Book Review: “Jay’s Journal,” allegedly edited by Beatrice Sparks

There are a lot of reasons to dislike this book, but let’s start with the main one:

Although Sparks always presents herself as merely the discoverer and editor of the diaries, records at the U.S. Copyright Office show that in fact she is listed as the sole author for all but two of them.

So, this book presents itself as a cautionary tale about the dangers of drugs, bad girls, and most of all the occult — but in actual fact it’s an object lesson in lying. There’s no evidence that Bernice Sparks was “Dr. Bernice Sparks” or even that she had experience as a therapist. The boy’s family say the work is largely fiction:

According to a book written by Barrett’s brother Scott (A Place in the Sun: The Truth Behind Jay’s Journal), and interviews with the family, Sparks used roughly 25 entries of 212 total from Barrett’s actual journal. The other entries were fictional, based on case histories from other teenagers Sparks worked with, and interviews of friends and acquaintances of Barrett.

The thing is, you don’t need his family’s word for it to know that this thing is a huge concoction of lies. Unless you’re currently off your much-needed meds and have been reduced to believing that demons hang out in teenagers’ bedrooms, you can pick out the “totally didn’t happen” bits quite easily.

Movie recap: Frankenstein’s Daughter (1958)

This is one of those peculiar teen movie/horror blends. So on the one hand we get the expected monsters and laboratories, but on the other we have an extended pool party sequence with a live band and some “kids” who appear to range in age from teen-ish to forty-odd.

• Script quality: uneven. Things like Trudy’s putdown of Frank: 7/10. Things like the pool party: 2/10.
• Acting quality: Not horrible. Not great, but serviceable.
• Overall feeling afterwards: I should really start using night cream regularly.

The scene shown in that poster — the monster carrying Trudy — doesn’t actually happen. And that’s a damned shame, given who the monster is, because that would have added a whole other aspect to the film.

There are only a handful of characters you need to know, so here they are with actor names: Johnny Bruder (played by John Ashley); Trudy Morton (Sandra Knight); Suzie Lawler (Sally Todd); Don, Suzie’s boyfriend (Harold Lloyd Jr.); Oliver Frankenstein (Donald Murphy); and Trudy’s elderly, sweet mad-scientist uncle, Prof. Carter Morton (Felix Locher).

There are also a couple of cops, assorted victim/witness/partygoers, and a band.

Movie recap/review: “TWIXT” starring Val Kilmer, Elle Fanning and Bruce Dern

• Script quality: 6/10 for moments of actual hilarity, not unintentional
• Acting quality: 11/10 based solely on one monologue by Val Kilmer
• Story quality: …there is a story, yes.
• How much sense this movie makes: 0/10
• Ranked on the Coppola-Metre: What’s second-to-last, right above “The Godfather Part III”? (No. Seriously. It’s terrible.)

[ Experience the incredibly long “TWIXT” trailer here. It will show you I am not making any part of this review up. ]

Oh, my holy hell, what did I just watch?

I could editorialize for pages about what a mess this movie is, especially the “ending,” but let’s just skip right to the bits where I try to make you feel like you’ve seen it (if that’s even possible), because I assure you that reading this will take you less time than watching it yourself would, and that’s pretty much the goal of this entire blog, last I checked.

We begin with an immediately out-of-place-feeling narration by a voice that sounds like Giovanni Ribisi, although I haven’t yet been arsed to check if he’s credited. It could just be Val Kilmer doing one of his awesome impersonations (see the 11/10 score above and stay tuned for the explanation below). [Edited to add: Oh, my goodness – I should roast in hell for not realizing it was Tom Waits doing that voice-over. Yes, I was finally arsed to check.] Either way, we get a bit of backstory about how Swann Falls is a nowhere town that attracts all kinds of people who don’t want to be known, or found, and is a haven for runaways and the like. Many of them have made a new home for themselves in a commune-like setup across the lake, and the townsfolk avoid them because they’re creepy and probably evil. Cue montage of pretty shots of said desolate town that makes Swann Falls look considerably less cosmopolitan than, say, Keene, NH (I chose that just because it’s a random American small town I’ve actually visited; in fairness Keene was quite lovely, and Swann Falls isn’t hideous either, but it’s not exactly…tourist-friendly, shall we say?).

