FINAL EXAM (THE NOVELIZATION)

TYPICAL REVIEW

"If a movie ever suffered from too much plot, it is this one." - Wooden Spoon's Obscure Horror Movie Reviews

THE PLOT

After a couple is butchered at the local lover's lane, students at Lanier College spend the last day of exams talking about it. They also pull some pranks, cheat on tests, question their relationships, consider the future, read some books, try to make a drug deal, eat lunch... Eventually the killer gets bored with hanging out in the bushes and pops out to massacre the majority of the cast in the last 15 minutes.

THE POINT

(Apologies in advance, I just couldn't find any way to keep this one brief.)

Way back in my review of Student Bodies I covered a number of the common cliches in slasher movies. Chief among them, of course, was how "generic young adult stereotypes like the jock, the geek, the slut, the stoner, etc. give into vice and are systematically slaughtered." This lack of character development is one of the longstanding (and valid) criticisms of the genre. So you would think a slasher film which bends over backward to flesh out its characters would be a welcome change of pace. But if you think that, then you've never watched Final Exam.

The movie spends over an hour of its brisk 89 minutes letting you get to know the characters. In fact, for most of its running time, Final Exam is really less of a horror movie and more of a standard teen dramedy. Isn't this what everyone asked for? Don't we want to invest time in these characters so that when the killer finally shows up we care about what happens to them? Absolutely. If we were given real characters. But that isn't what Final Exam gives us. What we get are the same tired stereotypes that have shown up in countless teen movies from She's Out Of Control to She's All That. Yep, we get the jock, the geek, the slut, the stoner, etc. (And if you guessed that the studious good girl makes it to the final scene, give yourself extra credit.) You would hope with all that time to kill (so to speak) we might have gotten to know the characters a little better.

Which is where the novelization comes in. Before the days of DVD extras and the internet, book adaptations of movies were like gold if you wanted a little bit more from a low budget horror movie than what you got in the theater. And, if nothing else, Final Exam: The Novelization does give you more characterization. Take the young couple who are murdered at the beginning of the story. The movie gives them a few stilted lines of dialog and then quickly dispenses with them. In the novel, however, Dana and John (see, I know there names now) get the first 15 pages and plenty of back story, even as they're dying.

"The black stream of blood began to torrent fitfully, each rush splashing as it landed; and Dana, liberated from her game plan, thought of the cheesecake she had passed up at dinner."

See, now the movie didn't even mention cheesecake! I think that kind of detail is important if we're going to get to know these characters as people. And everyone in the book gets paragraphs full of THAT KIND of internal monologue. Even the killer, who in the film is never identified or even given a reason for being at the school in the first place, is fleshed out just a little.

"He remembered the roar; the crowds in the stands; the jeers; the colors; the humiliation; the pain. He remembered the bit between his teeth; the shocks; the jackets; the knives. He remembered the spit and the feces. He remembered money (he had twenty dollars). He forgot his name. He forgot language. He forgot his mother (just as well). He remembered how to drive."

Okay, so not every writer can be Shakespeare (although, for some unexplainable reason, I kind of like the snappy way he uses parentheses), but who cares? If you're going to read the novelization of a third rate rip off of Halloween, then your expectations probably aren't that high to begin with. Final Exam is the kind of "junk food" book you take to the beach on a day when you just don't feel like thinking. If you finish it, fine; if you doze off and the tide carries it away, that's fine too. And if it happens to add something new to the movie, then that's a bonus, but nothing of real concern.

It's not that way for all novelizations though. A few properties are just too high profile to let some dashed off dime store pulp novel slip out to the public. In response to the proliferation of Star Wars spin-off products, Lucas Licensing has actually created a continuity tracking database known as The Holocron in order to establish control of what they refer to as The Star Wars Canon. The Holocron consists of four tiers (G, C, S, & N) with varying levels of authority based on their relationship to and distance from the films. Besides the movies themselves, G-Canon includes novelizations and radio plays based on their scripts, as well as any statement George Lucas personally makes. The second level, C-Canon, includes books, comics, and video games which expand the universe beyond the movies, but don't have any blatant contradictions. On a lower level, S-Canon includes stories and games which are out of continuity, but may still include non-contradicting elements from the higher levels. Imaginary stories and fanfiction populate N-Canon and are given no credence whatsoever. (Which means, mercifully, that video of Star Wars: The Empire Brokeback you found on YouTube DOES NOT COUNT as canon.) Sue Rostoni of Lucas Licensing is quoted as saying, "Our goal is to present a continuous and unified history of the Star Wars galaxy, insofar as that history does not conflict with, or undermine the meaning of Mr. Lucas's Star Wars saga of films and screenplays." (Of course it would be helpful if Mr. Lucas didn't re-edit his blasted movies every time ILM invents a new CG program, but for the most part The Holocron system seems to do what they want it to.)

