Roughly nine years ago, I stumbled across a great glorious cinematic What-in-the-Sam-Hill called STANDING OVATION, which I described as the tweener intersection of HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL and "JERSEY SHORE." I happily say that I have a fondness for films aimed at the grade school set, decades after they stopped being relevant to my existence, because more often than not I can imagine how li'l Mark (before he started spelling his name with a "c" instead of a "k" just to be difficult) would have reacted to them. Look, many of you have probably revisited the movies of your childhood and determined that they don't really hold up, but more often than not they still make you smile because you're remembering the wide-eyed hope of that earlier time. All I'm doing different is viewing such modern-day trifles through a theoretical fog of memory instead of an actual one.
So when I started seeing the advertising for another Pre-Adolescent Performing Arts Saga called NEXT LEVEL, naturally I was intrigued, being that ever since that previous jolt of kooky endorphins, I've been chasing that cotton-candy dragon for years since. I made the drive to attend one of the few theatrical playdates the movie has been granted - apparently the release is so small a theatre count or opening weekend gross could not be obtained from Box Office Mojo - and sure enough, I was the only person at my screening. For all I know, I may have been the only person in attendance for the whole day's worth of shows. To my mild disappointment, I was not treated to the same delirious array of plot turns and aesthetic decisions that made STANDING OVATION one-of-a-kind. Those looking for the next OOGIELOVES or THE IDENTICAL are thus duly warned. But, to my warm-hearted pleasure, I found just enough grace notes at play that I felt it worth expending space at this moribund blog to discuss them.
My close friend and esteemed colleague William Bibbiani, who was one of the few people to also take the time to meet this movie halfway and write a review for it, served up a thumbs-down pan for The Wrap that was nonetheless fair-minded, friendly, and respectful. His largest issue with the movie appears to be its lack of plausibility and stakes-worthy conflict, stating that, "the film’s production values [undermine] the story at every turn." On his Critically Acclaimed podcast with Witney Seibold, he further addressed that though it would be churlish to take issue with teenagers of limited acting experience and range performing as such, the experience of watching the film felt akin to being the parent of one of the kids who feels compelled to stay and watch the proceedings even though rooting interest dissipated shortly after their particular fave already did their number. Which is pretty much how my own father felt when he came to watch the big show at the performing arts camps he sent me to for my middle school years, not to mention how my friends felt about coming to see me during my open-mic stand-up years. (Plot twist: they didn't, and I wound up performing to the empty room that resulted after the audience members who came to see their friends split when their five minutes was up. But I digress) Much like me, he was hoping for a different kind of "camp" movie.
Bibbs has cogently assessed why he does not recommend it. I am not here about simply gainsaying his points, suffice to say that, in keeping with the principle coined by programmer Jesse Hawthorne Ficks as "neo-sincerity," what took him out of the movie never troubled me. Low production value? Sending me to Days of Creation cost my dad plenty, and their facilities were definitely not Camp Mohawk posh. The songs and choreography are so-so? Would it be better if Tommy French from SMILE were to have been in charge and turned a nice bunch of high school kids into Vegas showgirls? And, dude, it's not that Cindy turned on the house lights during Kelly's number, it's that her jerk move cut the power to her backing music and threw off the act. Didn't you ever have to solve the mystery of "The music stopped, and the lady died" when you were in middle school? But hey, consistency is a hobgoblin of small minds. And speaking of HOBGOBLINS...naah, we'll table that movie for now. The point is, he's already lain out what doesn't work. I've come to say here's what does work, DO MORE OF THAT!
The element that director Alyssa Goodman and screenwriter Byron Kavanagh bring to NEXT LEVEL which I believe help transcend it's outwardly ragged issues is how it quietly upends and thwarts the gender tropes that would normally be de rigeur in a PAPAS (yes, I am going to make that acronym happen). Press materials have openly name-checked MEAN GIRLS as an influence, though what I kept thinking of as I was watching was Jessica Bendinger's underappreciated directorial debut STICK IT, in how the ongoing theme is that shoehorning a young woman's desire to hone a talent into a winner-take-all environment will either curdle their personality or drain all joy from that pursuit, or both. Modern movies like to talk a good game of girl power and cooperation, but it's rare you see something where the lead is doing her damnedest to not be an Alpha in her group...and succeeds. It also keenly addresses that even if you outwardly eschew competition, it's often still ingrained in your thoughts. A particularly striking moment is when, after a boys versus girls dodgeball game, Kelly, the maverick who doesn't care about winning, initially resents that Hayden, the boy who likes her, effectively let her win; she considers it condescending that he didn't bring his A game. But Hayden points out that yeah, he could have flung the ball hard and beaned her, but then she'd be in pain and probably not in the mood to spend more time with him, and she agrees. Later, when Cindy pulls a boilerplate make-the-girl-jealous-with a hug scam, Hayden describes what happened and Kelly recognizes that Cindy's obsessed with manipulating people and bam, it's resolved. The contrivances of most teen stories are cut short here. It's refreshing that all the boys in this movie for once are not presented as antagonists or chaos agents, but just benign diversions. When they first appear, disrupting an initial rehearsal, they flat out say they heard the song and dance happening and liked it and wanted to watch, and after some chiding, are allowed to. When they acquiesce to their makeover bet payoff with the girls, none of them seem embarrassed or even that anxious to get it off, much to the chagrin of their female coach. Heck, the d.j.'s at the closing night celebration are girls. And the fact that at the end it is suggested that hey, why not allow boys in this arts camp as well, frankly I laughed heartily at that because after decades of having to sit through dozens of movies where "girls can do this too" is the moral, turnabout is fair play and overdue.
