SANCTIMONY (2000)

Directed by: Uwe Boll

Writer: Uwe Boll

 

Sanctimony is a movie about some guy that kills people and it was released a few months after American Psycho, with which it shares certain plot elements. I originally thought that Sanctimony was actually the first and therefore considered American Psycho just a blatant rip-off of it, but now that I know the chronology, I realize those two have absolutely nothing in common.

"Please sign this. It's a statement that you won't sue us when we kill you."

This movie was one of the last Uwe Boll made before the historic House of the Dead, which marked the beginning of the long and fruitful video game adaptation phase of his career. That phase is still not over (and probably never will be), but thankfully for the last few years he’s also been doing other projects. But I digress. Even though this (at least to my knowledge) isn’t a video game adaptation, it sure has UWE BOLL written all over it – it’s not hard to see a rushed-out production, Michael Pare (this time without the usual accent aigu in his last name, which makes typing this text a whole lot easier), complete disregard for the usual film structure (also for political correctness!) and occasional flashes of brilliance, which make you wonder what would Uwe do if he was given tons of money and enough time to completely realize some of his visions. I guarantee that would be a blockbuster more insane than Transformers and 2012 combined!

What a nice couple! Working couple, I mean - Jennifer surely wouldn't do anything to ruin Michael's marriage

Sanctimony starts as your average serial killer thriller (no rhyme intended). Pare and Jennifer Rubin are two cops working on a bizarre series of murders (working as in solving, not committing them, mind you). The killer, nicknamed The Monkey Maker (sic!), has already offed like 14 people or something – six of them have their eyes ripped out, six of them ears cut off and the last two – the tongue (if I remember correctly). This leads Michael and Jennifer to think that this might be related to that see no evil – hear no evil – speak no evil thing, and the number of victims (6 + 6 + 2 and counting) reminds them of a certain Iron Maiden album. The hunt for the Monkey Maker is taking its toll on Pare, who is so occupied with the case that he starts to neglect his wife Catherine Oxenberg. Fairly standard stuff as you see, complete with a ridiculous nickname for serial killer.

It's OxenbErg, you fools!

However, this movie is not about the hunt for the killer, as his identity is revealed very quickly – it’s about the killer himself. The guy’s name is Tom Turner (or Garrick if you read the credits, but don’t trust them too much – they even misspelled Catherine Oxenberg’s name on the DVD) and he’s a brilliant young stock trader who realises the emptiness of our modern society driven by materialism and decides to start killing people. Of course, he’s not killing the entire time - he also wisely takes time to humiliate and insult everyone around him, especially his fiancee and friends.

A subtle reference to Starship Troopers! That was a movie about BUGS, and this here is Volkswagen BEETLE, which is practically the same thing!

 

You won’t see Casper Van Dien playing the bad guy very often, but he definitely should – as Robin Williams’ example shows, psychopaths are best played by quiet and nice people (I think Javier Bardem would also agree). At times Tom seems like a nice guy, only to turn into a monster without any visible effort. The best example is the hilarious dinner scene with his fiancee, which I won’t spoil here – suffice it to say that she expected them to talk about some final wedding arrangements and instead she got something completely different.

Casper was initially offered Michael Pare’s part, but he found the role of the villain more interesting. That way he lost the opportunity to have his wife play his wife. It’s pretty cool to watch the movie when you know that Casper and Catherine are married in real life – for example, in one scene she says to Michael Pare “Catch that son of a bitch!” (referring to Casper) and while you may think that’s not a very nice thing to say about your husband, you have to keep in mind that he tried to hang her from the window a few minutes earlier. I consider Casper’s behaviour towards his wife in this movie even worse than in Road Rage. 


 

Catherine is pregnant and not happy with Michael's obsession with Casper

I haven’t even mentioned his sex scene, which is easily the most disturbing part of the movie (and keep in mind that the body count here is pretty large). Basically, he starts to rape his fiancee but it turns into consentual sex. This was too much for the British censors, who decided that was simply unacceptable because it implied that women like to be raped or some crap like that. Idiots. They managed to completely miss the point of the scene. It’s not about raping itself, it’s about Casper’s character – it shows him being a real bastard and at the same time irresistably attractive (to women).

"Now I'll show you how to make a KILLING!"

