"Permanent Record" (1988)

"Permanent Record" Movie Poster

Who thinks Keanu Reeves is a good actor? I'll admit, in the movies that I've seen him in, it's been hit or miss. When I was browsing in the library the other day (I'm practically there all the time, but not just for the movies), I found one of his earliest films, a 1988 release called "Permanent Record."

My first thought: It's about a teenager who did something so horrible that it went on his permanent record and scarred him for life. I personally had never heard of it, so I found the movie, in its entirety, on YouTube and proceeded to sit down and watch it, not sure what it was about or how Reeves's role would be portrayed.

Turns out, the movie wasn't what I thought it was. In fact, it was something completely different.

Also starring Alan Boyce and Jennifer Rubin, the movie begins with a bunch of teenagers hanging out on a hillside, a circle of 1980s-esque cars and trucks, and teens talking, laughing, smoking. It looks to be a very popular hangout spot or "lover's lane" type of place, where kids from school gather and boyfriends and girlfriends come to hang out and hook up. One of the cliffs overlooks the beautiful coast and water, which I later learned was Portland and Cannon Beach, Oregon. As a few of the teens walk along the cliffs, we see a girl sitting on the ground, back up against one of the rocks. She has what appears to be a planner or notebook on her lap, but then she closes it and stands, slowly walking down the rocky slope towards the massive group of cars. We see a motorcycle leave the area, and the girl joins up with another girl and a guy to get into their cars and leave.

The scene switches to a rural area with small, bungalow-style houses spaced apart. An older model car pulls into one of the grassy driveways. stopping abruptly as any teenage driver would. Seagulls cry as the boy gets out of the car and rushes toward a house. He enters the house quickly, where we hear loud electric guitar chords crashing. Another guy is in a separate room, likely a bedroom, playing the said guitar. The orange neon sign of the treble and bass clefs and music notes, along with the official "Recording" light-up sign, set the mood that this is a musician's bedroom.

As the arriving friend enters the bedroom, they start talking as if they are best friends. The first guy greets the guitarist and they talk about how the guitarist's dad left that morning, where the friend says, "You have a dad?" and the guitarist responds, "Once in a while," as he puts his guitar down. He starts talking about "how the party is on for tomorrow night," while his friend says, "Oh cool!"

As the movie progresses, we discover that the guitar player is named Chris (Reeves) and his best friend is David (Boyce). David is dating Lauren (Rubin), and as high school seniors, they seem to have it all and are living out their lives. Chris is the quirky outsider, while David has everything: talent, great grades, a sense of humor, and being the popular guy. However, something tragic happens at a party that's held along the coastal cliffs. What was thought to be an awful accident is something much worse, and their lives are changed forever.

Curious to know how it ends? Watch the movie online or get it from the Longwood library!

Stay tuned for another movie next week! As always, I greatly appreciate and welcome any comments, questions, and especially movie suggestions!

-Laura Beth :)

"Nell" (1994)

"Nell" Movie Poster

I first heard about this movie when I was in one of my Communication Studies courses a few semesters ago. Dr. Tracy had assigned us to read a particular chapter from Rebecca Ann Lind's "Race/Gender/Media: Considering Diversity Across Audiences, Content, and Producers." When I started reading, the example that the introductory paragraphs discussed was "Nell." The descriptors intrigued me because it was about a young woman who lived in the backwoods of North Carolina who came up with her own language. Yet, I haven't watched the movie until now. I didn't realize the Longwood library even had the movie until about a week ago.

The movie stars a young Jodie Foster, her first major movie appearance since the mega 1991 hit "The Silence of the Lambs," along with Liam Neeson and Natasha Richardson.

This movie was based on the play "Idioglossia" by Mark Handley.

In the opening scene, there is an aerial flyover of sorts, taking you over blue mountains, lush green forest and a deep blue river shining in the early morning sun. A spooky-sounding woman's voice is heard, singing some sort of song but with no music. But the words are not really words; they are difficult to make out beyond child-like syllables and jumbled gibberish. As the flyover focuses on one part of the mountains, the engine of a motorcycle grows in volume. We then see a man riding a red motorcycle around a curve of the highway cut into one of the hills and forest.

