My Demon Lover (1987)

My Demon Lover (1987)

Director:  Charlie Loventhal

Cast: Scott Valentine, Michelle Little, Robert Trebor

Back when I was around twelve years old, seeing a film like My Demon Lover was prohibitive for me because the household I grew up in was fanatically Christian and therefore any film with demons or sex was extremely off limits as far as my parents were concerned and My Demon Lover had both! But back then, I was just starting to fall in love with special effects, so I found a way to see it; I waited for just the right moment in which my parents were gone and then, alone and in the dark, I feasted my eyes on the demonic imagery. I have to admit watching My Demon Lover was all about the thrill of doing something I wasn’t supposed to be doing. What attracted me to the film wasn’t the sex or possible nudity because truth be told, there’s very little of both on this movie, no, what I wanted to see were those crafty makeup effects! You see, back in the 80’s, horror movies where pushing the boundaries of what could be done through make up effects. Back then, every horror movie was about gooey, slimy monsters. The Nightmare on Elm Street franchise spear headed this gruesome movement in cinema, but many smaller budget movies emulated this idea of turning a film into a special make up effects showcase, My Demon Lover was one of them.

I’d been meaning to re-watch this movie for the longest time, to re-live this forbidden fruit of my youth one more time, but for some strange reason, this movie disappeared from the planet. This is something that happens to a lot of low budget horror films. Suddenly, poof! They vanish from the face of the earth! But I never forgot about My Demon Lover, it was this little horror movie that thrilled me when I was a kid and had fond memories of enjoying it, I needed to give it the old re-watch! For nostalgia's sake! So anyways, one day I go into Amazon and there it is.  Warner Bros. had released it under their ‘Warner Bros. Archive Collection’ banner. Under this banner, Warner Bros. has re-released a lot of these “forgotten” sci-fi/horror/action movies like Freejack (1992), If Looks Could Kill (1991) and The Green Slime (1968). So anyways, I quickly snatched a copy and re-watched My Demon Lover, a film I had not seen since I was twelve! And of course, it’s silly as hell. As silly as any other 80’s movie you’ve seen and of course, that’s exactly what I loved about it. It took me back to simpler days in cinema, when a film could be about two silly kids falling in love in New York City; where a movie could be about a couple of crazy kids with no bigger priorities in their lives save for falling in love and having fun. The film runs on that idealistic idea that the world might be messed up, but we can survive it with a little love in our lives. Weird that the filmmakers decided to mix demons with love, but such is the nature of the cinema of the 80’s.

In retrospect, My Demon Lover is less a sex comedy and more a date movie. It’s about accepting each other with our flaws, finding ways to “make it work” and finding someone you want to care for. On this film everybody is trying to date somebody, it takes place within the bachelor world, where girls and boys are constantly worried about finding “the one”. In this way it reminded me of films like About Last Night (1986), where the two sexes are constantly analyzing each other. So you get the typical “men are like this, women are like that” conversations. ‘Denny’, the main character in the film is a working girl who falls for the worst guys; losers who dump her by stealing everything in her apartment. Then we have ‘Kaz’, a bum from the streets who plays the saxophone on the train and oogles and harasses the ladies he sees on the streets. Oh, he’s also cursed to turning into a demon whenever he tries to have sex! There’s an allegory there, about how guys can turn into wild animals whenever they want to get it on with the ladies, but you shouldn’t really read too much into that. This isn’t exactly what you’d call a ‘deep film’. Its themes are simple yet valid ones: if you truly care for someone then you have to do something truly noble for that person; you have to show some real love and go beyond just sexual attraction. 

  

The entertaining part of the film comes of course whenever ‘Kaz’ gets horny and turns into a demon. What’s cool about the concept is that he turns into a different looking demon every time he turns, so we get a variety of monsters throughout the film. Kaz goes from turning into a werewolf demon, to turning into a fat bald guy who can’t stop laughing, to growing demon wings among many other amusing transformations. The makeup effects are not anything I’d call amazing or award worthy, but they sure are entertaining… and gooey. There’s a lot of slimy, squishy stuff going on. My Demon Lover was produced by New Line Cinema’s head honcho Robert Shaye, the guy responsible for producing so many of the Nightmare on Elm Street films before New Line Cinema became a major film studio. This explains the films emphasis on makeup effects work; it was just the thing to do during the 80’s when latex monsters ruled the screens. If you wanted a movie to make money, you put a lot of special make up effects in it. New Line Cinema was after all known as “The House that Freddy Built”. This make up effects frenzy ran its course and ended in the mid 90’s when horror switched back to ‘slasher mode’ with the success of films like Scream (1996) and I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997). It’s interesting to note how it was horror maestro Wes Craven’s creations that decided the direction horror films would take throughout the 80’s and 90’s, he certainly had a pulse on the genre.  

