SLJ Political/Social Dramatic Thriller Movies Review

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[00:01:01] Hello, gang. So to start off with the crime and political thrillers of this portion of the Samuel L. Jackson chat, I'm reviewing Dead Men Out.

[00:01:12] Once again, this is a very obscure movie. It's one of those VHS-only movies by HBO. It stars Danny Glover as a prosecutor trying to reopen a questionable inmate who might not actually be all he's politically deemed to be, played by Rubén Blades. And Samuel L. Jackson, disappointingly, has a very small role in this movie.

[00:01:37] So, unfortunately, I was really looking forward to this and I was so let down. I just couldn't get into it. You can find it on True TV Movies. Again, it's very expensive, but you can find it on sites like that. The DVD Ladies site, unfortunately, had a Spanish dub of it. So, I don't feel like you're missing much. It's pretty popular, unfortunately.

[00:02:06] Even though I agree with a lot of these themes. And I take it back. Glover is not a prosecutor. He's a psychiatrist. But, yeah, he's trying to see if the death row inmate is really that mentally unstable. It's a big all-star cast. Tom Atkins is also in it. Unfortunately, I just found it a drag. This was one of those movies I agree with everything they're saying. And yet, it doesn't really engage all that much, sadly.

[00:02:32] And Richard Pierce, pretty respectable TV and indie film director. But, yeah, I just found it too static. I didn't find it all that engaging. But, yeah, it was definitely one person on Letterboxd even said it's more of a curiosity. And I think that's the best way of putting it.

[00:02:52] If it's just blending, blurring that mixture between an above-average PBS production to bland lifetime staging. It just wasn't really... It didn't deliver on much. But, regardless of the crime elements or the drama elements, it is a curiosity given how, you know, HBO already had some other mild prison show produced by Ron Howard before Oz. And it didn't need to be vicious or anything.

[00:03:22] But it was also just one of those, like, I feel like the actors are making this better than the actual material. This just needed one more draft. So, the 6.3 out of 10, that's pretty generous. I'd give it more of a 5. It just doesn't really compel. It's been released in other countries, so it's kind of a cult movie. But, yeah, I did not feel compelled to even finish the film. I did, but I didn't like it. I just was like,

[00:03:52] what are we really trying to do? Big, huge disappointment. But don't worry. There's some highlights here that I'm going to get to that do rock. So, let's cover those, shall we? The HBO prison drama, Against the Wall. This was heavily talked about on John Frankenheimer's episode of The Directors. And how could it not be? It was a very restricted budget, made for, like, just $2 million. And, again, the same thing. You know, at that point, Frankenheimer was a has-been.

[00:04:22] Because everyone liked him, wanted to work with him. But his last movie is underperformed. And it just was beyond his control. And he started kind of becoming the go-to guy doing a bunch of HBO original movies. And this was the first one seeing the actual Attica prison riot. As it went down, you know, Colin McLaughlin, definitely a better role for Danny Trejo. And it's an interesting just prison drama, how it just documents the whole thing.

[00:04:49] Do you remember that coming out for some strange reason? No, it's all good. I really dug how, you know, Colin McLaughlin, you know, he was perfectly cast here because, you know, it's fresh off Twin Peaks and a bunch of other cult movies like The Hidden. And here he's playing the rookie prison guard who gets to understand who's leading a prison revolt, you know, against crappy conditions and utter turmoil. It basically was a war happening in a prison, you know.

[00:05:19] As they often do. Yeah. Oh, there it comes. Oh, there it comes. Almost like a prototype for Oz. Yeah. That's a good point. Yeah, I definitely, I have no doubt that one of the producers was looking at, you know, the returns on that movie and its reception. He was like, we, you know, so whenever Tom Fontana St. Ellsworth said, how about we do that? He was in there like to say yes the minute he heard prison drama.

