I know, I know. We’ve all been waiting for it… an erotic thriller about child molestation. Now what could be hotter than that? Strangely, Play Nice is just such a film in the subgenre dealing with that very unsavory topic… and somehow manages to make it entertaining.
Seriously.
I’m not sure how they did it either, but the folks behind Play Nice took something so sleazy and un-hot, if I may use that term, and mixed it up with a lot of graphic sex (thanks to Robey and Ed O’Ross). They shook it up real hard (no pun intended! OK, maybe a little pun) and what came out was a likable romp about a serial killer named Rapunzel who stalks divorced men accused of diddling their little girls. Yikes! O’Ross is Jack “Mouth” Penucci, one of those I-don’t-play-by-the-rules kinds of guys that are always getting in trouble on the job even though they almost always get their man (or nymph if you will). While searching through police records, he meets the sheepish Jill (geddit? Jack and Jill?!?) and the two begin to see each other (a lot of each other, if you get my drift). Well, a couple of hot dates later and the bookish Jill is ready for some heavy duty S&M type action, which makes Jack not such a dull boy, but also a little uneasy. Mostly because he’s a divorced father who isn’t molesting his daughter so mixing rough sex while investigating this disturbing case just ain’t his style. It doesn’t take long before Jack decides to end it with Jill and wouldn’t you know it, the identity of Rapunzel isn’t far behind (in fact, the first scene gives the whole convoluted mystery away).
Continue reading ‘Not so Basic Instincts: Play Nice (1992)’
Shannon Tweed was already a Playboy Playmate of the Year (1982) and had racked up an impressive list of acting credits as long as your arm when erotic thrillers came knocking on her door in the early 90s. And it was these films, including the sequel to the salacious flick Night Eyes that really put her on the map. She had already appeared in a handful of these types of movies before Night Eyes II, but there was just something so good about the pairing of her and Andrew Stevens. There was also something to the fact that she was a beautiful woman who did nudity and could actually act. Shannon definitely brought up the bar in any production she graced, making her a bit of a Claudia Jennings to the world of the erotic thriller.
Ah, Tanya Roberts. She burned up the screen in the 80s on Charlie’s Angel’s and as a Bond Girl in A View to a Kill. I won’t even get into Beastmaster… That’s just too much!
Although no one would consider this early 80s thriller a classic, The Seduction does have some interesting and glossy qualities to it. Andrew Stevens’ character is fairly well drawn for a popcorn thriller and eerily close to the kind of obsessive fan famous folks have had to accustom themselves to. In fact, The Seduction’s voyeuristic theme still holds a candle about the warped ability to turn one’s fantasies into a dangerous reality.
What can I say? Sure I think Robert Forster is the hottest thing since low-fat cheese and yeah he just happens to be in the last two erotic thrillers I reviewed but that has nothing to do with why I chose The Banker as my next film. It just so happens that he made a few of these movies back in the day and I just tend to own them because like I said, he’s hot.
If loving Body Chemistry III is wrong, I don’t want to be right!
What makes a great horror film anyway? Of course the answer is subjective and it truly relies on your ability to open yourself up to your own fears. The rest depends on the madmen behind and in front of the camera. Dario Argento says his greatest inspirations come from his dreams and almost any great horror film I can think of does lie in a surrealistic domain where one can feel the impossibility of the situation. But all dreams come from some germ of reality so in the end, the movie also has to anchor the viewer in a place, however strange, where we relate to at least a nugget of truth either in the situation or within ourselves.
David Heavener has played everything from a mentally unstable Viet Nam vet to a Ragin’ Cajun (in what else? Ragin’ Cajun!) to a down on his luck baseball player, yet the idea of Heavener donning a priest’s collar somehow still comes as a shock. Most people know this rugged actor as the dude kicking major boo-tae through various 90s indie action films (Kill Crazy, Kill or Be Killed, Twisted Fate). However, you might not be aware that he is behind the camera almost as often as he is in front of it. Much like Tom Laughlin (Billy Jack), Heavener figures the only way you’ll get something done the way you want is to do it yourself. In the last two decades, he has starred in-directed-produced-written over ten films. What is the key to his poly-hyphenated lifestyle? The modest filmmaker admits, “It is easy when you have good people around you, which is what I have. I love to act the most.” His latest creation, Confessions of an Exorcist started out just like all the others, but as things began to develop Heavener found that there just might be a home for an episodic series based on exorcisms. I tend to agree.
Shriekfest is a great homespun kind of festival. It’s an intimate affair held at the Raleigh Studios in famous Hollywood, CA. I’m pretty big on the shorts the fest chooses because they are uniformly excellent but this year I could only manage to see two of the features, Lovecraft: Fear of the Unknown & Dark Reel… What I love so much about this festival is that not only is Raleigh Studios a fantastic studio to visit but you can sometimes find yourself hobnobbing with the likes of Harry Manfredini or Tony Todd, like I did this year. What can I say, it makes me feel important. So there.
Gregg Smith, where are you?
Gregg was the writer/producer/editor/director of Cover Story, an early 90s erotic thriller that spun a convoluted yet entertaining tale of a reporter and his obsession with a dead girl. It’s bit like the old Dana Andrew’s movie Laura, only with boobies. Also, there’s rap-music galore (Ram Luv, I adore you!), gay gangsters, Tuesday Knight (Nightmare on Elm Street 4) in the WORST wig in the history of wigs (Take that Loni Anderson!) and Robert Forster as the guy who couldn’t generate an emotion if you ate his kid in front of him (and yes, he’s STILL gorgeous!).
Those Brits love their zombies. As of late (and not counting the great George Romero) they’re the ones that have really been bringing something to a subgenre that should have already burned itself out. Both 28 Days Later and Shaun of the Dead took two disparate approaches and brought back two fabulous films. The Vanguard is the latest flick from across the lake to do their version on zombies vs. man, but it looks like the subgenre has indeed finally worn itself out. Or this movie just isn’t very good. Or maybe it’s a little of both…
The slasher genre always did get a bum rap. It might have made oodles of dinero for the production companies, but they still turned their back on their product for fear of becoming victims to the backlash. Still, as with any tried and true formula, the slasher blueprint became a staple in other types of films. They might deny it, but many a film took the conventions and just dressed them up all pretty, hoping no one would notice the soiled underpinnings. Here are the 10+ movies that came to mind when I thought about films that fell into different genres but retained a little of the slash.
