The erotic thriller DREAM LOVER is so far the only movie directed by Nicholas Kazan, a writer who’s an Oscar nominee for REVERSAL OF FORTUNE and on my shit list for MOBSTERS. James Spader (SEX, LIES AND VIDEOTAPE) stars as Ray Reardon, successful architect, charmer, admitted bad husband, but supposed to be well-meaning and sweet. At his divorce hearing he fires his lawyer and lets his now-ex Martha (Kathleen York, unaired DARKMAN tv pilot) have everything. Sitting in the courthouse afterwards they look like they’re on a first date that’s going really well. They talk about how much they still love each other but she can’t stay with him because he hit her. Which seems more than fair to me! He tries to downgrade it to a slap or accidental bump and justify it as a response to her cheating on him, and this does not offend her. She puts her head on his shoulder and tearfully promises that the woman he finds who’s right for him will be “the luckiest woman alive.”
He’s got this buddy at work named Norman, played by Larry Miller (SUBURBAN COMMANDO) in the classic Dennis Miller/Denis Leary/Kevin Pollack type role of the comedian playing a horny best friend who’s sexist in a supposedly lovable way. Norman invites Ray to a gallery show to try to set him up with a woman (Blair Tefkin, V, FRIGHT NIGHT PART II), and while trying to escape her he spills wine on Lena Mathers (Mädchen Amick, TWIN PEAKS: FIRE WALK WITH ME, SLEEPWALKERS) and she chews him out. (read the rest of this shit…)
a survey of summer movies that just didn’t catch on
June 17, 1994
Okay, this one is not a Summer Fling with a McDonalds tie-in. It’s more like a prestige horror film for grownups that didn’t make much of an impact despite its pedigree. It’s Mike Nichols (WHO’S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF?) doing a serious and/or metaphorical monster movie, reuniting THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK‘s Jack Nicholson and Michelle Pfeiffer, both at new career heights thanks to Tim Burton BATMAN movies. The score is by Ennio Morricone – more of a minimalistic one than he usually does, and very important to the tone of the movie. The cinematographer is Giuseppe Rotunno (FELLINI SATYRICON, AMARCORD, THE ADVENTURES OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN).
Like one other serious grown up horror movie that I know of, WOLF opens with Jack Nicholson driving down snowy roads. But it’s night and he’s by himself and he has to stop because he hits a wolf. He experiences that common horror movie experience of “Do I have to put it out of its misery?” before a very effective “oh shit Jack don’t do that!” as he grabs the thing by the paws and tries to drag it out of the street. So anyway, yeah, he gets bit. (read the rest of this shit…)
THE AVENGERS PART 2 is probly the most comic bookiest comic book movie achieved by mankind so far, which is to say that most of the action scenes have like 15 different supermen and secret agents and shit flipping around shooting magic beams and power waves and explosive arrows and laser things and doing super punches and alley ooping each other and what not as they fight against an army of flying wiseass robots. There are two main characters who wear capes, one that turns into a giant monster, one that’s from a viking fantasy dimension or whatever, at least two that fly of their own accord and two using the jets on their power suits, one that moves faster than sound and another that does mind control and shoots red, uh… magic I guess?… from her hands. It’s not played exactly “gritty” but it’s not a joke either. It means it.
After writer/director Joss Whedon (SPEED)’s masterful job of combining all the different Marvel characters into one supergroup in part 1, he has an even bigger miracle to pull off, and ends up with more mixed results. Because after you’ve managed the trick of combining all these worlds and characters into one coherent movie (which honestly I didn’t believe could be done), the challenge is how do you do it again and make it seem new again and bigger this time but not worse? And the answer is “it’s hard to say.” (read the rest of this shit…)
SEX, LIES, AND VIDEOTAPE is a very divisive movie among copy editors who argue bitterly about its use of the Oxford comma in the title. The rest of us agree it’s a solid debut for writer-director Steve Soderbergh.
It’s a story with basically four characters. We’ve got Ann (GROUNDHOG DAY‘s Andie MacDowell), a somewhat troubled stay-at-home wife who opens the movie talking to her therapist (okay, I didn’t count him in the four) about her worries, about her husband not touching her, and about her belief that sex is overrated, not that big a deal.
Then we’ve got her husband John (STEP UP REVOLUTION‘s Peter Gallagher), a pure ’80s character because he’s a lawyer who wears suspenders and “just made junior partner” and he’s real proud of himself and a total douche.
And we’ve got Ann’s younger sister Cynthia (Laura San Giacomo), who is much wilder than Ann and sort of rebels against her and also is fucking John.
Lastly we have Graham (CRASH‘s James Spader), an old friend of John’s who he hasn’t seen in nine years but he’s back in town and John is letting him stay at the house briefly while he tries to find an apartment. Graham is the individualistic non-conformist cowboy drifter loner artistic beatnik rebel who sweeps through their square lives and changes everything forever. And he does it merely by being a pervert who can’t get a hard-on and owns a Hi-8 camera. (read the rest of this shit…)
After the election on Tuesday, which brought us 4 historic gay rights ballot victories, the first openly gay Senator and the most women in the Senate ever, it was a no-brainer to spend Friday night watching Spielberg’s movie about Abraham Lincoln and his people’s fight to eke together a coalition to pass the 13th amendment to the Constitution, ending 400 years of slavery. Also, SKYFALL was sold out. (read the rest of this shit…)
Since I recently watched that movie CRASH that Roger Ebert said was the best movie of 2005, I decided to finally go back and watch the original David Cronenberg version, which in my opinion is pretty fucking different.
