DESTROY ALL MONSTERS (1968)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *cosmological, sociological*


I have to say up front that I came tardy to the Toho Godzilla series, catching the late 1960s releases in the theater and the earlier ones on television. I was in much the same boat in terms of discovering Marvel comics in the late 1960s and playing catch-up afterwards. The one advantage these situations have in common is that the reader/viewer gets somewhat inundated with all of the story-tropes built up over several yeas. In my case at least, the "embarassment of riches" filled me with a desire to trace the tropes back to the "primal origins."

DESTROY was intended as a potential send-off for all of Toho's roughly interrelated kaiju films, Some of the monsters had crossed over several times, with GHIDRAH THE THREE-HEADED MONSTER and MONSTER ZERO as the standouts. Other critters had made only single appearances, such as Manda in ATRAGON. The titular creature from VARAN THE UNBELIEVABLE barely appears, allegedly because the studio's monster-costume had deteriorated to the point of no return.

Inoshiro Honda, who had helmed most of the key kaiju since 1954's GOJIRA, seems to be agreeing with an executive alleged to have claimed that the series had run out of ideas. DESTROY follows the pattern established in MONSTER ZERO, where insidious aliens take control of Earth's monsters and use them to conquer Earth. As in ZERO, everything on Earth seems to look like the 1960s, but a multi-national project has resulted in a permanent moon base. There are token efforts to show non-Japanese actors in minor scenes, but all of the main actors are Japanese, and lead male Katsuo (Akira Kubo) and his crew are constantly jetting around in flashy rocket-ships more reminiscent of Buck Rogers than of NASA.

Further, for the first and only time in the series, all of Earth's monsters have been humanely pacified and confined to a well-stocked Pacific isle, sometimes called "Monster Island." The implication is that Earth's scientific knowledge has grown so great that even the mighty Godzilla can be restricted to a single island with a device that sprays noxious gas at him. Joining him are Manda, Mothra, Rodan, Angilas, Baragon, Gorosaurus, Varan, Spiga, and Godzilla's son Minilla-- with Mothra seeming a bit out of place, since the giant moth had always been a "good monster" not given to random rampages.

This time the alien visitors strike right away, rather than making overtures of peace as those in MONSTER ZERO did. The Kilaaks-- all of whom look like Japanese women in silver lame outfits-- take over the moon base, implanting control-devices in all of the personnel. The takeover of the moon base and the abduction of the inhabitants of Monster Island are apparently the last steps in the Kilaak's long-term plan. Whereas the invaders of ZERO simply controlled monsters through radio-waves broadcast from their flying saucers, the Kilaaks don't seem to have as many vehicles, since they "seed" Earth with a great quantity of receiving-units, all hidden in obscure places. The idea seems to be that the control-waves are beamed from the moon but have to be re-broadcast on Earth in ordet to control the monsters when they start attacking strategic Earth-cities. However, during Earth's swift response to the incursion, forces of the United Nations (or some similar group) manage to uncover a lot of the receiver-units, and the monsters seem to keep on rampaging nonetheless.

The Kilaaks are actually snake-like beings that were bred to flourish in hot climes and who retreat from cold into stony hibernation-shells. Thus their tactic of taking the appearance of Japanese women doesn't track especially well, particularly when they can control real humans for their world-mastering schemes. The Kilaaks are arrogant about their superior technology, but they're even more hubristic than the average invading extraterrestrial, since at one point they even use one of their human agents to tell the United Nations the location of their base. Thus Katsuo's team is able to infiltrate the base despite its being guarded by Godzilla, rip off an important part of Kilassk control-technology, and bring it back to the military scientists, so that they can reverse-engineer it and turn the monsters against the aliens.

When all is said and done, all the dodgy plotting serves just one purpose: to give the monsters a reason for going on assorted apocalyptic attacks. Individual monsters make a few peripatetic assaults on non-Japanese targets, but Honda saves most of his city-model work for yet another Tokyo thrashing, as Godzilla, Rodan, Manda and Mothra raze the city. Missiles from the military seem to cause as much destruction as any of the titanic terrors.

As good as the Tokyo Stomp is, it can't compare with the ten-on-one monster rally, when humans send their ten native monsters to confront the Kilaaks. The aliens then unleash their own alien servitor, Ghidrah. What's masterful about this fight-scene is that although Ghidrah is played by a man-in-a-suit like the other monsters, the monster's wings and weaving heads made it difficult to stage an involved fight with so many monsters. Honda and his crew used a solution not unlike the conflict of the Big G and Angilas in GODZILLA RAIDS AGAIN: keeping the action rooted to one spot-- aside from some up-and-down motion on Ghirdrah's part-- while using quick cuts and brutal violence to keep the audience invested. Numerous times both Ghidrah and his opponents bite one another savagely, reminding the audience that they are, after all, colossal animals.

All ends happily for Earth and its hulking monster-heroes, and it would've made a good send-off for the original series, had the box office not proven strong enough to keep the franchise running. Continuity glitches aside, DESTROY ALL  MONSTERS remains one of the best of the kaiju genre.

TEEN TITANS GO VS. TEEN TITANS (2019)

 

If anything, the DTV entry-- which I'll call TEEN/TEEN for short-- is even more referential. Here, most of the inside jokes deal with the popular 2003 TEEN TITANS series, which was dominantly serious in tone and which was responsible for establishing the comic-book characters as popular subjects for animation. Indeed, the producers of GO! included a "teaser" at the end of MOVIES, suggesting that the "Serious Titans" would appear in this sequel.

If the main subject of the first movie was American society's enthusiasm for all manner of superheroes, TEEN/TEEN spoofs what I'll call the "multiple earths adventure" In comic books, this trope depended on the encounter of at least two groups of heroes from parallel versions of Earth, wherein the two groups had to resolve some cosmic threat to the respective domains of each group. In Silver Age DC Comics, these were usually variant versions of popular heroes like the Flash and Green Lantern, and thus for the most part the trope was confined to the comic-book medium. The TEEN/TEEN take on this concept is certainly one of the first, if not the first, non-comics adaptations of the trope, debuting even before the CW network produced its very loose adaptation of a crossover-series from the eighties DC-series CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS. In TEEN/TEEN, not only must the "funny Titans" deal with the serious versions of themselves, and with an assortment of other variant heroes as well, the teams' antagonists are a funny and a serious version of the demon-lord Trigon.

Though the 2003 Titans are played straight, their gravitas is largely flouted by the levity of the 2013 group. The level of humor is about the same level as MOVIES, decent but not spectacular, and the "serious TItans" don't really have a chance to shine in this format-- which will probably aggravate the many fans who preferred their adventures to those of their goofball variations.

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 2 (2017)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, sociological, cosmological*

I tried to avoid reading other reviews of this film before writing mine, but by chance I read a fragment where some critic lambasted the film for being too much of a repeat of the first film, leading me to assume that this critic wrote his review on mental autopilot.

Yes, given that the series features an ensemble of generally quarrelsome characters, there are plot-threads carried over from the first film, which might give some viewers the impression of repetition. But compared to some of the ham-handed handling of soap-opera plotting in some Marvel films-- particularly CAPTAIN AMERICA CIVIL WAR-- VOL. 2, both written and directed by James Gunn, represents a quantum leap. Indeed, a lot of the set-up situations in the 2014 film were more than a little forced, given that the ensemble characters were thrown together in "Dirty Dozen" fashion. This time, since the Guardians have now been in one another's company for some time--they're first seen undertaking a mercenary operation for a planetary culture in their sprawling galactic empire-- one can take their bond for granted in VOL.2.

