inmate profile: Thunder Levin

With the World Premiere of American Warships occurring this Saturday night at 9 p.m. on SyFy (DVD to follow the next Tuesday), for the last few days we here at Committed have been spotlighting the talent behind this upcoming Naval/Alien clash of the titans. Already we've profiled the film's incredible stars, Mario Van Peebles and Carl Weathers, and now we turn to the talent behind the camera, the man responsible for American Warships, writer/director Thunder Levin.

Levin with star Mario Van Peebles

Though he's been in the industry for more than 20 years, Levin didn't come to The Asylum until just last year, when he penned the script for the street-racing actioner 200MPH. Before his work with The Asylum, Levin also wrote and directed the film Mutant Vampire Zombies From the 'Hood, a horror-comedy (obviously) starring 5-time Asylum-alum C. Thomas Howell (War of the Worlds, War of the Worlds 2, The Da Vinci Treasure, The Day the Earth Stopped, The Land That Time Forgot). Levin has also worked as an editor and a still photographer.

American Warships marks Levin's first trip behind the camera for The Asylum, but I'd be willing to bet it won't be his last. Check out Levin's masterpiece-to-date, American Warships, this Saturday, May 19th on SyFy at 9 p.m., then on DVD and Blu-Ray the Tuesday after that, May 22nd.

inmate re-profile: Director Christopher Olen Ray

So, with only three weeks before the DVD release of 2 Headed Shark Attack, I thought it time we start shining the Committed spotlight on the creative personnel involved, starting with the man in the director's chair of this impending classic, one Christopher Olen Ray.

That's Mr. Ray on the left there.

Ray has directed twice before for the Asylum - last year's Mega Shark Vs. Crocosaurus with Jaleel White and this year's Almighty Thor with Richard Grieco - as well as twice before that: in 2008 he directed Reptisaurus, a made-for-TV movie starring Gil Gerard, and a series called "Road to Rhythm." 

I've made mention here before of Mr. Ray's cinematic pedigree - his father is noted exploitation director Fred Olen Ray, who in more than thirty years of filmmaking has unleashed nearly one hundred titles, among them Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers, Evil Toons and Scalps. Ray honed his skills spending years as an assistant director, PA and coordinator on more than a dozen of his father's films, so you know he received a lot of firsthand, on-set training from a master of the field. In fact, C-Ray's still works as a first assistant director on occasion, most recently on two other Asylum films - A Haunting in Salem and Zombie Apocalypse - and also on an upcoming C. Thomas Howell film I've made mention of before, Camel Spiders.

Christopher Ray, therefore, is no stranger to the creature-feature game - as MSvC clearly and deftly proved - he is weathered, learned, and more than capable of delivering to us, the ever-expectant masses, simply one of the Greatest Shark Films of all time (please please please).

Decades from now when they mention the best B-Movies of the early 21st Century, I have every faith 2 Headed Shark Attack will be on the tip of every tongue, as well as the name of its director, Christopher Olen Ray. Watch the magic unfurl before your very eyes when the greatest story ever told hits DVD January 31st, 2012, only a few short weeks from now...

outside the walls: Asylum Regulars' Other Work

I thought in this post we'd check in on some of the work being done by Asylum regulars outside the walls, that is, for other production companies besides the one we cherish so dear. This time, I thought we'd start with some of my favorite talent behind the camera.

Writer/director/cinematographer/etc. Mark Atkins, recently of Battle of Los Angeles and soon-to-present Dragon Crusaders, has another directorial effort due soon, the awesomely-premised Sand Sharks, starring Corin "Parker Lewis" Nemic, Brooke "Fruit of Hulk's Loins" Hogan and Vanessa Lee Evigan, Asylum vet for Journey to the Center of the Earth, in which she appeared with her father, the great Greg Evigan (also 6 Guns). I don't have the exact plot for this one, but the great thing about shark movies, is that once the premise is established, it pretty much goes in the same, wonderful direction. No release date for this one yet, either, but all indications are it'll be some time this year.

Anthony Fankhauser, director of 8213 Gacy House, 2012 Supernova and line producer of 17 other Asylum titles, has a pretty full plate of his own. IN addition to producing Atkins' Sand Sharks, he's also line producing a television film called Jabberwocky featuring the lovely Kacey Barnfield (Lake Placid 3). No word on whether it has anything to do with Lewis Carroll. Furthermore, Mr. Fankhauser has also written and directed a horror film called Grizzly Flats (formerly Shadow People) about a family terrorized by, well, shadow people. Danielle DeLuca stars.


Speaking, in a sense, of Lake Placid 3, its director, Griff Furst - known for directing The Asylum's 100 Million B.C., I Am Omega and Universal Soldiers - has been keeping busy as well. In addition to his recently-released horror flick Mask Maker, he was also at the helm for the recent SyFy Saturday Night entrant, Swamp Shark, starring D.B. Sweeney, Kristy Swanson and Robert Davi, recently of The Asylum's Ballistica. Swamp Shark aired last Saturday night to the highest ratings since Sharktopus. Seems SyFy fans realllllly like shark movies. And The Asylum has 2 Headed Shark Attack on its slate. I'm just sayin'...guaranteed ratings champ.