This is the courageous story of a movie producer (James Spader) and his wife (Debora Kara Unger from STANDER and PAYBACK and THE GAME) and all the people they like to fuck from behind (various). The movie opens with Ms. Unger in an a hangar rubbing her nipple against an airplane while some dude licks her ass. And you can imagine where it would go from there (perverted car crashes, etc.). Very predictable, standard stuff. (read the rest of this shit…)
WAYS YOU CAN SUPPORT THE SHIT OUT OF VERN & OUTLAWVERN.COM
if that's your thing:
1. Patreon
Toss me a couple bucks a month, support the good shit, also get access to a bunch of exclusive writing. This is my primary source of writing money that has allowed me to cut down to part time at the day job. Thank you!
2. Buy my books from your local bookseller or somebody
(NOTE: My ten year contract has passed on the Titan books, so I don't get residuals on them like I do WORM ON A HOOK and NIKETOWN, but I would love for you to read them because I'm proud of them)
EXTRA CREDIT: Review them on Amazon! That would really help me out. Unless you didn't like them, in which case forget I said anything.
3. If you ever buy from Amazon, go through my links or search engines
(you pay the same amount you were gonna pay anyway they cut me a little slice)
I also have an Amazon UK one:
(I can't get the search box widget to work anymore, so click on MOONWALKER and then search for what you want.)
4. My exciting line of fashion and leisure products
(I get a couple bucks per item, you get a cool t-shirt, mug or lifestyle item)
5. Spread the word
Tell your friends about my reviews and my books and everything. Only cool people though please, we don't need a bunch of suckers and/or chumps around here.
THANKS EVERYBODY. YOUR FRIEND, VERN
* * * *
Recent commentary and jibber-jabber
KayKay on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “My mantra: Separate the art from the artist. I’ve read all seven Harry Potter books—pride of place on my shelf—and…” Mar 26, 16:54
Palermo on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “I liked this one and the negativity surrounding it is weird to me. It’s not a masterpiece, and doesn’t reinvent…” Mar 26, 15:49
MaggieMayPie on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “I actually really enjoyed this movie. I’m not sure why it works for me more than most people, but I’m…” Mar 26, 15:21
CJ Holden on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “Personally I did enjoy the HP books. They were an entertaining read and definitely more quirky than the movies, with…” Mar 26, 12:22
Alex R on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “And I’m totally fine with them being that blasé because treating it like a traffic jam is funny and then…” Mar 26, 10:44
VERN on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “I agree that people wouldn’t be blasé about it, but that early scene where they kinda are is pretty great.…” Mar 26, 10:40
Alex R on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “@Miguel Hombre: I can’t speak for other generations, but I was in the fourth grade when Harry Potter came out…” Mar 26, 10:35
VERN on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “Daniel – I was just making an off-handed anti-Rowling gesture. I personally was sick of fucking hearing about it anyway…” Mar 26, 10:32
Alex R on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “Mr. Majestyk makes a good point about Vern’s good points that the film is good because it doesn’t trip over…” Mar 26, 09:49
Miguel Hombre on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “I guess my point was what the hell does any adult, with all the life lived, experiences and spectrum of…” Mar 26, 09:47
daniel on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “@CJ Holden Gotcha, thanks for clarifying. @Miguel Hombre “I found the second book (I skipped the first book because I…” Mar 26, 07:19
Acid Burn on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “Bill, I think you’re dead on that the hybrid stuff is the wrong direction for these; I was 100% more…” Mar 26, 07:06
JeffG on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “I think I am with the consensus, this was perfectly average. But I will say, it was one of the…” Mar 26, 06:14
Bill Reed on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “I found this one pretty middlin’, and at this point the JURASSIC series is the most mediocre franchise. REBIRTH has…” Mar 26, 06:06
Miguel Hombre on Jurassic World: Rebirth: “I try not to get into too much of a negative internet pile on, but since Rowling is such a…” Mar 26, 04:43
May 6, 1994
THE AVENGERS PART 2 is probly the most comic bookiest comic book movie achieved by mankind so far, which is to say that most of the action scenes have like 15 different supermen and secret agents and shit flipping around shooting magic beams and power waves and explosive arrows and laser things and doing super punches and alley ooping each other and what not as they fight against an army of flying wiseass robots. There are two main characters who wear capes, one that turns into a giant monster, one that’s from a viking fantasy dimension or whatever, at least two that fly of their own accord and two using the jets on their power suits, one that moves faster than sound and another that does mind control and shoots red, uh… magic I guess?… from her hands. It’s not played exactly “gritty” but it’s not a joke either. It means it.
SEX, LIES, AND VIDEOTAPE is a very divisive movie among copy editors who argue bitterly about its use of the Oxford comma in the title. The rest of us agree it’s a solid debut for writer-director Steve Soderbergh.
After the election on Tuesday, which brought us 4 historic gay rights ballot victories, the first openly gay Senator and the most women in the Senate ever, it was a no-brainer to spend Friday night watching Spielberg’s movie about Abraham Lincoln and his people’s fight to eke together a coalition to pass the 13th amendment to the Constitution, ending 400 years of slavery. Also, 
Since I recently watched that movie CRASH that Roger Ebert said was the best movie of 2005, I decided to finally go back and watch the original David Cronenberg version, which in my opinion is pretty fucking different.
