Third party videos:

Close My Eyes (1991)

Although this film has a good reputation and lots of nudity, neither Tuna nor I has covered it!! One of us will do it soon. In the meantime ...

• Helen Fitzgerald (zipped .avi)
• Kate Gartside (zipped .avi)
• Saskia Reeves (multiple .avis zipped together)

 

 

Cup of My Blood (2005):

Jack, once a great photographer, lost everything important to him when the love of his life and the muse of his art died in his arms. He lost his religious faith and became a wastrel, haunted by guilt, tortured by his artistic block, forced to make a living by churning out dreary photographs for a pornographic web site. One day he witnesses a car accident. Running to the scene, he is too late to help, but just in time to hear the dying words of one of the victims. Although she is a stranger, she addresses him by name. Turns out it has been foreordained for him to be there at that moment so he can accept a responsibility for which cosmic forces have chosen him. He is to be the keeper and protector of the Holy Grail.

He then wanders home with the Grail and opens its protective box to find out that it works exactly like The Clapper. Opening and closing the box turns his electricity on and off in his house. This creeps him out, so he takes the box to the local Church and hands it to the priest. When the Grail Box is opened by one who has not been chosen, it does a lot more than The Clapper. It basically sucks all the liquid out of the body of anyone who looks upon it. Oops. Two priests bite the dust. Vaguely aware of the danger he has placed the priests in, Jack heads back to the Church, surveys the damage, and takes the Grail back with him, since he is able to deduce that he is the only mortal who can look upon it without dying.

Keeping it is not as easy as it seems. Since it was foreordained that Jack would someday get the Grail, that fact was known to  just about every angel and demon in the universe and beyond, and even to some mortals who have studied the ancient texts and read every issue of Weekly World News. Therefore, everyone who is now and has ever been in his life is actually there for some grail-related purpose:

• The master pornographer/procurer that he works for is actually posing as a pornographer to get the Grail.
• His agent of many years, who has been trying to get him back to his art again, is just after the Grail, and has been cultivating a relationship with him for a decade waiting for the Grail to show up.
• The webmaster of the porno site is actually running a porno site as a front for a Grail-related site about the Rapture and other such end-times mumbo-jumbo.
• His girlfriend is ... well, I think you get the idea. Grail-related.

Some of these people are trying to protect him and the Grail, while others are trying to steal the Grail for their own purposes. Some are human, some demonic, some angelic, some apparently hybrids. Some can be killed permanently. Some can be killed temporarily. Some are good, some bad. The various baddies are not necessarily in cahoots, but represent competing forces who want the Grail for reasons mostly undefined.

Lost?

Yes, so was I. It's a very confusing story with too many players, many of whom are totally undeveloped. To make matters even more confusing, the story begins with a prologue about a couple of guys who had previously obtained the grail. They seemed to be about college age, and apparently were going to use the Grail as a beer stein or something. I'm not sure what the hell they were doing with it, but owning it did not turn out to be a good idea, because apparently every angel and demon in the universe also knew that the young guys were going to end up with the Grail, and ... things worked out badly for them, to say the least. Who were those guys going to pass the Grail to? Who stopped them and why? How many years pass between the prologue and the main story? Who had the Grail in the interim? Your guess is as good as mine, even though I just watched the film, plus the deleted scenes.

So, you probably think I hated the movie.

You're wrong. Despite my caviling above, I thought this to be one of the best straight-to-vids I've ever seen in the horror genre. It's a good horror film even by theatrical standards, and is almost certainly the Citizen Kane of Circus-Szalewski movies.

Wha ...? Circus what?

This film has one of the better credits in recent memory:

 ... with Circus-Szalewski as Nibbles

On the other hand, there is some stiff competition for the top spot in the Circus-Szalewski filmography. The Circus man also appeared in a film called Miss Twiggley's Tree in the demanding role of Puss the dog, but I'm going to have to disqualify that because (1) it's not a feature-length film; (2) Circus only did voice work as an animated Puss; and (3) he was then billed as Circus Szalewski without the hyphen, so it was technically not a Circus-Szalewski film.

So why is there a guy named Nibbles in a deadly serious theological thriller? Again, your guess is as good as mine. Some of the other characters are named Scooter, Sparky and Limpy.

OK, I'll admit the director had some screwy ideas and didn't really have that good a script on the table, but he had a solid vision of the look and feel that he wanted to create, and he paid a lot of attention to the visuals and the other atmospheric details. The film is one of those very deliberate supernatural stories which builds very slowly. It has a greenish, darkly-tinted, neo-Gothic look to it, the same kind of atmosphere present in the best recent horror films from Asia. The director didn't just make every scene seem murky and claustrophobic, but he made them all seem consistently so, as a great artist like Peter Greenaway might do in his own films. He did not get so absorbed with his visual atmosphere that he ignored dramatic tension. The film has a lot of spooky moments, mostly the kind that inspire those "oh, jeez, what's in this room with me" feelings, but also the occasional "jump" scare, and a fair share of splatter as well. The filmmakers were not lacking in visual imagination, either. They didn't have a lot of money to work with, but they did a good job at combining low-tech, wires-and-batteries grunge with eerie religious symbolism to create some unique environments to film in. Some of the sets didn't seem to make any more sense than the plot, but they worked quite well to generate the required ambience, and were melded effectively with the chilling sound track.

