American Gigolo

American Gigolo

The film that set the style for the 80s

Every so often a film comes along that defines the look of an era. On February 1, 1980 the film American Gigolo was released, making it among the first major studio films of that decade, and the look of the film set the stage for a radical change in style for the 1980s. Gone were bell bottoms, leisure suits, wide ties and brown, orange and green clothes. Even the film's poster, featuring the film's lead, Richard Gere smartly dressed in an austere environment, in the striped shadows of a Venetian blind exudes 80s cool.

The film opens up with to the strains of Blondie's "Call Me", a song that practically epitomizes 80s New Wave, and quite frankly is far more memorable than the film itself. Though the movie defines the look of the of the 1980s, it's hardly notable for much else. The plot is a plodding two hours of conventional melodrama with Gere's character Julian sleeping with wealthy women, and eventually framed for murdering one of them. The film takes forever to get started, and then forever to wrap up.

Much like one of Julian's trysts - or the decade of the 1980s itself for that matter - American Gigolo is ultimately an emotionally shallow, style over substance affair, most notable for coming along, and perhaps contributing to, a sea change in the American cultural landscape.

(*** out of *****)

Star Wars: The Last Jedi (spoiler free review)

Star Wars: The Last Jedi

(Absolutely Spoiler Free Review)

At GC8 we always try to give spoiler free reviews - but we are EXTRA cautious with the Star Wars franchise, given how everybody wants to be a blank slate going in... to try to achieve that first awe and wonder you had seeing Star Wars for the first time when you were seven years old.

What we can say is that so far the Disney films have been better than the Prequels (including the Disney film that was a prequel: Rogue One), but not as good as the original trilogy. Star Wars: The Last Jedi, continues that trend, and is probably the best of the Disney Star Wars films so far.

Having set up the story with The Force Awakens, and Rogue One, The Last Jedi is free to finally go in depth (two and a half hours of depth) to "finish" (yeah, right) what they've started.

And frankly, it's pretty good. We've finally reached a level where practical effects and CGI blend nicely, all the character get plenty of screen time, and most of the original cast is back.

The downside is that none of the new characters (Rei, Kylo, Finn, etc.) are as charismatic or interesting as Luke, Leia, C-3P0, R2-D2, and Chewbacca, and so when the latter are not on screen, you immediately miss them.

Which brings us full circle - to that biggest reason for a spoiler-free review; the desire to go in as a blank slate, and see something you've never seen before with the awe and wonder Star Wars inspired when you were seven. The reality is this series is not going to do that, and it seems almost futile to expect that it ever will again. The more jaded will say it's because you are no longer seven years old, but the reality is that there is an overall familiarity, a been-there-done-that to the series at this point. It's still entertaining and fun, just not all that surprising.








(**** out of 5)

The X-Files: I Want to Believe

The X-Files: I Want to Believe movie poster

The X-Files: I Want to Believe

After pretty much everyone had moved on, The X-Files came up with an encore performance that reminded us why we wanted to believe in the series.

There comes a point in almost every TV series, where the show peaks after which comes a decline and eventual cancellation. Time and time again we've seen that, with rare exception, it's almost always a downhill slide, often with an embarrassing made-for-TV "movie" pilot for a relaunch.

And so it has been for the X-Files. What started as a Kolchak: The Night Stalker type paranormal investigator show - where FBI agent, and true believer Fox Mulder, and skeptical partner Dana Scully investigated a new "X-File" each week - soon devolved into a tedious slog through an overarching alien conspiracy story with endless loose plot threads.

So it's not surprising that even many fans of the show gave up on it after it was canceled and revived to the silver screen in the film The X-Files: Fight the Future, which centered again on the alien conspiracy story yet still failed to resolve anything.

A decade after that film, a second X-Files film made it to the screen, The X-Files: I Want to Believe. Judging by the box office numbers, even most fans chose to pass on this one. It did only about 10% of the ticket sales of Fight the Future.

That's a shame, because The X-Files: I Want to Believe is actually a far superior film. Almost completely ignoring the alien conspiracy angle it focuses on what the show did best - the standalone supernatural thriller.

The plot involves a now retired Mulder and Scully, who are drawn back in to help the FBI when an agent disappears and the only clue to her whereabouts are discovered by a priest with psychic visions. The case soon puts Mulder, Scully and the FBI on the trail of an organ harvesting ring. In doing so, Mulder and Scully must face some of their biggest personal demons, Mulder's obsession with his sister's abduction and Scully's Catholic faith, as well as their inability to commit to each other. But all this character development is handled deftly, without taking away from the driving plot, and one would need no prior knowledge of the series to understand the central premise: both characters want to believe in something.

David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson have rarely looked or acted this well on any screen, large or small, and while it's not as good as the best episodes of the series itself, this "forgotten" X-Files film was at least as good, if not better than most Hollywood's other "supernatural thrillers" that were all the rage (thanks at least in part to the success of The X-Files on television) in the first decade of the 2000s.

It would take nearly another decade before the series would return to TV, bumbling along with predictably middling reviews, but The X-Files: I Want to Believe stands as a glimpse at the promise the series once had.

(***1/2 out of *****)