A very Murray Christmas

IGN

BY MATT FOWLER Droves of determined "Bill Murray is God" fans who claim to be willing to watch the star of Ghostbusters and Groundhog Day in anything are in for a bit of a cheeky challenge with Netflix's A Very Murray Christmas - a walking-dream style homage to "good hang" holiday variety specials of yesteryear, premiering Friday, December 4th. Stepping in as host/nucleus - like crooners Dean Martin and Perry Como (and many more) have done over a good chunk of the previous century - Murray smartly evokes the "man of the people" pop-in vibe that he's cultivated over the past few years.

Reuniting with Lost in Translation director Sofia Coppola, A Very Murray Christmas occasionally gives off a similar aura. Trapped in a hotel during a blizzard (NYC's Carlyle, specifically), Murray starts off despondent over the fact that he's contractually obligated to play ringleader for a live holiday special in which no stars have arrived. Guests (the first of many) Amy Poehler and Julie White busy around him as frantic producers while Murray prepares to commit TV suicide. And it's during these first 10-to-15 minutes that the special drags. No coincidence too perhaps, these are the moments that contain the show's meager attempts at comedy.

Once you get past this hurdle though, the special relaxes into itself and becomes a big booze-soaked musical pal-around. With guests like Jason Schwartzman, Rashida Jones, Maya Rudolph, Rilo Kiley's Jenny Lewis, and the band Phoenix. I'd say the middle part of this soirée is the best. Just a Christmas Eve laze in the hotel bar with the "work staff" - doing shots of vodka and/or tequila while singing songs such as "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)" and "Baby, It's Cold Outside."

Rounding things out here is a dream sequence featuring a more elaborate and "traditionally festive" series of numbers with Miley Cyrus and George Clooney (Yes, he sings - a bit. It's actually quite funny) that stands as the special's final hurrah. Odd though as it is to have a dream element within a show that already feels like one, but it still works.

As Murray himself slowly warms to the idea of spending the holidays stuck inside a hotel, so will you to the idea behind this special. Especially if you're not familiar with the sort of soused songfest programming it's attempting to pay respect to. As mentioned, it doesn't start off that promising. Essentially, the premise's "set up" is the weakest part, but once the star himself begins to enjoy himself, so will you.

The Alantic

A Very Murray ChristmasCaptures the True Spirit of the Season

Confusion. And commercialism. And goodwill to all mankind, via celebrity cameos and classic songs

What is Christmas? A religious holiday? A commercial ritual? A time of warmth, and togetherness, and generosity, and love? A time of sadness, and loneliness, and regret? Is it magic? Is it mythic? Is it madness?

It is, at this point, all of those things. As a culture, here in the U.S., we tend to be extremely confused about what, precisely, is being celebrated on December 25 (and, at this point, the entire month that precedes it). The Starbucks cup controversy. The fact that you can buy an advent calendar from Dior. The notion that there is, apparently, a war being currently waged in the name of the most wonderful time of the year.

RE

 Tradition

Nowhere is all this yuletide perplexity made more clear than in A Very Murray Christmas, the Netflix special directed by Sofia Coppola that takes the traditional cliches of the Celebrity-Driven Christmas Extravaganza—complete with musical acts and dance numbers and cameos from fellow celebrities—and makes Murray of it. The premise: Bill Murray, playing himself or a proximate version, has signed on to do one of those extravaganzas, this particular one set at the Carlyle Hotel in New York, on Christmas Eve. He does not want to do the show. This is mostly because he thinks the show is silly, but also because, apparently, he is beset with holiday ennui. (We are meant to understand this because A Very Murray Christmas’s opening musical number features Murray, bedecked in a tux and an antler headband, crooning “Christmas Blues” as Paul Shaffer accompanies him on the piano. And because Murray announces to his producers that “I feel so alone” and also that “God hates me.”)

Murray is forced to do the special, though, because—as his producers (Amy Poehler and Julie White) repeatedly remind him—he is under contract. And because, Poehler also reminds him, with an indeterminate amount of irony, “Everything that’s fun is always hard.”

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Monty Python The Meaning Of Life

RogerEbert

Halfway through "Monty Python's Meaning of Life," the thought struck me that One-Upmanship was a British discovery. You remember, of course, the book and movie ("School for Scoundrels") inspired by Stephen Potter's theory of One-Upmanship, in which the goal of the practitioner was to One-Up his daily associates and, if possible, the world. A modern example:

Victim: "I've just been reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez's 'Chronicle of a Death Foretold,' in Vanity Fair magazine."

One-Upman: "Really? I'm afraid I missed it."

Victim: "But Garcia Marquez is brilliant."

One-Upman: "No doubt, dear fellow, but my subscription ran out in 1939."

