King Cobra: True Crime Gets Deadly Dull

It is supposedly a crime drama based on Andrew E. Stoner & Peter A. Conway’s nonfiction book Cobra Killer: Gay Porn, Murder, and the Manhunt to Bring the Killers to Justice, but it only takes the cops about thirty seconds to arrest the perps. Maybe the term “manhunt” is used euphemistically. Despite the intentionally lurid subject matter, you will be hard-pressed to find a duller, dingier, more vacuous film than Justin Kelly’s King Cobra (trailer here), which opens today in New York.

In the early 2000s, apparently anyone with a digital camera and a website could become a player in the gay porn industry. For Stephen, his nocturnal side light as producer-host “King Cobra” was the only relief from a life of quiet desperation. He was already moderately successful when he recruited seventeen-year-old Sean Paul Lockhart (mistakenly believing him to be eighteen), but the videos the performer shot under the name “Brent Corrigan” took his company to a whole new level. For a while, everyone enjoys their success, but when Lockhart decides to leave King Cobra, he discovers the spurned producer holds the trademark on the Brent Corrigan name.

Meanwhile, escorts and self-styled pornstars Harlow and Joe really want to work with Corrigan. Deep in debt, they are convinced a video co-starring Corrigan and Harlow will solve all their problems. Of course, it has to be Lockhart under the Corrigan name. He is willing, but King Cobra is not.

One of the many problems with King Cobra is the murder and the subsequent investigation are compressed into the final ten minutes. The overwhelming majority of the film is devoted to Lockhart’s hopes and dreams and angsts and insecurities of the killers. Frankly, this material couldn’t sustain a fifteen minute short. Clearly, Kelly hopes we will be distracted by the naughty business, but it quickly gets boring (particularly if it doesn’t float your boat to begin with).

How mind-blowing is it to see Alicia Silverstone playing Lockhart’s mom?  Actually, she is not bad—maybe the best thing about Cobra. To be fair, Christian Slater is also very good playing the profoundly sad Stephen (the King), but the film’s general crumminess is in keeping with the recent underwhelming additions to his filmography, such as The Adderall Diaries (another utterly unwatchable James Franco joint), Stranded, and Playback. Franco probably considered Joe the Psycho to be another opportunity to display his gay-friendliness, but it is an awfully schticky, perilously clichéd character. At least we notice him, whereas neither Garrett Clayton nor Keegan Allen have any presence or depth as Lockhart/Corrigan or Harlow.

To reiterate, the real problem with the film is not the subject matter. It is just an unforgivable snore fest. Arguably, it takes unique talent to make pornography and murder boring as Hell, but somehow Kelly pulled it off. He even squanders 1980s icon Molly Ringwald in an entirely inconsequential role. Tedious yet still sleazy, King Cobra is not recommended for anyone when it opens today (10/21) in New York, at the IFC Center.

Lars Volume One

When Lars von Trier and the increasingly controversial Shia LaBeouf collaborate on a film, it creates a certain level of expectations. Add in a generous helping of explicit sexual content and you would anticipate of perfect storm of provocation. Instead, it will be fans of the Dogma 95 co-founder who will feel vindicated by his latest bout of risk-taking. Far from a source of joy, sex is an act of existential alienation in von Trier’s Nymphomaniac, Volume One (trailer here), which opens tomorrow in New York.

Seligman is a good Samaritan, who offers to take Joe to a hospital when he finds her battered in the street. She firmly demurs, only reluctantly allowing the older man to patch her wounds in his nearby flat. Joe not only blames herself for her alarming state, she rather seems to think she had it coming. She will explain why over a hot cup of tea.

Joe discovered her power turn men into animals at a young age. Like a playboy notching his belt, she regularly challenges her chum B to a contest of who can score the most men in a given period. However, B starts breaking one of their cardinal rules, allowing affection (or worse still, love) to influence her erotic pursuits. As a result, Joe becomes a solitary seducer, who deliberately leaves broken lives in her wake. Yet, Seligman insists on finding redemptive elements in each of her tales—or so he tries, in between fishing analogies and literary allusions.

Nevertheless, Joe’s self-indictment is consistently and cumulatively damning. In a particularly memorable episode, Mrs. H outdoes Medea, shaming her wayward husband and the trampy Joe by crashing their vice-pad with her shockingly young sons. Yet, Joe really is not shamed. She is already hollow inside, desensitized by her carnal compulsions.

