Video Comics: Hawkman & Swamp Thing

It took Aquaman’s reputation decades to recover from being mocked as the guy who “talks to fish” on Saturday Night Live. However, people often forget that Hawkman could also talk to birds (at least on some Earths he could). Admittedly, birds have much greater surveillance and intel applications. Plus, Hawkman flies and has greater-than-average strength. Nevertheless, he has mostly been a supporting character in film and television. Still, he had a rare solo spotlight on the 1979 Qube/Nickelodeon motion comic series, Video Comics, which you can find online to celebrate his Earth 1 birthday today.

Motion comics are pretty much what they sound like: a camera panning and scanning over comics pages, while voice actors read the dialogue and descriptive boxes. Early in its existence, the network that became Nickelodeon commissioned the Video Comics motion comic series to serve as filler, licensing content from their corporate cousin DC. Rights were probably unavailable for marquee characters. Regardless, DC apparently saw this as a venue to promote second-tier characters like Hawkman and Swamp Thing or fourth-tier characters like Space Ranger. The series disappeared in the early 1980s and only two legit superhero episodes have escaped online.

“Hawkman” is only nine minutes, adapting a back-up story from a 1970s issue of Detective Comics. In this case, the detective/superhero from Thanagar takes a case that might better suit Scooby-Do and Mystery Incorporated. Someone is regularly stealing from Bleakhill Manor, a converted museum that specializes in military art. However, the thief only takes the replica arms that accompany the priceless art.

Frankly, this storyline does not pass the logic test, but it is pleasant enough on a Scooby-Do level. It also shows Hawkman in his element, wielding hardcore medieval weaponry. However, it it is pretty clear E. Nelson Bridwell’s story was quickly written to fill out pages.

In contrast, “Swamp Thing” is a full 20-minute origin story. Technically, this is Swamp Thing #2, Alec Holland, rather Swamp Thing #1, Alex Olsen (from House of Secrets #92), but they suffer much the same fate. Holland is the Swamp Thing everyone knows from the Wes Craven film and subsequent series. (If DC knew how big Swamp Thing would get, they probably would not have licensed him for Video Comics.)

Holland and his wife Linda are developing a Garden of Eden-like formula in their secret lab nestled in the Louisiana bayous. The government assigned Agent Matt Cable to protect them, but he is a bit of an idiot. However, he waxes quite poetic over the spooky swamp country, where he grew up as a lad. Tragically, he cannot protect Holland from the shadowy syndicate out to buy, steal, or destroy his formula. However, his own research saves his life—but at the cost of his humanity.

Los Frikis, Trying to Rock and Eat in Cuba

In 1991, rock & roll was illegal in Cuba. LGBTQ Cubans were also widely discriminated against. That consequently caused tremendous stigma for HIV patients. Nevertheless, hundreds of Cubans  (especially “Los Frikis” of “The Geeks,” as the punk sub-culture was known) deliberately self-infected, to be admitted to HIV sanitariums, where patients were well-fed (at least while they could still eat). A young teenager joins his older brother’s HIV-positive band in their provincial refuge, but they cannot hide from reality forever in Tyler Nilson & Michael Schwartz’s Los Frikis, which is now available on VOD.

Even by punk rock standards. Gustavo’s older brother Paco is extremely nihilistic. It fuels his music, but causes friction with the family that took the siblings in, after their father was executed in the sugar cane fields, for a minor infraction. They intend to sail to Florida on a makeshift raft, but they only plan to take Gustavo with them.

Since everyone believes AIDS will be cured in a few years, Paco gets an infected jab, believing he can wait out the starvation of Castro’s “special period” in the comfort of an HIV sanitarium. Every one repeat after me: “the alleged superiority of Cuban medicine is a propaganda lie.” Paco will learn that the hard way, However, the care provided by Maria is quite conscientious, but she is not a doctor. She came to the sanitarium to care for her brother and stayed on after his death.

Gustavo also joins his brother, but as a patient. After abandoning the sinking raft, he convinced a doctor to give him a false positive report. Technically, he is perfectly healthy, but he feels shame listening to the other patients’ HIV “pride.” Of course, the local cops do not see it their way.

It is deeply disturbing to think that Cubans like Paco intentionally self-infected, just for the sake of food, but that was the reality of Castro’s Cuba. Ironically, the brothers’ early days in the sanitarium feel like an idyllic respite. Unfortunately, they greatly under-estimate the virulence of AIDS and over-estimate the effectiveness of Castro’s health system.

Thank You Very Much: The Andy Kaufman Doc

When you think about, a lot of people now owe Andy Kaufman an apology. They demonized him for staging wrestling matches against women. He did it precisely because it was an unfair spectacle. Even though Kaufman was no Schwarzenegger, he was still a man. Apparently, society has become as absurd as an Andy Kaufman gag, allowing biological men to pummel women boxers in the Olympics, but everyone is too chicken to observe the irony during Alex Braverman’s documentary, Thank You Very Much, which opens today in New York.

As most fans know by now, Kaufman’s style of comedy was more like performance art than traditional stand-up. Bob Zmuda (a major voice in Braverman’s doc) got it, becoming Kaufman’s longtime writer and collaborator. Yet, Kaufman could project the sad clown persona that came out in characters like Latka Gravas, his beloved character on the Taxi sitcom.

Kaufman also created his abrasive alter-ego, Tony Clifton, who was sadistically annoying to everyone around him. Braverman incorporates chaotic audio of Clifton’s ill-fated guest-starring appearance on Taxi, which compares to Orson Welles’ “Frozen Peas” radio commercial.

Arguably, Kaufman’s “inter-sex” wrestling displays get as much time as Clifton or Taxi, if not more. Understandably so, considering how Kaufman was vilified for what critics considered his loutish manhandling of women. Yet, nobody compares his provocations, which were intended to be outrageous, to a biological male beating a field of women swimmers by entire pool lengths, but seriously, what’s the difference?

So, everyone in Thank You Very Much is too much of a scaredy-cat to make the blindingly obvious comparison. Who knows, maybe Kaufman will. Several of Braverman’s interview subjects readily admit Kaufman often discussed the possibility of faking his death as part of an elaborate gag-hoax. According to Danny Devito, it took him a long time to finally accept the reality of Kaufman’s death.

