Willy’s Wonderland

Enter a wonderland of mayhem.

(2021) Horror Comedy (Screen Media) Nicolas Cage, Emily Tosta, Beth Grant, Ric Reitz, Chris Warner, Kai Kadlec, Caylee Cowan, Jonathan Mercedes, Terayle Hill, Christian Del Grosso, David Sheftell, Jiri Stanek, Jessica Graves Davis, Taylor Towery, Chris Bradley, Duke Jackson, Billy Bussey, BJ Guyver, Christopher Carlos Padilla, Olga Cramer, Grant Cramer, Madison Leigh.  Directed by Kevin Lewis

 

Back in the ‘80s, we used to go to the neighborhood video store to find horror movies that we’d missed in the theaters or on cable. Every so often, we’d discover a gem on the shelves that we might not have heard of, or if we did hadn’t seen because it only played L.A. and New York. We’d rent the puppy, order a pizza (if we still had cash) or grab whatever snacks we could lay our mitts on and settle in for an evening of bliss, usually with a few invited friends – we don’t share such things with just anyone, you understand.

A mysterious drifter (Cage) rolls into a small town in his muscle car only to see it break down. The repairs cost way more than he has, so a deal is struck; if he spends the night cleaning up a disused family entertainment center that owner Tex McAdoo (Reitz) is thinking about re-opening, he’ll get the repairs done on the house. The drifter agrees to be a Janitor for a night (the character is referred to in the credits as “The Janitor” so we’ll do the same here).

What the Janitor isn’t told is that the property used to be owned by a group of serial killers who used to lure families into a “special room” for satanic rituals. When the law caught on, the murderers performed a ritual that transferred their souls into the animatronic characters. Now they come to life from time to time and the town, tired of having them hunt down their own citizens, promise to provide human sacrifices for the bloodthirsty machines. People like the Janitor.

Liv (Tosta) has a special connection to Willy’s Wonderland, as the Chuck E. Cheese from Hell is known, has an agenda of her own. She’s gonna burn the MF to the ground. However, when she realizes there’s an innocent man in there, she goes inside to rescue him along with her fellow teens, albeit reluctantly. Can anyone say midnight snack?

But, as Liv so eloquently puts it, as it turns out, the Janitor isn’t locked in with the possessed animal machines (Willy the Weasel! Gus the Gorilla! Ozzie the Ostrich! Arty the Alligator!); they’re locked in there with him. Armed with a busted broom, a plunger and other tools of the trade, he takes on the murderous characters in between bouts of gulping down Punch Pop (“A fistful of caffeine to the kisser”) and playing pinball.

Bleary-eyed gamers who have spent hours playing the 5 Nights at Freddy’s series might be heard to say quizzically “Wait…what?” when they hear the plot. There is a real 80s vibe here, from the tinny synthesizer-laden score to the horror tropes of dumb teens pausing for sex in a deadly haunted house and, of course, plenty of gory goodness. Children of that era will likely appreciate the similarities.

And it’s also true that Cage is usually good for action fun, whether through his idiosyncratic line readings or legendary on-screen freak-outs. While some of the latter take place, the former is a wash as the Janitor has no dialogue whatsoever. Not a word. Still, Cage is still Nicolas Cage enough through gestures, body language, and his trademark pissed-off glare.

The movie’s big flaw is that they have this setting of a dilapidated family entertainment center, complete with ball pits, pinball machines and a full-service kitchen, but don’t really do anything with it. The robots attack, the Janitor counter attacks, blood, blood, gears, gears, snarl, scream, done. This happens time after time. A little more imagination would have been appreciated.

Still, for sheer nostalgia value and of course the presence of Nicolas Cage, this can’t be beat. So grab yourself a gallon of Jolt Cola, fire up the microwave pizza rolls, grab a couple of bags of Nacho Cheese Doritos, and settle in your bean bag. All that’s missing is the time stamp and wiggly lines of your old VHS player.

REASONS TO SEE: Completely whacked in a good way.
REASONS TO AVOID: Doesn’t really take advantage of its environment.
FAMILY VALUES: There is a whole lot of violence, profanity and some sexuality.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Cage has no spoken dialogue in the film, and communicates only through grunts and occasional battle yells.
BEYOND THE THEATERS: Amazon, AppleTV, DirecTV, Fandango Now, Microsoft, Redbox, Vudu
CRITICAL MASS: As of 2/17/21: Rotten Tomatoes: 63% positive reviews, Metacritic: 42/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: 5 Nights at Freddy’s
FINAL RATING: 6.5/10
NEXT: X

Bellflower

A little backseat canoodling.

