TYTD Reviews

I had the absolute privilage of watching the ‘Quicker Man’ 18 minute ‘triple bill’ feature cut tonight, and it was everything I hoped for and more. Hilarious honestly. You may not get the songs, bizarreness or performance ‘chops’ in this cut. But you damn well better believe you’ll get the ‘cliff notes’ version of the ‘Wicker Man’ in a bitesize pill. And I have to respect that.

Very well put together, I could see myself catching this one a few more times. Great if you have a quick lunchbreak and fancy watching a movie.

More films need to have an 18 minute cut. Titanic, Carrie, Halloween, Tron…The skies the limit and I wanna be there.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-wicker-man/6/

As a long time fan of ‘The Wicker Man’, I’d found it rather odd that its thematic sequel ‘The Wicker Tree’ is often noticeably absent from Wicker discourse within the ‘Wicker’ fandom. In fact, before watching this film I actually reached out to several of my friends who are massive ‘Wicker Man’ fans, and most admitted they hadnt bothered to check it out. And the ones who had didnt really have much good to say about the film other than ‘…Well, its a movie…thats for sure.’

So going into this one, I didnt really have any kind of idea what to expect, other than a lot of people I knew actively deciding up front that it probably wasnt going to be as good as ‘The Wicker man’…so why bother? And y’know what? Sometimes, the status quo is right on the money.

As mentioned this is a thematic sequel to ‘The Wicker Man’…so essentially it deals more in the themes of ‘old gods’ and murderous cults rather than it being a direct continuation of the antics on Summerisle. and while Christopher Lee does get a VERY brief cameo (mild spoilers) noone involved in the production honestly knew or cared enough to decide if Lee was supposed to be playing Lord Summerisle…or just a guy.

The plot in this instance centers around ‘born again’ puritan Christians Beth and Steve. The pair are famous musicians on the Christian circuit and have decided to act as missionaries sharing the good word of the lord to a small Scottish village. On arriving at the village from Dallas Texas. The locals greet them with warmth and friendliness…But it becomes apparent quite quickly that things are all they seem in the village. An accident involving the local power plant has rendered the village completely infertile, with very few children. And the villagers have their eye on Steve to help ‘increase’ the population…Testing both singers vows of celibacy.

And…from that point onwards, this essentially just turns into idle chatter at a village feight, until the last 10 minutes when it all goes a bit traditional cult murderey…and indeed as the credits rolled I too had to concede that; Yes. This was indeed ‘A movie’.

The quick answer to why this film ended up the way it is, is the way most of these movies end up the way they do…Money. Robin Hardy had been trying to sell a Wicker man sequel for years, and eventually managed to get a deal agreed with ‘British Lion’ (the company that funded the original Wicker Man.) Unfortunately; there was a communication breakdown and Hardy thought this was going to be a multi million pound film production…and as such; he produced a script that reflected that budget…Only for British Lion to bring him crashing down to reality that this very much was NOT the case…At which point, the cuts began.

I dont honestly know how much of this movie was torched before production began, but I do know that a LOT of the bigger ideas that DID make it into the final movie, had to be scaled down to a ‘Direct to Tubi’ level consistency. From there, things go from bad to worse.

The script is painfully beige. Watching this actually gave me a greater understanding of the careful ‘Yin/Yang’ balance that the original ‘Wicker Man’ script had. The bones of the work, a carefully crafted drama mystery with horror elements via Anthony Shaffer. Peppered liberally with some eccentricities and finesses from Hardy. The two elements complimented each other creating a simultaneous believable work, with fantastical; but non the less grounded elements.

The Wicker Tree by contrast is all Hardy. And the end result is a plodding and beige feature that borders on cringy in places, with unmemorable, flat and lifeless characters with ‘gimmicks’ to try and push things along. The joy of ‘The Wicker Man’ was that of the unknown and the isolated. We didnt know what Sgt. Howie was walking into as an audience, and the characters of Summerisle keep their cards very close to their chests. only revealing dribs and drabs of key plot, and a LOT of red herrings, until Howie is in such a position that he’s trapped. Fully aware of what he’s tangled himself up into, horrified, and totally unable to escape.

