Frasier: And the Dish Ran Away with the Spoon, Par

Marvellously mixing semi-documentary aspects with traditional genre motifs, Walsh’s archetypal gangster thriller follows the fates of three WWI doughboys who return to an America plagued with unemployment: while Lynn goes straight, Cagney’s the good guy reluctantly strained into bootlegging and genocide by a ruthless Bogart, and forever pining for good girl Lane while ignoring the attentions of George’s tart-with-a-heart. Most awesome in the service of its frantic pace and its suggestion that in times of Despair all but everyone is corruptible, it’s also a churlish elegy to a decade of unrest: that mother wit of sadness and loot is perfectly encapsulated by George’s last line, laconically pronounced during Cagney’s corpse, ‘He against to be a weighty shot’.

“The clothes might be about fifteen years out of style, but the stories are still pretty darn good.”

-Jeffrey Robinson

The First Season

Beverly Hills, 90210 first aired in 1990 and ran for ten seasons. It was a popular series that had a huge influence on pop culture in the 90s and made actors/actresses Jason Priestley, Shannen Doherty, Luke Perry, Jennie Garth, Tori Spelling, David Austin Green, and Ian Ziering famous. The series is credited as a soap opera and it is filled to the brink with melodramatic content. However, in the show’s first season, it is not nearly as “soapy” as the later seasons. The season one content focuses on the Walsh family getting accustomed to their new lives and friends in Beverly Hills, which include episodes dealing with (somewhat) common teenage issues: drinking, drugs, sex, racism, minority oppression, rape, cheating, and other serious topics.

Headlining the season one cast is Jason Priestley as Brandon Walsh and Shannen Doherty as Brenda Walsh. Brandon and Brenda are paternal twins, who with their parents Jim (James Eckhouse) and Cindy (Carol Potter), have recently relocated from Minneapolis to Beverly Hills. In Beverly Hills, the Walsh family endures culture shock as they find out what life is like for the rich and beautiful. Brandon is a good-natured kid who works hard in school, on the school paper, and at the Peach Pit (local diner) as a waiter. Brenda is of different sorts. While she is good-natured like her brother, academics and responsibility are far from her list of priorities. She comes to Beverly Hills completely taken in by the glamour and tries hard to fit in with everyone else. Their parents Jim and Cindy are loving parents, who want the best for their kids. Jim is usually busy with work, while Cindy is still adjusting to her new life and on one occasion, she becomes a sultry desperate housewife (see episode “Seventeen Year Itch”).

Brandon and Brenda’s new friends include Dylan McKay (Luke Perry), the bad boy surfer who befriends Brandon and becomes romantically involved with Brenda against her parent’s wishes, Steve Sanders (Ian Ziering), the rich son of a popular television sitcom actress who has an ego a mile high, Kelly Taylor (Jennie Garth), Brenda’s beautiful best friend and love interest for Brandon, Andrea Zuckerman (Gabrielle Carteris), the “geeky” girl who runs the school paper and has a thing for Brandon, and David Silver (Brian Austin Green), a dorky freshman who wants to be part of the in crowd. Other common faces include Donna Martin (Tori Spelling), Brenda and Kelly’s best friend who has a small role this season, but takes on a bigger part as the show progresses, Scott Scanlon (Douglas Emerson), David’s nerdy friend, and Nat (Joe Tata), the owner of the Pit Peach.

The leading performers, for the most part, are very good in their roles. Priestley makes for a great leading character as a likeable, good-natured kid as he gets used to the Beverly Hills life. Doherty comes off as an immature younger sister, which works in most cases because of the direction her character takes. Both Eckhouse and Potter are great as the parents and they have a terrific dynamic with both Priestley and Doherty making a wholesome family. The remaining cast members offer solid contributions to their roles.

As for the season one content, I was honestly surprised how much I enjoyed it. (I was expecting to enjoy it, just not this much!) It has been many years since I have seen Beverly Hills, 90210 and I remember the show being a very soapy drama with lots of over-the-top acting and storylines. And while the season one episodes tend to be soapy and over-the-top, the content felt pretty rich. It does a fine job keeping your attention and developing the characters further.

The initial storylines dealing with the Walsh family, specifically the twins, integrating into their new environments (e.g. high school) and meeting their new friends offer some enjoyable stories. Specifically, the series two-part pilot episode “Pilot” is a great start to the show. It offers a solid introduction to the cast and the format of the season one episodes. Afterwards, the many of the subsequent episodes include bits and pieces of the family’s adjustment, which again, includes important plot and character development that I thoroughly enjoyed.