In Val Kilmer you’ve got a washed-up director named Francis Ford Coppola writer named Hall Baltimore, which is one of the greatest names ever, especially since it seems to be his Actual Name, not a nom de plume. Either that or even his wife calls him by his pseudonym, but I digress. So Hall Baltimore has a long and storied (hardy har) career writing “witch books” – I’m not altogether sure what a “witch book” is or how he’s made a series out of them, but I guess Anne Rice did it, so let’s imagine we’re in Mayfair territory – but he’s visited the well a few too many times and is now on a “book tour” to shill his latest novel…in a town that doesn’t even have a bookstore. Instead he sits for a long, humiliating day in the backwater hardware store trying to appeal to any customers looking for nail guns who appear to also be literate (total takers count: zero). He’s pretty miserable until finally some crazy-looking old dude walks in and proclaims that he knows exactly who Hall Baltimore is, and he’s a big fan. (Not in the Stephen King “Misery” way, mind you…we hope.) Said crazy old bastard is none other than Actual Crazy Old Bastard Bruce Dern, playing here the town sheriff, Bobby LaGrange (who comes up with these names?? I want to give them a cigar). Of course, moments after meeting, we discover that Sherriff LaGrange is less interested in the stuff Hall has written in the past, and more interested in teaming up with Writer Washed-Up in the here and now, because he’s got an idea for a really creepy story. Hall balks, naturally. Until, that is, LaGrange expounds upon the idea by saying he’s got a part of the story – a “real doozy,” even – sitting in the town morgue right now, and would Hall like to tag along to have a little look-see? Well, sure. Nothing else to do in a hick town where nobody’s buying your crappy witch books anyway. Off to the coroner’s office-slash-sheriff’s-department we go!

Book Review: “Flowers in the Attic” by V.C.Andrews

This is less of a book review/recap than it is an explosion of horrified thoughts after having just finished my dozenth-or-so reading of “FLOWERS IN THE ATTIC,” and my first as a grown-up. If you’re unfamiliar with the plot, don’t read on because spoilers, or alternatively you can have every agonizing minute of the experience broken down for you on Wikipedia. And for the love of all that is decent, do not ever, EVER see the ’90s movie version. 

 

Now we can proceed with what I just posted on Goodreads, under my 4-star rating.

• Story quality: 8/10
• Dialogue quality: LOL/10
• Still scandalous after all these years: PRICELESS.

 

Did I just stay up until five in the morning re-reading a book that messed me up in unimaginable ways when I was 11 years old? Did I, seriously, just do that? Why, yes. Yes, I did.

 

No, actually, I’m lying. It was only about 4:55 a.m. when I finished the book. I’ve spent the last half hour trying to decide whether to laugh or cry hysterically at the staggering number of Goodreads reviewers who read this godforsaken book at the same young age I did. What the hell, world? How did everyone just happen across this book – THIS BOOK!!! – before we’d even hit puberty?? And has anyone ever discussed with their therapists how it may or may not have completely fucked up all things relationship- and sex-related forevermore?!? No??? I’m thinkin’ I need to go find me a therapist just so I can ask how many others have staggered into those offices, lain themselves down on that Freudian couch and said, “Doc, I have a burning lust for my brother/sister, and my house doesn’t even have an attic. Help me.”

 

SPOILERS, obviously.

 

I seriously doubt there’s anyone reading these reviews who doesn’t already know what the book is about. You’ve read the blurb. This thing is infamous anyway. And apparently, as though all belonging to the same cult without ever realizing it, we’ve all read it. At a wildly inappropriate early age, no less.

 

Here are the things in this book (and I will struggle to not allow the subsequent books – all of which I read years ago, and own, and STOP LOOKING AT ME LIKE THAT – to colour my observations here, because hot damn, there is so very much in “PETALS ON THE WIND” in particular that can and will make you a headcase if you weren’t already) which are most likely to warp you forever:

 

Movie Review: “Sexcula” starring Debbie Collins, Jamie Orlando, and John Alexander, and featuring Julia Simmons

The first thing you need to know about Sexcula is that, according to the liner notes, it was produced with tax benefits through the Canadian Film Development Corporation, which makes it one of the oddest uses of government money ever.