Most of us religious types understand the importance of establishing rules for what gets into canon, especially in religions like Judaism and Christianity where scripture is considered divinely inspired. But as the Catechism reminds us, The Church "does not derive her certainty about all revealed truths from the holy Scriptures alone. Both Scripture and Tradition must be accepted and honored with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence." That's why, in addition to extensively quoting scripture, the Catechism is full of quotes taken from other sources like Ecumenical Councils, Papal Encyclicals, and especially writings from the Early Church Fathers. (Augustine alone gets over 100 mentions.) The question naturally arises as to just where these extra-biblical writers fit in with canon and how much authority do they have?

As Pope Leo XIII pointed out, "all the opinions which the individual Fathers or the recent interpreters have set forth in explaining [scripture] need not be maintained equally. For they, in interpreting passages where physical matters are concerned have made judgments according to the opinions of the age, and thus not always according to truth." Simply put, sometimes they got it wrong. So, much like Lucas Licensing, the Church views these particular writings on a different level than the Apostolic writings included in canonical scripture. In Holocron terms, the early Church Fathers would fall somewhere in the C & S Canons. Their authority lies not in themselves, but only where they affirm, or reaffirm, those doctrines already central to the religion. That's why the Catechism has no problem quoting someone like Tertullian even though he eventually got excommunicated for joining the heretical sect called the Monanists around 210 AD.

But since we know some of their individual teachings were wrong, why bother quoting the Church Fathers in the first place? Well, because with the inclusion of the Church Fathers, the Catechism (much like the stated goal of the Holocron) presents us with the beginnings of a continuous and unified history of the Church and its teachings stretching from its Apostolic origins all the way through today. (Bluntly put, the writings of the early Church Fathers prove Catholics didn't just make up a bunch of new crap in the middle ages.) Also like the Star Wars C & S canons, the writings of the Fathers have earned their place of honor in the Catechism by "expanding" the Christian universe through clarification and solidification of doctrines like the Holy Trinity and Mariology. And finally, I think, the Fathers are in the Catechism as a memorandum to new and emerging theological trends that the "old" teachings of the Church are not to be undermined. Because if we have anything, anything at all, to learn from Final Exam: The Novelization, it's that no matter what wild and crazy things pop up over the course of the story, bad things can happen in the last few pages if you forget about what happened at the beginning of the book.

THE STINGER

The Fanfiction Glossary defines "Canon Rape" as twisting the canon characters, setting, etc. so far out of alignment that it burns to read. The Urban Dictionary definition of Canon Rape goes a little further (like it always does) by stating that "This term is used when a fan fiction author tries to reconstruct an original work to their liking. This often times makes the author look like a complete nut who has no appreciation for the original creator or storyline." In Christianity we call this the Jesus Seminar.

WEEKLY NEWSREEL

Good evening Mr. and Mrs. Catholic and all you other Christians at sea. As no horde of torch wielding mobs descended upon the offices of Eegah, Inc. last week demanding this feature be discontinued, we diligently continue our trek through the wilds of celebrity culture in order to capture the news you really care about. (Okay, so nobody really clamored for it's return either, but our reporters gleefully take your silence as approval.) Remember, today's gossip is tomorrow's bible study. Now, let's go to press.

DATELINE: HOLLYWOOD - WHAT GOES STRAIGHT UP MUST COME DOWN... MESSILY

Monstersandcritics.com brings to our attention the latest meltdown by American Idol host Paula Abdul after her recent firing from the Bratz movie. In case you weren't aware, a live action movie based on the skanky pedophilia-encouraging line of dolls is scheduled to be released in August of this year. While many might consider being excommunicated from this movie a blessing in disguise, Ms. Abdul was filmed exclaiming "Where's God when you need him...I love what I do, this was going to be a great project for me to work on." This would seem to be a blatant case of what Pope Benedict XVI calls, in reference to Deuteronomy 6:16, "putting God to the test." Writing in his recently released book Jesus of Nazareth, the Pontiff says we often demand that God "submit to the conditions that we say are necessary if we are to reach certainty. If he doesn't grant us now the protection he promises in Psalms 91, then he simply is not God." Still wondering where's God? The Holy Father adds in the next paragraph, "The arrogance that would make God an object and impose our laboratory conditions upon him is incapable of finding him."

DATELINE: JAPAN - YOU'RE A GOOD 人 CHARLIE BROWN

Speaking of His Holiness, Catholic World News informs us that in a meeting yesterday with about 400 Italian priests the Pontiff again "insisted that Vatican II must be understood in light of Catholic tradition, rather than as a break from that tradition". For those who wonder why the Pope won't stop making public statements on some of the liturgical changes made since Vatican II, we need only to direct your attention to Quixoticals where we are given a look at the Manga version of Peanuts. Augh! Clear and irrefutable evidence that not all innovation is a good thing.

