The Norliss Tapes (1973)

***SPOILERS***

Journalism, as a career for cinematic and television protagonists, isn’t in favor like it once was.  This could be because technology has changed how news is both reported and absorbed.  It could be because journalists aren’t as trustworthy as they used to be (which also ties in with how technology has changed the landscape).  Outside of social issue films, journalists just ain’t sexy no more.  The only two recent exceptions to this that I can think of are Clark Kent in any given DC Comics film featuring Superman and Sam Turner and Jake Williams in Ti West’s The Sacrament.  While I’m sure people are still inquisitive, there is also a bold streak of cynicism that pervades most people’s attitude toward everything they hear (I’m no exception).  If anything, this should provide a hardboiled edge to any contemporary journalist characters, marrying the nobility of truth-seeking and the gruff edge of film noir.  

On television, we still have cop shows, lawyer shows, doctor shows, etcetera, but no shows about reporters spring to my mind.  Gone are the Lou Grants, the Murphy Browns, the Les Nessmans, sequestered off to discreet retirements though they’re sometimes whispered about in nostalgic reveries of when reporting was a noble cause worthy of pursuit.  It can be argued that most protagonists on the boob tube are truth-seekers; the police who solve crimes, the lawyers who defend the wrongly accused or prosecute the wicked, the soldiers and agents who fight amorphous menaces that threaten our existence, the doctors who must find the cure for a mystery illness.  But the main difference is that the reporter sheds light on things so the whole world can see, and while the other archetypes sometimes strive for a sense of transparency, their findings are often isolated, given weight in how they affect even only a few lives.  If they do carry more widespread ramifications, they are likely hushed up or spoken of only in muted tones.  Characters like David Norliss (Roy Thinnes) in Dan Curtis’ The Norliss Tapes shouts his findings from the rafters, and this narrative deals with the consequences of that.

Norliss is a man with a problem.  He’s become despondent, and his book debunking paranormal charlatans is long overdue.  When the worrisome word scribe goes missing, and friend and publisher Sanford Evans (Don Porter) finds a pile of cassette tapes dictating the tome Norliss hasn’t yet finished.  The remainder of the film details the first chapter, wherein Ellen Cort’s (Angie Dickinson) sculptor husband Jim (Nick Dimitri) just won’t stay in the family crypt.

In The Norliss Tapes, the truth is something worth pursuing, but it comes with a heavy price (it has to, the truth being something the powers-that-be seldom want known).  As Norliss delves deeper into the mystery of Jim’s reanimation, people around him start dropping like flies.  This applies not only to Norliss and Ellen’s acquaintances but also to completely innocent bystanders.  Further than that is the possibility that our protagonist may not be able to save anyone at all, himself included (this is the basic premise of the series this film was intended to spin off and didn’t).  In a post-JFK assassination, post-Vietnam War, post-Watergate America, this type of foreboding ambiguity was popular.  It wasn’t enough that we didn’t trusted in our institutions anymore.  Our heroes had changed, too.  They were no longer stalwart supermen who always saved the day and got the girl.  More and more, they were everymen with flaws and doubts we recognized in ourselves.  They didn’t necessarily come out on top, and even when they did, they typically were left to ponder the aftermath of their actions.  They had become reflective of the cultural timbre.  Norliss is no different.  His attempts at stopping Jim are constantly stymied because he doesn’t fully grasp the monster’s nature, and though this doesn’t discourage his resolve, ultimately, he’s left with the realization that he’s in way over his head.  It was a common feeling for the era.

Another interesting aspect of this film is its intertwining of art and the supernatural.  While nothing new in and of itself, The Norliss Tapes deals specifically with the creation of art and, by extension, the creation of life.  Jim is known in the art world, though I can’t recall if it’s ever mentioned how successful or well-regarded he is.  At any rate, he makes a deal with a demon named Sargoth (Bob Schott) whereby Jim will be granted immortality via an ancient Egyptian ring after he completes a sculpture of Sargoth made from a mixture of clay and blood (hence Jim’s victims).  The sculpture provides a gateway (or a birth canal, if you will) for the demon to be born onto our Earthly plane.  Further, Jim’s sculpture, like Norliss’ writing, imparts another means to eternal life, assuming some portion of his body of work remains extant.  This is something which has forever fascinated me as a concept, to create something living outside the marriage of egg and sperm, and it begs quite a few questions.  Why do we create in the first place?  What does it say about us?  What does it say about itself?  Is the act of creation governed by us or by some external force?  What happens when what we create becomes bigger than us or grows beyond our control?  It’s a simple idea which leads to a labyrinth of things to ponder, and it’s here in this film, just not especially developed.