Then there's Shane Van Dyke, who, if you've read this blog ever before today, you probably know is currently wrapping post-production on The Asylum's August release, A Haunting in Salem, which is going to be AWESOME, and not just because I wrote the script for it (though that's the source of a lot of its awesomeness, for me at least). But that's not all SVD is up to these days. In addition to acting in Fred Olen Ray's upcoming Super Shark (alongside Sarah Lieving and Dylan Vox, both Asylum vets) Shane and his older brother Carey (who also appears in A Haunting in Salem as Deputy Mike) have written a horror script called The Sacred, a literary-set horror-thriller starring Jeff Fahey and Sid Haig.


And finally, Christopher Ray, director of Mega Shark vs Crocosaurus and Almighty Thor, as well as being the first assistant director of A Haunting in Salem, has another gig as first assistant director in the pipeline, this time on the creature-thriller Camel Spiders, starring the great C. Thomas Howell (War of the Worlds, War of the Worlds 2, The Day the Earth Stopped, The Land That Time Forgot) and Brian Krause (2012 Supernova).

So as you can see, inside Asylum walls or out, the creative types responsible for your favorite films have a lot on the horizon. Don't feel the least bit guilty straying to support them.

From The Asylum Library: Edgar Rice Burroughs

Every now and again, as is true of most motion picture studios, The Asylum will look toward the world of letters for inspiration. The public domain offers an array of spectacular, action-packed, thrilling, and - most importantly - free works ripe for the updating. In this occasional column, I'll take a look at the literary giants from which The Asylum has borrowed. Today, we look at the man responsible for two Asylum films to date, but perhaps he's best known as the creator of that crazy vine-swinging white dude in the jungle, Tarzan; Mr. Edgar Rice Burroughs.

Notice how the parrot"s mean-mugging the camera?

Mr. Burroughs, a native Chicagoan, was born ten years after the end of the Civil War to a retired Union Colonel and his wife. For the first part of his life it seemed E.R. was destined to follow in his father's footsteps, attending several military academies as a child and adolescent. But when it came time to take the entrance exam to West Point, old E.R. didn't cut the mustard, and failed the exam. This lead him to join the military as an enlisted man, but this too was to be a brief acceptance: shortly after, he was diagnosed with a heart condition that made him ineligible for service. So to the private sector E.R. was cast.


What followed were years of aimlessness and low-paying jobs, a passionless existence for E.R. but for the introduction and acquisition of one Emma Centennia Hulbert as his wife. 

But then one night, while working as a pencil sharpener - yep, that used to be a job - E.R. discovered the Pulp Magazines and their seedy little stories inside. Though not impressed with the material, E.R. was taken by how popular they were, giving him one of the greatest reasons ever for deciding to become a writer:

"...[I knew that] if people were paid for writing rot such as I read in some of those magazines, that I could write stories just as rotten. As a matter of fact, although I had never written a story, I knew absolutely that I could write stories just as entertaining and probably a whole lot more so than any I chanced to read in those magazines."

Now, taken by itself, this is a pretty cocky statement. But when you realize that's exactly what old E.R. proceeded to do, it's kinda baller. 

Over the next 40 years, E.R. would write more than 80 novels and short stories, creating some of the finest and most-enduring literature of the 20th Century across a variety of genres: adventures series like "Tarzan," sci-fi series like the "John Carter" or "Pellucidar" novels, western and historical novels, etc. Along with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and H.R. Haggard, the man practically invented - certainly exemplified - the adventure novel. So influential was he, in fact, that there's a freaking crater on Mars named for the dude. A crater. On Mars.


As for E.R. and The Asylum, to date they have adapted two of his novels, both in 2009: Mark Atkins' adaptation of Princess of Mars (also the inspiration for James Cameron's Avatar as well as the upcoming John Carter of Mars, the live-action directorial debut of Andrew Stanton, writer/director of Finding Nemo and Wall-E), and the C. Thomas Howell-helmer The Land That Time Forgot. 


In regards to these films, or rather their source materials, there are sequels to both: there are 11 novels in the "Barsoom" series, of which Princess of Mars is the first, and The Land That Time Forgot is the first part of what Burroughs called his "Caspak Trilogy," followed therefore by two sequels, The People That Time Forgot and Out of Time's Abyss. So somebody get Antonio Sabato Jr. oiled up and lasso C. Thomas Howell back to the helm, cuz these are movies just waiting to be made, folks!


So much more than just the man who gave us Tarzan, the work of Edgar Rice Burroughs is thrilling in a way comparable novels written today can't be; they come with a sense of true exploration, the genuine wonder that comes from living in a world you can't entirely know, of there still being secrets to parts of your very planet - a foreign concept to most of us today.