DATELINE: NEW YORK - WHERE ALPH THE SACRED RIVER RAN DRY

Finally, in a bizarre combination of the themes from our first two stories, we give you Entertainment Weekly's review of the brand new Broadway adaptation of the 1980 cinematic bomb Xanadu. Apparently the new stage version contains a number of things poorly thought out and executed, some things which shouldn't have been done in the first place, and when it's over, you may find yourself yelling, "Where's God when you need him?" When faced with such trials, it's best to reflect on the words of St. Therese, The Little Flower. "Sanctity lies not in saying beautiful things, or even in thinking them, or feeling them; it lies in truly being willing to suffer... I suffer much but do I suffer well? That is the important thing."

On that note, we end this week's newsreel. As always, in the words of the great Les Nessman, "Good day and may the good news be yours."

COMING ATTRACTIONS: FINAL EXAM (THE NOVELIZATION)

What the..!?!

Don't worry, you're in the right place. This is still a movie review blog. It'll all make sense in the end. (Well, about as much sense as it ever does anyway.)

THE BLOOD OF HEROES

TYPICAL REVIEW

"There's no real drama, no great goal, no moral victory, just lots of jugging." - Richard Harrington, Washington Post

THE PLOT

In a far away time long after an unexplained apocalypse, the remains of the human race are scattered amongst various shanty towns and encampments. The land is desolate and life is hard. But there is one small distraction for the people amidst the bleakness in the form of an ultra-violent sport known as Jugging, a sort of hybrid congealed from Australian rules football, hockey, and ultimate fighting. When a nomadic group of juggers led by Sallow (Rutger Hauer! Rah Rah!) loses a player to injury, small town girl Kidda (who inflicted the injury, naturally) takes his place. Kidda's ambitions (she wants to go pro) and Sallow's history (he was a pro before he got overly friendly with an official's wife) eventually lead them to the big city (well, big in the post-apocalyptic sense) in order to issue a challenge to the professional jugging league. Our heroes are eventually granted a shot against the championship team. The problem is that not only have the champions destroyed every amateur challenge within mere seconds, but they've also been given secret orders to end Sallow's career permanently. It all comes down to the final match where Kidda hopes to prove her worth and Sallow hopes to find some redemption (or revenge or closure, it's not too clear), if only they can manage to stay alive long enough.

THE POINT

This movie is dark in a lot of ways. First off, obviously, is the bleak future the movie portrays, which doesn't even bother trying to hide the fact that it's a riff on the Road Warrior movies. However, the world of Blood of Heroes appears noticeably more deteriorated as even the gas-powered technology of Mad Max is no longer freely available. Now that I think of it, there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of pack animals left either (probably all having been eaten; the primary agricultural crop appears to be dirt), which means travel through the desert wastelands is mostly undertaken on foot. The near complete loss of technology lends a darker, more sober tone to the movie overall. This is not a world of heroic struggles and exciting chases, but of bland acceptance of fate and monotonous survival. The young Kidda's choices really do seem limited to a life of farming dirt or participating in the crippling game of Jugging. At least as a player she'll get to move around some and take part in the occasional celebrations which are thrown anytime a team of juggers comes to town, feasts which more often than not last well into to the night.

Which brings us to the worst way in which this movie is dark. It literally IS dark. Seriously, except for those scenes which take place outdoors in broad daylight during a drought, this is one of the darkest movies I've watched in a long time. The movie The Dark wasn't even this dark. I appreciate the limitations of small budgets as much as the next B-Movie fan, but come on, if you're going to set over half your movie during the nighttime or deep underground, have the common sense to invest in a few frickin light bulbs. The lighting problem is so frustrating because the parts of the movie you can actually see are surprisingly enjoyable.

Now, to be honest, your level of enjoyment may vary. If you're looking for the standard conflict/resolution type of movie, then you're better off elsewhere. Blood of Heroes doesn't even bother introducing it's one and only villain (the jealous city official) until the movie's almost over. The movie is much more interested in just watching it's characters move about and interact with one another. Which doesn't mean they talk a lot. If you like movies full of expository dialog then Blood of Heroes is sure to disappoint. Writer/first-time-director David Webb Peoples (the same man who scripted Blade Runner, 12 Monkeys, Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven and, alas, Leviathan) is all about creating an atmospheric and believable world for his characters to move around in, he would just rather you figure out how that world works on your own. A good example is when Sallow and his squad arrive at the entrance to the big city. Every individual must pay an entry tax in the form of a bolt or lug nut or some such piece of hardware. This has not been mentioned previously, no guard explains why, and no outsider-type character steps forward to function as our proxy and ask. Later on, though, you discover the city does actually have a handful of machines still in operation and it clicks that the entry tax is a clever way of gathering spare parts. It's world building by interpretation rather than explanation, kind of like the director's cut of Blade Runner as opposed to the theatrically released version with the Harrison Ford voice over.

The biggest and best example of this is, of course, the sport of Jugging itself. Not once in the movie is a single rule explained. And yet so thoroughly worked out and presented is the game that half way through the movie you know everything about it. You understand both the ceremonial presentation of the dog skull (yes, I said dog skull) and its use as the game ball. (Yes, you read that right too.) You understand the positions and roles of the players. (Most of which involves bashing and gouging their opponents with sticks and chains.) You understand the system of keeping game time in a world with no clocks. (The trained rhythmic tossing of stones against a metal shield which incidentally adds a cool heartbeat effect to the proceedings.) You even come to understand the unspoken system of honor between opposing teams. (You may have poked out my eye, but I'll still give you a slap on the fanny and tell you "good game" afterwards because, by God, we're juggers!)

