Trans-Siberian

Trans-Siberian (2008): Here is another well done indie thriller starring Woody Harrelson and Sir Ben Kingsley. After spending time with his church group helping children in China, hardware store owner Woody and his wife decide to take the Trans-Siberian express back to Moscow and then home rather than flying all the way. The Woodster is also a train buff and can’t pass up a chance to take a ride on this world famous passenger train. Well, after seeing this flick you may decide that flying really isn’t that bad after all.
Soon, the couple hooks up with another couple who may not be completely upfront about themselves. While fawning over some old Soviet era steam engines at one of the stations enroute, Woody misses the train and his wife has to get off at the next stop to wait for him. The other couple offer to stay with her for the night since the next train isn’t until tomorrow. Well, it isn’t long before things kind of go off track for just about everyone, including the train. The police start sniffing around, the helpful guy makes a move on the Woodster’s wife and then something really bad happens. Back on the train, Woody and wife are reunited and as you breathe a sigh of relief, things commence to accelerate downhill into darker places. The movie continually builds tension to a high level as things keep twisting in even worse directions. This is a very well done thriller and you will enjoy an evening of train spotting if you rent this flick. And in Georgia, you don’t have to worry about falling to a similar fate because it’s almost impossible to get on a train in this state. The movie is rated R for: bullet through the head, brief male buttinski sans briefs, leg carving, foot freezing, seriously swollen eye, a 1x4 vigorously to the head, drug dolls, frozen dough, crushing Pullmans, and for the surprise ending of the train.

The Proposition

The Proposition (2005): This is truly a masterpiece of a movie. It is an Australian western about the outback frontier in the 1880’s. The proposition is made by a somewhat nasty lawman to a captured felon. He will release his younger brother scheduled to hang in a few weeks and also give him a pardon if he will kill his other brother who is hiding in the outback. As the story progresses, you see the lawman is not just a stereotype and actually cares tenderly for his wife but is driven to succeed at his job while being frustrated by the local politician. The characters are well drawn down to even the minor characters. The brother targeted for elimination is a poetry spouting well read intellectual type with a lust for violence. For a while, you will not be able to stop liking this evil man for he hides his evil behind a mask of civility. The interaction of the characters is well done and even the conflict between the aborigines and the Europeans is hinted at on occasion. The movie is also not short on violence and most of the characters are greasy, sweaty, and pretty dirty as they would have been living in that rough dry environment. The photography is excellent, showing the land’s beauty as well as its ugliness, not easy to do in an action drama. And the musical score fits perfectly with the zeitgeist of the movie. If you haven’t seen this flick, rent it soon. The movie is rated R for: excessive dirt, 100 lashes to the back, stoning prisoners, spear though the chest, bullet through the intestines, a near rape, and especially for the large amount of greasy sweat rolling off most of the cast.

The Tomb

The Tomb (2006): This was offered as a movie based on a story by H. P. Lovecraft who was a superior writer of horror fiction. If there is a connection to Lovecraft, it is masterfully masked by inept filmmaking. Shot in an empty building with some temporary fencing and industrial shelving, I could have sworn I was looking in the back of a discount store warehouse. There is no action, mostly unintelligible dialogue, and no plot to speak of. The movie goes something like this; a gal drops into the shelved area after being dropped through a hole in the ceiling. She is wrapped in clear plastic and eventually comes to and unwraps herself. Well, she has a number of injuries and lots of fake blood painted on various parts. Soon, a guy drops in similarly wrapped, but with a lot of nails in one elbow and he is not in too good a shape. The two mumble about a couple of things and seem to be in a daze and little of the conversation makes sense. By now, I too was in a daze. After a nap, other people start to drop in and most are in really bad shape and soon die without advancing the plot too far. Their captor tells them to put the dead in the handy dandy coffins that show up regularly. The movie degenerates into repeated appearances of seriously injured people showing up who mumble a few pearls of wisdom and then reach room temperature. The original two continue to get coffins and nail the dead into the coffins as per their verbal instructions. It was very handy to find nails in most of the victims for easy coffin closing. It looks like the same coffin is used all the time and they never seem to have any problem getting rid of all the bodies. The maniac who has locked them in the back of this Wal-Mart lookalike taunts them over his PA system indicating only one will survive.
It is finally revealed that all the dead and pre-dead have somehow wronged the maniac and this is his payback time. The tenuous connection to Lovecraft is that the pre-dead guy remembers seeing a copy of a Lovecraft book at his girlfriend’s apartment. He apparently romanced her away from the maniac. This guy was so ugly I found it hard to believe a woman would leave even a maniac for a swollen balding mumbler like him. I think that is stretching credulity just a bit much, don’t you think?
Finally, the two mental giants figure out that they will have to fight each other to the death to get out. (Not that hard, since they both can hardly walk unaided but can still bleed without assistance.) The gal finally gives the guy a nice one-two with a hatchet and nails him in the magic coffin which shows up again just when needed. Suddenly, a door opens and our murderous ingénue runs out to find a sports car loaded with a pile of money. She grabs the car and goes to a really run down motel, gets in bed and starts reading an H. P. Lovecraft book. HUH? What the herpes is going on? She doesn’t call the police or anyone, just goes to this sleazy motel room to read. Come on! Just as she hunkers down for a good read, Mr. Maniac busts in and tells her if she has sex with him, she can keep the car and money. What? What has he been doing the last few hours? Didn’t he have an opportunity to make this offer quite a while ago? In any event, our morally upright ingénue (well, sort of, since she’s already killed one guy) turns him down and he leaves. But wait, he comes back and starts to force his way with her and she clubs him with a lamp and then goes to sleep with the book and dead maniac. The movie now mercifully ends. Please, if you have any self respect, avoid this movie, it is one of the worst I’ve ever seen. The movie is rated R for: murky dialogue, murky breastulations, murky plot, murky logic, coffins that appear on call, nails in the coffin, nails in the elbow, stretch wrapped victims, multiple hatchet impacts, excessive mumbling, and for the appalling cast depopulation.