The Norliss Tapes followed hot on the heels of the Curtis-produced The Night Stalker, which gave us the character of Carl Kolchak, arguably one of the most enduring and beloved cult figures in genre circles.  It’s no surprise that this later film gets lumped in with The Night Stalker as it’s practically a carbon copy of it.  Norliss and Kolchak are both writers.  They both want to find the truth and disseminate it.  They both encounter the supernatural and attempt to overcome it with their wits, though Kolchak is a natural believer in the paranormal and Norliss is a skeptic.  They both must face the consequences of their actions.  They both start their films in a lowly state, and their tales are told in flashback.  That said, it’s clear to see why Kolchak got a (short-lived) series and Norliss did not.  For one thing, The Night Stalker dealt with a vampire, a popular monster even back then (its sequel, The Night Strangler, dealt with a slightly less standard boogeyman), while zombies hadn’t yet taken off like they have today (the demon aspect doesn’t crop up until the last act).  Also, Kolchak is a journalist, which naturally allows him to meet up with interesting characters in the course of his investigations.  Norliss, as a writer of books, is more solitary and internalized, but he tries.  Most of all, Darren McGavin played Kolchak as a charming huckster, right down to his seersucker suit and straw hat.  Thinnes, as much as I like him, is far too dry and brooding for audiences to want to follow him overlong in this mode.  It’s kind of a shame, because the final setup to the hoped-for series may have been just enough to overcome its failings.  We’ll never know.

MVT:  The story has enough familiar and strange elements to feel almost fresh, though the shadow of Kolchak looms large.

Make or Break:  The final scene is open to the possibilities this property could have been.  Plus, it eschews a classic, upbeat ending for something more sinister and nebulous.

Score:  5/10  

Dr. Strange (1978)

This review is more than likely going to veer a lot into the realm of comic book nerdery, so you have my apologies at the outset.  

The honorific “Doctor” makes just about any word coming after it sound more important or alternately menacing.  Would Doctor Who be as cool if he were just Who?  Would Dr. Diane Shmelman be held in as high regard if she were just Miss Shmelman?  Would Doctor Death be less of a threat if he were just Death?  Well, yeah, maybe on that one.  Anyone’s name is augmented with honorifics; that’s kind of the point.  In an odd sort of way they bestow a mantle of adulthood on the bearer by the speaker, or at least they do when used in a forthright manner (though admittedly, this only really effective on kids and young adults).  But perhaps what they do best (at least in terms of showmanship) is confer the tone by which the holder’s character is meant to be gauged.  Witness: Mr. Majestyk, Ms. 45, Professor X, Captain Kangaroo, etcetera, etcetera.  Almost every honorific in recorded history has its share of badasses and morts attached to it, but to my mind, none are quite as potent as “Doctor.”  Funny thing is, unlike so many fictive characters who share the title, Dr. Strange actually is a medical practitioner.

The Ancient One (a stop motion creation voiced by the late, great Michael Ansara, and more than likely intended to be the dread Dormammu) informs elderly (yet still smoking hot) underling Morgan LeFay (Jessica Walters) that she has only three days to pierce the barrier between the dark realm and our dimension and vanquish the elderly and current Sorcerer Supreme, Thomas Lindmer (John Mills).  Employing the unwitting assistance of lovely, soon-to-be Buck Rogers Babe, Clea (Anne-Marie Martin aka Eddie Benton), Morgan very leisurely sets about her task.  Enter Dr. Stephen Strange (Peter Hooten), a warm-hearted physician and a cold-blooded lover, who just so happens to be connected to all of this much more personally than he would expect (but hardly the audience).

Outside of cartoons, I believe Marvel Comics characters came to the live-action world of television adventures a bit later than their main rival DC Comics.  There was the Shazam television series starting in 1974, the Cathy Lee Crosby version of Wonder Woman who appeared in a TV movie that same year.  Prior to this there were, of course, series starring both Batman and Superman.  However, to the best of my knowledge, the first Marvel character to hit the live-action world was their own wall-crawling web slinger in 1977’s Amazing Spider-Man program (episodes of which were condensed and edited together into feature length form a few years down the road).  Funny enough, the character with the best track record on television (two original pilot films, a show running five seasons, plus several more television features afterward), The Incredible Hulk, is also the one with the least cinematic success (hopefully this will change in the near future, as he’s my personal favorite).  Following this Dr. Strange outing, Captain America would even get a couple of films in which action star Reb Brown was allowed to strut his proverbial stuff.  