The game is SO authentic that a group of Germans actually started a real life Jugging league of their own a few years back. That picture at the top of this review, that's not from the movie, that's from a German newspaper. (I can't read German myself, but if I understand the league's website well enough, Team Rigor Mortis from Berlin is currently leading the 2007 season in total points earned.) Folks, this goes way beyond wearing Spock ears to Dragon Con or dressing up as Snape for the midnight sneak peek of the latest Harry Potter movie. These guys are wearing homemade armor and beating the living snot out of each other with blunt objects. Is this really a good idea for a sport? Even if you dismiss jugging as an overzealous fan obsession, what about the more acceptable, but equally violent, sports like boxing or the increasingly popular ultimate fighting championship? Are these sports problematic under Christian philosophy?

This is one of those instances where you realize the Catechism is not just some indexed rule book one goes to for easy answers. Much like Blood of Heroes, a lot of the time you have to work things out for yourself rather than have it spelled out for you. (I know Jack Chick told you the Pope would do all your thinking, but, there you go.) The Catechism only directly addresses sports in a few places; to recognize it as a part of the necessary socialization involved in human communities; to warn against the idolization of physical perfection, and to remind those who are required to work on Sundays (including athletes) to find another day to rest and worship. That's it. There's nothing in there which directly addresses whopping an opponent upside the head with a big stick. But if you flip over to the section on Respect For Health, The Catechism states "Life and physical health are precious gifts entrusted to us by God. We must take reasonable care of them, taking into account the needs of others and the common good." Again, there's no overt reference to sports, but it's as good a starting point as any for making a value judgement.

As an example, let's apply "reasonable care" to the sport of boxing. Father Pat McCloskey, O.F.M. writes, "There is no sin in training for boxing as long as you use those skills only in supervised, amateur competitions or self-defense. Because of the number of brain injuries and deaths that have occurred in professional boxing, some moral theologians question the morality of boxing at that level." So, in theological circles, the increasing evidence that life-altering brain injuries are almost guaranteed in professional boxing would seem to rule out participating in that sport, but probably not in amateur boxing where the possibility isn't as certain. However, if future evidence arises which shows amateur boxing to be just as much a guarantee of permanent injury (as the American Academy of Neurology now suggests) then it's probably out too.

To be honest, that part of my anatomy which secretes testosterone really wants to dismiss this as just some Johnny-come-lately new age wimpy theology. But as Prof. Michael P. Foley points out, this way of looking at sports goes all the way back to the beginning. He writes that "the Judeo-Christian proclamation of the sanctity of human life led to far-reaching changes in the way that Westerners played games. After the Roman Empire embraced Christianity, a successful war was waged against the old athletic festivals and gladiator games, all of which were inherently tied to death cults, animal sacrifice, and even human sacrifice." Of course, the Romans did have much better evidence in deciding which sports were too violent to continue to support. (Death is, after all, a pretty clear sign of permanent injury.) But for us, with the data still coming in, the decision to call a sport wrong or immoral is much harder. We just have to pray, that if the evidence does fall against a game we're fond of, that we have the strength to put it aside in the name of a higher principle.
I think we can go ahead and rule out jugging, though. You think?

THE STINGER

It's not all bleak. Pope Pius XII wrote that "sport, properly directed, develops character, makes a man courageous, a generous loser, and a gracious victor; it refines the senses, gives intellectual penetration, and steels the will to endurance." So Christianity still has plenty of room for sports featuring the occasional (accidental) snapped bone or broken nose. Just as long at the end of the day the players have a fair chance to say, in the words of 2 Timothy 4:7, "I have competed well; I have finished the race; I have kept the faith."

WEEKLY NEWSREEL

Good evening Mr. and Mrs. Catholic and all you other Christians at sea. (While not required, it would help if you read this in your best Walter Winchell voice.) Welcome to the inaugural edition of The Weekly Newsreel, our rather snarky new feature here at The B-Movie Catechism designed to further enhance that old Saturday Matinee experience. Each week our intrepid news hounds will scour the headlines for breaking news in the world of movies and, more importantly, movie stars, in order to filter them through a little catechesis. Remember, today's gossip is tomorrow's bible study. Now, let's go to press.

DATELINE: CALIFORNIA - BEVERLY HILLS 9021 OH NO!