Another element that may seem incredulous to some but felt effective to me is the virtual lack of adult supervision in this story. Aside from the hapless camp director, there are no other adult males ever seen. And beyond some early comic relief with Cindy's enabling mother, a disheartening audio exchange between Becky and her pushy stage mom, and the one moment with the boys' basketball camp coach, no adult women either, Even the ostensible visiting mentor Jasmine Joel is herself just reaching college age, though she does have some lessons to impart. Thus, we are spared any kind of tired "the grown-ups have the answers" lecturing; the girls in effect are recognizing and solving their own problems. As FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH director Amy Heckerling once observed, "I hate parents. Parents open a whole box of stuff I [don’t] want to get into. I just [want] to say ‘Here’s the world of kids in their own universe.'" And in a film that is almost exclusively going to be viewed by the Tiger Beat set, agency and self-determination are good skills to depict.
I'll further throw in to say that I enjoyed how while there is a declared prize to be won within the story, it is deliberately undercut to the point of becoming an anticlimax. There's a nice resolution between Cindy and Kelly that dovetails to the earlier exchange between Kelly and Hayden, where the girls debate whether, if they had not been at loggerheads, the award win would have been different, and then decide it would have been the same because their essential temperaments for achievement have always been different, and there's more contentment from having good company. Even in an uplifting kids movie, one is risking massive mockery to go for a "the real prize was the friends we made along the way" ending. Seeing as how Kelly, in an earlier gloomy moment, assumes that her botched performance will shortly become a meme, and in real life all these eager young performers already have an internet presence, everyone involved in this film are aware that the snark brigade is always waiting. So woot to them for believing that sometimes if you leave girls to their own devices, they won't go LORD OF THE FLIES on each other; for the viewers about to start high school, that's reassuring. And for some of us arrested adolescents as well.
While NEXT LEVEL is not a strong enough movie to hold much interest for anyone who isn't a teenage girl or their sitter for the night, if you do find yourself watching it in such circumstance...your roommate absconded with your copy of the original HAIRSPRAY, and CAMP with Anna Kendrick got pulled from streaming, and you don't think your young charge is ready for Coco's breakdown in FAME, you will see a world where girls are valued, boys aren't toxic, and in a time of your life where it feels like Everything is Everything, it's possible to lower the stakes and find calm. Bibbs is right in that I won't likely remember any of the song or dance numbers that were supposed to be the big draw. But I will remember that I had a good time, and that's worth something too.
(P.S.: Thank you for the post-credit blooper reel. Since most indie movies don't get physical media releases anymore, I sometimes worry that little bonuses like this may fall by the wayside. Why should Marvel fans get all the cookies?)
Academy Award nominated screenwriter Josh Olson, when he is not toiling away for the studios, can often be found gregariously supporting offbeat film screenings in the Los Angeles area. And on some special occasions, he even gets to mount screenings of his own choosing, which is doing on November 1st at the New Beverly Cinema, pairing up two of the most infamous examples of song-laden cinema gone sour: Menahem Golan's THE APPLE and Michael Schultz's SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND. (He is also, full disclosure, a reader and supporter of this blog, which I guess he makes time to read when he is busy not reading your fucking script.) As such, this entry is respectfully written from his inspiration.
Now, with the exception of Katja von Garnier's BANDITS in 1999 (which you can hear me rave about on my last appearance on The Popcorn Mafia podcast), I have long held a maxim for film posterity: Never let the Germans finance a musical! My primary evidence: N.F. Geria II Filmgesellschaft mbH, a German tax shelter consortium you've never heard of, is singlehandedly responsible for precisely these aforementioned two twin titans of misbegotten musicals. Most people allow me to stop there and say point taken. But if you need more evidence that Germany has at best a very slippery grip on what makes a viable song-and-dance diversion, I have exhibit two: a pair of chick-driven trifles that feel not only from another country, but in many moments appear to have come from another planet.
