Hello folks, and welcome the heck back to Wrong Every Time. This week I hit another milestone in my backlog progress, as I finally watched the last Rebuild of Evangelion film, 3.0+1.0. I’d been saving the viewing until after I finished my original Eva writeups, and am quite happy I did so; the film offered a worthy sendoff to the franchise at large, and I am currently hard at work chiseling an article to match. In contrast with the relatable myopia of the original series, the Rebuilds offer a path beyond Evangelion altogether, grasping towards a world where human connection need not be quite so torturous, and where we might learn not just to coexist, but to work together in building a gentler future. Anyway, I’ll have more to say about that once my piece is finished, but in the meantime, this week also featured its requisite share of film viewings. Let’s get to it!
First up this week was Ambulance, a recent Michael Bay thriller starring Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as a former soldier and young father desperate for money to afford his wife’s surgery, and Jake Gyllenhaal as his adoptive brother with the perfect plan: rob a goddamn bank. Abdul-Mateen agrees in spite of strong objections, and when the job goes south, the two find themselves fleeing in an ambulance with a near-dead cop and EMT in the back, attempting to keep their leverage alive as all of Los Angeles descends upon them.
Punchy premise, right? And Michael Bay absolutely makes the most of it – I’m actually not sure I’ve ever seen him in finer form than this, even with the film’s characters helpfully reminding me he directed Bad Boys and The Rock. Gyllenhaal is also perfect here, bubbling with manic energy from the start, and exploding into violent paranoia as the chase continues. And Abdul-Mateen puts in a fine performance as the thankless but essential emotional rock of the journey, perpetually evoking the desperate love of family that brought him here, and the fatigue of living in a society that offers no mercy even to its battered war veterans.
With such a well-stocked box of fireworks at its center, Ambulance’s two-plus hours pass in no time at all, the chase perpetually evolving as one side or the other decides to disastrously escalate things. There are sniper duels, freeway surgeries, shootouts and brawls and at one point something approaching open war between LA’s cops and gangs, all while the mutual love of the brothers and Abdul-Mateen’s desire to do good shine through clearly. Michael Bay is at his best constructing pressure-cooker crime dramas, and Ambulance stands as one of the strongest entries in his career. I’m not even trying to damn with faint praise there – Ambulance is just a great fucking action movie.
We then watched The Old Dark House, a ‘32 horror-comedy directed by James Whale, who also directed Universal’s original Frankenstein, Invisible Man, and Bride of Frankenstein features. Though it features Boris Karloff himself as a disreputable butler and violent drunk, The Old Dark House is quite distinct from Whale’s adjoining features. Rather than embracing horror, the film lampoons the assumptions of Usher-derivative Spooky House Stories even as it establishes them, while offering a tidy and extremely British comedy of manners in the bargain.
The Old Dark House is blessed with a dry wit and rapid-fire comic sensibility typical of many pre-Code films. Its cast possess a natural chemistry reflective of their shared theatrical background, while the larger-than-life inhabitants of its titular house each delight through their own ominous eccentricities. It’s an easy gag, but I particularly liked the grumpy sister Rebecca (Eva Moore)’s mixture of curmudgeonliness, sadism, and inability to hear a goddamn thing. Simple pleasures really, but for a film released in 1932, The Old Dark House’s lampooning of horror convention feels charmingly timeless.
We then checked out the 1954 adaptation of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, starring Kirk Douglas as harpoonist Ned Land, James Mason as the implacable Captain Nemo, Paul Lukas as Professor Aronnax, and the always-welcome Peter Lorre as Aronnax’s loyal Conseil. The film follows the book’s plot with general accuracy: the three would-be sea monster hunters find themselves trapped on Nemo’s Nautilus, join the captain on a variety of daring nautical adventures, and ultimately bid goodbye to both Nemo and the bitter dream he represents.
The film is a handsomely furnished adaptation, boasting lovely interior sets, lots of impressive underwater photography, and a thrilling realization of that classic giant squid battle. It’s a fine articulation of the story, so much so that I mostly occupied myself considering the ways Verne’s tale had to be massaged for cinema. Aside from the usual acts of combing and curtailing, it was unsurprising to see the man of action Land shift into the starring role – the book is able to luxuriate in Professor Aronnax’s scientifically minded perspective, but films are about images, and the most engaging images of 20,000 Leagues mostly involve Ned Land fighting off squids, cannibals, and giant sharks.
As a result, the film’s moral perspective is also altered: Aronnax mostly comes off as a narrow-minded fool, and the tragedy of Nemo is far more obscure to us. Nemo’s perspective is difficult to sympathize with even in the book, but he is undoubtedly the story’s most interesting character, and I found myself wondering how his appeal might be better preserved in cinema. A touch more reflection on his solemn mission over more scenes of Kirk Douglas kicking ass might have done the film some good; still, 20,000 Leagues chooses its priorities wisely, and offers a fine articulation of the deservedly classic novel.
Last up for the week was Wishmaster, a ‘90s horror feature centered on a malevolent djinn. After being sealed inside an opal by a crafty sorcerer, the djinn lies dormant until its tomb is shattered upon transport to the modern United States. The gem eventually finds its way to the hands of gem appraiser Alex Amberson (Tammy Lauren), who unwittingly wakes the djinn. The nefarious wishmaster then begins his terrible reign, granting vaguely phrased monkey’s paw wishes to random cityfolk, stealing their souls in the bargain, and eventually demanding of Alex the three wishes that will set him free.
Wishmaster is an unabashed pastiche of ‘80s horror staples, coming across very much like Leprechaun-meets-Hellraiser, and guest starring a vast array of B-horror royalty. Hey look, there’s Candyman Tony Todd as a security guard! There’s Tim Raimi getting crushed under a statue! There’s Reggie from Phantasm as a pharmacist! It’s a gimmick that points towards Wishmaster’s modest aspirations: embrace what is engaging about B-horror, make no pretensions of creating higher art, and nail the goddamn practical effects.
I am happy to report that Wishmaster accomplishes all of that with confidence, if not necessarily anything approaching distinction. The opening scene alone is a cavalcade of delightful monstrosities, with the prior wish-bearer’s ill-considered “show me wonders” offering such wonders as a man slamming into and fusing with a stone wall, a devil bursting from a man’s chest to attack a nearby woman, and another man’s skeleton forcefully breaking free of his own flesh, all captured in glorious practical effects. Andrew Divoff also puts in a striking performance as the djinn’s human form, evoking both the villain’s profound arrogance and his fury at being bound by the wishes of idiots. You’ll laugh at the preposterously contrived “wishes” and their often random consequences, you’ll cheer at the generous variability of the film’s monstrous creations, and you’ll hopefully leave satisfied by this nutritionally dubious but undeniably overflowing box of popcorn.