USA Today reports that actress Tori Spelling recently received her minister's license after applying for one online. Her first act as an "ordained" minister was to perform a same-sex union which will likely be shown on Inn Love, her "reality" show currently being broadcast on the Oxygen network. (Yes, that's Oprah's channel.) Ms. Spelling notes, "I was so honored when the couple asked me to officiate. We did it on the front steps of the Chateau as 40 of their friends looked on seated in a loungelike atmosphere." Oddly enough, this same week, Pope Benedict XVI released a document which among other things reaffirmed the Catholic Church's teaching on apostolic succession as stated in the Catechism: "In order that the full and living Gospel might always be preserved in the Church the apostles left bishops as their successors. They gave them their own position of teaching authority." Indeed, "the apostolic preaching, which is expressed in a special way in the inspired books, was to be preserved in a continuous line of succession until the end of time." Coincidence? You be the judge. Meanwhile, Martin Luther, poster boy for the self-proclaimed Protestant Reformation, was unavailable for comment on this story as he is currently spinning in his grave.

DATELINE: GERMANY - SHOW YOU THE MONEY? I'LL SHOW YOU THE DOOR!

From Total Film we learn that ex-seminary student Tom Cruise has run into a roadblock with the German government over the filming of his upcoming movie Valkyrie. Because of Mr. Cruise's affiliation with Scientology, the German Defence Ministry has decided not to open military sites to the production for the filming of certain key scenes. Scientology, as you may know, is not considered a religion by the German government, but rather a predatory commercial enterprise with cultish overtones. While offering no ecumenical support for the freakish teachings of Scientology, we do acknowledge the Catechism when it states, "The right to religious liberty is neither a moral license to adhere to error, nor a supposed right to error, but rather a natural right of the human person to civil liberty, i.e., immunity, within just limits, from external constraint in religious matters by political authorities." So, rather than jump for joy over the dissing of the barely tolerable Mr. Cruise (who's been on a steady decline since his excellent performance in Taps), The B-Movie Catechism casts a wary eye towards any instance where a religion is declared an enemy of the state. We Catholics have been there, done that, and have no desire to go back. We wouldn't want to create any more Guy Fawkes now would we? (Because Guy Fawkes invariably leads to V For Vendetta which leads to bald Natalie Portman, and no one wants that.)

DATELINE: NEW YORK - NOTHING FUNNY HERE

And finally, in more somber news, Film Threat is quick to point out that Good Morning America's beloved Joel Siegel, who recently succumbed to colon cancer, is just the latest in a string of such passings among movie critics. The past few weeks have also brought us the deaths of E! Online's Andy Jones and SuicideGirls' Daniel Robert Epstein. You can find glowing tributes to each of these men scattered about the internet. I don't really have anything humorous to say here, I'm just a bit worried about, you know, some kind of trickle down effect or something. "He who guards his mouth protects his life; to open wide one's lips brings downfall." - Proverbs 13:3

And that's it for the first edition of The Weekly Newsreel. As the great Les Nessman used to say, "Good day and may the good news be yours."

NOW SHOWING AT A BLOG NEAR YOU

The Sci-Fi Catholic continues his tour of Asia with the Jet Li opus The Legend. He also takes a look at some little films you may have heard of by the name of Transformers and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. If you blinked you might have missed the hundreds of millions of dollars they made worldwide during their respective opening weeks.

Speaking of that Potter kid, The Mad Tea Party's March Hare also got a chance to take the kids for a look see. But imagine our surprise when we discovered The Mad Tea Party had also risked a viewing of that Justine Bateman/Julia Roberts classic Satisfaction. The March Hare gives it 2 golden tickets out of 5, which is probably still kinder than our own review.

As long as we're discussing movies we've reviewed before, poor old Man-Thing manages to garner a few more comments over at Arkanabar's Eclectic Rants. None of them favorable. For balance, though, he gives Man-Thing's fellow Marvel universe resident Ghost Rider a bit more respect.

If you've got wee ones and think wizards, giant robots, and skull-headed bikers might be a little too much for them, then you might be interested in The Happy Catholic's take on Pixar's latest release Ratatouille. It's nice to see, though, they didn't forget our own little dark corner of the blogosphere with a quick review of Shaun Of The Dead.

Shaun? That reminds me. I've recently been taking a trip down nostalgia lane with season 2 of the Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries, so be sure to check out Catholic Fire's review of the latest incarnation of Nancy Drew starring the niece of Che Lovell's favorite actress. They give it a B (our favorite letter), but I don't know. I bet it doesn't have a single scene designed for no other reason than to let Shaun Cassidy sing. (Maybe that's a good thing?)

That's it for this trip to the multiplex. See you next time.

COMING ATTRACTIONS: THE BLOOD OF HEROES

A tip of the hat to Che over at The Spirit of Vatican 2 for suggesting this week's movie and D. G. D. Davidson at The Sci-Fi Catholic for jump starting the accompanying religious discussion through his comments on my review of Bloodsport.