Great for kids, thrilling still to adults, download you some free ERB today. God bless public domain!

observation notes: The DaVinci Treasure

This high-tech thriller tie-in to the international phenomenon and airport staple known as The DaVinci Code opens with forensic anthropologist C. Thomas Howell and a ski-masked crew breaking into a private residence to rifle through DaVinci artifacts including spectacles ("optics"), and pilfer a page from the artist's notebooks that contains the lost DaVinci Code...x, it's a codex he's looking for, not a code, just to clear that up, legally-speaking. The codex, if properly used, can unlock the path to a great if vague treasure, one worth killing for, as C. Tom soon learns.

After barely escaping with the codex and his life when one of his team turns on him, C. Tom runs smack into a Mafioso-style anthropologist/old rival (Lance Henriksen) who wants two things: C. Tom to join his team of highly-skilled relic hunters, and the codex. Clearly, however, he has a preference should only one of these things be available. See, in Lance's head the treasure should be his because he's been looking for it longer, and C. Tom's just one more obstacle in his way, one that he can take or leave. But, in typically foolish bad guy behavior, Lance gets the codex but not C. Tom, yet leaves him alive to thwart another day. Enter the final, and only reliable, member of C. Tom's own team, a stunning linguist/theologian (Nicole Sherwin) who's more than disappointed at the codex lack.

And all this - the first nine minutes - is just the opening sequence.

The gist of the plot is this: several hundred years ago, the rich and powerful House of Medici had this awesome treasure hidden away so well that the most capable kings and armies could never find it, thanks to one of the architects of this plan, none other than famed artist/inventor/thinker/turtle-inspiration Leonardo DaVinci, who, being the shrewd man he was, secretly left clues to the whereabouts of said treasure in his work and notes. Thus, there's an entire sub-population of anthropologists, archaeologists and historians who make the quest for this treasure their lives' work, and our characters are among them. C. Tom's quest begins with the Shroud of Turin, the mythical length of fabric said to have been cloaked over the body of Jesus following his crucifixion, and furthermore said to bear an image of the body of Christ, burned there upon his resurrection. At this point in the film there were - like there are here, now - a lot of twists and facts and historical tidbits being bandied about, enough that I got a little lost in exposition, but I think that's the long and the short of it. Regardless of whatever I'm forgetting or omitting, C. Tom and his hottie theologian locate the Shroud and find it provides them with still further questions.

But as our heroes go in search of answers, Lance's goons continue to hunt them down for any new knowledge or artifacts they may have. Lots of Euro-action/intrigue ensues: church basements, stairwell shoot-outs, marketplace foot pursuits, that sort of stuff. Like a Goldberg-puzzle-box (if he ever made any) one clue unlocks the next unlocks the next and so on, resulting in a cleverly-crafted intellectual thriller that to divulge any more details about would be to rob it of its mystery. Needless to say, missed opportunities have to be rectified, rivalries intensify, cars get chased by other cars, and helicopters, shrouds become maps, Afghanistan comes into play, camera obscura gets a lot older, bricks are broken, Jesus gets name-checked a whole bunch and Lance Henriksen rocks a left-earring.

The film is directed by Peter Mervis (Snakes on a Train, When A Killer Calls) in a kind of Bourne-style: intentional glitches, freeze-frames, title readouts, sequence speed-ups and a variety of techno-noises tossed in for good measure. The film has some pretty spectacular action sequences and excellent pacing; the momentum never ebbs, building from the first scene to the revelatory climax.

This is partially due to the script, and partially to the actors. I'll start with the actors: Committed-fave C. Tom Howell turns in an exuberant, passionate and actively-pensive performance, really bringing his A-game, making him easily more fun to watch than Tom Hanks in the tie-in (I said it.). There's just a gracefulness to him here; it's the most at home I've seen him in a role for The Asylum - including his repeat performance for the wars of worlds.


Lance Henriksen, as always, plays a really believable violent badass, but at the same time, he is not at all believable - not at all - as a guy who gives enough of a fuck about archaeology to get a degree in it. Not that it matters - all-told, Lance isn't in this one more than 10 or 12 minutes.


The lovely lady at C. Tom's side is played by Nicole Sherwin, an actress/TV host/green even expert, whatever the fuck that means. Basically she's eye-candy with an intellect, largely underdeveloped (as a character), and (on the contrary) shows a little too much cleavage for a theologian, I think, though not enough for a linguist, so, balance.

As for the script - co-written by Asylum bigwig Paul Bales (Moby Dick, Sherlock Holmes) and scribe Carlos De Los Rios (Pirates of Treasure Island, War of the Worlds, King of the Lost World) - it's nice and tight, riveting in spots, pulse-stirring in others, engaging in others still, dense ("compact," not "stupid") with information but worth negotiating; there are more twists and turns here than a pretzel showcase at the Pennsylvania State Fair.

