Space Probe Taurus (1965)

SPACE PROBE TAURUS  (1965)  ¢ ¢
    D: Leonard Katzman
    Francine York, James B. Brown, Baynes Barron,
    Russ Bender, John Lomma, Phyllis Selznick
In the year 2000, four astronauts blast off for deep space in search of another inhabitable planet. They find one, but when they get there, they land in the water, and there are these giant crab monsters and an aquatic humanoid thing that looks like the Creature from the Black Lagoon's mutant cousin. Slow-moving, low budget sci-fi, more notable for the interplay between the characters than the draggy, episodic storyline. The end titles credit the sound effects to somebody called "Josef von Stroheim". Maybe "Erich von Sternberg" was unavailable.

8 Mile (2002)

8 MILE  (2002)  ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2
    D: Curtis Hanson
    Eminem, Kim Basinger, Brittany Murphy,
    Mekhi Phifer, Evan Jones, Eugene Byrd,
    Anthony Mackie, Taryn Manning, Michael Shannon

Brothahs and sistahs, it's your main man Nick,
Gonna spin a little rap about this here flick. 
It's all about a white kid in Detroit City,
Got a dead-end job and his life is lookin' shitty.
He lives in a trailer park and that's no good,
So he hangs with the homies at a club in the 'hood.
He might  be a honky, but he knows the lingo.
His mother (Kim Basinger) likes to play bingo.
Now the cat's big dream is to be a star rapper.
If he can't cut that, then his future's in the crapper.
So he gets on stage where he freezes and chokes,
And the folks in the audience laugh and make jokes. 
Then he goes through all kinds of toil and trouble.
Gonna take more than ridicule to bust his bubble. 
And after watchin' lots of real bad shit pass,
He picks up the mike again and really kicks ass.
By now you've prob'ly guessed that this is Eminem's movie.
In the language of the '60s you could call it kinda groovy.
The story's pretty basic and you've seen it all before,
But this Marshall Mathers kid really nails it to the door.
He plays it low-key, a kind of hip-hop zen.
Makes you wonder what he'll do when he gets to mile ten.

In the spirit of the New Year and as a gift to the rest of the human race, the Movie Buzzard resolves not to try to write any more rap lyrics for the foreseeable future. 

Black Sabbath (1963)

BLACK SABBATH  (1963)  ¢ ¢ 1/2
    D: Mario Bava
    Boris Karloff, Mark Damon, Michèle Mercier,
    Lidia Alfonsi, Susy Andersen, Jacqueline Pierreux
Three tales of the supernatural, introduced by (who else?) Boris Karloff, which is a little like watching three episodes of Karloff's old "Thriller" television show. In the first segment, a nurse steals a ring from the finger of a corpse, and lives (but not long) to regret it. The second has a woman terrorized by a voice on the telephone. The third is a vampire story starring Boris himself. Ironically, that one's the least frightening. The first is the shortest and the best. 

Men In Black 3 (2012)

MEN IN BLACK 3  (2012)  ¢ ¢ ¢
    D: Barry Sonnenfeld
    Will Smith, Josh Brolin, Tommy Lee Jones, Alice Eve,
    Jemaine Clement, Michael Stuhlbarg, Emma Thompson
The guys in the black suits are back, with Agent J (Will Smith) going back in time to 1969 to save the world, as well as the life of his surly partner, Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones). Josh Brolin plays the younger Agent K, and it's brilliant casting, while the premise allows for a revelation at the end that opens a whole new window on the relationship between the two agents. The rest is the usual summertime blast of special effects, with a new icky creature being blown to pieces every so often to hold the attention of viewers who really aren't interested in anything else. My favorite: the giant mutant fish thing that tries to devour Agent J.

The Woman In White (1948)

THE WOMAN IN WHITE  (1948)  ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2
    D: Peter Godfrey
    Eleanor Parker, Alexis Smith, Sydney Greenstreet,
    Gig Young, Agnes Moorehead, John Abbott
A movie based on the Wilkie Collins novel about a mysterious woman who seems to hold the key to a plot that involves blackmail, larceny, mistaken identity and murder. My colleague Ms. Applebaum has read the book and says the film departs from it in significant ways, but the movie holds up fine on its own. Sydney Greenstreet as the treacherous Count Fosco is one of the most sinister villains ever, but his wife is played by Agnes Moorehead, which at least makes it a fair fight. 

Bad Santa (2003)

BAD SANTA  (2003)  ¢ ¢
    D: Terry Zwigoff
    Billy Bob Thornton, Tony Cox, Bernie Mac,
    Lauren Graham, Brett Kelly, John Ritter
What if you took your kid to the store to see Santa Claus, and Santa turned out to be a mean, belligerent, foul-mouthed, antisocial, smelly, womanizing, safe-cracking, alcoholic bum? That's the joke in this sour, one-joke comedy, a shot of vitriol to counter the annual onslaught of holiday cheer. Santa gets drunk. Santa chain-smokes cigarettes. Santa stumbles around and acts like an asshole and uses words like "shit" and "fuck" in every goddamn sentence, and after a while you kind of get numb to it all. There's a nice payoff late in the film, though, if you make it that far. It happens when Santa, on the run from the cops after a botched burglary, gets gunned down trying to deliver a little stuffed elephant to the only kid on his Christmas list. Now that's funny. I realize I just gave away the ending, but trust me, you're not going to have enough invested in this guy to care want happens to him anyway. Merry Christmas.

Screen Test / Take 10

Match the following actresses with the movies in which they played opposite Cary Grant:

                              1. Ingrid Bergman
                              2. Grace Kelly
                              3. Sophia Loren
                              4. Eva Marie Saint
                              5. Mae West
                              6. Leslie Caron
                              7. Deborah Kerr
                              8. Doris Day
                              9. Marlene Dietrich
                            10. Marilyn Monroe

                              a. "That Touch of Mink"
                              b. "I'm No Angel"
                              c. "An Affair To Remember"
                              d. "Notorious"
                              e. "Father Goose"
                               f. "To Catch a Thief"
                              g. "Monkey Business"
                              h. "Blonde Venus"
                               i. "Houseboat"
                               j. "North By Northwest"

        Answers:

1-d / 2-f / 3-i / 4-j / 5-b / 6-e -/ 7-c / 8-a / 9-h / 10-g