Director Report Card: Joe Dante (1997)

13. The Second Civil War

On the surface, most of Joe Dante's films do not seem especially political. Sure, you can read into the way the gremlins tear down the suburban settings or the towering symbol of big business. Or the darkness hiding under a similarly ideal community in “The 'Burbs.” I mean, that's exactly what I've done throughout this Director Report Card. Yet, for the most part, the chaotic comedy and monster kid homages in Dante's films do not provide probing insight into America's society or politics. He seems like a film nerd making movies for other film nerds, more often than not.

However, Dante has occasionally touched upon explicitly political messages in his work. Weirdly, this side of the director tends to come through more in his television work. Look at his two “Masters of Horror” episodes. “Homecoming” is an explicit critique of the Bush II administration while “The Screwfly Solution” directly takes on American gender politics. An earlier example is “The Second Civil War.” A television film made for HBO, it aired in 1997 without drawing much attention. (Though it did win a Primetime Emmy and drag a few obscure nominations here and there.) In 2019 though, this critique of a divided America comes off as way more relevant than ever anticipated.

Set at an undetermined point in the then-future, “The Second Civil War” takes place in an America on the brink of upheaval. A charity has announced that they are planning on transporting a group of Pakistani refugees – the result of a nuclear war along the Indian border – to their base in Idaho. In response, the xenophobic governor of the state, Jim Farley, is planning on closing the state's borders. This creates a constitutional crisis. The President of the United States issued an ultimatum: Either desist with the closed border in 63 hours or national troops will be sent in. A racially divided United States proves more supportive of Farley, who has his own personal problems, than anticipated. Soon, America is on the verge of civil war, as militias and bodies within the U.S. military threaten to stand against American troops on the Idaho border.

In 1997, “The Second Civil War” was an exaggeration of fringe beliefs and concepts boiling inside American culture. In 2019, it's basically a documentary. The film depicts an America more xenophobic than ever before, where people on the right are freaking out about refugees from the Middle East. In response to this, borders are closed. Gun-totting rednecks and lunatics, fancying themselves patriots and true Americans, are ready to fight back against these immigrants and their own countrymen. Meanwhile, politicians say things that are totally opposed to their own beliefs and actions just to win points with their base. This obviously mirrors our modern world in eerie ways. Just do a Google search for the film's title and see how many hits you get from websites actually speculating about the possibility of a real second civil war. Though not even a satire as eerily accurate as “The Second Civil War” would've guessed that the President would be a failed casino owner/former game show host.

“The Second Civil War” might've been weirdly forward-thinking in many ways. However, it was way off in some ways. In the America of “The Second Civil War,” different parts of the country are dominated by non-white races. California is populated almost exclusively by non-English speaking Latinos. A sudden influx of Asian immigrants to Rhode Island has made the union's smallest state a prominently Chinese neighborhood. The Hindu population has exploded in Alabama. Former L.A. gang members are now senators. This is one prediction that clearly didn't come to pass. Moreover, it comes off as pretty clumsy. Depending on the light you read it in, the idea of different races self-segregating and dominating entire states plays into the worst fears of the radical right.

But let's not get hung up on the various ways “The Second Civil War” predict our current predicament or was way off the mark. This is a comedy, a satire. The film's biggest laughs tend to come from how the characters' incredibly petty desires contrast against their political decisions. Farley's isolationist politics has pushed America to the brink of war. This isn't what's really on his mind. Instead, he's utterly obsessed with Christina, a Latina news reporter he previously had an affair with. She has left him, partially do to his racist rhetoric, and he just can't get over it. Everything he does is directed by his libido and broken heart. The President, meanwhile, is unwilling to make any decisions. Instead, his actions are largely manipulated by lobbyiest who speak to him with meaninglessly broad historical references. Meanwhile, he decides to move his deadline ahead a few hours so as not to delay a soap opera broadcast. The woman running the immigration charity is constantly sore that other charities get more attention. This future where big decisions that affect all of society are influenced by the the pettiest of bullshit is also a scarily accurate reflection of our own time. And, maybe, it's always been true.

If the film's biggest laughs come from the contrast between public figure's decisions and their personal failings, its second biggest laughs come from its treatment of the media. In this future, the media is essentially torn between people who want to report the truth and businessmen who only care about ratings. (The rise of fake news and conspiracy theorists posing as journalists is another thing the filmmakers couldn't predict.) Producers argue about which massacres they should mention, so as not to alienate any profitable demographics. Others discuss the most commercial ways to sell the American public on the immigrant orphans. One of the film's funniest moments occurs when a co-anchor cracks up during a live broadcast, no longer being able to contain her emotions.

As funny as “The Second Civil War” can be, the film also lurches awkwardly towards other moods at times. There are pretty serious moments here. The angered Mexican population of Texas decide to burn the Alamo down. In retaliation, white nationalist blow up the Statue of Liberty, objecting to the message on her stone slate. These are pretty grave moments that exist alongside moments of wackier comedy. So is a scene of when the fighting breaks out on the Idaho border, where people are being gunned down and then Dick Miller cracks a one-liner. The overall flippant tone ends up jiving body with more serious attempts at political points, like a tender conversation with James Earl Jones' reporter and that gang-member-turned-senator.

The biggest problem “The Second Civil War” has is how damn shaggy it is. You have to wonder if writer Martyn Burke always intended this as a feature film. This is a ninety-three minute long television movie. It contains enough plot points and characters for an entire season of television. There's over a dozen named characters, each with their own histories, which we only get a peek at here. So much happens over the course of the script, so many events transpiring as the Idaho conflict veers towards actual bloodshed, that the viewer can get a little lost. You can easily see this being stretched out a little more, many of these story turns and plot twists being given more time to breath.

The Emmy “The Second Civil War” won was for Beau Bridges as Farley. Beau is, in fact, hilarious. When the cameras on him, he passionately spits speeches about putting America first. (He even delivers a line about restoring America to its former glory, that plays like a less catchy “Make America Great Again.”) In private, he's a neurotic mess that refuses to let go of a one night stand that probably hates him. Beau plays these two sides nicely, often getting laughs from his pathetic ramblings. Phil Hartman, meanwhile, is perfectly cast as the child-like President who is preoccupied with recreating the great presidents before him. An authority figure that is hopelessly over-his-head but unwilling to relent his power is an ideal part for the hilarious stylings of the late, great Hartman.