[00:05:49] Oz is such a great show. Can't recommend it enough. Surprised Jackson wasn't on there. He would have sat right in. He would have totally been a perfect prison warden. As much as I love Ernie Hudson, it would have been interesting to see him on there. One, eight, seven. This is another movie he did where he played a teacher at a chaotic high school, finding out some shady secrets about various people.

[00:06:16] It's another one that hasn't aged as well due to some statutory, you know, predicaments. But it's also kind of renowned because at near the end, the movie just, the more moody it gets, the more striking colors it uses. And then it has a deer hunter style Russian roulette session where, you know, the gangsters who are harassing Jackson say, okay, let's figure it out this way.

[00:06:47] That was the one with the Pyrrhic victory at the end, right? The girl makes the speech about the Pyrrhic victory. All I know is it was just an earlier role for Clifton Collins Jr. And a bunch of other just very talented actors. It's another thriller. It's like it was just always at the video store and it's like, okay, interesting. But again, lost in the shuffle. Brings us on to another atypical role that I saw just played endlessly is now playing on pay-per-view.

[00:07:17] Changing lanes. Anyone ever see this one? Yeah. It's a like it or hate it kind of movie. And it's kind of like falling down where it's just basically you're just getting the rage. And I wish they would make more. It's one of those. I don't like Ben Affleck's arc, but I do like Jackson's arc where he's just a frustrated dad and businessman. They're kind of want to get revenge on each other.

[00:07:45] And it's one of those. I think the biggest disappointment is set in L.A. It should have made better use of the L.A. scenario. Yeah. It kind of fades away in the background after a while. But it's definitely another movie. I kind of have a love-hate relationship. I don't enjoy sitting down for it in one scoop, but I do like seeing clips of it on occasion. Same here. Oh, God. But like JJ just pointed out, it is kind of one of those.

[00:08:14] It's like so much fucking potential. You think the movie's going to go places and then it's just like. It gets very messy when it's good to go there. Toni Collette's a great actress. And it was like, the minute it gets into that whole I'm getting a divorce, it's like, why is this shit in the movie? So, alas, alas.

[00:08:41] Going into a lot of Jackson's traumatic movies. Some of his political thrillers. Social studies. Some good ones. Some really, really, really good ones. And I'm going to start with my second one in this draft. I take it back. It's not the second one. More like the fifth one. Looking back at it, you know, we already told you about, again, Dead Man Out, which is an HBO film.

[00:09:11] And Against the Wall, another HBO hit movie that many saw. 1.87 and Changing Lanes. But, yeah, in my country. Oh, man. It's got some highlights. It's not perfect. But, man, the ratings on this were so schlocky. I've actually seen it twice, being the Jackson fan that I am. It's by John Boorman. I've never been a fan other than, well, Excalibur.

[00:09:39] But never been a fan of Point Blank, Emerald Forest, Exorcist 2, or Zardust, or Deliverance. Sorry. Not sorry. Most, after this, you would probably know him best for doing the okay Hell in the Pacific and the movie that everyone else likes that I always find just a dull set. And that's the Taylor Panama. But whatever. He was a genre guy. Seems like a nice guy. He did some utter unusual mysteries after this, like The Tiger's Tale.

[00:10:08] But, yeah, In My Country is one of his last films before he leaves this earth. Oh, I take it back. He's actually still with us. I can't believe it. I swear he was dead. But, yeah, no. He just works wherever he wants to. And, yeah, this is just an atypical political film. It could have been more of a potpourri.

[00:10:35] I guess, much like Beyond Rangoon, it was just atypical just seeing an African poet played by Binoche and an American journalist played by Jackson. And just going to South Africa to report about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings. And it just wasn't a... It's ready for primetime, but it just wasn't going to ever be a big movie. This was the kind of movie that you'd see come on Sundance channel or Showtime.

[00:11:05] And Nelson Mandela liked this movie a lot, so there's something. But, what a Berlin Film Festival award with 2004. What is with the Berlin Film Festival? These reviews. Anyway, yeah. The scenery feels authentic. I would kind of compare it mildly to The Year of Living Dangerously. Remember that older movie? Now, unfortunately, Four Men doesn't have the inspired just letting the scenery tell the story.