In addition to Zmuda and Devito, Marilu Henner also talks about their Taxi days, but Judd Hirsch is only heard unloading on Kaufman in his troublemaking Clifton persona. Braverman does not enlist a huge platoon of talking heads, but Steve Martin and fellow merry prankster Bob Pagani offer a fair amount of insight into the subject.

The Hunt, on Viaplay

For the Dutch, this series was obviously directly inspired by the notorious murder of teenaged Marianne Vaatstra. For the rest of us, the drama involving attempts to scapegoat the local asylum-seeker shelter seem very zeitgeisty—or at least reflective of current media preoccupations. It is no spoiler to say Anneke Boorsma was not murdered by a refugee, because writer Willem Bosch and director Michiel van Erp reveal the real killer almost immediately. However, it is a long agonizing process for the police to finally reach that conclusion in the six-episode The Hunt, which starts streaming today on Viaplay.

Before she left the local night club alone, Boorsma had been fighting with her boyfriend, which becomes super-awkward for Jeroen Bovenkamp, because it makes him everyone’s second favorite suspect. Prime suspect #1 is the teen Afghan refugee Fenna Schepenaer claims to have seen making an obscene gesture at her rival for Bovenkamp’s affection. After a mob beats the poor kid, he retreats to Turkey, but the Mayor Kees Vormer has Detectives Syl Frankenaar and Joanna van der Veen extradite him back—only to immediately clear him based on forensic evidence.

Nevertheless, Boorsma’s father Rinus and her thuggish older brother Lukas remain convinced one of the Afghan migrants killed her. At one time, the old man was not such a bad guy, but his grief blinds him to the sinister nature of the nativist extremists his son forges alliances with. Consequently, the sleepy provincial village becomes a powder-keg as the investigation drags on. Meanwhile, Boorsma’s mother falls in with a QAnon-like group of conspiracy theorists, who see ritual satanic killers under every bed.

The Hunt is a bit like Broadchurch, in that it explores the ways the trauma of a murder can profoundly wound a community. However, there is little actual mystery. Even if Bosch and van Erp had not tipped their hands, the killer’s suspiciously twitchy behavior would have made him conspicuously obvious. Thematically (if not necessarily artistically), The Hunt compares more to Crime and Punishment in the way it examines the corrosive power of guilt on the killer as well as his family.

Despite the frequent jumps along the 13-year timeline, van Erp always clearly delineates each temporal shift. This is a starkly realized drama with distinctively severe aesthetic, but it is a ruthlessly downbeat viewing experience. The is no escapism and little assurance offered by the police procedural elements.

The Studio, on Apple TV+

In a way, you could say Continental Studios’ upcoming tent-pole is sort of a Marvel movie, because back in the 1980s, Marvel Comics released five promotional comics featuring the Kool-Aid Man. It was a little weird at the time, but a big-budget Kool-Aid Man movie is a daunting task for Matt Remick, but he had to feign enthusiasm to get promoted to run the studio. He wants to be Robert Evans, but his insecurities are only too obvious in writer-creators Seth Rogan, Evan Goldberg, Peter Huyck, Alex Gregory, and Frida Perez’s 10-episode The Studio, which premieres today on Apple TV+.

Remick loves movies, so he wants his talent to love him back. Instead, they usually blow him off, at least until sleazy CEO, Griffin Mill, promotes him to studio chief, replacing his mentor, Patty Leigh. However, Remick soon offers her a lucrative producing deal to keep her in the fold. He will have many challenges shepherding Kool-Aid, as well as the rest of his upcoming slate, including Ron Howard’s Alphabet City and a Sarah Polley art film.

Fortunately, his core staff remains more-or-less loyal to him, including his hard-drinking buddy Sal Saperstein, his freshly promoted former assistant Quinn Hackett, and the caustic head of marketing, Maya Mason.

Obviously, The Studio takes a great deal of inspiration from Robert Altman’s The Player. It even pays homage to Tim Robbins’ character, the original Griffin Mill. It also features many real-life show business celebrities playing themselves, but some are considerably funnier than others. Frankly, the surprise scene-stealer is Dave Franco (as himself), who pokes fun at his image and career, while going for some big laughs. He even provides perhaps the funniest recap narration in TV history for the concluding episode, a two-part continuation.

Zoe Kravitz is also a very good sport. However, even though filmmaking legends Ron Howard and Martin Scorsese fully commit, their storylines are more cringy than humorous.

Indeed, the writing and execution varies wildly throughout the ten installments. The opener is an okay set-up, but episodes two, three, five, and six set-up excruciatingly uncomfortable situations that just keep piling on, rather than puncturing the tension. However, episode seven has some of the funniest TV/streaming writing of the 2020s that absolutely skewers Hollywood’s DEI mindset. Honestly, there is no way this episode could have been produced three or four years ago. Ice Cube is also savagely funny as himself.

The two-part conclusion, set during CinemaCon, is also vintage door-slamming farce that even pays tribute to Weekend at Bernie’s. It is mostly either feast or famine with The Studio, but episode four, “The Missing Reel,” is sort of an okay middle of the road offering, mostly because Zac Efron’s droll self-portrayal. It also somewhat amusingly uses elements of film noir.

The Frankenstein Complex, OVID.tv

For horror fans, makeup and practical effects artists like Stan Winston and Rick Baker were bigger stars than most of the people in front of the camera. At least that was true in the 1980s and early 1990s. The whole CGI thing unfortunately complicated their business. Some of the best creature creators explain their art and craft in Gilles Penso & Alexandre Poncet’s documentary, The Frankenstein Complex (a.k.a. Creature Designers: The Frankenstein Complex), which premieres today on OVID.tv.

Penso & Ponset’s interview subjects are all makeup and effects artists who still regularly work in the industry, but they explain how everything they create is built on the innovations of the original masters, like Jack Pierce (who designed the Universal monster makeup), Willis O’Brien (who brought King Kong to life), and Ray Harryhausen (the great stop-motion animator, who was the subject of a previous Penso & Poncet doc). In fact, many of the creators specifically credit Pierce’s Frankenstein makeup for inspiring their careers (hence, the title).

In the 80s, Rick Baker emerged as one of the new breed of makeup stars, largely because he worked on both The Howling and An American Werewolf in London, a pair of dueling werewolf movies, whose directors, Joe Dante and John Landis good-naturedly discuss his work and their old rivalry. Although Rob Bottin has since left the business, his colleagues celebrate his work on John Carpenter’s The Thing as a continuing influence on creature designers.