As real music is heard, the scene switches to hands threading and then tying another person's black bootlaces. The scene goes back to the man on the motorcycle as the highway gives way to dirt trail, and making a right turn into the woods. The person's hands who were tying the bootlaces is now setting tortoiseshell combs into a woman's gray hair.

The man is still on the trail but heading ever-deeper into the woods. The trees and brush slow his pace every so often, but he continues on, with a determination to find his destination, no matter how far away from civilization he is. Then the scene changes back to the hands, where one pair is washing the other with water and a yellow sponge. As these scenes switch back and forth, the man is still making his way to his destination in the woods, while the pair of hands continues to prepare the older-appearing woman for the day, including smoothing her hair and placing a daisy bloom across her skin.

Finally, the man on the motorcycle stops at a place next to the rolling river, with bright sunshine illuminating the water, trees and surrounding scenery. He dismounts the motorcycle and grabs a cardboard box off the back, full of what appears to be groceries with Quaker Oatmeal, rags and other household supplies. The man walks a few feet and then puts the box on the ground. A leather change purse lays there, and he picks it up and takes the money out to pocket it. As he turns around to leave, weird sounds from behind him catches his attention, according to the dumbfounded look on his face. We see a dilapidated wooden cabin in the distance, surrounded by trees, almost completely secluded and swallowed by the forest. He turns around to face the cabin, his expression changing to astonishment with a hint of puzzlement, as he walks toward the cabin with the box, which appears that he has never approached the cabin before.

He walks hesitantly up the steps, as we see a screened porch overgrown with vines and clutter everywhere. He knocks softly on the entrance frame. The music changes to the spooky, danger-alerting kind of music that you probably hear in any horror movie. He calls out the name of the woman hesitantly as he slowly walks toward the entrance of the cabin. As he slowly looks around the corner and knocks again, he calls out "Ms. Kellty" once more. We see an overview of the primitive kitchen, before the view pans to the woman lying on her back on the floor, dead. As the man comes for a closer look, the woman is dressed in a pale blue dress, black boots and has two daisies covering her eyes. At this, the man runs out of the house and is seen riding away on his motorcycle, likely to go find help.

After the opening scenes, we are introduced to a doctor attending to an elderly man. As he walks out of the house talking to the man's daughter, a Sheriff's Department SUV pulls up with a honk, the driver saying, "Been looking all over for you, Jerry!" as he walks toward the road and the waiting vehicle. This is the first instance of Dr. Jerry Lovell (Neeson). As the SUV heads toward the mountains, Sheriff Todd Peterson (Nick Searcy) tells Jerry that Billy Fisher (Jeremy Davies) found her. "He delivers the groceries out there. I guess she's what you'd call a hermit." As the focus shifts to their faces, the Peterson continues, "She talks kinds funny too. Kinda like, duh, ooh, ma." Jerry responds,"You try talking out of one side of your face." The sheriff says, "Oh, you've seen her then?" Jerry says, "Only once."

As the two men cover up the dead woman's body and look for evidence, Jerry asks if no electricity, no phone, no running water is real. "She lived here all alone?" Jerry muses. The sheriff responds, "That's what hermits do, Love. They live alone and they die alone." As Jerry walks along the rocks out to a calm spot near the middle of the river, Todd calls out, "OK we're done here! Let's get back to civilization!" when Jerry appears resigned about having to leave this beautiful place of nature.

Jerry yells that he'll catch up as he goes back through the cabin. As he is musing over the now-opened packages of oatmeal and dry milk, he hears what sounds like footsteps above him. Discovering a set of stairs, he climbs up to a full-length oval mirror and what appears to be a bedroom. As he looks in the reflection over a mirror, the spooky music starts up again. Jerry continues to slowly look around, he finally sees in the mirror a young woman's bare leg, accompanied by a white dress or nightgown, her dark face covering her face as she is huddled in a corner of the room. She is hanging on to the rafter as Jerry whirls around to look at her, as she emits the strange noises that Billy heard earlier. Here, we are first introduced to Nell (Foster).