MESA OF LOST WOMEN

TYPICAL REVIEW

"Put it all together, and you have the closest approximation I've ever seen to a fever dream I had once when I was running a temperature of 112 degrees." - Dave Sindelar, SciFilm.com

THE PLOT

Right. I'll do my best. Grant and Doreen are found wandering near death in the Muerto Desert. (Muerto means death the narrator informs us.) Upon recovering, Grant begins to tell in flashback the story of how they escaped from the laboratory of local mad scientist Dr. Aranya (And Aranya means spider!). However, Grant's flashback is interrupted by local handyman Pepe who knows some stuff he's not telling. But before Pepe can get his flashback going, the narrator interrupts and begins his own flashback in which he... Look, let's start over. There's this other guy Masterston, who travels to Dr. Aranya's lab whereupon he discovers the crazy scientist is breeding amazon spider women, dwarven spider men, and enormous spider puppets. This knowledge drives him insane. Later he visits a cafe and kidnaps a plane full of people in order to return to Aranya's lab and destroy it. People dance, people fall in love, people die.

THE POINT

Sometimes, it's best just to step back and let a film speak for itself. Following, with no embellishments, are just a handful of the things you will experience watching Mesa of Lost Women.

After a brief intro, the narrator begins the movie proper with these words. "Strange the monstrous assurance of this race of puny bipeds with overblown egos, the creature who calls himself man. He believes he owns the earth and every living thing on it exists only for his benefit. Yet how foolish he is... In the continuing war for survival between man and the hexapods, only an utter fool would bet against the insect." He never once stops speaking in this manner until the end credits. Often the characters appear to hear him, stop what they're doing, and look around to see who is talking.

With the exception of one extended dance sequence, the musical soundtrack consists entirely of an endlessly looped thirty second music clip featuring a flamenco guitar and some piano chords. In especially tense scenes the composer adds a percussion instrument, or possibly just a person, making the noise Pssst Pssst!

While in a cafe, one of Dr. Aranya's spider women launches into the aforementioned improvisational dance, a routine which includes creeping on all fours along the ground, holding two fingers up to her face like fangs, and waving her arms above her head like pedipalps. After she finishes dancing a man stands up and shoots her.

Following the crash of their plane, Grant (the Pilot) and Doreen (who is supposed to marry someone else in 12 hours) fall in love over a bottle of liquor and some cigarettes. Their conversation on the meaning of their lives would represent the longest scene in the film if it weren't occasionally intercut with spliced in close ups of misshapen dwarf faces giving suggestive looks.

When Doreen becomes inconsolable over the loss of her hair comb, her man-servant Wu, an Asian who speaks only in fortune cookie like proverbs, volunteers to sacrifice himself in order to try and find it in the nearby monster infested woods. His parting words are "He who serves well will also serve in danger, there is a day to be born and a day to die." Wu never returns and Doreen never gets her comb.

Scene after scene after scene the movie careens ever more into the surreal until by the end you stop worrying which character is actually having a flashback and start worrying that you might be having one of your own, even if you've never ingested a drug any stronger than aspirin. How did such a thing eve see release? Well, apparently the original director abandoned production when the money ran out and the film was shelved. Much later legendary exploitation director Ron Ormond came in to film enough scenes to pad out the movie to a minimal theatrical running time. By the time it was finally complete, Ormond's wife June (also a filmmaker) would call Mesa Of Lost Women "the lousiest thing I've ever seen." (Of course, Ron Ormond hadn't made his extreme protestant evangelical films yet, but that's another review for another time.) And Mrs. Ormond wasn't alone in her critique. Along with garnering scores of bad reviews, Mesa Of Lost Women has also been featured in the documentary The 50 Worst Movies Ever Made and in the book Son of Golden Turkey Awards.

It's a bad movie. Sure, there are plenty of unintentional laughs and a number of moments where you'll sit gaping in wonder at the absurdity of it all, but in the end, it's just bad. In fact, it's so bad you have to ask the question, is it evil? Did director Ormond commit an evil or immoral act by unleashing such a cinematic abomination on the world? The Catechism, taking its cue from Aquinas, states that the morality of human acts depends on three things: (1) the object chosen; (2) the end in view or the intention, and (3) the circumstances of the action. These three criteria "make up the "sources," or constitutive elements, of the morality of human acts." Well, good luck, Mr. Ormond.

So, number one. "The object chosen morally specifies the act of the will, insofar as reason recognizes and judges it to be or not to be in conformity with the true good." Is the very act of making a movie, like the act of stealing or murder, breaking some accepted rule of moral conscience? No, not as far as I've ever read. As a craft (and sometimes art) filmmaking is one of those actions that can go either way. I'm sure the makers of something like The Nativity Story would find the idea that filmmaking is inherently evil a little silly.

But the makers of The Nativity Story obviously had good intentions from the outset, which brings us to number two. Was Ormond's personal intention behind filming Mesa Of Lost Women an evil one? "The intention is a movement of the will toward the end: it is concerned with the goal of the activity. It aims at the good anticipated from the action undertaken." If my description of this movie is even half accurate, then the obvious question that arises is what possible good could have been anticipated in completing this abomination? Obviously, the goal here was not to produce an uplifting piece of art, but there's also nothing in the interviews I've read that suggests Ormond had any secret motives to intentionally damage the viewer's psyche. No, according to his wife, Ormond's intent here was just to make a paycheck, and even the Catechism grants us that "everyone should be able to draw from work the means of providing for his life and that of his family." So, he squeaks by here too.