Here? the main characters spell out the entire plot of the movie in the first 30 minutes, and the rest of the film is watching the main characters (who arnt aware) slowly eek into a situation we knew IN FULL over an hour prior to the finale.

The pacings slow and unpleasent. Not in a ‘slow burn’ way…in a ‘we’re killing time’ way. the acts are consistent…but take an age to transistion. Quite honestly? there were moments here where I didnt even recognise an act change because that little happens in the film.

There are moments where I really got a sense of what had been cut from the film. Moments with characters, where it felt like something much more grand must have taken place in the script. But rathat than rework it to make it work better in the context of the budget and time they had for this production. they just…deleted the expensive bit, but left the residues in place. Leading to a very dislocated viewing experience.

Dialogue isnt as memorable or interesting as the original film, the core characters are fairly unremarkable, to the point that our main characters end up feeling like B-tier characters in a movie ABOUT THEM.

I think the fundamental issue with this movie really is that we just…dont get the same sense of helplessness or isolation that the original movie instilled. In that film we followed Howie as a mainlander falling into this world of strange islanders, where nothing quite made sense, until it was too late to understand the danger. Here? we’re chummy with the islanders, we spend more time with the islanders than the main characters. And it means that…rather than us feeling a sense of unease or dread about them. It really does feel like (up until the final 10 minutes) we’re just hanging around with the locals of any village or town in the north of Britain.

Thats not even getting into the fact that NON of the characters are remotely likeable. Howie was not a particularly ‘likeable’ character in the Wicker Man…but we at least could associate and relate to him from the perspective of ‘hes a guy trying to enact the law, and in his own mind, while he may be arrogant about his faith. He isnt ACTIVELY an unlikeable person’. Beth and Steve by contrast come across as grifters, con artists. We dont see enough of their genuine selves to gain any kind of appreciation or likability for them. I personally believe this was Hardys attempt at a bit of lampooning or critiquing of Evangelist culture in America…or that he just…didnt much care for Americans as a cultural movement. I kind of have to take that stance based on how unlikeable he makes every American character in this movie.

Visually the things a bust as well…from a directoral standpoint, I dont have *TOO* many gripes, this is fairly competently shot, but its basic. this is very much ‘Direct to streaming’ fodder with very little in the way of sincere unique creativity. its painting by numbers folk horror. Nothing you wouldnt find in any low to lower medium budget horror film from around this window of time. For any other Low/No budget production, i’d have been kind of ‘Meh’ on that and given it a pass…But with this being a sequel to a film that I widely consider to be one of the best horror films ever made? Its beyond disheartening and quite dissatisfying.

Not helped either by the colour grade. Where we trade 70s vibrant and lush multicolour horror of Green rolling hills, roaring red and orange fires, the blues of the sea and skies and the vibrancy of the budding flowers…for that scourge of 2000’s horror…the desaturated ‘brown grey’ colour grade. everythings washed out, nothing pops, nothing looks interesting, it all blends into a sludge of mediocrity…which only further reinforces the kick to the nads that this film did to me.

The cine is pretty ‘mid’ too…we have very little in the way of interesting composition, and overreliance on weird plug in filters and POV shots and nudity that feel less ‘Steamy erotica’ and more ‘Babestation’ in its execution. I was…dissapointed to say the least. Matched with an edit that felt clunky, poorly planned and executed in a way that left me feeling really kind of depressed.

While the direction and cine are kind of bland, but ultimately passable. Its the combination of the script and performances that really let this film down. The ONLY solid performance in this whole film is Honeysuckle Weeks as ‘Lolly’ one of the cultists essentially playing the ‘Britt Eckland’ role in this movie. Shes good! she seems to have nailed the assignment of not playing things too cartoony, but having a degree of unpredictable eccentricity about her performance. Whenever she was on screen, I did genuinely wonder what direction her performance was going to take. Which I see as a good sign.