As the movie progresses, Nell, though a young woman, is child-like because she cannot speak like others. She expresses herself initially through anger and violence towards Jerry, but eventually warms up to him as his visits increase. Jerry wants to protect her from a life of laboratories and research studies, but he is at a loss about what to do with Nell. However, Jerry meets Dr. Paula Olsen (Richardson), a Charlotte, North Carolina psychologist.

I was captivated throughout the entire movie, a total of 113 minutes. The actors are brilliant with their roles, flawless in their characters. I highly recommend the movie, and the review for the original "Idioglossia" play can be found here.

I can't decide which one of two movies to review for next week, so I'm asking you readers to give me feedback. I'm deciding between "The Onion Field" and "Permanent Record."

Stay tuned until next week! As always, I welcome any comments, questions and movie suggestions! Thanks for reading!

-Laura Beth :)

"Biloxi Blues" (1988)

"Biloxi Blues" Movie Poster

I don't know why, but I love movies from past decades and about wars. Ever since I took my awesome 20th Century World Topics history class my senior year in high school, I learned everything I could about all the major wars from the 20th Century: World War I, World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam, the Cold War, the Persian Gulf War and so on.

I'm also passionate about the military. Though my family is small, I'm pretty sure all five branches of the military have been covered in some way. My dad is retired Coast Guard, and my grandfathers served in the Army and the Navy.

So when I picked up Neil Simon's "Biloxi Blues" from the library, seeing a young Matthew Broderick on the front cover wasn't the only thing that got me interested. The dog tags with pictures of Christopher Walken and Penelope Ann Miller plus the background of soldiers at what appears to be a training camp peaked my interest. It got me guessing what war this movie was set in, and well, by then, I knew I had to pick it up and watch it.

The opening scene shows Broderick's character staring out the window of an old train painted forest green with gold lettering, moving along a railroad trestle bridge over a huge body of water. Broderick is staring, while army recruits around him are talking and laughing. The music is the melodious yet sad "How High The Moon" by Pat Suzuki. The camera eventually pans out to give a stunning aerial view of the entire train and its locomotive puffing along toward its destination. You can watch the opening scenes to "Biloxi Blues" here on YouTube.

As the credits end and the music fades away, we see a close-up of Broderick's character's crestfallen face, as we learn it is 1945. He says, "I don't think much about the big war anymore, the one they call the second one, because the small wars that came after it, seem a lot bigger now than the big war was. Most people today look back at the big one with fond memories. It was, in a sense, an okay war. We knew why we were fighting it and we felt pretty proud of ourselves being in it. We liked the songs, we liked the uniforms. we liked the girls, we liked that everyone liked us. So looking back it really was one of the better wars. Except if you were just a kid, the year out of high school, heading south on a troop train, knowing that in two months, you'd be in some mud hole, fighting for your life."

As his voice-over continues, we see Broderick's character take up a fountain pen, open a school black-and-white speckled composition book, and begin to write. As the train continues on its journey, we hear the train whistle blow, and eventually fade out.

As the movie progresses and Broderick narrates, Broderick stars as 20-year-old Eugene Morris Jerome, a Jewish Brooklynite drafted into the U.S. Army during the last year of WWII. He is subsequently sent to Biloxi, Mississippi for basic training before being sent off to join the fight for the Allies. During training in Biloxi, Eugene has to deal with his fellow, often hostile recruits along with tough drill sergeant Merwin J. Toomey (Walken). Throughout training, Eugene, expecting the Army to be "dolls, doughnuts and USO dances," according to the movie cover, he learns about all walks of life and meets Daisy (Miller), along with a host of other characters.