The weakest of the "carried-over" threads-- Rocket the Non-Raccoon's inability to work and play well with others--  is still relatively consistent, as well as efficient in the role it plays in the overall story. Two Gamora plotlines, respectively regarding her sister and her love-interest Peter "Star-Lord" Quill-- are handled nicely, even if neither reveals any hidden twists. The plug-ugly Drax doesn't precisely get a new plot-thread of his own, but his dominant trait-- that of saying whatever comes to his mind, no matter how stupid-- is counterpointed by a new character, Mantis, who is largely an innocent and thus unable to suss out Drax's bullshit. Thus, though Mantis may not be intended to be a series regular, her chemistry with Drax is a highlight of the film's comic dimension. Drax (Dave Bautista) arguably gets the most juicy lines in the film.

However, the central plot is that of Earthman Peter Quill. The first film established the basics of the conundrum: following the death of his mother-- who maintained that Quill's absent father was an alien-- Quill was abducted from Earth by an alien. This was not Quill's daddy, but a buccaneer named Yondu, and for reasons unknown he chose to raise Quill as one of his band of space-pirates. This forced association assured that even though Yondu functioned as a surrogate father to Quill, the hero rebelled against Yondu's authority and escaped his control. Large parts of the first film are devoted to delineating the love-hate relationship between Qiull and Yondu.

Then, fortuitously enough, Ego, an alien purporting to be Quill's real dad shows up and invites the Guardians to his own planet, occupied only by him and his servant Mantis. Two Guardians, Rocket and Groot, stay behind to get involved in Yondu's continued pursuit of Quill, while Quill. Gamora and Drax journey to Ego's world. Ego reveals that he is a godlike being called a "Celestial," one who evolved from a primary mental entity. He says that he mated with Quill's mother but had to leave in order to replenish his energies on his self-created planet, and his story is partly affirmed by the fact that Quill discovers his heritage of Celestial powers (which explains one of the apparent plot-flaws of the first film). However, there would be no real conflict if Ego didn't have some secrets to be revealed, and sure enough, Real Daddy is even more heinous than Substitute Daddy. Gunn charts the relationship of Ego and his former henchman Yondu credibly, so that Quill finds out some hidden facts about his indebtedness to his surrogate father. I won't detail Ego's master plan here. Suffice to say, though, that it starts out looking like a sci-fi version of the Christian Father-God taking his Son, into his bosom, and then ends up as a nasty parody of that trope, slightly cross-bred with the history of Greek Zeus and his multiple spawnings.

I didn't research the persons responsible for VOL. 2's visual design, but the imagery here far excels that of the first film, to say nothing of most other Marvel films (particularly the visually stunted THOR films). A lot of critics have complained about the supposed sameness of the Marvel films, but I don't imagine any of them will celebrate things like the rich, Hindu-istic look of Ego's planet (complete with lots of mandala-circles) or the Luc Besson-like design of the Sovereign people's "virtual bicycles." Here, too, Gunn sets a new level of craft for others to imitate-- though they probably will not.

A lagniappe for hardcore Marvel-fans is to be had in drawing comparisons between the film's characters and the original versions of figures like Ego and Mantis-- not to mention one whose name is dropped in the end-teaser.

ADDENDUM 8-31-2021: After a second viewing of the film, I downgraded its mythicity to "fair," as I don't think Gunn does all that much with the "son of God" symbolism.

HERCULES AND THE MASKED RIDER (1963)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *uncanny*

MYTHICITY: *poor*

FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*

CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *sociological*

Apart from the categorization problems offered to my theory, HERCULES AND THE MASKED RIDER's only entertainment value lies in its title.  Upon watching the film, it's evident that "the Masked Rider," not Hercules, is the star of the show.  Otherwise, RIDER is nothing but a run-of-the-mill swashbuckler set in 16th century Spain.

In my system, a figure like Hercules can be "marvelous" if he's given powers like those of the gods, as in the 1959 HERCULES.  He can be "uncanny" if he's just a normal man with somewhat awesome muscular strength, which describes the majority of the Hercules/Samson flicks of the early 1960s, some of which starred RIDER's cast-member Alan Steel.  Here, however, Hercules (Steel) is a minor character who does some minor strongman feats, so the "Hercules" hero here possesses "outre skills" in a naturalistic context.

However, the main character of this swashbuckler does don a mask and cape for a few minutes, and becomes a name to conjure with a la Zorro and other masked adventurers.  So this particular development qualifies the film to be uncanny because of the (admittedly brief) presence of the hero in his masked identity.  The plot isn't worth commentary.

JUNGLE MOON MEN (1955)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, sociological*


I speculate that the only reason actor Johnny Weismuller got to play "Jungle Adventurer Johnny Weismuller" was because producer Sam Katzman had presold theaters on his three last "Jungle Jim" cheapies.  Rumor has it that Katzman lost the right to adapt the "Jungle Jim" comic strip, so the last three films in the series starred Weismuller as "himself," up to the usual jungle hijinks.  Johnny even kept Jungle Jim's pet chimp Tamba.

JUNGLE MOON MEN, the second of the three Weismuller-as-himself outings, is a little more imaginative than the usual potted-plant peregrinations, even though the imagination has been borrowed from H. Rider Haggard's novel SHE.  The "moon men" of the title are not-- as would have been fitting for the mid-50's-- aliens from our lunar satellite, but a tribe of pygmies from the realm of "Baku," who worship a moon goddess named "Oma." Their actions become important to Jungle Johnny when a poisoned pygmy dart slays a member of a normal-sized tribe of Africans-- that is, "Africans by way of Polynesia"-- thus causing the tribe's chief to declare war on the pygmies.  Jungle Johnny seeks to bring the pygmies' leader, the aforesaid goddess, to justice in order to prevent further hostilities.

The nature of the pygmies' goddess causes me to label one of this film's functions "metaphysical," strange as that may sound when applied to a routine jungle-adventure film.  But where most jungle-films were satisfied to recycle the old schtick of the "white goddess" who's actually some modern-day Caucasian castaway, Oma is at least a supernormal entity.  She claims to have been alive since the era of ancient Egypt-- hence the Rider Haggard comparison-- and that she remains alive because her people discovered the secret of eternal life.  She invokes two pagan Egyptian deities in her story, just as Haggard did in SHE and its sequels.  Oma claims that all the rest of her people were destroyed by the sun-god Ra, who was jealous of their attainment of immortality. Whether a real Egyptian god truly existed is left up for grabs, but Oma is definitely vulnerable to the radiation of the sun.

She was able to continue her life by fleeing to a series of underground caves, to which she was led by "Osiris, god of destruction." Some scripter desperately needed an Egyptian mythology-book! At most one could say that the real Osiris was a god of death, but Anubis and other death-deities were more intimately associated with the aspect of after-death burial-- which in a sense is what Oma has done, "burying" herself in order to escape the sun's rays. Oma proposes to Johnny that he becomes her new high priest and give her the nookey she needs.  In the end Jungle Johnny exposes Oma to the sun, and she dissolves-- again, roughly along the same lines as the priestess Ayesha in the first SHE novel.