As with all other road maps to Hades, our story begins with good intentions. Filmmaker Wolfgang Buld had earned a solid reputation for his no-frills documentation of what were fringe music movements in the late '70's. His unofficial trilogy of PUNK IN LONDON, REGGAE IN BABYLON, and PUNK IN ENGLAND are still admired today for capturing many influential artists on their own turf and in their own words. Naturally, he wanted to parlay that talent into feature filmmaking, and in turn, producers hoped that someone so well steeped in music and youth culture could bring freshness into formulaic templates for the 14-28 demographic. But in the same manner as one-time Jean-Michel Basquiat contemporary Tamra Davis found herself trying to make Britney Spears have plausible grit in CROSSROADS, Buld attempted the task of making movie stars out of two of the leading figures of the purported "German New Wave," heartthrob Markus Mohr, and Gabrielle "Nena" Kerner.
Initially, Buld and his producing partners were thinking of a much more radically punk concept, a Ramones-ish romp called HURRAY, THE SCHOOL IS BURNING which would have done for German youth musicals what ROCK'N'ROLL HIGH SCHOOL did for the American style, and would have featured another worldly-popular German act, Trio (of that iconic "drivin' around with your pal aimlessly" song "Da Da Da") as both teachers and insane asylum inmates who get mixed up. But Trio bowed out due to touring fatigue and the company reconfigured the story into a more traditional road movie, an ersatz IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT where a mismatched couple go off in pursuit of one's intended true love but naturally discover it's really each other's arms they should share, with musical interludes, what was known as a "singspiele", the kind of movie that, say, Bridget von Hammersmarck would have churned out during the backstory of INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS. In circumstances that certainly forsee the comically chaotic shoots of the rival breakdancing and Lambada dramas of the '80's, Buld and company had only started principal photography in October 1982 when distributor Constantin Film announced the film would be released in February 1983, so the production commenced without a finished script and composed scenes on the fly. Moreover, while Markus had initially been thought the audience draw (The opening half of the movie is given to his songs), Nena's popularity was growing, and she frantically commuted from recording sessions for her debut album to the shoot, while the directors tried to integrate as many of her new songs into the movie and design numbers around them; ultimately, she was given top billing on the finished release.
The resulting film, GIB GAS - ICH WILL SPAß! (STEP ON THE GAS - I WANNA HAVE FUN!), is, much like the aforementioned CROSSROADS, entertaining, but not for the intended reasons of its inception. From the moment Markus makes his first appearance in an otherwise snazzy jacket paired with shorts, white socks, and sandals (implying that his contribution to the German New Wave was preemptively dressing like your elderly future self at Leisure World), to the inexplicable use of actor Karl Dall in five different roles as some sort of Chris Elliot-style agent of chaos, to the multiple and rather incongruously dark moments of sexual threat against both protagonists, to extremely random homages to DIVA and DON'T LOOK NOW, one is left to wonder whether the preposterousness amidst the pop songs is an intentional act of bird-flipping by Buld and company (in a recent interview, the irascible Buld proclaimed, "German humour. There isn’t any; if Germans want to laugh, they start a war!"), or if this is honestly just one of those Deutsche things, what Norm Macdonald would try to encapsulate just by saying, "Germans love David Hasselhoff."
While the film was a regional hit, GIB GAS would not break out nearly as largely as its ascending star did. Nena's single "99 Luftballoons," recorded after the completion of the film, would become a surprise worldwide smash from late '83 to mid '84, more so in that almost all airplay and sales were for its original German-language version despite its availability in English, though that latter recording was a translation so badly phrased that I would not be surprised it was a deliberate act of sabotage on her behalf. Still today, "99 Luftballoons" has been a staple of '80's nostalgia on themed radio weekends and movies like BOOGIE NIGHTS and GROSSE POINT BLANK. Despite that humongous windfall, her movie did not benefit from her stardom: an English-dubbed export version was prepared under the title HANGIN' OUT, but never got picked up for distribution in Anglo territories, probably because of the fact that it did not contain the one song that made her reputation, and just how would you shoehorn an apocalyptic canticle of nuclear war into that finished film in the first place? (As Rahn Ramey taught me years ago, you can't cook something if it's done.) Thus, any English-language scholarship on the film is very hard to come by - I could only find one missive written in my tongue, written by the very brave Kurtodrome, and even the IMDb listing for GIB GAS features not one user review as of this writing, nor any message board action. I can only hope to effect change.
Nena's "other" American hit single, which proves she knew how to rhyme in the Kings'.
A sequel was definitely wanted by the creative team and the public, however Nena and Markus declined to participate. But as we all know, the lack of involvement from people that made a first movie a hit has never stopped anyone from going forward, and Buld and company crafted another movie that managed to be even less-plot driven and yet more bizarre than its predecessor, and also more absolutely naked in its primary goal of selling records. The West German equivalent to "AMERICAN BANDSTAND" was known as "FORMEL EINS", or "FORMULA ONE," and plenty of Top 40 bands would travel overseas to perform on that show as they would for Dick Clark's Saturday morning powerhouse. In keeping with their spirit of quick adaptation, the team fashioned another old-fashioned type of story - the aspiring singer/songwriter working up from the bottom - and tied it into the popular TV series, providing the convenient clothesline with which to hang one slumming second-tier pop act after another, and created DER FORMEL EINS FILM, which has been an endless source of der fun und frolic for me.
