The Mask of Zorro (1998)

Director: Martin Campbell

Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Antonio Banderas, Catherine Zeta-Jones, the stuntman for Anthony Hopkins (who I think we can all agree deserves a lot more credit than he’s gotten so far)

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure.

Did I Like It: I like it a lot. Had it not been followed by one of the most indifferent sequels in history with The Legend of Zorro (2005), it might be remembered as a more seminal film today.

Anthony Hopkins might not be just a great actor, but also one of the more underrated movie stars in the history of cinema. Sure, he can play Hannibal Lecter and various near-Hannibals with aplomb, but the fact that such a pointedly English actor could convincingly the wit and swashbuckling bravura of Mexican California’s greatest hero. Antonio Banderas as his heir presumptive is pretty intuitive, but the star of Remains of the Day (1993)? On spec, I don’t see it, and yet, he delivers. He delivers so well that the movie lives and dies by his presence. Just see the aforementioned Legend to see how such a film without Hopkins can only generate a lifeless quality.

And yet, while he is the strongest link in the chain, there is one part of the conceit of Hopkins-as-Zorro that takes one out of the movie. At the time of filming in 1997, Hopkins was already 60. It’s pretty clear in the early goings—when Diego’s Zorro is repelling the Spanish oppressors— that he isn’t doing his own stunts.

It’s a minor quibble in movie that works by its own standards. The plot actually tracks for the most part. The bad guys are dastardly. The good guys play out their revenges in a gallant sort of way. The action is all of the firey explosion and clanging saber variety, with nary a pixel of computer generated imagery.  Which also puts it in that rare breed of films that ages in such a way that—without further context—you wouldn’t necessarily guess when it was made*. What more can really be expected of a movie?

* Unless of course you count the obligatory love ballad over a James Horner melody that places it firmly in the shadow of James Cameron’s Titanic (1997), but that is only over the end credits, and should hardly count against the film as a whole.

Stephen King's IT (1990)

As long as Beyond The Cabin In The Woods is doing their Stephen King run, I’m thinking entries around this period of time will all have a certain theme. We will re-join our other program already in progress just as soon as we can.

Director: Tommy Lee Wallace

Cast: Tim Reid, Tim Curry, and some White People

Have I Seen it Before: How much time do you have?

Did I Like It: Well…

The TV Movie adaptation of Stephen King’s novel clocks in at 187 minutes (depending on what version of the story you watch) and, in the sober, clear-minded reality of 2018, maybe 6 minutes of unquestionably work. The unfathomable demon that most often appears as Pennywise The Dancing Clown (Tim Curry) only appears for about 20 minutes of the production, and while his performance is the one culturally resonant part of the proceedings, even his returns diminish to the point where the last time we see him as a ghostly apparition just before the Loser’s Club descends to face IT’s “true form,” I am less filled with a sense of dread, and more marveling at Curry’s performance, which is manically magnetic, even when he isn’t given much to do.

But those six minutes, though…

I’ll admit, when this film works best it is merely reaching back into disparate memories I have of catching moments of its original broadcast in 1990. The image of Pennywise instructing the now-adult Henry Bowers (Michael Cole) to “kill them all” particularly did me in. To this day, I’m convinced the evening sky of November 20, 1990 possessed a full moon, and forever ruined me as a human being, and continues to give me just a jot of an adrenaline spike whenever I see a clown, including Bill Skarsgård’s performance in the more recent 2017 adaptation. In truth, the almanac insists that the date in question was waxing crescent. To be frank, the truth only disturbs me more. Was I imagining it? Or was something else happening?

Anyway.

The rest of the performances are made up of slightly mis-cast but amiable presences, made all the more precious by the fact that many of them have since passed on. Harry Anderson doesn’t quite connect with me as the slightly cynical adult Richie Tosier. Honestly, at that point in his career, Bob Saget would have been great in the role, and probably destroyed the American Broadcasting Company, Lorimar Television, and all of Western Civilization in the process. John Ritter is nice to see also, but I can’t help but look at him and feel as if he’s trying to some sort of farce in the piece to play. Jonathan Brandis is just so damned earnest, that I could practically hear the producers of Seaquest DSV typing the phrase “Wesley Crusher of the Ocean” into their Wordstars. 

