ABCs at the Movies: The Doubles Round!

[southendmd]

IMDb user:  The short is loud and glitzy and full of musical angst, as the anti-hero begins to wonder if killing people is all it's cracked up to be. So of course, he and a chorus of bloody victims break into a song and dance number! When I saw this short film for a purported musical based on THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, I really wish it had been a real musical, not a comedy short. That's because the concept is so bizarre and unusual that I might have been tempted to see it for myself! Heck, weirder things have made it to full-length films or stage (such as the off-Broadway plays, THE EVIL DEAD or BAT BOY). I hope someone sees this silly little short and runs with the idea! Cute idea and definitely weird--this short is well worth a look and is a funny little idea.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stF2ddDSM4k[/youtube]

[memento]

From IMDB: A valuable ranch lands in the hands of "Bingo" Strook when "Dad" Davenport dies and leaves two young boys. Strook is a dope smuggler and his accomplice is Laura, the Davenport housekeeper. "Happened-Along" Meredith and "Doughnut" Casey are on the property one day and Laura drives them away. They ride on laughing, and 'happen-along' in time to rescue Doris Davenport, niece of "Dad" who has come to taker over the ranch and care for the boys, when she falls off the motor-stage. Meredith borrows a couple of horse and a buckboard and takes Doris to the ranch. This does not set well with Strook. He sets a trap for Meredith, sends for the Texas Rangers, and when they arrive at the ranch they find Meredith with a cache of dope which he says he found in a tree. Strook tries to have Meredith arrest as a dope smuggler, but Meredith shows the Rangers his papers and badge proving he is the Ranger Captain Halliday they have been expecting.

(No poster)

[Fran]

From IMDb:  When his girlfriend tells him that his men wouldn't follow him to a house of ill repute, Max, a general in the Mexican army decides to perform some great act of heroism. He takes his men over the border into Texas and re-captures the Alamo. This upsets the Texans greatly. The Texas National Guard is sent to retake the mission. Normally this would be easy as Max's men have left all of their ammunition back in Mexico, but the State Department insists that no one be killed, so the National Guard also goes in with unloaded weapons.

[southendmd]

Plot:  This controversial documentary about the stand-off between an unorthodox Christian group - the Branch Davidians, under the leadership of the young, charismatic David Koresh - and the FBI and ATF in Waco, Texas, from February to April 1993 presents a different spin on the events from that of the United States government, which held that the Branch Davidians set the fire that destroyed their compound, and killed the vast majority of them, on April 19, 1993. Using footage from the 51 day siege, from the congressional hearings afterwards, from people involved in all aspects of the siege, and from experts technical, psychological, and religious, the movie suggests that the Branch Davidians were not a cult, but a valid religious group practicing under First Amendment freedoms who fell victim to first the ineptitude of an ATF raid designed to garner the agency positive attention and later the cruel, methodical work of the FBI, who over-saw the murder of the Davidians and then quickly covered it up.

[southendmd]

AKA Texas Layover.

Plot:  BLAZING STEWARDESSES features Adamson's wife, cult scream queen Regina Carrol, and Yvonne DeCarlo, best know as TV's Lily Munster. This broad comedy, the sequel to NAUGHTY STEWARDESSES, finds a planeful of oversexed airline attendants touching down on a ranch. Little do they know, however, about the masked bandit lurking in the sagebrush, who just might ruin their plans for some lusty fun.

[Fran]

Filming Locations:

Austin, Texas, USA Olympia, Washington, USA Tikrit, Iraq

From MilitaryTimes.com:  Well, my initial impression of this movie turns out to be wrong. The filmmaker/director, Maj. Steve Metze of the Texas Army National Guard, didn’t set out on his 2005 deployment to Iraq intending to make a feature documentary. Speaking after the screening, Metze told the audience that he did indeed intend to document his deployment, but he wasn’t sure while he was doing it whether it was just for himself, his family or a larger audience.

Fortunately, Metze and editor Don Swaynos chose to bring the film to the people.