Though MOON MEN offers only bargain-basement thrills, it's more visually interesting than most of the JUNGLE JIM oeuvre, in large part thanks to the pygmies, led by Billy "WIZARD OF OZ" Curtis.  Though the sight of Curtis trying to drive a jeep is hardly great comedy, it's a distinct relief from the antic of Tamba the Chimp.  Jungle Johnny's tagalongs include a lady archaeologist, her rather dull would-be boyfriend, and the usual nasty white adventurer, out to swipe diamonds from the pygmies.  This is one of the few films directed by Charles S. Gould, who logged far more credits as an assistant director on many classic Universal films, including DRACULA, WEREWOLF OF LONDON, and THE GHOST OF FRANKENSTEIN.  That experience may be the reason that MOON MEN looks crisp and professional despite its meager budget.

THE LONE RANGER AND THE LOST CITY OF GOLD (1958)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *uncanny*
MYTHICITY: *good*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *sociological, metaphysical*

CITY (which I deem the best abbreviation for the movie's long-winded title) was the last outing for the Lone Ranger of the 1950s following the conclusion of the series.  It was also the last official performance of Clayton Moore as the character, though the actor continued to make public appearances in costume and, according to imdb, never again portrayed any non-Ranger-related role.  In 1979 the company that owned rights to the Ranger character sued to block Moore from such unsanctioned activities, but relented when the suit netted them nothing but bad publicity.

Still, had Moore never again been able to don the Ranger mask, CITY would have made a good if not exceptional film with which to conclude.  Directed by Lesley Selander, a specialist in horse operas, and scripted by a writing-team that had already collaborated on various TV-show episodes, CITY has a strong sociological theme relating to the fate of the "red man" at the hands of white culture, and a minor metaphysical theme that alludes to the subject of Indian beliefs about deific forces.

The latter theme is constituted almost entirely in terms of an Indian legend related to Tonto and the Ranger.  Back in the time of the conquistadors, a tribe stood in danger of being wiped out by the superior firepower of Coronado's troops as the soldiers searched for the fabled "Seven Cities of Gold."  The night before the conquistadors' attack, a "fire from heaven" crashes down upon the conquistador camp and wipes out the enemies of the Indians.  Being a rational fellow, the Lone Ranger deduces that the Spaniards were wiped out by a falling meteor, but Tonto's demurral-- that the Indians believe the fire came from God-- is supported by the thrust of the story as a whole, which concerns the Indians of a particular tribe getting back their own from the white man.

The story proper begins with the heroes coming to the rescue when a band of hooded outlaws ambush an Indian's wagon, killing him but leaving behind his infant son.  Tonto and the Ranger take the child to a local mission, whereupon they learn that the same outlaws have been repeatedly attacking many Indians in recent months, always despoiling them of jewelry or related trinkets.  While the heroes investigate, Selander reveals the villain as a rare female antagonist: a ranch-owning widow named Fran Henderson.  Aided by her foreman Brady, Fran is the secret boss of the hooded outlaws.  Her goal is to regain the separated pieces of a medallion which, when assembled, will lead its possessor to one of the fabulous "seven cities of gold." At the conclusion we'll learn that the "city"-- actually a city-like expanse of golden stalactites-- resides beneath the ground where the meteor of legend crashed, which doesn't make a lot of sense but allows for a good emotional payoff.

In addition to coveting ancient Indian treasure, Fran-- though she's plainly keeping Brady loyal with displays of affection-- shows some interest in the town's local doctor, James Rolfe.  Unbeknownst to her and to the town-- dominated by a bigoted sheriff-- Rolfe is a half-breed, who has concealed his Indian heritage in the hope of earning enough money from the whites in order to build a mission hospital to help his people.  His true love is the full-blooded Indian squaw Paviva, who works at the mission and desires to adopt the orphaned child.  This causes her to put pressure on Rolfe to reveal himself as an Indian so that he can marry her, implying that the white community of the town would have taken a dim view of a white guy marrying red.  At the same time, Rolfe is justifiably concerned that if he comes out of the closet, he'll be ostracized from the town, short-circuiting his plans for improving his people's lot.  Though the Rolfe-Paviva story is clearly the "B-story" beside the main storyline of the Ranger's pursuit of murderous outlaws, the two complement each other quite well.  Eventually, after Tonto has a violent encounter with the bigoted sheriff, Rolfe does the right thing and reveals his nature to the people, who rather quickly renounce both their own bigotry and the sheriff's.

The upshot is that, following a few more encounters with the outlaws, Tonto and the Ranger unmask the villainess, moments after she kills her foreman in a fairly grisly scene for what must have been sold as a "family western."  They recover the medallion's sections from her, which leads them to the sunken "city."  Because the gold is on Indian land, it's assured that now the doctor will have the necessary funds to build his hospital, and for once a western ends with the unequivocal triumph of the "red men."

Some reviews speak of the meteor's role as propelling the film into the realm of science fiction.  But though the meteor accrues some symbolism as a possible manifestation of the "Hand of God," the meteor has no marvelous properties, though it might be deemed a mark of the uncanny.  However, as noted elsewhere the mere fact that the main hero wears a mask alone qualifies the film within that phenomenality, under the "outre outfits" trope.

HONOR ROLL #50, AUGUST 31

JAY SILVERHEELS' Tonto rose above the level of sidekick to become as iconic as his never-quite-"lone" partner.

HELENE STANTON played a road-company "She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed" in "Jungle Moon Men."

ALAN STEEL had better strongman-films in his repertoire, but his is the only recognizable name in the selection here.

Even in the second film ZOE SALDANA continued to guard her galaxy from Star-Lord's explorations.

Two STARFIRES (one goofy, one semi-goofy) for the price of one this time.

SPIEGA only got a few moments of time in "Destroy All Monsters," but he (she?) gets the nod here because everyone else could be linked to other movies in my repertoire.

REPTILICUS (1961)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *cosmological*

Confession time: I like at least one thing about REPTILICUS, and not in a "so bad it's good" way.

Long before I saw the Americanized version of Denmark's contribution to the Giant Monster Hall of Fame, I'd seen a few clips of the titular marionette-of-mayhem in the teleseries GOMER PYLE.  Gomer was apparently a big fan of watching old Repti at a drive-in theater.  At least I seem to remember the same clip(s) appeared in more than one episode-- which was presumably a shot at the maturity-level of giant-monster movies.

Though the film isn't juvenile as such, it certainly has more than its fair share of absurdities.  Reptilicus is a barely animated construct that makes even THE GIANT CLAW credible by comparison.  Though the critter looks about as durable as a pipe-cleaner, the narrative repeatedly insists that his scales are strong enough to repel shells from the local military.  Reptilicus also spits acidic poison, courtesy of crude animated effects added to the American release, but since they were interpolated in this belated fashion, they barely fit the existing continuity.

Also dragging down the film is one of the least likeable protagonists seen in any era of giant-monster films.  When first introduced to a group of cordial Danes, hook-nosed actor Carl Ottensen plays the American major Grayson as if he's got a major stick up his butt.  Maybe the writers were going for the sense of a military man resentful of his assigment to a desk job, only to meet a challenge like nothing he's ever experienced.  But if such was the intention, the script fails to deliver that irony.  Grayson softens somewhat when he meets a pretty UNESCO lady scientist, who comprises the film's most notable imitation of the American breed of giant monster-flicks.  Romance is back-burnered, though, in favor of assorted tours of the wonders of Denmark. Late in the film this bozo has the brainstorm that leads to Reptilicus' defeat, but the giant snake still comes off with more personality.