[00:11:33] And invest the viewer in this. Like Peter Ware or even a David Lean type. But this is his best attempt at imitating Lean to some extent. Binoche, you know, again, no one hates her. You've seen her in the Free Color trilogy. You've seen her in some other Jean-Luc Godard films from his later career. Rendezvous.

[00:12:02] The clouds of Silas Maria. Chocolate. The English patient. I mean, sex goddess. Great actress. Much like Kristen Scott Thomas. Never phones it in. Always dynamite. Makes you cry. So, I guess it's interesting seeing son of John Vorman Charlie make an appearance in this. Brendan Gleeson is also in this. It's a colorful character. Sure. So, I just found it decent. Just Jackson had some okay just speeches.

[00:12:32] Binoche just gave it some extra stuff. This is a better version of Out of Africa. I said it. One of the worst Best Picture winners. Not a good movie. But, yeah. Gets the job done. It's just kind of a... It's trying to make too many people happy. I mean, it's that mixture between a PBS thriller and a journalism, political, social commentary film. And just, again, the chemistry is infectious between Binoche and Jackson.

[00:13:02] It was just enough for me to carry the movie for me. And it says a lot, considering they're adapting Country of My Soul, which is a non-fiction book about the South Africa, you know, TRC, experience as a radio reporter. But that book has poetry, prose, reporting, and verbatim testimony from the commission. So, definitely a hard-to-translate kind of book, I think.

[00:13:29] But halfway successful, and that's more successful than I'll ever be. So, I don't mind it. I'm going to give it a mild recommend. And if you're Jackson completist, you will watch it. So, another outing with us. Freedomland. When I first saw this, I thought this was a stupid piece of shit. Some people still think it's bad. But in this case, Richard Price, who's a reliable author.

[00:13:52] You know him from the books and the movies they were adapted from, including Lush Life, Clockers, and The Wanderers. He's written episodes of The Wire, and Stephen King's The Outsider for HBO. He first came on, as well as The Night Out, which is a remake of Injustice. So, again, top-notch HBO stuff. If you don't get David Simon, you're going to get Richard Price.

[00:14:20] He's worked with Simon on not only The Wire, but also The Deuce. And one of his first big ones was doing the sequel to The Hustler, which was Martin Scorsese's The Color of Money. So, again, he's adapted his own material. I think it's interesting for a while. And I'll put this on. I don't mind it. Coincidentally, he worked with Jackson on Kiss of Death. Also did other movies like New York Stories and Sea of Love.

[00:14:50] A few other De Niro comedies. Also worked on the first Chef movie with Jackson. So, I would put it in Richard's top ten movies. It's just people who complain about this movie just find some of the interactions of the individuals in this housing project community to just be cliche. Where is it set?

[00:15:16] But it's basically a Susan Smith type gal who may or may not have made up a story about her baby being kidnapped by someone. And it just was a very heated movie. And people were getting tired of social commentaries unless they were by beloved filmmakers. Big all-star cast. William Forsythe's and Juwan Ellis is again on here. Another Anthony Mackie co-starring with Jackson prior to this. Edie Falco is really good as one of the community leaders.

[00:15:46] She's always good. Who are you kidding? Clark Peters. You know, as the lieutenant on The Wire. Some other decent actors. Philip Bosco. Asif Mondavi from The Daily Show. Dominic Lombardazzi. So, I just think there's just enough frills in this movie. Just enough of the town at ease. I just like that kind of stuff where someone is disrupting the community. James Newton Howard scores taught. And the camera work allows for just...

[00:16:16] It's a mixture of handheld and over-the-shoulder kind of scenes. And those give you enough to just kind of keep going. But yeah, it's just... Roger even fucking hated this, of course. Where's the setting of this movie? I guess some people just found it just... It's set in a fictional Jersey town of Dempsey. And again, just showing the divide between the white communities and the Armstrong housing projects.