Of course, CGI changed the industry. Most of the interview subjects argue practical and computer-generated effects should be used in concert rather than seen as an either/or proposition. Indeed, many casual genre fans might be surprised to learn from Complex just how many of the effects in both Jurassic Park and Terminator 2 were in fact, practical. Yet, artists like Phil Tippet admit frustration with the over-reliance on CGI, at the expense of his practical artistry.

Earth II: CCP Nuclear Blackmail in Space

This 1971 TV movie feels more realistic today than it did the year it released. When it was produced, Mainland China was still not a UN member, but by the time it aired, the Communist regime had taken Taiwan’s place. In retrospect, that was a huge mistake. In the film (conceived as a TV pilot), the CCP engages in nuclear blackmail, in defiance of the UN. Today, they would do so with UN support. However, the titular international space station is at the greatest risk in Tom Gries’s Earth II, which releases today on BluRay.

Most UN member nations, including the United States, agreed to help finance Earth II and recognize it as a sovereign nation, in the Roddenberry-esque hope that it will develop scientific innovations to solve all our terrestrial problems. The one-world idealists insist Earth II must remain neutral, but hawks like Frank Karger are skeptical. However, the former NASA launch director has the kind of skills Earth II needs, so he immigrates with his family, intending to shape more realistic military and defense policies for the space station.

In contrast, his friend and colleague David Seville strictly advocates for Earth II’s utopian ideals. Unfortunately, reality intrudes when China launches a satellite armed with nuclear warheads, ironically pointed at Moscow (even though the USSR originally supplied the nukes to their socialist brothers). Clearly, screenwriters Allan Balter and William Read Woodfield subscribed to the Sino-Soviet split scenario that was then in vogue.

Rather awkwardly, every rotation Earth II makes round Earth I, they come perilously close to colliding with the CCP satellite. They issue strongly worded diplomatic protests, but the “Red Chinese” (as the film refers to the regime) tells Earth II to go pound sand. Seville is inclined to live with Damocles Sword, but Karger convinces the station through their town meeting-style direct democracy to take active measures to remove the nukes.

Obviously, Gries, Balter, and Woodfield have a greater affinity for Team Seville. Yet, some of the rash, ill-thought-out actions of his fellow peaceniks risk ultimate Armageddon for Earth I. Indeed, the writing is sufficiently smart, to the extent that it greatly muddles the intended message, which actually makes the TV film quite interesting. Earth II also has the distinction of advisory help from both NASA and, believe it or not, Buckminster Fuller, who created the geometric maps displayed in the control room.

Tony Franciosa is surprisingly good as Karger (even though his presence screams “TV movie,” especially since Mariette Hartley portrays his wife, Lisa). However, Gary Lockwood is disappointingly dour and rather unengaged as Seville (especially considering his classic appearance in 2001 and his great guest-shot on Star Trek). On the other hand, Gary Merrill is reliably craggy as veteran operations director Walter Dietrich. It is also worth noting the great James Hong and Soon-tek Oh appear uncredited as the Red Chinese “diplomats.”

In-Flight: Spring Garden

Chang-soo’s garden is nothing like the one Frances Hodgson Burnett described. Frankly, it really is not such a big plot point anyway. There is an evil influence that permeates the entire country house andsurrounding grounds So-hee inherited from her late husband. He secretly designed it to be her dream home, right down to the titular flower patch, but something went very wrong in Ku Born’s Korean horror film, Spring Garden, which is currently available on American Airlines international flights.

Tragically and inexplicably, Chang-soo committed suicide, with no apparent explanation. Naturally, his family blames So-hee, who was just as baffled. She is even more surprised to suddenly inherit her the fabulous country home he secretly designed for her, right down to the “Spring Garden.” However, bad things happen there, as viewers know from the prologue. Of course, the teenagers suffering from the terrible misadventure were also there with nasty intentions.

Eventually, So-hee starts connecting the dots between Chang-soo and the delinquents. However, In-kyeom is still way ahead of her. He is the creepy guy who always skulks around her house. He knows a lot about bad mojo. The question is whether he is fighting it or causing it—or maybe a little of both.

Admittedly, Spring Garden is a fairly convention K-horror film, but it has yet to have significant North American screenings, beyond its in-flight distribution (seriously, you never know what treasures you might find on American international flights). It was inspired by Neulbom Garden, which is allegedly one of Korea’s three most haunted locations (along with Gonjiam Asylum), but the circumstances of Baek Yool-seo’s narrative are very different than the reported Neulbom lore.

Kung Fu Rookie, from Kazakhstan

Timuchin is a prime example of the power of positive thinking. His hard head and fleet fists do not hurt either. Usually, the big city of Almaty eats county bumpkins like him for breakfast, but he is a college grad, who finished his military service and closely studied all of Jackie Chan’s old school HK movies (the good ones). Consequently, the bad guys routinely misunderestimate him in Aman Ergaziyev’s Kung Fu Rookie (a.k.a. Timuchin), which is now available on VOD.

Good natured, lunk-headed Timuchin came to Almaty to apply for the police academy, but his uncle Samat argues he should just find a girl and settle down while he still has time to enjoy starting a family. As fate would have it, Timuchin quickly meets Alua, a civilian academy employee who accepts his paperwork (after a bit of teasing). She also happens to be the daughter of a high-ranking officer and the niece of Samat’s special customer Samal. (Obviously, they are quite compatible—just look at their names.)

Of course, Timuchin won’t back down when Arsen, the neighborhood gang leader acts all thuggish. Timuchin does not look so scary, but he has the moves to teach Arsen and his henchmen a few lessons, but they refuse to learn and keep coming back for more. Eventually, they start coming for Samar and Alua.

Anuar Turizigitov’s screenplay is not exactly brilliantly original, but Ergaziyev’s fight choreography is gleefully inventive, incorporating a host of found objects into the melees. Essentially, this film is an introduction to Timur Baktybayev, to determine whether his martial arts chops and ah-shucks screen presence can carry a film. He passes the test. In fact, he aces it.