Put all these elements together and the result is a thoroughly intriguing thriller that recalls not only The DaVinci Code but also National Treasure, and rests comfortably among the best of the straight films (not sexually, I mean films without a supernatural, sci-fi or ruthless manic slant to them) The Asylum has produced. There was a lot of stuff, largely speculative documentaries, that tied-in to The DaVinci Code, so it's not like The Asylum's treading on holy ground here (pun intended); I wasn't distracted by the similarities in the slightest. A good movie is a good movie, no matter where it comes from, and this is a good movie. 

Enjoy.

inmate profile: Christopher Ray

So yesterday the Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus trailer at long last hit the web, therefore I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to take a closer look at the man in the director's chair for this impending classic, one Christopher Ray (who is kinda tough to find a picture of online. that's supposedly him on the left).

I've made mention here before of Mr. Ray's cinematic background - his father is noted exploitation director Fred Olen Ray, who in more than thirty years of filmmaking has unleashed near one hundred titles, among them Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers, Evil Toons and Scalps. So you just knew it was only a matter of time before Ray the Younger stepped behind the camera, and fortunate for us, this progeny chose The Asylum for his feature debut!

Ray has directed twice before, but never for a feature release: in 2008 he directed Reptisaurus, a made-for-TV movie starring Gil Gerard, and a series called "Road to Rhythm." So it seems he has a little experience with creature features, and a little with TV, which makes him, in my book, the perfect mediator between Mega Shark, Crocosaurus, and Jaleel White.

Ray honed his Hollywood skills as an assistant director, PA and coordinator on more than a dozen of his father's films back in the 1990's, so you know he received a lot of on-set training from a master of his field. In fact, C-Ray's still working as a first assistant director, forever learning, on an upcoming C. Tom Howell film I've made mention of before, Camel Spiders.

So though this might be his feature directorial debut, Christopher Ray is no stranger to the game, no mere novice plunging feet-first into sacred, chummed waters -- he seems weathered, learned, and more than capable of delivering to us, the ever-expectant masses, simply one of the greatest monster shark films of all time (please please please).

No doubt Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus marks the beginning of a prosperous and proliferate directing career, so get on the bandwagon while there's still room. The film debuts on DVD December 21, 2010, only 19 short days from now.

977's Unsolicited Yet Copyrighted Pitch #5: THE PEOPLE THAT TIME FORGOT

So when last we saw C. Thomas Howell, he had valiantly sacrificed his own escape for the sake of others', and remained on the mysterious island out-of-time populated with prehistoric terrors and most inhospitable natives. He had his wife with him, and she was pregnant. You just knew there was a sequel in this, and sure enough, there is. And it's already plotted!

Edgar Rice Burroughs, who wrote the original novel "The Land That Time Forgot," also conceived a sequel, "The People That Time Forgot" (should be "who," I think) that has actually been filmed once before, as a sequel to the Doug McClure-starrer filmed in the 70's by American International Pictures. The story of the sequel concerns a rescue mission staged years later by friends of he who was left behind. That's the story I'd steal for The Asylum's sequel.


In my envisioning, twenty years have passed since C. Thomas and his budding family were left on the island. Back in the real world, Timothy Bottoms' character has dedicated his life to trying to get back, but when our film starts, he's dead, recently, and his son has taken up the mantle, desperate to make his father's life not have been in vain. On his team he has his girlfriend - a ethnologist/anthropologist/photographer - as well as a mercenary unit of three lead by a former Special Forces operative (if I have my druthers, the incomparable Geoff Meed). Together they're working the last clues Bottoms left before dying, and sure enough, it finds/triggers the wormhole and through time they go, only to come to offshore of the same said mysterious island.

Their initial assessment of the island is pretty much the same as everybody else's - holy shit, those are dinosaurs! After a couple close scrapes with the thunder lizards, the team begins making its way into the interior, searching for clues of CTH & Family's existence. On this hunt they stumble upon a lurid scene: a scantily-clad native girl about to be summarily executed for some unknown crime by a few men of her tribe. The mercenaries easily dispose of this crew, and the grateful native girl agrees to help them find their friend, as she knows of him.

Seems after everyone else left, C. Tom figured the only way to survive was to make peace with the natives. In exchange for teaching them agricultural, recreational and political skills, they let he and his wife live, let their baby - a daughter - come into this strange world. All was well for a period. Then the island brought others, another, more hostile tribal force, who discovered the power of the island to move people through time, and the peace was shattered, conflict broke out, and in the end it was this newer tribe who won, killing all the native men and taking all the women and children as brides and slaves. As for C. Tom, rumor has it that he escaped, disappeared into the jungle, and has not been seen since. What of his wife? She was killed refusing to be taken from him, murdered before his helpless eyes. The child? The native girl looks away uncomfortably, says that child is dead too. Why did the tribesmen want to kill her (the native girl)? Because she cannot have children, and is therefore worthless to them, just another mouth to feed.