After the series pilot episode, the stories include a “moral of the week” in one form or another. The morals range from sex to drugs to alcohol to cheating to stealing to racism, and include plenty more teenage-oriented topics. A few of these stories get pretty hokey, with overly dramatic acting and moments. For instance, in the episode “Higher Education”, Brandon has to choose between ethics and good grades when Steve encourages him to cheat. What makes episodes like these hokey is how serious and melodramatic the characters get about their situations. And the fact of the matter is that it is not as critical and important as they make it out to be.

On the other hand, there are episodes that end with the proper, good-natured message that have hokey aspects, but are still handled pretty well. The episode “B.Y.O.B.” is a pristine example. In it, Brandon, who usually stands strong to his convictions about not drinking alcohol, experiments with alcohol and quickly loses control and gets behind the wheel of a car. I will not go as far to say the episode is powerful on any level, but it has a powerful subtext to it. What happens in the episode and the aftermath, in regards to how the various characters respond to it, makes the episode pretty strong and one definitely worth seeing. Bluntly put, the episode is played out pretty well, despite several over-the-top moments.

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Overall, the first season of Beverly Hills, 90210 is full of solid content. Perhaps it is the nostalgia talking, but I really enjoyed getting to relive the Walsh’s first year in Beverly Hills. The season contained some pretty enjoyable episodes dealing with getting to know the characters and they did a fine job developing them. Sure, there were a few hokey episodes and over-the-top moments, but it works. Part of what I enjoyed so much about it was how un-soapy the season one episodes were in comparison to what I remember about the show, which is mainly the later seasons when Tiffany Amber Thiessen shows up. In the end, Beverly Hills, 90210 is a fun drama and its inaugural season does a fine job with its characters and storylines.

Episode Guide

1. Pilot Parts 1 and 2: Twins Brandon and Brenda Walsh experience a very special kind of culture shock when they move from Minnesota to Beverly Hills and begin their new lives at West Beverly High. We meet their new friends the moment they do, including Donna, Kelly and David.


2. The Green Room: Brandon meets Dylan McKay, a brooding classmate. As they become friends, Brandon learns that Dylan’s bad-boy act masks a hidden life that few people ever see.


3. Every Dream Has Its Price: Brenda shops with Kelly and Tiffany and wishes she has their kind of money. But Tiffany’s a shoplifter and, when she stashes her stolen clothes with Brenda, the police get involved, forcing Brenda to clear her name.


4. The First Time: Brandon is visited by his ex-girlfriend Sheryl but, when she meets Dylan, she’s quickly star-struck by his money and glamour. The tension builds between Brandon and Dylan until it erupts into angry words, hurt feelings and flying punches.


5. One On One: When Brandon tries out for the basketball team, he’s angered to learn that his main rival is from another district. Brandon’s about to expose the student when he finds out he came there legally and for a good education.


6. Higher Education: An unreasonable teacher makes Brandon’s life miserable by giving him no grade higher than a C. Brandon cheats on a quiz, but the stakes get higher when he gets a stolen copy of the midterm before the test.


7. Perfect Mom: “Delusions of glamour” overcome Brenda when she meets Kelly’s beautiful mother Jackie, a former model. Jackie’s also a recovering addict and, when she falls off the wagon, her dark side comes back for all to see.


8. Seventeen Year Itch: The Walsh parents examine their relationship while Brenda and Brandon examine theirs, as they get involved in a UCLA study on twins.


9. The Gentle Art of Listening: Sympathy and responsibility are at odds when Brenda volunteers for a teen crisis hotline. She violates the rules when she takes an after-hours call from a date-rape victim. Soon, Brenda is desperate to find her and help her.


10. Isn’t It Romantic?: The chemistry between Brenda and Dylan starts to heat up when Brenda accidentally catches him the shower, then comforts him after he fights with his father. She’s prepared to go all the way, but a speech from an AIDS activist prompts her to slow things down.


11. B.Y.O.B.: Both Walsh twins face the temptation to drink alcohol when their peers are doing it all around them. The issue comes to a head when their parents leave town, and Brenda and Brandon throw a party that quickly gets out of hand.


12. One Man and a Baby: Brandon gets an unexpected taste of fatherhood when he asks his classmate Melissa for a date-then has to baby-sit her infant son while she has a college interview. Other family members get involved when Melissa contemplates giving her son up for adoption.

13. Slumber Party: Pillowtalk threatens to destroy Brenda’s sleep-over as all the girls share their deepest secrets, with unexpected results.


14. East Side Story: The Walsh’s agree to let their maid’s niece, Carla, use their address to enroll at West Beverly. Brandon falls for her, even after she reveals that she’s waiting to testify as a witness in a murder trial.


