Brides of Dracula

Brides of Dracula

The first sequel in Hammer Film's Dracula series, The Brides of Dracula is a bit of an odd duck. First of all, Dracula isn't even in the movie and is only referred to once. The film also has all sorts of scripting problems, brought on I suspect by last minute rewrites to beat the censors of the day. The result is a bit of a mess, with a rushed finale and subplots that never get resolved.

But I gotta tell you, it's a really entertaining mess! There are parts that are even more enjoyable than The Horror of Dracula. Now that the writers are no longer constrained by Bram Stoker's original book, they cut loose and go a bit wild. Marianne (the beautiful Yvonne Monlaur) is traveling to an all girls school where she has been hired as a new teacher. When the stagecoach abandons her in a foggy, little Carpathian village, she unwisely accepts an invitation by a local, creepy Baroness (Martita Hunt) to stay in her castle. While there, she is tricked into freeing an imprisoned Baron Meister (David Peel), a dashing vampire who begins to wreak havoc on the villagers. Good thing vampire hunter Dr. Van Helsing (Peter Cushing) just happens to be visiting town...

First, the good. Terence Fisher's direction is great. Despite not much happening in the first half of the film, he keeps the pace moving briskly, and I was never bored. The shot selection and moody lighting are much more effective here, as well. The acting along the board is fairly good - especially Martita Hunt as the Baroness, Freda Jackson as Baron Meinster's human servant, Greta, and of course, the super cool Peter Cushing returning as Van Helsing. Cushing was the best thing about The Horror of Dracula, and he is even better here. The writers have fun playing with the vampire mythos, changing the legend as they see fit and cobbling together some really fun and creative ideas, such as the creepy scene with crazy Greta, laying on a fresh grave, gently cooing to the earth, encouraging a new vampire to awaken and rise.

But there is the bad, as well. There is a character in the beginning of the film, set up as a major bad guy, who ensures that Marianne is stranded in the village. And then he disappears. Completely. He's not in the movie any more. No clue who he was or why he was there. Odd. We also have the super rushed ending, including two vampires (the brides of the title, even!) who just kind of stupidly watch everything unfold and then also just vanish from the scene. No idea what happened to them. And then there is the vampire bat that Baron Meinster can turn into. This bat looks like two flapping pieces of cardboard glued to a toupee. I've seen scarier hand puppets. Not even Peter Cushing can make the bat attack scenes work. They are just laughably bad. And of course, the bat transformation raises the big plot hole question - if Meinster could just turn into a bat and fly away, how was he a prisoner to begin with?

And how about Meinster, anyway? The imposing and forceful Christopher Lee is missed. David Peel does just fine when he is the arrogant aristocrat, but as soon as he goes vampiric, he hunches and snarls and overacts and just looks generally silly. I'd laugh in his face if he tried to bite me.

Overall, though, this is a fine film. It may not be as consistent as Horror of Dracula, but there are some parts that are big improvements. Check it out. You may enjoy it.

MVP: Is there any doubt? Heroic, athletic, confidant, but unerringly polite and quintessentially English, Peter Cushing's Van Helsing is the guy I would want at my side if I ever got in a vampire fight. SPOILER ALERT: The big example of his awesomeness this time involves a completely revisionist and absurd way of "curing" a vampire bite by branding himself with a hot rod and splashing the wound with holy water. This is highly questionable, but Cushing sells it and makes it the most memorable part of the movie - to me, this superb scene is the real climax of the film, not the goofy fight that follows it. Look around online and you'll see anyone who has seen this movie raves about the branding scene. SPOILER OVER. Cushing is the man!!!

TRIVIA: Dracula was actually supposed to make a cameo in this movie, appearing at the very end to kill Baron Meinster for being lame. I don't think they could convince Christopher Lee to come back, which is a shame. Because Meinster was kinda lame, and deserved to be punished...

Also, take a look at the windmill fight scene in this movie and then watch the end of Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow again. You'll see a lot of the exact same shots and ideas. Sleepy Hollow was Burton's love letter to Hammer Films. I just thought that was kind of cool.

BEST LINE: "I'm not tenant of yours, you jackass!"

Alice in Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland
You would think that Tim Burton and Alice in Wonderland would be a perfect match, a dynamic duo of perfection like Batman and Robin, Abbot and Costello or Cheese and Burgers. In so many ways, this movie could have been a classic, but instead Burton's inane film is just a series of one classic blunder after another. Alice in Wonderland completely and utterly fails to live up to its potential. This is easily Burton's worst film since his Planet of the Apes remake.

The problem is deep-rooted and lies in the very concept of the film. Instead of a remake or an adaptation of Lewis Carroll's stories, this is more of a sequel. A teenage Alice (Mia Wasikowska) returns to Wonderland - though she doesn't remember anything of her earlier adventure. The story that follows contains all of our familiar iconic characters, but instead of a romp through Wonderland, we have a bunch of gibberish about fate, magic swords, and The Chosen One. Burton has basically taken all of the characters from Wonderland and shoehorned them into a Chronicles of Narnia or Lord of the Rings movie. And they just don't fit. When the very concept is unsound, it is hard for any movie to recover.

Is the movie all bad? If nothing else, Burton has assembled a wonderful cast. Even if the movie is bombing, it was nice to hear Alan Rickman's Caterpillar and Stephen Fry's superb Cheshire Cat. Matt Lucas also does good work as Tweedledee and Tweedledum, and Helena Bodham Carter is a great Red Queen (more on her later). The cast and voice cast also includes Johnny Depp, Anne Hatheway, Christopher Lee, Crispen Glover, Michael Gough, Timothy Spall, and Michael Sheen - some do better than others, but you can't deny the talent up there on the screen.