And the film is damned sinful and erotic as well: lots of naked flesh, lots of sex, even a hot three-way with the hero and two female demons. So it combines new-wave Japanese visual horror sensibility with Polanski-type religious themes and old-school European gorotica, 1970s style. That's a pretty good combination because it brings life to the new Asian style and a more controlled artistic sensibility to the old European style. And the DVD has lots of extras, indicating that the creative team put as much thought into the disc as they did into the film. I'd say that this young filmmaker may just have established his credentials, certainly he did well enough that I was willing to forgive the messy plot and the disappointing ending and still say to him "well done; good start; hope to see your next one."

IMAGES and CLIPS removed upon request.

 

OTHER CRAP:

Movie Reviews:

Yellow asterisk: funny (maybe). White asterisk: expanded format. Blue asterisk: not mine. No asterisk: it probably sucks.

Ai No Shinsekai (1994)

Ai No Shinsekai was a sensation in Japan, and was the first official film to show female public hair. In fact, the film more or less exists to show off both star Sawa Suzuki, and her best friend, Reiko Kataoka. Both women show the full monty for the first time in mainstream Japanese theaters. Sawa Suzuki won numerous awards for this film, basically for being seriously cute and a natural in front of the camera. Reiko not hard on the eyes either.

Both play characters employed in the sex industry, with Sawa working as a dominatrix, and Reiko as a call girl. As both women make very good money, they can afford what they want.  They meet on their way to engagements, since they both work out of the same district in Tokyo. Sawa is a serious acting student, and also specializes in having fun, which includes sleeping with each male member of her acting group. Reiko wants to marry a lawyer, but the best she can do so far is someone who keeps failing the yearly entrance exam for law school.

The film is shot in a pseudo-documentary style, showing their daily lives, including VD, a mean customer, an in-depth view of female domination, and more than a little insight into actors' workshops in Japan. That combination of elements makes for an odd production, but it is made even odder by the insertion of art stills of Sawa Suzuki throughout the film.  (These were actually shot by a famous photographer named Araki Nobuyoshi.)  If I had to grade this based on the story, I am afraid it would be hard to give good marks. As a sexy mockumentary, however, I found it interesting with much to enjoy.

C.

There are complimentary subtitles, one translating the dialogue, the other providing background information.

IMDb readers say 6.5 based on 52 votes.

 

 

Reiko Kataoka

Sawa Suzuki

unknown

Notes and collages

Bonnie Bedelia in Needful Things   I'm a big Bonnie Bedelia fan: there is just something I perceive as soft and fluffy about her (which, considering my misapprehension of woman, may mean that she's a vicious monster.) She does look great in a bra ... so I made this collage. ----- As for the film "Needful Things," it's a Stephen King story which actually ends in a less awkward way than the novel did which is fairly easy to do since my dear author Stephen King sucks at ending his supernatural stories. Am I being too severe? Nope. The man writes great characters and very involving tales on occasion: he just sucks when it comes to resolving a supernatural tale. Ironic isn't it since that is what he is best known for? On the other hand, he is awesome when he writes about people just being people. I recommend the following films from his stories in that genre: "Stand by Me," "The Shawshank Redemption" and "The Green Mile." ( I realize that "The Green Mile" is about a man who can "heal" but the core of the story is about love.)     Eva Green in The Dreamers   ... so there I was talking about the new "Casino Royale" with my friend Sean and I tangented to Eva Green as the latest Bond girl ... so he asked me if my latest collage would be Eva Green? ---- A pretty lady; I hope that she doesn't join the James Bond curse.

Rae Dawn Chong in Valentine's Day (1998). I think this was the last exposure of her glorious nude career.

Chili Gold in Freak Out (2004).

Penny Johnson in The Hills have Eyes 2.

BRITNEY DIVORCING K-FED, SOON TO BE K-UNFED

In a surprise move Tuesday, Britney Spears filed for divorce from Kevin Federline, citing "irreconcilable differences."  TMZ.com obtained the papers, and they say Britney is seeking custody of both their children, asking the judge to make both parties pay their own attorney fees, and waiving her right to spousal support.  The London Daily Mirror claims that Britney has an ironclad pre-nup to protect her $120 million fortune, and she could get rid of K-Fed for as little as $350,000 and a half-interest in their Malibu house, which is valued at $7 million. 

*  Or it would be, if they could get the smell of Colt 45 and old
undershirts out of it.

*  He also gets to keep 500,000 unsold copies of his "Playing With Fire"
CD, which he can burn to keep warm.

*  No wonder Britney's showing off her new figure: she just dropped 180
pounds of useless dead weight!



 

The New York Post reports that people who received the promotional DVD of Al Gore's global warming movie "An Inconvenient Truth" were repulsed by the disgusting-looking box made of ragged, speckled cardboard.  One recipient said he didn't want to touch it without tweezers.  But inside was a note saying that the mailer was made of natural, recycled, biodegradable materials and basil seeds.  Recipients were advised to tear it to pieces, bury it, water it, and it would "burst into tasty Basil!"

*  Makes you wonder what you'd grow if you buried the box from a Cheech & Chong DVD.


 

Moscow urologist Dr. Petr Pomozov has created a lucrative new business by selling custom-made designer condoms.  He got the idea from patients who complained that they couldn't find condoms that fit.  But the real money started coming in after he began decorating the condoms.  He said people ask for condoms with bears, elephants or Mickey Mouse drawn on them; romantics have ordered condoms with pictures of Venetian gondolas; and some patriotic clients requested condoms with
pictures of AK-47s, the Russian assault rifle that can fire off 600 rounds
a minute.

*  Talk about wishful thinking! 

*  Men also like the International Space Station, which is great for
docking maneuvers.



 

The bad news: a University of Virginia study found that jet lag can shorten your lifespan

* The good news: Paris Hilton is a jet setter