If all you care about is plot, FLASHDANCE isn’t very good. There’s not much to it, just two central threads, both lightly sketched. First is the story of a talented young dancer who wants to apply to a ballet academy, but believes that her modern style will be rejected by snobby gatekeepers. We’ve seen so many more detailed variations on that theme in BREAKIN’, STEP UP, CENTER STAGE, STREET DANCE, etc. that this doesn’t seem like much.
The second thread is a romance between her and her boss, who’s twice her age, is completely transparent that he’s interested in her because he saw her do a sexy dance, is not particularly hot himself, keeps hitting on her after she says no, pisses her off by secretly using his connections to get her an audition she wanted to earn, and is forgiven without ever doing anything to make amends. At best, you understand her having a fling she’ll regret later, and hope she broke it off within the week. It’s hardly a romance for the ages.
And yet I kinda loved FLASHDANCE, because it feels like every other thing besides the plot goes above and beyond. In the case of the cinematography it goes above and beyond and loops back under and then goes above again. It’s Donald Peterman, who had shot WHEN A STRANGER CALLS and a couple others. He later became Ron Howard’s guy (SPLASH, COCOON, GUNG HO, HOW THE GRINCH STOLE CHRISTMAS) and Barry Sonnenfeld’s guy (ADDAMS FAMILY VALUES, GET SHORTY, MEN IN BLACK) and he did STAR TREK IV: THE VOYAGE HOME. Okay, I’m not sure what to make any of that, but he also did POINT BREAK, and that’s an impressive credit. (read the rest of this shit…)
For many years I was aware that there was an old ‘80s movie released on VHS called SHORT FUSE starring Art Garfunkel. Because of that tough sounding title I figured it was some kind of 
Mario Bava’s DANGER: DIABOLIK stars John Phillip Law, who to me will always be Pygar, the blind angel of love from BARBARELLA. This one came out earlier the same year, 1968, and kinda seems like BARBARELLA’s evil crime movie cousin. It is in fact another Dino De Laurentiis international co-production based on a comic book, and reportedly uses some of the same sets (though I’m not sure which ones). It feels very much like a super hero movie at the beginning: we hear police talking about Law’s character Diabolik as some kind of legendary figure, he first appears in a long black car (Jaguar, not Batmobile), he shows up in a mask, does his thing, makes an escape to a secret entrance to an amazing hidden base inside a cave. But this guy is no super hero, he’s just a thief with a whole lot of flair.
I’m still catching up with these RUROUNI KENSHIN movies. I really recommend 
GUARDIAN ANGEL is a 1994 Cynthia Rothrock joint from PM Entertainment, directed by Richard W. Munchkin (RING OF FIRE) and written by Joe Hart (REPO JAKE, 
I don’t know what DEMENTIA 13 means, but that’s the name of Francis Ford Coppola’s official on the record first feature directorial work, and it’s the rare Coppola horror outing, almost 30 years before 
HYDRA (2019) is a modest Japanese crime movie that I enjoyed for its simplicity. It begins harshly, with a very efficient killing and disposal of a guy in a public restroom. The very human detail that the victim can’t stop peeing as he’s stabbed and dragged from the urinal to a stall ups the disturbing factor by about 150%. And that’s before we see a man wearing tight swimming trunks (Takashi Nishina, GAMERA 3: REVENGE OF IRIS) so he can chop up the body and then hose himself off before giving a few chunks as treats to his piranhas. Seems like he’s got the process down pat.
You know how it is – sometimes the mood hits you for a little martial arts/horror combo, specifically the type found in Hong Kong vampire movies from the early 2000s, so you check out two of them. At least that’s how I dealt with the problem. The first one in my double feature, VAMPIRE EFFECT (2003) credits Dante Lam (BEAST COPS, THE STOOL PIGEON) as director and none other than Donnie Yen (
BANSHEE is a pretty cheesy 2000s crime/action type movie I added to my Letterboxd watchlist long enough ago that I don’t remember where I found out about it. I think I was scouring for movies directed by women that were more in the b-action type zone I prefer instead of the respectable stuff you usually see on lists. So I came across this obscure car thief movie I’d never heard of from Canadian director Kari Skogland and screenwriter Kirsten Elms (
THE SWORDSMAN is a 2020 Korean film about a swordsman. Color me intrigued. (Seriously. I like swordsmen.) I wonder what’s up with this swordsman that makes him THE swordsman?