Neil Simon is a master at making funny movies. The hilarious antics of Eugene's humor spices up the army and bootcamp life in Biloxi. Eugene's naivety is poignant early on, but he is transformed into the quintessential army man and the gentleman of the 1940s, who is captured by Miller and her heart. Walken, a brilliant actor, plays the role of Sgt. Toomey in hilarious fashion, eccentric but always annoyed by Eugene and the other recruits. Director Mike Nichols accomplished fantastic work with "Biloxi Blues," incorporating a great cast with Simon's semi-autobiographical play, the second of three parts.

I would highly recommend this film, especially if you are a Matthew Broderick or Christopher Walken fan. It is classic Simon comedy, set in the not-so-funny atmosphere of WWII bootcamp.

As always, I love any comments or suggestions for little-known movies to review!

Thanks for reading this week and stay tuned for a new review next week!

-Laura Beth :)

"Clockwatchers" (1997)

"Clockwatchers" Movie Poster

A couple of the greatest, funniest movies of all time released in the 1980s and 1990s were all about office life. Remember 198o's "9 to 5" with Jane Fonda, Dolly Parton, Lily Tomlin and Dabney Coleman? And how about 1999's "Office Space" with Gary Coleman and a whole crop of lazy office workers? Well, I bet you haven't heard of "Clockwatchers".

The seemingly-boring, yet goofy and hilarious trailer is posted on YouTube, where the voice announcer says, amongst the drab cubicles and bare walls, "In a world where nothing ever happens, a major catastrophe is about to strike." To be honest, when I first picked up this movie off the library shelf, I wasn't expecting much more than a silly 1990s movie about four girlfriends just trying to enjoy life and get out of working. However, seeing that this movie has been compared to "Taxi Driver" and "Working Girl," it changed my perspective a bit. Still, I was skeptical, but I said to myself to give it a try.

Winner of "Best Picture" at the Turin Film Festival and "Official Selection" at both the Sundance and Toronto Film Festival, this 1998 comedy-drama shows the life of four friends who are temping at an office building, taking viewers on the ride of all their adventures as friends, co-workers and eventually, enemies.

The movie opens with a ticking of a clock, with a solid black background and white script letters introducing the actors and actresses. Without any dialog, the first scene opens to a male receptionist reading a magazine with a nervous and impatient-looking woman, dressed in a gray sweater, pink blouse and brown skirt, standing on the other side of the counter. The ticking of the wall clock continues, showing it is almost 9 a.m. Once the clock turns to 9 a.m., the receptionist pushes the magazine aside, revealing the letters "GCA" behind him, asking the woman in a pleasant, orderly voice, "How can I help you?"

The beginning progresses with Iris (Toni Collette) beginning her job as a temporary office worker. On her first day, she waits for two hours until a woman worker escorts her to her cubicle, saying, "I hope you can type." Iris's duties are typing invoices on an ancient-looking typewriter and making copies of them. A mousy and quiet woman with large glasses, Iris works away, discarding the invoices with mistakes in her purse. She goes to make copies, where she meets Paula (Lisa Kudrow) jamming paper clips into the second copier so it will not work. Paula is much the opposite of Iris, dressed in a bright yellow and black shirt and short skirt set, flipping her blond hair around as Iris just tries to make the copies. Much of the same happens day in and day out, where, according to the back of the movie case, "Looking busy is a full time occupation."

Along the way, Iris and Paula become friends, and then they meet Margaret (Parker Posey) and Jane (Alanna Ubach). Margaret is the polar opposite of Iris, getting Iris to eventually stand up for herself and be more outspoken. Jane is the driven one, hoping for a full-time assistant position through temping at GCA. However, she is engaged to a jerk who is already cheating on her.

Eventually, friendships fall apart. Thefts begin to occur in the office, and everyone suspects the temps. Did the temps do it, or is someone else behind the stealing? Watch this movie to find out. With my initial skepticism, I surely didn't expect there to be a mystery wrapped up in this comedy-drama, but it certainly made "Clockwatchers" more entertaining and much more amusing than I originally imagined.