But this time period was really a heyday (at least in my mind) for the popularity of comic book superheroes (a time which is seemingly repeating itself currently, though now it could be argued they are much more self-serious).  They had seeped into the popular culture and saturated the market with everything from stickers to posters to records to toys to costumes and on and on and on.  But if you look at the above-mentioned characters, they predominantly all had a presence in the pop culture psyche before they hit the screen (big or small).  Hell, most of DC’s characters referred to here were created before or around the onset of World War Two (and yes, I know Shazam aka Captain Marvel was not even created at DC, but that’s another discussion).  Hulk and Spidey were extremely popular in their respective comic titles, and both had also had animated runs to further cement their statures.  By this logic, Dr. Strange seems a…um…strange choice to elect for Hollywood treatment, but if you look at the culture of the time, it actually comes a bit sharper into focus.  There was a fascination with all things occult and supernatural at this time.  In all sorts of media, if there weren’t ghosts haunting your house, Bigfoot raiding your fridge, or devil worshippers living next door to you, there was something wrong with you.  Obviously, Dr. Strange, at least from a perfunctory perspective should have fit right in and even dominated this time, but he didn’t.  

This film is part of the reason why he didn’t (or at least explains it a bit).  Hampered as I’m sure they were by a tiny budget and a short schedule, what writer director Philip DeGuere turned out is perfectly passable for a Wednesday night television programmer.  And that’s the real problem.  The story has any number of interesting avenues it can explore, but it does nothing with any of them.  The story of passing the mantle to the new Sorcerer Supreme is handled offhandedly.  Morgan’s ability to manipulate people and its ties to sexual gratification is teased but never explored (and yes, it could have been done so in a way that would have passed the censors).  The action scenes have absolutely zero tension in them, and every obstacle is conquered with the facility of walking up a ramp rather than with the senses-shattering effort of climbing a giant mountain.  

But even discounting these things, and bearing in mind that origin stories are a chore to do in any sort of fresh way even in 1978, the filmmakers (as the powers behind just about every live-action superhero venture of the time) seem to completely miss the point of what makes this character and characters like him compelling.  It’s not that Spider-Man can climb walls and shoot webs.  It’s that he is forever trying to work off the unbearable guilt he feels over the death of his Uncle Ben (“With great power comes great responsibility”).  It’s not that the Hulk can throw men hundreds of feet or crack the ground with one stomp of his foot.  It’s that he is the embodiment of a suppressed rage and impotence and the inability of Dr. Banner to deal with these issues in a healthy manner.  Dr. Strange was an ego-maniacal neurosurgeon who was maimed in a car accident and came to know humility and enlightenment as well as discovering a new purpose in life through the mystic arts.  The interesting parts of these characters are not their super powers but their feet of clay.  It’s sharing in their human struggles, of identifying with their tribulations that makes them special.  The costumes, the powers, the property damage is spectacle, and though it has its place, it’s simply not enough to compel the long term devotion these characters have garnered.  By making Strange a really nice guy with an overactive libido, he is (mostly) normalized.  His ego is no longer a problem.  He doesn’t have to suffer the loss of his hands and his medical career.  All he has to do is smirk, spout a few “magic” words, and he’s suddenly Gandalf.  I can only assume that this sort of thing is done to appeal to as many children and age brackets as humanly possible, but the trick is it doesn’t work.  Banality does not engender commitment to a character.  I could go on, but I already have so I’ll stop there.      

 As a time-waster, as filler, this movie is acceptable.  As anything that distinguishes itself from the pack or is in any way memorable other than giving us a couple of nice shots of Ms. Walter’s bare legs, not so much.  And yet, I’m glad that this was made, just because it gave a very brief spotlight to one of the more obscure superheroes from Marvel’s stable.  

MVT:  I love the core ideas behind Dr. Strange as well as the stop motion monster effects.  The execution is lacking, but what’s beneath is rich for exploration.

Make Or Break:  Following from that, I liked the scenes featuring the Ancient One and LeFay.  They’re a triple threat.  They have a stop motion monster.  They have a beautiful woman in tight clothes.  They have Ansara’s grandiose voice acting.  If only the rest lived up to this.

Score:  6/10

Back to Back (1996)

All I heard of “Back to Back” was that it was a made-for-TV (HBO, I believe) action flick starring Michael Rooker. I was immediately sold! Then I read that Ryo Ishibashi would play his partner (so to speak), his daughter to be played by the gorgeous Danielle Harris, John Laughlin would be his superior, Bobcat Goldthwait would play a minor villain and both Tim Thomerson and Fred Willard would have cameos. If that’s not enough to convince you to watch this film, I don’t know what will.

