The Bride (1985)

Charles Frankenstein (Sting) orders his assistants about the tower as they prepare to give life to his newest creation.  His first creation, the monster (Clancy Brown) eagerly awaits his bride.  The bride of Frankenstein (Jennifer Beals) comes to life and the monster immediately tries to take possession.  Frankenstein isn't ready for that yet and a dispute ensues.  The furious monster rampages and soon there is a fire, the tower is destroyed, and both of Frankenstein's assistants are killed.  Presumed dead in the fire, the monster storms away in the night.

Frankenstein names his latest creation Eva.  He tells a tale of her having been found in the woods, the victim of a lightning strike and amnesia.  Frankenstein plans to make her the equal of a man, displaying a proto-feminist streak.  She becomes a voracious reader and is soon correcting him on who wrote Prometheus Unbound.  Introduced to society, she is pursued by a dashing officer (Cary Elwes), much to Frankenstein's irritation.  Meanwhile, the monster has met Rinaldo the midget (David Rappaport).  Rinaldo, who finds himself bullied by children, recruits the monster and gives him a name: Victor.  Rinaldo's fortunes dramatically improve thanks to his giant companion.  He proposes they travel to Budapest and join the circus.  Victor is just glad to have a friend.

 

Beyond his outburst in the tower, Victor is a surprisingly well-adjusted and friendly fellow though rather dull-witted.  His adventures with Rinaldo are mostly as a side-kick.  David Rappaport hugely outshines Victor and is the best part of the movie.  Sting starts off as a man ahead of his time regarding the equality of the sexes and then devolves into a sexual predator, kind of like a lot of men in Hollywood these days.  Beals progresses rapidly from tabula rosa, to child-like wonder, to rebellious youth, to independent woman.  Clearly, she was put together much better than Victor but her story arc is less compelling.

 

It's okay.

The Last Coyote

Bosch has been sent for psychological evaluation after he assaulted his commanding officer.  Lt. Harvey Pounds was more a bureaucrat than a cop and Harry had had enough, shoving the man face first through his office window.  That his year-long relationship with Sylvia had crashed simultaneous with the Northridge Quake (1994) that resulted in his house being condemned didn't help matters.  Suspended pending the evaluation, Bosch decided it was time to solve his mother's murder.  Though he was not supposed to access any police files, he nonetheless retrieved the 33 year old case.  He was quickly infuriated by the half-assed job the detectives had done.  He tracked one of them down in Florida but when he returned to LA, he learned that Lt. Pounds was dead and he was the prime suspect.

Referenced throughout the previous books, the unsolved murder of Harry's mother is finally explored.  It proves to be a real puzzler that offers multiple potential perpetrators and an apparent political cover up.  As the book is told from Harry's point of view, the reader necessarily follows his current reasoning.  This isn't really a case where there are several suspects and one might determine the right one.  However, the conclusion does remind me of The Concrete Blonde, providing likely suspects that fit Harry's current theory.  My one quibble is that Bosch is caught off guard repeatedly.  Despite knowing there is a cop killer on the loose, he isn't paranoid enough.

Like the previous three books in the series, this one is a great read with excellent pacing.  Recommended.

 

A Simple Favor

Stephanie (Anna Kendrick) is a super mom.  She volunteers for everything at her son's school and has a daily vlog where she offers recipes, tips, and various helpful advice for parents.  The other parents call themselves 'bad parents' by comparison.  Her son's best friend is Nicky and it just so happens that Nicky wants a play date.  Nicky's mom, Emily (Blake Lively) relents and invites Stephanie and her son to the house.  Emily is almost the polar opposite of Stephanie.  Initially shocked by Emily's demeanor, she is soon entranced and starts doing favors, mostly picking Nicky up from school.  Emily has a high-profile job with a fashion designer.  Her husband, Sean (Henry Golding) is a college professor and wrote a book that Stephanie loved.  In fact, Stephanie and Sean have instant chemistry.  After several weeks, Emily suddenly disappears.  Stephanie quickly discovers that she didn't know Emily as well as she thought she did.

 

Though frequently funny, A Simple Favor touches on many dark subjects: patricide, fratricide, incest, drug use, and alcoholism.  This is not the typical light-hearted silliness one expects from Paul Feig.  Of course, it is a dramatic improvement from his Ghostbusters reboot.  Anna Kendrick is terrific, as usual.  She pulls off a combination of awkward, sweet, hyper competent, and insightful.  If a sequel was made about her future sleuthing exploits, I would gladly see it.  By contrast, Blake Lively didn't bring her character to life nearly as well.  Emily is thoroughly unlikeable with no positive traits beyond her looks.  Pretty women can get away with a lot but with this personality, not for long.  Also, she inexplicably ruins her plans by foolishly goading her adversaries.  Henry Golding plays a hapless and clueless husband.  Like Lively, he didn't pull off the character.  By the end of the movie, it is hard to accept that this handsome, well-educated man was so obtuse and incurious as to be seduced by this unappealing shrew.