There are no special effects tricks, so somehow, Baktybayev must have the same kind of rubber bones and cement head that made Chan so entertaining in his prime. This film has been widely compared to Rumble in the Bronx, with good reason. Indeed, you can see deliberate homages in several fight sequences.

Wonder Woman: Bloodlines

Wonder Woman has always been a particularly military-friendly superhero, thanks to her close relationship with Captain Steve Trevor. Sadly, Trevor was killed in the Wonder Woman All In comic book series. Diana Prince was busy caring for their newborn child, so the killer was brought to justice in issue #16 by Detective Chimp, who is exactly what he sounds like. (Please, please Sam Liu and DC Animated, give the world a Detective Chimp movie.) This is a different timeline, but Prince and Trevor are still immediately interested in each other when he literally drops into Themyscira in Sam Liu & Justin Copeland’s Wonder Woman: Bloodlines, which deserves a re-watch today, the day Prince was originally molded out of clay. (That must have been high quality clay.)

Some kind of kaiju attack Trevor’s air squadron, but Princess Diana (the original one, who didn’t live off UK tax revenue) saves his life. Her mother Hippolyta intends to keep him imprisoned, because she fears “Man’s World.” Yet, ironically, it will be a rogue’s gallery of female supervillains who eventually threaten the hidden Amazonian civilization of Themyscira.

This is indeed a female-dominated story, except for Trevor, but he is definitely a manly kind of guy. Recognizing his sense of duty, Diana helps Trevor escape, so she can help him fight the invading monsters. Presumably, they are successful, since that subplot mysteriously vanishes.

To prepare herself for her career as a superheroine and member of the Justice League (who are mentioned in passing but never seen) Trevor places her with archaeologist Julia Kapatelis, who will teach her about our world and to learn about her civilization. Unfortunately, Kapatelis’s teen daughter feels like Diana steadily steals her mother’s affections—to an extent that creates super-villains.

Indeed, Dr. Poison and Dr. Cyber exploit her rage, mutating her into the Silver Swan. Of course, the transformation process will eventually kill her, but they do not care. They just want to use her as a pawn to find Themyscira and plunder its advanced tech.

Adapted from the Down to Earth comic story arc, Bloodlines works best when it focuses on Princess Diana’s slow-building relationship with Trevor. They really represent one of the great comic book romances. On the other hand, it is a little off-putting to hear Trevor’s intelligence colleague Etta Candy explicitly lusting after Amazons (this is a film kids will watch, after all). In contrast, the old school William Marston-esque scene of a hog-tied super-villainess come across like a knowing wink to Wonder Woman’s history.

Regardless, Rosario Dawson and Jeffrey Donovan nicely express the personas of Wonder Woman and Trevor. It is also cool to hear Michael Dorn as the fan-favorite character, Ferdinand the Minotaur.

Ash, Co-Starring Iko Uwais

The planet dubbed “Ash” by the exploratory team is admittedly a bit of a fixer-upper. The atmosphere is only partially toxic. However, by the Earth’s current standards, that sounds like a pretty good deal. Unfortunately, something else got there first, which is always how things work in movies like Flying Lotus’s Ash, which opens today in theaters.

Dozens of teams were dispatched to prospective planets in hope of finding a suitable refuge from the Earth’s imminent eco-destruction. Ash was looking like a decent candidate, until something went wrong. Riya Ortiz is not sure what happened. She came to with a severe case of amnesia amid the dead bodies of most of her fellow crew, who clearly died violent, grisly deaths.

Eventually, Brion, from their orbiting overwatch comes down to investigate. Obviously, he is a little suspicious of Ortiz and she is a little suspicious of him. He insists she keep medicating, in the hopes that it might temper her possible psychotic eruptions. Nevertheless, she keeps having flashes of memory return, which suggest something not unlike John Carpenter’s The Thing.

It is absolutely bizarre that Flying Lotus (a.k.a. Steven Ellison) gave dramatically more screentime to both Aaron Paul and Elza Gonzalez (who play Ortiz and Brion) than martial arts superstar Iko Uwais, who portrays their commander, Adhi. However, at least he gets a showcase fight sequence that shows off his skills.

To be fair, Paul portrays Brion with convincing shiftiness, but Gonzalez is no Helen Ripley—not even close. Frankly, aside from Uwais, the only crew-member contributing any charisma or screen presence would be Beulah Koale as Kevin (who also happens to be a jazz trumpeter, which is a nice bit of character development).

Most genre fans will also anticipate every beat of Jonni Remmler’s screenplay, well in advance. However, the effects and the gory fight scenes are nicely executed (especially Uwais’s, of course). Arguably, the brutal action sequences help elevate Ash above other Alien-clones (like Life).

1989: A Statesman Opens Up, on OVID.tv

When former Hungarian Prime Minister Miklos Nemeth supported reclaiming the remains of his predecessor, Imre Nagy, from an unmarked grave, so it could have a proper burial, he genuinely risked ending up in one himself. Nagy had supported democratic reforms during the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, which resulted in his trial and execution by the Soviets. Memories of ’56 brutality weighed heavily on Gorbachev when Nemeth decided to loosen restrictions in Hungary, particularly with respect to the borders. When he opened Hungary’s border with East Germany and allowed any crosser with a valid passport to proceed to any nation that would accept them, he largely rendered the Berlin Wall obsolete. At least that is how he remembers it—and he has a valid point. Nemeth looks back on his history-making years as Hungary’s final “Communist” PM in Anders Ostergaard & Erzssebet Racz’s 1989: A Statesman Opens Up, which premieres today on OVID.tv.

Nemeth always had dramatically mixed feeling about the Party. His father did not talk to him for six months after he joined. He was only selected as PM to serve as a technocratic caretaker, who would hopefully arrange more Western loans and credits. Hungary was teetering on the brink of default, so he was shocked to learn the regime spent a large fortune annually on border security—including considerable amounts for border armaments from our ally, France.

Despite clear opposition from Hungarian Party Secretary Karoly Grosz, Nemeth started scaling back border enforcement, starting with the Austrian frontier. Naturally, that alarmed the East German Party boss, Erich Honecker. Grosz was not pleased either, but he really had a fit when Nemeth supported the posthumous rehabilitation of Nagy. Grosz was not an apparatchik to trifle with. He first made a name for himself as part of the Hungarian Workers Militia, working beside the Soviet Army to hunt and kill his fellow countrymen.

