The Fanatic (2019)
Questions about the movie:
- How was Fred Durst as a director? Apparently he took some scenes from his own real-life brushes with toxic fandom. Was there an earnestness to any of this, or was it gimmicky?
- How was Devon Sawa? I feel like he’s pretty much the next step up from post T-3 Nick Stahl.
- Is this a good performance by Travolta, or a terrible one? Because I cannot tell.
- I believe I paid you a little bit of fan service here… tell me about the Jason Voorhees, Friday the 13th connection in this flick!
- Was there a message in this thing? I’m seeing Moose had a social media account and I’m intrigued to know what this guy’s Instragram looks like.
- Did you know this film was the first release of RedBox’s distribution arm which they launched in 2019? Crazy to think they thought making their own content was a good idea and it’s interesting that they’ve not released a new film since 2022. Incredibly, despite sharp dips in revenue in 2019 and 2020, in 2023, RedBox still operated 34,000 rental kiosks around the U.S. with plans to open 1000 more! Long live physial media… sort of. I hate these fucking kiosks.
Bottom Five Obsessions
Aguirre: The Wrath of God (1972)
Dir. Warner Herzog
There’s a balance in many movies with a central obsession, and that’s the weight of the obsession’s drawing power as it directly relates to the mental state of the obsessed character. Often times, I struggled with moving things onto my list because the characters were too unhinged to really call the obsession “dumb.” In the case of something like “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan” or even “Cape Fear,” the movies hang on a villain’s hatred for the protagonist. It’s crazy, for sure, that Khan would “chase him ’round the moons of Nibia and ’round the Antares Maelstrom and ’round perdition’s flames” before he gives him up, but that’s his madness – his sickness. Same could often be said of madmen and their pursuit of riches and power, like say, just about any bad guy from the James Bond series, the DCEU or, really, most of the Marvel Extended Universe villains. But when the obsession grows and blooms into all that’s left, regardless of how bleak the likely outcome will be if pursuit is continued, then the madness seems to feel forced and too thin a rationale for the continued obsession. For me, the prime example of this is 1972’s “Aguirre: The Wrath of God,” Warner Herzog’s harrowing decent into the unexplored jungles of the Amazon River in pursuit of El Dorado, a fabled city of gold. Casting is part of the issue here – Klaus Kinski by all indicators was one totally looney-tunes fucking guy with a dark personal history that seems to have informed his screen presence. Herzog described him as “one of the greatest actors of the century, but also a monster and a great pestilence.” In the titular role, Kinski takes the problem some have with Nicholson’s Jack Torrence from “The Shining” – namely that he is bonkers from the get-go, way before anything crazy happens – and dials it to eleven. By the time the Amazon expedition starts to meet with adversity, it’s obvious this thing is going nowhere but to Col. Kurtz-town because why else would Kinski be at the wheel? His Aguirre is PRIMED to drive every last member of the expedition to their deaths, including his own teenage daughter, all in pursuit of the promise of untold riches. But before long, his desire has grown, and as the resources diminish and all his people die, his goal is to become the conqueror of all of the New World, and as he floats alone down-river on a ramshackle, half-sunk raft, the last survivor of his expedition, he asks a monkey that has leapt onto his boat “Who is with me?” It’s all TOO outrageous – no one THAT nuts lives that long and is THAT obsessed.
Fatal Attraction (1987)
Dir. Adrian Lyne
Glenn Close’s obsession is… Michael Douglas?! Seriously? Why is it that ludicrously attractive, awesome women kept falling for Michael Douglas in obsessive ways. Whether it’s Sharon Stone in “Basic Instinct” or Demi Moore in “Disclosure” or, most notably and most unhinged, Glenn Close as Alex Forrest in “Basic Interest,” Douglas’s self-satisfied, smarminess seems more like something that would repel women than it would attract them. Yet, Alex Forrest in “Fatal Attraction” decides she’s ALL IN on this obviously unfaithful schlub who thought he was just getting his yayas while his wife and daughter were out of town. I know this thing is supposed to be a warning of some kind to the yuppies of yesteryear – guys modeling themselves after Douglas’s character Gordon Gecko from “Wall Street” perhaps, but the read when watching the film for me has always been why the Hell is she SOOOOO obsessed with THIS guy? He’s odious and her “fatal attraction” for him is less an indictment on her and more on the foolishly lazy, bullshit writing. This flick is viewed as a classic, sexy thriller for the ages and I’ll admit it’s both sexy and entertaining thanks to director Adrian Lyne’s smokey, sensual visuals. But screenwriter James Dearden made Alex so hollow, so pathetic, that it’s shocking to me that this flick was nominated for the Oscar for best screenplay. I’m a fan of the phantasmagoric life-ruining villains in films like “Pacific Heights” and “Ricochet,” but in “Fatal Attraction,” right from the get-go I feel like Alex is nothing more than a tool to move the story along and punish the “irresistable” Michael Douglas. Fun fact, John Carpenter was asked to direct the film initially but turned it down because he felt it was too similar to Clint Eastwood’s “Play Misty for Me.”
