Tag Archives: 2003

Despiser (2003)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: This was first on the site on January 30, 2023. As I’ll be exploring the films of director and writer Philip Cook this week, this movie has been reposted with lots of added new material.

Gordon Hauge (Mark Redfield) gets fired, kicked out of his apartment and dumped by his wife Maggie (Gage Sheridan) all in one day, then wrecks his car and wakes up under attack by the Ragmen and Shadowmen of purgatory, the world between heaven and hell. He soon meets others who are trapped here because they ended their lives in a moment of noble sacrifice, all united in combat against the dreaded Despiser, a horrific blast of 2003 CGI that crashed into our planet when his spaceship slammed into Russia in 1908 and caused the Tunguska event.

Despiser feels like a Canadian movie but it’s made in Virginia.

It has the tones of a faith film but is packed with tons of violence.

And it feels like parts of The Wizard of Oz, The Stand and Lord of the Rings yet has so many strange ideas inside it that it feels like nothing else. Or, as the official site says, director and writer Philip Cook “was intrigued by the idea of an alternative world like ours, recognizable but skewed, dark and ominous—a blend of our culture mixed with macabre fantasy. This concept became the purgatory, a place where, after death, one’s soul is purified of sin—by suffering. But in this story, something has gone terribly wrong with it. It’s no longer a clearinghouse for confused souls; it’s become bottlenecked, out of balance and fraught with conflict.”

Keep in mind that this isn’t a movie with a multimillion-dollar budget but instead is a combination of green screen shot on video footage and all the CGI money could buy in 2003. If you liked the strange worlds that show up in Fungicide, good news. This goes even harder, if that’s possible. It feels like if you stare at it long enough, you’ll be able to see a sailboat in its pixels.

Cook was a vet by the time that he made this, as he had already written, directed, edited and/or photographed hundreds of commercials for clients ranging from The Washington Opera to MTV. Before that, he worked on Nightbeast for Don Dohler, Metamorphosis: The Alien Factor and was the director of photography for Godfrey Ho on the Cynthia Rothrock movie Undefeatable. 

When he made this movie in 1998, no one was making movies with a stylized look like this. It’s accepted now — just look at how The Mandalorian has been filmed — but in the five years it took to make, Cook said that “the audience was jaded because 3D was everywhere. Special effects aren’t special anymore.”

I disagree. No movie anywhere looks like Despiser.

It even has some intriguing heroes beyond Gordon, like Nimbus (Doug Brown), a soldier who has been in purgatory since World War One, kamikaze pilot Tomasawa (Frank Smith), Jake (Michael Weitz) and Charlie Roadtrap (Tara Bilkins).

Joe Bob gave this three and a half stars and had these totals: “Forty-nine dead bodies. Five gun battles. Three crash-and-burns. Four motor vehicle chases. One sucker punch. Two body-transformation scenes. One hydrogen explosion. One Viking funeral. One peasant riot. Flaming church. Flaming car. Upside-down crucifixion. Grotesque insect destruction. Doll-stomping. Gratuitous shipwrecks. Kung Fu. Grenade Fu. Bazooka Fu.”

For those that look at the cover image for this and instantly think, “I need to know more,” or loved staring at blacklight posters at Spencer’s or played enough Gamma World, this is for you. It’s definitely for me.

I really can’t recommend this movie enough.

You can watch this on Tubi.

MILL CREEK BLU RAY BOX SET: Dawson’s Creek (1996-2003)

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I know no bigger fan of Dawson’s Creek than my friend Jim Sloss, who was kind enough to teach me that Pacey’s boat is named True Romance and to write this:

Over the years Sam has asked me many times if I’d like to write something for B&S and I’d always hem & haw and then never get around to it. Then came the box set of all box sets, the show that is like a time capsule to the 1990s and one of my all-time favorites, Dawson’s Creek.

In 1998 when this show came out I can remember vividly watching it on my VCR the following morning (because I had to work the night before) and from the first moment of the pilot to the last I was hooked, the dialogue was nothing that I’d heard before in a teen soap. They took a chance at treating the audience like adults rather than kids and it paid off. So, from that night on I followed the “kids” from Capeside each week for six seasons.

Created by Kevin Williamson, the co-creator of the horror franchise Scream, this series is a fictionalized account of a young film buff from a small town just trying to find his way. Pretty much what Kevin Williamson did was pitch what he knew and so he told a fictionalized version of his growing up in North Carolina. The show was launched on the WB network in January 1998 and was an instant hit with the show being parodied on MTV and Saturday Night Live. Their use of current pop culture and hit music for the time was what kept it relevant each week and talked about on school campuses.