Retaining the same character name from GIB GAS but with a new leading actress, FORMAL EINS tells the story of a reluctant mechanic who dreams of being a pop star, and thanks to the usual convoluted turns involving her car and people skills, gets herself a job on the titular hit music program, while navigating a clumsy suitor who also works at the show. Replacement actress Sissy Kelling is about as pleasant a performer as Nena, but damn if she isn't just a little bit hotter. (Of course, introducing her with a nude shower doesn't hurt!) With the pout of her mouth, she often resembles Isabelle Adjani or a darker-haired Molly Ringwald. And she gets an awful lot of opportunity to use that pout and rolling of the eyes, as she deals with all the stumbling blocks in her career path, be they her crush's maladept wooing or the bizarre needs of the celebrity guests appearing on the program.
And let us run down the celebrity guests, which are the legitimately funniest part of the movie. Meat Loaf, in the midst of his European exile, pre-reconciliation with Jim Steinman, gets his diva fit pacified by styling Sissy Kelling's hair, a surprising field of expertise that would easily prove problematic to his current new pal Mitt Romney. Limahl, former lead singer of Kajagoogoo, besieged and nearly trampled by dozens of ravenous female fans (a likely Europe-only situation) after doing a big song in an industrial kitchen then being mistakenly thought to be having his way with Sissy. But hands down, the single-greatest sequence in the film belongs to the late Falco, who plays an ultra-vain version of himself obsessed with his vintage Cadillac convertible, suffering so much humiliation at the hands of the car, the rain, and Kelling herself, that he could have had a second career in physical comedy; in his best moments he reminded me of the great Bruce Campbell with a smaller chin. (And yes, you do get to see him perform "Rock Me Amadeus".)
I also really enjoyed the running gag of legendary German punk band (and sworn enemies of legendary German crooner Heino) Die Toten Hosen, portrayed as such music industry pariahs that their unscrupulous manager keeps trying to disguise and repackage them within other genres (beach rock, greasers, mariachis) to sneak them onto the TV show. (A gimmick that I always thought the equally craven Mr. Wiggs should try with his discredited Wiggies if by some miracle a sequel to STANDING OVATION were ever to be made.)
You also get treated to:
Re-Flex, NOT singing "The Politics of Dancing," but "How Much Longer"
The Flirts, NOT singing "Jukebox (Don't Put Another Dime in)" but "Dancin' Madly Backwards"
Katrina and the Waves, NOT singing "Walking on Sunshine," but "Red Wine and Whiskey"
Pia Zadora, and if you know any of her songs, you are a better man than I
Throw in another batch of incongruous elements like a shout out to Istvan Szabo's MEPHISTO and a third-act escape-from-the-draft sequence, and again, you are left to wonder if Buld is legitimately trying to create comedy or engaged in some deeper Andy Kaufman/Tim & Eric-style shenanigans. Considering that Buld has stated for the record, "I did my best films in the UK, in Germany I only worked for the money," I have to give serious consideration that perhaps in the grand tradition of Malcolm McLaren, he was indeed willing to deliberately offer crap for cash.
Off the strength of its artist-driven, if not hit-driven, soundtrack, DER FORMEL EINS FILM did fare better than GIB GAS, its English-dubbed version titled FEEL THE MOTION receiving a big-clamshell-box VHS & Beta release from Vidmark Entertainment in 1985, luring unsuspecting renters with a large blurb promoting Falco's cameo appearance. Used copies of said tape can be found relatively easily by hungry analog scavengers everywhere. You can also locate its soundtrack on vinyl and cassette, or just try assembling it yourself.
Much like its predecessor, though, it's hard to find anyone who'll document that they've actually seen it: I could only locate twoother reviews in English on the web. Moreover, it's even harder to find any details in English or German about it's smouldering star Sissy Kelling - no Wikipedia page, no old Angelfire/Geocities fansite, nothing! All I can glean from her IMDb profile is that she has done a little bit of everything in entertainment: besides starring again as a musician in the "MONKEES"-influenced German band sitcom "BLAM!" in 1985, she has also been a casting director, written a TV movie, and more recently, served as assistant director on two recent English-language horror films directed by Wolfgang Buld: THE CHAMBERMAID and TWISTED SISTERS, both of which have received positive, completely non-ironic reviews from the horror press, suggesting that Buld has found his true cinema niche. An interesting note about their friendship is that about the same time as FORMEL EINS FILM's production, together they also wrote and directed the 1985 documentary BERLIN NOW featuring industrial noise pioneers Einstürzende Neubauten, indicating that this pretty lady has some decent punk bonafides of her own. If I have any readers in Germany or fluent in the language, I'm dying for some details on this broad.