Yes, there is a lot of sex and nudity in Volume One, but it is not the least bit seductive or titillating. Instead, this is an unrated morality tale, which explicitly cautions viewers of the dire consequences wrought by divorcing sex from love (or least like to a reasonable extent).

It should be noted, this all applies solely to Volume One seen independently of Volume Two. Based on the teaser that runs during the closing credits, von Trier apparently cranks up the lurid content of the concluding installment. Whether or not this anticipated foray into Shades of Grey territory will come with a disingenuous claim of “empowerment” remains to be seen. Nonetheless, Volume One ends at an oddly logical and unsettling point.

Frankly, it is not the naughty business that is interesting, but the conversations between the not-as-young-as-she-used-to-be Joe and Seligman. Von Trier’s language is highly literate and rich with meaning. Past von Trier alumni Charlotte Gainsbourg and Stellan Skarsgård quickly develop the darnedest screen chemistry, encompassing morbid fascination and humanist compassion. Despite the film’s explicit content, von Trier assembled quite a cast, including Uma Thurman, who knocks the wind out of viewers as the ferocious Mrs. H.

In a case of trial by fire, Stacy Martin makes a bold screen debut as the twenty-something Joe, but her character is so glacially reserved, the role better demonstrates her willingness to serve the needs of a film rather than her emotional range, per se. On the other hand, Christian Slater cannot shake off his snarky b-list persona as Joe’s henpecked father. (By the way, if any von Trier fans are wondering, Udo Kier will duly appear in Volume Two.)

With Volume One, von Trier stakes a claim to being a truly subversive contrarian. He makes sex look like no fun whatsoever. In fact, hedonism takes a toll on the soul and inextricably leads to some very dark places. Better to go fishing instead. Recommended for mature, fully informed audiences as a film in its own right, Nymphomaniac Volume One opens this Friday (3/21) in New York downtown at the Landmark Sunshine and uptown at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center.

Stranded: Christian Slater Maintains Protocol

In space, no one can hear you getting chewed out. Frankly, this crew has it coming. You might think scientists would be careful about contagions, but evidently not. Perhaps the semi-competency of their military commander will keep some of them alive in Roger Christian’s Stranded (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

A small four-person moon-base is a terrible place to be surprised by a meteor shower.  That much we can buy.  Suffering damage to their power generators and life support systems, Col. Gerard Brauchman’s crew hastens to make repairs.  While outside the station, Eva Cameron notices strange glowing spores covering the meteors, so naturally she carries one back inside, in gross violation of station protocol and basic common sense.  While she and Dr. Lance Krause analyze it, one of the test tubes breaks in their centrifuge, so naturally she starts digging around in there with her finger.  Before you know it, she is spectacularly pregnant with the alien demon spawn—and then just as suddenly she is not.

Cameron and Bruce Johns, the station engineer and resident drunk, know her alien offspring is out there, wreaking havoc.  Yet, Brauchman and Krause dismiss their warnings, assuming they are just suffering from CO² induced hallucinations.  Indeed, Stranded repeatedly explains the symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning with impressive thoroughness, so at least it fulfills its public service mandate.  Despite all the flak Brauchman takes for sticking by the book, the film also suggests breaking protocol is a really bad idea.

If Stranded sounds like an Alien wannabe, take into consideration the fact that Christian was nominated for an Academy Award for his art direction on Ridley Scott’s beloved sci-fi horror classic, so maybe he has the right to rip himself off.  Christian had previously won an Oscar as an art director on Star Wars (before it was known as A New Hope).  His short film The Dollar bottom also won an Oscar and his previous fantasy short Black Angel screened before The Empire Strikes Back during its initial run in the UK and Australia.  To temper your growing optimism, bear in mind Christian also directed the notorious Battlefield Earth.

That is some career, but with Stranded, he lights out into clear-cut b-movie territory.  Christian makes a virtue of necessity, emphasizing the claustrophobia of his limited set and the mounting tension within his small ensemble.  To an extent, the quartet’s constant bickering and back-biting gives the film a bit of character.  Still, there is no getting around the conspicuous carelessness of their actions and the cardboard dimensions of their characterizations.

