Midnight" and "The Betsy" come to mind, both based on books by novelist Harold Robbins. His books were all sexy, trashy fun and never claimed to be anything more. Those two films had the same attitude. RICH AND FAMOUS seems to be reaching for something more important. Alas, it never climbs out of its own dull limitations, settling for a C-. Bisset was my first crush as Gwen the Stewardess in 1970's "Airport". Out of allegiance to her status in that regard, I'll resist giving this film she produced a D. But only cause I'll never forget Gwen and my mad crush on her on the big screen 11 years before this dud.

GOOD BOY turns out to be a one-trick puppy, but moments of the trick are undeniably entertaining. The definition of a low-budget horror entry, Writer/Director Ben Leonberg shot the film over 400+ days, capturing natural moments of his own dog Indy on film. And damned if Indy isn't great as the center of the tale. I can't imagine the patience it took to film the puppy for that many months to get the exact right expression/whimper or bark, but Leonberg and Indy nail all the key moments. We meet Todd (Shane Jensen) but only from Indy's viewpoint, mostly from the neck down, with faces of all the characters mostly in shadows until the finale. Todd is just out of rehab. His caring but annoying sister Vera (Arielle Friedman) has found him almost comatose, his nose dripping blood as Indy hovers nearby, whimpering. Todd inexplicably decides that the best place to go when he gets out of rehab is to their late Grandpa's haunted/cursed cabin. At least that's how Vera describes it. Indy agrees with her. He doesn't want to enter the Cabin in the Woods and almost immediately, the camera follows him as he crouches down by dark spaces just past the reach of the ambient light. Indy is especially fond of a room in the attic, where he'll sit and stare at nothing for long stretches of time. Leonberg gets several things in his film very right. He pays off our patience. How many times have you watched a low budget horror feature that's all tension and no payoff? He definitely lets those spirits and creepy beings come out of the shadows, selectively. From my perspective, just the right amount. As the bumps in the night, apparitions of another dog in the house and quiet barks and voices elevate their frequency, the film falls into a bit of a repetitive loop, serving up the same basic sequence over and over with slight variations. What happened to Grandpa? What's up with that neighbor? I liked the way that Todd's discovery of Grandpa's many, many VHS tapes set up an even bigger part of the mystery, but if feels like there was a lot more tension to be built out of watching snippets of those VHS tapes, peeling back the mystery. "Lee Cronin's The Mummy" recently served up exactly how to deal with a terrifying old VHS that holds horrific secrets. That feels very fumbled here. At just 72 minutes long, there was time to tell that part of the story, but you have to also credit Leonberg with making the absolute most of his $70,000 budget. That's the catering budget for a week on many Hollywood productions. Indy is fantastic. That dog expresses more hesitation, curiosity, terror and bravery than plenty of his human counterparts. Leonberg's cinematography is pretty damn good too. Once I got over thinking about how Muppet Babies only shows adults from the neck up too....... The fact that GOOD BOY made over $8 million on that budget should tee up Leonberg for something much grander next time out. Based on this mildly scary appetizer, the horror entree should be pretty tasty. He has said that the thematic inspiration for this film was "Poltergeist" and the way the dog in that film sensed the spirits long before the Freelings had a clue. I get it. This is no "Poltergeist" but it's no dog either. I'll give it a C+, with panting anticipation of what Leonberg does next. If you are a dog lover, bump that up to a B-.

