Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

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Polybius
Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 10:57 pm
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#51 Post by Polybius » Wed Aug 03, 2011 4:52 am

I share the love for Deep Cover. I will always pay attention to Mr. Fishburne and the title song is a permanent member of my Top 10 Hip Hop songs list. It radiates cool but insistent menace.

if we can go a bit off of strictly Noirish subjects, I really like Disorganized Crime, from '89. I actually just watched it again a couple of weeks ago on FLIX and what I've always liked about it (Ed O'Neil's slow burn of pained annoyance, the running joke of the rivalry between Ruben Blades and William Russ and the fact that the heist itself is plausible and daffy at the same time) all held up nicely.

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Cold Bishop
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#52 Post by Cold Bishop » Thu Aug 25, 2011 9:30 pm

Supposedly, Boiling Point started out centered on Dennis Hopper's character. It was studio tampering in wake of Snipes popularity that ended up with the film we have now. It wouldn't surprise me if most of the "second-hand" stuff was actually filmed but cut.

It's one of those post-70s studio movies that deserve a director's cut, but which won't because A) nobody gives a damn about it enough to pursue one, and B) even it's final product would probably never be a great film. But good-not-great films deserve rectification, too! (I know there are few more of them, although I can't think of most of them at the moment... Mike's Murder, for example).

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domino harvey
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#53 Post by domino harvey » Tue Sep 20, 2011 6:15 pm

I've been sporadically picking up titles I remembered from back in the day thanks to this thread being somewhere in the back of my mind, and watching the bizarre Modern Vampires really helps crystallize why these movies have a way of sticking in the head. These movies I fondly recall in a sort of half-remembered state stick out for their novelty, their eccentricity, and their devotion to ideas more esoteric than mainstream fare tends to offer. Something like Modern Vampires has virtually no aesthetic charms, unless one counts the oft-nude Natasha Gregson Wagner, but while it is impossible to defend in terms of mise-en-scene, the question is why would anyone ever? The film, scripted by Freeway's Matthew Bright, brings together so many known names under the auspices of such a half-cooked but delightfully weird premise and execution that it's hard not to admire its very existence. The film is an LA-set riff on the metaphor of the vampiric being representative of the sexual. Here a select subset of trendy vampires, mostly comprised of permanent tourist Eurotrash, galavant around the city of appearances fucking everything they can-- only with their fangs, not their thangs. It's anything but subtle, but told with ridiculous good humor-- plot elements like Wagner's trailer trash (literally, of course-- she lives at the dump in a trashed trailer) vamp disguising herself as a prostitute and then attacking the unlucky johns (and at one point fending off an overly-impertinent pimp by vomiting up blood all over the mack and his trick) or Rod Steiger(!)'s Van Helsing hiring out some Crips to help him battle the baddies exist in a world beyond critical appraisal, but that's part of the charm.

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Cold Bishop
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#54 Post by Cold Bishop » Tue Sep 20, 2011 9:59 pm

I never even knew this film existed!

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knives
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#55 Post by knives » Tue Sep 20, 2011 10:26 pm

You didn't? They played it constantly on SciFi back in the day. I remember it pretty identically to how Domino describes. Nothing much visually speaking, but the overall effect is outstanding (though I prefer other cable standby Near Dark).

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domino harvey
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#56 Post by domino harvey » Tue Sep 20, 2011 10:40 pm

I'm surprised it could air on basic cable, this thing is on the NC-17 side of the "unrated" spectrum. I def saw it on HBO some night, because one reason it stayed in my mind is that it contains one of the most hilariously gratuitous nude scenes ever involving (who else) NGW

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knives
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#57 Post by knives » Tue Sep 20, 2011 10:41 pm

The version I saw was likely edited down than.

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knives
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#58 Post by knives » Fri Oct 28, 2011 5:20 am

The Dark Backward is even better then I remember. It's almost impossible to describe except as an example of everything perfect about '90s cinema. The visual style is great, the script is hilarious and witty, the performances are perfect, it's just a lovely film. Bill Paxton is greasier and weirder than usual somehow and Judd Nelson basically plays his character in a way that suggests if it were cast nowadays Jason Schwartzman would be the only option. I mean seriously how did he not become a bigger star after this slice of pathetic perfection. As to how the film is I guess the only way to describe it is if John waters shot The Elephant Man on the abandoned sets of Beetle Juice. I mean how can one describe a film with lines like, "I can't date a man with three arms Marty," in a way that makes sense to those who haven't seen it. The satire still works too (actually the apocalyptic set up this world is in makes it probably more effective now than when it was released). I'm really surprised there's not a huge cult following this one.

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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#59 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Fri Oct 28, 2011 11:01 am

Not to derail this, but given the proliferation of movie channels in the last 10 years, isn't everything out at least over a year old a Premium Cable staple now?

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Murdoch
Joined: Sun Apr 20, 2008 11:59 pm
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#60 Post by Murdoch » Fri Oct 28, 2011 2:47 pm

I think the thread is more about the bygone era of early HBO and its ilk. While I don't think digital cable and the explosion of niche channels - along with on-demand - depreciate premium cable's value since you'll find something interesting pop up every so often, the era oddities that used to be shown regularly on these channels have faded into the background as home theaters have expanded and recent releases dominate the premium channels.