Play it Again, Sam (1972)
Dir. Herbet Ross
Woody’s Allen wrote and acted as the lead in this rare, early misfire, directed by the usually capable Herbert Ross’s. Allen plays an unlucky-in-love and recently divorced goofball whose obsession with the film Casablanca results in him seeing the ghost of Humphrey Bogart who gives him… relationship advice. The film is an early attempt at the kind of meta bullshit we’re seeing endlessly in films now, think shit like the SpaceJam movies or pretty much any other garbage movie that floats Warner Bros. IP around with a wink that feels as subtle as a hammer on a fingernail. This isn’t as winking, but it’s cringey to see the filmmakers attempt to bring Bogart back to life to give advice to Allan’s woeful lead character who then attempts to be like Bogart with allegedly comedic results that instead just feel completely untethered from reality. And when the ending of “Play it Again, Sam” finds Allen’s character quoting, verbatim, the end of “Casablanca,” my eyes rolled so hard that it was likely audible. [Play clip]
In the next moment, the films version of Bogart explains to Allen’s character that he’s now “Learned to be himself” and I’m thinking, hasn’t this all gone on for far, FAR too long? It’s silly, unbelievable and it shocks me that this film still has a following considering how foolish the entire conceit is.
Cannonball Run II (1984)
Dir. Hal Needham
Played by Ricardo Montalban, King Abdul ben Falafe’s need to have his son, the sheik King Abdul ben Falafe (Jamie Farr) win the cannonball run so as to “emblazon the Falafel name as the fastest in the world” after The Sheik lost the race in the first movie is… so dumb. But when it’s discovered there is no race that year, The King says to buy a race. Christ. It’s safe to say this “comedy” – it’s terribly unfunny, so to call it that is to just recognize the attempt to earn laughs – is an example of the type of brain-dead scripting bad films will justify because they’re “not about the plot.” And I get that. You can look at the obsessive motivations of countless comedy and family-film villains and they’re all pretty goofy, usually centering on a kind of childhood experience that propels the character into a career in mayhem, like Syndrome in “The Incredibles.” But to spend a vault of oil money on setting up a cross-continent race against the likes of Burt Reynolds, Dom DeLuise, the fucking Rat Pack, including Sinatra, and Jackie Chan in one of his first-ever Hollywood roles, well, it’s just foolishly idiotic. You’re clearly not supposed to ask “Why,” as no answer will hold up. But Montalban and Farr basically during Arab black-face as a set-up for a road-race picture? There’s no more important question than “Why?” Although “How?,” “For whom?” and “Who the Hell thought this was a good idea?” are solid follow-ups. About the film, Roger Ebert said “one of the laziest insults to the intelligence of moviegoers that I can remember” om his one-star review while his co-host on “At the Movies,” Gene Siskel, gave the movie only 1/2 star and called it “Worthless.”
Lolita (1997)
Dir. Adrian Lyne
So gross. Brilliant novel, but yikes. I think Kubrick struck the right tone with satirical notes that made the proceedings less unseemly, but the late 90’s version has that late-night Cinemax stink all over it, in part because it was directed by Adrian Lyne who makes a second appearance on my list! Jeremy Irons and Dominique Swain add some complicated layers to their characters, but ultimately this whole damn thing hinges on an obsession that, as an audience member, you don’t want to understand. And Lyne’s lingering, stylized male gaze is the total opposite of what’s called for. Uber-letch Jane’s Toback, a writer/director whose track record as an alleged sexual abuser makes Harvey Weinstein’s look negligible – it’s said he was accused by 395 women for sexual impropriety – counts this and Kubrick’s original both in his top ten. That’s all I need to hear to know this story isn’t centered on an obsession I want anything to do with.