15. Palm Springs Weekend: A weekend in Palm Springs goes awry when David invites Steve, Kelly and Donna to join him at his grandparents’ house while they’re away on a cruise-but he gets the dates confused, and they’re still there.


16. Fame is Where You Find It: Brandon is “discovered” when he’s out roller-blading one day, landing a role as an emergency extra on a big TV show. The sexy star wants to give him a reoccurring role, but soon Brandon discovers she has other motives in mind besides his film career.


17. Stand (Up) and Deliver: Brenda’s had it with home life and West Beverly, and decides to leave both for the real world. After house-sitting for an older friend, however, she gets a reality check that sends her back with a new appreciation for what she’s got.


18. It’s Only a Test: The Walsh twins and all their friends are panicked by the upcoming SATs, but then everything gets put in perspective when Brenda finds a lump in her breast and faces a test no one can prepare for.


19. April is the Cruelest Month: Brandon interviews a classmate, Roger, who’s an outstanding athlete and student-and haunted by overbearing success of his father. When Brandon reads a script written by Roger, he begins to worry that the grisly ending just might come true.


20. Spring Training: Baseball fever strikes when Brandon is asked to coach a little league team after his dad gets injured. Something that should be a lot of fun gets ruined by pushy parents, however, and Brandon ends up teaching his own team a lesson.


21. Spring Dance: The drama and the stakes rise as the West Beverly High crew gets ready for their Spring Dance. Brenda loses her virginity to Dylan; Kelly confesses her love for Brandon; and David wins the dance contest and the right to dance with the Spring Queen.


22. Home Again: Moving back to Minnesota makes sense for Brenda and Brandon’s dad, but for them it’s a wrench thrown into their new lives. AS the family gets ready to move back, friends and family make their feelings known and affect the decision to go back.

Two years ago, CineSchlock-O-Rama’s Most Wanted celebrated the capture of Predator 2 after an exhausting 62-week critter hunt. Now, with designs on bolstering AVP: Alien vs. Predator’s DVD debut, that beloved bare-bones release has received a substantial special-edition retrofit that revisits the transfer, adds a DTS mix, two commentaries and a second disc of goodies that — for good or ill — perhaps only a CineSchlocker will love.

Oh, how fondly I recall that frosty Thanksgiving when yours truly smuggled myself away from the fam — and a third helping of turkey — to plunk my keister down at a Piney Woods multiplex and behold what remains the holiday’s GORIEST debut! Sorta makes me misty just thinkin’ back on it. So, yes Mr. Naysayer, as if the 5-star rating weren’t plain enough, this ultra-violent, yet inexplicably mainstream creature feature is most certainly a personal passion — though it’s one more of us should own up to.

As any smartly-crafted sequel does, this sucker delivered EXACTLY what most fans wanted — plenty more face time for ol’ snaggle puss. FX idol Stan Winston’s interstellar malcontent takes its homo-sapien safari to the near future of Los Angeles. The city swelters in 109 degree heat. There’s open, street-to-street warfare between drug lords and police. Pure bedlam. Prime hunting conditions for our eight-foot Rastafarian killing machine who mangles a cocaine baron very nearly mid-diddle, and in short order, SKINS a half-dozen other goons just out of sheer MEANNESS! In lieu of Ah-nold, Danny Glover is the woefully ill-prepared cop whose not-so-by-the-book heroism draws the big guy’s attention. Thus begins the sporting and what some postulate is an allegory for man’s brutality toward animals, which lends an amusing subtext to those climatic meat-packing plant scenes. Regardless, there’s oodles of really nifty Pred-O-Vision footage, groovy glow-in-the-dark space alien blood and oceans of the garden variety red stuff. All of which leads up to a real jaw-dropper of a final reel!!! Therein was a single shot that famously threw fuel on the flames of the burgeoning Alien vs. Predator comic franchise, which in turn, spilled into video games and, now, a sadly underwhelming feature film. But, more importantly, WHERE is Predator 3!?! Fourteen LONG years overdue!

CineSchlockers will spy the late-great Morton Downey Jr. who’s brilliantly typecast as an in-your-face TV slimeball. Mort the Mouth went on to HOLLER REALLY LOUD in Body Chemistry II and Revenge of the Nerds III before losing his battle with lung cancer four years ago. Another tragic loss among the cast was towering Kevin Peter Hall, the man beneath the latex and alien dreads, who succumbed to AIDS just six months after this sequel’s release. According to popular lore, Mr. Hall first snagged the Predator role when Jean-Claude Van Damme walked off the original picture after no more than a couple of days.