The film has one good aspect.  Reptilicus starts out as nothing but a dismembered tail naturally quick-frozen in ice.  From this little flesh-chunk the mighty monster regenerates itself into a fullblown force of carnage.  The cosmological intent here is to invoke the penchant of reptiles to regenerate lost legs or tails, though the idea of a creature regenerating itself the other way round is patent pseudo-science.  But if the script does nothing else right, it does set the challenging problem as to how to fight a monster that's less dangerous on its own than if it's blown into several pieces, all capable of similar regeneration.  Naturally the paltry FX-budget undermines the potential awe of this idea, but given modern-day advances in technology, a remake of REPTILICUS would have a leg (and a tail) up on any dozen of the lame "giant beastie" telefilms that show up on the Syfy Channel.

TEEN TITANS GO! TO THE MOVIES (2018)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *sociological*


I commented in one of my ARCHETYPAL ARCHIVE essays, SUBCOMBATIVE SUPERHEROES PART 3, that I didn't consider the still-current series TEEN TITANS GO! to be a combative series, even though occasional episodes did hinge on fight-scenes rather than on fart and poop jokes. In the multi-part episode "Island Adventure," even the character Raven commented, after she and the other Titans beat a bunch of villains, something like, "I don't know why we don't do this more often. After all, we are superheroes."

The two feature-movies based upon the GO series, however, emphasize the tropes of adventure more than does the average episode. Possibly, because both films run about eighty minutes each, the producers may have favored a more action-oriented superhero-plot to hold the audience's attention, even though both films are dominantly comedies. Of the two, only MOVIES was released to theaters, but though it enjoyed a profitable box office, the second went straight to DVD release. Perhaps Warner Brothers simply couldn't find a hole in their release schedule for a cartoon-movie sequel, despite the fact that MOVIES made substantial money.

As in various episodes, the comedic Teen Titans are screw-ups and bozos. When they botch a confrontation with the Balloon Man (based on an ultra-obscure one-shot METAL MEN villain), three other heroes-- Superman, Wonder Woman, and "John Stewart Green Lantern"-- comment that they don't consider the Titans real superheroes. The teens suffer further societal scorn. They're excluded when they try to attend an advance screening of a new Batman movie. Dozens of heroes far more obscure than the Titans are getting movies-- including Swamp Thing and the Challengers of the Unknown. Robin, the group's irritable alpha male, is particularly torqued at the group's marginalization. The other four aren't that affected, but they're willing to accompany Robin to Hollywood in quest of getting both respect and movie-fame.

Naturally, in the course of courting the cinema, the Titans fall afoul of the evildoer Slade. In the 2003 TEEN TITANS series, Slade was one of the group's principal villains, but most of the GO! episodes made only vague allusions to him, though he seemed to exist in their universe in some form. Here he's treated as if the heroes have never encountered the villain before, resulting in one of the film's better jokes, when the Titans mistake him for Marvel's Deadpool. Slade's evil plot also happens to involve the current craze for superhero movies, and even the late Stan Lee is called upon to make an animated cameo to usher the Titans into the Superhero Big Time.

Overall MOVIES has some moderately witty moments, though I imagine the references to obscure aspects of DC Comics' history were lost on younger viewers.

ESCAPE 2000 (1982)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *sociological*


These two future-dystopia flicks might be object lessons in "the right way" and "the wrong way" to do this kind of thing.

ESCAPE 2000, also called TURKEY SHOOT, is a rarity in that it melds tropes from three disparate sources-- the futuristic tyranny out of Orwell's 1984, the hunting-of-humans out of THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME, and any number of prison-pictures-- and yet all three sets of tropes complement one another.

In an English-speaking country that isn't identified (though it may be the country where it was filmed, Australia), both real political dissidents and those frivolously accused of rebellion are transported to remote desert-prisons where they're subjected to behavior modification. At the same time, the prison's warden Thatcher amuses himself and his sadistic guards with the custom of the "turkey shoot," in which captives are turned loose in the desert and then tracked down by the armed hunters.

Some critics complained about the very graphic violence in the tortures doled out by the guards and by the retaliation of the prisoners. However, there are been so many hundreds of routine tyrannies in film that often the supposed cruelties of the regimes lack any vraisemblance. By contrast, the scene in which head guard Ritter abuses one female prisoner for failing to speak a required catechism sells the idea of relentless cruelty better than any number of wholesale slaughters.

Paul (Steve Railsback) is the one true revolutionary among the targets, but though he and the other prisoners are simply characterized, they manage to keep audience sympathy despite the familiarity.

ERIK THE VIKING (1989)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *irony*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, sociological*


Wikipedia informs me that this Terry Jones-directed film was based on a children's book with a similar title, written by Jones, though the article asserts that the film bears no resemblance to the book. I would assume that the main purpose in making the film was not to keep fidelity to the source-novel, but to give the Monty Python troupe another shot at making another irony-laden costume epic, like 1975's HOLY GRAIL and  1979's LIFE OF BRIAN. I liked LIFE OF BRIAN but was not a great fan of HOLY GRAIL. For me ERIK falls in between, though it's nowhere near as quote-worthy as GRAIL.

Erik (Tim Robbins) is a young Viking who has just never warmed to his people's penchant for rape and pillage. He joins his comrades in raiding a village, but when he meets a woman who fully expects to be raped-- and to some extent, even encourages it-- Erik just can't work up the, uh, enthusiasm. The woman's killed shortly after, without being raped, but this just depresses Erik even more. He tries to get help from his grandfather (Mickey Rooney), who doesn't understand the youth's disenchantment with the Viking way. But Erik finds purpose when he talks to a seeress (Eartha Kitt), who tells him that mankind is doomed to eternal war since the fall of Ragnarok. The fact that clouds perpetually obscure the sun in Erik's world testifies to the fact that doomsday has already taken place, with the great wolf Fenris having swallowed the sun. Erik is then galvanized to gather a group of fellow Vikings and take them on a quest (he persuades them by the simple persuasion of knocking their heads together). Eventually, Erik and company leave their home in search of a great magical horn. With the aid of the horn, they can transport themselves to fabled Asgard, and petition the gods to save the Earth.

The first thirty minutes of ERIK are the best part of the film. It's an intriguing setup, and suggests that Jones did some homework on Nordic mythology, even though he chose to see the myths through an ironic lens. The Vikings' first obstacle affords the film a strong, if ludicrous, battle, when the sailors meet a sea-dragon, which creature for some reason sports a light-globe on its head, like that of the real-life angler fish. However, after the strong start, the film starts bogging down in typical Python-esque routines set in archaic times. The film particularly bogs down when the heroes visit the island Hy-Brasil to get the magic horn. Jones's script throws in assorted complications, but the film never recovers from this boring sequence. (Reportedly Jones cut the theatrical version of ERIK considerably for VHS release.)