    

So what we got here is a silly, simple yet entertaining little horror movie from the late 80’s. It reminded me of another film you might want to check out if you end up enjoying My Demon Lover, it’s a film called Date with an Angel (1987). It shares a similar premise (that of falling in love with a supernatural being) but instead of dating a demon, the main character falls for an angel. But if you ask me, all of these movies in which regular people fall in love with a monster, or a creature are influenced by Ron Howard's Splash (1984), that's the one where Tom Hanks falls for a mermaid played by Darryl Hannah. Seeing My Demon Lover made me think about how modern movies aren’t populated with regular people anymore. I miss that about movies, where the protagonists don’t have to be perfect, politically correct, unrealistic tight asses, in fact, a lot of films from the 80’s were about the working class, those of us surviving to make it in the world, this is something we don’t see that much anymore. In movies from the 80’s, characters weren’t afraid to be silly and ridiculous, they were imperfect, they were more like us, the regular everyday people. In this way, characters in films from the 80’s feel more real to me, even though they are extremely silly because let’s face it; all pretensions aside, most of us are still a bunch of grown up kids pretending to be adults. Deep down inside, we’re all little kids who want the thrill of watching horror movies in the dark, without our parents’ permission.

Rating: 3 out of 5 

Her (2013)

Title: Her (2013)

Director: Spike Jonze

Cast: Joaquin Phoenix, Scarlett Johansson, Amy Adams

In order to truly understand Her, I suggest you first watch Sophia Coppola’s Lost in Translation (2003), you see, there’s a connection between both of these films; one comes as a response of the other. This is not to say that you can’t get anything out of watching the film without understanding its back story, but you’ll get a whole different perspective on them once you understand where they are both coming from. So this is how it goes: once upon a time not so long ago, Sofia Coppola, the youngest daughter of legendary film director Francis Ford Coppola, grew up with quirky music video director named Spike Jonze; their friendship blossomed and grew until in 1999 they ended up getting hitched. So anyhow, to make a long story short, their marriage ended in 2003. In order to deal with the divorce Sofia Coppola, though denying it a first, wrote and directed a film that expressed her feelings on the break up; that film ended up being Lost in Translation (2003), which curiously was released on the very same year she divorced Jonze.

In Lost in Translation, Scarlett Johansson plays a woman who’s married to a photographer, played by a very loopy Giovanni Ribissi. The photographer is so wrapped up in his career that he completely neglects Scarlett Johansson’s character and she ends up befriending a much older man played by Bill Murray; they end up developing a platonic romance even though their age difference is huge. The loopy, sort of absent minded photographer was actually Sofia Coppola’s version of Spike Jonze. The way I see it, that character was a cartoon like version of Spike Jonze, it’s how Sofia Coppola saw Jonze. So if we are to read between the lines, we can deduct that Coppola felt neglected by Jonze during their marriage because he was so wrapped up in his film career, which was beginning to take off back then. “I was trying to figure it out when I was writing that” she said in an interview to ONTD. That’s one thing I can say about the Coppola’s: they make very personal films that talk about their life experiences, sure they’ll deny the hell out of it if you ask them, but truth is, they are simply sharing their life experiences with us. Beautiful thing about these films is that even though they are extremely personal in nature, we can still enjoy them and get a lot out of them because they are genuine reflections of the human spirit, of what it means to be ‘us’. Her is another good example of an extremely personal film; detailing the thoughts and situations that go into a divorce. 

Jonze sets up a shot

So, fast-forward ten years later and now its Spike Jonze’s turn to address how he feels about that divorce. From what I can tell after watching Her, I think it’s safe to say that it was Jonze who ended up the most heartbroken from that divorce and he projects himself in the character of Theodore; a very sensitive man who truly misses his wife and can’t seem to stop remembering the good times he had with her. This film feels as if ten years later, Sofia Coppola still lingers in Spike Jonze’s soul. In that same interview to ONTD , Sofia Coppola mentions that “Spike didn’t end well” so I’m not just talking out of my ass here. Jonze was truly broken up and we can definitely pick that up from watching Her. So, it is understandable then that the main character in Her; Theodore Twombly, is mopy and anti-social; he can’t take the fact that he is about to divorce his wife Catherine of many years; who by the way looks a heck of a lot like Sofia Coppola! 