She leads them deeper into the interior where they face more tribulations in the form of dinosaurs on land, sea and air, and increasing contact with the hostile natives who are desperate to locate and usurp the island's power for their own. As they get closer to an answer, stranger things begin to happen, people begin to appear and disappear, Nazis, Huns, WWI soldiers, Crusaders - distressed, aggressive, out-of-time passengers plucked here one second then whisked away the next. One of their own steps through a hidden wormhole and is never seen again. 

At a climactic point our team finds themselves in a certain-death situation, which is when an aged and haggard but alive C. Tom reveals himself and saves the day then leads them to his secret, the island's secret, the source of it's power (I realize I'm borrowing from LOST here, if anyone was actually wondering.).


I've decided to go full-spoiler here, because, you know, nobody's actually reading these things, right?

The gist of it is this: this lair of CTH's, it's all light and portals to different places, different times. It's the island that controls time, or rather, this island is the nexus of all times, under its own control, and CTH has taken on the role of guardian, seeking to keep this place from falling into the wrong hands, like the hostiles', who he loathes beyond description for killing his wife. It's true that he could have left the island, this time, whenever he wanted, ridden the time-waves through the centuries, going whenever he wanted, but his daughter was here (she's now revealed to be the native girl; he tried to rescue her but it was impossible), and besides, without his wife, the love of his life, where (when) was he going to go? Nothing in the world was going to make him happy again, so he opted to stick around, hermit it up here, watching all time at once but never interfering, never trying to go back to before they were here, because time, once altered, ripples, and who knows what would have happened? Chaos effect, butterflies and tsunamis, all that. He can, however, send our team home with everything they need: Bottoms' boy with his promise to dad fulfilled, the anthro-gf with incredible evidence, the mercenary captain with a new lady-love - the native girl/CTH's daughter. She wants to go back to the world with them, and CTH wants her to go. But he will stay behind, as, like he said, there's nothing out there in the world for him anymore. Couple of sappy goodbyes and presto, the team is back in the future, their present, and that's that.

Could be, though, at some distant point in the future, like say when medical advances make it so that the native girl and the mercenary can conceive, and give birth to a child, that they publicly christen, it could be that in the back of the church an old man in the shadows smiles in a familiar fashion before blinking out of sight in a wink of light. 

You always leave room for another sequel...


I'm just sayin'.

observation notes: The Land That Time Forgot

Though there are some that it would tell you this is a tie-in to the Will Ferrell debacle Land of the Lost, in truth it's another stand-alone literary adaptation, based on the novel of the same name by "Tarzan" creator Edgar Rice Burroughs, who The Asylum has adapted before for their Avatar tie-in, Princess of Mars. This novel has also been adapted before, but that was thirty-five years ago, and in that time there's been a significant development in the world of film directing that significantly changes the game and makes it unfair, even rude, to attempt to compare the two; because as good as the Samuel Z. Arkoff-original was, The Asylum has something Arkoff did not - C. Thomas Howell, acting and directing.

The story starts pretty much like "Gilligan's Island:" a small party on a brief ocean tour gets caught up in foul weather that somehow turns them around and strands them on an uncharted island on the other side of a time-rift (this last bit isn't like "Gilligan's Island"). Ashore, however, it's more dangerous than dead-adrift at sea, thanks to the island's prehistoric reptilian inhabitants - a.k.a. dinosaurs - who seem especially eager for the fresh food supply. Some cast members freak out, some are lost as a result, and ultimately, once given a moment to put the pieces together, those who remain of our party figure out that they're quite literally out-of-time. As though this inconceivable threat wasn't enough, C. Tom's trophy wife, who was too chicken to leave the boat so stayed to watch the boat, is gone when the others return to the beach. So is the boat. Thus their mission becomes two-part, survival and recovery, though admittedly most cast members seem far more concerned with the former than the latter.


A day or so into this and our party comes across - rather, he comes across them - a pilot with an unfortunate accessory who's also been stranded on the island, but for a year, and not one that coincides with their years (it's tricky, I'll admit, and kind of confusing, but only depending on how much you've had to drink.). In conversation it comes up that this bloke has seen a boat in the last day or so, and by his description, it's their boat, the boat they've been looking for, the boat C. Tom's arm-candy was last seen lallygagging about. On the way they stop over at the pilot's place, a rather lovely little cave stocked with artifacts and remnants from centuries' worth of stranded sailors, including Conrad, an elderly man claiming to be the skipper of a well-known vessel that disappeared 55 years ago, though Conrad's only been stranded three years (duh-duh-dummmmmmmmm).

As the plot thickens, the journey toward our party's boat continues, as does the terrorizing and killing by prehistoria. It's not a spoiler to say they find their boat, but fuck that, they find something better: a Russian sub. Only problem is, it comes with a lot of fit Russian soldiers, who also happen to have custody of C. Tom's sheets-treat. The rest, however, is spoilers, so I'll stop.