The climax recovers itself somewhat in the conclusion, and this time the plot successfully invokes Viking lore to make its satiricial points. Erik's Vikings reach the gods in Asgard, but they find that the deities don't care anything about what happens to "Midgard." There's a little visual surprise in that the Asgardian immortals don't look like any conventional representations, for they take the form of richly-robed children. However, Jones doesn't really do anything of note with this change-up. Worse, it's not clear what, if any, effect the Vikings' visit has. One minute, Child-Odin is claiming they won't do anything to undo Ragnarok-- and a little later, the Lord of Asgard announces that Ragnarok has ended and the Wolf Fenris has returned the sun to normal. It seems as if Jones was rushing past this point to deliver his ironic coup de grace: that the gods, being sticklers for protocol, won't recognize the mortals' courage in reaching Asgard, and prepare to hurl the Vikings down to Hel. Only dumb luck saves the heroes and returns them to their home on Midgard.

Based on the fact that these ironic protagonists do accomplish some heroic feats, despite their kvetching and ambivalence, I consider this a "combative irony." And though there's not a major fight-scene at the end, the film does conclude with Erik's quest indirectly causing the downfall of a mortal adversary.

KILL OR BE KILLED (1980), KILL AND KILL AGAIN (1981)

 

PHENOMENALITY: (1) *uncanny,* (2) *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *sociological*


Both of these martial-arts films were filmed in South Africa with casts mostly unknown to American audiences. Both follow the trope of the "tournament-film," in which some character, usually a villain, hosts a tournament that attracts fighters from all over the world, all of which follow in the deep footprints led by ENTER THE DRAGON.

Now, while I did judge DRAGON to be a metaphenomenal film, it wasn't because the villain organized a tournament, but because he used weird weapons like a metal hand and a maze of mirrors. General Rudloff, the villain of KILL OR BE KILLED, has nothing special in his arsenal, but he's weird in another way: he's a "perilous psycho" in that he wants to re-stage a previous such tournament that *supposedly* took place back in the 1940s, *supposedly* involved the Germans pitted against their allies the Japanese, and *supposedly* was sponsored by historical Nazi figure Albert Speer.

Though KILL OR BE KILLED is poor in terms of script and production values, I've got to give the filmmakers credit for putting forth such a brain-damaged idea. Certainly there were no martial-arts tournaments back in WWII, though the film's alternate title, KARATE OLYMPIAD, suggests that the script-writer was really thinking Olympic thoughts. One never knows what Rudloff's been doing following the fall of the Axis Powers, but apparently nothing matters to him more than the Olympiad he lost to the Japanese. After assembling kung-fu fighters from all over-- including main hero Steve Chase (James Ryan)-- Rudloff challenges the same Japanese general whose fighters devoted those of Rudloff (though the general claims that his men were bought off). Most of the story concerns Chase and his girlfriend (supposedly another fighter, though she can't fake-fight to save her life) first escaping Rudloff's tyrannical hold, and then returning in order to destroy the general's mad scheme.

KILL AND KILL AGAIN is still cheesy, but it easily makes it into fantasy-film concordances because this time Steve Chase's villain is a mad cult-leader with a sci-fi gimmick. Nasty Marduk, who has even less background than General Rudloff, kidnaps a prominent scientist who intended to create a super-fuel from potatoes, because Marduk has learned how the same formula can be used to control the minds of his cultists. However, the professor has a daughter, the coyly named "Kandy Kane," who convinces Chase to go after Marduk. Chase, having already dealt with one madman, decides that this time out he could use a little more help than he got from his former girlfriend (who is never mentioned, of course). So he appeals to four previous acquaintances to infiltrate Marduk's  compound and to liberate Kandy Kane's father. Not surprisingly, Kandy herself also goes along for the ride, and the actress playing her, Anneline Kriel, at least does some creditable if short fight-scenes.

Though Marduk is not as wild an evildoer as the Nazi with the Olympics fetish, KILL AND KILL AGAIN is a little funnier than the first film, thanks to a lot of goofy lines given to Chase and his friends, anticipating the rise of the equally goofy A-Team in 1983. Fight-scenes overall are better but nothing to write home about.

AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (2018)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological, sociological*


Though INFINITY's opening weekend yielded one of the most impressive box-office bonanzas for a superhero movie, it's not quite the apogee of the genre. True, it duplicates one of the big appeals of Marvel Comics: the multi-character crossover, this time focusing on nineteen principals, in contrast to the mere dozen seen in CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR. And it's equally true that it's a much more enjoyable and coherent movie than the previous AVENGERS film, the tedious AGE OF ULTRON, which was more concerned with setting up plot-points than telling a good story.

Even critics who dislike superhero movies ought to be able to admire the chutzpah of the filmmakers. Having already sold the mainstream public on films starring both individual superheroes and the assembled Avengers together, the producers chose to "up their game" by crossing over the earthbound Avengers with Marvel's spacefaring crusaders, the Guardians of the Galaxy. Most of the "MCU" films have been planting "Easter eggs" in various superhero flicks in preparation for this mammoth team-up feature, using commendable restraint regarding INFINITY's Big Bad: the redoubtable Thanos. As yet most of the MCU films have avoided cosmos-spanning threats, usually focusing on catastrophes taking place in a restricted spaces, whether on Earth or in exotic realms like Asgard or Xandar. This time, even though much of the action takes place on Earth, or at otherworldly sites already visited by the Galaxy-Guardians, it's explicit that Thanos's evil will affect every sentient being in the universe.

In contrast to the comic-book villain, a sort of cosmic necrophile who wanted to destroy the universe in homage to the Goddess of Death, this Thanos is framed as an obsessed extremist like Erik Killmonger in BLACK PANTHER. However, whereas Killmonger is merely a facile bundle of ideological postures, the writers of INFINITY strive to make Thanos a truly epic villain. His backstory isn't much better delineated than that of Killmonger. Yet Thanos is given a coherent character-arc, balancing his obsession with winnowing the universe's population with his paternal affection for a little girl who will grow to become Gamora, one of his most dedicated enemies.

Not a few reviewers have celebrated the writers' ability to evoke distinct emotions for each of the nineteen characters, as well as assorted support-cast members. I'm somewhat more impressed by the fact that the MCU has managed to translate one of the key aspects of Marvel Comics' appeal-- that of character-based, soap-operatic melodrama-- without being able to utilize the structure of what I term "the fast serial." Such serial entertainments are predicated on being able to attract patrons with characters who can be viewed with high frequency, whether once a week, as with a television serial, or once a month, as with the most popular commercial comic books. The medium of cinema sometimes flirted with such formats, as with weekly film-serials. But in film, most sequels and serials have been separated by considerably more time-- be it about three months, as seen with B-films like the Charlie Chan and Andy Hardy franchises, or three years, like the original STAR WARS series. MCU films are "slow serials" like STAR WARS flicks, and slow serials cannot devote a lot of time to continuing plotlines. For instance, in between ULTRON and INFINITY, the Vision and the Scarlet Witch become lovers, but viewers must fill in the blank spots themselves, rather than seeing the love-affair progress as it would in a "fast serial." That the MCU has "trained" its audience to look forward to such adumbrated dramatics impresses me no end.

Humor, of course, is the MCU's key to making the characters relatable, though since the films can't use drawn-out sequences, jokes and funny character-moments assume far more importance than they did for Silver Age Marvel. The MCU also works with might and main to conceive large-scale scenes of spectacular violence, and INFINITY has some good fight-scenes, though nothing here measures up to the "airport scene" in CIVIL WAR.