(I apologize for the oldest joke in the world, but it seemed appropriate)

Anyway, the raping part of the scene was cut in the UK version, and the cut is absolutely horribly done (it was probably in a big hurry) -  it looks as if some kid had fun editing the film with his VCR. One moment Casper is approaching the girl and then it immediately jumps to them being naked and having sex and it’s so damn obvious that there’s something missing. I wonder what Catherine thought of that scene (though I must admit, there’s a possibility that body doubles were involved at some point). As for her, she didn’t have any sex scenes with Michael Pare (most of the time she was pissed off with him for giving his complete self to chasing Casper and not loving her), but she did see him naked in a completely gratuitous nude modeling scene (fortunately, we didn’t!).

That beautiful red and green photography always creates an intense atmosfere of fear and moral destruction of our society. And death.

The weakest part here is the character development. Almost all of the characters are completely flat and uninteresting, with Lieutenant (played by Eric Roberts) taking the cake. What a tragic waste of a good actor! He was given only the most generic lines in the history of thrillers. “Catch this guy before FBI takes the case from us!” is about the peak of his character’s intelectual capacity. Michael Pare tries his best playing a disturbed cop, but often winds up looking like a sissy. Catherine Oxenberg is good, but her part is too small to make any significant impact. As for Jennifer Rubin, I must say I expected more from her. She was always the sexy one in her movies and there’s none of that here. After this, she made only two or three movies (one of which was the incredibly crappy Cruel Game) before retiring, only to make a spectacular comeback seven years later in... are you ready... TRANSMORPHERS: FALL OF MAN (!).

A nice car race through the streets of Vancouver

With character development being the weakest part of the movie, it’s no surprise you’ll quickly find yourself rooting for Casper, and he won’t disappoint you – the ending of this movie, when he finally snaps (snaps, as if he hadn’t killed 15 people already!) is absolutely hilarious. Uwe does John Woo like his life depends on it and the last ten minutes or so are almost entirely shot in slow motion. I’ll just say that people die here and it’s one of the most beautiful examples of gratuitous violence EVER (though I have to warn you, there’s not much blood – it’s all about the action and the choreography). So, even if you didn’t enjoy the rest of the movie much, the ending will make it worth your while.

Michael saves Catherine from certain death. Pay attention to the fact that this is the building they live in! Either the cops have crappy salary, or Uwe should have fired his production designer

The atmosphere is good and mostly makes up for the undeveloped screenplay – the photography and music at times create a feeling of a William Gibson story (though there’s no trace of cyberpunk here, of course) and the direction and editing are done in that chop-chop music video style, which actually works really well.

 

"Honey, where are you going?"

"To buy some sheets and pillows."

 

Sanctimony may not be the deepest movie in the history of cinema, but it’s well worth watching. If Uwe had improved the screenplay just a bit, it could have been a mightily mighty thing, but then again, you have to remind yourself that at any given moment Uwe is working on about fifteen different films, so he can’t be bothered with technicalities. I will end this review now.

ROAD RAGE (2000)

Directed by: Sidney J. Furie

Writer: Greg Mellott

I don’t know how many of you are car chase scene addicts – I sure am! A car chase in a movie is like a great instrumental break in a rock song – it tends to overshadow everything else and I always wish there was more of it. Take for example the 1972 film Fear is the Key. It begins with a mindblowingly great (and long) car chase, but the rest wasn’t that good. In Bullit, which was of course a great film, car chase scene was the best part, too.

Cool!

 

 

So what if someone made a movie consisting entirely of car chase(s)? Road Rage is that movie! Unfortunately, it’s really horrible. Okay, before we get into details, to respond to a question you’re asking – yes, of course, there’s Duel, a brilliant film, one that certainly predates Road Rage and serves as an obvious inspiration for it. However, Duel was primarily a thriller (or even horror), not an action movie. The main character being pursued for no reason by something large and terrifying and seemingly undestructible is a theme that has more in common with, say, Halloween than your regular car chase movies.

Cool!