(2011) Action (Oscilloscope Laboratories) Evan Glodell, Jessie Wiseman, Tyler Dawson, Rebekah Brandes, Vincent Grashaw, Zach Kraus, Keghan Hurst, Alexandra Boylan, Bradshaw Pruitt, Brian Thomas Evans, Britta Jacobellis, Caesar Flores, Chris Snyder, Dan Dulle, Jon Huck, Jet Kauffman, Josh Kelling, Ken Bailey, Mark Nihem, Joel Hodge. Directed by Evan Glodell

When all you have to look forward to is the end of the world, you’ve got problems. That’s the situation that Woodrow (Glodell) and Aidan (Dawson) find themselves in, however. Woodrow, an introspective quiet sort, and Aidan, a more outgoing sort, are best friends who moved to Los Angeles from Wisconsin. In fact, they live in one of the more squalid areas of Bellflower, a mostly-poor suburb of the city and spend their days drinking and creating weapons for an apocalypse that they are certain is coming soon.

During a cricket-eating contest at a bar, Woodrow is bested by Millie (Wiseman) and the two hit it off. While Aidan is flirting with Millie’s best friend Courtney (Brandes), Woodrow is arranging to take Millie out on a date to the worst place he’s ever eaten which will involve a trip to Texas. As it turns out, Woodrow really knows his bad eating establishments.

When Woodrow gets back, Aidan gets to work on the Medusa, a tricked out Pontiac Skylark that he is outfitting with all sorts of goodies including flamethrowers and smoke screens. From this vehicle, he very reasonably deduces, the two of them can rule the post-apocalyptic wasteland. However, Aidan is annoyed that Woodrow is spending more time with Millie than with him, and Courtney is feeling the same about Millie.

But things are not rosy in Bellflower. Woodrow is getting to be controlling and paranoid – and with good reason as it turns out as he surprises Millie having sex with her roommate Mike (Grashaw) in his own bed. He and Mike scuffle and Woodrow eventually flees from the scene on his motorcycle only to be hit by a car. He suffers brain damage in the incident.

Afterwards things get strange. Woodrow returns home, depressed and mostly staying in bed while Aidan gamely works on Medusa without him. Another confrontation with Mike leads to a situation which may turn out to be Woodrow’s own personal apocalypse, or indeed may be a product of his damaged mind. Things can get weird when you don’t know what’s real and what’s imagined.

This is a first feature on a microscopic budget which has an awful lot going for it. First and foremost, this is a great looking film. Glodell custom built his own cameras that give the film a distinctive look that is unlike anything else you’ve ever seen. Had this been released by a major studio, it would have won an Oscar for cinematography. Of that I’m certain. Nonetheless it is as unique looking a movie as you’re likely to ever see.

 

The problem I have is that the characters are so bloody awful that you don’t really want to spend any more time with them than you have to and that can be a problem. Aidan is the closest one to being a decent human being and he can be a complete jerk at times. The violence in the movie escalates and gets pretty disturbing with a consensual but rough sexual scene, a suicide and a severe beating. That this may be a product of Woodrow’s injuries is beside the point; we are left having to wallow in the squalor and we don’t smell pleasant when it’s over. The story just kind of peters out at the end with a coda that is meant to raise doubts as to what’s real but by that point you don’t really care.

The Medusa, also custom built by the filmmakers, is a cool car and for those of a certain age it might inspire some ideas of their own. I’m not sure that it’s street legal but in a perfect world it would be making the rounds at car shows across the country and attracting big crowds.

I can’t say that this is a great movie because at the end of the day it doesn’t have all the elements needed to be great. It is, however a very promising first film with a lot going for it. I would say check it out but keep your expectations kind of low; it’s worth seeing for the look of the film but not for spending time with any of the fairly lowlife characters.

WHY RENT THIS: Very cool car. Shot and edited beautifully.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: The characters are mainly unlikable and the story doesn’t really go anywhere.

FAMILY VALUES: Violence, much of it disturbing as well as a good deal of sexuality and nudity. The language is colorful throughout and there’s some drug use just to top it all off.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: All of the functions of the car displayed during the film are real; the car was custom built by the filmmakers and friends, and has two working flamethrowers, smoke screen, a bleach drift-kit, adjustable rear suspension and three surveillance cameras, all controlled from the dashboard.

NOTABLE HOME VIDEO EXTRAS: There’s an outtakes real and a featurette involving a dashboard cam on the car that shows it being put through its paces.

BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $168,226 on a $17,000 production budget.