I use this illustration as an approach to "Monty Python's Meaning of Life," which is a movie that seems consumed with a desire to push us too far. This movie is so far beyond good taste, and so cheerfully beyond, that we almost feel we're being One-Upped if we allow ourselves to be offended. Take, for example, the scene featuring projectile vomiting. We don't get just a little vomit in the scene, like we saw in "The Exorcist." No, sir, we get gallons of vomit, streams of it, all a vile yellow color, sprayed all over everybody and everything in a formal dining room.

The first reaction of the non-Upman is "Yech!" But I think the Python gang is working at another level. And, given the weakness of movie critics for discussing what "level" a movie "works" on, I find myself almost compelled to ask myself, "At what 'level' does the projectile vomiting 'work'?" And I think the Python One-Up reply would be, dear fellow, that it rises above vulgarity and stakes out territory in the surrealistic. Anyone who takes the vomiting literally has missed the joke; the scene isn't about vomiting, but about the lengths to which Python will go for a laugh.

There are other scenes in equally poor taste in this movie, which has a little something to offend everybody. And I mean really offend them: This isn't a Mel Brooks movie, with friendly little ethnic in-jokes. It's a barbed, uncompromising attack on generally observed community standards.

Does the attack work? Only occasionally. The opening sequence of the film is one of its best, showing the overworked old clerks in an insurance company staging a mutiny. After they've gained control of their shabby old stone building, the movie does a brilliant turn into surrealism, the building becomes a ship, and the clerks weigh anchor and set sail against the fleets of modern high-rises, firing their filing cabinets like cannons. It's a wonderful sequence.

I also liked a scene set on a military parade ground, and a joke involving a tank full of fish, and a cheerfully unfair rugby match between two teams, one made up of 12 small schoolboys, the other with 18 schoolmasters, all huge. Balanced against these bright moments is the goriest scene in Python history, showing a liver being removed from a transplant "volunteer" by brute force. There are also a lot of religious jokes, some straightforward sexism and the above mentioned vomiting sequence.

By admitting to being offended by some of the stuff in this movie, I've been One-Upped. By liking the funny stuff, I've been One-Upped again. ("But you liked the jokes that were in good taste? Jolly good!") But I'm a good loser, and I don't mind being One-Upped. In fact, let's say this is a tennis match, and the Pythons are the winners. Here, I'll hold down the net while they jump over to shake hands with me. Whoops!

Rotten Tomatoes

MOVIE INFO

The Meaning of Life is without a doubt the most tasteless of the Monty Python feature films; it also happens to be one of the funniest. Life's questions are "answered" in a series of outrageous vignettes, beginning with a pre-credits sequence at a staid London insurance company which transforms before our eyes into a pirate ship. One of our favorite bits involve the National Health doctors who try to claim a healthy liver from a still-living donor, pointing out that there's nothing in his contract preventing this. And of course, there's the scene with the world's most voracious glutton, who brings the art of vomiting to new heights before his spectacular demise. Be warned: though hilarious, this may be the grossest bit of comedy filmmaking ever conceived (there aren't enough words in the world to describe it in detail!). Loyal Pythonites Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin star in The Meaning of Life and share writing responsibilities, while Jones is in the director's chair this time out. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

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Zombinator

IMDb

• A fashion blogger documentary turns into a Zombie horror nightmare when Youngstown Ohio college students come face to face with the undead. Their only hope of survival is a former soldier turned zombie killer trying to protect them from a mercenary working for an evil corporation who developed the serum that causes zombie-ism.
  - Written by zombie blogger

Rotten Tomatoes

MOVIE INFO

A young fashion blogger in Youngstown, Ohio captures a zombie outbreak on camera while shooting a documentary. As the undead scourge begins to spread, a group of college students must place their faith in a battle-hardened ex-solder if they hope to make it out of this nightmare alive.

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Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter

IMDb

Wow, a B-Movie that's actually a B-Movie!

Author: sami-18 (sami@interlog.com) from Canada
25 October 2003

It's great to see a low budget b-movie that actually looks and feels like a real B-movie! The genre has become so artificially popularized and 'fetishized' that most recent low budget films have seemed more like relatively capable ventures trying to 'appear' as b-movies. I always felt the overall cinematic incompetence of b-movies was a result of poor financial and technological resources available to the filmmaker. Today the idea of a consciously manipulated shaky digicam is considered to be 'low-tech'. How pretentious! Sorry, I just don't have the ability to reconcile the inherent academic quagmire of the high-tech/low-tech dichotomous relationship that is today's modern b-cinema. Any filmmaker can now pretend to be Orson Welles or Roger Corman rather than find himself forced to follow one or the other due to his vision and associated resources.