During the late 90s, Dawson’s Creek was considered cutting edge for teen angst, touching on issues that were not talked about on TV and even less so in public. The first season dealt with drug abuse, addiction and infidelity along with every teenage boys dream… the inappropriate relationship with a hot teacher. In 1998 that was a huge story arc for a main character with the teacher just leaving to avoid scandal. These types of stories were becoming more and more common during this time and now leads to the teacher spending long stretches in prison rather than just moving on to another school.

Yet along the way these colorful kids learned from their mistakes and grew into functioning adults just trying to make their way. With the main character Dawson Leery, played by James Van Der Beek, not getting his High School crush Joey Potter, played by Katie Holmes, but instead getting to fulfill his dream of working in movies and TV where he turned his life into a teen drama TV show just like Kevin Williamson.

I would be remiss if I didn’t leave you with the greatest quote and moment of this fantastic tv show. In the finale we find our core characters several years in their future living their lives with little interaction when everyone is reunited for a wedding they immediately learn that one of the main characters, Jen Lindley, is dying of cancer. While Dawson is spending time with his close friend at a hospice facility she has this Hollywood filmmaker record a video for her infant daughter to watch when she’s older. In that video one line she says that gets me every time is “Be sure to make mistakes. Make a lot of them, because there’s no better way to learn and to grow.” While she’s saying that you can see the anguish on Michelle Williams’ face, showing the audience how fragile she is at the end of her short life and how she just wants the best for her child.

This show never shied away from tough storylines and in the end wrapped up everyone’s arc phenomenally.

I would give this series a 10 out 10!!

P.S. The popular Jenna Ortega can be seen watching Dawson’s Creek in Scream 5 out in 2022 and currently on Paramount+.

Thanks again Jim.

The Mill Creek release of the entire series has all 127 episodes across six seasons, along with seven hours of bonus extras, which include Entertainment Weekly‘s 20th Anniversary Reunion, audio commentaries on select episodes, a retrospective featurette and alternate scenes and an alternate ending to the pilot episode.

I watched several of the episodes on this set as, surprise, I never watched this show, despite Jim telling me near consistently — we lived in a house with six people while this show was popular, so I have no idea how I didn’t watch it with him — that I need to watch “The Dawnson,” as he put it.

Surprisingly — as I have often remarked about Williamson’s other work — I really liked what I watched. It felt honest and truthful, nearly lived in. I’ve been watching a few episodes a week now and really enjoying the opportunity to be part of the lives of these characters.

These Mill Creek TV sets are great because they really give you the opportunity to do the same, exploring or binging or however you choose to watch. And unlike streaming, they’re always there for you, not being edited or taken down when you’re in the middle of watching a season.

You can buy the Dawson’s Creek set from Mill Creek at Deep Discount.

LIONSGATE BEST BUY EXCLUSIVE STEEL BOOK: Horse of 1000 Corpses (2003)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: I can’t believe it’s been twenty years since this movie came out. Now you can get this gorgeous steelbook only at Best Buy. Extras incluide director commentary, a making of feature, casting footage, rehearsal footage, cast and crew interviews, a trailer and never before seen before the scenes materials. You can order this special House of 1000 Corpses set from Best Buy. 

Taken from bluray.com

This is the first film from rock star Rob Zombie, a man that I have pretty much vilified in conversations and reviews for basically filming Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 over and over again (with side dishes of Horror House on Highway 5 and Eaten Alive). That said — I watched this with an open mind and the hope of being entertained. And you know, at this point, Zombie was making interesting films.

Zombie started by directed several of his band White Zombie’s videos and was selected by Universal Studios to design a haunted maze for their Halloween Horror Nights. It was so successful that he was credited with reviving the attraction and he began a relationship with the studio. He has previously worked on a script for a sequel to The Crow called The Crow: 2037 A New World of Gods and Monsters.

Despite plans for an animated Frankenstein film, Zombie decided to turn his haunted house into an actual movie. Filmed in 2000 on the Universal Studio backlots, which gives this the same feel as the aforementioned Eaten Alive, the film was held for three years as there was concern over releasing it, due to all the blood, gore, masturbation and necrophilia. Not wanting an NC-17, Universal was content to sit on the film until Zombie bought it back and sold it to Lion’s Gate, who finally released it almost three years after the film had wrapped.

The film opens on October 30, 1977, as two criminals attempt to rob the gas station of Captain Spalding (Sid Haig, Spider Baby). It’s a quick intro to get us into the spirit of the film — down, dirty and scummy. Soon, Jerry (Chris Hardwick), Bill (The Office’s Rainn Wilson), Mary and Erin arrive, as they are traveling the country writing about strange roadside attractions.