C. Thomas Howell the actor (War of the Worlds, The Da Vinci Treasure), as the elder vacationer, is frenetically in charge once the shit hits the fan, panicked but powerful, an unsteady stalwart a.k.a. a normal hero, not a scientist or a soldier or anything that especially equips him to handle this trauma; he's just a guy trying to stop himself from losing his shit after becoming shipwrecked on the other side of a time-rift on an uncharted island populated by ravenous dinosaurs and Nazis, who have custody of his wife. All this considered, I'd say he holds it together pretty good. As a director (War of the Worlds 2, The Day The Earth Stopped), he's at the top of his game, crafting a slick, concise sci-fi thriller.

Timothy Bottoms (non-Asylum film The Last Picture Show and "That's My Bush") is the grizzled sea captain, a burnt-out Jimmy Buffet, totally bummed to be stranded but, you know, dealing with it. It's this slavish concern, this borderline dementia that gives him a childlike wonder in the face of such horror, dangerously aloof, which makes him the film's most lovable character. 

And then there's Lindsey McKeon (Airline Disaster) as the lady-friend in the other couple, young and tightly-clad but stronger than your usual hottie-in-distress, fiercely sexy and brashly independent, real, palpable, the kind of girl you want with you in a crisis, or, you know, really anywhere: cute, capable, skeptically concerned and charismatic. Oh, and did I mention she's drop dead gorgeous? That helps. My only complaint is that her role should have been bigger.

Other acting standouts include Darren Dalton (The Day the Earth Stopped, War of the Worlds 2 [he must be a buddy of C. Tom's, because besides these films, which, like this one, Dalton wrote, he's also in a movie with C. Tom called The Jailhouse, which also coincidentally, or not, co-stars Lindsey McKeon. I'll be watching that soon and getting back to you with more.]), David Stevens, who plays the Simon Pegg-esque pilot and Patrick Gorman in the role of "Conrad."

I had a lot of fun with this one: the FX are bitchin' from dinos to insects, not drop-dead authentic but playfully believable. The story takes a couple nice turns in keeping with The Asylum's inventive narrative blending, and best of all, let's its action rely not on bloodletting, but on the tension of survival, a plot rich with highs and lows, peril and excitement. Bottom line? Incredible action, a great script, reserved, poignant performances and awesome FX make this one of the most thrilling films The Asylum has produced yet, and easily one of their most enjoyable.

Now if only I can convince them on my pitch for a sequel, The People That Time Forgot...

observation notes: War of the Worlds 2: The Next Wave

Daring to go where no other incarnation before it has dared gone - into sequel territory - War of the Worlds 2: The Next Wave, once again stars C. Thomas Howell, who also directs this go-around, (script by Eric Forsberg and David Michael Latt, cinematography by Mark Atkins) as the astronomer who survived the original invasion a couple of years earlier and has now, along with the rest of society, started to regain some sense of normalcy. C. Tom has been reunited with his son (his wife has died between films) and together they've begun to settle into domestic hum-drum, post-apocalypse-style, eager to put the aliens behind them. That is, until the aliens return.

C. Tom gets hip to the impending re-invasion and takes this info to the culture's last scientists (Kim Little and magician Jonathan Levit), the three of whom together proceed to engage in a bunch of science-talk that's way over my Creative-Writing-MFA head; stuff about atmospheres and viruses and rates of speed, all spot-on, I'm sure, just beyond my intelligence level at the hour I popped this one in. Bottom line, if the aliens are indeed coming back, mankind is probably more prepared than we were the first time.

This theory is put to the test - with mixed results - when alien scouts land and begin to pave the way for invasion, killing every little pest that gets in their way, namely us. C. Tom finds himself again a cursed soul wandering the landscape alone until he is captured, along with others, by an alien paddy wagon where they are intended to be cocooned and drained to feed the invaders. Thus the shit hits the fan.

The story splits here between the scientists' battle on Earth, and the crew aboard Spaceship Suck trying to avoid drainage; both situations get worse before they get "better" - on Earth it gets all Independence Day-esque and in space it just gets gross. Long story short - C. Tom and crew return to Earth just as our defenses push the invasion into deep space, chasing after, and from here the path to resolution is paved in spoilers, so I'll step off.

Overall, I found this to be a strong, sharp film, helmed expertly by CTH the director(Da Vinci Treasure, The Day The Earth Stopped), who managed a satisfying balance between sci-fi-action and character-driven chaos. As an actor, C. looked better here than he did in the original, the grizzle is working for him now, not against. He's a little more empowered, crafting a progression in character from the last film and its unseen aftermath that finds him harder now, more capable, more adept, more adaptive, not because he wants to be, but because he has been forced to be. In this world, scientist also means warrior, and C. Tom comes ready to scrap. As good as he was in part one, he's twice as good in part two. Quite frankly, any part Kevin Bacon's up for, CTH should at least be getting a callback.