Unfortunately; the rest of the cast end up largely flailing. With Brittania Nicol and Henry Garret as Beth and Steve really failing to do anything other than make me wonder if Robin Hardy had ever heard an American accent before. They’re stiff, have very little on screen chemistry and neither of them really convinced me that they believed anything they were saying or doing. Graham McTavish as Lachlan Morris establishes himself as ‘the bad guy’ more or less immediately; and then fails to really do anything that would cement the fact he’s supposed to be the ‘bad guy’ for this movie. Underwhelming, underutilised and lacking any real ‘show stealing’ moments. He’s no Christopher Lee…and while I know they’re big shoes to fill…It didnt really even come close to me.

The rest of the supporting cast range from middling to poor. With a major issue really being that these cast member just dont really seem to understand the tonal balance of how to play a cultist trying to lure someone in. They either play it completely straight, which doesnt work because its missing that feint unhinged element that lets the audience know somethings a bit amiss…Or they play it completly doolally. which again, doesnt work because NOONE would chat to a guy who only talks in riddles, who has a pet raven that attacks people and only listens to records about how its wrong to eat people…If I were in that situation, i’d have been halfway to Yorkshire before sundown.

And; as an aside. Thats ANOTHER problem this film has…it simply CANNOT resist back referencing ‘The Wicker Man’…even though this is really only supposed to be a thematic sequel. Giving the main villains of this film the last name ‘Morrison’, giving Lachlan Morrison Christopher lees tweed jacket to wear for most of the movie. bringing back (more affordable) cast members from the Wicker man for cameo appearences. direct references to Summerisle and music stings are all WAY too prevelent and on the nose. I dont mind one…maybe two passing nods to a previous film. But its SO blatant and on the nose here that its impossible really for me to think anything other than ‘Hey…I should stop watching this sub par attempt at a Wicker Man sequel…and just go WATCH the Wicker Man’…

The final nail in the coffin for this one really is the soundtrack. The original Wicker Man reworked and modernised classic folk songs from history into a mesmorising and beautiful score that still holds strong to this day. The Wicker Tree vaguely tries to do something similar, but with gospal music. and it SUCKS…SO SO bad. most of the reworkings of gospal numbers sound muddy, poorly arranged and flat. they dont add anything to the film, if anything that just make things feel all the more cheaper. The original songs are dire. vaguely religious themed works that dont gel with the language of the singer….and Beths ‘pop’ song from when she was just making it into the industry, really truely had me biting my knuckle for the 3rd party embarrassment. its a stink bomb of a score, a truely awful work in my opinion which…when mixed with all the other elements, really truely acts as the millstone around the neck of this movie.

Had ‘The Wicker Tree’ had zero ties to ‘The Wicker Man’…Had it just been some low – lower medium budget offering from an indie film maker. I’d have probably still disliked it. But I could have been kinder given its attempt at trying to create folk horror with unknowns at the healm.

But this had talented people behind it. Christopher Lee personally campaigned to drag top level cast members into this. And because it tries to shore itself up to the Wicker man SO intently…without really TRYING to match the quality or flare of ‘The Wicker Man’, it makes the fall from grace SO much more dissapointing to me. I knew every single beat of this movie from about 20 minutes in, and I didnt get a single thing wrong. I dont consider that a good sign when watching a film. A rushed, poorly made production that desperately needed cash to put it even remotely into ‘good terratory’. I absolutely cannot recommend this one to anyone. I say this earnestly…You’ll have a MUCH more enjoyable time watching the 2006 Wicker Man remake than this.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-wicker-tree/

Well; I’ve made it to part 3 in the ‘Vice Academy’ Franchise and…honestly? theres not a whole lot to say really. In essence this is just a slightly more screwball, slightly more titilating and slightly less coherent redux of ‘Part 2’.