[00:16:44] But it was shot in Staten Island, New York. So, that's not too far. But I just kind of dug into racial tensions. And I guess... If it were to be handled better, they should have hired some... You know, Joe Roth is... Wanted to make this movie. He was a big Sony Pictures producer at the time. Having already worked for Disney. And Morgan Creek. I think his heart's in it. And he gets a reasonable movie. It's just... They probably should have gotten...

[00:17:15] Someone bigger. Like, Antoine Fuqua. To kind of layer this a little more. This is definitely his best movie he's ever done, though. And that says a lot. Because he did Streets of Gold. And if you like British Ninja Turtles 2, that's okay. But... When he did crappy comedies like America's Sweetheart and Christmas at the Cranks, I was just rolling my eyes. Because it's like... Those are not movies. Those are just vanity projects. So... Lots to like.

[00:17:45] Just imperfect. In terms of how it introduces the subject matter. But... Definitely not a racist movie. I don't think so. This would definitely probably have worked better as an episode of The Wire SVU. That's for sure. Now, I will say this. Yeah. Unthinkable. Not a bad movie at all. So much fun. Gritty, gritty, gritty. It's partial action, but more of a mystery thriller.

[00:18:11] Just this madman terrorist played by Michael Sheen of Masters of Sex fame. This was years before. He'd only done stuff like The Queen and Blood Diamond and Stage Roll and The Damned United. So... He's an indie darling. Carrie Ann Moss is fresh off The Matrix. And other indies like Snow Cake and Memento. As awesome as the badass FBI agent.

[00:18:38] Again, Sam Jackson's role in this is a Delta Force operator turned interrogator. And... Basically, they go to a black site to interrogate this terrorist. Peter Woodward, who's best known as the son of the Equalizer actor Edward Woodward. I knew him for his work on Bad Line 5. Yeah. He just was writing a screenplay. Gregor Jordan directs this. He's a decent director.

[00:19:07] You know from other stuff like Buffalo Soldiers. Ned Kelly with Heath Ledger. Two Hands. A poverty movie with Heath Ledger. It's been a little uneven. And done some documentaries and music videos. But yeah. I thought... This was definitely a career highlight. And the fact that Bram Rebell has never released a score for this. Didn't get any awards consideration. It just was a limited release. It was... Basically shown internationally.

[00:19:38] And then... Basically... It... Only got... Most people only saw it when it came to DVD. But I just remember watching this. I mean like this is a good 24 spinoff. It's a violent episode of Criminal Minds. In a good way. Yeah. Unfortunately... It just wasn't seen by many. But yeah. Joe Bellows is in this. Brandon Roof. That's right. Superman. Got a decent role. I don't think there's any bad performances. It's cool when you see one of the military officers. Benito Martinez.

[00:20:08] From the Shield. Be one of the other guys. Who's asked to... Slip... One of the other terrorist suspects. Wife's... Frodo's. And he refuses. And Jackson's then like... Fine. I'll do it. But yeah. Jackson you absolutely detest in this role. Yeah. Because again. He gets off on the violence. And then he'll say like one or two true things about terrorism. The only weak spot for me is Martin Donovan. I've never liked him as an actor. He's done some good work with director Hal Hartley.

[00:20:38] But yeah. He's just always rubbed me the wrong way. Maybe it's just because he does his job too well. I personally just think he's just a little one-dimensional despite being in big stuff like Nolan's Insomnia. And some other just off-color movies. But yeah. I've just never found him to be that deep. Especially because in this he's just playing a suck-up guy who wants all the credibility for this terrorist unit.

[00:21:08] But decent all-star cast and supporting actors. I've seen it about three times now because it really is just very engaging. And I mean hell the movie was pirated and made some like a ton of downloads clicks. Because people were like what is this movie? Because the trailer was awesome. The social commentary was interesting.