Two breasts. 48 corpses. Cajone crushing. Six explosions (including one in slow mo). Excessive coke snorting. Razorblade Frisbee to the gut. Multiple whip pans. One highly emotive porn queen (Teri Weigel). Extraterrestrial taxidermy. Coitus interruptus with extreme prejudice. Self-medicating. Head butting. Amusing Bernard Goetz reference. Multiple decapitations and amputations. Bahama-born Calvin Lockhart holds court as King Willie: “I don’t know WHO he is, but I know WHERE he is. The outside. The spirit world, man … There’s no stopping what can’t be stopped. No killin’ what can’t be killed … You can’t see the eyes of the demon until he come callin’!” Gary Busey chews his fair share of scenery as well: “An other-world life form! A f@#&ing ALIEN! Drawn by heat and conflict. He’s on safari! Lions, the tigers, the bears, oh my!” Predator can steal ANY line he darn well pleases: “You are one ugly … MOTHER F@#$ER!!!”

Both in the flashy “making of” doc and his solo commentary, director Stephen Hopkins seems far more timid about his cinematic spawn than his younger, rock-star coifed self did on location more than a decade ago. “It’s blood and cocaine everywhere — that’s a good ’80s movie for you,” he sheepishly observes. “You don’t really see films like this anymore.” Yet, as the movie rolls, Steve warms ever so slightly to his new-wave gorteur past, exuding a perceptible level of glee in Stan Winston’s never having made so many dead bodies for a single film and his picture being the first to receive an NC-17 rating. Mr. Hopkins says the movie was whittled on “20 times” before the MPAA agreed to an R-rating. Leaving one to wonder whatever became of the excised footage? This special edition reveals no deleted or extended scenes.

Over on the second disc, is an exceedingly fan-friendly Predator show ‘n’ tell by John Rosengrant of Stan Winston Studios. But, honestly, the real find of this entire brouhaha is eight minutes into the aforementioned documentary where CineSchlocker fave and crazy-talk king Gary Busey issues the most baffling (and breathless) on-set soundbite ever …

Oh, Gary! You’re the proverbial cherry on top who makes this salivatory set an absolute must-own for any self-respecting CineSchlocker!

1990, 108 mins, 1.85:1 anam, DTS & DD 5.1, Director and co-writer commentaries, Documentary [35 mins], Featurettes [30 mins], Arsenal analysis, Two unedited “Hard Core” reports, Extensive still gallery, TV spots, Trailers.

Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz

This is the first film to go from a Super-16 original to HDTV and
then to a 35mm negative. It was shown at the 1998 Toronto Film Festival.

Jay Anania’s second feature is a very cold intellectual film that
asks the question: Can we have a memory of what we only imagined? This
is a mystery puzzler without much emotional impact or much of a payoff.
It’s imitative in its minimalist style of a Robert Bresson film. You would
have to be a mind reader to know what the filmmaker wanted to say.

The film opens on New Year’s Eve, 1971. Robert Burn’s Auld Lang Syne
is playing on the car radio and Diane Thwaite (Paulina Porizkova, ex-supermodel)
is on a rural road where she suddenly hits something with her car, and
before she can be certain she faints. She is troubled that she thinks she
hears a baby crying. This is something that will haunt her the rest of
her life.

It’s now 24 years later, and the ice cold, blonde beauty, Diane,
is in NYC working as a noted illustrator of plant specimens for technical
science books. She has a robotic love relationship with one of her colleagues
at the foundation, Cyril Troy (Jeff Webster), who can’t tell her what research
he’s doing in his study of man. He tells her some abstract tale about a
man who drowned while reaching for his reflection.

For the first time since the accident Diane begins to have dreams
and when she hears Auld Lang Syne on the radio, thoughts keep coming back
to her that she makes entries of them, does sketches of the faces she sees,
leaves phone messages of her dreams on her boyfriend’s phone, tells her
hypnotherapist about them, requests hypnosis, and forms an impression that
something evil happened that fatal night. It is out of the blue that her
memory just comes back, as she tells her therapist that the evil is not
the shooting by a man of a woman but something that she feels is greater
than that; it is something deeper that occurred on the side of the road
on that fatal New Year’s Eve. Though, she still is not certain if what
she envisions is a dream or a memory.

Into the picture enters the mystery man, Michael James (Julian Sands),
and Diane’s sleuthing begins in earnest, as she learns about her past.

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To go along with the somber and ridiculously serious tone of the
movie, there are moody vocals by Judy Kuhn. The film’s cinematic style
is eye-catching, but the acting and the story itself felt forced.