Get Over It (2001)

Get Over it perfectly exemplifies the phrase “Timing is everything.” If the movie had been released a few months earlier (or a few months later) it might have been a box office hit.  The studio dumped it off into theatres in March of 2001 and it was met with complete indifference by its target audience, teenagers.  Just months earlier, this same audience had made Bring It On (also starring Kirsten Dunst) a smash hit, but now they could care less.  It died instantly at the box office (grossing a paltry $19 million worldwide against a 22 million budget) and quickly faded into obscurity. This cycle of teenage movies had worn itself out and audiences would begin to crave bigger and better things; the releases of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone and Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring at the end of the year would mark the beginning of studios pumping their money into popular franchises.

The pity is that Get Over It is easily the most imaginatively directed out of the teen movies and is blessed with a ridiculously overqualified cast.  The main problem Get Over It has to overcome is R. Lee Fleming, Jr.’s hackneyed script.  Fleming is not only content with stealing from other movies, but from himself as well – he wrote the screenplay to She’s All That.  For instance, in She’s All That, Zack’s girlfriend dumps him for a former reality TV star and in Get Over It, Berke’s girlfriend dumps him and hooks up with a former member of a boy band, who has transferred to their high school.  The script isn’t exactly brimming with originality.  It also shares a few plot points with Bring It On; in that movie Torrance (Dunst) falls in love with her best friend’s brother, Cliff, while in Get Over It, Berke falls in love with his best friend’s sister, Kelly (played by Dunst). In Bring It On, Clive gives Torrance a cassette tape which contains a punk song he wrote for her; this cheers her up during her darkest hour.  In Get Over It, Berke buys Kelly a tape recorder (to help her with her song writing) and records a "I Believe in You" message on a cassette tape. This inspires Kelly to throw out Dr. Oates terrible song and perform one that she has specifically written for the school musical. Though, I would chalk that up to coincidence as Get Over It went into production before Bring It On was released. Get Over It also continued the trend of adapting classic plays into teen comedies; She’s All That (Pygmalion), Ten Things I Hate About You (The Taming of the Shrew), Whatever It Takes (Cyrano de Bergerac), and She’s the Man (Twelfth Night).   In Get Over It, Berke, in a futile attempt to win back his ex-girlfriend Allison, is cast in a supporting role in the high school’s musical adaptation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and is shocked to learn the play parallels his own situation.   

This brings me to the other flaw of Get Over It – the lead character Berke is completely unlikable. When Berke isn’t obsessing over Allison, he is feeling sorry for himself.  Sure, it sucks that his girlfriend dumped him, but it’s extremely annoying that whenever Kelly wants to have a genuine conversation, he keeps bringing up Allison.  The other moment that drives me nuts is after Kelly gives him a short summary of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Berke promptly starts packing up his gear to leave.  When Kelly points out they have just got started, Berke replies, “No offense, Kelly. I’m not trying to win an Oscar; I just want my girlfriend back.”
GET OVER IT, MAN!   In order for Berke to work as a character you need an extremely charismatic actor in the role and, unfortunately, Ben Foster is not that guy. Berke is the kind of role that John Cusack and Michael J. Fox could play in their sleep, but Ben Foster’s more intense style of acting is often at odds with the character. It doesn’t help that he is forced to utter lines like, “I can handle that Backstreet bitch.”  

 Foster isn’t terrible and there are few moments where his understated performance actually works; there is one scene where his “understanding” mother suggest they go for yogurt and then adds, “Or maybe Berke wants to go home and polish the rocket.”
Berke, with a look of disgust on his face, answers, “Yogurt’s good.” 

I also like the piano scene between Berke and Kelly.  She is playing a tune she wrote, on the school piano, and Berke sits down next to her.  She is too embarrassed to play the song for Berke, so he cheers her up by playing the “A.B. Cs” and she eventually joins in. There is genuine chemistry between the leads and it’s nice that it is Berke cheering Kelly up for once instead of the other way around. It’s not surprising to learn that this scene wasn’t in Fleming’s original script and was a result of reshoots (this is noticeable in that Dunst’s hair is dyed red in this scene, as she was filming Spider-Man at the time).  In fact, you will find that some of the movie's best scenes were either adlibs or rewrites.  It is almost like director Tommy O’ Haver realized the script was garbage and did whatever he could to salvage this mess, but more on that later. 

Kirsten Dunst is likable as Kelly; and is far better than the material she is given.  Kelly is also another example of Fleming’s limitations as a screenwriter; in She’s All That, Laney’s defining feature was that she was an aspiring artist, while in Get Over It, Kelly’s defining feature is that she is an aspiring songwriter.  It’s a role that doesn’t deserve an actress like Dunst, but she gives it her absolute all.