The stacked supporting cast features quite a few names. James Earl Jones, likely cast do to his iconic turn as the announcer of CNN, appears as the most principled of the network's journalists. Few performers project gravitas the way Jones does and he certainly roots the film's more serious themes, even if they don't entirely work. James Coburn has a very funny role as the main lobbyist pulling the President's strings. Coburn brings a musical quality to his dialogue, often making certain phrases hilarious just from the way he says them. Dan Hedaya is also funny as the put upon head of the news network, always pushing for bigger ratings. Elizabeth Pena gets the most out of scenes that have her reacting to Bridge's ridiculousness.

There's few corners of the film that aren't filled with some recognizable face or another. Ron Perlman shows up as one of the more outspoken producers in the news network, whose left-wing politics frequently see him butting heads with his more conservative co-workers. Dennis Leary shows up as a field reporter, doing his typical Leary schtick – swearing a lot and acting outraged – to varying degrees of success. Dante brings along plenty of his house players too. There's Robert Picardo as the network's technology expert. Here's Dick Miller as the cameraman dropped into the soon-to-be war zone. How about Rance Howard as one of the more clueless would-be minute men? Or Roger Corman as the calculating money man on the network? Kevin McCarthy and Belinda Balaski are somewhere in there too.

I don't think “The Second Civil War” totally works. Time has rendered its satire fact, making it more depressing to watch now than back in 1997. The film's script is overstuffed and not all of its ideas land. Yet it's such an ambitious movie, especially for a television production. (The film's scope was rewarded in some overseas markets, where it played theatrically.) This is a film with some really big ideas, making biting and perceptive points about American life. Obviously, it was really ahead of the curve on a lot of these issues as well. Some have hailed it as Dante's overlooked masterpiece, which is a statement I'm tempted to agree with even if I don't like the movie anywhere near that much. [Grade: B]

RECENT WATCHES: The Howling: New Moon Rising (1994)

From any sort of narrative perspective, most of the “Howling” films are unrelated to each other. Aside from a token attempt to link “Your Sister is a Werewolf” to the original, only the presence of werewolves connected the rest of the films. Behind the scenes, however, there’s a little more conjunctive fibers. Phillippe Nora directed two and three, after all. Producers Steven A. Lane and Robert Pringle were involved with nearly the entire series. And then there's Clive Turner. Turner produced, co-wrote, and acted in “Howlings” four and five, even doing some uncredited directorial work on “The Original Nightmare.” Turner's enthusiasm for “The Howling” was such that he would be the primary creative force behind the seventh entry in the series, “The Howling: New Moon Rising.” The resulting film is easily among the oddest sequels in a semi-well known horror franchise I've ever seen.

A dead body is found outside the small town of Pioneerville, California. A detective is dispatched to investigate, soon teaming up with a Catholic priest who is convinced a demonic werewolf is behind the slayings. Though the detective is skeptical at first, the priest's thorough research soon convinces him. Meanwhile, a mysterious Australian man named Ted arrives in Pioneerville. He befriends the townsfolk, romancing a local woman and spending time at the country-and-western bar. However, some people begin to suspect that Ted and the mysterious werewolf murders in the night may be linked.

Once upon a time, another low budget werewolf feature was described as “a movie that takes it time and hangs around in bars.” This sentence rather literally describes “New Moon Rising.” Well over seventy percent of the seventh “Howling” movie is devoted to the locals of Pioneerville – playing themselves – sitting in a honky-tonk bar. They drink and clean up tables. They listen and play a lot of country and western music, sometimes while line dancing. They trade in-jokes and personal anecdotes that must be hilarious if you knew these people personally. In fact, “New Moon Rising's” status as a werewolf movie seems incidental to its actual goal. Clive Turner fell in love with the residents of Pioneerville. He wanted to share them with the rest of the world, producing a whole film around this purpose. This essentially makes “New Moon Rising” an elaborate home movie.

Despite clearly not being that interested in making a werewolf movie, Turner was also determined to make “New Moon Rising” the caper on a trilogy. The film weaves “The Original Nightmare,” “The Rebirth,” and this film – the three “Howling” sequels Turner was involved with, incidentally – into one story. It does not do this elegantly. The story of the detective and the priest is largely disconnected from the rest of the movie, at first. Long scenes are devoted to the priest dumping exposition on the cop. Quickly, this devolves into extensive stock footage from the fourth and fifth film, as these unrelated stories are awkwardly woven together into one story. Turner at least went to the effort to get Romy Windsor, the protagonist of part four, back for a brief part. (That the superior “Howling VI” is left out of the movie's lore makes “New Moon Rising” seem even more like an ugly vanity project for Turner.)

“The Howling VII” very rarely attempts to be a real movie. For most of its run time, it exists as an extremely shaggy combination of a franchise clip show and footage of Clive Turner and his friends hanging out. There are no actual werewolf attacks in the film. Instead, we get recycled footage from previous movies and red-tinted point-of-view shots. In its last third, “New Moon Rising” remembers that movies are suppose to have actual plots. At this point, there are even more awkward plot points sorted out through exposition. The werewolf's identity is bluntly revealed. (Apparently werewolves can change their appearance.) This leads to our on-screen transformation... Which is accomplished by having the actor's face crudely morph into a werewolf head that wouldn't pass mustard as a Halloween mask. The film then ends abruptly, with yet more singing and dancing.

In other words, “The Howling: New Moon Rising” is one of the damnest films I've ever seen. It does not follow the rules movies are suppose to, clearly being the work of amateurs. If you go in expecting a werewolf movie that follows the traditional trajectory of cinematic art, you'll probably agree with those that say “Howling VII” is among the worst werewolf movies ever made. If you go in expecting a piece of outsider art, a baffling homage to a small town and the people who live there, you'll get a lot more out of it. Turner somehow tricked New Line Home Video into distributing this on video, meaning they could slap “From the Creators of “A Nightmare on Elm Street”” on the box, but it remains unreleased on DVD. Granted, this is still a pretty bad movie no matter how you slice it. Yet it's a fascinating bad movie, one that makes you wonder how the hell it got made. [4/10] 

Director Report Card: Joe Dante (1994)

12. Runaway Daughters

Not that long ago, I was talking about the “Rebel Highway” series of TV movies. For those that need a refresher, in the mid-nineties, the son of Sam Z. Arkoff had an idea. He would give the titles of a bunch of his dad's old A.I.P. movies to a group of filmmakers, composed of old cult favorites and up-and-comers. They could make any movie they wanted with these titles and the finished products were broadcast on Showtime on a weekly basis. Joe Dante being selected as one of the directors to participate in “Rebel Highway” was somewhat ironic. Dante – along with fellow “Rebel Highway” directors, Alan Arkush and Jonathan Kaplan – had gotten his start at Roger Corman's New World Picture, the direct descendant of sorts of A.I.P.  Considering his obvious love of A.I.P and fifties pop culture, Dante seemed like an obvious pick to helm this kind of project.