 

The movie drags on a bit too long.  There is a confrontation scene that looked like it might be the climax but then there was more movie.  It has a lot of great scenes and Kendrick carries the movie.  If you're a fan of hers, go see this movie.  If not, wait for Netflix.

 

The Concrete Blonde

Harry Bosch is the defendant in a civil trial, accused of having wrongfully slain Norman Church, a serial killer known as the Doll Maker.  It has been four years and his shooting of Church saw him transferred from the prestigious Robbery-Homicide Division (RHD) to Hollywood Division.  Church's wife is seeking damages and her lawyer, Honey "Money" Chandler, is making an excellent case.  Worse, the recent LA Riots (1992) have damaged the LAPD reputation and made a negative verdict more likely.  The trial has hardly begun when a body turns up, a blonde woman buried in concrete, who matches the modus operandi of the Doll Maker.  She's only been dead two years.  Did Bosch kill the wrong man?

 

Harry has a lot on his plate.  He needs to be in court most of the day, he needs to find out who killed the concrete blonde, and his love life is entering a bumpy patch.  Deputy Chief Irvin, who has been adversarial in previous books, transitions more to ally.  In fact, Harry discovers that Irvin was the officer who found his mother's body in a Hollywood alley.

 

Three books into the series, there is a pattern of bad cops and law enforcement.  The first book had a pair of bad FBI agents, the second had a cop in the drug trade, and now there is another.  Yes, there are mostly good cops - or at least non-bad cops - but I suddenly see why the TV series is rife with bad cops.  Of course, cops make the best opponents since they know the playbook.  Interestingly, the trial from the book appeared in Season 1 of the Amazon series but it was a separate story from the main plot.  In the book, it is integrated with the story.  Better focus in the book.

 

Excellent book.  Like the earlier books, the pace increased.  It gets harder to put the book down the further along you are.  Highly recommended.

 

Alpha

20,000 years ago on the European tundra, Keda (Kodi Smit-McPhee) is on his first hunt.  He has proven to be squeamish and lacking persistence.  Hunters from two tribes crawl toward a herd of buffalo.  Then Keda's father yells 'Go!'  The hunters leap to their feet and charge the buffalo, herding them off a cliff.  Unfortunately, Keda performs badly in his first hunt and goes over the cliff.  Apparently dead and unreachable on a ledge half way down the cliff, hunters mourn him and leave.  Keda awakens when a buzzard pecks at him.  After climbing down/falling off the cliff, Keda finds himself hunted by a pack of wolves.  He seriously injures one before escaping up a tree.  In the morning, the pack is gone but the injured wolf remains.  Still too squeamish to kill, he binds its snout and nurses it to health in a cave.  He names the wolf Alpha.  Alpha becomes a member of Keda's pack and soon the wolf is chasing prey to Keda's spear.  Here is the origin story for man's best friend. 

 

As with other Stone Age movies (e.g. Quest for Fire, Clan of the Cave Bear), a prehistoric language was created.  Even the narration by Morgan Freeman is spoken in that language and translated with subtitles.  I didn't recognize his voice, which defeats the point of hiring Morgan Freeman to narrate.  The bonding between man and wolf is done well but the story is a bit too epic, involving too many death-defying challenges.

Good popcorn fun.

 

Searching

The movie opens with a Windows screen.  Whoever is using the computer selects to add a new user.  New user named is Margot.  When selecting a user photo, the computer camera shows David, Pam, and 5 year-old Margot in frame.  They take a picture.  The years flow by with new photos and videos.  Here is a happy family.  Then cancer strikes Pam and she dies just before Margot enters high school.  There are not as many photos thereafter.  Margot is a sophomore.  She and her father communicate via text message or FaceTime.  It is Thursday when David (John Cho) notes that the garbage hasn't been emptied and calls Margot (Michelle La) to chastise her.  That night, she tells him she is going to be late with a biology study group.  Then she is gone.  For the first 24 hours, he isn't sure if he has just missed her and she is upset or what.  Finally, he contacts the police.  Detective Vick (Debra Messing) starts investigating and is happy for any help David can offer to illuminate his daughter's friends and habits.  He logs into her laptop and discovers a side of his daughter he never knew.

 

Though the story is told entirely on computer screens, TV reports, text messages, and video chats, it is very engaging.  Cho does an excellent job as the frantic father.  He is the movie and he carries it well.  He proves to be a talented detective himself, making some big breaks in the case thanks to what he finds on his daughter's various social media accounts.  There are plenty of twists and turns, many of them proving to be dead ends.

 

Excellent film and recommended.