In conclusion, I've done my best to tell you about the fun and freakiness of two movies financed and filmed by Germans. Does this mean that I have undercut my maxim about never letting Germans finance a musical? Well, if your concept of a musical is a film that has a solid plot, well-written songs, strong performances, and will move audiences to high emotion, then no, you need to let someone of another nationality put up the money for that venture. But in the case of THE APPLE, SGT. PEPPER, and these two entries, when someone can't intercept that attache case of cash, and that musical gets made, cherish that misfit movie like it was your third nipple: it's wrong, but it's beautiful all the same.
Last night, I finally went out and saw Zack Snyder's would-be Gyno Gearloose epic SUCKER PUNCH. Or as I will be facetiously be calling it among my cattier friends, PAN'S LAPPYDANCE. No, it is not good. I don't hate it with the ridiculous fury of a thousand Sunny D drinkers as Geekscape writer Jonathan London has correctly criticized, but I must stand with the majority of my close friends and trusted voices and agree that it is a loud, mostly unpleasant hodgepodge of dubious grrl power, pointless genre side trips, and yes, a blatant point-by-point horking of Guillermo Del Toro's deeply moving parable of trauma and transcendence, right down to its Dickensian ending. I will be surprised if I don't hear reports from the next MTV Movie Awards that Del Toro put Snyder in a headlock and maniacally giggled, "HERE IS MY SEQUEL TO YOUR RIPOFF OF MY MOVIE. I CALL IT SLEEPER HOLD!"
And, I am ashamed to say, I will probably go see it again on its inevitable second life on the "Awful is the New Awesome" revival theatre mandate, and I will probably buy the threatened unexpurgated edition on DVD later this year. I am completely cognizent of every wrong thing in this movie that should deign it to the scrap heap of "So Bad It's Gone Past Good And Back to Bad Again" with other unloved failures like THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN and THE DUCHESS AND THE DIRTWATER FOX, films that even the most rabid proponents of cinema d'ordure will never dare try to lure Wiseauholics to watch at midnight. But for all my intellectual distancing, there was that sliver of my psyche that was having a good time.
It could be the relentless injection of elements from steampunk and anime that has not been prevalent in most major studio movies, imagery that I do enjoy looking at: In the larger fantasy scenes I heard a rather Ponsonby Brittarian exchange in my head..."Well, there's something you don't see everyday, Chauncey." "What's that, Edgar?" "An art deco bullet train traveling towards the rings of Saturn populated by faceless robots." "Oh, I don't know, Edgar; mass transit has taken some amazing strides." It could be that I was slightly impressed by Snyder's commitment to a crazed vision - "So, you're really going to use a 21st century battle weapon to mow down WWI zombies? This is really happening? Okee dokee then." Or, it could just boil down to the fact that I'm an unrepentant perv who's had a lifelong weakness for girls in sparkly tights and cabaret pumps. Looking at the sullen, joyless, wizened faces of the two other men who were in the auditorium with me, I do sadly fear it's that last explanation...and that they are my future self. But at the end of it all, SUCKER PUNCH crossed my line and became that dreaded trope known as the Guilty Pleasure.
Like many of my contemporaries in filmmaking and criticism, I am often loath to use the term "guilty pleasure" to describe a film. Primarily because 85% of the time if I like a movie there is no guilt in it: I can point to something in there that makes it worthwhile, I can argue that it is legitimately good. If asked, I will mount passionate defenses of oft-derided efforts like THE POSTMAN and MYRA BRECKINRIDGE. But yes, there are some movies that I know in my heart are not misunderstood, just plain irredeemable. There is no justification for them beyond the fact that I inexplicably like them, and the fact that I like them should make you lose all respect for me and my palate. Again, it goes back to the concept of neo-sincerity: I can easily point out all the faults, but I choose not to. And while some of them are well-known to you too, seeing as how I almost single-handedly put one back on the map (Thanks for nothing, ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY!) and have been busy keeping a newer one in constant consciousness, I can't resist an opportunity to bear my tortured soul on a few other less familiar outings of the outre.
Though Robert Altman was enormously adept at telling multiple stories that add up to one big story in film after film, sometimes he let his cleverness get ahead of entertainment. HEALTH was made at the end of what I like to call Altman's "Green Awning" period at 20th Century-Fox (named after a Mel Brooks riff about how when a director is hot, he could pitch a movie about just a green awning and producers will take it seriously), and was intended to be his big 1980 election satire, using the power-play for leadership of a health organization as extended metaphor for political dirty tricks. Or at least, that's what I've always taken from it; according to background actor Lary Crews, who served as Altman's assistant and typed the script for him, the story was constantly altered and changed by Altman and his collaborators under the influence of sandwiches and weed. Fox, naturally, found it so weird they buried it worse than they did IDIOCRACY; even when the studio released a purportedly complete box set of all their Altman movies on DVD, this was conspicuously left out.
