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Samuel L. Jackson upset over lack of nudity in upcoming film

September 12th, 2008 by Scott Marks

Samuel L. Jackson in “Lakeview Terrace”

Samuel L. Jackson is outraged over a scene in the upcoming Lakeview Terrace that involves clothed strippers. The cop thriller is written and directed by Neil Labute whose In the Company of Men delivered the type of verbal venality one often associates with Nick St. John or Paul Schrader.

The reason for watering down the sex, violence and profanity is simple. There is more money to be made with a PG-13 rating.

Jackson told Showbiz Spy, “There is a big scene in this movie that is really great. It is a bachelor party, and we have three strippers at the party. But it is a PG movie, so there aren’t any titties. We have three strippers at the party, and none of them have their top off.

“How does that work? I’m like, come on! You could show the girl from the back, with her back bare. At least it gives a sense that she was naked.

“You can’t just show them in their bras and panties. You have forty drunken cops in a house with three strippers? And nobody is naked? I don’t f***ing think so!”

A source close to Emulsion Compulsion (God, how I’ve always wanted to write that) confirms Jackson’s ire. “Neil Labute did not want to make a PG-13,” the booking agent informed me. “The script I read was a hard R, but Sony decided they could make more money if it was PG-13.

“My client was supposed to do nudity, but when she got on set, they told her they changed it to a PG-13, so she would keep her clothes on. She was relieved.

“I told her about the Sam Jackson lack of boobage article and she said, ‘Sam was pissed off at me for the two days I was shooting, and I couldn’t figure out why. Now I know. It’s probably because I wouldn’t get naked.’”

Rumor has it that when Sam got ready to shoot the scene, he exclaimed, “HEY, WHERE ARE THE WHITE WOMEN AT???”

The film is produced by role model Will Smith which might explain the R avoidance.

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JUMPER / Doug Liman (2008)

February 14th, 2008 by Scott Marks

polyester-jumper.jpg

Q: What do this 100% polyester student’s jumper and Doug Liman’s “Jumper” have in common?
A: One is flame retardant gear, the other geared for flaming retards.

Jumper (2008)
Directed by Doug Liman
Written by David S. Goyer, Jim Uhls & Simon Kinberg from the novel by Steven Gould
Starring: Hayden Christensen, Rachel Bilson, Samuel L. Jackson & Jamie Bell
Running Time: 88 min.
Aspect Ratio: cinemascope3.jpg

Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆

Thumbing through the production notes while waiting for the lights to fade gave reason for hope. Both David S. Goyer (Batman Begins) and Jim Uhls (Fight Club) contributed to the script. Two out of three ain’t bad. Turning the page uncovered a the third participant, Simon Kinberg, the mastermind behind xXx: State of the Union, Mr. and Mrs. Smith and X-Men: The Last Stand.

Guess which writer appears to have yielded the strongest influence on this latest comic book rip-off? No matter what level it tries to function at — a thriller, romantic adventure, sci-fi yarn — Jumper is an incomprehensible blur.

No sooner does young David (Max Thieriot) shyly present high school crush Millie (AnnaSophia Robb) with a snowdome than it’s hurled on a frozen pond by the school bully. Shades of Bedford Falls, as David bravely ventures out to retrieve the gift, the ice cracks and the boy plunges to an almost certain doom. Almost, because at this crucial moment in time David discovers a mysterious power that allows him to zap through worm holes in the space-time continuum. In the blink of an eye, David (along with hundreds of gallons of water) “jumps” to the school library.

In spite of witnesses to David’s inexplicable appearance in the stacks and no corpus in the river to delicti, the townsfolk appear satisfied that David has vanished. Eight years later, after David has matured into Hayden Christiensen, he returns to Ann Arbor to conveniently find Millie (Rachel Bilson) tending bar and the school bully her best customer. Both have the good taste not to bring up his presumed drowning.

The reason for David’s return visit home is not to bond with his surly old man (Michael Rooker). As soon as David discovered his powers, he instantly put them to bad use. “What I loved about David Goyer’s original draft is that it was about somebody who got superpowers and the first thing he does with them is go out and rob a bank. I really liked the honesty of that,” says director Doug Liman. It’s the only honest moment in a film that otherwise has more holes than a Sonny Corleone toll booth.

David soon discovers Griffin (Jamie Bell), a fellow freak of nature who has been on the run since childhood. In hot pursuit of both Jumpers is Roland (Samuel L. Jackson), head of an elite force known as Paladins that are out to save humanity from an enemy they perceive as morally unfit. “Only God,” Roland bellows, “should have the power to be at all places at one time.” It isn’t long before this hyper-real trio are popping off like flashbulbs in all corners of the CinemaScope expanse. Sadly, this digitized Jumper cabal generates nary a spark.