Spalding gives them a tour of his Museum of Monsters and Madmen, during which he relates the legend of Doctor Satan, a mad doctor who was hung by an angry mob. Before they leave, he gives them a hand-drawn map to the tree where they lynched the man.

On the way, they pick up Baby (Zombie’s muse, Sheri Moon Zombie), a hitchhiker who gets in the car moments before a tire blows out and her half-brother Rufus (former pro wrestler Robert “Bonecrusher” Mukes) picks them up in his tow truck.

What follows is a descent into madness, as the Firefly family (who are all named after Marx Brothers characters) takes over the film. There’s Mother Firefly (Karen Black, Trilogy of Terror), adopted brother Otis Driftwood (Bill Moseley, Chop Top from Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2), Grampa Hugo (character actor Dennis Fimple in his last film) and the deformed giant Tiny (Matthew McGrory, a real-life giant who is also in Bubble Boy and Big Fish). The family has already kidnapped five cheerleaders and now is presenting a Halloween show to their guests, who run in fear before being taken back into the house.

The family begins to torture the four kids, including killing Bill to turn him into a mer-man like something out of an old roadside sideshow and scalping Jerry (who is named for the composer of the Star Trek theme).

Meanwhile, Denise’s dad Don and two deputies (Tom Towles from Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer and Walton Goggins from TV’s Justified) track down the missing kids, only to be killed by the family. Then, the remaining three are dressed as rabbits and chased through a maze.

Jerry — despite being scalped — and Denise survive, only to find their way to Doctor Satan’s lair, where he operates on Jerry and reveals that his assistant Earl is the father of the Firefly family. Denise, however, escapes again, only to be picked up by Captain Spalding, who offers to drive her to safety. She passes out and Otis appears in the back seat. She awakens on Doctor Satan’s operating table and that’s the end!

The footage for this film is all over the place, much like Natural Born Killers. That’s because Zombie filmed a lot of the sequences in his basement with a 16mm camera, including the opening shot of the moon.

There are moments of style here, but the film feels pretty messy, There are enough ideas to fill several films and no real cohesive tale to be told, but that didn’t take away my enjoyment of the film. It feels like there’s promise here, unlike 31, where Zombie pretty much retold this same story again. There are several films that Zombie never made, like retellings of C.H.U.D. and The Blob, as well as an adaption of his comic The Nail called Tyrannosaurus Rex that would have been an homage to violent 70’s action films.

If you love his films, I can think of no better set for you to buy.

The Hitcher II: I’ve Been Waiting (2003)

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There is no reason for this movie to exist.

I know, most sequels can claim the same thing, but this enters in Die Hard 2 territory. Except we want to see Bruce Willis get into these situations. Do we really want to see C. Thomas Howell endure the same pain 15 years later?

Jim Halsey (Howell) is now a cop but he’s suspended for excessive force. He has PTSD — have you seen The Hitcher? — and decides to visit the man who helped save his life, Captain Esteridge, deep in the heart of Texas. His girlfriend Maggie (Kari Wuhrer) — who I shit you not has a crop dusting business — comes along and has no idea that her boyfriend once watched a love interest get torn in two by trucks. At least she flies an airplane into his truck.

As they drive, they see an RV with blood all over it. Jim refuses to stop and help anyone, even the man they see hitchhiking away played by Jake Busey. Before you know it, the same movie starts off, but takes the wild step of — spoilers! — killing off Jim halfway through the movie and having the son of Gary face off with the queen of Remote Control. At least she flies at airplane into his truck.

Louis Morneau not only directed Carnosaur 2, but he’d direct another on-the-road sequel, Joy Ride 2. This was written by Eric Red, Molly Meeker and producer Charles R. Meeker.

Thanks to Andrew Chamen for finding a typo.

APRIL MOVIE THON 2: Hangman’s Curse (2003)

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April 9: Easter Sunday – You don’t have to believe to watch and share a religious movie.

No, not Hangman’s Joke, Hangman’s Curse.

The Veritas Project is a privately funded team commissioned by the President — the President, yes! —  that is in charge of supernatural occurrences, mysteries and crimes and looks into them from a Judeo-Christian perspective. They exist in two books, the one that inspired this movie and Nightmare Academy.

Directed by Rafal Zielinski and written by Kathy Mackel and Stan Foster, this takes place at John R. Rogers High School in Spokane, Washington. Ten years ago, Abel Frye got sick of being bullied and hung himself. Now, it seems that his ghost has come back to put the football playing jerks of today into comas thanks to spider-assisted poisoning, a plot straight out of Black Belly of the Tarantula.