Which leads me to Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter. This character is perfect for Depp and should have been a great opportunity. Instead, his Mad Hatter is just too mad. He is all over the place - schizophrenically changing accents and personalities with no rhyme or reason. As my friend said, "I don't know what he wants us to do with this performance."

Now you may say, "James, A) he is supposed to be crazy! or B) the performance is just great indicator of his madness!" To which I reply that Mad Hatter's performance only A) gave me a headache, and B) made me angry because Johnny Depp should know better than this. I don't care if he is supposed to be crazy. He's really just annoying.

What else can I say? Even the special effects are unremarkable and Wonderland looks...dare I say, it looks boring. It's all been done before. And that hurts to say when the visually inventive Burton is involved. Everything in this movie has been done before and done better. Alice in Wonderland could have and should have been so much more. What a waste.

TRIVIA: Here's something interesting - Burton didn't want to direct Alice in Wonderland at first because he felt there was no story. It was just a sequence of unconnected moments and that didn't interest him. Only when he found a central narrative to link everything together did he excitedly jump onboard. And this is the story that interested him?!? Did he just watch The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and think "oh, there's my Alice in Wonderland story!"???  Stupid. SPOILER ALERT HERE: So at the end of the film, Alice has one of these flashback moments where she remembers everything from her first adventure, and we are treated to a quick montage of the famous Alice events - the tea party, painting the white roses with red paint, chasing the White Rabbit - and I thought to myself that "hey, that looks great. Why am I not watching that movie!?"

MVP: I have to go back to Helena Bodham Carter because she is terrific. Unlike Depp and Burton, who drop the ball with what should have been a home run, Carter completely embodies the Red Queen. This is a perfect synthesis of character and actor. She is wonderfully funny, vain, cruel, and clueless. She is an absolute treat to watch in this film. What a greater treat if she had been in a real Alice movie!

BEST LINE: "I need a pig here!"

OSCARS: Best Art Direction, Best Costume Design
OSCAR NOMINATIONS: Best Visual Effects

The 4th Best Holiday Movie Ever: The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

The Nightmare Before Christmas (2-Disc Collector's Edition + Digital Copy)

After the sugary sweetness of Emmet Otter, I think it is appropriate to go for something a bit more sour, and a bit more sinister - the visually inventive, stylishly produced, and devilishly clever Nightmare Before Christmas. Produced by Tim Burton, directed by Henry Selick, and featuring music and songs by Danny Elfman, The Nightmare Before Christmas was a modest hit when it was first released, but has since become regarded as a bonafide holiday classic.

Jack the Pumpkin King is tired of presiding over Halloween. Every year, it's the same old thing - goblins and skeletons and corpses. It gets sooooo old. In short, Jack has lost his faith. After wondering through the woods one night, he comes across Christmastown, and lo and behold, he sees a new way of doing things - there's snow, there's smiles, there are heads still attached to their bodies! Enamored by Christmas, Jack decides to make it his own, kidnapping Santa Claus and ordering his army of witches and ghouls to make toys for children around the Earth. Naturally, he learns the error of his ways. But along the way, we are treated to all sorts of material that is genuinely disturbing - little demon children plotting the best way to kill Santa Claus, skeleton reindeer (of course, the lead reindeer has a shiny red nose), and a horrific sleigh ride on Christmas night. Yet despite how subversive the film is, I am impressed at how the spirit of Christmas still comes through loud and clear, with all its purity intact. It's a delicate balance, but Burton and Co. pull it off.

Everybody brought their 'A' Game to the film, particularly the voice cast and Danny Elfman. He not only wrote a powerful score and several memorable and amusing songs ("Kidnap the Sandy Claws" and "Poor Jack" being highlights), but he also provided the singing voice for Jack.

The film also has one of the best entrances I have ever seen in either a horror or holiday movie. SPOILER: During the opening song, "This is Halloween," the townsfolk of Halloween-town celebrate while a scarecrow lights himself on fire and dives into the town fountain. And in a closeup, we see for the first time, Jack the Pumpkin King, rising from the fountain, enveloped in steam, his shiny skull gleaming in the moonlight, his skeletal face smug in evil triumph. It was an awe-inspiring moment for me, and one heckuva entrance. SPOILER ENDS.

I would not recommend the film for young children. It is perhaps a bit too dark for them. But don't wait too long. As unlikely as it may seem, Jack the Pumpkin King is rapidly becoming a season staple and his adventure should be seen by everyone.

BEST LINE: I don't want to ruin the context of the line, but when Jack howls to the moon, "I AM the Pumpkin King!!!!!" it is impossible not to feel the weight of his faith reborn. Great line, and great line delivery.

MVP: This is a tough call. Should I give it Burton? This was his vision, after all. Or to Selick, who directed that vision? Or Elfman, who so ably provided a dark and comical musical landscape for the vision to inhabit? No. None of them. I have to give the MVP to the team of stop motion animators. Because they actually brought the vision to life. Over three years of painstaking and downright painful work, the stop motion animators made all the characters live and breath, literally millimeter by millimeter. The result is impressive and this hardworking army of workers deserves to be recognized!

OSCAR NOMINATIONS: Best Visual Effects (it lost to Jurassic Park)

TRIVIA: Nightmare Before Christmas is not the first appearance of Jack. He can actually be seen clearly on top of one of Beetlejuice's hats in Beetlejuice (1988) and even showed up in one of Burton's earliest projects, Vincent (1982).