The second is that several of the, ah, actors play multiple roles. So it wasn’t well funded.  Not that you’d have any trouble working that out on your own. Still, it gave the whole thing a strangely playful, amateur-ish feel, as if the school drama club had decided to skip fundraising via dinner theatre and try porn instead.

Movie Review: “TRANCE” starring James McAvoy, Vincent Cassel and Rosario Dawson

• Script quality: ?!!?!?
• Acting quality: 8/10
• Number of martinis needed to understand it: > 12
• Overall feeling afterwards: ?!??!?! Maybe…6/10?? Mostly for eye candy, though.

Danny Boyle, as a rule, has never led me astray. The man is a directing god. As soon as you add a Scotsman to the mix things get even more watchable (see: “TRAINSPOTTING,” SHALLOW GRAVE“). You can see, then, why I went into this James McAvoy vehicle – with a delicious side of Vincent Cassel, and the universal eye candy of Rosario Dawson, for good measure – feeling ridiculously optimistic. Oh, Danny Boyle, the light, the light is faaa-aaaa-diiiiing…

[ Watch the red band trailer for “TRANCE” here. ]

Let’s start with the plot. Sounds easy to do, right? Yeah. Not so much.

McAvoy plays Simon Newton, an affable young fellow with a delectable accent who works at a swanky London auction house, where pieces of art are sold off at obscene costs on a daily basis. We’re told, through his first-person narration, that as valuable as these pieces of art may be, their training has taught them that no painting is worth a human life; they therefore have stringent training in order to react quickly and safely in the event of a heist. Which is nice, really. On top of dental and health coverage, and a little paid vacation time each year, What To Do In The Event Of A Heist Training is something every decent job should offer.

Boyle wastes precisely zero time cutting to the action, which is a good thing in that you’re sucked in right away, but is a bad thing because the action becomes immediately relentless and impossibly convoluted. Still, there’s some cast nudity to which one can look forward, so all is not lost.

McAvoy’s lovely Scottish narration carries us into a day during which Goya’s “The Three Witches” is being auctioned off. I’ve seen the painting in person (weirdly enough, in Scotland – see? Danny loves that country!), and I have no idea why anyone would bid a bazillion pounds sterling on it, but that’s precisely what happens here: despicably wealthy people holding up placards with numbers on them to indicate that their wallet is deeper than the person’s next to them, and the people who drive me insane – those too lazy to even be arsed to attend an auction and instead get some lackey to take their bids by phone – driving up the price as the seconds pass. Anyway, this is all moot, because in a moment, there will be a Major Art Heist. Handling Art Heists, as we’ve mentioned, is something for which our Simon is Well Trained, and he lets said Training take over. As masked gunmen burst into the prissy crowd, tossing smoke grenades and hollering threats, Simon employs his Training and immediately seizes the ugly Goya canvas, hauls ass down a back corridor where everyone else seems to have abandoned their Anti-Heist Training while they run willy–nilly instead, and goes through the motions of saving the painting. He tucks the framed canvas into a big black bag that looks an awful lot like what pizza delivery folks use, then saunters into a back room and heads toward this magical slot into which, in the Event Of A Heist, a painting can be slipped, landing in a drop safe below, thus safeguarding the work of art, although I fail to see how this would placate a determined art thief, who would now have no reason not to kill the poor sap that just made the sought-after masterpiece impossible to steal. That’s pretty much what happens here: McAvoy gets within inches of sending that Goya down the Chute Of Safety when he’s caught up to be Franck (Vincent Cassel), possibly the sexiest criminal on earth, brandishing a gun and demanding the painting be turned over. In a seemingly bizarre twist, McAvoy hesitates, not following his Training which ought to out his own life above a crappy Goya throwaway, but rather grabbing one of the auction house security dude’s cattle-prod-like taser and promptly zapping Franck. Not enough to knock Franck out, mind you; just enough to piss him off, which is of course what you want to do to a sexy French art thief with a gun.

Movie review: 1313 UFO INVASION

So here we go: one of the infamous “1313” movies. If you haven’t seen one of these, it’s going to be hard to believe anyone else’s description of the pacing and “plot.” Basically, I think these movies emerged from some alternate reality in which there is no such thing as gay porn (or else it’s illegal or impossible to obtain), so there is a huge market for extended shots of buff young men walking around semi-clad.