 
As mentioned before, Kirsten Dunst starred in the cheerleading comedy Bring It On and it’s interesting to compare that movie’s screenplay (written by Jessica Bendinger) to Fleming’s screenplay for Get Over It.  In Bring It On, Torrance’s main focus is to get her cheerleading squad back on track, despite all the misfortunes that have befallen her; everything else is secondary, including her potential romance with Cliff.  In Get Over It, Kelly’s main focus is on winning the love of Berke, even though she is one of the leads in the high school play. It is established early on that Kelly has a crush on Berke and views the musical (and Allison dumping him) as a chance to make her move.  She’s willing to, potentially, sabotage the high school music just so she can win over Berke; she opts to sing a song she has written instead of the number written by Dr. Desmond Forrest Oates (“Pocketful of Dreams”).  Later on, Berke returns Kelly’s gesture by changing to ending of the play so that his character ends up with hers.  This a good example of movie logic vs. real world logic: In the movie, everyone is charmed by this gesture of love, while in real life the cast members and crew would absolutely be livid that the two leads were going off script.
 

 Dr. Desmond Forrest Oates is portrayed as a narcissistic asshole, yet even he is touched by Kelly’s song.  Kelly is the ideal woman: beautiful, intelligent, and extremely loyal.  The problem is there’s no reason for these two characters to end up together other than that it’s in the script. There is also the time element which the movie kind of glosses over; in the beginning we are shown people auditioning for the play and the movie ends on opening night, which means a few months have passed.  That means for the last couple of months Berke has been pining over Allison, while Kelly has taken it in stride.  Why? A more satisfying ending would be Kelly realizing Berke is not worth her time and focusing on her performance in the stage. Why should she have to prove herself to him any ways?  Granted, this type of writing is on par with most teen comedies, but given the cast and the director, it would have been nice to see a different approach to the material. 

On the other hand, Allison is definitely a step up from Taylor, the ex-girlfriend in She’s All That.
In She’s All That, Taylor (Jodi Lyn O’ Keefe) is an irredeemable bitch who treats everyone around her like garbage, while Allison is a much more sympathetic character. It is clear that she regrets hurting Berke’s feeling, but she also realizes that it’s time to move on; their relationship has lost its spark, and she has been going through the motions for some time.  In She’s All That, Taylor cheats on Zack with an obnoxious reality TV star while on Spring Break and rather nonchalantly breaks up with him.  Allison meets Bentley ‘Striker” Scrumfeld after she has broken up with Berke and starts to date because “he’s different.”  She isn’t a malicious person; though I question her going to a party at Berke’s house, with her new boyfriend, after she has dumped him.  It’s a huge inconsistency in the character; things are already awkward enough between her and Berke, so why escalate it even further?  Was Allison originally written as a one-dimensional bitch? Or did Fleming always intend her to be a more sympathetic character?  It’s also hard to believe that a sweet natured person like Allison could ever fall for a complete cad like ‘Striker.’  In She’s All That, it makes sense that a bitchy, superficial person like Taylor would fall for a total sleazebag like Brock Hudson, but someone as intelligent as Allison would easily see through ‘Striker’s’ act.  

This brings me to my favorite performance in the movie; Shane West as Bentley ‘Striker’ Scrumfeld.  Shane West talks in a bad British accent the entire movie and it goes from being mildly amusing to dreadfully unfunny to absolutely hilarious; it does a complete 360. Most movies would have a scene where the character drops the accent and talks in his normal voice, but West absolutely commits to it. It is absolutely amazing!  West is a lot of fun as the arrogant, pretentious ‘Striker,’ and is perfect foil for Foster’s Berke.  He is such a raging douche that even Berke comes off well by comparison. 

Striker is also responsible for the most unintentionally laughable moment:  When Allison catches him making out with her best friend Maggie. This happens mere seconds after Berke tries to tell Allison that Striker was hitting on Kelly, but Allison will not listen.  She walks away, opens a door, and there’s Striker making out with Maggie. This is a scene that could easily have been shortened by having Allison witness Striker’s advances towards Kelly; she could then storm out of the house and Striker would chase after her, in a desperate attempt to explain himself. Instead, we are fed the same piece of information twice: Striker is two timing asshole.  Maggie barely registers as a character that it’s hard to feel anything towards her; she is neither sympathetic nor detestable. Maggie is one of Zoe Saldana’s earliest roles and, thankfully, she has gone onto better things, because she is completely ill served by the script.  

