The Foot Fist Way

A lot of small independent films come out that I read reviews for and think they would be fun to see.  Wet Hot American Summer was one of those films.  The Foot Fist Way was another.  The problem is that these films seldom make it to WV, so I’m left waiting for the DVD.  Of course I won’t buy the DVD until the price drops or I find it used, and that doesn’t always happen either.  Recently I did manage to run across a copy of The Foot Fist Way at Wills, so I picked it up.

The Foot Fist Way is the story of Fred Simmons (Danny McBride), a Tae Kwan Do instructor with a huge ego and a poor sense of reality.  The film shows us Simmons’ life in much the way a documentary filmmaker would show it.  It’s like watching The Office without the interview segments.  When Simmons finds out his wife has cheated on him (she gave her boss a hand job at a party), he begins a downward spiral.  He tries hitting on one of his female students to no avail and begins discussing his marital problems with his grade school age students in graphic detail.  The only bright spot for Simmons is his trip to Las Vegas to meet his idol Chuck “The Truck” Wallace (Ben Best).

Fred Simmons plays like a Will Ferrell character which is not surprising since Ferrell and Adam McKay were “presenters” on this film.  The director is Jody Hill, who also plays Simmons best friend Mike McAlister.  Hill was the writer/director of Observe and Report and has also worked with McBride on his television series Eastbound & Down. 

The Foot Fist Way has some funny sequences, and it has its share of cringe inducing moments as well.  The scene where Simmons sits in his van with one of his students whose parents failed to pick him up and starts talking about his wife while drinking beers has a very creepy feeling.  When he asks the kid if he knows what a hand job is and then proceeds to explain the act in technical detail, there is almost a predatory pedophiliac overtone to it, but that’s not the case.  The scene is just more of Simmons self-absorbed personality and bad judgement.  This is not your garden variety comedy.  It does have a fairly uplifting ending, but it’s not a case of everyone lived happily ever after either.

The DVD contains a behind the scenes featurette, but it is the worst example of this that I have ever seen.  There is no dialogue.  It is lots of home movie style footage spliced together with some music over top of it.  There are a couple of bloopers and some deleted scenes such as an alternate ending.  These are more enjoyable, but still nothing amazing. 

As I said The Foot Fist Way isn’t for everyone, but if you want something different, give it a shot.  For my money, Foot Fist Way gets 2 1/2 stars.

Roost Vol.1 Issue 1-2

At the same resale shop where I found the Disco Demolition DVD, I also found a DVD called Roost.  The cover has a man with two guns pointing right off the cover at the buyer.  The front cover calls it an Unrated Gangster Film DVD.  The side lists it as Vol. 1 Issue 1-2.  The back cover adds the subtitle “The End Is The Beginning” and states that it is an unrated graphic film novel DVD series.  The DVD disc has no artwork except for a printed sticker for the center of the DVD with the title.  I had no idea what I was buying, but for $2.99 I was intrigued enough to take a chance.

Roost is an urban Mickey Spillane or Raymond Chandler tale, but instead of a hard-boiled detective, Roost features Alex, a hard-boiled hitman for the mob.  Alex, portrayed by King B.,  is an iceman, when he is sent to do a job, he does it.  It doesn’t matter if it’s a man, a woman or a child.  Within the mob several forces are working on their own agendas and Alex is getting roped into some of their gamesmanship.  Mob boss Cutfoot Callahan’s daughter Sandy (Toya Turner) tricks her father into having Alex eliminate her cheating boyfriend and his new woman.  Now without a man and having a thing for bad boys, she starts to make a play for Alex.  Meanwhile another lady also makes a play for Alex by first convincing him that she is a prostitute and then by phone stalking him. 

In addition to the women causing problems for Alex, elements in Cutfoot’s mob have decided that it might be the perfect time to take out a rival gang whose leader has been a friend of Cutfoot’s for years.  They decide to take out the man’s son by sending Alex to do the job.  There’s a lot going on inside both gangs and it’s hard to tell who is playing who and for what reasons.

Looking at Roost’s case and the actual disc, I wasn’t sure what to expect.  I actually figured it would be some poor quality street hood crap with a lot of gangster rap and the fashions seen in rap and hip hop videos.  What I got was a thoughtful, well written, wonderfully produced and perfectly acted modern-day gangster film, and I want more.  King B.  wrote, directed, edited and starred in the film.  To do all of that and come up with something this well made outside of the major studios speaks volumes about this man’s talent.  The rest of the cast turns in performances that are equally memorable.  My only complaint was with the sound which seemed much less polished than the rest of the film in several places.

For whatever reason Roost has been overlooked on the IMDB, where I normally fact check and spell check the names of the characters and the actors portraying them.  The only place I was able to get more information was on King B.’s MySpace page at http://www.myspace.com/theredinc .  Getting the chance to watch this DVD and the Disco Demolition DVD certainly made the trip to visit my family even more wonderful as I doubt I would have ever found these discs in West Virginia.  The Roost DVD is also full of bonus features.  If you can’t find this DVD where you live, go to King B.’s page and order it.  You will be glad you did.  I give the film 3 3/4 stars.