 

 

As much as I’d prefer to continue writing about Spielberg/Matheson’s masterpiece, sadly, we have to turn our attention to Road Rage, which, as I said, is a real action movie with lots of car chases and crashes. Similar to Duel, the main protagonists get into trouble straight away and are being chased to the very end. Everything else is different. First of all, there is no mystery about the pursuer’s identity – Casper Van Dien and his annoying female sidekick Sonia are being chased by her idiotic ex-boyfriend and his two equally idiotic friends. All three of them are dumb jocks (actually, two of them are, I don’t know about the third one) who look like they couldn’t tie their shoelaces, which is extremely disappointing especially if we, again, remember Duel and its mysterious antagonist whose face we never see.

Not cool!

 

 

Be that as it may, those three morons for some reason always appear on our heroes’ tail when they least expect it. They are never too upset about their truck exploding or falling off the side of the road or other similar minor annoyances. For example, they try to attack them on a gas station, hit a gas pump instead, there’s a big explosion, the truck is totally destroyed, but minutes later it’s as good as new. I don’t understand if they got a new one, or quickly fixed the one that exploded or... For a movie with such a simple story, it sure has its share of whatthehell moments.

 

Cool!
 

So, anyway, how the heck have they managed to ruin such a great and simple idea? Surely, a few continuity errors can’t be such a big issue. Well, the main problem is the screenwriter, who should be shot repeatedly in the head before he “writes” anything else (unfortunately, this movie is more than 10 years old and in the meantime he has “written” quite a few of them, which I’ll try my best to avoid). The characterization is absolutely horrible and the dialogs are the worst. Almost everyone has two or three (not very impressive) lines that they repeat over and over until you get sick. Take the main bad guy, the ex-boyfriend. Aside from looking like a complete dork, he constantly repeats how he loves Sonia. Remember, this is happening at the same time while he’s trying to kill her. His fat sidekick (the non-jock one) only cares about his truck not being damaged so it’s “You scratched my truck! Don’t hit my truck! You’ll ruin my truck! Don’t ruin my truck!” over and over and over again. As a bonus, his acting (if you can call it that) is terrible.

Cool!

 

 

Sonia is really cute and while her conversations with Casper are made of the worst clichés ever (“You are a rich girl! You have everything!” “No, I don’t! My life sucks!” “No, it doesn’t!” “I love stars!” etc) it’s all relatively bearable until about halfway through the film when she finally loses her grip and starts yelling “I want to talk to him! Let me talk to him! Why is this happening to us? I wish I was dead! Let me die! I want to talk to him! Let me talk to him! Why is this happening? I want to die!” and similar. You get the idea. Anyone less cool than Casper would’ve probably thrown her out of the damn car under her stupid ex-boyfriend’s wheels. Anyway, Casper’s the only one that manages to fight the idiotic script and come out with some dignity left.

Not cool!

 

 

Or is he? There’s a scene when he and Sonia are out of gas and they stop a ranger (played by Catherine Oxenberg) to try to get a ride. The bad guys appear and immediately attack, Catherine gets out of the car and shoots at them, but they hit her and she rolls over to the side of the road. So, surely, our heroes immediately go there and help her, right? Wrong! They take her car and get the hell out of there without even turning their heads to see if she’s alive! And I presume we are supposed to root for them? Remember, this is Casper’s wife we are talking about! He probably had a lot of explaining (and dish washing!) to do to make up for that. If anyone cares, the ranger apparently did survive, but she didn’t appear again. Her sole purpose was to provide a new car after Casper’s limousine ran out of gas.

Cool!

 

 

Also, one of the first scenes in the movie is Casper being headbutted by that loser ex-boyfriend, which sucks big time. Johnny Rico would certainly have none of that!

Not cool!

 

 

Fortunately, the movie is not completely unwatchable. The action scenes are pretty cool, especially at the beginning, but there’s also some nice car chasing through the beautiful Canadian country at the end. Too bad they didn’t hire someone at least competent to write the script. Hell, I think even Kevin Smith would have written it better!

THE SWORD OF BUSHIDO (1988)

Directed by: Adrian Carr

Writer: James Wulf Simmonds

The Sword of Bushido stars Richard Norton, one of the true martial arts legends, the man who has so many black belts that he probably needs two separate rooms to keep them all. Richard may not be as famous as Steven Seagal or Chuck Norris, but unless you’re Jackie Chan (and you are probably not) you should get the out of his way. In real life, he has worked as a bodyguard for many famous rock stars and he’s constantly improving, learning new skills, speaking on various martial arts seminars, etc. And he even co-created his own martial arts system (called Zen Do Kai or something). The point is – if for any reason you decide to mess with Richard Norton, you can choose from various ways in which he can kick your ass. You have been warned.