Like all of the “Rebel Highways” movies, Dante's “Runaway Daughters” is nothing but the loosest remake of the 1956 film it takes its name from. The primary connection is that both movies follow a trio of teenage girls who runaway from home. Good girl Laura, bad girl Angie, and something-in-between Mary are the best of friends. Each has their struggles with parents and boyfriends. Mary's boyfriend, Bob, pressures her into going further than ever before. Afterwards, she fears she's become pregnant. When Bob hears this, he runs off to join the Army. Incensed, Angie talks Mary and Laura to go on a road trip to track Bob down. In order to get away with it, they send fake ransom notes to their parents, making it appear they have been kidnapped.

“Runaway Daughters” is the last of three films Charlie Haas would write for Joe Dante. This trio of films don't exactly form a thematic trilogy of sorts, as “Gremlins 2” doesn't connect much with the other two. However, one can't help but see “Matinee” and “Runaway Daughters” as complimenting movies. While “Runaway Daughters” is set a few years before “Matinee” – 1956 versus 1962 – both have that nostalgic approach to them. Both are awash in the signifiers of the baby boomer's childhood. Here, we see the greaser boyfriend again, this time played by an absolutely baby-faced Paul Rudd. We see the drive-in movie theater, which is always showing old monster movie or vintage teen flicks. (Including, paradoxically, the movie this film is a remake of.) There are big cars, bee hives, poodle skirts, and golden oldies on the radios.

Yet, in some ways, “Runaway Daughters” seems less reflective on these nostalgic tendencies than Dante's previous films. We do not see the full-blown destruction of the Capra-esque small town, as seen in “Gremlins.” We don't even really get the nudging mockery of 1950s foibles that we got in “Matinee.” There's a little bit of that. While on their road trip, Mary and Angie are cornered by a pair of small town cops, who are fully determined to use their power as cops to assault these teenage girls. Laura saves the day by shotgunning the cops' car. Aside from that, “Runaway Daughters” plays it pretty straight. This is a movie about how the fifties were pretty great.

Or, at least, the fifties that exists in our collective pop culture unconscious. The first “Rebel Highway” entry was Robert Rodriguez' “Road Racers,” which exaggerated fifties teensploitation stereotypes to their self-destructive extreme. While “Runaway Daughters” is a much, much gentler film, Dante is similarly interestingly in stretching these ideas to their furthest point. So, at times, this film almost plays like a parody of the movies it's celebrating. The greaser boyfriend is such a mysterious bad-ass, he's only capable of barking about his independence to his dad. That Dante-esque impish sense of humor peers through, in moments when a clueless cop writes down a suggestion from a parent. Or Dick Miller as a private detective describes all the bad shit teenagers can get up too.

These comedy elements sometimes feel at odds with the rest of the movie. For long stretches of its run time, “Runaway Daughters” is a fairly sincere movie. The characters and their plight are taken seriously. So the more outwardly humorous moments, like Laura running away from an argument with her mom into a total stranger's home, feel slightly out of place. This is not the only odd tonal shift in the film. Midway through, another police officer guns down a guy right in front of the girls. A very sloppy explanation follows but it's still a harsh, violent moment that really sticks out.

What's most frustrating about “Runaway Daughters,” about its inconsistent tone and straight-ahead approach to fifties nostalgia, is that it was very nearly something really interesting and subversive. There's something potent about a story of teenage girls running away from home, defying the authority figures in their lives, to punish a selfish boy that did one of them wrong. You can feel that sense of sisterhood in fun scenes of the three of them eating around a camp fire. Or just driving around in their car, chatting. Despite that really cathartic moment where Laura destroys the cop car, “Runaway Daughters” stops just shy of embracing this girl power message. Bob gets his just dessert but every other girl goes back to their boyfriends, the status quo being restored at the end.

I don't know how much creative freedom the “Rebel highway” filmmakers were truly granted for their films. I imagine they were probably on a pretty tight shooting schedule. At times, “Runaway Daughters” really does feel exactly like the cheap television it actually was. There's a rather flat look to many of the sequences, as characters just stand around and talk or come and go from their various destination. This is most apparent at the end, when the end credits play over images of the actors from earlier in the movie. This just strikes me as such a cheesy artifact of mid-nineties television.

I don't know, maybe I'm being kind of hard on the film in that department. Dante and his team does, occasionally, create a memorable image. For some reason, the interior shots of the houses look really great. There's a wonderfully atmospheric shot of a cop taking notes from the parents, shadows draping over the actors and the set in a really neat way. We get a similarly smoky approach in a shot of Angie and her boyfriend riding in his car. While the characters talk a lot about Sputnik without the famous satellite really meaning anything to the plot, I did dig that final zoom-up from Earth into space, focusing in on the same satellite as it journeys around the globe.

“Runaway Daughters” does have a likable cast. The three actresses playing our main girls are fun to be around. Julie Bowen, as Angie, gets top billing even though she's not the main character. Bowen brings an amusing amount of attitude to the bad girl part, nicely conveying how few fucks Angie gives. Holly Fields as Mary is the story's actual protagonist. Fields has the right amount of vulnerability, making Mary wounded but not insufferable. She has a good scene with a cat, showing off how right she got this mixture. My favorite of the three might be Jenny Lewis as Laura. Lewis is hilarious, showing Laura's sexual frustration through comedic actions.

The DVD case of “Runaway Daughters” makes sure to highlight that Paul Rudd is in this movie. (To be fair, he was also on the original VHS box too.) He plays Angie's boyfriend and fills the role of stereotypical bad boy greaser. Rudd is actually quite good at this, as he pairs smoldering eyes with pretty boy looks. The weasally Chris Young is also well cast as Bob. This being a Joe Dante movie, Dick Miller appears as well. He has a highly amusing role as the detective hired to find the girls. Miller plays the hard-boiled guy as someone exasperated with the world today but in a very self-aware and comedic fashion.