SITES TO SEE: Netflix DVD/Streaming, Amazon (rent/buy), iTunes

COMPARISON SHOPPING: Miracle Mile

FINAL RATING: 5.5/10

NEXT: The Expendables 3

Drive Angry

Nicolas Cage can remember when it was his career that was on fire.

(2011) Supernatural Action (Summit) Nicolas Cage, Amber Heard, William Fichtner, Billy Burke, David Morse, Todd Farmer, Christa Campbell, Charlotte Ross, Tom Atkins, Katy Mixon, Jack McGee. Directed by Patrick Lussier

It is said that a man will walk through the fires of Hell for his daughter. For some that’s more literally true than for others.

John Milton (Cage) has been away for a very long time. You might think he’s been in prison and he has, after a fashion; y’see, Milton’s been dead for several years – in the biggest, nastiest, prison of them all, Hell.

But he’s out now, walking the Earth from a place where you don’t exactly get paroled for good behavior. He’s a man on a mission; as it turns out, his daughter has been murdered by a charismatic cult leader going by the name of Jonah King (Burke) and not merely murdered, but butchered. To make things worse, her infant daughter (Milton’s granddaughter) has been kidnapped by King, earmarked for human sacrifice that will bring about a new world order – Hell on Earth.

Chasing him is the Accountant (Fichtner), an urbane demon who never gets ruffled but is someone you definitely do NOT want to mess with, as well as the police, as personified by the brutal Cap (Atkins). Assisting him is Piper (Heard), a waitress at a diner who Milton saves from being beaten up by her boyfriend (Farmer, who co-wrote the movie incidentally), and Webster (Morse), a former compadre of Milton’s.

Piper and Milton drive through the south, chasing the cult and trying to retrieve the baby before the full moon. Hell is walking the Earth and things are going to get strange before all is said and done.

Director Lussier has been impressive in some of the opportunities he’s had; this is very much a tribute to a variety of different grindhouse genres. Quentin Tarantino would have a field day with this kind of thing; in many ways, his Deathproof has the same pedigree as this does, which owes a little more to Race with the Devil in many ways with its satanic cult overtones.

Nicolas Cage has had a really bad run in terms of box office. The one-time Oscar winner and A-lister has taken on enough B movie projects to become in danger of becoming the next Steven Seagal. Milton is not really given much of a personality and Cage doesn’t really supply him one. He talks in a laconic monotone and doesn’t show very much anger or desperation. Maybe it’s because he’s dead, but he doesn’t seem to have much passion about…well, much of anything. The title of the film may be Drive Angry but Drive Irritated might have been more suitable to the tone as Cage projected it.

The movie is carried to a very large extent by Amber Heard. She kicks ass, but not in an unrealistic way; she gets beaten up early on but she takes no crap from anybody. The fact that she looks awesome in her Daisy Dukes (yeah, there are all sorts of references like that here) doesn’t hurt. She isn’t so much a damsel in distress, even though there’s a little bit of that here.

Fichtner, who’s created a nice niche for himself as a bureaucratic corporate sort, takes that role and plays it to the “nth” degree here, only with a certain amount of a sly wink. He has a good time with the role, giving it the right amount of attitude to make it memorable. I found myself looking forward to Fichtner’s screen time more than Cage’s.

Burke, best known for his work in the Twilight series, channels both Tommy Lee Jones and Josh Brolin as the cult leader. It’s not amazing work, but solid enough; fortunately Cage doesn’t provide enough fireworks to make their showdown more meaningful.

However, there is plenty of bang for your buck here. Plenty of things get blown up, lots of jiggling boobs (including a great scene when Cage is having sex with a barmaid (Ross) when his hotel room is attacked by a horde of farm tool-wielding cultists, Cage starts shooting at his attackers, all the while remaining inside his partner even when one hits him with a taser, giving the lady a good shaking) and enough bullets flying to make an NRA highlight reel.

This movie is essentially mindless fun. If you try to think about what the plot means too much, your head might just spontaneously combust. However, it’s fine grindhouse entertainment that stands proudly alongside the best of that genre from the 70s and 80s.

REASONS TO GO: Mindless entertainment, lots of things blow up and lots of sex and violence.

REASONS TO STAY: Little plot, zero plausibility and Nicolas Cage is strangely flat.

FAMILY VALUES: Hmmm, where to begin? There’s violence, sex, nudity, rough language and disturbing images. There’s also baby sacrificing going on but that’s a whole other ball of wax.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: In the film, Milton drives a 1964 Buick Riviera, 1969 Dodge Charger and a 1971 Chevy Chevelle.

HOME OR THEATER: I know I’m in the minority here but I think this is one that should be seen on the big screen.

FINAL RATING: 6/10

TOMORROW: Sophie Scholl: The Final Days