OK, anyway – The Sword of Bushido is a really nice B action/adventure movie in which Richard Norton plays Zac Connors, a former Navy Seal (or some such thing) who goes on a quest to find the truth about the disappearance of his grandfather. His plane was shot down three days after the end of the World War II and his fate remains a mystery. Well, not quite, because the very first scene shows him being captured and about to be killed by the Japanese, but Richard doesn’t know this, as he’s not able to watch flashbacks.

 Richard demonstrates his skills with those knives made famous by Raffaello in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Some blonde girl, who happens to be an information officer or something (and Richard’s real life wife), finds that the plane crashed somewhere in Thailand, and as a reward Richard lets her make love to him. After that, he travels to the said place and discovers the remains of the plane (and his grandfather), but he and his guide are attacked by a ruthless gang of bastards and they kill everyone except Richard. And just as they are about to kill him too, he’s rescued by a brave gang of nearby villagers, led by Suay (meaning: beautiful), his future love interest. Together they kill the gang members and Suay tells him about the terrible situation in the region – gangs of looters and robbers and killers and mercenaries and drug smugglers and gun runners and bad students and stuff are freely roaming and attacking innocent villagers and the government is powerless.

Together they get back to the village, but to their horror they discover that it had been attacked and some people are dead, including Suay’s mother (notice how many people die in this movie). Richard stays in the village for some time. Actually, discovering the remains of his grandfather was just a part of his real mission – you see, he (grandpa) has stolen a legendary sword from the Japanese and Richard’s giri is to return it to them. The reward is 2 million dollars, but he’s such a nice man that he doesn’t care about the money.

That’s about the first half of the movie – what follows is more deaths, more adventure, more action and some nice fighting scenes, just to keep you entertained right till the end. In fact, what I love about B-movies is that you can have so many different cool things in them. For example, here we have a car chase scene in which Richard drives a go-kart. Then there’s a really cool scene when a ninja attacks him in the hotel room, Richard kicks his ass, throws him out of the window and then the poor guy suddenly gets hit by a bus, in a scene that foreshadows Final Destination movies.

There’s also a hilarious Japanese bad guy, whose English is so mindblowingly terrible that half the time you can’t even tell whether he’s speaking English or Japanese. Speaking of speaking, there are some funny dialogs, but when it comes to one-liners it doesn’t match an average Arnie or Lorenzo Lamas movie. My favorites are Suay’s description of the situation in the jungle, when she mentiones “bad students turning into killers”, and the cheesy pick-up line Richard uses to get her to bed (“You have got to let yourself love. If you don’t – you have lost the war anyway.”).

Long hair - not cool!

As for acting, it’s mostly terrible, with that Japanese guy taking the cake. Richard is certainly not a bad actor, but he fought hard with the American accent and he generally lacked the coolness and charisma of Lorenzo Lamas. I prefer his bad guy roles (see for example the brilliant Jackie Chan Movie Mr. Nice Guy, where Norton simply shines). On the other hand, the fighting scenes are great – you won’t see something like this in an A movie, where the main roles are played by people like Keanu Reeves.

I recommend The Sword of Bushido to any B-movie fan. You have action, adventure, swordfights, sex, good music, exotic setting and Richard Norton. What more could you possibly want?

SNAKE EATER III... HIS LAW (1992)

Directed by: George Erschbamer

Writers: John Dunning, W. Glenn Duncan (book Rafferty’s Rules)

In my opinion, this final part of the legendary Snake Eater trilogy is actually the best in the series. Now, before the rabid fans of the first two parts tear me apart, let me try to justify this somewhat controversial statement: First of all, Snake Eater III is based on a book, which spices up its intellectual side a bit. And it has more breasts. I rest my case.

Nice...

The influence of W. Glenn Duncan’s novel Rafferty’s Rules (which I haven’t read, but I’ll bet it’s a pure masterpiece) on the screenplay is obvious: Instead of rednecks, drug lords, mental institutions etc, we have a warm story of a biker gang that kidnapped a young reporter and spent several months drugging and raping her. When she finally escaped (or was let go, I don’t remember) she was so screwed up in the head that she automatically offered herself to anyone she met.