We need Christian giallo, right?

The Veritas Project — Nate (David Keith, who is also in Christian Mingle, the movie about the holy hook up company) and Sarah Springfield (Mel Harris, Raising Cane) and their kids Elisha (Leighton Meester, Gossip Girl) and Elijah (Douglas Smith, Big Love) plus Max, a dog that can smell drugs — are here to look into the various arachnid-related comas and the goths that worship Frye and love that he’s finally taking out the students who make their lives so rough every single day.

Back to the giallo, get this plan: every bully has a male spider inside a straw inside their locker and the student targeting them gives them money tainted with female spider pheromones, which causes the spider to emerge from the straw, bite them and give them hallucinations which make them think that the ghost of Frye is killing them.

Elisha figures out all of this and is attacked by the killer and nearly dies from spider bites, as thousands of female spiders have taken over the school. She’s saved by Dr. Algernon Wheeling, who just so happens to be Frank Peretti, who wrote the book.

There are religious mentions here, but it’s not as over the top as many other faith-based movies. Well, praying does save Elisha from the spiders, so that does happen. I’m just amused that they didn’t look too deep into the other films Zielinski made before this, including Recruits, all three Screwballs movies,  Spellcaster and State Park. I mean, Cyrus was a broken vessel too and he ended up being the man who set the Jews free from the Babylonians and helped build the Second Temple in Jerusalem. Jesus did hang out with the sex workers and tax collectors, so maybe He would also enjoy Canadian tax shelter sex movie directors helping to spread the Gospel.

Despiser (2003)

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Holy shit, this movie.

Gordon Hauge (Mark Redfield) gets fired, kicked out of his apartment and dumped by his wife Maggie (Gage Sheridan) all in one day, then wrecks his car and wakes up under attack by the Ragmen and Shadowmen of purgatory, the world between heaven and hell. He soon meets others who are trapped here because they ended their lives in a moment of noble sacrifice, all united in combat against the dreaded Despiser, a horrific blast of 2003 CGI that crashed into our planet when his spaceship slammed into Russia in 1908 and caused the Tunguska event.

Despiser feels like a Canadian movie but it’s made in Virginia.

It has the tones of a faith film but is packed with tons of violence.

And it feels like parts of The Wizard of Oz, The Stand and Lord of the Rings yet has so many strange ideas inside it that it feels like nothing else. Or, as the official site says, director and writer Philip Cook “was intrigued by the idea of an alternative world like ours, recognizable but skewed, dark and ominous—a blend of our culture mixed with macabre fantasy. This concept became the purgatory, a place where, after death, one’s soul is purified of sin—by suffering. But in this story, something has gone terribly wrong with it. It’s no longer a clearinghouse for confused souls; it’s become bottlenecked, out of balance and fraught with conflict.”

Keep in mind that this isn’t a movie with a multimillion-dollar budget but instead is a combination of green screen shot on video footage and all the CGI money could buy in 2003. If you liked the strange worlds that show up in Fungicide, good news. This goes even harder, if that’s possible. It feels like if you stare at it long enough, you’ll be able to see a sailboat in its pixels.

It even has some intriguing heroes beyond Gordon, like Nimbus (Doug Brown), a soldier who has been in purgatory since World War One, kamikaze pilot Tomasawa (Frank Smith), Jake (Michael Weitz) and Charlie Roadtrap (Tara Bilkins).

Joe Bob gave this three and a half stars and had these totals: “Forty-nine dead bodies. Five gun battles. Three crash-and-burns. Four motor vehicle chases. One sucker punch. Two body-transformation scenes. One hydrogen explosion. One Viking funeral. One peasant riot. Flaming church. Flaming car. Upside-down crucifixion. Grotesque insect destruction. Doll-stomping. Gratuitous shipwrecks. Kung Fu. Grenade Fu. Bazooka Fu.”

For those that look at the cover image for this and instantly think, “I need to know more,” or loved staring at blacklight posters at Spencer’s or played enough Gamma World, this is for you. It’s definitely for me.

You can watch this on Tubi.

DISMEMBERCEMBER: National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation 2: Cousin Eddie’s Island Adventure (2003)

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On December 20, 2003, NBC ruined many Christmas holidays by fostering this mess of a movie — directed by Nick Marck and written by National Lampoon publisher Matty Simmons, who at one time was the Executive Vice President of Diners Club. He is not John Hughes, Doug Kenney, Henry Beard or Michael O’Donoghue, as this film will show. I don’t know — maybe I just hated this movie so much that I am minimizing his contribution. Maybe he was a good writer. This movie doesn’t prove that.