So how does this all preface a review of "Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter"? Well, here's a grungy little film that never finds a slick moment and something about that is really satisfying. The acting, camera-work, sound, editing, lighting, dubbing and just about every other cinematic component is raw and unrefined... and this is precisely the kind of film they intended to make! All the members of this film - director Demabre, writer Driscoll, the actors, the vampires, the zombies, the lesbians, the corpses, the atheists, the bystanders, the props, the locations - seem to be complicit in the joke. Everyone seems to be having a great time just trying to commit this crazy idea to film.

But should you actually see this film? If you grew up watching b-movies, and aged into understanding what the genre is all about, then you'll easily sink into this little bloodlust and likely soil yourself by the end credits. If you recently discovered b-movies because of some oblique connection to Quentin Tarantino and a brief sitting through the 'Blair Witch Project' you'll think it's far too low-brow and a waste of good film stock - not to mention being embarrassed in front of your beret-wearing, gitannes-smoking, art-house friends for seeing such a film.

"Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter" is a riot from beginning to end. Like many of it's great predecessors ("A Polish Vampire in Burbank" comes to mind) it's an ironic, creative, cliched genre experiment wrapped up in a consciously handicapped final package. Phil Caracas, who plays Jesus, has the kind of hardened gristled features we've seen on the faces of actors like Gary Oldman and Bruce Campbell. Like Campbell, Caracas never falters with his role - he remains in character and truly projects the necessary determined, single-minded missionary/militant slayer attitude throughout. This no-name actor is actually very good! Unlike Campbell though, Caracas only appears to be about 5'2" tall, but that somehow adds an even greater depth to his character's anger!

The kung-fu sequences are surprisingly well conceived and executed for such a film. The action is always hilarious and, as viewers, we're constantly aware that the actors are just barely fulfilling the required stunt choreography. One can imagine the director shouting, "Cut! That's good enough. We'll just have to go with that and fix it in editing!" But in this film even the editing phase is likely to be a clunky non-fix. Classic! Most memorable are the scenes of Jesus using drum sticks and pool cues to kill vampires in a jazz club, and a daylight vampire battle in a park where real families can be seen picknicking and playing in the background. A true b-movie cares not for silly protocol such as securing a proper location shoot!

Rotten Tomatoes

MOVIE INFO

Forget that hack Van Helsing, for true extermination of the fanged undead believers turn to the one and only sandaled slayer, Jesus Christ: Vampire Hunter. Having returned to Earth for the eagerly anticipated Second Coming, Jesus finds his bid to judge the living interrupted by a horde of angry bloodsuckers who possess the ability to walk in daylight. Of course even Jesus needs a hand now and then when it comes to battling the legions of the undead, and Mexican wrestling hero El Santo is more than eager to pitch in and do his part to ensure a safe Judgment Day. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Just would like to say This is for Easter I find this a real look at WTF have Fun

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Into the Woods

IMDb
A witch tasks a childless baker and his wife with procuring magical items from classic fairy tales to reverse the curse put on their family tree.


Rotten Tomatoes

MOVIE INFO

"Into the Woods" is a modern twist on several of the beloved Brothers Grimm fairy tales, intertwining the plots of a few choice stories and exploring the consequences of the characters' wishes and quests. This humorous and heartfelt musical follows the classic tales of Cinderella (Anna Kendrick), Little Red Riding Hood (Lilla Crawford), Jack and the Beanstalk (Daniel Huttlestone), and Rapunzel (MacKenzie Mauzy)-all tied together by an original story involving a baker and his wife (James Corden & Emily Blunt), their wish to begin a family and their interaction with the witch (Meryl Streep) who has put a curse on them. (C) Disney

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and Movietard

Night Train to Terror

IMDb

• God and Satan are on a train discussing the fate of three individuals. The stories of the people in question are told in a trio of very strange vignettes. One involves an insane anylum with some very interesting treatment plans. Another involves a 'death club'. The final story shows us the adventures of a server of Satan. This is a strange movie.
  - Written by Josh Pasnak <chainsaw@intouch.bc.ca>

Rotten Tomatoes

MOVIE INFO

God and Satan are on a train discussing the fate of three individuals. The stories of the people in question are told in a trio of very strange vignettes. One involves an insane anylum with some very interesting treatment plans. Another involves a 'death club'. The final story shows us the adventures of a server of Satan. This is a strange movie

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Babes in ToyLand

IMDb

• 11-year-old Lisa has no time for toys; she's too busy taking care of her siblings andcooking for her mother. During the Christmas Eve blizzard, Lisa travels to Toyland in Wizard of Oz-like fashion and arrives just in time for a wedding. Young Mary Contrary is about to marry mean, old Barnaby Barnacle, despite the fact that she loves Jack Be Nimble. Lisa tries to stop this terrible wedding and, together with her new friends, discovers that Barnaby wants to take over Toyland. Lisa, Mary, Jack, and Georgie Porgie ask the Toymaster for help, but he can't help them as long as Lisa doesn't truly believe in toys.
  - Written by Christine Sai-Halasz <sai@mit.edu>