It alternates between sledgehammer obviousness and obscuro minutiae (even I would have to say you must be really historically adept to get the fact that Lauren Bacall and Glenda Jackson's characters are meant to represent Dwight Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson), and ultimately plays like one dip in the NASHVILLE pool too many. Still, though, I'm fond of it for its sheer audacity, and there are moments that I think really work. But this would be way low on the list of Altman movies that I would recommend to the novice viewer.
This story about a pornographer who turns to snuff for bigger kicks is a humorless and grim exercise in nihilism chic, with all manner of graphic excess to try distracting you from the otherwise pointlessness of its existence. Yet somehow, it grabs me the way that my first viewing of R. Kern's shorts kept me in the room despite my repulsion. It's completely unpleasant, but it has a stench of authenticity that makes me compulsively respect it, as if Faye Dunaway's NETWORK wet dream came true and real psychopaths got hold of 16mm equipment and filmed their exploits. And if you consume the hard-to-find DVD's extras, you'll learn that indeed, the late director Roger Watkins had some serious issues. This falls under the category of "Movies That Will Get You Divorced and/or Lose You Custody of Your Kids."
The movie that landed Cameron Crowe in director jail for almost a decade, which gave license to chuckleheads to piss and dismiss his catalog of lovably flawed protagonists and for satirists to suggest he should only make soundtrack albums...yes, it is an indulgent soup of overromaticised redemption. From the melodramatic set-up of Orlando's blunder, to the preciousness of the fourth act (when could Kirsten Dunst have all that time to make her customized road map and CDs?), even resorting to that horrid trope of every college sophomore's party-kitchen philosophizing, the question "But who are THEY?", indeed, after viewing ELIZABETHTOWN it is enough to make weaker souls take the baseball bat to Lloyd Dobler's boombox. But I loved every phony, hokey minute of it, as soon as that retro Paramount logo started the show. I wanted to live in that universe where losing a billion dollars could be sloughed off, where family quarrels could be peaceably resolved with a stand-up routine and a divided funeral, where you had time to drive across America and just look at stuff and listen to tunes, and yes, where a perky flight attendant knows all the deep album tracks and secrets of the heart. Really, it's biggest crime is that it's just too darned nice of a movie, and thus there's no suspense for the average viewer in seeing how it will turn out. Yet for me, on days where the world has been one big meanie to me, I go back to ELIZABETHTOWN and indulge in a little sugar. And yes, I bought both soundtrack albums too, because the Onion can snark all they want, but dammit Crowe makes good mix tapes.
There are few things more painful than truly funny people in the middle of a not very funny movie. And that's probably what fans of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore felt like watching them parody Sherlock Holmes, as director and former Warhol acolyte Paul Morrissey tried to continue the over-the-top antics of his surprisingly successful Dracula and Frankenstein film satires with Udo Kier. But I discovered this movie before I was even 13, when anything slightly resembling "adult" comedy was exciting, and if I loved the performer enough, I could convince myself anything they did was funny. Which is essentially what I did: I watched, listened, and memorized this movie and made myself love it. I suspect it's not the material in the movie but my memory of it and that time of my life that is triggering the laughter.
No, I take that back: Dudley playing Sherlock's phony-psychic mother as a hectoring yenta who keeps calling him "Sherl" is legitimately funny. "I've lost a medium; rare in a world in which the steaks are high."
And so, I stand before you with the evidence of my criminal diversions in full view. Launch whatever rejoinders you will. But keep in mind I have years of training in the art of dodging rocks and garbage.
In one of my earliest blog entries, I dabbled on the subject of loveably misbegotten films...the TROLL 2s, the HELLO DOWN THEREs...movies that confound conventional adjectives because they don't meet the artistic or intellectual standard of "good" but deliver more genuine pleasure than most films that do reach that arbitrary measure. The bearish Dave White is bullish on this type of film, what he has branded "Awful is the New Awesome," and if you consider that said adjective literally means "full of awe," he is spot-on in that description, because audiences in the right frame of mind, myself included, indeed sit in awe, wondering if what we are witnessing on screen is really happening. And in my still-controversial gobspit on THE ROOM, I delved into the appeal further, proclaiming that an audience's true enjoyment of these movies cannot be based merely in feeling superior to them, but in fact in feeling sympathetic with them, meshing the open flaws of the film to our own life's previously best-laid plans in a moment of familial love. The message to the filmmaker is you dun goofed up, and the consequences of me watching your movie will never be the same, but I can't deny the fact that I like you, right now, I like you!"