"I'll take the two hundred on the left..."

So, the girl’s parents are quite upset with this and they hire Lorenzo Lamas to track the bikers down and have them rubbed out, eliminated, maybe even killed. Initially, he refuses, saying that he doesn’t do that sort of thing, but when the girl’s mother replies “I think you do!” he immediately changes his mind and accepts. Someone with her persuasion skills would certainly be a fine addition to any RPG party.

"No signal??? Damn it!"

The reason Lorenzo’s able to accept this time consuming task is that he’s suspended from the police again, this time for killing a guy who was trying to rob a cafeteria. I wonder if they have a limit on suspensions in the department... Anyway, now that Lorenzo has some free time, he finds himself a pretty cool sidekick named The Cowboy, who provides vital information for him and occasionally helps him kill people. Together they manage to bring down the gang and eliminate their leader, after which the girl is mysteriously cured. This sounds lake a lame horror movie, but that’s how it is.

Party pooper!

Snake Eater III has all the action and humor of the first two parts, plus more nudity than both of them combined (which means simply more than the first, because the second one didn’t have any). All the main female characters take their clothes off at some point. For example, the girl that got tortured by the bikers (Valerie’s her name, I think) lifts her skirt and starts to pull down her panties immediately upon being introduced to Lorenzo, but unfortunately her boring father stops her (a short digression: If you analyze these movies carefully, you’ll notice that Lorenzo probably has some superpower that makes women strip in his presence). 

"You have the right to... oh, why don't I just kill you?"

The film has a good tempo and constantly alternates between fist fighting, shooting, sex and Lorenzo’s arniesque one-liners. The highlight is probably a scene in a bar where he fights this HUGE redneck, a moment of epic proportions, rivalling the legendary fight between Bruce Lee and Kareem Abdul-Jabaar in Game of Death. An interesting change from the previous installments is that Lorenzo has a full-time girlfriend in this one, which shows his romantic side. Of course, she’s completely useless, just like other female characters in the series. 

"You know, Cowboy, you're cool and I like you, but I'd prefer if you stayed in your bed."

Unfortunately, they have never made another Snake Eater movie and it burns my heart with sorrow. But at least Lorenzo went on and many other brilliant movies.

SNAKE EATER II: THE DRUG BUSTER (1989)

Directed by: George Erschbamer

Writers: Don Carmody, John Dunning, Michael Paseornek

Lorenzo Lamas returns as Jonathan “Soldier” Kelly in this sequel which is probably the weakest film in the trilogy, but that doesn’t mean it sucks or something, it’s just that it’s... the weakest film in the trilogy.

The story goes as follows: Lorenzo learns that a particularly nasty drug lord has been enrichening his merchandise with rat poison, which for some reason causes the death of some people. It comes as no surprise that Lorenzo is really pissed off and that he immediately sets sail for bringing down the said druglord and kicking his ass.

 

It’s also not a real surprise that he’s suspended; this time they don’t even bother to tell us why. This comes as a small problem for his mission, because he’s unable to use the standard police methods like shooting everyone and blowing everything up. Forced to keep a low profile again, he arms himself with a really big shotgun and goes to shoot everyone, but only manages to kill four or five bad guys before the police arrives.

He goes to trial, where his lawyer plays the temporary insanity (TM) card, resulting in him (Lorenzo, not the lawyer) being sent to a mental institution for evaluation, rather than jail. Apart from not being in jail, the institution has several upsides: First, the doctor that does the evaluation is a woman, so she eventually falls in love with Lorenzo. Second, the inmates are really a cool bunch, especially a crazy sex-obsessed former preacher whose “sermons” are probably the high point of the entire movie. Finally, the place is so well guarded that Lorenzo’s pals can go out and return unnoticed any time they like. They just don’t want to do it because the people outside are crazy.

 

Lorenzo however sees an opportunity and armed with his wit, fists and a black sidekick named Speedboat he goes about his business of destroying the evil drug master. Here lies the main problem with this movie – there’s a significant lack of fistfights.  Lorenzo and his pal base their operation on sabotage – for example, they blow up the evil guy’s warehouse, they poison his henchmen (and blow one of the up) in a restaurant, etc. etc. Finally, they get tired of that crap, kill the bastard and get arrested. End.