Rotten Tomatoes

MOVIE INFO

While Walt Disney's 1961 filmization of Victor Herbert's Babes in Toyland pales in comparison to the 1934 movie version starring Laurel & Hardy, the Disney film is an unqualified classic when compared to the ill-starred 1986 TV version. Adapted for television by playwright Paul Zindel, the 1986 film stars Drew Barrymore as Lisa Piper, a contemporary girl whisked off Wizard of Oz fashion to Toyland. Here her friends and family from the "real" world are reincarnated as villainous Barnaby (Richard Mulligan), Old Mother Hubbard (Eileen Brennan), Jack-Be-Nimble (Keanu Reeves) et. al. Only "March of the Toys" and "Toyland" have been retained from the original Victor Herbert score; the rest of the songs were specially written for this adaptation by Leslie Bricusse-and, suffice to say, these were hardly classics. Irreparably damaging this version was its 180-minute length-over twice as long as the Laurel & Hardy version, and not even half as good. Filmed in Munich, Babes in Toyland was first telecast December 19, 1986.

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POULTRYGEIST: NIGHT OF THE CHICKEN DEAD

IMDb

• When the American Chicken Bunker, a military-themed fried-chicken chain, builds a restaurant on the site of an ancient Indian burial ground, local protesters aren't the only ones crying fowl! The previous tenants, fueled by a supernatural force, take "possession" of the food and those who eat it, and the survivors discover that they must band together before they themselves become the other white meat! Film lovers have been starved for sustenance. The relentless diet of predictability and pretense Hollywood has been serving up just doesn't cut it. Poultrygeist is hearty food for thought. In Poultrygeist, Troma takes on the the fast-food industry-skewering the soulless restaurateurs-in the world's first horror-comedy film to feature zombie chickens, American Indians and a bit of singing and dancing! It's Poultrygeist!
  - Written by Troma Entertainment
• When Arbie's girlfriend turns out to be a lesbian, he decides not to go to college but to work at the American Chicken Bunker where she always protests. One thing, the American Chicken Bunker was built on an Ancient Indian Burial Ground and on Toxic Waste. What will Arbie do when the mutated toxic spirits of the Indians enter the dead carcass of the Chickens? It's POULTRYGEIST! ATTACK OF THE CHICKEN ZOMBIES!
  - Written by Ben Dover
• A former member of the Ku Klux Klan, General Lee Roy, now owns and runs a fast food chain 'American Chicken Bunker'. His new store is located on a site that was the burial ground of Native Americans. He has leased this franchise to an African-American, Denny, and has hired a Jew-hating/chicken-loving employee, Carl Jr.; a Burkha-cladMuslim woman, Humus; a Mexican, Jose Paco Bell; a male named Arbie, who is now called 'Daisy' amongst others. He attends the official opening of the store amidst protests from the local community of atrocities carried out on chickens, and the Indianburial grounds' desecration. Watch what happens when Lee Roy decides to pacify the protesters with free chicken meat.
  - Written by rAjOo (gunwanti@hotmail.com)

Rotten Tomatoes

MOVIE INFO

For anyone who has ever felt genuine fear while pondering what's really in that oddly shaped chicken nugget they're about to consume, director Lloyd Kaufman offers a simultaneously horrific and hilarious parody of the zombie genre that takes on the one thing scarier than the flesh-eating legions of the undead -- America's love affair with fast food. Arbie (Jason Yachanin) is a nostalgic romantic with little luck in romance and a bad case of puppy love. When Arbie's high-school sweetheart, Wendy (Kate Graham), returns home after her first year of college, the lovelorn teen attempts to win the object of his affections back by taking her to the site of their first romantic encounter. Unfortunately for Arbie, the ancient Tromahawk Tribe Indian burial grounds have been bulldozed to make way for an American Chicken Bunker restaurant, and Wendy has turned into a left-wing lesbian with a penchant for protesting. Subsequently beaten to a pulp by Wendy's rough-and-tumble girlfriend, Micki (Allyson Sereboff), and in desperate need of a steady job, disgruntled Arbie applies at the Chicken Bunker despite the fact that Wendy and Micki have launched a tireless campaign against the restaurant. But something supernatural is stirring in this poultry paradise; the spirits of the dead are not pleased that their eternal slumber has been interrupted. As the employees of the American Chicken Bunker begin dying a series of increasingly gruesome deaths, restaurant owner General Lee Roy (Robin L. Watkins) does his best to cover up the scandal and keep his customers in the dark. Meanwhile, the restless demons of the Tromahawk tribe vow to take revenge on the fast-food-loving masses by infecting every last piece of genetically modified poultry that is served at the Chicken Bunker. Perhaps if Arbie can prevent their curse from reaching beyond the drive-through window, he can save the world from a fate worse than trans fat and finally win back the girl of his dreams. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

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