Ostergaard, Racz, and Nemeth himself make a strong case the former PM has yet to get the credit he deserves for the fall of Communism. Ironically, he steadfastly advocated for free elections, even though he fully understood he would lose his position as a result. He also played Gorbachev beautifully.

Reconstruction of Occupation, on OVID.tv

Obviously, footage of the Soviet 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia was dangerous. That is why average Czechs and Slovaks kept it hidden. It was also a valuable historical record, which is why they never destroyed it. Fifty years after the brutal repression of the Prague Spring, filmmaker Jan Sikl shaped extensive excerpts of previously unseen professional and amateur film into the documentary, Reconstruction of Occupation, which premieres tomorrow on OVID.tv.

As a collector of vintage family home movies, Sikl happened to be the guy who often got called when someone uncovered an old reel of film. However, the cache of professionally-produced newsreel footage of the invasion and subsequent protests was something else entirely. Sikl started showing clips on news shows, hoping the demonstrators captured in the act of resistance throughout his footage might come forward. Many did. So did others who were secretly holding film of their own.

Suddenly, Sikl’s small project grew considerably in scope. Like many Czechs, the events of 1968 greatly shaped Sikl’s perspective. Yet, he made a conscious effort to interview those who chose to go along, as well as those who resisted. While Sikl strived to be non-judgmental, the most memorable stories involve those who lost loved ones to the Soviet imperialist invaders. For instance, one woman remembers how her mother responded to her brother’s shooting death, by hoisting his bloody shirt outside their window like a flag—until the Party ordered it down.

It is also fascinating to hear many of the protesters differing responses to Jan Palach’s self-immolation. Some were deeply moved, while others found his suicide deeply disturbing. Yet, in all cases, they still find it acutely painful to discuss.

Centered: Joe Lieberman

Sen. Joe Lieberman was a Democrat, with both capital and small-case “D’s.” He was also a man of deep personal faith and an ardent supporter of the American military, who could often reach out to Republicans. In the year 2000, that made him a potentially game-changing running mate for presidential candidate Al Gore. However, in 2006, those same qualities made him a pariah within his own party. Yet, he remained the same man. Jonathan Gruber chronicles his career in Centered: Joe Lieberman, which will have special nationwide theatrical screenings this today and tomorrow.

Right from the start, Gruber and Lieberman’s family emphasize how his devoutly Jewish working-class parents gave him the faith and values that guided his career. He attended Yale and interned for Abraham Ribbicoff, who remains to this day, Connecticut’s first and only Jewish governor. Subsequently, a Yale Law student named Bill Clinton interned on Lieberman’s state senate campaign.

Thus, began a long, usually close alliance that threatened to fray when Lieberman publicly censured Clinton’s judgment and behavior with respects to the infamous White House intern scandal. That independence and integrity made him an attractive running mate. It also led to a close friendship and fruitful working-relationship with Republican Senator John McCain.

Frankly, the dramatic arc of Lieberman’s career sounds like the unlikely plot of an Allen Drury political thriller. Somehow, the Democratic Party’s 2000 Vice Presidential candidate lost his 2006 senate primary, only to come back and win the general election as an independent. Two years later, he endorsed the 2008 Republican Presidential candidate, McCain, who seriously considered him as his own running mate.

Oddly, Centered misses some opportunities to further burnish Lieberman’s independent credentials. While the film briefly discusses how Lieberman criticized the incumbent Republican Lowell Weicker during his initial U.S. Senate run “from the right,” he overlooks the vocal endorsement and financial support his candidacy received from conservative titan William F. Buckley. By any measure, Weicker was considered more liberal than most Democrats and took great pleasure in antagonizing conservatives. Buckley and other national conservatives recognized Lieberman’s more moderate stances on national security issues and his measured demeanor—and never regretted backing him.

Perhaps tellingly, the only Democratic political figures participating also happen to be from Connecticut or Lieberman’s various campaigns. On the other hand, GOP Senator Lindsey Graham (of South Carolina) and Amb. Cindy McCain (wife of the late Arizona Senator), discuss at length how the Democrat and his two Republican colleagues became the so-called “Three Amigos,” constantly visiting American military posts throughout the world, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan, to get a first-hand understanding of the boots-on-the-ground reality.

Somewhat oddly (given recent events), Lieberman’s steadfast support for Israel receives little attention until late in the film. However, it serves as another illustration of Lieberman’s determination to elevate principle over party, when he passionately decries his former Senate colleague Chuck Schumer, for using the October 7^th terrorist atrocities to attack Benjamin Netanyahu’s administration in Israel.

For the record, Gruber also deserves credit for previously directing several excellent documentaries related to Israel, including Follow Me: The Yoni Netanyahu Story, profiling Bibi’s fallen war-hero brother, and Upheaval: The Journey of Menachem Begin, examining the life and times of the Prime Minister who made peace (more or less) with Egypt through the Camp David Accords.

Arvo Pärt: And Then Came the Evening and the Morning

Arvo Pärt’s compositions combine elements of minimalism, the avant-garde, and sacred music, none of which particularly pleased the old Soviet cultural ministers. Yet, he became the world’s most performed composer in the years 2011-2018 and yet again in 2022. He wasn’t there yet in 1990, but Dorian Supin was present to document Pärt just as his international renown was about to explode. Supin’s intimate profile also keenly reflects the austere aesthetics of its subject. Fittingly, Supin’s Arvo Pärt: And Then Came the Evening and the Morning screens tomorrow at Anthology Film Archives, as part of a new record release.

The film starts while Pärt and his family were still in exile in West Berlin, so obviously much has changed since then. Supin had up-close, personal access, being Pärt’s brother-in-law. He also clearly understands Pärt’s music, especially its deeply spiritual resonance. Indeed, he intuitively grasped the need to hear his music as it is intended to be heard, rather than mere snippets. For instance, playing “Pari Intervallo” over the closing credits, gives it time to sink in, so the audience can get it.

Supin follows Pärt as he rehearses with large orchestras and chorale groups throughout Europe. Ironically, he contrasts Pärt’s growing prestige with man-on-the-street segments, in which nobody recognizes the composer’s name—not even musicians. Again, much has changed.