Which leaves number three. "The circumstances, including the consequences, are secondary elements of a moral act. They contribute to increasing or diminishing the moral goodness or evil of human acts (for example, the amount of a theft). They can also diminish or increase the agent's responsibility (such as acting out of a fear of death)." This one's a little tricky, because it addresses two issues. One is the physical circumstances surrounding the act (i.e. stealing because your children are starving) and the other is the actual outcome of the act. I can't address part one, because I really just don't know if directing this movie was a matter of life or death for Ron Ormond. (Although, for his sake, there's a part of me that desperately hopes it was.) But as for part two, well, this is where things start to look bad for old Ron, because (just in case you might have skipped the comments on the movie) the outcome of his efforts was truly, truly horrible.

But wait, there's hope. As Pope John Paul II pointed out in his encyclical Veritas Splendor, this part about the outcome of an action is actually in there to counter bad philosophy like the Utilitarianism of J.S. Mill which proclaims that ONLY the consequences will determine the morality of acts. In a Catholic morality, the ends can never justify the means. But conversely, neither can the ends automatically condemn the means. JPII goes onto say, "Everyone recognizes the difficulty, or rather the impossibility, of evaluating all the good and evil consequences and effects — defined as pre-moral — of one's own acts: an exhaustive rational calculation is not possible. How then can one go about establishing proportions which depend on a measuring, the criteria of which remain obscure? How could an absolute obligation be justified on the basis of such debatable calculations?" In short, the act itself determines its species (good or evil) and the outcome is secondary. So it seems Ormond slips by here too. Even though he did something poorly, he didn't necessarily do something evil since the original act of making the movie wasn't intrinsically immoral and who in their right mind could have foreseen the end result.

All of which is fine for Ron Ormond, but not so fine for us, because it in no way makes Mesa Of Lost Women a better movie. It's still bad. Not evil, but bad. Oh dear Lord is it bad.

THE STINGER

"Bonum ex integra causa, malum ex quocumque defectu: An action is good when good in every respect; it is wrong when wrong in any respect." (Just a little Latin to let everyone know that, yes, I'm well aware of the release of the Motu Proprio last week.) It kind of seems like the odds are against us in this whole good or evil thing. In order to judge an act good, it has to pass all three criteria; in order to be judged immoral or evil, it only has to fail one. Thanks a million, God, not a lot of room for the spiritually lazy, is there?

COMING ATTRACTIONS: MESA OF LOST WOMEN

SATISFACTION

TYPICAL REVIEW

"Director Joan Freeman stages the movie with little imagination, and the script (by Charles Purpura) couldn't be more formulaic if it was simply a blueprint (and perhaps it was)." - DSH, The DVD Journal

THE PLOT

High school is over and Jennie Lee and The Mystery, an 80% all-girl cover band from the big city, have a dream. They know in their hearts if they can just make it to the beaches of South Carolina and land a gig as the house band in ex-record producer Martin Falcon's club, then international stardom can't be far behind. (Because nothing opens more doors than playing two sets a night in some has-been's bar in Hicksville.) The band initially makes a small misstep by BREAKING INTO MARTIN'S HOUSE, but manage to rectify things by blowing the crowd away with their audition the following night. (Because nothing brings the house down like a tepid 80s cover of Knock On Wood.) The job secured, the band's future seems set, but all is not well. Each of the young ladies is carrying weighty emotional baggage which threatens to derail the Mystery train before it evens gets a chance to leave the station. (Because nothing says overly clever self-impressed movie reviewer better than sentences like that.) Jennie's brother gently describes the situation as, "Your guitarist is a junkie, your drummer is a thief, and your bassist, on a good day, is a slut!" Jennie herself faces the impossible choice between college, her May-December romance with Martin, and becoming a rock star. It's coming of age time for the girls as the days of Summer wain and life-altering adult decisions must be made quickly.

THE POINT

Ever since Gidget first climbed on a surf board way back in 1959, carloads of movie girls have made pilgrimages to the beach in order to learn everything about life over the course of one Summer that 16 years at home just couldn't seem to teach them. The king... er, queen of these movies is still 1960's Where The Boys Are in which four very different girls spend Spring Break in Ft. Lauderdale and learn some very hard lessons indeed. Over the years there have been a number of variations on that simple theme, and Satisfaction... is just another one of them. In this case, they do try to change things up just a bit by having the girls be members of a garage band, but in the end it's still the same old thing recycled into a new package. And that's the problem with Satisfaction; the movie isn't really bad, it's just SO mired in overdone clichés that it commits the one unpardonable sin of motion pictures. It's boring.