The wild card in the entire cast is Martin Short as drama teacher/musical director, Dr. Desmond Forrest Oates.  Whether you find Short funny or not, he does bring an unpredictable to the proceedings that this movie desperately needs.  According to O’Haver on the commentary, the look on confusion on the cast’s faces was genuine; they didn’t know what to make of Martin Short. My favorite Desmond Forrest Oates bit is when Kelly thanks him for casting her as Helena, he replies, “Me thinks thou best not botch it.” It’s an energetic performance and Short really gives a boost to an otherwise routine script. Oates is a rude, egotistically asshole who genuinely believes that his musical adaption of A Midsummer Night’s Dream is an improvement on Shakespeare’s original; when Kelly suggest making changes to one of his songs, by incorporating lines from Shakespeare’s play, he is absolutely appalled. He never offers genuine direction to his actors; after Kelly has finished rehearsing her song number he tells her that it was “terrible.” 

The movie’s biggest asset is that is has Tommy O’ Haver as its director; his imaginative direction often breathes life into the stale material.  The opening is a great example of this; after Berke has been dumped by Allison, he walks down the street, carrying his box of belongings, in a dejected state. A more conventional movie would have Berke look screen right, see a couple holding hands, sigh, and then walk out of frame. O’ Haver turns into in a musical number: As Berke is walking in the middle of frame, we see Vitamin C and her band emerge from a garage, screen left, singing the Captain & Tennille song “Love Will Keep Us Together” and they begin to follow him.  Then an old couple emerges into frame and starts dancing. They are followed by a pair of newlyweds.  Then a mailman and a female UPS driver start to dance with each other.  The scene finally escalates with a marching band walking into frame, along with a baton twirler, until finally Berke can’t take it anymore and screams.  It’s not only a fun scene, but it perfectly encapsulates Berke’s victim mindset – the entire world seems to be mocking him.  No matter where looks he is reminded of his time with Allison and it’s like being hit with a blunt instrument. What is more impressive is that this whole musical number is done in a single shot. As a result, we can see the frustration build on Berke’s face as the musical number continues.    

There are also a few Zucker Brother like gags scattered throughout the picture: in one scene Dennis asks a pretty classmate of his, Dora Lynn, if she will go out on a date with Berke. It is established that Dora Lynn is accident prone and missed six years of high school due to being in a coma. When Dennis approaches her, they are in shop class and Dora Lynn is holding a blow torch. When Dennis calls her name, she turns around, without turning off the blowtorch, and accidentally sets a classmate on fire. All chaos soon breaks lose. Again, this done in a single shot and we get to see the entire tragic scene unfold before our eyes. 

It also says a lot about O’ Haver that even the minor characters are fairly well defined; my favorite bit is when Peter Wong, Dr. Oates’ prized pupil, shows a look of concern on his face after he sees how blown away Dr. Oates is by Striker’s audition.  

 I also like Jeannie Calleja as Oates’ long suffering assistant, Jessica; who is doing her very best not to reach over and strangle the insufferable drama teacher.  Get Over It is loaded with interesting faces and I like that O’ Haver gives each of them a moment to shine. It is a shame he didn’t have a better script to work with, because the movie could have been a genuine classic (as opposed to being an agreeable experience). 

Credits
Cast: Kirsten Dunst (Kelly Woods), Ben Foster (Berke Landers), Martin Short (Dr. Desmond Forrest Oates), Melissa Sagemiller (Allison), Shane West (Bentley ‘Striker’ Scrumfeld), Colin Hanks (Felix Woods), Sisqo^’ (Dennis), Mila Kunis (Basin), Zoe Saldana (Maggie), Swoosie Kurtz (Beverly Landers), Ed Begley, Jr. (Frank Landers),  Jeanie Calleja (Jessica), Christopher Jacot (Peter Wong), Dov Tiefenbach (Little Steve), Kylie Bax (Dora Lynn), Vitamin C (Herself), Carmen Electra (Mistress Moira), Coolio (Himself).

Director: Tommy O’ Haver
Screenplay: R. Lee Fleming, Jr.
Running Time: 86 min.

Babes in Toyland (March of the Wooden Soldiers) (1934)

In the last few years, with the rise of Netflix and other streaming services, the local TV stations have essentially dropped movies from their schedules to focus more on television series.  As a result, many Christmas classics that were in heavy rotation during the 1980s and 1990s have been dropped to the wayside to make room for more contemporary programming.  This is the fate that has, unfortunately, befallen the Laurel and Hardy classic Babes in Toyland (March of the Wooden Soldiers).