Naturally, another way you can tell this is a Joe Dante movie is the number of cameos he packs in from various cult actors. Robert Picardo, hilariously high-strung, appears as Laura's dad with Belinda Balaski as Mary's mom. (Joe Flaherty appears as her dad, slinging fast food at the drive-in.) Dee Wallace and Christopher Stone are Angie's parents, both highly amusing despite their few scenes. Don Steele, unseen but present nevertheless, is another Dante regular in this film. John Astin and Rance Howard appear briefly as parts of a random militia, being nicely over the top. Lastly, Roger Corman walks on-screen and gets a laugh out of me.

As I've said before, “Rebel Highways” was cooler in concept than execution. Despite an interesting selection of talent – William Friedkin, Ralph Bakshi, and John Milius also made some – very few of the films proved especially memorable. “Runaway Daughters” is probably the second most notable of the series, since it fits in pretty well with the rest of Dante's career. Still, I wish the movie was better. It's mildly entertaining, has some interesting ideas, but more-often-than-not feels like the quickie TV project it absolutely was. I guess even really distinctive filmmakers can only do so much when working on a tight budget and a speedy production schedule. [Grade: C+]

Director Report Card: Tim Burton (2019)

19. Dumbo

Look, I'm a big fan of the Disney Animated Features and I'm obviously fond of big budget, special effects filled spectacle. But this wave of big budget remakes Disney has made of their various classic cartoons? At best, they are usually deeply unnecessary exercise. At worst, they range from nearly shot-for-shot remakes to films that actively betray the themes of the original story. Tim Burton can take some blame for starting this mess, as the billion dollar success of his “Alice in Wonderland” urged Disney on. They show no signs of slowing down, as 2019 alone sees them rolling out quote-unquote live action versions of “Aladdin,” “The Lion King,” “Lady and the Tramp,” a sequel to “Maleficent,” and Tim Burton's “Dumbo.” Considering my obvious lack of enthusiasm for his prior stab at this, it was hard to get excited for Burton remaking an old Disney cartoon again.

The original “Dumbo” runs barely over an hour and contains no major human characters. This means Burton's “Dumbo” has to expand upon the plot greatly. The basic are still the same: Mrs. Jumbo gifts the circus with a new baby elephant. The new baby, quickly named Dumbo, is born with giant ears that get him mocked. However, when he grasps a lucky feather, he can use his huge ears to fly, making him a star act of the circus. Soon, he uses his ability to rescue his mother. Added to this plot line is recently returned war veteran/amputee Holt Farrier and his recently motherless kids, Milly and Joe. The kids have a special bond with the little elephant. When news of the act reaches millionaire theme park owner V.A. Vandevere, he purchases the entire circus. Vandevere's intentions are less than benevolent though.

Many of these live action remakes Disney have rolled out are largely shot on green screens. This blurs the line between live action and animation, as Jon Favreau's “Jungle Book” was computer generated save for one actor while his upcoming “Lion King” is entirely CGI. Burton's “Alice in Wonderland” largely depended on real actors performing on sets made in a computer. Burton's “Dumbo” takes a similar approach. At first, this is hugely jarring. Seeing real people perform before clearly unreal surroundings, sometimes wearing clearly CGI outfits, makes everything look plastic-y and weightless. However, as “Dumbo” goes on and the story grows increasingly surreal, this starts to work in the film's favor. Maybe “Dumbo” is suppose to look artificial, to further facilitate a dream-like and fantastical atmosphere.

Burton's “Alice in Wonderland” was depressingly free of his stylistic trademarks. At first, his “Dumbo” looks much the same, as it joylessly marches through the original's story beats but stripped of their whimsy. However, once Vandevere enters the film and the story moves to his Dreamland park, things pick up. Dreamland includes a hall of horrors, inhabited by regular animals dressed up as fictional monsters. Shots of a “werewolf” howling in the fog or a crocodile outfitted with fake horns – a possible slurpasaur homage? – reminds us of Tim Burton's earlier films. A Robby-like robot appears rather randomly, as does a highly anachronistic mechanical hand. His take on the “Pink Elephants on Parade” sequence, performed entirely in bubbles and partially seen reflected in Dumbo's eyes, is a similarly dream-like sequence. It's good to know that Burton can occasionally grab some of the spark that made him interesting in the first place.

Even in the cartoon, Dumbo didn't talk. Creating a film where your title character is both silent and created in a computer presents some challenge. Amazingly, Dumbo in 2019's “Dumbo” works. First off, he's genuinely adorable. He doesn't look like a real elephant but he's an awfully cute approximation. More importantly, the film captures Dumbo's vulnerability and his connection to his mother, making the audience want to see him succeed. A flying elephant doesn't look real. That's where the film's surreal tone comes in handy. However, the scenes of Dumbo flying are still exciting and inspiring. As if to make the audience relate even more to Dumbo, Burton's film often assumes his point of view.

Danny DeVito supposedly signed onto “Dumbo” so he and Burton could complete their “Circus Trilogy.” It is true that Burton has shown a particular fondness for the circus before, in “Big Fish” and parts of “Batman Returns.” Large parts of “Dumbo” are devoted to the sense of family formed among circus performers. Everyone in the circus stands up for Dumbo and his mom. Yet Burton seems even more fond of what an extended confidence act the circus is. Ringmaster Medici has few people filling multiple roles at the circus, the strongman doubling as a orchestra leader for one example. He isn't great about paying people, extending promises he doesn't always keep. There's something sweet about how this big mess is held together by everyone loving it so much.

Burton has certainly expressed his love of ramshackle establishments running on pure sincerity before. Dumbo and the circus around him emerge as another set of Burtonian misfits, fighting against conformity. Weirdly, Burton chooses this material to bring a political context to his usual tropes. Medici's Circus is a small business. It gets scooped up by Vandevere's Dreamland, a bigger and glossier establishment worth millions. Yet Vandevere doesn't care about the little workers his company has absorbed, deciding to fire them shortly after hiring them. His establishment is soon exposed as flashy but hollow. The way a rich man commodifies unique and special things – by selling stuffed animals of Dumbo – is either Burton biting the corporate Disney hand that feeds him or the movie being especially blatant about its toy tie-ins.