A film that feels almost bored of exploring new ground and instead falls into self referential directoral callbacks to Rick Sloans earlier works (expect similar scene set ups to ‘Hobgoblins’, ‘Blood Theater’ and ‘The Visitants’ to be melded in here with random references to Batman ’66 and early John Waters movies…) It SHOULD in theory be a film that I got on with. But its lack of enthusiasm to actually try and push the series forward just kind of left me flagging a bit.

So the film picks up a few months after the events of Part 2, Linnea Quigley asked for too much money this time- I…I mean…’DiDi’ has moved on from the Vice team to pastures new and in her place her younger, more affordable sister Candy has just graduated into the force and is looking to cut her teeth after her time in the Academy. Cue Candy basically doing a similar set of patter to the opening half of Vice Academy 2…just sans Holly.

Holly meanwhile is undercover in a womens prison and hating every minute of it. When a new inmate called Melanie springs a jailbreak she takes with her a crew of inmates and swears vengence on the local authoraties. Leading the Vice Squad ultimately to pull Holly out of her undercover duties to team up with Candy in…err…well…the film isnt entirely sure. They keep saying they need to catch Melanie and her gang and put them back behind bars…but the vast majority of the films runtime (up until the final 10 minutes or so) is just Holly and Candy taking part in varying degrees of risque ‘sitcom’ style shenanigans intercut with Melanie and the team gurning and swearing there absolute vegence on the city.

As you can imagine its boobs, bums, gun battles and plinky plonky synth music out the wazoo from minute 2 till closing credits.

And…yeah, there isnt much to say. Realistically this feels like Rick Sloan had a lot of potential ‘skits’ that he couldnt quite fit into ‘Vice Academy Part 2’ so he just pulled them out of the garbage, finnessed them and wove a thread through the leftovers creating this movie. It doesnt feel any better paced, any better scripted and the dialogue feels even more stilted and strange than before.

Its not an unpleasent watch really, it just…isnt anything new. they retread a lot of old ground from the previous movie, the humour isnt particularly built on or developed from the last film. and because the plot is even less present here, it just kind of feels like your watching an attempt at a reconstruction of a film that the cast and crew can only vaguely remember.

Direction and cine equally feel under developed with a lot of the better scene structurings being self referential pastiches or literal copy/paste lifts from the directors earlier films. Again, its not BAD perse…its just not anything we didnt get in the last two movies, and i’d had quite my fill of this type of thing WITH the last two movies…So I just kind of found myself asking what the point of this entry was for most of the runtime.

The performances are a bit stiffer than the last film, Elizabeth Kaitan is a fine enough addition to the cast, but the air head gags by this point are worn through to the point of exhaustion and…while shes a change of pace…she’s no Linnea Quigley here. The rest of the cast seem largely on auto pilot. Not in an unpleasent way, but just in a way that makes you acknowledge that this is absolutely just a paycheque gig to them and nothing else…something to help fill a couple weeks in a scheduling diary and to keep their management happy.

The quick caption summary for ‘Vice Academy Part 3’ from me is ‘Basically just Vice Academy 2, but less coherent and less fun’. With the previous two films I could actually see myself revisiting them with a heavy whiskey. But this one? I dont really see the point. Its just a less good take of the last film…and if I OWN the last film…why would I bother with this?

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/vice-academy-part-3/

Did ‘Vice Academy’; a film largely trying to answer the question ‘What if ‘Police Academy’ but less funny and more boobs?’ need a sequel? I dont feel its my place to say really, but in either case, they promised a sequel at the end of the first one, and lo and behold, we’re here.