Whereas all previous MCU films have been structured to give closure in spite of overarching plot-lines, INFINITY finally comes to its EMPIRE STRIKES BACK moment, trusting that the audience will accept a true cliffhanger ending and come back for the next chapter. This is appropriate since INFINITY's box-office earnings have exceeded those of each of the recent STAR WARS outings. The outer-space scenes are executed efficiently but with little of George Lucas's elan, but then, as I've noted elsewhere, the "sense of wonder" in the MCU comes at a distant third from the jokes and character-arcs.

I enjoyed the way the film managed to balance so many such arcs, though some characters inevitably get less attention than others. I expect that the second part of INFINITY will be no less impressive in this regard, though I'll be more interested to find out how the MCU manages to "top itself" in its impending "Phase  Four."

HONOR ROLL #49, AUGUST 31

 MARK RUFFALO didn't seem too "ruffled" by the downgrades of the Hulk in the last two Avengers flicks.

After JAMES RYAN killed so that he would not get killed, he then went on to kill and kill again.

Even Hiccup Haddock proves a more convincing Viking than TIM ROBBINS.

STEVE RAILSBACK escaped to a time that was the future, forty years ago.

RAVEN (Goofy Version) said "nevermore" to any more "Teen Titans Go" movies about the Teen Titans being in the movies.

You'll never be rid of the Dane, much less the Danish contribution to European kaiju, REPTILICUS.

PREDATOR (1987)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *psychological, sociological*


PREDATOR has proven one of the most fertile franchises to be spawned in part by the Arnold Schwarzenegger boom of the 1980s-- perhaps proving more malleable than the TERMINATOR franchise due to the fact that PREDATOR's concept depended less on Arnold's presence.
There's no question that director John McTiernan and the scriptwriters had some awareness of the "men's adventure" mindset to which they played, not least because it takes place in the wilds of Central America, and because only one female character appears on screen (though there are typical men's jokes about "pussy" in the course of the film).  Arnold's character "Dutch" and his five elite mercenaries are hired by Dutch's old buddy Dillon (Carl Weathers).  Dillon, a former soldier now working with the CIA, wants Dutch's team to extract a missing cabinet minister, captured by jungle-dwelling guerillas when the minister's helicopter went down.  Dutch's early reservations about Dillon's CIA ties are later borne out: Dillon is in fact using Dutch to find out what happened to CIA agents gone missing when they investigated the guerillas' area.  Like many CIA ancestors to Dillon-- notably the quisling advisor from RAMBO II-- Dillon freely lies to the commandos to achieve his organizational ends, thus breaking the code of male loyalty that underlies all such adventure-tales.

Soon enough, the rescue time finds that it has more to worry about than Central American guerillas and untrustworthy agents.  After Dutch's team wins a firefight with guerilla forces and take one prisoner-- a female local named "Anna"-- they find themselves being hunted by a single being possessed of technology able to make him blend in with the surrounding jungle, so that in effect he becomes the jungle, able to attack the commandos at any time and with an array of super-scientific resources.  Slowly the alien Predator-- who is never called by this name in the film-- picks off its human quarries.  Anna, though she's not able to add anything to the formidable firepower of the group, supplies some historical perspective: as the sole person native to the area she tells the commandos of "demons" that have haunted the jungle at certain periods.  Fittingly, the Predators only come looking for game during the hottest times of the year, equating them with the fierce heat of the jungle as well as its visual torments.

McTiernan plays to the "body culture" of the 1980s by displaying many shots of the actors' buff bodies, and the script is just as on-target with regard to the almost masochistic bravado of the "men's adventure" genre.  When during the guerilla-firefight one commando informs another that the latter is bleeding, the wounded man replies, "I ain't got time to bleed." But the Predator ups the ante of the typical "men's adventure" story and confronts the experienced fighters with an enemy that none of them have ever conceived. Most of them acquit themselves reasonably well but only two survive: the star (of course) and the female he protects.  Since Anna's survival isn't strictly necessary to the plot, it might be conjectured that the script keeps her alive for purposes of rewarding the hero as in most stories in this genre: however, Dutch and his friends are kept too busy by their camoflagued foe to even contemplate sex from start to finish.

I rate PREDATOR's mythicity as "fair" because it does a good job of expressing the male-bonding culture while carefully avoiding any elements that might politicize the narrative, even on the cartoonish level of the RAMBO films.  It's possible to see the Predator as a symbol of the "invisible jungle native" who haunted American soldiers in Vietnam, but that would probably be reading the film in too narrow a manner.

TANK GIRL (1995)

 

I've also only brief acquaintance with the Australian comic TANK GIRL, and, again based on memory, I would have to say that the 1995 film does not represent the spirit of the raucous 1988 comics feature. Ironically, though the live-action portion of the film fails to keep the proper tone, there are occasionally cartoon-inserts throughout the continuity, done in the style of the original comics-artists, and these suggest that a full animated feature might've been a better way to go.

It's another post-apocalyptic future, this time caused by a comet that strikes Earth and obliterates a lot of the planet's water-supply, In Australia a tyrannical combine, the Water and Power Corporation, attempts to corner the remaining water market, but they often suffer attacks by mysterious attackers called "Rippers." In addition, Water and Power-- run the megalomaniacl Kesslee (Malcolm McDowell)-- discovers a scruffy little commune with their own well, so they decimate the commune and take prisoner a young woman named Rebecca (Lori Petty). However, during her captivity-- which seems unusually lax-- the Rippers invade the W & P facility and nearly slay Kesslee. With the help of "Jet Girl," a young woman with great mechanical talent, the heroine steals a tank from W & P, at which point she morphs into the titular "Tank Girl." While the two young women go in search of other allies, not least the Rippers, W & P uses extraordinary technology to resurrect Kesslee in a sort of holographic cyborg-body. Naturally, he then wants revenge on everyone associated with his near-death, particularly the defiant Tank Girl.

Budgeted at about $25 million-- incidentally, about a third of MYSTERY MEN's budget-- TANK GIRL looks like a lot less was spent, particularly when the script introduces us to the Rippers, who are (for the most part) humans who have been genetically crossbred with kangaroos. Considering that director Rachel Talalay made a much better movie-- A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 4-- for less than half the cost of TANK GIRL, the fault would seem to lie in an overly jokey script and poor development of characters. Lead actress Lori Petty makes a game try to incarnate the boisterous spirit of the comics-character, but the script gives her only dull psuedo-western cliches to work with. Malcolm McDowell has a considerably easier time of it playing the tyrannical Kesslee, but a strong villain can't save a film with a weakly conceived hero.

Allegedly Talalay is currently attempting to reboot the franchise with a new film. I'd still say that an animated feature would be the way to go, but after the critical embrace of MAD MAX FURY ROAD, a new outing for the girl with the big tank could only be an improvement over this outing.

THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT (1975)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair* 
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *cosmological*


Over three subsequent summers, producer John Dark and director Kevin Connor produced what a few references call the "Edgar Rice Burroughs" trilogy.  However, aside from the stories' authorial source, the only common element of the three films is that the heroes venture to primitive worlds full of prehistoric inhabitants. One is an adaptation of Burroughs' novel AT THE EARTH'S CORE, a series about a prehistoric world inside the Earth.  The other two draw in varying degrees from Burroughs' "Caprona trilogy," each of which focuses on a different hero in the prehistoric world of Caprona, hidden with a volcanic crater in a remote corner of the globe.

THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT follows many key elements of the Burroughs book of that title.  Hero Bowen Tyler is one of a group that survives the torpedo-ing of their ship by a German U-boat during the hostitlities of WWI.  Tyler, accompanied by some English sailors and a gutsy young girl, boards the U-boat and takes control of it.  Unfortunately, when Tyler and his crew attempt to return to the world of their allies, they are fired upon. Their search for a safe haven lands them in the unknown land of Caprona, a land where evolution has gone berserk.

In the book Caprona's wealth of prehistoric life is explained by a mystical-sounding "pool of life" into which all Capronan species lay their "eggs." The 'eggs"-- which act more like "sperm"-- then progress along a "great chain of being" so as to become dinosaurs, cavepeople, or even a weird species of winged humanoid called the "Weiroo."  Connor's LAND does to its credit keep this wild explanation for Caprona's evolution-flux, including Burroughs' core idea about the different species of cavepeople.  In Burroughs' scheme, the cavepeople undergo evolution within their own lifetimes, progressing from "ape-men" to men able to use clubs, to men who can use axes, and so on.  The idea naturally doesn't come off as clearly in the cinematic medium as in prose, but the LAND script makes a game effort to adapt Burroughs, though it drops the idea of the animal-human hybrids.

The film also keeps the book's other most appealing aspect, showing how all of the humans-- English, German, and American-- are forced to work together to survive in this grim milieu.  The biggest change is the one wrought upon the German U-boat captain, who is a stereotypical evil Prussian type in the book, guilty of firing upon an innocent civilian ship.  In the film he's a generally sympathetic figure who justifies having blasted Tyler's ship because it carried hidden arms for his country's enemies.  In the book the German officer attempts to abandon Tyler and his friends to Caprona by making off with the submarine, and the villain only gets his just desserts in the third part of the trilogy.  In the film, the officer tries to save Tyler when another German abandons the heroes, but he and all of his officers ironically die in a volcanic explosion while Tyler's group lives through the chaos.

Further, Connor's film eschews the novel's strong focus on the romance between Tyler, the plucky girl and the German officer, to whom the girl was engaged by family arrangement.  Here the officer has no designs on the heroine, and there's barely any romance between Tyler and the woman with whom he ends up sharing Caprona.  Connor's direction is fluid and keeps the melodrama lively even without the romance.  And though the film makes considerable use of models and puppets, location shots taken in the Canary Islands gives the film an expansive feel characteristic of the best adventure-films.

DAVID AND GOLIATH (1960)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *metaphysical, sociological*


DAVID AND GOLIATH was made during the height of Italy's *peplum* craze, and in many scenes does resemble one of those action-adventure flicks more than one of the equally-popular Biblical-drama films, such as THE SILVER CHALICE and THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Arguably, the 1960 film holds together a little better in dramatic terms than many Bible-epics, possibly because the script rewrites religious canon for the sake of showing how the warrior-shepherd David (Ivo Payer) assumes the mantle of Israelite kingship from the older, unpopular monarch Saul (Orson Welles).

I've seen many reviews assert that Welles' Saul is the best aspect of the film, but I found it an unexceptional, one-note performance-- certainly a result of the script, which gave Welles nothing with which to work. In contrast, though star Ivo Payer doesn't set any worlds on fire, his David at least does have to show more than a single emotion-- joy as he romances his shepherd-fiancee, sorrow when she's apparently taken from him by a manipulative God (who zaps her with lightning so David will give up the shepherd's life), and righteous fury when he goes to Jerusalem and sees the people being tyrannized by the "false liberties" of Saul's reign.

If it weren't for that very improbable lightning-strike-- which isn't in the Biblical tale of David, though it bears some comparison to the story of Job-- I would probably deem DAVID an uncanny film like SILVER CHALICE. As in that film there are prophets claiming to know the word of God-- in DAVID, it's the soothsayer Samuel-- but no other miracles take place, though the Ark of the Covenant is referenced. (Saul is blamed here, though not in scripture, for losing the artifact to the evil Philistines.)

The source of the film's uncanny vibe is inevitably Goliath, the nine-foot-tall giant who comes to work for Israel's enemies. One of the film's best scenes paints him as something of a Cyclops, when a weaselly go-between seeks out Goliath within a huge cave in order to gain his services for the Philistines. I was unable to find out the actual height of the actor playing Goliath, a circus giant named Aldo Pedinotti, but going on the film's use of forced perspective I presume he was something less than nine feet high. Since the film's hero is a lithe but not bulky specimen of masculinity, Goliath gets to fill in as the film's "muscleman," lifting a huge stone that only the legendary Samson was ever able to lift before.

The filmmakers apparently wanted their David to be more of a firebrand than the standard Biblical image, since upon arriving in Jerusalem he loudly expresses his disapproval of seeing Saul's enemies publicly tortured, another scene present nowhere in the Bible. There's a tiny suggestion that David is also the harbinger of a more civilized mode of governance, as there's a line about letting the people rule themselves-- but this sociological theme is not developed, any more than the psychological relationship between the Old King and the Young Blade who's come to replace him. In the end, after David has conquered Goliath and returns in triumph, Saul even comes to David's rescue against a hidden conspirator-- also not in the Bible.

The film's least interesting scene is without a doubt the "fight" between the shepherd and his titanic adversary. While it would have been impossible to prevent the majority of viewers from knowing the outcome in advance, the directors might have chosen some more interesting angles from which to shoot the short encounter. Though it's not much of a battle, Goliath's defeat leads to the military downfall of the Philistines in a general rout, thus supplying more action for the viewer and putting the film more firmly in the combative mode.

Like many peplum-films, DAVID AND GOLIATH also sports two females, one good and one bad, and both strikingly gorgeous.

DICK TRACY'S G-MEN (1939)

 

DICK TRACY'S G-MEN follows much the same pattern, except that the first and the fifteenth episodes of the serial are far better than everything in between. This time, Tracy's opponent is a full-fledged enemy agent with the rather devilish name of Nicholas Zarnoff (Irving Pichel). Zarnoff makes his debut as starring villain in a most improbable manner, for he's imprisoned in a jail cell, waiting to die for his crimes. Tracy appears on the other side of the bars, and when Zarnoff asks if the g-men thinks he Zarnoff is afraid of death, Tracy replies:

 "No, Zarnoff, you probably hold the same contempt for it that you held for the lives of others."

Thus the gauntlet is thrown down between Tracy, representing the forces of life, and Zarnoff, who is contemptuous of death and life alike. But before his execution, Zarnoff ingests a special chemical, and seems to die ahead of time. After his apparent passing, his agents revive him, and Zarnoff tells them that the death-chemical was the legacy of the "alchemists of Satan." Though in real history alchemists are not identical with Satanists, this section makes Zarnoff seem as if he's technically in league with the forces of evil, rather than just being a simple enemy agent. Indeed, the master spy makes an ambiguous remark about having "lost" some vital ingredient of his being because of using the devilish chemical-- though the allusion to sacrificing one's soul is never developed.

After this phenomenal opening, the serial settles into familiar territory, as Tracy continually prevents the spy's schemes of murder and sabotage. Regrettably, the serial makes heavy use of the practice of re-running previous scenes in order to recap earlier events, thereby saving the studio money and gypping contemporary viewers who actually followed the serials from episode to episode. However, G-MEN makes up for this debit with one of the strongest endings to any sound serial, when a crashed plane strands both Tracy and his quarry in a burning desert, where only one can survive.