If you need further persuasion, it’s a pretty damn good action flick! The first twenty minutes alone is a heart pumping adrenaline rush! You’ve got Bobcat Goldthwait playing a bank robber dubbed Psycho whose men are all taken out by Bob Malone (Michael Rooker). He doesn’t unload bullets into them because they robbed the bank. He does so because they parked him into the street and, after already having a disastrous day, snapped and beat the holy hell out of the getaway driver (by locking his head into the back window, no less)!

We learn that he’s a recently divorced cop who’s had his badge taken away due to severe anger issues. He started his morning off with a brief shouting match with his daughter, Chelsea (Danielle Harris), then had his house repossessed by the bank (in a cameo by Fred Willard). When he went to take out twenty dollars from the ATM, he was denied and his card was confiscated. Enter Psycho and his goons and you’ve got a pissed off Malone going postal on some baddies.

While he disposes of all of the goons, Psycho slips away. Before he can chase after him, his former boss, Dussecq (John Laughlin), intervenes and reluctantly arrests him. Meanwhile, Psycho is driving downtown with the police hot on his trails. Spouting out one liners (my favorite being how the town isn’t safe anymore) and spraying bullets out of his back windshield, he eventually makes his way into a restaurant that just so happens to be owned by a local mobster.

That’s the least of his worries. Koji (Ryo Ishibashi) and Hideo (Kô Takasugi) are waiting there to finish off the mobster and effectively conclude their mission. Psycho puts a dent in their plans, so they put a dent in his face. Another shootout occurs and Hideo gets shot in the process. Koji disposes of Goldthwait in an explosive manner, but is taken in by Dussecq for questioning. Hideo makes his getaway and wanders around town aimlessly bleeding from the gut and prophesizing that Elvis Presley is still alive (it works, trust me). There’s a hysterical spot where he knocks out an annoying homeless man posing as a cripple that may possibly be the highlight of the film!

Koji doesn’t have time to put up with Dussecq, so he breaks his nose and escapes the interrogation room by shooting out the one-sided mirror and crashing through it. He takes Bob and Chelsea hostage as they are conveniently leaving the premises at the same time. A brief run-in with Chelsea earlier gave Koji the slip in. It’s clear from this point that he doesn’t want to harm them, but will if necessary.

He takes them back to their house and stakes out. The film slows down a bit here as Robert Nygard develops the characters. He mainly just has Bob and Chelsea shouting at one another which grows wearisome. The heart to heart she has with Koji works decently, but it feels a bit too forced (from the script perspective, not the acting). We also learn of a rat in the police force (I won’t spoil who, but it’s pretty easy to uncover) and get a brief cameo from Tim Thomerson. Oh, and Vincent Schiavelli appears briefly as the mob boss’ slimy assistant. Good times!

It does show that this is a made-for-television film in the editing department. The scene transitions appear straight from an early edition of Windows Movie Maker and some of the camera cuts are jarring. The reason I believe this aired on HBO is that the film’s pacing is relatively good. Most TV movies have to abide by commercial breaks, forcing the film to have a more episodic nature. That’s not the case here which helps it flow nicer.

Don’t let the made-for-TV tag scare you, though. The action is fierce and rampant! There are multiple shootouts, car chases, destruction of property and even some blood (mainly from a nasty torture method that involves nails). The finale takes place in a restaurant under renovations and Nygard gets good use out of the setting. He also uses the cast well to his advantage!

Let me repeat myself from the first paragraph. “Back to Back” stars Michael Rooker, Ryo Ishibashi, Danielle Harris, Bobcat Goldthwait, John Laughlin, Tim Thomerson, Vincent Schiavelli and Fred Willard. That right there is a genre fans wet dream! It’s easy to forgive some of the film’s shortcomings thanks to the dream cast and solid action. It’s possible some of my issues were the side effect of premature ejaculation. This is an action film with Michael Rooker as the lead, after all. That’s too much awesome for me to contain myself!

MVT: I’m going to give it to Rooker, as I love the man and he’s in fine form here. Ryo Ishibashi gives him a run for his money. He holds his own in both the action department and in commanding the screen.

Make or Break: The opening action sequence. It has Bobcat Goldthwait looking like a sewage worker mowing down cops and spouting one-liners (and not acting like Zed from the “Police Academy” movies). What’s not to love?

Final Score: 7.5/10

Hard Time (1998)

Once I found out there was a film starring Burt Reynolds, Charles Durning, Robert Loggia, Billy Dee Williams and “Rowdy” Roddy Piper, I knew I had to see it. I immediately started drooling when I heard the cast from a fellow gentlemen. When he told me it was streaming on Netflix, I hopped straight over and hurled the film to the top of my “to review for the GBtMC” list.