What is ‘Vice Academy 2’? Well…continuing on from the ‘Police Academy’ ties, part two is quite literally ‘Their First Assignment’ as Holly and Didi pick up where the last film ended, starting their careers in the Vice Squad…well…sort of. Honestly; the plot of this one is border incoherent in places and can effectively be split into two halves, with the opening half of the movie being Holly and Didi trying to find a place where they fit in within the police department (with HILARIOUS and SEXY results) and the second half being their attempt to infiltrate and gather evidence on a woman codenamed ‘Spanish Fly’ who runs a nightclub(s)/sex ring operation who has a personal vendetta against the local law enforcement.

With their careers on the line and a potential stint as undercover cops in jail looming over their heads unless they deliver the goods, the pair must learn to work together to bring Spanish fly to justice and find out just what it takes to be a cop!

This…is a messy messy movie, I honestly gave my best shot at trying to follow it, but its firing off in so many different directions it may as well just be a series of comedy ‘bit’ parts with a loose narrative woven through it. Its not unpleasent you understand…I mean, comedy is subjective and a lot of this movie veers wildly between DEEPLY unfunny and actually pretty hilarious. But, and I say this to my own surprise, this film is probably funnier than the majority of the ‘Police academy’ movies, unironically.

The pacing is breakneck, the screwball elements are funny in their own right, the sexy stuff is a nice addition but it feels almost like it doesnt need to be here, the tones wacky to the point of nausea inducing at times…its not the best film in the world, but it definitely has a charm about it that Rick Sloan is known for. While I absolutely cant say this is one of his best, It does still have a good sense of humour and structure to it that feels more in line with his ‘Hobgoblins’ style works than his ‘Blood Theater’ style stuff.

Direction and cine are just about on the level if you can ignore continuity, the performances are aggressively over the top in trying to make you laugh, which goes both ways of simultainously bordering on grating, while also sometimes winding up granting the ‘Stewart Lee’ effect of the repetative hammering of a gag ending up actually becomign funny.

This isnt a remarkable looking picture, but it sits competent in terms of editing and sequence structuring, it isnt obnoxious, it knows what it is and its just having a fun time doing what its here to do.

This probably isnt Linnea Quigley or Ginger Lynns best work, but again, they seem to be having fun here, and its clear from their performances that they’re here for their own amusement and the paycheque was a bonus.

The scores dreadful plinky plonky synth stuff. But on the whole? I was expecting a lot worse and came out pleasently surprised. I dont think this would be one i’d be able to watch with my full attention again, but I could absolutely see myself popping this on in the background and drifting in and out of it while im doing something else, its got a pleasent enough vibe and has just enough sincerity and good humour in it for me to consider giving it a revisit…I can really recommend it if you arnt planning on watching all of these. But if you liked the first one, its basically more of the same. But more incoherent.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/vice-academy-part-2/

One of the earlier AGFA offerings I sank my teeth into. ‘Sometimes Aunt Martha Does Dreadful Things’ is the intersection between a daytime TV movie and a ‘Desperate Living’ era John Waters movie.

The plot revolves around 2 ‘on the run’ murderers Paul and Stanley. The pair accidentally murdered a couple of people in a blind rage and as the film picks up, they’ve both gone into hiding with Paul disguising himself as a middle aged to elderly ‘Aunt Martha’ while Stanley plays the part of her Nephew the idea being that Stanley is in the care of his Aunt Martha.

But both are having problems. Stanley has some psychiatric problems and force him into a blind murderous frenzy whenever a woman wants to have sex with him, and…this is the early 70s, so a lot of ‘free love’ is still floating about. While Paul is struggling to keep his cool, DESPERATELY unhappy with having to play a middle aged old woman and even MORE unhappy that Stanley isnt really even trying to keep a low profile while being tied to him because of the murders.

Things begin to escalate when Stanley starts once again attacking women and ends up bringing home an old friend who’s aware of the pair and may in fact be working against them. With the tension and the bodies mounting Paul decides that the heat is too much, and begins plans to relocate and start again…Though, whether Stanley will be part of those plans is very much up in the air.

The best way I can summize this film is that there are a handful of campy and wonderful moments across the runtime…broken up by a DESERT of inactivity.