Any NFL fan will be hard pressed to not enjoy DRAFT DAY on some level. Your enthusiasm will vary wildly based on your forgiveness for how badly the film fumbles the ball when it gets off the field. Kevin Costner stars as fictional Cleveland Browns general manager Sonny Weaver. He has just lost his legendary father/previous Browns GM after firing him the year before. Sonny is facing a draft day that will shape his team and his career as he is truly at the controls for the first time. Denis Leary is excellent as Browns Coach Penn, whose style is the opposite of Sonny's. Leary brings his usual humor and attitude to the role, man how I miss "Rescue Me". Frank Langella is owner Anthony Molina, who challenges Sonny to make a splash on draft day but has no idea how seriously Sonny will take that advice. Trading to the #1 pick in the draft, Sonny must decide between a picture perfect QB who may or may not be hiding something and Sonny's personal favorite Vontae Mack, whose passion for the game and the draft is over the top. Vontae is played by Chadwick Boseman and he is terrific, completing an amazing year of film roles that included playing James Brown in "Get On Up" and Jackie Robinson in "42". As long as the film stays in the boardroom, on the field or at Radio City Music Hall for draft day, it's a lot of fun. When it strays into Sonny's personal life it fumbles badly into predictable and maudlin territory. It manages to correct itself in the final quarter, scoring some unexpected twists and turns that manage to make drafting players look pretty damn exciting. The fourth quarter elevates everything that came before it, just like on the gridiron. Costner is reliably good as Sonny, Jennifer Garner is ok as his love interest Ali, but she and Costner have zero chemistry in the huddle. Ellen Burstyn is terrific as Sonny's hard-wired Mom. Look for Sean Combs as an agent and plenty of ESPN reporters and NFL players as themselves. Director Ivan Reitman knows how to create a compelling, witty film. With everything from "Ghostbusters", "Heavy Metal" and "Stripes" on his resume, this would prove to be his final film before his death in 2022. DRAFT DAY is predictable but fun for football fans and (as long as it's focused on football) a well made diversion, especially on Draft weekend! The real life Cleveland Browns will wish yet again tonight that they had Sonny Weaver at the helm! We'll give it a game day B-.

Bob Odenkirk is the new Liam Neeson. Didn't see that one coming. NORMAL is another hugely entertaining action thriller and a great follow up to Odenkirk's "Nobody" flicks. In those films, he played a former agent who's just trying to retire. This time out, he's Ulysses Richardson, a good lawman who's found quiet respite as a fill in sheriff in a very small, very cold Minnesota town that might remind you of a little place called Fargo. The townspeople certainly are the same kind of folk. Quick with a warm smile and a wave, the town seems to be hugely prosperous under the guidance of Mayor Kibner, played by a foul mouthed, very confident Henry Winkler. He's terrific, playing against type and owning it. Ulysses narrates the film via long messages he's leaving for his estranged wife. Something in his law enforcement past is haunting him, leaving him restless in the local fleabag motel. His deputy Mike Nelson is an absolute idiot, hilariously played by Billy MacLellan (Nobody). A people pleaser of the highest order, some of his interactions with the feuding citizenry left me laughing loudly, especially watching Odenkirk react to them. An almost unrecognizably frumpy Lena Headley (Game of Thrones, 300) plays Moira, the town bartender with a ready pour and an eye for bullshit. Ryan Allen is Deputy Anderson, who might not be the best shot in the force, but he's got a lot of enthusiasm. The armory at the police station would make Rambo proud. Seems like a lot of firepower for this little frozen berg. Just as Ulysses is beginning to have strong suspicions that this tiny town seems to have a whole lot of unexplained money, two outsiders Lori (Reena Jolly) and Keith (Brendan Fletcher) decide to rob the downtown bank, where the town's mysteries are deeply rooted. What happens next is part action thriller, part laugh out loud comedy and 100% entertaining. By the time a squad of Yakuza fighters are landing in a private jet to descend on the town and about 50 bodies litter the streets in a huge variety of pieces, I was having one hell of a great time. Odenkirk creates a character to cheer for in Ulysses. He's a good man looking to wind down and hide, drawn into a massive battle in which he's got nothing to lose. The sheer variety of lethal characters that populate Main Street had me smiling ear to ear throughout. Derek Kolstad, the creator of John Wick and the screenwriter of the first three films in that series, brings the same depth of character building and mad fight scenes to this snowy little burg that he did to Mr. Wick and The Continental. There are huge echoes of Neo-Western lore here, with High Noon coming to mind in Ulysses man-against-the-entire-town story. Fargo fans will get a chuckle out of Sheriff Gunderson as well. Like the Wick films, the extreme violence reaches almost slapstick proportions and serves up real suspense and gory fun. I don't know how much weapons training that Odenkirk's been through, but between this and the Nobody films, he's an unlikely and very believable action hero. He may be fighting yokels here, but they're motivated. The grand finale with the Yakuza is funny as hell, especially the way it starts, but it's also Tarantino worthy in its close quarters, bloody mayhem. I laughed out loud more than a few times. Like Wick, Ulysses is an on screen hero who sits down out of breath, half broken and bleeding at the end of every confrontation. I don't know how in the hell he kept getting up for the next fight, but I was always glad he did. This is a fascinating and very enjoyable, weird blend of John Wick and a John Wayne western. Who knew those Johns blended together would serve up something so fast & fun? NORMAL is anything but and gets a very solid B for its double barrel blast of action and laughs.