It’s a fairly standard war documentary:  bombs, boredom, missing family, missing birthdays. But with a soldier behind the camera, the soldiers at FOB Danger open up a little bit more. When Mezte asks his commander how he feels about being in charge immediately after the change-of-command ceremony at FOB Danger, the commander replies, “Scared [expletive]-less.” But the CC then asks for a do-over, and delivers a message of excitement and pride in his soldiers that would be very convincing if he hadn’t looked so terrified seconds before.

The thing that will stick with me the most is that this is the only war doc I’ve ever seen that deals with a fratricide.

Metze wasn’t too eager to talk about how he got permission to film all around the war zone, but it doesn’t feel like there’s a strong pro- or anti-anything slant to the movie.

This is the film’s official premier, but Metze has shown it to some of the soldiers featured in it.

After seeing it, "The military guys have all come up and just said thank you," Metze said. "And then the spouses are primarly coming up and going, 'Thank you. I had no idea. They never told me anything like this.'"

Since soldiers have tended to open up about their experiences after seeing the film, Metze thinks maybe he’ll tour it around military installations if it might help troops work through PTSD. But I think anybody who has deployed or is about to will benefit from watching this movie with their loved ones.

[oilgun]

aka: Goodbye Texas

Synopsis:  The tough gun-man Burt Sullivan (Franco Nero) leaves his job as a town sheriff to go to Mexico to find the man, Cisco, who killed his father many years ago. He and his younger brother arrive in a small town where everybody is afraid of Cisco who has become the local landowner. But there is a secret. It turns out that Cisco is the father of Burt's younger brother and Cisco are craving for respect from his "son". Burt Sullivan joins forces with the local townspeople to stop and bring Cisco back to his punishment in Texas.

[Fran]

The Murder Round!

Featuring movies that deal with murder,
attempted murder, murder investigations....

[memento]

From IMDB: This excellent period drama is based on a popular novel of 1939 by Rachel Field. It told a version of the story of the murder, in Paris in 1847, of Fanny Sebastiani Choiseul-Praslin, Duchesse and wife of Theobald, Duc de Choiseul-Praslin. Fanny was the daughter of Marachal Horace Sebastiani, one of the leading political and social figures in the July Monarchy or Orleans Monarchy of France, under King Louis Phillippe (1830 - 1848). This was a middle-class supported monarchy, and was far more liberal than it's predecessor monarchy under King Louis's cousins the Bourbons. But by 1847 it had grown corrupt, and it was suffering a series a serious scandals. The murder of Duchesse Fanny by her husband was the last real blow. Supposedly the marriage had collapsed due to the growing relationship between Theobald and the children's governess, Mlle. Helene Deluzy-Desportes. The actual relationship between the governess and the Duc remains questioned, although most believe she was his lover. Rachel Field, a descendant of Fanny and her later husband, Rev. Martyn Field, presented the governess as the victim of circumstances (working in a household that was falling apart). Finally, whatever the cause, Theobald beat Fanny to death, and tried to make it look like a burglar did it. Instead the Surete was not fooled, and Theobald was arrested. But while under arrest he took poison, and he died denying his guilt and denying the involvement of the governess. Fanny came to America, where she taught school and married into the Field family (her brother-in-law Cyrus was a financier who laid the Atlantic Cable, and her brother-in-law Stephen was an Associate Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court). As for the French, they blamed the government for allowing the Duc to escape justice, and within a year the July Monarchy was overthrown. Marachel Sebastiani (Montague Love in the film) died prematurely in 1851 - the last victim of the crime.

[Lynne]

From IMDb:

Detective Dave Bannion investigates a police sergeant's suicide. Strictly routine...until a B-girl claiming to have evidence is found murdered, and Bannion's superiors order him off the case. Not one to suffer being pushed, Bannion pushes back at reputed mob boss Lagana, who fanatically keeps his home life free of "dirt." Result: a bomb meant for Bannion kills HIS WIFE, and Bannion becomes a white-hot sword of vengeance, alone against a corrupt world...except for Debby, disfigured ex-mistress of sadistic mobster Vince Stone.