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Ok, after seeing CLAY PIGEONS a man in a suit
approached me. He claimed to be from
GRAMERCY and he had a heavy as hell shiny steel
35 mm film can next to him.
“Harry Knowles?” he said.
“Yes.” I said intelligently.
“I have something I need to show you, and that
you need to see. Do you have somewhere to screen
this?”
So Tom Joad and I call up Robogeek and ask if
he can give us the keys to the Paramount Theater in
town. Robogeek is usually easy to coerce, but this
time I had to promise him that I’d take him on an
adventure soon.
We swing by the Robo-labortory. He handed us
the keys and over to the Paramount we went. Now
usually I have this underground screening facility, but
I loaned Quint the place to try to woo some young
lass, but he left the vents open and well... it’s fairly
mildewy, so I had to use a real theater in Austin. It’s
dangerous cause of the danger of being caught.
We had the Gramercy fella meet us there.
Downtown Austin on Tuesday night is about as dead
as it ever gets. I send Father Geek up into the
projection room. And we, Father Geek, Tom Joad
and myself all saw LOCK, STOCK AND TWO
SMOKING BARRELS. The Gramercy fella stood
guard in the lobby, to make sure the rightful owners
of the Paramount never found out.
I’ve been hearing about this flick for a while
now, and when I was in London there were
advertisements everywhere for it. With a title like
that, it’s kinda hard not to notice. But I left the UK
before I could see it.
I’ve been having Brits rave on and on and on
about how good this thing is. Ahhhhhhhh Bullshit...
right? Wrong. This is everybit as wonderful as the
Brits are saying.
This is an ultra-stylish cool universe film. It
exists in that screwed up universe where Tarantino
and Rodriguez and Danny Boyle live. It’s that place
where nothing ever goes according to plan, where
everything looks cool even if it isn’t. And last but not
least there is this beat and music overlaying
everything that just has you doing that
“OOOOOOOoooooh YEEEeeeeeaaaaaaAAAHHH”
sort of thing.
This was the perfect double feature with CLAY
PIGEONS, unfortunately I don’t think that is going to
be possible till the latter part of next year when both
of these films are available on video. I was just lucky
as hell.
The easiest way for me to explain to you the
coolness of the film is to do a rundown on some of
the periphial characters. IE the characters that aren’t
the main folk of the flick.
First off there is HATCHET HARRY. He’s
about as cool as they come. A gun collecting card
playing porno dealing loan shark that just don’t take
shit from anyone and plays every angle like Caligari
in a german expressionist flick of old. He’s known to
beat people to death with dildos and other... pleasure
enhancement tools.
There’s BIG CHRIS and LITTLE CHRIS, a
father and son team of enforcers that... well, they do
everything together that you always wished your Dad
would show you how to do... you know like kill
people with doors, and bad looks. They wear the next
generation in cool overcoats. I think most people are
going to love this team.
There’s the afro-sheen MR BREAKER that has a
Samoan Pub, but deals high grade chemically
enhanched super weed (like that shit that turned Stacy
Keach into a lizard in CCNM). He’s a bad ass with
two guns and a crew of the biggest blackest badasses
around town. Imagine waking up one day with a
meaner and uglier Martin Lawerence standing over
you with a dripping jeri-curl Afro that has two shiny
pistols in your face.
There is the gang of paranoid laid back marijuana
hortaculturalists that are armed with a high powered
pellet rifle and a psycho-drugged out femme living in
the cushions of their couch.
There’s the bumbling moronic pair of idiots that
try to do absolutely nothing right.
That’s just some of the background characters.
The really good ones I’ve kept as a secret. Right now
I haven’t heard a peep as to when to expect this film
to hit the USA. But I can tell you this, when it does
get here, by all means go. Why?
Ahem...
Remember when Mr Blonde cut the policeman’s
ear off? Remember when Ving Rhames took it up the
ass from that HillBilly Bastard named Zed?
Remember when Renton went toilet diving?
Remember when Floyd toked from the Syrup Bear
Bong? Remember when Sex Machine’s Crotch Gun
lept to life? Mike McDermott played poker with
Teddy KGB?
Remember when Blake said, “That watch costs more than you
car. I made $970,000 last year. How much you make? You see pal, that's who I am, and
you're nothing. Nice guy, I don't give a shit. Good father, fuck
you! Go home and play with your kids! You wanna work here,
close! You think this is abuse? You think this is abuse, you
cocksucker? You can't take this, how can you take the abuse you
get on a sit?”
You may be getting the point by now. You see
this film is about those quirky mean as hell cool
moments where the subversive film freaks, like you
and me, smile and walk out of the theater and know
we are cooler than all the people out there that
haven’t sat in that seat and saw that moment. This is
that type of film. The one you imitate dress from.
The one you buy the soundtrack to. The one you buy
the all the dressing DVD or LaserDisc to. This is a
cool movie.
My father began hailing it above
TRAINSPOTTING as did Tom Joad. Me? Well, for
me they are two films of such incredible differences
that I can’t begin to compare them on a quality level.
But I can say this, I’ll end up watching and quoting
this movie more than I will TRAINSPOTTING.
It’s quirky and it is cool. If ya want to know
what it is about... well go to the site and read that for
yourself, it’s at this link.
The flick is just cool. It’s not a film for Mid
America. It’s for those that wear black. For those
with piercings. For those with the hair of a different
color. It’s for people that love cool films.
To wrap this up, let me say that... wow...
Gramercy really is showing a couple of fun as hell
films this day. Now see CLAY PIGEONS if you’re
in the USA, and go see LOCK, STOCK AND TWO
SMOKING BARRELS if you are in England. They
are both a damn good time, though you folks in
England are getting a better deal.
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