Kim Little (Supercroc, 30,000 Leagues Under the Sea) as a scientist of some sort affects her best Southern accent - Savannahan, I believe - and turns in a very austere, even-tempered and thus controlled performance, even in the face of crisis. (it should be noted that Ms. Little is not reprising her role from the first film)

And finally there was Christopher Reid. I read the name on the box*. I knew I knew it. I saw it in the credits. I knew I knew it. But in my head, the people this name conjured weren't this person. I thought it would be Christopher Atkins (100 Million BC) for a while, but he never showed up. Then I though it was Jonathan Levit, but it wasn't him either. Then a man came onscreen, and I knew I'd known that name. Christopher Reid is fucking Kid, as in Kid 'n Play, one-half of the dopest duos in the history of hip-hop, and one-half of the star power behind the ridiculously successful House Party film franchise. The massive flat top is gone, so it took me a minute to place him. Fucking Kid. He's awesome.

The FX for this film were taken over by Tiny Juggernaut, and the difference is astounding (noting that I liked the FX in the first film): the alien craft look far more formidable than they did, the blast-scenes were fast and furious, the mass destruction tangible and the dogfights between jet and spacecraft were exquisite, all totaling up to the finest work I've seen from TJ in an Asylum film.

It's a daring risk The Asylum took here, treading on holy ground and staking an acreage of their own. Ultimately, though, it seems to pay off: what you get is a film that retains the paranoia of the original while extrapolating believably into a world where the nightmare recurs. If you liked the first film, the second will more than suit your fancy.

I'd actually be up for a third.

* looking at the box again at the head of this post, I see it actually says CHRISTOPHER "KID" REID. so then, i'm just an idiot.

observation notes: War of the Worlds

This is it, the one that started it all, the film that shifted The Asylum's focus from DVD horror toward the tie-in, or "mockbuster," market. For better or worse (better), this is where The Asylum began to become what we know (and love) today.

The plot here should be rhetorical, being that it's the most famous radio broadcast ever, the direct basis for two other big screen adaptations and, as the best-known and arguably first alien invasion story in the English language, the indirect basis for at least 65% of all sci-fi films ever made. So story then isn't the issue here; the issue becomes how The Asylum handles the story. And as was (or would be) the case in regards to Allan Quatermain and the Temple of Skulls and 30,000 Leagues Under the Sea, the fine folks at The Asylum aren't necessarily making a tie-in as much as they are their own adaptation of the same source material. And in this adaptation, H. G. Wells' narrative becomes a picaresque apocalypse story, kind of like The Road if we the audience had encountered these characters as the apocalypse was happening, not after it: one man(C. Thomas Howell, naturally)'s journey to find his family among unimaginable chaos, and the array of bizarre events and characters he encounters along the way. By setting the weight of the entire story of the sole shoulders of one character, the film becomes less an action-spectacular - though the action is indeed kinda spectacular - and more a philosophical characterization of the variations within the spectrum of human responses to global catastrophe.

And speaking of the catastrophe, by proxy the special effects, they weren't Tiny Juggernaut good, but for whoever did them, they were effective, especially if the aim was to try and attempt a sort of old-school sci-fi feel: the bug creature things looked like they were made for Starship Troopers by Ray Harryhausen at the dawn of CGI. Does that sound harsh? Rude? I don't mean it to, honestly, I liked this. The death rays and toxic gas, too, I thought, were nods to classic sci-fi, specifically George Pal's incarnation of this story with its iconic green glow. I really hope these nods, this effect I felt, was in fact a nod to classic sci-fi, because it's in regards to this vein that I most often view the work of The Asylum. Like George Pal or Samuel Z. Arkoff, I see David Michael Latt (who directed this film) and his crew as innovative imagineers (a term I think I'm stealing from Disney), testing the bounds of what we can believe, not afraid to tell a story you might have heard before because of confidence in their ability to tell it differently than all others; not better, not best, but not the worst, either, just different, theirs, which is the aim of every artist - to make that which is universal, unique.

"Slow down, asshole," some of you might be saying, "We're not exactly talking about art here."

To which I say: that's pretty narrow-minded of you. If all you can find art in is pretentious heavy-handedness, if you can't see it in the creation of fictional bug creatures, or in the neon glow of vaporizing death rays, or in the lines of C. Thomas Howell's face when he laments the fate of his wife and son - then you're not seeing half the art that's out there (and you're probably reading the wrong blog).

Back to it though: the main distinction I found in this telling of the story was that The Asylum has made a more intimate film than other versions; instead of focusing of the global scale of things their version is largely centered around one man alone in pursuit of his family, and, like they did with I Am Omega, The Asylum puts a heavy emphasis on the emotional toll of such a fate, allowing stress to dominate reason and cast the scientist as all but useless, just another rote survivor. Latt and crew also played up the faith angle a little more than others, okay, a lot more, specifically in reference to the alien attacks as a version of the Christian Rapture. Though here it isn't driven home as fervently as it would be in the pictures distributed through their Faith Films off-shoot, the character of Pastor Victor (the always splendid Rhett Giles) is absolutely inserted to give a theological perspective on the end of days.