These anti-big business themes are certainly more compelling, and unexpected, than some of the other ideas floating around inside “Dumbo.” This is a movie that purports to support animal rights while also trumpeting a love for the circus. A circus in 1919 even, a time and place that almost assuredly saw its share of casual animal abuse. Nevertheless, the ultimate goal of the story is to release Dumbo back into the wild. This is especially apparent during a closing scene where Medici talks directly to the viewer and mentions how free and comfortable their animals are. It's absolutely a good message but I don't think this story – which also plays an imperiled monkey for occasional laughs – was the best place to make it.

At times, “Dumbo” really does feel like three different movies shoved into one. You have a cutesy CGI remake of the original “Dumbo,” you have a story about a little circus being bought up by a big circus, and you have a story of a family recovering from their mother's death. Weirdly, that last story is the one that feels the most childish. The dead mom is just a prop, a clumsy way of connecting the children with Dumbo, who is missing his own mom. We never get a sense of who their mother was. We also never get the feeling that Holt is mourning his own wife very much, as he seems much more upset by Medici selling his horses and slightly annoyed by how clearly traumatized his kids are.

I hate to say this but a big reason why that particular subplot doesn't work, aside from it just being really underwritten, is that the child actors aren't very good. Nico Parker and Finley Hobbins are making their debuts here. Parker as Milly, who Burton makes up to look a lot like one of Margaret Keane's big eyed waifs, speaks most of her lines in a blank monotone. It doesn't help that she's given some truly tin-earred exposition to deliver too. Hobbins, as Jack, is among the film's most underdeveloped kids. He too seems deeply uncomfortable on camera. It's not right to blame kids for these sort of things but somebody somewhere made a mistake with these leads.

But maybe the kids give lackluster performances because they are just following the lead of the movie's biggest star. Colin Farrel, playing a part probably would've gone to Johnny Depp a few years ago, is cashing a paycheck so hard. There's a lot for an actor to dig into in the part of Holt Farrier. He's a veteran of the first World War who has recently lost an arm, a loss that comes atop his wife dying while he was overseas. Instead of digging into any of that, Farrell recites his dialogue and goes through the motions without a single flicker of genuine emotion crossing his eyes. I don't know, maybe he was trying to play it stoic...

Luckily, Burton has his collection of regulars along and they are more than capable of carrying the entire film. Danny DeVito, who is very close to being the film's main character, is truly delightful as Medici. He seems in very high spirits, as a man whose childhood enthusiasm is never quite crushed despite the sadness he clearly carries around inside him. Eva Green, now thoroughly established as Burton's latest muse, soars as Colette, the trapeze artist who is slowly won over by Dumbo. That ineffable grace and wit Green brings to every role is especially well utilized here, as a character who is more complex than she initially appears. Lastly, Michael Keaton has a ton of fun hamming it up as Vandevere. Halfway between Beetlejuice and Bruce Wayne, Keaton growls and pontificates as the unscrupulous businessman. As he grows more unhinged, Keaton only becomes more entertaining.

Maybe it's because my expectations were very low but I ended up liking “Dumbo” a little more than expected. After an extremely slow first act, it picks up a lot and starts to feel a lot more like a Tim Burton movie. Granted, it's a Tim Burton movie with not nearly enough heart in its story and way too much fucking CGI but at least it's recognizable as a Burton film. As uneven as it is, it ultimately proves more interesting than “Miss Peregrine” or “Dark Shadows,” the director's anti-corporate themes emerging in a big way. And, it turns out, an adorable baby elephant goes a long way. I still can't support Disney raiding their vault for easy, nostalgia-baiting box office. (Which didn't exactly work out as well planned this time.) However, this probably emerges as my favorite of their recent remakes. [Grade: B-]

Director Report Card: Joe Dante (1993)

11. Matinee

It might seem like Joe Dante slowed down in the nineties. One might assume that few of his post-”Gremlins” films replicating that box office success might've tarnished his name a bit. Yet Dante was working hard all throughout the decade to make movies that, ultimately, never got out of Development Hell. He was attached to remakes of “The Sea Wolf” and “The Mummy,” the former with Tom Hanks and the latter with Daniel Day Lewis. He toiled for quite a while on “The Phantom,” before Simon Wincer took over. After “Termite Terrace,” a Chuck Jones biopic, fell apart, Dante decided to make a homage to another thing from his childhood he loved. “Matinee” was another Dante pictures that didn't have much of a reach in its theatrical release but became a cult favorite later on.

The year is 1962 and the place is Key West, Florida. Gene and his family, including little brother Dennis, have recently moved to town. As a Navy brat, Gene has been in many schools and hasn't made many friends. Instead, he immerses himself in monster movies. Among his favorite filmmakers is Lawrence Woolsey, a savvy businessman who sells his monster movies with in-theater gimmicks. Mr. Woolsey comes to Key West to help sell his latest epic, “Mant!,” a big bug thriller that outfits the theater with half-a-dozen gimmicks. At the same time, the tension of the Cuban Missile Crisis is rising. Soon, the residents of the town, kids and grown-ups alike, will be tossed into a panic by the encroaching threat of nuclear war.

Once again, Joe Dante dips his toes into boomer nostalgia. Unlike “Gremlins” and “It's a Nice Life,” which were ostensibly set in the modern day while heavily recalling a fifties setting, “Matinee” is explicitly a period piece. As with those Spielberg-adjacent projects, Dante creates a visually lush homage to a bygone day. There's a warmth to “Matinee.” The interior sets are painted in bright, primary colors. Many of the touch stones of the decade – fervent first kisses in the balcony of a movie theater, greasers, big cars and black-and-white TVs – are prominently featured. By making a story about childhood, set during the time when his own childhood would roughly have happened, you can see Dante indulging in some glowy nostalgia.

Yet, as he did with his previous features, Dante also takes a darker approach to the boomer blues. “Matinee” never backs down from the bullshit prominent to the Cold War era either. The girl that catches Gene's eye is Sandra. The daughter of liberal parents, she's all too willing to inform her classmates how useless duck-and-cover drills are. The hypocrisy of America loving its wars but not caring about how that attitude traumatizes kids is always in the background. The moral hypocrisies that came with that attitude arise as well, as we see Woolsey manufacturing outage to his films. Dante also has fun subverting other stereotypes of the time, as that greaser is part juvenile delinquent and part would-be Beat poet.