Thanks for reading! I willingly accept any comments on my reviews or suggestions for movies for me to review. My only requirements for movie suggestions: (a) it has to be a movie that I have never heard of or (b) a movie that you think not a lot of people --- especially college students --- haven't seen.

Tune in next week for a movie you probably haven't seen!

-Laura Beth :)

"Boys Don't Cry" (1999)

So the title of my first blog post in almost four months is a movie that I've wanted to see for such a long time, but never got around to it. I've literally picked it up from the Longwood University Greenwood Library movie shelf probably 10 times in my entire college career. Why I never got around to see it until now, I don't know. But I know one thing: I'm regretting waiting this long to finally see it.

This movie is based on the powerful, true story of transgender man Brandon Teena murdered on December 31, 1993 by male friends. Newcomers Hilary Swank and Chloe Sevigny command outstanding performances, along with Peter Sarsgaard , Matt McGrath, Brandon Sexton III, and Alicia Goranson as supporting characters.

Janet Maslin of The New York Times called this movie "The Best American Film of the Year!"

The movie opens with what appears to be a two-car race down a dark country highway. Music in the background is on beat with the lights of cars whizzing by and the reflection of headlights against windshields and mirrors. We see a boy's eyes in the rear-view mirror, before the flashing lights of a highway patrol car appear in the fog. The first words of dialog come from inside a trailer: "Short. Shorter hair."

Lonny (McGrath) is helping, reluctantly, to cut Brandon's (Swank) hair into a boy's style. In a plaid shirt, denim jeans and a brown belt, Brandon easily passes for a high-school-age guy, complete with cowboy hat and cigarette, as they make their way to the Broadway Skateland. Lonny gets even more agitated when Brandon says he has a date waiting inside, leaving Lonny stunned and confused in the crowded parking lot. As "You're Just What I Needed" plays in the background, their date progresses from casually skating around the rink into kissing in front of the girl's house. When she finally leaves to go inside, Brandon lifts his hands to the sky, as if thanking God for finally giving him a chance as a boy.

The next scene shows that the setting is Lincoln, Nebraska in 1993. A date's brother and his angry buddies are chasing Brandon into Lonny's trailer, shouting expletives, "You freak!" and "You f***ed my sister!" All the while, Lonny pins his sister to the wall yelling, "You are not a boy, that's what went wrong! You are not a boy," while Brandon looks exhilarated and happy. The scene ends with glass breaking, Lonny taking money from his Brandon's wallet, and saying, "You're not staying here anymore, Teena."

Brandon goes to the bar and strikes up a conversation with a girl named Candice (Goranson). She hates her name and is considering changing it, to which Brandon responds that changing your name "sometimes helps." As a drunk guy tries to sit next to Candice, Brandon tries to haul him off, resulting in a bar fight. Ex-convict John Lotter (Sarsgaard), Candice and Brandon run into an alley to escape the incoming cops. John notices that Brandon has "the tiniest hands" and that he'll have a shiner in the morning, to which Brandon seems very excited about.

The scenes are so well-done and portray the gritty side of the Midwest and countryside. The bars are dark, dank, full of pool tables and drunk guys. As Brandon converses with some of the guys at the pool tables, a guy yells for Lana (Sevigny). Brandon is dumbfounded, with a visible look of shock on his face.

As Brandon tries to make his way back to Lincoln and Lonny, he becomes romantically involved with Lana. Brandon is arrested and placed in the women's section of the Falls City jail. Lana bails him out and asks him why he was in the women's section. Brandon subsequently lies and says he was born a hermaphrodite and looking to get a sex-change operation sometime in the future. Lana then declares her love for him, "no matter what he is."

However, the ending is none too happy for Brandon and Lana, along with John, fellow ex-convict Tom Nissen (Sexton), and Candice.

The actors are absolutely fabulous and practically live and breathe their characters' personalities and show their true colors. Lonny is the overprotective brother. Brandon/Teena is the innocent teenager, looking and longing for love and acceptance as a boy. Candice and Lana are intriguing girls: Candice is the typical farm homemaker with a child. Lana is smitten with Brandon and wants to be with him, no matter what. However, though all their characters are bonded by seemingly-normal friendship, the events they all experience change their lives forever.