Devils Stay: A Really Dark Heart

There is no reason for this Korean horror movie to adversely affect organ donation. Donors face no risks (since they are dead already). Unfortunately, this recipient did not reject the heart from a demon-possessed girl. It turns out the invasive demon was transferred right along with it in Hyun Moon-sub’s Devils Stay, which releases tomorrow on VOD and home video.

Poor little Cha So-mi will be a nasty case of demon possession. Father Ban ought to know. He has experienced some bad ones, including his own. That is what motivated him to become an exorcist. He thought he had successfully cast out her demon, but just as the young girl started to calm, she suddenly died.

Her traditional three-day funeral will be particularly hard, because the demon still inside her body starts tormenting the mourners, especially her father, Cha Seung-do. He is also not inclined to accept anymore of Father Ban’s help, even though he is obviously in over his head. Even he will admit as much when he discovers he was set up by a mysterious satanic cultist, when he was cutting corners to arrange So-mi’s organ donor heart.

In fact, Devils Stay turns rather zeitgeisty when the shadowy satanist turns out to be Russian (in light of South Korea’s concern regarding North Korea supplying troops and arms to Russia, for their brutal war in Ukraine). The demonic particulars are also especially sinister.

Indeed, Devils Stay is an insidiously effective demonic horror film that bends (if not breaks) the template in several places. It is tense and scary—and good gosh, do we ever feel bad for the poor beleaguered Cha family.

First Look ’25: Chronicles of the Absurd

Unfortunately, for Miguel Coyula and his collaborator-muse, Lynn Cruz, being an independent artist is illegal in Cuba. That is not my analysis. Those are the words of multiple government officials whom they secretly recorded. The apparatchiks did not just tell them. They also laid down the law for photographer Javier Caso, who happens to be the brother of Anna de Armas (whose roles they approved of). You can hear the censoring and the not so veiled threats for yourself in Coyula’s documentary, Chronicles of the Absurd, which screens today as part of First Look 2025.

Shot over the course of several years, Absurd initially documents the long, arduous production of their dystopian film, Corazon Azul. Eventually, it cost Cruz her livelihood, because she was expelled from the actors’ union, but never properly informed. She even sort of successfully challenges her expulsion, winning reinstatement along with the immediate, legally required 30-days-notice of her second, permanent ejection.

Routinely, their attempts to attend screenings of their past films are blocked by cops and secret police, who refuse to identify themselves. Accustomed to the harassment, Coyula and Cruz regularly leave home with secret cell phones hidden on their bodies recording whatever might transpire. Indeed, such recordings make up nearly the film’s entire audio track. Although they have no corresponding video, they use cleverly monstrous looking stand-in icons and slyly selected photos for bureaucrats with an online footprint, creating dramatic montages.

Frankly, Absurd would be quite amusing in a farcical and aptly absurd way, if it were also not so Orwellian. Clearly, Cruz and Coyula are not paranoid. Caso similarly employs their cell phone technique to capture the secret police trying to scare him away from his longtime friends. Fortunately for Caso, his relationship with his famous sister provides him some degree of protection.

First Look ’25: The Vanguard Tapes (short)

This film couldn’t be made in the same way today. That is because the venerable Village Vanguard jazz club no longer has a kitchen—at least not one that requires a paid dish-washer. However, from 1991 to 1995, filmmaker Bill Morrison washed dishes in the Vanguard kitchen. Evidently, even back then the kitchen-area was a hang-space for musicians between sets and their guests. Morrison quickly realized he should film some of their candid banter. Jazz fans finally get to hear some of the comradery in the short film (possibly an excerpt of a longer future project) The Vanguard Tapes, which screens today as part of First Look 2025.

Jazz fans will immediately understand the appeal of this film when they hear the two most prominent voices are alto-sax player Lou Donaldson and pianist Harold Mabern. They were both amazing musicians and wonderful showmen, who routinely cracked up both their audiences and sidemen in between numbers. Whether it is Donaldson talking about playing his numbers and betting on horses, or Mabern recapping his favorite soap opera, you can understand why Morrison felt compelled to record these slices of the behind-the-scenes jazz life.

Logically, there are also very serious discussions of music. Trumpeter Danny Moore pulls no punches with his critical appraisals of Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock. (It should be noted, this was the early 1990s. By the late 1990s, Shorter was enjoying a career renaissance returning to the acoustic hardbop he played before his Weather Report years.)

October 8, in The Epoch Times

OCTOBER 8 is a sober and thoroughly damning examination of the hatred directed at Jews (especially Jewish students) following the horrific 10/7 Hamas attrocities. It is hard to dismiss its urgent warnings, unless you share the violent prejudice it exposes. EPOCH TIMES review up here.

Dope Thief, on Apple TV+

In 2021, a couple of Philly ex-con lunkheads like Ray Driscoll and Manny Carvalho do not have many opportunities for gainful employment while the world slowly rouses from the COVID shutdown. Conveniently, there was one business that did not observe closure mandates: drug trafficking. Posing as DEA agents, the duo shakedown marginal drug houses not affiliated with the major cartels. However, Covid still wreaked havoc on the illicit supply chains nearly as much as it did for legal trade. Consequently, when Driscoll and Carvalho unknowingly knock over a big-time meth lab, it ignites a whole lot of trouble for the product-hungry gang and even more so for themselves in creator Peter Craig’s eight-episode Dope Thief, which premieres today on Apple TV+.

Driscoll is in denial, but Carvalho recognizes this is what they do. They are not Robin Hoods. Shadowy Son Pham put them in business with fake DEA badges and bullet proof vests. They keep the cash and he flips the drugs they “confiscate.” It usually works out well, until Carvlho’s recently released friend Ricky suggests a score way outside their usual territory.

It soon becomes evident Ricky set them up when their fake bust turns into a blood bath. Driscoll and Carvalho shoot several meth heads in self-defense, including, rather awkwardly, an undercover Fed. They thought they’d also killed Mina, another undercover agent, but somehow, she slipped away, with a bullet lodged in her throat. Unfortunately, they cannot interrogate Ricky, who also took a fatal bullet. Even worse, the sinister mastermind who keeps calling Driscoll clearly knows who they are—and who they care about.