More than anything else, “Matinee” is a loving homage from a monster kid to the movies that inspired him. Gene is an early film nerd, recognizing the faces and names of actors and directors, reading monster magazines and studying advertisements. Unlike his timid little brother or his peers, he's not scared of these films. Instead, he feels an odd sort of comfort in these adventures. Dante, of course, pairs this genuine love with lots of in-jokes. Lawrence Woolsey is patterned after William Castle, utilizing many of the same gimmicks. (Life insurance in case the movie scares you to death, buzzers in the seat, the monster emerging off the screen.) The immediately recognizable AIP music is heard along with many period accurate posters appearing in the background.

The greatest homage in “Matinee” comes during the “Mant!” sequences. Dante happily devotes long portions of the movie's second half to this film-within-a-film. Plot wise, “Mant” is essentially a mash-up of “The Fly” and “Them!,” involving a man being bitten by a irritated ant and slowly transforming into a monster-sized ant. Specific shots and sound effects from many of these films, that fans will recognize immediately, are recreated. These hyper-specific details function in service of a pitch-perfect period of fifties nuclear panic creature features. Singular moments, like the man-ant freeing his insect brothers or his wife informing the military what to call the monster, produce big laughs. (This is where Dante slots in Kevin McCarthy's role too, a perfect placement.) “Mant!” is not the only spot-on recreation Dante includes, as he also throws in a parody of Disney family films, coining the phrase “shopping cart movie” in the process.

Beyond the plethora of knowing nods at horror/sci-fi history, “Matinee” perfectly understands why movies are important. With few actual friends of his own, Gene finds himself relating to the stars of the horror pictures he sees at theaters. He finds kinship in the screams and creature effects. This means he's especially happy to make friends with Lawrence Woolsey. Though Woolsey is partially a con artist, he's still the movie's central sage. A key sequence has Woolsey leading Gene on a tour of the movie theater. He explains the exact appeal of these movies. How they allow people to forget their troubles, to enter a world where the problems of the world are vanquished in an hour and a half. The filmmakers, speaking through Woolsey, also understand the special power of the movie theater, those grand temples of cinema where a giant screen fills the viewers' eyes and reflects their dreams back to them.

While “Matinee” is most effective as a loving homage to the atomic age of monster movies, it is also a touching coming-of-age story. Gene has his fears and insecurities. Like everyone else, the spectre of nuclear annihilation looms large in his mind. This is seen in an effective nightmare sequence, where his father's arrival home and the bombs dropping coincide. Yet the boy also does his best to interact with kids his own age. He finds a friend in Omri Katz' Stan, another outcast. Soon, he's developing a romance with Sandra. During the last act, through a rather convoluted series of events, he ends up locked in a bomb shelter with Sandra. There, both nerdy kids take their first, delicate steps towards mature romance. It's probably the film's least memorable element but is charmingly deployed never the less.

For the most part, “Matinee” is a movie grounded in reality. Yes, it's a mostly sweet recreation of an earlier period, that is full of comedic throwbacks to classic cinema, yet it's fairly realistic. Except in the last act, where Dante and his co-conspirators maybe push things too far. In a hilarious coincidence, the aforementioned psychotic greaser gets a job as the in-theater monster actor. This sets up a last act where Woolsey's gimmicks are pushed to their limit, causing the theater to tear itself apart. At this point, “Matinee” maybe gets a little too silly for its own good. The story's proper climax – the people in the theater thinking the Cold War just got hot – did not need the added melodramatics of a collapsing balcony and a daring rescue.

Despite this slip-up, “Matinee” still creates a compelling portrayal of adolescence. The cast can deserves a lot of credit for this. Simon Fenton, who has stuck almost exclusively to television throughout the rest of his career, is very good as Gene. He can capture that youthful enthusiasm while hinting at the conflict the boy feels inside. Lisa Jakub, who had a pretty good run in the nineties, is also excellent as Sandra. Her fiery intelligence and refusal to be talked down to by anyone makes it easy to imagine Gene, or any boy, falling for her. Omri Katz, who starred in the Dante-produced “Eerie, Indiana,” has a less meaty part as Stan. Still, to Katz' credit, he's likable as the goofier friend that helps Gene come out of his shell some.

Yet if one performance dominates “Matinee,” it's John Goodman as Lawrence Woolsey. It's easy to imagine that, as scripted, Woolsey came off as a more cynical character. The way he uses manipulative tactics to drum up interest in his monster movies makes him seem like a bit of a shyster. And there's definitely still some of that characterization in the final film. Yet Goodman cuts such a warm, paternal figure that you can't help but love the guy. He has a child-like twinkle in his eye, still enchanted by the magic of movies even as he explains how they're made. In an odd way, he becomes a father figure to Gene, whose actual father remains off-screen during the entire movie. Goodman is also excellent at playing it totally deadpan during Woolsey's melodramatic trailers.

Dante brings along some of his established players. Aside from McCarthy – hilarious in his brief scenes – Dick Miller and Robert Picardo are present. Miller appears as a former tough guy who now runs part of Woolsey's promotional scam. Picardo has a fairly funny bit as the deeply paranoid owner of the theater. (Belinda Dalaski and Archie Hahn are here too, even if their parts are easy to miss.) Cathy Moriarty is also notable as Ruth, Woolsey's long suffering wife and main actress. The way Moriarty can see through her director's bullshit with just a withering glare is fantastic, even if she too can't resist being charmed by him. James Villermaire is also hilarious as Harvey Starkweather, a dangerous kid driven by irrational desires but desperate to be taken seriously.

Enthusiastically received by critics, “Matinee” was largely overlooked elsewhere. A nostalgia-dripping love letter to classic monster movies probably wasn't that interesting to audiences flocking to “Aladdin” at that time. Of course, “Matinee” really isn't a movie made for Joe Movie-Goer. It's a movie made for you and me, the hardcore film lovers, the monster kids. In retrospect, it emerges as one of Dante's smoothest and best films. Unerringly sweet, very funny, and deceptively perceptive, it's an absolutely delightful motion picture that will be especially loved by anyone who understands the magic of seeing a movie. [Grade: A]

RECENT WATCHES: Howling VI: The Freaks (1991)

The “Howling” series would continue to haunt video stores into the nineties. Despite the serious lack of werewolf action in the last two entries in this werewolf series, video store patrons were clearly not deterred. With the sixth installment, “Howling VI: The Freaks,” a woman would step behind the camera. Hope Perello would direct this latest installment, which would prove more ambitious than the previous “Howling” sequels. This decision to put a little more time and money in paid off to some degree. While I’ve heard nothing but negative things about the other “Howling” sequels, people have occasionally said nice things about “The Freaks.”