Tune in next week for another movie that you probably haven't heard of. I welcome all comments, questions and suggestions!

-Laura Beth :)

The China Syndrome (1979)

Okay guys, I'm really trying to get back into the swing of things and post a new movie review every Saturday!

This week I went nuclear. Not literally of course, but in the form of watching the 1979 thriller "The China Syndrome" about a nuclear power plant's partial meltdown and impending disaster.

The movie stars Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon, Michael Douglas, Wilford Brimley and a host of other actors. It was nominated for five Academy Awards, and won the 1980 Writers Guild of America award for the script.

The film was released on March 16, 1979, just twelve days before the real-life nuclear accident at Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania. The accident helped propel "The China Syndrome" into a blockbuster.

Fonda stars as TV news reporter Kimberly Wells, who, along with Douglas as cameraman Richard Adams, go to visit the Ventana nuclear power plant outside Los Angeles. This is a part of a series on energy production. As Wells and Adams are observing the control room, the plant goes into a reactor SCRAM, or emergency shutdown.

Lemmon plays shift supervisor Jack Goddell, who notices an unusual vibration during the SCRAM. Turns out, the water levels in the reactor core has risen to high levels; and when the crew attempt to open relief valves to reduce the level, one water level gauge is dangerously low and the core of the reactor has almost been uncovered. Fears of a meltdown mount, but backup systems bring the reactor back under control.

Adams secretly films the activity, which he was not permitted to do for security reasons. When he and Wells return to the station, the news director refused to air the footage in fear of criminal prosecution. Adams then steals the footage and shows it to a pair of experts, who determine that what happened at Ventana was close to "the China syndrome," where the reactor core, at an extreme temperature, would have melted down into the plant and hit the ground water, exploding into the atmosphere and contaminating the surrounding area.

Goddell conducts an investigation of his own and discovers the Ventana plant is unsafe. He determines that if another reactor SCRAM were to occur at full power, the cooling system would be severely damaged. Goddell urges the plant foreman to allow the reactor to be disassembled and inspected. The foreman refuses, not wanting to pay a hefty price and shut down the plant for several weeks. This is where the thriller part comes in, where Wells and Adams come back to film and another SCRAM happens, and...well, you need to watch the movie to see the rest of the action.

Fonda and Douglas are brilliant, while Lemmon is fantastic as the concerned Goddell, just trying to protect the plant and the citizens around it.

If you're looking for classic old-school suspense and being on the edge of your seat, watch "The China Syndrome."

Tune in next week for another review! As always, all comments and review suggestions are welcomed!

-Laura Beth :)

Coming Soon: "The China Syndrome," "Flash of Genius" and More!

Hi everyone!

I just looked at my last blog post and realized that it's been exactly one month since I've written a post! Ack - I feel so behind.

I won't make excuses, but there's reasons why. I just got initiated as a sorority sister of Alpha Sigma Tau yesterday (yay!) and just school and work caught up with me. It's been really busy, but surprisingly not too stressful. Yet. There's still a month and a half of the semester left, and that include final projects, portfolios, and those lovely little things called finals in mid-December. Joy.

Anyway, over the last few weeks, I've been compiling a list of movies that I will be reviewing and writing about in the next few posts.

"Adam" (2009)
"Boys Don't Cry" (1999)
"Flash of Genius" (2008)
"She's Too Young" (2004)
"The Burning Bed" (1984)
"The China Syndrome" (1979)

Other thoughts: A 10-week series/installation reviewing all of the Muppet movies that have been made to date. The first, "The Muppet Movie" was released in 1979 and the most recent, "The Muppets' Wizard of Oz" was released in 2005.

One of the six films that I listed in alphabetical order beginning with "Adam" will be reviewed and posted between Friday and Saturday, but you won't know which one it will be until I post it!

Happy waiting in suspense (appropriate since it is Halloween week) - and have a great week!

-Laura Beth :)