For Driscoll, that only means Theresa Bowers, his jailbird father Bart’s tough-talking girlfriend, who has raised Ray like a son. He pretends to hate his incarcerated dad, but his feelings are clearly more conflicted than he lets on. He even agrees to work with Michelle Taylor, a pro bono lawyer trying to secure Bart’s compassionate release, at Bower’s request. He will probably need her services, as the cartels, biker gangs, and the real DEA all start circling him.

Dope Thief starts off with a bang. Perhaps not so coincidentally, the first episode also happens to be directed by executive producer Ridley Scott. Frankly, he probably should have adapted Dennis Tafoya’s source novel as a feature film. Episodes one and two are gritty and tense, but the middle installments are bloated and sometimes even a little aimless. The entire subplot focusing on Mina’s recovery and quest for not exactly revenge but something sort of like that clearly feel like padding—even though Marin Ireland is quite good in the role. These detours just take the audience too far away from Driscoll and the ominous voice (who sometimes falls silent for full episodes).

On the other hand, Dustin Nguyen is a shockingly quiet scene-stealer, who often upstages his flashier co-stars as Pham, the suburban family-man gangster, whose complicated relationship with Driscoll incorporates both loyalty and exploitation.  As Driscoll, Brian Tyree Henry develops terrific chemistry with multiple cast members, definitely including Nguyen. Yet, his work alongside the wonderful Kate Mulgrew, as Bowers, really gives the series a lot of heart. This is really some of Mulgrew’s best work yet.

First Look ’25: Zodiac Killer Project

The Zodiac Killer remains America’s deadliest uncaught serial killer, so any half-baked theory about his identity deserves a Netflix documentary. At least that is what documentary filmmaker Charlie Shackleton (probably rightly) figured. Deciding to essentially “sell out” and go true crime, Shackleton tried to buy the rights to a former California highway patrolman’s expose/memoir of his off-the-books Zodiac investigation. The negotiation went smoothly until the rights-holders suddenly backed out. Undeterred, Shackleton explains the film he would have made, using material already in the public domain in Zodiac Killer Project, a sort of docu-curio that screens during this year’s First Look.

By the time the deal unexpectedly fell through Shackleton had already done a lot of prep work, including scouting locations and pre-interviewing potential on-camera subjects. The focus of his film would have been the late Lyndon Lafferty, who had a fateful encounter at a rest stop with the man who would become his prime suspect for the Zodiac murders.

Ordinarily, Highway Patrol is not in charge of serial killer investigations, but the police took his information and started sniffing around his suspect, until higher-ups declared him off limits. Considering this a cover-up, Lafferty assembled his own team, largely consisting of retired law enforcement friends, who worked the case without official sanction.

In fact, that sounds like a very commercial premise, so it is easy to understand why Shackleton thought his unmade Zodiac Killer Project could have been a nice payday. Basically, he explains shot-by-shot, what might have been. The visuals are mostly static shots of prospective locations, like the library that would have served as the police station.

Frankly, the real revelation in Zodiac Killer Project are the ways Shackleton quite offhandedly admits he would have deceived viewers and distorted the truth, for dramatic effect. For instance, he causally admits he would have implied Lafferty had been present for his suspect’s first police interview, even though he seriously doubts that was true. It just would have made better TV.

Shackleton also skewers the very genre he hoped to join, illustrating each of his hypothetical scenes with half of dozen split screens from previous true crime productions that show nearly identical imagery. It starts with the grainy, dreamlike opening credits and precedes to the description of the suspect’s hometown as “a nice play to raise a family,” but it always “had a dark side.” Plus, every other cop is nicknamed “the Bulldog.”

The World Will Tremble, in The Epoch Times

THE WORLD WILL TREMBLE presents the inspiring true story of the two Jewish escapees who first exposed the true of National Socialist concentration camps to the world. Both the subject matter and execution are quite gripping. EPOCH TIMES review up here.

Control Freak, on Hulu

If a self-help program works, you should only need to buy one book once. If it shows you how to unlock your inner potential, why keep buying a bunch of tapes and workshop tickets? Val Nguyen (which usually sounds like “Win”) is about to learn how little her empowerment babble is worth. Her family demon does not care if she awakened her giant within. As a result, today might not be the first day of the rest of her life. Instead, it might be her last, in director-screenwriter Shal Ngo’s Control Freak, which premieres today on Hulu.

Nguyen is a self-help, motivational speaker-human branding campaign on the verge of superstardom. Her upcoming tour should push her into the promised land, but she has been distracted during the final planning by a nasty itch on the back of her head. Her compulsive scratching even draws blood.

Something is very wrong, which Ngo leads viewers to suspect might in some way involve her long buried family trauma. Her mother died under mysterious circumstances, which Nguyen partially blames on her former junkie father, Sang. Perhaps he does too, since he took vows as a Buddhist monk shortly after her death. Nguyen also discovers a lot of darkly mystical documents when she rummages around his storage locker in search of her birth certificate.

Initially, Ngo mines a vein of body horror, but after the first act, he pivots to the supernatural, but with deep psychological and folk horror overtones. The audience never really thinks it all might be in her head, unless you mean the hole he is boring into it. The film also dramatically displays a deep generational divide between Nguyen’s junky “you’re good enough, you’re strong enough” pablum and her Aunt Thuy’s old school, jaded “karma will get you every time” combination of realism and superstition.

Regardless, Ngo is surprisingly successful balancing competing sources of horror. The body horror will literally give you the itch, while the bogeyman is appropriately sinister. However, it is hard to top Nguyen’s spectacular descent into madness, which, thanks to Kelly Marie Tran’s lead performance, is an absolutely spectacular cratering.

New Looney Tunes: The Day the Earth Blew Up

How can they have a Looney Tunes alien invasion movie without Marvin the Martian? Maybe there are some things he just wouldn’t do—but what might that mean for the Earth? Regardless, Daffy Duck could possibly do anything by accident, as his best friend Porky Pig knows only too well. Nevertheless, the duo will be our last and only line of defense in Peter Browngardt’s The Day the Earth Blew Up, a brand spanking new Looney Tunes feature, which opens Friday in theaters.

Like Red Planet Mars and other classic alien invasion B-movies, this Day starts in an observatory, where the “Scientist” first gets a gander at the “Invader’s” ship. Of course, you can guess what happens when he races out to its crash site. Unfortunately, it also took out a chunk of Porky & Daffy’s roof. The officious neighborhood block association president, Mrs. Grecht, is only too eager to threaten them with eviction and demolition, if they do not fix it pronto.