A few years ago I couldn’t have imagined that I would prefer a new adaptation of King’s story, but here we are. The “original” IT is overlong, but a few chunks of gold are in there for the discerning viewer.

The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

Director: Frank Darabont

Cast: Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, the triumph of the human spirit

Have I Seen it Before: I’ve got two eyes, a heart, and a cable package that has TNT. What do you think?

Did I Like It: See my answer to the previous question.

It’s pretty preposterous to try and write any length of criticism for a movie that subjectively is perfect, and objectively might hit that level as well. If you’ve seen it, you know that the thing works. I don’t need to tell you that. If you haven’t seen the movie yet, well Gosh… You should. But again, you probably don’t need me to tell you that.

I’ve seen the movie dozens of times over the years. I can’t think of a mark against it. Maybe it’s become clear that the “fresh fish” guy is also the same guy who appears in a photograph in the file of young Red (Morgan Freeman). He’s also Freeman’s son, and receives an additional credit as his assistant. Maybe—if you’re not hip to the idea of letting film work for you—that one little element might beggar suspension of disbelief.

It shouldn’t.

It’d also be pretty preposterous to try and list all the things the film this does well. There are likely plenty of other reviews that can offer similar insights, so I will offer you only one that stands out at me above the others during this viewing. Nearly any time a film defaults to voice over narration, I have almost always instantly decided that whatever virtue the film might have had, it has disappeared under the shadow of such an egregious dramatic crutch.

Not here.

With Shawshank, I never once judge the film for having a high amount of V.O. Maybe it’s the fact that Morgan Freeman offers the narration. I like to think that the film as a whole works so well, and in this one instance, the film actually demanded a tool that would destroy a lesser story.

It is in that rare pantheon of movies that you begin to forget its greatness the longer you go without seeing it. And then, when you are exposed to the film again, it’s almost as if you are viewing it for the first time.

That Frank Darabont is not in the pantheon of the great directors for this entry alone, I’ll never know. I just looked back on my review of The Green Mile (1999), and I said the same thing there. I must really mean it.

The Shining (1997)

Director: Mick Garris

Cast: Rebecca De Mornay, Steven Weber, Melvin Van Peebles, Courtland Mead, some truly awful mid-90s CGI.

Have I Seen It Before: The mere notion of watching it up until my deep-dive into Shining-ology this week seemed ridiculous. And yet, here I am.

People often complain when a filmed adaptation is released, if the subsequent work doesn’t strictly adhere to the source material. Those who adore Stephen King’s original novel The Shining decry Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 film of the same name. King himself is among the most prominent of this ilk. I tend to disagree with them, both in general and specifically in this case. There’s something interesting about a true adaptation, that a transcription just can’t quite accomplish. See Watchmen (2009) for a pretty perfect example of this phenomenon.

But, King was unhappy with the Kubrick film and he thought he could do better. So he tried. He managed to retrieve the rights to his own novel from Kubrick (for a price that various sources indicate was 2 million dollars, and an agreement that King cool it with his criticism of the original film), wrote a 4 1/2 hour teleplay, and had the company film the thing in Stanley Hotel, the same inn that had inspired him to

It’s a TV miniseries from the 90s. Thus, it has what you would think for production values (to say nothing of the special effects), and the acting to back it up. One particularly egregious example is a series of helicopter tracking shots following the Torrance’s to the Overlook. Kubrick already mastered such a shot with the opening of his movie. Inviting the comparison by trying to work in the same milieu isn’t doing your movie any favors. It is not of quality anywhere near the Kubrick original, even if it is occasionally slavish to the novel.

But that shouldn’t surprise you. What might surprise you is the points where King actually diverts from his novel. An extended epilogue is attached, showing Dick Hallorann (Melvin Van Peebles) very much a part of the surviving Torrance’s lives. Young Danny (Courtland Mead) is graduating from High School, and as it turns out, he looks exactly like his vision from many years ago of his imaginary friend, Tony (Wil Horneff). Yikes.