However, HBO Signature/Zone, Indieplex, Flix, etc. have kind of taken over as my go-to channels for relatively unknown/uncelebrated movies of the past twenty or so years. Maybe the HBO channels less so, since I no longer have premium cable and it was a few years back when I did, but I often caught something on those that I either completely forgot about or never knew existed.

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Forrest Taft
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#61 Post by Forrest Taft » Fri Dec 16, 2011 3:24 pm

Came across this article/interview on Mark L. Lester. It's an enjoyable read, and I have fond memories of the Lester flicks I recall having seen. In particular, I recall Night of the Running Man being a fast paced, effective thriller. I guess most of these have played on American Cable stations, which is why I posted the link here. Lester seems very fond of his two Larry Cohen collaborations, so I'll definitely be on the lookout for those.

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domino harvey
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#62 Post by domino harvey » Sat Apr 19, 2014 9:22 pm

This thread's been on my mind during the 80s list and I thought it would be a good time to revisit a film that like Modern Vampires has come to exemplify what I think of when I think of the unique and short-lived lifespan of premium cable programming. There's really no modern equivalent anymore, as even streaming services require someone to seek out a given title as opposed to just flipping through channels and stopping for a few minutes and then staying with something til the end. An imperfect method of digesting a film in whole, but an excellent form of accidental exposure. However, I'm pretty sure I saw all of BlackMale (George and Mike Beluzy 2000) on my one and only HBO viewing ~14 years ago, and it's always stuck in my head as a prime example of a film I would never have sought out and one for all its flaws I was and am glad to have seen. I'm not sure why I put off seeing it again-- maybe I didn't want to spoil my memories of it being a pleasant surprise-- but revisiting it I see it's an uneven film that nevertheless possesses a certain charm and a carefree ambition within its constraints.

It's impossible to talk about the movie without spoiling its novel twist a third of the way through, so you've been warned, but also no one is going to seek this movie out without a little reasoning why, so here we are. Ostensibly the film is yet another post-Tarantino goof concerning Bokeem Woodbine and Justin Pierce from Kids kidnapping/blackmailing Roger Rees' hoity-toity British doctor in order to pay off gambling debts to a crippled kingpin played with real zest by Erik Dellums of Homicide / the Wire, only to discover… the blackmail victim is actually a serial killer who, thanks to the criminals' theft of his car and attempts to gain "his" money from the bank, has all of the guilt shifted from himself to the two "innocents." There are two reasons to see the film, one being Dellums, who at one point shakes the walker he uses in a futile attempt at being menacing, with the other and primary reason being Rees. BlackMale knows something basic about Americans: we are easily dazzled by a British accent, and many of the film's best jokes arrive after the movie starts to slowly abandon Woodbine and Pierce to follow Rees and his encounters with smiling upper middle class idiots who nod their head and believe everything he says because he sounds so charming, dresses like he won the Masters, and smokes a pipe. Never mind that the pipe is filled with crack rocks or that he at one point attempts to participate in a threeway with two corpses, he's British, he's got to be sophisticated!

I was surprised to see George Pelecanos listed amongst the film's producers, but if that gets some people to check it out thanks to his association with the Wire and Treme, all the better. In contrast, the hilariously incorrect DVD cover trying to sell this as a tough urban crime flick probably won't:

Image

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domino harvey
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#63 Post by domino harvey » Thu Dec 28, 2023 4:02 pm

domino harvey wrote:
Sun Jul 24, 2011 4:20 pm
Jeff wrote:On the right track?
Surely! As someone who was raised by TV, I have a special affinity for these strange b-films from the 90s (or close enough) that I vaguely remember watching on HBO or Cinemax or Showtime and have been looking for an excuse to revisit some of these barely-remembered oddities to see how they hold up to memory. I mean, something like Mean Guns or Made Men probably don't hold up to my fond recollections, but it'd be fun to confirm/deny that and other titles for myself in the present
Mean Guns is finally coming to Blu from MVD

beamish14
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Re: Premium Cable Staples Worth Revisiting

#64 Post by beamish14 » Thu Dec 28, 2023 4:47 pm

domino harvey wrote:
Thu Dec 28, 2023 4:02 pm
domino harvey wrote:
Sun Jul 24, 2011 4:20 pm
Jeff wrote:On the right track?
Surely! As someone who was raised by TV, I have a special affinity for these strange b-films from the 90s (or close enough) that I vaguely remember watching on HBO or Cinemax or Showtime and have been looking for an excuse to revisit some of these barely-remembered oddities to see how they hold up to memory. I mean, something like Mean Guns or Made Men probably don't hold up to my fond recollections, but it'd be fun to confirm/deny that and other titles for myself in the present
Mean Guns is finally coming to Blu from MVD

There is a newish book on Albert Pyun called Radioactive Dreams that I’ve been meaning to read

Apple Podcasts has a series on the Chinese gang leader who wrote Pyun’s Crazy Six

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