The plot itself is engaging, but only on about the same level as a late 60s daytime movie. in fact, it really kind of has a lot of the DNA of one of those films, the only real difference being that it isnt afraid to swear and isnt afraid of getting a bit bloody or dealing with difficult topics in places. But with some light (and I mean *light*) editing, this could have just as easily run alongside Kolchak or CHiPS honestly. And thats kind of the problem.

The plot in and of itself is fine, but it gets bogged down so quickly in the finer detail that after the first 10 or so minutes has happened, we’re stuck wading through kitchen sink drama and ‘freak outs’ that feel threadbear. The marketing for this film suggests a kind of punkish, more gory spin on ‘Psycho’ but in actuality its themes are probably the most controversial than anything you physically see on screen.

The pacing is a little on the slow side and the characters are a bit ill fitting from a development and scope perspective. The whole thing feels a little flat if im honest. That ISNT to say though that their isnt good to be had here, as the campier moments (particularly the interactions between Paul and Stanley, or the murder seqeunces) are, in and of themselves, very entertaining and do prop this thing up as and when required. Its just a shame that the films so good at ramping up into those moments, but not so good and maintaining the tone or pace after the fact.

The ending feels a bit rushed, the character development is slow and doesnt feel satisfying either. Its a film that has its moments, but struggles to really define itself past its initial shock premise.

Visually, i’d say im actually quite impressed. While it isnt exactly the most breathtaking production on earth, it does feel like a competent 60’s/70’s era TV movie, which given some of the absolute rot that the low/no budget era of indie film making gave us (look at Ray Dennis Stecklers Adult career around this time for dross beyond comprehension) this holds it together remarkably well, its a solid competent work that, while maybe a little thin on styalisation, is strong on editing and sequence building and the compositional choices, while a little on the safe side, work and work well.

Performance wise? Really this movie belongs to Abe Zwick who plays Paul/Aunt Martha. he’s phenominal here and utterly EATS any scene he’s in with zest. I loved him, and he pretty much tipped the film from being something I was tempted to clock watch on, into something I knew I had to watch till the bitter end. He really does nail it and is MORE than worth the price of admission.

The rest of the cast though? are not so solid…ranging from overly dry and stiff performances, to turns that feel more like test takes of the actors goofing on set than actual deliveries. its a mixed bag, and your milage may vary as to whether you find these entertainingly eccentric performances, or just border unwatchable ones.

Throw in a kind of stocky sounding score and overall ‘Sometimes Aunt Martha Does Dreadful Things’ just about tips the scale in its favour. I came away not excactly thrilled by the experience, but happy I caught it again and glad I stayed for the stranger moments.

I think this would probably pair quite well as a B-feature to ‘The Baby’ or something of that ilk, its got that kind of trashy vibe, and I think if you liked that movie, you’ll probably quite enjoy this one.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/sometimes-aunt-martha-does-dreadful-things/1/

Another year, another ‘Oscar Special’ and, if im being honest…a bit of a mixed bag for me this time around. Greggheads didnt get quite as much Gregg this year as usual. But when he got to deliver his movie expertize it was a crowd pleaser all round.

The fact Tim ‘Amatto’ Heidecker is still walking free is chilling honestly. ESPECIALLY given he’s now making racist kids shows and stealing from the elderly.

In short, needs more Gregg, More Mark, more three stooges and W.C Fields puppeteering and way WAY less Dootle Dots. WE’RE HERE FOR THE MOVIES GUYS!

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-13th-annual-on-cinema-oscar-special/

From what I can find online about this piece, its the middle part in a trilogy of short films titled: ‘The Werewolf Cult Chronicles’. A 20 minute short film set in Vietnam via Stockholm, this is a Swedish horror film that seemingly wants to be ‘Dog Soldiers’ and its a bizarre watch to say the least.