Just like most of the “Howling” sequels, “The Freaks” has no connection to any of the previous entries in the series. (Though it supposedly draws some story elements from Gary Brandner’s third “Howling” novel.) Instead, the film follows Ian Richards, a drifter who wanders into the midwestern town of Canton Bluff. Ian soon befriends local pastor Dewey and begins a romance with his daughter, Elizabeth. But Ian is in town for a purpose. He’s pursuing a traveling carnival run by the mysterious R. B. Harker. Richards is a werewolf and Harker is a vampire, running a freak show full of other monsters. The two have a personal matter to settle but not before Ian escapes being displayed among the freaks and proves himself to Dewey and Elizabeth.

The last two “Howling” movies really gave the viewer werewolf blue balls, leaving the hairy beasts off-screen as long as possible. Seemingly to make up for this lack of creature carnage, “Howling VI” is a proper monster mash. Ian transforms into a werewolf on-screen, in a fairly effective sequence. His wolf form, though it resembles Lon Chaney Jr. more than Rob Bottin’s elaborate creatures in the original “Howling,” is pretty cool and on-screen frequently. Harker isn’t just a fangs-and-evening-wear vampire. He turns into a bat-faced beastie later in the film. As is the way, werewolf and vampire fight. And it’s actually pretty well done, the action scenes featuring some solid stunts. The way Harker is defeated, a likely homage to both “Horror of Dracula” and “The Evil Dead,” is an especially neat note to end things on.

“The Freaks” doesn’t stop there. Setting this fangs vs. fur narrative in a carnival sideshow allows for other oddities to appear. Deep Roy appears as a card shark with an extra, deformed arm sprouting from his chest. There’s a scaly-faced alligator boy, one of the more virtuous freaks. On the less deformed end, we also have a mime who also works as the chicken gutting geek and, among the film’s least PC choices, an evil hermaphrodite. It’s not just the carnival setting that adds color to this story. The film is seemingly set in the fifties, creating a folksy and rather likable atmosphere for its small town. Little scenes devoted to the local election and church are surprisingly cute.

The previous “Howling” sequels have not exactly set a high standard for acting in the latter half of this series. Among its other surprises, “The Freaks” actually has a decent cast. Brendan Hughes previously played a werewolf in “An American Werewolf in London” and has a few other horror credits of note. He’s fairly likable as Ian, a conflicted guy trying to do his best. Bruce Payne plays Harker. There’s a reason Payne frequently appears as villains in low budget flicks. It’s extremely fun to watch him ham it up as oversized villain, which he certainly gets to do here. Antonio Fargas, Huggy Bear himself, plays the aforementioned geek. Michelle Matheson, of “Mr. Belvedere” fame, appears as Liz and is cute and charming. None of the performances are mind blowing but the characters are likable. You don’t mind following this bunch for ninety minutes.

It’s entirely possible the lackluster quality of every previous “Howling” sequel has lowered my standards. “The Freaks” may be a simply serviceable creature feature, entertaining but nothing special. Coming after the uneventful fourth and fifth “Howling” movies, it’s a real breath of fresh air. While it can’t quite match the campy insanity of “Your Sister is a Werewolf,” “Howling VI” is a fun monster mash with decent effects, effective pacing, and a likable cast of characters. This, almost by default, makes it among the best “Howling” sequels. Maybe I’ll rewatch it some day outside the context of the other films and see if I like it as much then. [7/10]

Director Report Card: Joe Dante (1990)

10. Gremlins 2: The New Batch

Warner Brothers really wanted to make a sequel to “Gremlins.” This is understandable, as the original was the fourth highest grossing film of 1984 and quickly became established as an eighties classic. The public's demand for further “Gremlins” adventures was evident in the number of successful knock-off series. “Critters,” “Ghoulies,” and “Troll” all grew into franchises in the years following Joe Dante's original. WB asked Dante to return for a second “Gremlins” film but he declined. When attempts to make a sequel without him failed to get off the ground, Dante was lured back with the promise of complete creative control. This freedom allowed Dante to make a kookier, wilder film than the original. This off-the-wall approach, combined with perhaps too large a gap since the original, led “Gremlins 2: The New Batch” to disappointing box office. Yet that same wackiness made the sequel into another cult favorite.

In the years since the Gremlins rampaged through Kingston Falls, Gizmo remains in the safe care of kindly Mr. Wing. Millionaire Daniel Clamp is buying up much of Chinatown but Wing refuses to sell his shop. When the old man dies suddenly, Gizmo is scooped up by men who work for a genetics lab nestled inside Clamp's giant, high-tech skyscraper. Billy Peltzer and Kate, it turns out, are recently employed in Clamp Tower. As soon as Billy realizes Gizmo is inside the building, he rescues him. However, the mogwai still ends up splashed with water, spawning another set of evil off-spring. The Mowgli get loose in Clamp Tower, soon enough transforming into gremlins. The office building presents far more opportunities for chaos for the little monsters. Billy and friends, new and old, have to stop the rampage before sundown and the horde is unleashed on New York City.

The original “Gremlins” was torn between Spielberg's desire to celebrate boomer nostalgia for small town America and Dante's desire to eviscerate the sacredness of that concept. The sequel, given over totally to Dante's impulses, fully sets its sight on another hallmark of eighties culture. “Gremlins 2” is a ruthless mockery of consumerism and then-modern convenience. Clamp Tower is a ridiculous monument to excess. Automated voices chatter whenever a door is opened or someone uses the bathroom. Unethical experiments are performed on animals just an elevator's ride up from a frozen yogurt stand. Despite being so high-tech, simple things like revolving doors fail to operate correctly. Naturally, the gremlins tear down this creation, this temple to capitalism and eighties greed.