[00:21:36] Without it would be a good double feature believe it or not probably with The Siege. The Denzel Washington movie or some of those other just even Arlington Road just or. But yeah if you like other shows I mean it would be so relevant now. Now that shows like Sleeper Cell and Homeland and Strike Back are being appreciated. Just solid genre movie. And if you don't like it for the deepness you'll at least still find it a reasonable popcorn blockbuster film.

[00:22:06] But yeah it's just solid very concrete takes on how torture is wrong. And how it's going to be near impossible to find nuclear bombs in any kind of city. And I just like the voyeuristic camera work and the closed off conversations while the feds are just talking in their vans.

[00:22:27] So if you like other shows like the FBI shows or just other even Bosch or some other procedural let alone morbid. Just ticking time bomb literally of a screenplay. This is the movie for you. But thanks for listening. So then I'm going to go on another one that not many people saw where he plays the president. So hold on to your butts. It's called Big Game.

[00:22:55] And basically it's by the same people who did Rare Exports. And it's kind of a hard target surviving the game kind of campy premise. What's funny about this one is he gets to use a machine gun at the very end. And the entire time he's learning how to kind of hunt these guys who are trying to kill them in the woods. And I wasn't surprised to see that of course. You know it was a crooked guy on Secret Service planted by the vice president trying to kill him.

[00:23:22] But it was also funny because the crooked Secret Service guy is Ray Stevenson. Because it does kind of have a Punisher Warzone kind of feel to it. It's actually worth watching if you just want another campy outrageous movie. Air Force One meets Hard Target. There you go. So yeah. This big game should have had more love. Because Jackson got to play the fucking president.

[00:23:51] And despite again having a limited release. It was just kind of like Hard Target meets Air Force One. It was the perfect kind of just genre mashup. It was by the guy who did Rare Exports. So he was. It's like they said it best. It was just like a deliberately over the top movie. And the decent actors help it out best. It would definitely be a perfect double feature for those who like the Olympus has fallen films.

[00:24:19] Or even just some of the other just over the top die hard type films. Surprisingly. Despite being PG-13. It still got off some over the top language and fun. If you like the Red films or Expendables. This would be perfect. Because it would just be like this is an action comedy that was deliberate. I mean even Punisher Warzone. Which coincidentally Ray Stevenson is in both of these. It's like yeah.

[00:24:49] It's like The Substitute. One of those over the top movies that's in on the joke. While still having some fun stuff. To remind you to just keep watching. And it ends up being like a boat battle at the end. And they just find other stuff to just kind of just layer it. And make you just really just be engaged with it. Instead of okay. You know. Even like the Hitman's Bodyguard first film. It was like Jackson is in both these.

[00:25:20] And the movies are consistent with their over the top lethal weapon type physics. While also acknowledging oh I shouldn't even be alive right now. It's like just it's just enough. To make it just be a field up tank. And even if you never watch it again. You'll still just remember all the shit eating grins you had on your face while watching it. But that's it for this chapter of Jackson. Thank you for listening all. We love doing these actor and filmmaker retrospects. We'll try to keep up the good work.

[00:25:49] But I hope we entertained your eardrums. Keep listening. Feel free to engage with us on all the social platforms. We'll actually reply back. And maybe invite you on the show. If you want to be part of the discussion. So enjoy. On the next one. How about the Sunset Limited? It's basically a one act stage play. That was written by and directed by and co-star Tommy Lee Johns.

[00:26:14] Where he and Jones just basically play friends with rival viewpoints. Just having a very stubborn dinner conversation. It's pretty edgy for an HBO movie of recent years. But I was taken aback by it. Because I didn't expect it to be that kind of just well orchestrated. Just a one location. One just kind of gimmick. And before I knew it. It just time had gone by fast. It was just a straightforward kind of interesting character study.

[00:26:44] You felt. The filmmakers managed to make just kind of the quirks of real life. Very interesting. Instead of just feel uninspired. And just record with a camera one day. So. Sunset Limited everybody. This is some fucked up repugnant shit. We'll return after these messages. Alright folks. How's back here? We got a 90 minute weekly Shack Stop. It's growing all over the world.

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