Stickmen (2001) is a film from New Zealand somewhat reminiscent of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. This time, three mates are talked into entering an underground pool tournament sponsored by a local gangster. They don't realize that they are not supposed to win, and nobody plays fair. I found it a good yarn, and couldn't help but like the main characters.

Simone Kessell shows breasts in a fairly lengthy after sex scene. IMDB readers have this at 6.7 of 10, and it won 4 awards in New Zealand, including Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Screenplay and Best Director. IT was high energy start to finish, making it an enjoyable watch. C.

Dream with the Fishes (1997)

Dream with the Fishes is a pretty good movie. Inside of it, there is a great movie trying to escape. Because he is a first time writer/director crafting the one great story inside of him, Finn Taylor brought passion and humor and great empathy to the project. Because he is a first time director, however, he also brought a lot of inexperience to the table.

But that's OK. We all remember the fumbling sincerity of our first love much more tenderly than we recall the efficient lovemaking of our best sex. Taylor's first film is one to approach like a first love.

David Arquette plays a suicidal man standing on a bridge. Another man, Brad Hunt, walks by and tries to con Arquette out of his expensive watch. After all, if Arquette is going to be dead, he won't need the watch, and if Arquette jumps with the watch on, it will get destroyed by the river beneath. Arquette doesn't like the deal. Hunt mentions to Arquette that bridge-jumping is not a very good way to commit suicide, because he might just end up alive and in great pain. Hunt offers to assist with the suicide, and recommends pills. He has the pills Arquette wants, Arquette has the watch Hunt wants, and a deal is struck.

Arquette takes the pills, but changes his mind and wants to live. That turns out to be just as well, because Hunt conned him into trading the watch for vitamin pills. From  this bizarre beginning, an uneasy friendship is struck up between Arquette, a living man who wants to die, and Hunt, who turns out to be a dying man who wants to live. Hunt wants to get some kicks before he dies, so he talks Arquette into funding a fantasy road trip. After all, why does Arquette need money if he wants to commit suicide? Hunt strikes another deal with Arquette. If Arquette still wants to commit suicide in a couple of weeks, Hunt will kill him before he dies himself. If not, Hunt will pay back the borrowed money with his life insurance. Pretty sweet. They proceed to fill the next couple of weeks in a road trip filled with guns and cars and hookers and drugs. And nude bowling. And lots of surprises along the way.

Perhaps one of them will eventually help the other commit suicide. But which man will be in which role?

The script is filled with lots of details of plot and character, perhaps too many, but I never lost interest for a second.

If this early 1970s movie had really been made in the early 1970s, Jack Nicholson would have played the spirited dying man, Dustin Hoffman would have been the painfully shy suicidal guy, and the film would have been widely praised. Even lacking those great performers and wandering outside of its own time, Dreaming with the Fishes is still an engaging story which manages to find some warmth and redemption in a dark situation without excessive sentiment or melodrama.

Director Finn Taylor's only other film is last year's Cherish, which is another film I liked quite a bit.

There's quite a bit of breast exposure, and brief flashes of male and female nudity from Brad Hunt and Katherine Copenhaver in the nude bowling scene..

• Kathryn Erbe (1, 2, 3)

• Kristina Robbins (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

• Katherine Copenhaver

RIP "Suits":

I'm kinda dazed today. My dad, better known to longtime fans of our web page as Danny "Suits" Sparrow, passed away this morning (Friday) at age 81. He passed away quietly, with a minimum of pain, and chose to disappear quietly from the planet, ignoring Dylan Thomas's advice and going gently into that good night. He wanted no funeral nor wake, no gravestone nor cremation, no burial nor ceremony. He donated his body to medical science. He didn't even want his name in the paper. My dad did things his own way.

Essentially, there is nothing to mark his passing, except these few words I am writing here..

A lot of the things that I seem to remember actually happened before my time. That's because they are my dad's memories, not mine. Because he was a great storyteller, they are vivid memories for me, some of them much clearer than things which really happened to me. Unfortunately, they are probably all false.

False, but entertaining.

He was a funny guy with a truly crazy imagination, and a really laid-back guy before that became a popular thing to be. A couple of summers ago he visited me in Oslo, and in one of our talks he summarized his life as follows - always great, but too short.

He wasn't really one of the world's greatest baseball players, as he claimed in the wild stories which he didn't expect anyone to believe, but I'm sure all three of my sons will say that he may have been one of the world's greatest grandfathers.

For those who have never seen it, here is my compilation of his rippingest yarns, the career of Danny "Suits" Sparrow. 

Other crap:

• a housewife is suing John Tesh for using her poem without permission
• Eminem displays a complete lack of a sense of humor, denies Weird Al permission to use his music for a video parody
• Anna Nicole Smith has taken up painting.
• Actor Tom Sizemore has been arrested for allegedly threatening Heidi Fleiss.
• "Late Night With Conan O'Brien" has been transformed into clay animation for an episode that will air Thursday night.

Updates:

• Charlie's French Cinema Nudity Site is updated 
• New volumes: Kim Dickens

Here are the latest movie reviews available at scoopy.com.

• The yellow asterisks indicate that I wrote the review, and am deluded into thinking it includes humor.
• If there is a white asterisk, it means that there isn't any significant humor, but I inexplicably determined there might be something else of interest.
• A blue asterisk indicates the review is written by Tuna (or Lawdog or Junior or C2000 or Realist or ICMS or Mick Locke, or somebody else besides me)
• If there is no asterisk, I wrote it, but am too ashamed to admit it.

• Kim Basinger in a love scene from the Eminem movie "8 Mile" (2002). Not much nudity, but hey, it's Kim.

Be sure to pay Graphic Response a visit at his website. www.graphic-barry.com.

Here's a quick review by Vejiita:

While on an exploratory research trip into the jungles of South America, the beautiful Teresa Burns in bitten by a strange creature. Upon returning home, Teresa starts to change - she is more aggressive, with heightened senses and an uncontrollable passion.

The mysterious bite has inflicted her with the lust of a wild woman and the killer kiss of a demon. Teresa's boyfriend Paul is detained as the prime suspect of several mysterious murders. He informs the police about his girlfriend's strange behavior since their return and that it is she who is responsible for the murders.

As Teresa's passion grows stronger, so does her bloodlust. Soon the demons within her take over, pushing her to the edge of sanity.

The movies is not that bad, but since it is very independent, the image quality is not so good.

Today we pay one more visit to "Olga's House of Shame".

It's a doubleheader "Babes in Bondage" day.

The first five caps are of Susan Small with her blouse ripped open while tied to a tree.

• Susan Small (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

The next two caps are Susan and Brenda De Naut both tied to the tree topless and their breasts have been whipped.

• Susan Small and Brenda De Naut (1, 2)

The final 4 caps give us another look at Brenda's great boobs while still tied up.

• Brenda De Naut (1, 2, 3, 4)

MADONNA LAUDS FRANCE FOR OPPOSING WAR
And She Makes Worse Movies Than Jerry Lewis - Madonna did a radio broadcast performance of songs from her "American Life" CD for a small crowd in Paris and thanked the French for opposing America's war with Iraq. She said, "Here in France, I feel at home."