The main reason being that its a short film where you can visually see and hear the budget run out across its full runtime. The opening 5 minutes (while not excactly breathtaking) have solid CG effects for 2004/05, have decent direction and cine, and while the editing is a little ‘explosive’ for lack of a better word, it feels right and looks pretty good.

However, once this opening 5 minute flashback cuts to the present day, the budget seems to shrink and shrink, with costumes looking cheaper and cheaper as the film runs on. the quality of the direction going from ‘stylish vision’ to ‘just about functional’, the amount of cuts shrinks right down, the edit becomes increasingly incoherent. And the special effects, which again, for 2004/05 start strong, end up getting cheaper and cheaper as the film goes on until we end bordering ‘Amazing bulk’ quality CGI and Halloween masks brought from a grocery store.

The plot itself is fairly generic, largely focussing on two soldiers in veitnam learning of a werewolf curse from the 16th century. Its all kind of bland…with Vocal overdubs that start of hilariously awful and end up sounding like someone trying to do an American accent, who’s never HEARD an American accent, But has had one described to them by a Norwegian…

All in all? I dont think its really worth your time. I do feel for completionists sake that I should at least TRY to find the first entry in the series…Just to see if im missing something blatent here…but yeah. Not worth your time, just kind of dull and its said everything it needs to say within the first 5 minutes or so.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-werewolf-cult-chronicles-vietnam-1969/

A bizzare take on a variety performance ‘Fata Morgana’ was curated by Lee Hazlewood and features a variety of Swedish performers doing what they do best…opera and contemporary rock and roll. Its a trip and a half to be sure, with mind melting visual effects basically turning what could have been a kind of mediocre music programme into something that feels positively ‘Adult Swim’ by way of Vic Berger.

Its very lumpy, doesnt always make coherent sense and as soon as I found out that this was essentially a rushed submission to a broadcasters awards ceremony. It all seemed to fall into place that the reason this looked the way it looked is because they essentially rushed a variety performance through and then chucked it to the AV lads and told them to use as much ‘visual effects’ as its possible to use. Bearing in mind this is Sweden in 1979…so the visual effects are on a par with the US circa 1970.

All in all, what I loved from this one, I REALLY enjoyed for its surreal and unusual tone and presentation. What I didnt like, I was kind of bored by. Definitely worth watching at least once if your a fan of Counter culture European culture.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/fata-morgana-1979/

The latest Theroux documentary sees a jump to Netflix and a revisiting to the world of the ‘Manosphere’. around 10 years ago Louis explored the ‘alt right’ pipeline and the manosphere was an element of what he touched on, and now 10 years on he’s back exploring the increasingly bizarre world of ‘male influencers’ and redpill culture.

The whole ‘Alpha Male’, ‘Blackpill’, Looksmaxxing Incel movement is prime material for Theroux, and in his own way he shines a light on what is essentially a LOT of sad and lost souls using their own internalised hatred to try and find meaning in a world thats moved beyond them. They say that a child who is shunned by its village will burn it down to feel its warmth and by the end of this documentary I was left with no real doubt that if any of these Children could read, we would genuinely be doomed.

At this point, I dont feel like its an overstatement to consider Theroux a national treasure, and this documentary is about as formulaeic as its possible to get really for Theroux’s career at this point. He brings with him a calm and gentle persona that enquires looking for the exact moment where he can really strike into the nub of the issue. In many ways, he’s the antithesis of the ‘manosphere’ movement. A voice that cuts through the snake oil salemen…and its clear here they really dont like it.

Do I think this is his best work? no. I feel like this documentary falls down on three counts. I dont feel like it goes deep enough into the movement, its all very surface level and really designed to be more of an introduction to the concept, rather than an overview of the movement as of 2026. I also dont quite feel like this is as scathing as his first visit into this area. The 2010’s version of this documentary felt more ‘plugged in’ and Theroux seemed much more disdainful and willing to go for the jugular on these strange strange men. But here, I think the fact that a lot of these content creators basically threatened to pull the plug on the whole operation if he probed too deep, kept him at arms length rather than allowing him to get to the crux of the issue.