The Comic Book Lady

Of all the DVDs I’ve watched over the last several months, this was the one I was anticipating most.  By the same token of all the DVDs that I’ve reviewed over the last several months, this was the one I knew was going to be the most difficult to review.  That’s because I know the writer/director and I know the lead actress personally.  I’ve known writer/director Shayne Barker for over two years.  I’ve known Kathleen, the comic book lady herself, since I was in high school.  I remember when they were shooting the film and had been curious to see the finished product.  The film has been shown at several film festivals, but it had never been released on DVD.  Shayne and Kathleen entrusted me with a copy of the film on DVD.  Think of it as kind of a screener copy.  Shayne has said he wants to make sure that when the film is transferred to DVD that it is a high quality transfer rather than a simple dub of the film.  Kathleen went so far as to tell me he almost never let anyone have a copy of the film on DVD.  To say that I felt incredibly honored to be given one of these DVDs is a major understatement.

There are several reasons that it is difficult to review this movie.  The first is that since I have known Kathleen for so many years, I can’t help but confuse the character with the person.  Kathleen owns and operates Comic World, the same comic shop featured in the film.  In the film her character doesn’t speak to any of the customers in her shop, but that is in sharp contrast to the real Kathleen who is always very helpful and knowledgable about the books that she sells.  Watching her silently nod in response to the customers seemed so out of character to me, but that’s because I couldn’t separate the person from the character.

Another thing that makes the film difficult to review has to do with the fact that this is truly an independent motion picture.  There was no studio bankrolling it.  There was no professional editing and recording studio team being utilized to put the project together.  This was Shayne’s film.  His was the artistic vision played out at 24 frames a second.  So how do you compare a film like this with a budget that’s likely smaller than the catering budget on a low-budget Hollywood film?  Well, I’m gonna try.

When I was in college for a couple of semesters I took a filmmaking class.  I actually made a couple of short films on 8mm.  They were, to put it plainly, crap.  It was hard to get the camera where I wanted it within the limits of the sets I had.  It was near impossible to get the performances that I envisioned.  Above all, the shots never looked as good projected on the screen as they did in my mind.  Shayne has managed to put together a film that looks like a film.  It doesn’t look like a couple of college students with an 8mm camera.  The lighting, the texture, the composition of the frame, they all look like a film should.  Shot in black & white several of the shots recall other films I have seen.  Certain close-ups reminded me of Eisenstein while other shots recalled Lynch’s Eraserhead and other art films whose names have slipped from my memories over the years.  I was impressed.  The film looks nice.

The story concerns the comic book lady’s day-to-day life at the comic shop where various customers (or more often browsers) wander through, and her home life with a man who doesn’t seem to have a job, always demands to be fed as soon as she walks in the door, and starts and ends his day the same way with some under the covers self pleasuring despite the fact that his wife is always within reach.  Of course that would require him to shift some of his attention away from himself, so he sticks with masturbation. 

The scenes in the shop remind me of some of the bits in Clerks where Kevin Smith showed the inane questions that customers would ask.  The customers give dissertations on why the new Justice League is going to be amazing, why Stan Lee is a genius, why the shop should carry Field & Stream, why Star Wars rules and numerous other topics.  These are people who take their comics way too seriously or are completely oblivious to the fact that they are in a comic shop.  One guy comes in looking for hot dogs and another comes in to preach the gospel.  The scary part is that I have seen some of these types of customers in real life.  I just hope I’ve never been as obsessed as some of these characters.

The film does a good job of showing us the monotonous day-to-day life of the comic book lady and how she is trapped both at home and at work with people interested only in what they want.  I kept wondering what the resolution would be and hoping for something to happen to bring a smile to the comic book lady.  When the final line of dialogue is delivered, it worked perfectly.  It wasn’t what I expected, but it was perfect never the less.

So all in all how does The Comic Book Lady rate?  Treating it like a normal film, I’d give it 2 1/2 stars.  The scenes in the shop are funny, but the scenes of her home life are equally depressing.  I couldn’t understand why she would stay with someone who treated her the way the husband did.  I’m anxious to talk with Shayne about the film and then watch it again to see if my thoughts might change.  That being said, as a totally independent first feature, I was blown away with what they managed to produce.  Judged solely on those merits, I give the film 3 1/2 stars.