And right now, I can't deny the fact that I am currently in the midst of a ridiculously ebullient love affair with such a film: STANDING OVATION, an independently-produced East Coast-lensed spectacle attempting to be the tweener intersection of HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL and "JERSEY SHORE." In a summer that has given us all manner of underwhelming and mediocre movies, and only a few legitimately brilliant ones, this shiny, scrappy, and occasionally strident film is the wild card I didn't even know I was looking for. In its short theatrical run, I have seen it twice, and if I can drag any more brave friends along while it's still onscreen, I'll return again; the as-yet unreleased DVD is as good as on my shelf when it comes out. And yes, as that preambling (and prerambling) opening paragraph indicates, most of my enjoyment is in that dreaded "meta" zone of irony that is abused so much in pop culture you could mistake it for Luka on the second floor, the kind of reaction that, to invoke legitimate irony, does get explored at one part of this movie, which concerns me a touch because I don't want any of the nice kids who worked on this film to think that I'm laughing at them...at least not in any kind of mean way that would have easily upset me when I was their age.
Let's make this clear, STANDING OVATION is not "a movie for the whole family to enjoy" as the marketing would have you believe. The majority of families who have grown accustomed to the clean, professional, and star-laden output of Walden Media for the last decade will quickly grow impatient with the abrasively low-budgeted staging on display here. And those progressive hipster parents - the kind that decry anything associated with Disney, forbid sweets, and try to accelerate their offspring's development of righteous anger by playing Consolidated in the nursery - well they'll be downright horrified at what they see as a celebration of prefab pop and the quest for shallow stardom. So unless you live in one of those households where mom, dad, and the kids pop popcorn and sit in the living room to enjoy an evening of reading out loud from the latest issue of McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, this movie is probably not for you.
But if, like me, you find the Monkees more interesting than the Beatles, you miss Crystal Pepsi because you liked the taste, and feel a wonderful tingle every time you hear Bela Lugosi's "Home? I have no home!" speech from BRIDE OF THE MONSTER, this is a movie made for you. In the grand tradition of THE APPLE and THE GARBAGE PAIL KIDS MOVIE, to paraphrase from the "Stimutacs" episode of "SEALAB 2021," STANDING OVATION is a movie that makes me feel like a koala bear hacked up a rainbow in my brain...and to me, that is a pleasant thing!
STANDING OVATION, which opened in over 600 theatres on July 16th, the day before my birthday, and plummeted to 72 matinee-only screenings in its second week, is having a hard time finding any love in the marketplace, either from published critics...
And oh, the music...generic and empty, with derivative music and lyrics consisting of nothing but baseless, idiotic self-assertion. One group sings that they're "one in a million." Another sings that they're superstars. Then a little girl sings about how she's going to be a star. Everybody's going to be a star, and could you imagine what a nightmare it would be if everybody who wants to be a star actually became a star? You wouldn't be able to walk from your front door to the car without hordes of people following you, singing and singing and singing... It would be a nightmare. It would be even worse than this movie. But until that dreaded day, "Standing Ovation" must hold pride of place. – Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle
Standing Ovation could barely muster a golf clap from an audience. Unless you're a female senior citizen. The Kelinworth Film Production's debut flick will simply not work for anyone outside of the above mentioned and possibly a five year old. Everyone between the ages of six and sixty-five, wait for this to show on the Disney channel. In the afternoon. On Saturday. When it's raining. – Joe Belcastro, Tampa Movie Examiner
For us grinchy adults out there without children to sedate, the whole thing feels slightly less like a movie than like the filmed record of a mutiny at a juvie talent agency - Adam Markovitz, Entertainment Weekly
...or from IMDb commenters...
"Ugly kids movie...only a pedophile could love"
"Should be called 'How to Make a Narcissist.'"
"How the HECK did this get a theatrical release?"
...or even from moviegoers themselves. In a wide release of 623 screens, STANDING OVATION's opening weekend total of $343,125 (or $551 per screen) was the worst opening since TRANSYLMANIA in December of 2009, and ranks 5th in all-time worst openings since 1982. Despite the best of booster press in its location cities of Atlantic City, Cape May County, and Delaware County, PA, as well as national talk show plugs from its producer, venerated actor James Brolin, STANDING OVATION was unable to find the family audience it aspired to. And I suspect that the kids and parents who busted their buns and boiled coffee to make this film may not be 100% thrilled to hear that one of the few large contingents that's energetically trying to support it also seems to be regarding it as a post-millenial PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE.
I would like to assure all parties that this is not an accurate assessment. While there are still remnants of the initial Harry & Michael Medved school of snotty dismissal mingling with the too-cool-for-school detachment dinguses (or is that dingae?) that may watch this movie to mock it, everyone I've talked to who has seen STANDING OVATION knows its faults, and openly embraces it regardless. It's a stance that maverick San Francisco film programmer Jesse Hawthorne Ficks calls "neo-sincerity", which he describes as as "post-ironic...you know you can make fun of something if you want to; but, you don't really need to." It's that kind of lopsided love that fuels the cults that embrace TROLL 2, or TEEN WITCH, or any of the films that despite their perceived disposability, have somehow kept their fanbase years after their shelf life should have expired.