I first saw Babes in Toyland in third grade; our principal owned a 16 mm print and screened it for the entire school. This came shortly after I had discovered Laurel and Hardy, so naturally I was elated when I saw their names in the opening credits. The rest of the students were indifferent at first, but eventually got into the movie. Imagine my joy a few years later when, while browsing through the (then) brand new Wal-Mart, I found it to buy on VHS (in color) for the low prices of 12.99. WHAT A DEAL!!!  I just recently purchased the DVD for five dollars, so I guess it wasn’t much of deal after all. 

The first thing that immediately stands out about Babes in Toyland is that it fully embraces its theatrical roots (it’s based off a 1903 operetta by Victor Herbert).  For instance, most of the sets are two dimensional mocks ups, and the costumes look like something you might find at Target during the Halloween season.   The idea is to give it the feel of a storybook come to life. This is actually confirmed in the opening song number (“Toyland”) when Mother Goose emerges from a storybook and sings about the setting of the story. Midway through the number, she opens the book, and with each turn of the page, we are introduced to each of the principle characters (Little Bo Peep, Tom Tom, Little Old Lady That Lived in a Shoe, Barnaby, and Stannie Dum and Ollie Dee). 

 This is actually a really clever way of introducing the characters and allows the filmmakers to do away with stilted exposition that might impede the plot.  When Little Bo Peep is looking for her sheep, Tom Tom appears and the movie can immediately jump into song because we know who Tom Tom is. A lesser movie would have some awkward dialogue exchange between the two:  “Don’t worry, Bo Beep. I, Tom Tom the Piper’s son, will help you find your sheep.”  I also have to wonder, given the way this scene is set up; did Walt Disney use it as a template for “Some Day My Prince Will Come” scene in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs? Hal Roach and Walt Disney were friends; Disney gave Roach permission to use the song “Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?” in this movie.  There is also a mouse that looks suspiciously Mickey who appears sporadically throughout the movie. It seems likely Walt Disney saw the movie, so was it a source of inspiration, or just a mere coincidence?

This story book setting also pays dividends in the movie’s climax when Toyland is under siege by Barnaby and the Boogeymen.  In a more “realistic” fairy tale, the Boogeymen would be absolutely laughable and embarrassing. They are essentially stuntmen in furry body suits, grass skirts, and weird rubber masks with Troll-like hair. They are less than convincing, but work extremely well in the context of this movie. These are the type of monsters you would find in a classic children’s storybook.  The fact that they are genuinely menacing (especially in the scene where they emerge from hiding to terrorize Little Bo Beep and Tom Tom) speaks volumes about the skill of the filmmakers.  Gus Meins and Charley Rogers will never be considered cinematic geniuses, but they keep things moving at a nice pace; even the “slow” musical numbers are the right length.  I would also like to point out that Babes in Toyland is one of those rare instances where I prefer the colorized version to the original black and white. The gaudy colorization process actually adds to the overall storybook feel of the movie. 

The weakest aspect of Babes in Toyland (at least from a child’s point of view) is the romance between Little Bo Peep and Tom Tom. This is largely due to the fact that neither character is particularly interesting; though, Charlotte Henry has an appealing screen presence as Little Bo Peep. Felix Knight, as Tom Tom, doesn’t fare quite as well, but at least he can sing.  What separates this romance from other Laurel and Hardy comedies of the era is that it actually plays a significant part in the movie’s plot.  There was tendency among many comedies (starring famous comedy teams) of the era to shoe horn in a romantic subplot that had nothing to with the actual story (see Bonnie Scotland as example).  While the Little Bo Peep/Tom Tom story might be a tad bit boring at least it has a point and isn’t overly obnoxious. 

Henry Brandon, appropriately, chews the scenery as the villainous Barnaby – he is wonderfully loathsome. Brandon’s performance is even more impressive when you realize that he was only twenty one years-old when the movie was made. He is very convincing as a miserly old man – he constantly walks in a stooped manner, sneers at everyone around him, and leers at the much younger Little Bo Peep. He also brings a physicality to the role that would be far too demanding of an older actor – he gets into fist fight with Tom Tom and later on carries off the screaming Little Bo Peep (who, in a bad piece of continuity, disappears from Barnaby’s arms when he is hit by a giant cork shot from a cannon).  It’s a terrific performance and Brandon nearly steals the movie with it. 

