Uncle Scoopy's Fun House

Thursday

Deception

2008

Deception is a twisty thriller in which things are not what they appear until everything gets sorted out by about a dozen outrageous plot twists in the last few minutes. The cast is good. It stars Obi-Wan, Wolverine and Michelle Williams. I can't really tell you whether the actual film is any good because the sound is all screwed up in the screener and I really couldn't tell exactly what was going on, although I got the general idea, and it seems to be the same old stuff we've seen dozens of times before.

Deception was released at the end of April into 2000 theaters and promptly challenged for the all time record for the lowest gross among films distributed that widely, finishing a strong seventh in that category. It was released almost without publicity. In fact, I wasn't aware it would be released until about ten days before it hit the theaters, and the only advance fanfare I saw was a little interview with Ewan MacGregor in which he said that he got worn out from all the sex scenes he had to film.

Poor guy. My heart goes out to him.

Despite Ewan's vigorous protestations, there's isn't that much sex, and the heavily edited nudity is all in the first 26 minutes. Michelle Williams does sex scenes with both of her co-stars, but shows nothing. Natasha Henstridge removes her top, but her nudity is spoiled by poor lighting and cutaway editing. Charlotte Rampling gets topless, but her entire scene is only about 30 frames long, so it's over in about a second. (I captured some stills for this reason.) The rest of the sex scenes are combined into a single montage in which I don't know the women, and I don't know which body parts go with which faces. As in the other scenes, the montage sequence is made less erotic by the rapid-fire editing. But you'll see all that for yourselves in a minute.

(Maybe there will be an unrated DVD some day, or at least a ton of deleted and extended scenes. Would be nice. It is scheduled to hit DVD on September 23rd, but so far there are no details available.)

Film clips:

Rampling. This lady appears to be willing to break Jessica Tandy's record for "oldest woman to do a nude scene." To be fair, she can still look pretty darned good if the cinematographer knows what he's doing. Sample below.

Henstridge.

Montage sequence. There are many different women here. These are apparently the scenes that got Ewan thinking about workman's comp.

* Yellow asterisk: funny (maybe).

* White asterisk: expanded format.

* Blue asterisk: not mine.

No asterisk: it probably sucks.

OTHER CRAP:

Catch the deluxe version of Other Crap in real time, with all the bells and whistles, here.

The Killer Eye

(1999)

The Killer Eye stars a giant eye from the 8th dimension.

And it's every bit as good as it sounds.

This film was obviously shooting for 50s horror plus boobs, all guided by a vague hope for cult status. The IMDb score of 3.2 gives you a good idea of just how successful it all was.

Said eye was let through by a researcher, and seems primarily interested in impregnating earth women, so he is really not much different from earth men from the first three or four dimensions. Maybe we can set aside our differences and learn to love one another.

The researcher's wife, Jacqueline Lovell is the first to be ravaged by the eye,

followed by Nanette Bianchi.

Snapdragon

The Time Machine takes us back to see what our ol' friend Pamela Anderson looked like fifteen years ago, when she showed off the hooters for her first credited film role.

Scoop's note:

Here is Pammy's film career, excluding her role as herself in Borat. I don't think any of these were written by Shakespeare, possibly excepting Barb Wire.

(5.40) - Scary Movie 3 (2003)

(4.23) - The Taking of Beverly Hills (1991) (Pam was actually uncredited in this one.)

(4.10) - Superhero Movie (2008)

(3.90) - Showgirls (1995)

(3.64) - Raw Justice (1994)

(3.63) - Snapdragon (1993)

(3.45) - V.I.P. (2001) (VG)

(3.32) - Naked Souls (1995)

(3.22) - Blonde and Blonder (2007)

(3.00) - Barb Wire (1996)

Notes and collages

The Eye of the Needle

1981

Kate Nelligan

Scoop's note:

It's a pretty good spy story based on a Ken Follett novel, and is rated a sturdy 7.1 at IMDb. The most interesting thing about the film is that it was one of only two important films directed by Richard Marquand. That name may not be familiar to you, but he directed a rather successful film you may have heard of: Return of the Jedi.

Marquand is the only non-American to direct a Star Wars film.

You never really heard of the guy because he died while still in his forties. He made Eye of the Needle in 1981, Jedi in 1983, and died in 1987. His entire career as a director of theatrical films lasted less than a decade.