Dante's targets are not generic. Daniel Clamp is a loose combination of two of the decade's most notorious moguls. Like Ted Turner, he owns several television networks and has a fixation on colorizing classic films. (If this couldn't be more obvious, one of his networks has a very Al-Lewis-as-Grandpa-like actor hosting a late night horror show.) Visually, Clamp draws heavily from Donald Trump, back when he seemed like a far more harmless figure. He slaps his name on everything. He's a feckless self-promoter. Clamp's book is obviously patterned after “The Art of the Deal.” These details mirror our own reality, exaggerating them to fit the film's cartoonish world. Though at least one gag, the Clamp Network's end-of-the-world message, turned out to be totally true.

Yet “Gremlins 2” does not reserve its scorn just for millionaires and big business. The film frequently mocks its own existence. Jokes are cracked about the lore of the first “Gremlins,” the rules that govern the monsters' transformation being scrutinized. We discover Christmas isn't the only holiday that haunts Kate, an especially absurd gag. “The New Batch” is a film that thoroughly understands sequel escalation, doing essentially the original film's premise in a way that's about a hundred times bigger. The story is essentially the same – the Gremlins are even led by a mohawked monster again – but there's more creatures, more gags, more chaos. Gizmo gets doused with water in a ridiculously overblown way. The Gremlins take revenge on a microwave. This idea extends to making fun of other sequels, when Gizmo turns himself into a soft, fuzzy version of Rambo.

Eventually, the sequel's willingness to make fun of itself is pushed so far that the meta fabrics of the story strain and break. At one point, Leonard Maltin appears to review the original “Gremlins,” a great gag that marks Maltin as a great sport. This sets up a later, even greater meta gag. The reality of the movie breaks. The Gremlins shatter break the fourth wall and enter the projectionist's booth. And only Hulk Hogan can save us. Not only is this moment a fitting rebuttal to parents' compliant that the first film was too scary for kids, it's primarily a brilliant violation of the rules that film traditionally follows. Imagine how unexpected this must've been back in 1990.

There's a good reason “Gremlins 2” can break the rules like this. The film's very first moment has Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, both brought to life in that vivid Chuck Jones style, appearing to the viewer. So Dante brings his Looney Tunes obsession into the open. A similarly anarchic tone directs most of the movie from there. One of the gremlins, named Daffy, acts in an aggressively silly fashion. As the film rolls on, it eventually becomes a series of crazy sight gags. There's an impromptu song and dance sequence. A Phantom of the Opera reference, of all things, becomes a running gag in the last third. Some of these gags, like a talking cow or a subtle “Dracula” reference, are in the backgrounds. Others, like shout-outs to “Wizard of Oz” or “Batman,” are right in front of us.

The true comedic freedom of the film is most displayed in the gremlins themselves. “The New Batch” allows more off the beasts to become actual characters. Of Gizmo's second litter, they each have distinctive facial features and personalities. Aside from the unhinged Daffy, there's the buck-toothed Lenny and the cigar chomping George. The genetics laboratory subplot becomes an excuse to push the Gremlins concept even further. This is what allows the absolute brilliant gag of Brains, an erudite leader of the Gremlins voiced by Tony Randell at his most foppish, to exist. Giving the chaotic monsters a voice, to give television interviews and stock advice, to contrast with his rambunctious brothers, is probably my favorite thing about the entire movie.

As Key and Peele observed, Dante and his team allowed their imaginations to become completely untethered in “Gremlins 2.” So all sorts of new, crazy variations of Gremlins are allowed to exist. Gremlins are gene-spliced with vegetables, a bat, a spider. There's a feminine girl Gremlin named Greta and a gremlin composed entirely of electricity. These are big, crazy ideas and I applaud the movie for including them. Better yet, these concepts are brilliantly realized through some top-of-the-line creature effects. The Bat Gremlin and Spider Gremlin are fantastically realized. Yet even these monstrosities are gifted with personality, as Greta and the Lightning Gremlin are characters in her own right.

If “Gremlins 2” can be said to have any flaw, it's that plot and forward momentum are largely sacrificed in favor of one gag after another. This might have been the one disadvantage of giving Joe Dante totally free reign. (This is hardly a complaint for me but some people bitch about it.) While Rick Baker's special effects are naturally excellent, I'll admit to preferring Chris Walas' slimier and more asymmetrical take on the monsters from the first film. Truly, my only real nitpick with the movie is how Gizmo is sidelined. The original's fuzzy hero is left tied up by the Gremlins for most of the plot. When he does return, using his newly acquired Rambo powers to turn the tables on his tormenter, it feels like a somewhat rushed and underwhelming conclusion to that power struggle.

Compared to the first movie, Billy and Kate sometimes feel a little lost in the story sometimes too. This is no fault of Zach Galligan and Phoebe Cates. Galligan has the same gee-whiz, aw-shucks small town boy appeal as the irreversibly wholesome Billy. Cates soon becomes the movie's stone-faced straight-woman. Yet Dante is so in love with his impish devils that you get the impression he would've happily moved on from Billy and Kate if he could have. In fact, John Glover's Daniel Clamp is almost a preferable protagonist. Written as a villain, Glover makes Clamp so likable and charming – more out-of-touch and eccentric than actively bad – that you end up liking him.

The Joe Dante company players put in their appearances here, of course. Dick Miller is back as Murray Futterman, given significantly more to do. Robert Picardo is fantastic as the asshole chief of security, who hilariously micromanages every thing he comes across, even after the chaos starts. Christopher Lee is hilarious as the straight-laced mad scientist who takes delight in the diseases he orders. Haviland Morris is very funny as the office temptress attempting to seduce Billy. Robert Prosky does a pretty good Al Lewis impersonation while making Grandpa Fred a distinct character. I also like Gedde Watanabe's little role, as his improvised camera man.

”Gremlins 2's” disappointing box office was blamed on Dante taking his cartoon sensibility a little too far for mainstream audiences. Maybe. Yet, if the film had come out three years earlier, before the hype from the original had died down, I'm sure it would've done better for Warner Brothers. Not that it matters because the right audience for “Gremlins 2” would embrace it soon enough, launching brilliant Twitter accounts and elaborate homages. There's been rumblings of a third film in the decades since, though I'm doubtful that'll ever come to fruition. While I'll always love the original more, there's no denying that “Gremlins 2: The New Batch” is a hilarious and inspired dose of monster-filled lunacy. [Grade: A]