Apart from the ecumenical aspect, Paladins are out to prevent Jumpers from using their powers for ill gain. One look at the stacks of loot David has amassed during his relatively brief career as a teleporting Clyde Barrow makes him an instant target of the merciless Roland.

Even the most remote fantasy universe must have some basis in reality. If you count Liman and the novel’s original author, it took five creative minds to come up with two rules of Jumping in order to set what they call “a solid foundation for the epic story’s complex inner mechanics.”

First, “you can jump anywhere that you can currently see” and second, “you can jump anywhere that you’ve seen before, even in a photograph, so long as you have a strong visual memory of it.”

What kind of lame-ass rules are these? Why not broaden the parameters a little more, fellas? Where’s the inner conflict, what’s David’s Kryptonite? At one point, Griffin transports a city bus to Egypt in hopes of crushing Roland. In their race to the special effects scenes, the filmmakers once again ignore all forms of logic let alone character development.

Even the special effects aren’t that special. The frenetic-CGI work frequently blurs and there is one moment where David looks like a toy Gumby perched atop the Sphinx. And why would anyone choose to dine alone at the peak of a pyramid other than the obvious reason of using the shot as a cool selling tool in the trailer?

Hayden Christiensen is a bore that has found his match in Rachel Bilson. Here are two beautifully formed vacuums that both suck and blow simultaneously. Their painful lack of chemistry is further hampered by the trivial dialogue they’re asked to spew. Thoroughly muddled Millie’s initial reaction to seeing Rome’s Colosseum is, “It’s so cool!”

Basic, S.W.A.T., Twisted, Star Wars pictures, Coach Carter, The Man, Freedomland, Snakes on a Plane, Black Snake Moan…What was the last script Samuel L. Jackson turned down? With the exception of John Boorman’s In My Country and possibly Kill Bill(s), in six years and twenty-five films SLJ has done little more than draw a handsome salary. His bleach blond Paladin is strictly Jackson by the numbers and the shtick is beginning to tire.

It’s not to early to earmark a spot on this year’s Ten Worst list. This is so bad there are moments you’ll want to “jump” to Cloverfield.

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THE MAN / Les Mayfield (2005)

January 12th, 2008 by Scott Marks

the-man.jpg

THE MAN (2005)
Directed by Les Mayfield
Written by Jim Piddock, Margaret Oberman & Stephen Carpenter
Starring: Eugene Levy, Samuel L. Jackson, Luke Gross, Miguel Ferrer & Anthony Mackie
Running Time: 83 min.
Aspect Ratio: cinemascope3.jpg

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Better than all three “Lethal Weapons” combined, but a safe distance from “Midnight Run,” the bi-racial buddy picture “The Man” has enough laughs to warrant a dollar-night rental if not a theatrical viewing. As a devotee of Eugene Levy since his days on “SCTV,” it was gratifying to see him finally land a starring role. While five minutes of Bobby Bittman is funnier than anything on display here, Levy’s ever-shifting eyebrows, oversized spectacles and pallor deadening makeup reminded me of a silent clown: Harold Lloyd with enormous caterpillars perched above his eyes. Admittedly, some of the biggest laughs come from Samuel L. Jackson’s nappy toupee and long shots of stunt doubles that look nothing like the stars, a nuance sure to be lost on the small screen.

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1408 / Mikael Håfström (2007)

June 21st, 2007 by Scott Marks

John Cusack

1408 (2007)

Directed by: Mikael Håfström

Written by: Matt Greenberg, Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski

Cast: John Cusack, Mary McCormick, Samuel L. Jackson & Len Cariou,

Jasmine Jessica Anthony, Tony Shaloub, Paul Birchard, Margot Leicester, Walter Lewis, Eric Meyers, David Nicholson, Alexandra Silber, Johann Urb, Andrew Lee Potts, Emily Harvey, William Armstrong, Kim Thomson, Drew Powell, Noah Lee Margetts

Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1

Genres: Horror, Thriller

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Once again Stephen King entombs an author in a hotel of horrors, this time to less than shining results.

SoCal scribe Mike Enslin (John Cusack) specializes in tour guides to ghostly hotels. Book sales must be up (he was commissioned to pen a fourth book), but you’d be hard pressed to notice given the abysmal turnout for his most recent in-store appearance.

Siphoning through the junk mail and bills, Mike spots a postcard from New York’s Dolphin Hotel with a chilling challenge scrawled across the reverse: “Don’t Enter 1408!” So long Hermosa Beach, Hello Big Bloodcurdling Apple!