Byrd is as good here as in any of his other Tracy serials, but Pichel is the real treat. He dominates every scene he's in, as much because of his presence as his Satanic-looking goatee, and for me at least ranks as one of the top ten villains of sound serials.

SCOOBY DOO & BATMAN: THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD (2018)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *psychological*


Though as an adult I've come to respect the Scooby-Doo franchise more than I did as a kid-- if only for its sheer persistence-- it stings a bit to see the talking Great Dane get top billing over Batman. I suppose I can take refuge in the fact that this DTV film wouldn't even exist if not for the durability of the mystery-solving mutt, and that the Batman here is the "hip humor" version who appeared in the TV cartoon BATMAN: THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD, a series that finished up in 2011.

I call the protagonist of the BRAVE AND BOLD series "hip humor" to distinguish from the "camp" aesthetic of the 1966 BATMAN teleseries. In camp, it's important that none of the characters, particularly the principals, should be aware of the absurdities they encounter. "Hip humor," in contrast, usually does have one or more characters who are acutely aware of the weirdness of their worlds. The Batman of the BRAVE AND BOLD teleseries sometimes resembles the campy Batman of the live-action series, but the former delivers his oddball lines with a deadpan air that suggests the knowing-ness of the hip humor-character:

What is this now, the fifth or sixth deathtrap I've been tied up to because of you over the years?

...you left the school before learning Wong Fei's most important lesson: when outmatched, cheat

 Sorry. Crime doesn't take dinner breaks and neither do I.

The teleseries loosely followed the template of DC's team-up title, which, for most of its existence, placed Batman into temporary partnerships with almost every "guest-hero" available from the DC roster. The comic book was nominally serious in tone, but not infrequently, the writers did attempt a sort of hip humor, though it's questionable as to whether they succeeded. More, a lot of fans remember the title best for its preponderance of wacky improbabilities, which also happens to be the way fans tend to think of Silver Age DC as a whole. Often the improbability stemmed just from the idea of the Caped Crusader being teamed up with characters who just didn't seem to belong to the same universe, ranging from World War II hero Sergeant Rock to the futuristic Legion of Super-Heroes. The 2008-2011 cartoon show exploited those incongruities with a "retro" artistic approach, hearkening back to the Batman comics of the early Silver Age, which often pitted the hero against flamboyant gimmick-villains like Clayface II and the Polka Dot Man.

However, the producers of SCOOBY/B&B, while trying to emulate some of the aesthetic of the cancelled teleseries, were clearly required to slant the humor not toward hipster loopiness, but toward the prevailing type of humor of the Scooby franchise. Over the years that franchise occasionally toyed with hip humor, but by and large the approach has stuck with what worked in the Hanna-Barbera original: baggy-pants burlesque and slapstick.

This wasn't a big problem when the Scooby Gang crossed over with other franchises in other DTV flicks, such as 2014's WRESTLEMANIA MYSTERY and 2015's ROCK AND ROLL MYSTERY. But in both of these, there wasn't a lot of mythology to the guest-stars-- respectively, the wrestlers of the WWE and the rock-group Kiss-- and so it didn't really hurt those guest-stars to play in Scooby's sandbox.

The writers of BRAVE AND SCOOBY try mightily to make B&B''s "hip humor" style jibe with the Hanna-Barbera baggy-pants style, but the attempt rarely succeeds. Perhaps one of the few bits that works is a scene in which Velma Dinkley attempts to out-detect one of DC's goofier sleuths, Detective Chimp. I can appreciate the Silver Age flashback when Batman invites the Scooby Gang to join his sleuth-group "the Mystery Analysts." In the comics this was a group of mundane amateur detectives who helped Batman solve crimes, but for the purpose of B&B, it's just an excuse to convene some of the favorite guest-stars from the teleseries: the Martian Manhunter, Plastic Man, Black Canary, and the Question-- none of whom are particularly associated with mystery-solving. (Aquaman, even less associated with sleuthing, deals himself into the plot, mostly because the show's "Richard Harris" take on the character was a fan-favorite.)

And the plot? It's a pretty forgettable schtick about solving the one case Batman himself couldn't solve, involving a scientist who disappeared into another dimension. There's also a mysterious spectre, the better to fulfill the ghost-hunting part of the Scoobies' resume. A few other Bat-villains are also added to the mix, resulting in too many crooks-- and too many crook-catchers-- spoiling the whole soup.

It's mostly interesting as a failed experiment, and, in my case, as a challenge for categorization, since the "adventure" theme of BRAVE AND BOLD is here overruled by the "comedy" theme of SCOOBY, though there's enough heroic action that the whole thing registers as combative with me.

HONOR ROLL; #48. AUGUST 29

So far the once Classic Hero PLASTIC MAN has to make do with a crummy guest-role in a Scooby Doo movie.

IRVING PICHEL has the distinction of providing Dick Tracy with his most intense cinematic foe.

In the story of King David, IVO PAYER had the pleasure of being the hero, even if Orson Welles was the headliner.

SUSAN PENHALIGON provided the woman's POV on prehistoric survivals.

LORI PETTY tanked as TANK GIRL.

Arnie S. had to play second fiddle to THE PREDATOR. At least it wasn't as embarrassing as doing the same to Red Sonja.

GODZILLA 2000 (1999)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, cosmological*


GODZILLA 2000 started out the "Big G" reboot known as the Millennium series, but 2000 is somewhat less than "millennial" in quality.

The film runs two parallel plot-lines which eventually dovetail, but to no great effect. The principal viewpoint characters are members of a small group of "Godzilla sighters," made up of scientist Shinoda, his precocious young daughter Io, and a jaded lady reporter, Yuki, who hangs around with them to get advance info on the monster's rampages. Shinoda makes clear in his speeches that he wants Godzilla contained but not destroyed, since he's an important example of post-nuclear adaptation. However, the "Godzilla Prediction Network" has no clout, and the officials of the "Japan Self Defense Force" continue with their plans to destroy the giant reptile. In fact, the JSDF is led by the obsessive Katagiri, whom Shinoda knows from his days working for the same organization. Both the scientist and the military commander are fairly flat figures, designed to embody "good view of Godzilla" vs. "bad view of Godzilla."

The JSDF is also responsible for giving Millennium Godzilla his first sparring-partner, when the military tampers with a sunken UFO. The UFO comes to life and promptly seeks out Godzilla, blasting the reptile in order to harvest the creature's DNA. However, the aliens in the UFO can't control the monster's "wild card" genes, and the whole shebang-- the craft and whatever beings are inside it-- morph into a big monster, whom the Japanese dub ":Orga," There's a seesaw battle between Godzilla and Orga, which Godzilla predictably wins. Katagiri actually gets the best scene: roaring his defiance of Godzilla just before the monster destroys him.

While Ogra is a dull opponent that made me long for the days of the Smog Monster, 2000 at least boasts an impressive new design for Godzilla, certainly better than the slinky iguana-critter from America's 1998 GODZILLA. The 2000 film even does its own version of the 1998 film's much longer and more involved "car fleeing big monster's feet" scene. Still, the Japanese characters are not as appealing as those of the American version, much less those of the earlier "Heisei period."