The blame rests entirely with the lazy script which isn't brave enough to push the stereotypes to the extreme necessary to at least make them entertaining or memorable. In fact, it really seems like the screenwriter takes great effort to squelch any hope the actors might have of developing the characters into someone interesting. Mooch is supposed to be the rough lowlife girl, but her criminal behavior goes no further than carrying a small pocket knife and stealing some money from a candy machine. Billy is supposed to be the druggie, but she never once appears stoned until her big "near death" scene requires it. (And even here a "near death" overdose looks a whole lot like "really sleepy".) Daryle is supposed to be the tramp, but she has sex with a grand total of ONE guy during the whole movie, her steady boyfriend. And as for Jennie Lee, she's supposed to be a combination of the smart and rebellious girl, but smart girls don't jump straight into relationships with guys old enough to be their father's father, and rebellious girls do more than give the principal the finger during their valedictorian speech. (You can get that behavior from some of the teachers these days) This kind of fluff might work fine for one of those old afterschool specials (CBS Schoolbreak Special to be specific; the screenwriter's previous assignment), but it's not very rock and roll.

There's just no way for the actors to overcome the script, which is a shame, because there's actually a surprising amount of real talent being squandered in Satisfaction. Britta Phillips (Billy) would leave this movie behind to become both the voice of Jem in the popular late 80s cartoon and the bass player for the indie pop band Luna. Trini Alvarado (Mooch) went on to a number of well received supporting roles in better movies, most recently in the excellent Little Children. Liam Neeson (Martin Falcon) was, of course, eventually nominated for (and cheated out of) an Academy Award for his portrayal of Oscar Schindler. The movie's headliner, Justine Bateman (Jennie), had already garnered a couple of Emmy nominations for her television work. And on top of all that, Satisfaction gives us the first credited appearance of Ms. Erin Brockovich herself, Julia Roberts, as Daryle the bass player. Oh sure, Julia's new and a little unpolished in this film, but she's a far cry from bad. And all her star making potential is there; the hair, the laugh, that patented nervous wringing of the hands thing she still does to this very day. Right there in the beginning you can see the hints of a mega star just waiting to make a splash on tabloids the world over.

It just goes to show you never can tell. You see, by all accounts, NBC funded this movie with the hopes of jump starting Justine Bateman's big screen career. It seemed like a no-brainer since her Family Ties costar Michael J. Fox had recently become a huge box office star himself and had even just released his very own rock and roll movie with 1987's Light Of Day. (I like to imagine that if both films had been bigger hits we might have seen some Freddy vs Jason type crossover where The Mystery and The Barbusters were forced into a battle of the bands to see who would get to play at Nelson Mandela's prison release party or something like that.) But, in the end, fate decreed that, rather than Ms. Bateman, it would be an unknown supporting actor in one of the most thankless roles Satisfaction had to offer who would go on to become the highest paid actress in the world.

It's just inevitable, what with over 120,000 members in the Screen Actors Guild alone, that most performers will never get to be the superstar with their name shown before a film's title. For the most part, they're considered lucky if they end up buried somewhere in the end credits with a character name like Man At Window or Girl #3. Sometimes, like Julia Roberts in her first big screen "appearance" in 1987's Firehouse, they don't get a credit at all. As a Christian, I can sympathize with that a little. At last count there were about 2.1 billion people who claimed Christianity as their religion. And that's just among the living. The total number of Christians since the inception of the religion is... well, I imagine it's a pretty darn big number. But despite that, the Church only recognizes just over 10,000 people from throughout history as official beatified Saints with a capital "S". Even if you were narrow it down to just the 1.1 billion living Catholics in the world today, that would mean only 0.00001% of the membership roll gets star billing. The rest of us are lucky if we get a small speaking part. For the most part, historically speaking, we're all walk ons.

And that's just fine. Among the generally accepted rules in storytelling is that one of the primary functions of a minor character is to accentuate something about the main protagonist, usually some defining character trait, through their interaction together, no matter how brief. Take the moment in John 18, for instance, when the high priest's slave Malchus tags along with the soldiers on their way to the Garden of Gethsemane to arrest Jesus. Out of nowhere, completely against Jesus' wishes, Peter takes a swing at one of the soldiers with a sword, misses, and lobs off Malchus' ear. Well, that's just swell! Fortunately, Jesus is there to put things right. And it turns out that Malchus' presence allows us to see a number of things about Jesus' character we're meant to emulate including mercy towards our enemies and the ability to offer comfort to another person even in the midst of our own worst moments. His ear reattached, his cameo appearance over, Malchus fades away into history never to be heard from again.

In the Catechism we read, "I believe in God": this first affirmation of the Apostles' Creed is also the most fundamental. The whole Creed speaks of God, and when it also speaks of man and of the world it does so in relation to God. The other articles of the Creed all depend on the first, just as the remaining Commandments make the first explicit." God is the main character, the box office draw, in all of this and the rest of us are just the supporting cast. Whether we're some big name Saint writing the Summa or just some unknown jackass writing a blog about bad movies, we can ask nothing more than that our lives in some humble way accentuate something positive about the nature of God.

THE STINGER

True humility is a virtue, of course, but like all virtues, it too can be corrupted. G. K. Chesterton reminds us, "what we suffer from to-day is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert—himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt—the Divine Reason."