 

Anyway, it takes almost 80 minutes to get to the first fight, where Lorenzo is almost killed by this huge bearded guy, but luckily he notices a nearby bottle, breaks it on the guy’s head and then electrocutes him. We have a few shooting scenes, especially at the beginning and near the end of the movie, but we can say that in total this movie is a bit short on action.

 

All in all, as far as first two movies are concerned, I must say I’m not quite satisfied with Lorenzo’s performance in fights. However, he totally makes up for it with his superior endurance. This time he gets stabbed right in the back and later the aforementioned large bearded guy shoots him in the arm and in the leg, all of which does absolutely nothing to slow him, or even bring him any pain. Still, he should be more careful with his reputation – the way he walked right into the trap by not checking the corners of the room is really unflattering. A former Snake Eater should not allow that.

Female viewers would be interested to know that Lorenzo again takes his shirt off a few times, but doesn’t spend so much screen time topless as in the first movie. Male viewers should be warned that this time there’s no trace of female nudity.

 

I have already said that this is the weakest movie in the trilogy, which was kind of lame because now I don’t have anything to conclude the review. So, this review will remain unconcluded.

SNAKE EATER (1988)

Directed by: George Erschbamer

Writers: Michael Paseornek, John Dunning

This is the first part of a trilogy in which Lorenzo Lamas plays Jack “Soldier” Kelly, a former member of the Marines, currently a cop whose job is to look cool, make the women around him take their clothes off, deliver one-liners so devastating they would make Arnie blush and occasionally beat up some bad guy. In this movie he faces a band of Deliverance-style rednecks who killed his parents and kidnapped his sister, but we will get there in a moment.

Lorenzo being cool and shirtless

First things first – the Snake Eaters are an elite division of the Marines whose speciality are actually the search & destroy missions and not something else that might have crossed your dirty mind. I’ll be first to admit that this was a relatively poor choice of words on the screenwriters’ part – they couldn’t theoretically have made it more gay, unless they’d named them Village People. And that one was already taken. Anyway, this is actually not that important, because, as I said earlier, Lorenzo is a former Snake Eater. The only thing that reminds us of his past is his belt buckle, which has a drawing of a snake on it. Apart from that, we are pleased to announce that Lorenzo doesn’t eat any snakes in any of the three movies.

Lorenzo being sad

Okay, anyway – the very beginning of the movie shows us a disastrous drug bust led by Lorenzo that got him suspended. Without going into too much detail, I will mention that we get to see a naked woman (she had to remove her clothes to show that she’s not wired, but she required the same of Lorenzo and he did it, but fortunately he kept his snake offscreen) and a general Dirty Harry attitude that drives his character. At the same time, said rednecks kill his parents and kidnap his sister with every intention of doing reeeaaally nasty things to her, like raping and stuff, but they never get around to that because something always interrupts. You would imagine they’d have some privacy deep in the woods, but no.

Lorenzo in a fight

Lorenzo doesn’t act in this one – he simply revels in his own coolness and generally keeps the same don’t-give-a-crap-gonna-kick-your-ass face expression throughout the movie, except for the very moment when he learns of the tragedy, when he looks down in sadness for about a second, but he gets back on the track really quickly.

Lorenzo meets a pair of boobs

Unfortunately, his self-confidence isn’t always followed by his actions. Of course, he did save the girl, but he also got himself into trouble far too many times, definitely more than someone of his reputation should allow. For example, the very first time he meets the rednecks, he starts a fight with them and gets heavily beaten (and there are only three of them!). He also steps into a bear trap, he gets shot etc., but luckily none of that does him any noticeable damage.

Lorenzo in bed, with a naked woman in the background

Snake Eater is a pretty good movie. It actually started great – the drug bust was really hilarious and after that we had a few juicy fistfights, all of that enriched with Lorenzo’s one-liners; unfortunately, things got a little quiet in the middle, with him trying stealth tactics to infiltrate the rednecks lair and all that, which was kinda gay. Also, the rednecks were totally inept and never managed to get any of the women to take their clothes off, which was a bit frustrating. Lorenzo, on the other hand, spends virtually the entire movie shirtless. Still, there’s enough action and humor to keep you entertained, so I would wholeheartedly recommend this one to all you B-movie lovers out there.

"... and then I said 'Squeel, little piggy!'... "