One of the most troubled productions of the mid 70's, LUCKY LADY proved to be anything but at the box office. Hot off of her Best Actress win for "Cabaret" in 1972, Liza Minnelli was very careful about her next big screen project. Perhaps lured by the chance to work with legendary (but aging) Director Stanley Donen (Singing in the Rain, Two for the Road) and the two biggest box office actors of the time, Burt Reynolds & Gene Hackman, she leapt in with both feet. You can't say that the three of them don't give 100%, but they're working from a very bad screenplay by married writers Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz. These two define HIT and MISS on a grand scale. They gave us "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" and "American Graffiti", but also delivered "Howard the Duck". This one spends a lot of time on the water alongside Howard. Minnelli plays 1930's nightclub singer Claire, performing at her husband's Tijuana cantina that also serves as a base for their rum running operation. When her never seen husband is killed, she recruits Walker (Burt Reynolds) for the next liquor run. When everything goes wrong, a stranger named Kibby (Gene Hackman) makes their operation a trio and the three become the rum running team of choice between Mexico and the states. Thankfully for us and the movie, John Hillerman (Blazing Saddles, Chinatown) plays Mob Kingpin Christy McTeague, a lethal, stuffy gangster boss who's not happy the trio are horning in on his action. Hillerman delivers every line with perfect droll contempt. Every time he's on screen, it feels like he's wandered in from a much better movie. Our leads have absolutely zero chemistry on screen. Minnelli has been vocal, especially in her recent biography, that Hackman talked down to her the entire time they made the film, making her feel that she hadn't earned the star billing. She loved working with Reynolds and the two of them have the closest thing to chemistry that you'll find, but it's low wattage. Poor Minnelli is stuck with a screenplay that has her yelling most of the time and Donen has her playing for the back row. Liza has shown incredible presence in "Cabaret" and "Arthur" with a much more still, more quiet and present delivery. Less is more and she knows it, but not given the opportunity here. Reynolds is just enjoying himself and Hackman is the journeyman bringing everything he can to the underwritten role. Hackman shows flashes of the comic timing he'd put on full display later in Richard Donner's "Superman". This was his biggest paycheck at the time at $1.5 million. Poor Geoffrey Lewis (Maverick, Tango & Cash) makes Liza's performance look positively reserved. I thought he was going to stroke out from screaming at everyone. His Coast Guard officer is on a quest to take down our rum running trio, but his crew feels like McHale's Navy. Huyck and Katz never find a tone for this lumbering wannabe epic. Is it a musical? Nope. Cabaret composers Kander and Ebb created two songs for Liza to perform, but they're treated like throwaways and she only performs one on screen. Is it a comedy or a drama? It tries to be both but fails in the middle ground, serving up violent deaths of major characters and then awkwardly going for laughs a moment later. Huh? Way too late, the film hits its stride with a fun, large scale air and sea battle between our trio, alongside their partners in 43 boats of all sizes, against the mob. That 15 minutes serves up plenty of laughs and some decent action, but then saddles itself with a horrible music score by Ralph Burns that sounds like leftover tracks from a Brady Bunch episode. It's been said that Steven Spielberg was offered this film as his first big screen feature, but he chose to make "Jaws" instead. Great choice, Steven. In his autobiography, Burt Reynolds said that Donen made a complete mess of the movie in the editing room and destroyed Minnelli's performance. If Reynolds is right, it would explain some of the very strange and abrupt changes in tone throughout the film. Even Hackman, who clearly didn't connect with Minnelli during the production defended her and said that Donen had destroyed the film with poor editing. It's hard to imagine that there is a great film somewhere between the one I watched and the film on the cutting room floor, but there very well may have been a better one. LUCKY LADY was 20th Century Fox's big Christmas release of 1975 and sank quickly to obscurity after bombing badly. Some things are better left at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. It gets a waterlogged D.