Of course, neither have jobs or marketable skills. However, a chance encounter with Petunia Pig lands them assembly line jobs at the Goodie Gum Factory, where she works in flavor development. She is also a little off-kilter, but she is still quite intriguing if “Pig” is part of your name, like Porky’s. As fate would have it, she cannot stand the new flavor her company just released, which secretly carries the Invader’s mind control virus. That leaves three uninfected Goodie employees to fight back—two of them stutter and the third likes to whack things with a giant hammer.

So really, what’s not to like? Clearly, Browngardt, Kevin Costello, and the rest of the platoon of co-writers channeled a lot of classic sci-fi, including Invasion of the Body Snatchers, War of the Worlds, and Carpenter’s The Thing. Outright homage is rare, but the influences are obvious.

Perhaps more importantly, this is all-new Porky and Daffy material. There is some chatter about the film “updating” the classic characters, but fans will be relieved to hear this really isn’t readily apparent. Please—enough with the fresh new “relevancy.” However, it is cool to see the well-established but under-utilized Petunia get a major, proactive role.

Indeed, the ruckus Looney Tunes spirit is alive and well. Arguably, Browngardt and company raise it to new heights with their extended regurgitation gags, which younger viewers are sure to love. Older animation fans should also appreciate some pretty impressive astronomical animation (it is not quite Chesley Bonestell-level, but it looks great on-screen).

Like Tears in Rain, on Viaplay

Rutger Hauer’s early lifestyle could fairly be described as Bohemian and he first came to international prominence in the sexually charged film Turkish Delight. Yet, he was happily married to the love of his life for forty years. One of his best friends was his brother-in-law and his other closest friends were the parents of his god-children. Fittingly, his new biographical documentary is a family affair, directed by his goddaughter. Obviously, Bladerunner will be discussed, but Sanna Fabery de Jonge devotes more time to the doting godfather she knew in Like Tears in Rain, which premieres Thursday on Viaplay.

Hauer extensively documented his personal life and film shoots as an amateur videographer, but a freak flood destroyed the bulk of his archive, robbing Fabery de Jonge of a wealth of primary sources. However, several boxes of video footage were discovered after his death, which, seen here for the first time, supply an intimate perspective on Hauer’s early life.

Young and dashing, Hauer essentially lived in a hovel and squandered his paychecks on things like motorcycles. Yet, he was charming. After buying the motorhome Fabery de Jonge’s parent put up for sale, Hauer became lifelong friends with the couple and godfather to their daughter and son. He first made friends with Ineke ten Cate’s brother, but they soon fell for each other hard. However, there was actually a first wife, with whom he had a daughter, both of whom go conspicuously unmentioned throughout Tears.

Still, Hauer’s loyalty to the people from this period of his life is quite touching. Indeed, Fabery de Jonge and ten Cate revealingly discuss how painful the Nighthawks shoot was, due to his brother-in-law’s illness. Ten Cate’s pilgrimage to the modern-day Roosevelt Island tram (the setting for his famous face-off with Stallone) was a nice touch.

From the Dutch perspective, there was one voice from Hauer’s past whose absence would be so glaring, it might have undermined the entire documentary, but Paul Verhoeven is indeed present. In fact, he rather forthrightly admits forcing Hauer to appear as yet another villain in the poorly received Flesh+Blood unfairly set back the actor’s career. It turns out their professional relationship even predates Turkish Delight, going back to the Medieval swashbuckling TV series Floris (which looks like a ton of campy fun, so a streamer like Viaplay ought to consider picking it up).

SXSW ’25: Mola

Kunsang Wangmo turned 100 in 2015. If Tibetan Buddhist nun had not left Tibet shortly after the CCP’s occupation, she probably would not have survived to 50. However, reaching her centennial made her keenly aware of her mortality. She wished to return home for her death and reincarnation, but the Beijing regime strictly controls access to the captive Tibetan nation. Her granddaughter and Swiss son-in-law document her preparation for her final journeys. One will only be a matter of time, but they hope she can also make the arduous trek back to Lhasa before that happens in Yangzom & Martin Brauen’s Mola: A Tibetan Tale of Love and Loss, which screens during the 2025 SXSW Film Festival.

Most of her family and the Tibetan community in Switzerland simply know her as “Mola,” or grandmother. She has lived in the land of neutrality with her daughter, artist Sonam Dola Brauen and her son-in-law Martin for forty-five years. First, she and Sonam Dola fled through India, where her daughter eventually met Brauen, who was doing field work in Mussoorie.

Clearly, the mother-daughter relationship has its share of stresses and strains. That happens to most people, even if those who need not adjust to life in exile. However, her son-in-law always seems to maintain good terms with “Mola,” while granddaughter, director-thesp Yangzom, never directly appears on-camera.

Regardless, Mola appears quite spry and alert for her age and she largely maintains a healthy spirit. According to her own testimony, her faith helps sustain her. Still, it is hard to get around the significance of her approaching milestone. Switzerland’s neutrality ought to make her visa application easier, but her history obviously raises many red flags (so to speak).

SXSW ’25: Video Barn (short)

1980s video stores probably did more to spread horror stories than even the campfire. Genre fans are also nostalgic by nature, so it makes sense the old school video store is a staple of retro horror movies. After all, we all remember discovering many of our favorites through VHS rentals. This store has seen better days, so maybe the 1990s have already arrived, but the aesthetic is still very 80s in Bianca Poletti’s short film Video Barn, which screens during the 2025 SXSW Film Festival.

Like usual. Hannah is working late with her friend Jules at the Video Barn, but tonight she will sneak off early to see her boyfriend before he leaves for college. While left alone, a mysterious VHS tape seems to be calling her. She presses play.

When we next see Hannah, she is working the late shift with only her guilt for company. Jules has been missing so long, the media clearly assumes the worst. Her only customer sneaks behind the notorious old video store curtain (so you know what he came to browse).

Throughout Video Barn, Poletti displays a keen feel for the VHS era. Frankly, this is one of the better VHS-themed horror films, of any length. It is not quite as much fun as Beyond the Gates, but it is about on par with Scare Package and vastly superior to its ill-conceived sequel. (Yet, one of the best VHS horror productions was not even a movie, it was the Shudder podcast, Video Palace.)