Cashback

Cashback is a rare film.  Every once in a while a film that I’ve heard nothing about will suddenly present itself to me.  In the case of Cashback it happened on a normal browsing session of the DVD section at Target.  One thing that I have to give Target props for doing, is helping highlight independent films.  Wal-Mart is great for finding blockbuster new releases and marked down catalogue titles, but Target actually has a small section in their DVD department set aside for indy and art house films.  You’re not going to find Criterion films, but you will find some low-budget gems.  I was scanning this section when I noticed the cover to Cashback.  I couldn’t help but notice it.  The cover features a woman in her twenties, walking down the aisle of a supermarket, a far-off look in her eyes and her top undone and draping down her bare midriff.  The banner with the film’s title conveniently covers the area that she has exposed.  The effect is mesmerizing. 

I didn’t buy the DVD when I first noticed it, but the cover image stayed in my mind.  I looked up the film on the IMDB and discovered it was an expansion from an Oscar nominated short film.  The next time I was in Target I picked up a copy, and Thursday night I popped it in the DVD player and started watching it.  The film has an R rating for graphic nudity, sexual content and language.  The back cover of the case shows a girl leaning against a stripper pole in an exotic dancer outfit.  All the signs pointed to this being a sex romp comedy like American Pie or Porkys.  This was definitely a case of not judging a book (or DVD) by its cover.  Cashback is at its heart a love story. 

The entire film springs from events related to a break up.  When Suzy dumps art student Ben (Sean Biggerstaff) he develops insomnia.  He can’t stop thinking about her.  Since he can’t sleep he decides to take those extra 8 hours a day and take a job at a local supermarket on the night shift.  He quickly learns that the workers at the supermarket each have their own way of fighting the clock.  Time is the enemy, he explains.  If you stare at the clock it seems to go slower, so the workers find every way they can to speed up time and get through their shifts.  Ben on the other hand takes a different approach.  He learns how to freeze time.  Literally.  He stops time and walks silently between the people stuck in the moment.  He takes his art pad and sketches them as they stand perfectly frozen.  He undresses the women and admires their beauty as he practices his life drawing skills.  When he is ready for time to start back up, he simply cracks his fingers and time is as it was before.

Ben soon develops an attraction to Sharon (Emilia Fox), one of his co-workers.  He spends hours in frozen time drawing her.  When they eventually end up going out, her kiss breaks the curse of insomnia he has been dealing with.  This is a truly wonderful movie.  It is not a laugh out loud comedy, nor is it a sex romp by any stretch of the imagination.  Yes, there is nudity, but it is not gratuitous.  It is artistic, like a walk through an art museum’s nudes collection.  The ending is especially magical as Ben, like the movie itself, is able to share the beauty he sees in these frozen moments.

The acting in this film is perfect as is the direction.  Certain shots continue to run through my head such as the intricate shot of Ben falling off the telephone into bed or the sleight of hand trickery shot of  store employee Barry (Michael Dixon) making his first appearance.  I highly recommend seeking out a copy of this film and watching it.  I give it 4 stars.

Freak Out

The other night when I was at Wills, I purchased a couple of films I wasn’t familiar with.  One of them was District B13 which I watched and loved.  The other film was a horror movie comedy called Freak Out.  Freak Out concerns a couple of horror movies fans that end up having an escaped mental patient turn up in their back yard.  The Looney may be crazy, but he’s also a vegetarian that tells people that “meat is murder”.  The two buddies, Merv Doody and Onkey, decide to try to mold their Looney into a serial killer.

Freak Out is not nearly as good as District B13, but Freak Out isn’t bad either.  Keep in mind that Freak Out was an independent film that took just under 5 years to make.  It is a labor of love with some very funny bits and several jokes that fall flat.  It also has several layers of hidden subtext that may be missed upon first viewing.  The film really tries to be funny.  Even the music has humor attached to it.  A song used in a montage scene sounds suspiciously like Maniac from Flashdance, but the song tells us that copywrite infringement is a crime and not to be confused, because this song sounds nothing like that other song that you;ve heard before.  It’s a joke inside a joke, playing over top of the montage joke.

The DVD I got was a former rental and although the disc was marked Disc 1, the case makes no mention of a second disc, and no other disc was included.  I checked on eBay and apparently there was a 2 Disc version released.  Most rental places don’t cater to film buffs that want all the bonus features, so they often get special bare bones versions from the distributer.  Apparently this was the case here as well with the second disc just not being included.

The lead characters of Merv and Onkey apparently also made a cameo in the movie Evil Aliens, so now I need to try to check that out.  Dan Palmer, the actor playing Onkey, reminds me of Trevor Moore from The Whitest Kids U’Know, so that was running through my mind the whole time I was watching it.

Horror comedies are difficult to pull off, and low-budget, independent ones are even harder.  One of my favorites in this genre is Psychos In Love.  Freak Out is no Psychos In Love, but it is a hundred times better than any movie in the Scary Movie franchise.  If you can get it cheap, check it out.  As a movie I give Freak Out a 2 1/2.  If it had been on Night Flight as one of their films like J Men Forever or Nick Danger and the Case of the Missing Yolk, it would have been an 8 if for no other reason than the Arse Piranaha and the talking Looney doll.