It’s like soft core porn, except…softer. No sex actually happens, but there are shower scenes filmed in real time that dwell so long on the actors’ abs and asses that it starts to feel like some new kind of meditation.

And why are they called the 1313 movies? Because that’s the number of the house where they’re all filmed. No, I’m not kidding. After about the third 1313 movie you start dreaming about the place; it’s that familiar.

IMBD estimates the cost of producing this thing at $1,000,000. Yeah…okay.

• Script quality: Ahahaha.
• Acting quality: AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
• Overall feeling afterwards: I need a drink.

SPOILERS beneath the cut, although I’m pretty sure it’s impossible to spoil you for this just by describing it. The best I can hope for is to warn you, really.

Movie review/recap: “SHELTER” starring Julianne Moore and Jonathan Rhys Meyers

• Script quality: 3/10
• Acting quality: 6/10
• Overall feeling afterwards: 4/10

Watch the trailer HERE

SPOILERS AHOY!

Welcome to our first official post meant to save you from a terrible waste of rental money or download time! (…not that we condone piracy.) Today’s film is a little-seen gem, depending on how you’d like to define that word, called “SHELTER,” also promoted in some places as “6 SOULS,” starring Julianne Moore as an intrepid psychiatrist hell-bent on debunking cases of “Multiple Personality Disorder” (apparently the writers neglected to check the DSM-IV to see that the term is long outdated and is now, officially, “Dissociative Identity Disorder,” but trust me when I say this is the least of the film’s troubles). We open on the eve of an execution, that of an inmate against whom Moore’s Dr. Cara Jessup apparently testified during his trial; we see her struggling with the ethics of her works as she sits in the cliched last-minute Governor’s meeting, stating once and for all that this prisoner has no right to a stay of execution based on reasons of mental disease or defect, because he is just the latest in a long line of criminals she’s seen who have put on a good show in the vein of “Sybill.” Immediately after her damning words, Dr. Jessup rushes to the nearest bar right before closing time, demanding several shots of bourbon and access to the television remote, so she can watch the execution coverage while tearfully getting drunk.

I’ll warn you right now that the majority of exposition I’m giving you happens in the first twenty or so minutes; after that, there’s little point in focusing on many of the finer points, since the barrage of details thrown at us in the middle and final acts are just too numerous and ultimately either senseless or fruitless, so if you wonder why I spend entirely too long on the opening scenes while whipping through any loose ends being tied up (or not), it’s because the interesting stuff all happens early.

Back to it, then! We’re treated to a couple of brief introductions to Cara’s family: her young daughter Samantha, who apparently spends most of her time watching zombie flicks and eating junk food with Cara’s cool younger bro Stephen while her mommy battles the “Three Faces of Eve” syndrome in governor’s offices and courtrooms around the country; and then Cara’s father (played with sweet earnest by “The Walking Dead”‘s Jeffery DeMunn), a psychiatrist in his own right who enjoys exploiting his daughter’s talents and skepticism at every turn. We learn all of this at breakneck speed, which I suppose is a good thing, since we really needn’t know much more about these people, as we’d then have to care about each and every one of them.

Cara returns home to Pittsburgh from her bleaker, post-lethal injection version of “The Hangover,” promptly receives a call from Dr. Dad who’s insisting she simply must check out his latest specimen of MPD, and grudgingly heads to her father’s office before bothering to claim her daughter from the kindly bad influence that is Uncle Steve-O. It’s at this office where we meet David Bernburg (played with an exceptionally convincing and soft Southern accent by the very British Jonathan Rhys Meyers), who, like any good specimen, is indeed kept mainly behind the one-way mirror attached to Dr. Dad’s academic lair. Dad watches as Cara takes her first crack at David, putting him through the usual tests, whipping out Rorschach flashcards and checking for colour blindness, asking psychobabble questions about how many windows were in David’s childhood home and whether he was counting them in his memory from within said house or from outside. David, wheelchair-bound from an accident “a few years back” that left him paralyzed from the waist down, a seemingly sad, soft-spoken, utterly polite and shy young man, manages a cute smile as he responds, “Inside. It’s warmer.” Cara smiles back. She’s charmed. It’s obviously time to pull the rug out from beneath her, and she clearly knows as much, so she thanks David for his time and excuses herself to return to Dr. Dad’s side of the glass.