Frankly, Christian Slater is not bad as Col. Brauchman, largely avoiding his typical tics and shtick.  Brendan Fehr comes across reasonably credibly as Dr. Krause.  However, it is hard to believe a basket case like Michael Therriault’s Johns could ever pass muster for a mission like this. As Cameron, Amy Matysio is similarly stuck with a problematically character, solely distinguished by head-scratching acts of stupidity.

If Stranded were playing at an old school drive-in, it would be easy to recommend.  On some level, dumb mayhem is always diverting, but Manhattan movie ticket prices demand considerably more than that. Those who might be interested solely because of Christian’s past work should note his long presumably lost Black Angel has been found and some sort of online distribution is expected in the near future. That is probably the film to wait for. Basically a time killer for woozy weekend viewing, Stranded opens this Friday (7/26) in New York at the AMC Empire and will also be available on itunes.

2012: The Low Lights

As a year-end insult, film sites are eagerly reporting the VOD-destined horror movie Playback is the lowest grossing film of 2012, raking in a paltry $264.  There is no secret to its anemic performance, having only been released for one week on one screen, with no promotional fanfare.  It is not very good either, but there were far worse stink-bombs released in theaters this year, some of which were torturously defended by critics who should have known better.  Meriting a solid D, Michael A. Nickles’ Playback (trailer here) is considerably more entertaining and accomplished than Dustin Lance Black’s Virginia, Benjamin Dickinson’s First Winter, Lee Daniels’ The Paperboy, and Spike Lee’s Red Hook Summer, 2012’s absolute low points.

Arguably, Black’s Virginia is the single worst film of the year, but it seems almost unfair to single it out.  After all, Black recognized how bad it was when it screened at Toronto and tried to fix it.  It didn’t work, but at least he made the attempt.  Next time he ought to start with a real story rather than merely lashing out at the Mormon Church of his youth.

Filled with endless scenes of urination, defecation, and disturbingly rough sex, The Paperboy is just a lurid sweaty mess.  A showcase for horrendous overacting, it deserves a long life on the Rifftrax circuit.  Indeed, many of the cartoonish characters seem like they ought to have serious issues with wire hangers.

Red Hook would have been painfully predictable and clichéd had it been released in the early 1990’s.  A tiresome attack on the Church and gentrification, RHS might well slow down the latter since it makes the Brooklyn neighbor look profoundly un-neighborly.

First Winter is pointlessly meandering hipster melodrama.

Comparatively speaking, Playback is impressively middling fare.  It starts with a gory buzz-killing opening, apparently choreographed to defy all common sense.  For some reason, notorious family killer Harlan Diehl had a thing about video-taping his crimes.   Playback appears to follow in the V/H/S tradition, but instead of telling five creepy stories, it tells one crummy one.  It also mercifully ditches the camcorder POV in the present day, for the most part.

Filming re-enactments of the Diehl murders as part of an ill-conceived journalism class project, Julian Miller becomes obsessed with the case. Eventually, he learns Diehl was a descendant of pioneering French filmmaker Louis Le Prince, whom his video store boss tells us was rumored to be Satan himself (Louis Le Prince = Lucifer Prince of Darkness).  As half-baked premises go, that’s not bad, but Nickles just lets it wither on the vine.  Instead, we see scene after scene of Quinn, a loser working for the local TV station, maliciously loading gear, apparently under the sway of Le Prince’s possession.

As Quinn, Toby Hemingway seems determined to do the world’s worst Johnny Depp impression.  Speaking of shtickiness, Christian Slater is also on-hand (indeed, he is taking the brunt of the media coverage) as Officer Frank Lyons, a cop paying Quinn for flash-drives of video recorded in the high school girls’ shower room.  Yes, how the mediocre have fallen.  On the plus side, Mark Metcalf (Neidermeyer in Animal House) has a few decent scenes as former reporter Chris Safford.

In truth, the rest of the cast is reasonably adequate as the dead horny teenagers.  However, there is absolutely no underlying logic to the supernatural goings on.  Essentially, Playback is a run-of-the-mill rip-off of The Ring, but it is relatively honest about that.  As a result, it stands taller than 2012’s more heralded quartet of shame.  It is now available on VOD and streams on Netflix.  There were plenty of films worth celebrating in 2012 as well.  To revisit some, check out my year’s best over at Criticwire.