Elsewhere, the smoky wreck of the Overlook is being rebuilt. Dun dun dun. Sorry, Mr. King. Your old friend Kubrick had the Overlook still standing at the end of his version of your story. It may work better, but the complaint of a poor adaptation rings false with this decision. You desperately want Jack Torrance (Steven Weber) to be something of a sympathetic figure, but negating his sacrifice by rebuilding the hotel is a little like those helicopter shots of the VW Bug: It’s been done before.

The Green Mile (1999)

Director: Frank Darabont

Cast: Tom Hanks, Michael Clarke Duncan, Bonnie Hunt, Sam Rockwell

Have I Seen it Before: Several times, but not nearly as much as that other prison-set Frank Darabont-directed movie based on a Stephen King story.

Did I Like It: I think it’s objectively a depressing movie, so why do I always feel a little uplifted by it the end. Must say more about me than about the movie itself.

There is—to my mind—only one problem with this film. I don’t for one second believe that Dabbs Greer is an elderly Tom Hanks. That being said, somewhere out there in the multiverse is a version of me who watches this film and wishes that they hadn’t put Tom Hanks in old age makeup. So, in the end, art is often about living with imperfections.

Beyond that, the film is great. A year before Patrick Stewart relented to play Charles Xavier in X-Men (2000), Michael Clarke Duncan had the rare distinction of being born to play a particular role in John Coffey. Hanks is Hanks, which may sound like slightly damning praise, but who doesn’t want to watch Tom Hanks in a movie. The rest of the cast is perfection, right down to the slimy Doug Hutchinson playing the odious Percy Wetmore. Between this film and Galaxy Quest being released in the same year, I am struggling to find a one-two punch that introduced a screen persona more efficiently than Sam Rockwell.

A well-cast movie is one thing, but in truth not much of anything if the writing and directing aren’t there. See Justice League (2017) (minus the tag scene) for a pretty good example. Here, Frank Darabont’s skills are unassailable. It’s a shame that he hasn’t directed a movie since The Mist (2007). It’s an even bigger shame that he was fired as showrunner on The Walking Dead after its first—and only watchable—season. It’s yet a bigger shame still that George Lucas relegated Darabont’s draft for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of The Crystal Skull (2008) to the scrap pile. 

It’s a pretty miraculous film that deals with the guards of death row, and still make me want to somehow know these people in real life. They are decent, and in a time with little decency to show for it, that is uplifting, even in the face of tragedy.

Also, and on a slightly unrelated note: I think this book informs this first season of Castle Rock more than any other King work. At press time, there are still a few more episodes left to air. Let's see if I'm right.

Sneakers (1992)

Director: Phil Alden Robinson

Cast: Robert Redford, Dan Aykroyd, Ben Kingsley, Mary McDonnell

Have I Seen It Before: No (sort of)

Did I Like It? Not really.

The movie comes from a very high pedigree. The cast sells itself. Honestly, if Redford is in a movie, isn't there a certain benefit of the doubt written into the picture? Phil Alden Robinson had just come off Field of Dreams (1989), the one movie featuring Kevin Costner that everybody seems to like. It's only now that we no longer have James Horner around that every time one of his scores echo forth, does it seem like discovering a lost treasure. Walter F. Parkes and Lawrence Lasker had already brought their skills to similar subject matter in WarGames (1982).

And that's where things don't quite work out. Where WarGames had a sense of fun to it, even when flirting with the end of Western Civilization and the fundamental futility therein. This movie plays dour and aloof. I'm not even an automatic naysayer of dour and aloof, but this one failed to bring me in. I'm even vaguely certain that I had tried to watch this movie at some point in the past, but neglected to get through the process. Had I not happened to be tempted to start these writings with this viewing, I may not have made it through here. The cast is fine, but not great. It is only a desire not to speak ill of the dead that keeps me from wondering what the big deal was about some people in the 80s and 90s. I'll leave you to contemplate that. Even that much feels pretty catty.

Also, and this may be just a nitpick, but I just don't understand how a movie post-1985 can get away with shooting so obviously in the Universal backlot. I know that's the Hill Valley Clock Tower. Everyone knows it is the Hill Valley Clock Tower. You're not fooling anyone.