Girls, Drugs, and Guns. Now how about a point?

As a fan of 60’s and 70’s exploitation flicks, it really bums me out when a movie makes naked nubile beauties snorting coke, turning tricks, and blowing people’s brains out unappealing. 2004’s Greek powerhouse of style attempting to masquerade as substance, Hardcore, is just that film.
No really, kiddies, I’m just kidding. Sex, drugs, and violence are bad and shouldn’t be celebrated in film. Well, that is unless they are presented in a fun manner. Hardcore is not fun. It’s not really even that entertaining. And for the trench coat faction of you out there it’s not even very erotic. It just kind of sits there like a million other pretentious arty films that wallow in sensational topics just to get attention but offer little in story or substance.
Well, at least the chicks are hot.

Hardcore follows two teenage prostitutes in Athens, Nadia (Katerina Tsavalou) and Martha (Danae Skiadi), who fall in love with each other (even though they both have fellow prostitute boyfriends), kill their pimp, blame it on one of the boyfriends, and go off together as Nadia becomes a famous TV star and model. The ups and downs of their twisted relationship are explored while Nadia, who is the “bad girl” of the two, screws her way up the corporate entertainment ladder and Martha declines into a life of drug abuse and depression. Some sort of redemption supposedly takes place at the end, but it beats me what that is.

It’s kind of unfortunate that the story is so silly and pointless because the look of the film is great. Hardcore is director DennisIliadis’s first feature film and he does a great job of presenting the world these two live in as a dark, disturbing place. There are a few fantasy-type sequences in which Martha is dreaming of a better life that are really well done but are unfortunately like small diamonds periodically peeking out of a vast pool of foul, slimy, sewage.

Alright, I have another thing to get off my chest: I hated Leaving Las Vegas. That movie was, to me, a nihilistic exercise in depravity that had no point, no redeeming value, and was absolutely no fun. Hardcore seems to follow along the same lines as Leaving Las Vegas, and I enjoyed it about as much. I guess I just don’t get this kind of film-making because Leaving Las Vegas received a lot of critical acclaim when it came out and I’m sure somebody is going to think Hardcore is utterly brilliant. True, it’s visually appealing and clever at times, but it’s ultimately a waste of time.

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Universal is the real jerk on this skimpy DVD

“Whaddya mean you’ve never seen The Jerk?!?!?!?” is the usual response I got when people found out I had never seen the 1979 comedy favorite starring Steve Martin. I am slightly embarrassed that this incredibly popular movie somehow eluded me all these years and I am delighted to be reviewing Universal’s new 26th Anniversary Edition DVD for you loyal Razorfine readers.
Unfortunately, any promise the words “Anniversary Edition” might hold for this disc to be truly special are squelched when one looks at the back cover and sees the near complete lack of bonus features. Well, at least the movie is really funny.

The Jerk tells the story of a very stupid man, Navin Johnson (Steve Martin), as he leaves home for the first time and travels around the country looking for fame and fortune. Raised by a poor black family in Mississippi, Navin hears watered-down jazz music on the radio and is inspired to get out and find what life has waiting for him. On his way he works at a gas station for Jackie Mason, gets a job with a carnival, falls in love with Burnadette Peters, and invents an eyeglass apparatus that makes him a millionaire. Throughout all of this, Navin never gets any smarter, and his stupidity finally leads him to losing his entire fortune.

Martin plays the idiot brilliantly in his first starring role in a feature film. He also had a hand in the writing of the screenplay, which combined with his expert comedy timing and delivery make the film an incredibly goofy, funny viewing experience.

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Must Love Dogs Tries to Defy Summer Fluff but it falls short, despite a stellar cast of seasoned, comic actors.
Wasn’t it only three years ago that Oscar nominated , Diane Lane, was in her full, sensuous glory, creating steamy, screen heat with hunky Olivier Martinez and driving a tame, detached Richard Gere to murder, in order to keep her, in “Unfaithful?” Still graced with the that rare kind of natural beauty that would turn both men and women’s heads, as she entered any room, we now have to watch as Diane Lane is cast as a woman who can’t get a date, on her own, in an easy to digest, romantic comedy, Must Love Dogs. The hard part is that we have to believe in her struggles to find a date, then love, in order for this film to work at all.

It has been eight months since pre-school teacher, Sarah’s (Diane Lane) divorce. Her large, close-knit, Irish-Catholic family is determined to help her get out of her pajamas and into someone else’s. We first meet this interfering clan, crowded in Sarah’s kitchen, all bearing photos of their idea of a perfect man for her. It doesn’t matter if he is married, divorced, gay, an anonymous model from a magazine, the main criteria is that they are male and a potential date and will get Sarah back into the living and loving segment of society.
Sarah’s glib sister, Carol (Elizabeth Perkins, who throws out some funny, pointed lines, a la Eve Arden at her gal pal best) decides to create an online profile and set Sarah up on potential dates, all without her prior knowledge. With too little prodding, Sarah dives into her love assignment, setting up a sometimes funny montage of stereotypical, bad first dates. We get a look of what is out there for single women over forty : someone who is too close for comfort, a jerk who tells her to her radiant face that she is too old, he likes them around 18 (so why did he answer her ad), a depressed crybaby and one who is looking for a some mild, kinky action.
At the same time we watch Sarah’s searches unfold, we are introduced to freshly divorced, Jake (John Cusack), a sensitive renaissance man, who designs and builds wood rowing skulls, the old world way. He is also reluctant to get back into the dating world and would rather watch Doctor Zhivago for the millionth time.
Sarah’s sister, Carol, has not given up, despite never having to go on any of the bad dates and places a new ad and a new criteria. The potential suitor must love dogs. This is the ad that catches a non dog owning Jake’s eye. Oh, Sarah doesn’t own a dog either, so both “rent” a pooch for the date. Of course, this first meeting has to go badly because neither are honest and Carol has added some extra breast tissue to Sarah that just isn’t there and Jake calls her on her breast reduction. It is a combination of first date nerves, fear of acknowledging chemistry and confronting each other’s dishonesty that convinces Sarah to cut it short and flee.
Yes, these two are meant to be together, but, before this can happen, we are must go through a land mind of misunderstandings, road blocks, missed meetings and a side sexual attraction between Sarah and one of her student’s separated father, a pseudo-quasi-renaissance man, Bobby (Dermot Mulroney).
Meanwhile, Sarah’s suave, handsome, refined, widowed father, Bill (Christopher Plummer) is involved in his own online dating entanglements. Unlike his gun shy daughter, Bill wants to date as many women as possible. One of the three of his steady dates is the flamboyant, trailer park-living, Dolly (Stockard Channing in the film’s most honest character). We discover that there is a huge heart underneath all the make up and turquoise jewelry .
By coincidence, the handsome Bobby and his cute son, also live in the same trailer park as Dolly, so he and Sarah can conveniently run into each other outside the preschool and explore their mutual heat for each other.
Even though Sarah has found two interesting possibilities in both Jake and Billy, she continues her online search, this time with confidence and on her own, setting up another round of not so amusing bad-date montages.
Sarah is constantly being bombarded with advice and interference from her well-meaning family, but, luckily she has the now standard, gay best friend and co-worker, Leo (Brad William Henke) who represents the voice of reason.
Will Sarah chose the sensitive Jake or the dangerously handsome Bobby? Will her family leave her alone long enough for her to choose? Will we even care?

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