All in all, this story isn't new; The Asylum's perspective on it, however, feels fresh, and is made so through the direction of David Michael Latt and the performances of his capable cast, a virtual who's who of Asylum films: C. Thomas Howell (Da Vinci Treasure, The Land That Time Forgot), Andy Lauer (Legion of the Dead, King of the Lost World), Rhett Giles (Frankenstein Reborn, The Apocalypse), Kim Little (Jane White is Sick and Twisted, Supercroc) - whose three minutes on screen are by far the most memorable - Sarah Lieving (in her first film role) and notable non-inmates like Jake Busey and the guy who played "Zed" in Pulp Fiction as C. Tom's brother.

Truth be told, I liked this better than Spielberg's version, I honestly did. Are the effects better? Of course not, the other version was directed by Steven fucking Spielberg. But H.G. Wells' original story isn't about effects, it's about fear, it's about chaos, and it's about the integral character of man being tested in the face of such adversities. And in that sense, in my opinion, Steven Spielberg is no David Michael fucking Latt.

Let the hate mail commence.

observation notes: The Day The Earth Stopped

The only Asylum movie to ever illicit a lawsuit, The Day the Earth Stopped was none-too-liked by the execs over at Fox, who thought the film's similarity to a certain, like-named and worse Keanu Reeves movie generated a "likelihood of confusion" among consumers. I work in a video store (big surprise, I know) and no one, even the mentally challenged or drug-addled, has ever confused Jennifer Connelly for C. Thomas Howell.

Plot in a nutshell: spaceships that look like sperm invade our galaxy and deposit on Earth robots or leftover transmorphers or some shit intent on doing us in. A rogue citizen of this alien race comes to warn us, assuming the form of a hot chick. And from there (as well as to there) it's basically the same movie as the Keanu shitstorm - with the added bonus of a thinly-veiled Christian end-message - slow to begin but once the concept hooks, it's a low-grade FX spectacular, a little simplistic, yes, but the best science-fiction movies often are; survival in the face of impossible, inconceivable odds is often compelling enough on its own, and in that regard, The Asylum's version of this sci-fi classic surpasses the Hollywood version, which is ultimately too political and concerned with rooting itself in a believable environment as opposed to just copping to the fact that it's a movie about a giant fucking robot. Own it, Fox. Their shit looks like a long episode of "The X-Files" with even worse lighting.

C. Thomas Howell is awesome as always, smoldering and compassionately disaffected, a sort-of shlub who's the only one to believe the hot alien. But C. Tom doesn't just rock this one in front of the lens, he rocks it from behind as well (all of that sounded so pornographic, I know, but I'm keeping it) as the film's director, his second such assignment for The Asylum. For a complicated, FX-laden busyfest, C. keeps his shots taut and concise, balancing panoramas of destruction with the tighter moments of chaos that fuel the tension.

Oh, and Judd Nelson finally drags his ass to work with 27 minutes to go to play the boisterously frazzled father of humanity's salvation.


A choice conversational snippet from this one:

"Prove that human life has value? How the hell am I supposed to do that?!"

"Did you ever see The goddamn Lion King!?"

inmate profile: C. Thomas Howell

One of the most recognizable stars in The Asylum's galaxy is C. Thomas Howell, who rose to fame in the early 1980's thanks to pivotal roles in films such as The Outsiders, E.T. and Red Dawn. And who could possibly forget his star-making turn in the delightfully racist Soul Man? Truthfully, that's where the rise leveled off, but C. Thomas kept plowing ahead, putting close to 100 movies under his belt over the last two decades, all over the spectrum: big-budget Hollywood pics, TV movies, and direct-to-video horror, drama, action, sci-fi and adventure flicks.

Then he entered The Asylum.

In five years C. Thomas has made five films with The Asylum - War of the Worlds, The Da Vinci Treasure, War of the Worlds 2, The Day the Earth Stopped and The Land That Time Forgot - the last three of which he directed. That's right! C. Thomas is not only acting for The Asylum, he's directing! Very capably, I might add.

Though there's nothing lined up in the immediate future between C. Thomas and The Asylum, the big man's keeping himself plenty busy, as usual, with six films in various stages of production at the moment, the most interesting of which seems to be Camel Spiders, about these things.

One can only hope that if MGM ever gets their shit together or sold, the Red Dawn remake will be released and The Asylum can mockbust that (Crimson Dusk? Maroon Twilight? Fuchsia Noon?), with C. Thomas as the small-town sheriff who rallies his citizens to fight back against the invading North Koreans. Stranger things have happened. Like the aforementioned Soul Man.

C. Thomas Howell, consider yourself saluted.