And finally, I just dont really feel like this builds much on Louis’s previous offers as a documentarian. Dont get me wrong, this is some good Theroux material…But after reinventing himself in the 2010s to move away from the more ‘weird weekends’ aesthetic, I didnt really feel any kind of growth or development from him as a speaker that wasnt seen in offering such as his look into Scientology or last years brilliant piece on the Settlers in Israel.

If you’ve been terminally online for the last few years, I dont think this documentary will offer all that much in the way of revelations. But I think this is the perfect thing to introduce a more mainstream audience to the manosphere concept. Especially if its paired up with his ‘alt right’ documentary from a few years ago. As for me? I enjoyed this as much as I can enjoy any Louise Theroux documentary. But I do feel it couldnt quite find its bite. While it does an excellent job of revealing this ‘influencers’ as scared and scarred sad children being hollowed out by the darkest parts of society. It doesnt quite manage to seal things off in a way that felt satisfying to me. I enjoyed this one. But I wouldnt say its his best.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/louis-theroux-inside-the-manosphere/

A nice complimentary piece to Baz Luhrmann’s 2022 Elvis Biopic. EPiC is essentially a pseudo documentary/concert film that came about as a result of Luhrmanns research team discovering hundreds of hours of previously unseen footage of Elvis performing in and around his Vegas residency period. The film flows in and out of songs with linking interview narration from the King himself as he talks about his feelings towards being a performer, his personal life and the toll it takes on him.

I always find documentary hard to really comment on, concert films even moreso really…But whats presented here is probably the best Elvis ‘Concert’ film to be released commercially (Not including the comeback special or ‘Aloah from Hawaii’) its imperfect…but its rock solid.

What works here is the editing, which is frankly obscenely good in my opinion. there are segments of the edit here where we weave in and out of different iterations of Elvis singing the same song at different points in the 70s and it flows and moves so effortlessly as to be border faultless. The music mixing is excellent REALLY blowing the dust of these rapidly approaching 50 year old recordings and remixing demos live performances and studio mixes to produce a modern feeling, but respectful of the era set of song mixes that on a good sound system felt like you were watching the concert itself live in person.

The documentary elements are a nice touch and help weave a solid narrative between the Elvis the crowd saw, and the quieter; goofier counterpart hanging out back stage.

It also has to be said that this footage looks immaculate, they mix in some more famous archive footage with the newly restored stuff, but all of it looks incredible, almost as if filmed yesterday and on a big screen, it really shows every fine detail. its really a remarkable work.

As for the not so good? Well…while I do think they did a good job in remastering and remixing the concert tracks, they have a really bad habit of mixing tiny snippets of other elvis songs into the film…but not really developing them or cutting them short. The most notable one for me being a brief moment where they start to play ‘An American Trilogy’ but cut it short before it even really begins. ‘In the Ghetto’ gets similar treatment. And it was frustrating because they are two personal favourites of mine, and to have them play about 20 seconds of them both before cutting to something compeletly different left me aching to see what they could have done with those tracks.

Equally; while the editing for the most part is an incredible work…with ‘Polk Salad Annie’ being a particular highlight for me. Sometimes it feels a little TOO breakneck for its own good, careering around the show and the audience to the point that it becomes difficult to really keep track of what im supposed to be looking at…the random use of psychadelic manipulation of the concert footage as well at times worked out okay…But for the most part just felt a bit cheap and weird…and not in a good way.

But! Overall, I really liked this one. i’ll almost certainly nab a 4k if it gets one, I can absolutely recommend it if your a fan of 70s Elvis, or just like the hits. and I can definitely see myself catching this one again in future. Though…quite HOW they missed out ‘See See Rider’ given it was Elvis’s intro song for a LOT of his concerts is totally missed on me!

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/epic-elvis-presley-in-concert/