One can’t accuse Dolphin manager Gerald Olin (Samuel L. Jackson) of deceptive advertising when he admits up front, “It’s an evil fucking room.” With a record of 56 kills, Olin is delighted to keep the room in a permanent state of “No Vacancy.” With a little coaxing from Mike’s attorney, by law if a room sits unoccupied the hotelier is bound to rent it, Olin grants the author a one-night stay in the soured suite.

Instead of spooks, an initial scan of the room with an ultra-violet lightsaber uncovers little more than a cluster of horrifying bed stains. Mike wonders whether the reason most occupants don’t last more than sixty-minutes is because they succumb from boredom.

At the stroke of 8, the clock radio transforms into an LCD stopwatch and begins counting down Mike’s final hour. Even that doesn’t seem to fluster him. Nor do numerous floating apparitions (including a specter wearing a Steven Wright mask), a return appearance from dear dead dad (Len Cariou) or most unnerving of all, the incessant sound of a closed-circuit broadcast of The Carpenter’s We’ve Only Just Begun on the radio.

Long before we even begin to reach an explanation, director Mikael Håfström has already hammered us with cheap techniques, most noticeably placing his camera where it doesn’t belong (i.e., inside Mike’s P.O. Box or behind a microfiche viewer). The paranormal highjinx and cinematic trickery can only carry so much of the story and movies like this are generally made or broken in the last half hour.

The shocks are rapidly replaced by cheap sentimentality. Instead of maintaining a state of heightened psychological surrealism, schlockmeister Stephen King resorts to mushy melodrama. It’s another family in hell with guilt-ridden Mike, his estranged wife (Mary McCormick) and the ghost of their dead daughter Katie (Jasmine Jessica Anthony). One nice touch has dad receiving little Katie’s dress via fax machine.

Cusack and Jackson are always a pleasure to watch. Too bad the script called for just one scene between them. If you missed Vacancy and Bug and find yourself in dire need of a horror fix, this will do for the moment.

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FREEDOMLAND / Joe Roth (2006)

February 8th, 2006 by Scott Marks

Julianne Moore & Samuel L. Jackson held captive in FREEDMOLAND (2006)

Freedomland (2006)

Directed by: Joe Roth

Written by: Richard Price

Genres: Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller

Cast: Samuel L. Jackson, Julianne Moore, Edie Falco, Ron Eldard, William Forsythe, Aunjanue Ellis, Anthony Mackie, LaTanya Richardson, Clarke Peters, Peter Friedman, Domenick Lombardozzi, Aasif Mandvi, Philip Bosco, Fly Williams III, Portia

Aspect Ratio: 2.35 : 1

Running Time: 113 min.

Freedomland was written by Richard Price. He’s an old hand at this sort of tough, urban drama (Bloodbrothers, The Wanderers, Clockers), in addition to scripting one-and-a-third-and-a-quarter softer projects (The Color of Money, Life’s Lessons and the Michael Jackson music video Bad) for Mr. Scorsese.

Here is one time you’ll complain about Price reduction.

A disoriented white woman (Julianne Moore) stumbles out of a park and into a poor black neighborhood claiming to be a victim of a car-jacking. (Did someone order a Crash-lite?) Routinely tough-but-tender detective Samuel L. Jackson fields her account of an African American thug forcing her from the vehicle. As almost an afterthought, she informs Jackson that her four-year-old son is still in the car. In the grand tradition of Flight Plan, we spend a good chunk of the film trying to decide whether or not she’s certifiable and what, if anything, happened to the kid.

If only the real police worked as fast as Revolution Studio’s art department. Within minutes of the kid’s disappearance, colorful “Have You Seen This Child” fliers literally litter the streets. Joining Jackson on the hunt is Edie Falco playing a mother who heads up the local missing children’s watchdog group. Given the backstory concerning her character’s tragic loss of a child, I was flabbergasted by her selfish pleas with Moore to confess in order to “put my heart at rest.”

The title refers to an abandoned, and painfully metaphoric, foundling asylum that could not help but work better on the printed page. On screen, it resembles Berlin after the war and offers director Roth countless camera set-ups. Coming from the man who brought us Christmas with the Kranks, there is little surprise that the film attempts to establish suspense through hand-held camerawork and machine-gun edits.

If ever a film cried out for a low budget and a cast of relative newcomers in order to succeed, it’s this one. Instead, let’s once again trot out professional victim-for-hire Julianne Moore to emote her heart out. A superb actress, her patented suffering routine this time becomes insufferable. Even his Jedi affiliation can’t sour me against Sam Jackson. Technically, his line-readings (and cocked porkpie hat) are flawless, but is Sam conscious of the slop he’s spewing or was he struck dumb by all the zeros on his paycheck?

About ten minutes prior to the final fade, numerous false endings, including a prolonged confession scene to explain everything to character and audience alike, kick in. File this as another cobblestone in that well-intentioned road to hell.

Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆

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