Look, we all love Cousin Eddie. Do we love him enough to watch him as the main character for an entire movie, along with his family, which includes Catherine (Miriam Flynn), Clark the third (Jake Thomas), Audrey Griswold (Dana Barron, the first time someone has played a Griswold kid more than once) and Uncle Nick (Ed Asner). They even got Eric Idle to show up for a bit, bringing back his character from National Lampoon’s European Vacation.

Eddie gets fired by Fred Willard because he’s dumber than a chimpanzee, who then bites him and earns his family a settlement that turns into a Hawaiian vacation guided by Muka Luka Miki, who seems Hawaiian but is not, but neither is South Korean actress Sung Hi Lee.

It’s a rough watch and one that makes you wonder whether this needed to be made. Eddie is the steak sauce on the prime rib that are two of the three Vacation movies, but a steak covered in A1 tastes horrible. Follow that rule and avoid this.

American Wedding (2003)

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The only theatrical American Pie movie in which Nadia (Shannon Elizabeth), Vicky (Tara Reid), Oz (Chris Klein), Sherman (Chris Owen), Jessica (Natasha Lyonne) and Heather (Mena Suvari) don’t appear, American Wedding was to be the last film of a trilogy. But hey — there was more to come. Even with a reduced cast, this cost way more than the first two put together — $55 million.

Jim (Jason Biggs) and Michelle (Alyson Hannigan) are getting married and if Steve Stiffler (Seann William Scott) can settle down, he’s allowed to plan the bachelor party. That said, once he and Paul (Eddie Kaye Thomas) see Michelle’s sister Candence (January Jones), all those promises go up in flames.

Is it any good? Well, Roger Ebert said that this film “is proof of the hypothesis that no genre is beyond redemption.”

It’s actually pretty fun. I mean, you get Eugene Levy and Fred Willard in a movie together. And it’s the only sex comedy I can think of that one of Bob Dylan’s son’s directed. Actually, it’s kind of cool that a teenage sex comedy can grow up — well, not much — and embrace marriage as something worth looking forward to. Who knew we’d get to that place for a movie centered around a teenager putting his penis inside a hot piece of dessert?

PITTSBURGH MADE: Bringing Down the House (2003)

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Most of Bringing Down the House — directed by Adam Shankman and written by Jason Filardi — is shot in Los Angeles, but some of it was in Pittsburgh and I guess that’s good enough to be included in this week of Pittsburgh-shot movies. There’s also an appearance by the LA headquarters of Mellon Bank, so maybe that’s a little more yinzer in this.

Peter Sanderson (Steve Martin) is seperated from his wife Kate (Jean Smart) and ends up chatting with Charlene (Queen Latifah), a woman who he’s surprised to learn is an escaped convict. And oh yeah, black. If that upsets you, this movie has plenty more race related humor and gets some of its few funny moments from having Eugene Levy say black slang as he woos Latifah. Kimberly J. Brown from the Halloweentown movies and Angus T. Jones from Two and a Half Men play the kids, Betty White is the next door neighbor and Missi Pyle has a decent fight scene with Latifah.

If anyone knows where in Pittsburgh this was filmed, let me know.

SLASHER MONTH: Puppet Master: The Legacy (2003)

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Directed by Charles Band and written by C. Courtney Joyner and David Schmoeller, the eighth Puppet Master movie takes us back to the Bodega Bay Inn where rogue agent Maclain (Kate Orsini) is reading the diary of André Toulon. I should write she was, as it soons goes up in flames.

In the basement, she finds Eric Weiss (Jacob Witkin) talking to Blade, Pinhead, Jester, Tunneler and Six-Shooter. She threatens him but he refuses to share the secrets of Toulon, but does play a recording from him.

Through flashbacks — and by that I mean footage from the older movies — we learn that Weiss is really Peter Hertz, the boy who Toulon saved from the Nazis in Puppet Master III. Then, the war between the puppets and the totems of Sutek in Puppet Master 4 and 5, as well as the events of Puppet Master 2 are remembered.

This is the final appearance of the original puppets created by David Allen and Dennis Gordon. They were sold at an auction one year after this movie.

Full Moon, I have to tell you, there are so many of your movies I’ve started and realized that I’ve seen before but you’ve repackaged them. There are only thirty minutes of new footage in this one. It’s like a Puppet Master supercut. The greatest hits, sold by K-Tel?