So sure, I could make jokes about the numerous plot threads about gambling addiction and unrequited crushes and parental absence that are introduced and then abandoned, or how the 5 Ovations are supposed to be the working-class heroes in contrast to the spoiled Wiggies yet they seem to have a budget for back-up dancers and costumes that exceeds their so-called rich rivals, or how the character of Joei Badalucci engages in stereotypes so egregious that I half-expected Joseph Columbo to rise from the grave to file a posthumous complaint from the Italian-American Civil Rights League, or that Alanna Wannabe's bratty antics are not so much adorable as more likely to inspire a response similar to Strong Bad's reaction to 'Cute Little Girl from Sit-Com Sings Patriotic Song', or the fact this story relies on so many deus ex machinae that it becomes a veritable deus ex officina...but see, those are the very things I love about the movie! Its daffy committment to what is clearly a blinkered and hyperactive 12-year-old fantasy worldview made me a little daffy too. And when left to contemplate whether to sit through the bloated emptiness of THE LAST AIRBENDER or the pained seriousness of TWILIGHT: ECLIPSE or the autopilot blandness of KNIGHT AND DAY or the calculated familiarity of THE KARATE KID...a movie like STANDING OVATION that's riddled with wrong yet smiling all the way through it is a lot more entertaining.
STANDING OVATION will never be regarded on the same level playing field as the gleaming Disney franchises to which it wants to, dare I say, Step Up. But like many determined knockoffs of bigger films (PIRANHA to JAWS, KING FRAT to ANIMAL HOUSE, LOVE AND A .45 to PULP FICTION), it is most definitely destined for cult movie status; even Brian Orndorff and Roger Moore, while both panning the film, acknowledge it's kook appeal and camp potential. There is already talk in a couple cities of reviving this in midnight screenings...when of course, the kids would be in bed and the grown-ups would have all the fun. Personally, I would love to see this become the teenybopper training film for THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW: book a theatre on Saturday mornings, let the tweener set learn how to shadow-cast and make funny callbacks, get them prepared for the sexier midnight movies when they get older. Who knows, maybe even some serious hard-partiers and ravers would still be awake from the night before to come watch as well and make it a hip destination.
Now then, in the off chance any of the kids from this movie are reading this essay:
First off, congratulations! This may not be the rave review you wanted to read in reward for your work, but what matters is you worked hard and whether people like it or hate it, you did it, and years from now you'll always be able to look back at it and think of all the fun you had. And as I am predicting, a lot of us will be watching and having fun too. Now some of you are probably also going to be looking at a decade's worth of ribbing and schoolyard taunting in the interim, so I'm hoping you've started building up a sense of humor about that. It might be cold comfort when the jokes get mean, but keep in mind that you did something big, and most people who feel like being nasty to you never will. You should read some of the rude things people said about me when I did "BEAT THE GEEKS" years ago!
And since I keep talking about this thing called "irony" and how it relates to your movie, I suggest you watch a really great documentary called BEST WORST MOVIE which was made by a former child actor about a movie he starred in, TROLL 2, that also didn't get the success or acclaim he hoped for, but earned him fans that years after the fact, are some of the best people he's ever known. I also suggest reading an essay by my friend and fellow blogger Witney Seibold about one of the other movies I compared yours to, THE APPLE, a musical that started me on my love of films like yours, and if nothing else, you can always point your friends to when they give you grief and say, "You think my movie is strange?"
Finally, I hear rumblings that you all may do a sequel. DO EET!!! Do it fast! Make it so fast we can see it this Christmas, where it will stand out in opposition to all the serious stodgy awards-season bait that will be in theatres. After all, who wants to watch another English broad in a corset suffering when STANDING OVATION II: WIGGIE WEVENGE is playing next door?
Oh yeah, and when you make that sequel, hire these boys:
So when I started seeing the advertising for another Pre-Adolescent Performing Arts Saga called NEXT LEVEL, naturally I was intrigued, being that ever since that previous jolt of kooky endorphins, I've been chasing that cotton-candy dragon for years since. I made the drive to attend one of the few theatrical playdates the movie has been granted - apparently the release is so small a theatre count or opening weekend gross could not be obtained from Box Office Mojo - and sure enough, I was the only person at my screening. For all I know, I may have been the only person in attendance for the whole day's worth of shows. To my mild disappointment, I was not treated to the same delirious array of plot turns and aesthetic decisions that made STANDING OVATION one-of-a-kind. Those looking for the next OOGIELOVES or THE IDENTICAL are thus duly warned. But, to my warm-hearted pleasure, I found just enough grace notes at play that I felt it worth expending space at this moribund blog to discuss them.
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