Many other things let us know that Her was made in response to Lost in Translation; Scarlett Johansson was the main character in Lost in Translation, while on Her she plays the voice of the operating system for which Theodore falls head over heels for. In the film, Theodore and Catherine grew up together which made the divorce that much more difficult, same as with Jonze and Coppola who also grew up together. Actually, if we want to get really detailed, some shots in the film are extremely similar, starting with Theodore’s room which looks a heck of a lot like Scarlett Johansson’s hotel room in Lost in Translation. Point is, if you want to really understand Her, you should watch Lost in Translation while keeping all these things in mind. Just remember that in Her, Theodore is Spike Jonze’s alter ego, while in Lost in Translation Charlotte was Sofia Coppola’s alter ego. The difference between the two films is that they are told from different points of view, one film is from the female perspective, while the other shows us the males point of view; which instantly makes both films all the more fascinating to me. It's like hearing both sides of the story; interesting thing is that both of them make sense in their own ways. They both got interesting points to make, and we can learn a lot from both films. 

But trust me, you don’t need to know any of this to enjoy Her, seen without all the context behind it, you can still get a lot out of it. The film works on two fronts:  it works as a comment on relationships, break-ups and male/female dynamics, while at the same time it throws a bit of commentary on society’s current obsession with social media and technology. Her is not for everybody, its a very cerebral film, which relies heavily on dialog, so if you like that in your films, you'll love Her. It seems to me that a lot of people where having a difficult time digesting the fact that Theodore was falling in love with a computer program. But you can’t go in thinking this is a silly premise, after all, this is a science fiction film, we are here to escape into a fantasy world where anything can happen. Her takes place in a slightly futuristic version of L.A., which by the way, Spike Jonze brilliantly shot in China, making China look like a futuristic version of L.A. How genius is that? So anyways, be ready for a film in which the main character falls for an artificial intelligence. What I loved about it is how Theodore’s obsession with his computer program represents our obsession with technology, an obsession that only serves as a way to alienate us from real human contact. Take a bus or a train and you’ll see more than half of the people connected to their phones, i-pads and I-pods, sometimes all at the same time! Are we growing apart as a human race? Are we in desperate need to reconnect with our fellow humans? Well yes we are and I’m glad we have films like Her to point that out.

Rating: 5 out of 5   

Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story (1994)

Title: Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story (1993)

Director: Rob Cohen

Cast: Jason Scott Lee, Lauren Holly

Review:

Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story is a biographical film based on the book written by Linda Lee Cadwell, Bruce Lee’s wife. The book was called Bruce Lee: The Man Only I Knew. It’s good to keep that in mind because the film is told mostly from the point of view of Linda Lee; something I rather enjoyed about this movie. It’s a love story, and a very engaging one. Bruce Lee is idolized by millions across the world, he truly is an example of what we can achieve when we commit our minds to achieve a certain goal; for this I’ve always admired Bruce Lee. He was focused, disciplined and determined, something we should all aspire to be in life. That plus he had such charisma, such a glow, it’s no surprise he became the icon that he became. Did this film do justice to the hero?

Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story starts out when Lee was in China, dreaming of coming to America. He gets into a brawl over a girl and ends up having to leave his country in order to escape the authorities, a situation he has no problems with because he loves the American culture, he loves movies and James Dean. After he arrives to America, we see how he goes from dishwasher at a Chinese restaurant to college student, to karate teacher, to becoming a husband and a father and finally, a powerhouse movie star. But one thing is always hounding Bruce Lee and that’s the demon that’s always followed his family. Will he ever confront his own personal demons? Will he always live in fear of them?

The film was directed by Rob Cohen, a director who’s never really wowed me with anything he has done. He’s the guy behind Dragonheart (1996), xXx (2002), Fast and the Furious (2001) and Stealth (2005), not the greatest bunch of films, watchable sure, but good or great, nope. This is why Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story is a surprise to me; it is without a doubt Cohen’s finest film. Unfortunately, he’s never truly done anything as good as this. But that’s okay, hey, at least he’s got this one great film on his repertoire, and what a beautiful film it is. It’s purely entertaining, while still managing to tell us Bruce Lee’s story and his fantastic rise to fame. I loved how the film ends up being a film about films, we get to see Lee work his way through all the Hollywood backstabbing. We see his devastation when they give the role that was supposed to be his for the television show Kung Fu, to David Caradine. In retrospective this was probably a good thing, had he ended up as a television star, maybe he wouldn’t have gone on to make the great films he made. And speaking of Lee’s films, on Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story we get to see him on the set of The Big Boss (1971) and Enter the Dragon (1973), which is quite fun, I loved how Rob Cohen played around with these familiar images and situations, especially those scenes that take place in the mirror room on Enter the Dragon. 