I almost backed out in trepidation, as I seen it was a made-for-TV movie (it aired on TNT). There’s a certain stigma surrounding made-for-TV films. One that plagues direct to DVD productions. One automatically thinks it’s of a lower quality. Why else wouldn’t it hit the big screen? Especially with such a cast behind it.

Fear not, gentlemen (and gentlewomen)! Despite being a made-for-TV production, “Hard Time” is an entertaining watch. And not in the “train wreck” sense. If anything, I believe it was aired on TNT in the hopes that it may start a new series (there are quite a few television pilots that are feature length). I could be completely wrong and just hoping that was the case, as I would have loved to see Logan McQueen (Burt Reynolds) some more!

The film (directed by and starring Burt Reynolds) is nothing new. Reynolds plays Logan McQueen, a detective who is classified as a loose cannon. Along with his partner and longtime friend, Charlie Duffy (Charles Durning), he bends the rules in order to get the job done. This has gotten him six spankings from the county, as Captain Adam Gunther (Buck Taylor) states. It’s also reduced him to graffiti duty, though Duffy makes us believe he hooked them up with the gig so they can relax.

When a chase and shootout occurs between Logan and Catarato Estevez (Paco Christian Prieto), McQueen is framed for killing the crook’s partner. He’s also believed to have stolen some money from the briefcase, which belonged to kingpin Connie Martin (Robert Loggia). Logan has to prove his innocence or face jail time (which he already spent some, making friends with a transvestite).

The plot itself is never so much convoluted as it is streamlined. There are twists and turns, but they’re not too hard to predict. It’s never overtly confusing, which makes sense considering it was playing to a broad audience on cable who were looking for a detective flick, but one that wouldn’t rack the brain. This is more along the lines of “Law & Order” with some gunplay thrown in. For that, it works well.

The shootouts in both the beginning and end are sufficient (though the opening is dragged out a bit). The hand to hand combat is a bit more juicy. There’s a brief, but satisfying fight sequence between Reynolds and Piper that quenched my thirst. Going into the film, I was hoping they’d duke it out. I wasn’t disappointed. I may have wanted more from the “Hot Rod”, but I understood his limited screen time. His sole task was to be one of Loggia’s henchmen and he fit the bill nicely.

The acting itself is above par for what one expects in a made-for-TV film. That shouldn’t be too much of a surprise, given the task. Reynolds and company do ham it up and shout loudly a lot (in this environment, you have to be macho), but there are moments where sentimentality comes through. One scene in particular has Logan talking to Leo Barker (Billy Dee Williams) and showing remorse for his actions. It’s in this scene that we discover his true passion for the business and that he’s nothing without his badge.

What holds the film together is the relationship between Logan and Duffy. Reynolds and Durning have terrific chemistry together! They’re given a back story on how Duffy rescued Logan at the age of sixteen, as he was bouncing from foster home to foster home at that point. You feel that bond from the start and, when they’re tasked with an emotional twist, I actually cared about them and felt sorrow. Durning also provides quite a few laughs, as he plays his role as a detective who’s a child at heart (the first time we see him he’s playing hopscotch).

“Hard Time” does have it’s fair share of flaws. Logan has a love interest with his lawyer (who is so unmemorable I kept thinking she was a new character every time she appeared) that goes nowhere and the lawyer trying to put him behind bars is too weasely and has no bite (and is also forgettable). Reynolds doesn’t utilize these characters well, using them solely as pawns on a chess board. He also doesn’t take the audience for much intelligence wise, as he’s constantly flashing back to previous scenes from the film. Even with commercial breaks, I have a feeling the audience wouldn’t have forgotten what’s occurred. The biggest detriment is the last half. It’s not that the twists and turns don’t work. It’s that the film simply runs out of steam. Maybe that’s why I felt this was a pilot for a television show. It would have been better suited at an hour instead of ninety minutes.

Nonetheless, “Hard Time” is an enjoyable film. It’s a light detective fable with a splendid cast that pleases the sweet tooth. It’s not necessarily high quality or a game changer, but it’s a decent production. Which, for a TV movie, is akin to calling it “Citizen Kane”. At the very least, you’ll probably have more “fun” with this than the Orson Welles classic.

MVT: The relationship between Logan and Duffy. Reynolds and Durning work off of each other well and are amusing to watch. The fact that I want to see a television series with these two in the lead is telling of how much I liked them.

Make or Break: The scene where Logan pours his heart out, so to speak, to Leo Barker. That proved that Reynold’s wasn’t simply going for a cheap buck. He put some heart into the film and characters and I appreciated that. From here on out, that shined through.

Final Score: 6.5/10