The film is told from the point of view of his wife, Linda Lee, the film is after all based on her book. Having Linda Lee give her input to this production is a wonderful asset to the production because she was the closest to him throughout his entire life. She was there through his college years, she was there through the first time he opens his karate schools, she was there when he made his first television show, his first movie. She was always there, so her side of the story is probably the most complete side of the tale. What I also enjoyed was how romantic the whole film is, the way Bruce and Linda fell in love is a beautiful love story that broke through racial barriers, they had to deal with Linda’s parents rejecting Bruce over him being Chinese. I’m so glad that their love for each other was stronger than racism; it was a triumph to humanity. It also helps that Lauren Holly and Jason Scott Lee had wonderful on screen chemistry. 

The role of Bruce Lee was at one point offered to Brandon Lee, Bruce Lee’s son. Unfortunately, Brandon declined to play his father. I wonder how Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story would have turned out had Brandon Lee taken the role because Brandon Lee turned out to be a wonderful actor; he truly blossomed as a performer when he made The Crow (1994), his final film. Not to mention all the input he could have brought to the role, after all, Bruce Lee was his father. It’s interesting to note that had Brandon Lee accepted to play his father, then maybe he wouldn’t have died while making The Crow, since both movies where shot on the same year. Sadly Brandon Lee was accidentally shot while shooting The Crow less than two months before the theatrical release of Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story. This is a tragic real life story; Brandon Lee’s death only adds fuel to that myth about Bruce Lee’s family being cursed, which is just silly non sense. So instead of Brandon Lee, the production ended up using Jason Scott Lee to play the role of Bruce, which was an excellent choice in my book, Jason Scott Lee not only has the look, he also brought that physicality to the role. He captured to perfection the mannerisms, the intensity and the charismatic persona of Bruce Lee.

The only thing I don’t like about the film is that it takes some artistic liberties with Bruce Lee’s life story. The film has many discrepancies with Lee’s real life story. For example, in the film, they lead you to believe that the Chinese are angry that he is teaching Karate to the Americans, so he fights with these Chinese dudes who end up breaking his back. In real life the story is substantially different, this fighting match did take place, but it was in Lee’s own Karate school and not in some temple like in the film. And even worse, Bruce Lee actually won that fight! In the movie they make you believe that he loses this fight and that one of the fighters purposely injures his back. This was not true either; his back was injured not by an angered fighter, but because of a weight lifting incident, so Lee’s back injury was self inflicted! In the film they make you think he actually managed to see his book ‘Tao of Jeet Kune Do’ published, in real life the book was printed posthumously. And speaking of his death, the film leaves it as something of a mystery, when in fact he died because of an allergic reaction to a muscle relaxant called ‘Equagesic’, which apparently worsened a condition he had been suffering from called, cerebral edema, basically, excess fluid in the brain. For the most part the film tells Lee’s story like it is, but it takes artistic liberties to make things more dramatic or visually interesting, which is to be expected on any biographical film.

In the end, the film ends up being very inspirational. It’s one of those movies that makes you want to do something with your life after seeing it. It makes you want to believe in yourself, it sends out that idea that if you put your mind to it, you truly can accomplish anything. Linda Lee says she’d rather remember her husband for the way he lived his life, than for his death and I have to say I agree, the guy lived an amazing life overcoming racism, personal fears and demons. The whole demon part of the story is where the film kind of dives into the fantastic because we actually get to see him fighting against this giant Samurai demon. This is yet another scene in which the film takes artistic liberties, but I didn’t mind because it is all kinds of cool to see Bruce Lee fighting a giant Samurai demon, plus it’s just so symbolic of all the struggles he went through to get to where he got. I guess life is like that, you always feel like there’s something hounding you, trying to stop you from achieving your goals, but Lee fought those and won in my opinion, the guy went on to become a legend in life and death. Bruce Lee remains one of my personal heroes, he exceled at what he did and always aimed higher, trying to be all that he could be.

Rating: 5 out of 5