Babes in Toyland (next to Way Out West) is probably the most tightly scripted out of all Laurel and Hardy’s full length feature.  Their other full length features tended to be more episodic in nature; they were essentially three two reel comedies stitched together to make up a full length feature (A Chump at Oxford is great example of this).  There is also a time element at work: Barnaby owns the mortgage on Widow Bo Peep’s house (a giant shoe) and if she can’t pay it off by morning he will have her (and her entire family) thrown out on the street.  Barnaby is willing to forget the mortgage if her daughter, Little Bo Peep, will agree to his wife, but she will have none of that.  The boys, Stannie Dum and Ollie Dee, are tenants in Widow Bo Peep’s shoe and will do anything in their power to help her out. It also does a nice job of setting up events that happen later in the movie:  the six foot tall wooden soldiers that drive out the boogeyman at the end don’t just appear out of thin air, there is a scene early on that establishes their existence.  Stan and Ollie are toymakers and Stan manages to botch an order that was placed by Santa; instead of making six hundred solider at one foot high, Stan misreads it as hundred soldiers at six feet high.  This scene effectively establishes two things:  that Stan is absent minded and the army of six foot wooden soldiers.   There is a button on the back of the soldiers that activates them and once they are started up they are near impossible to stop. 

I need to point out just how efficiently paced the movie’s climax is:  between the siege of Toyland by the Boogeymen and their being driven out by the wooden soldiers, only ten minutes of screen time has passed.  The movie cross cuts between the Boogeymen terrorizing the citizens of Toyland and the boys (as well as not-Mickey Mouse and the Three Little Pigs) fighting back. It’s an incredibly suspenseful sequence and it’s not until Stan and Ollie activate the wooden soldiers that we are allowed to breathe. Imagine if this same sequence where done today: It would be half an hour long with lots of CGI thrown at our faces, rapid editing, and a few explosions thrown in for good measure. It would also be incredibly boring.  There’s also something wonderful about Toyland being saved by two lowly toy workers as opposed to your typical muscle bound badass.   

It also surprised me while re-watching Babes in Toyland how Tom Tom completely disappears from the movie in the last ten minutes. You would think the romantic lead would play a part in bringing down Barnaby, but nope he spends the entire battle in hiding.  This is either a brilliant deconstruction of the pointless juvenile lead, or it’s just sloppy writing. It’s probably the latter, but I’m going to keep convincing myself that it is the former.

Credits
Cast: Stan Laurel (Stannie Dum), Oliver Hardy (Ollie Dee), Charlotte Henry (Little Bo Peep), Henry Brandon – billed as Henry Kleinbach (Silas Barnaby),  Felix Knight (Tom Tom), Florence Roberts (Widow Bo Peep), Virginia Karns (Mother Goose), Kewpie Morgan (Old King Cole), Marie Wilson (Mary Quite Contrary).

Directors: Gus Meins, Charley Rogers
Screenplay: Frank Butler, Nick Grande
Running Time: 78 min.

American Horror House (2012)

After watching American Horror House, I initially thought that it was made by young filmmakers who, after having watched one too many horror movies, decided to make their own horror movie as a calling card to the movie industry.  From its over reliance of dutch angles and point of view shots to constantly referencing better horror movies, American Horror House has film student written all over it. Therefore, it was a bit of shock when I found out that both its director (Darin Scott) and screenwriter (Anthony C. Ferrante) have been in the business for quite some time and have been churning out this kind of schlock their entire careers. I’m fairly lenient towards young, inexperienced filmmakers struggling to make a scary movie, but these men seem fairly content in cranking out lazy, by the numbers horror movies (Ferrante is probably best known for directing the Sharknado movies). 

American Horror House has the exact same structure as the original Friday the 13^th: a pre-credit murder scene, followed by an introduction of a female character (that I label the sacrificial lamb), and then the introduction of the film’s main protagonist. Though, in Friday the 13^th, the character of Annie was sort of misdirection; we initially assumed that she was the main character of the piece, so when she is murdered twenty minutes into the movie it was a genuine shock. The Annie counterpart in American Horror House, Marylynn, doesn’t have the same effect.  Annie, despite her limited screen time, was a genuinely likable character and had an appealing personality, while Marylynn barely registers as a character. She is first seen running across the campus on her way to a violin lesson, unaware that she is actually running towards a gory end.  After Marylynn is diced into pieces by possessed violin strings, we are finally introduced to our heroine, Daria.  

There are two problems with Daria: despite being the main character she is only in about a third of the movie and, more importantly, she makes incredibly stupid decisions. Granted, the dumb heroine is a staple in most horror movies, but Daria is supposed to be super intelligent and badass.  When the bodies start piling up rather than flee from the sorority house, Daria stays because she is determined to get into the sorority. That’s right – our main protagonist, who is supposed to be such a free spirit, main motivation is to get accepted into a stupid sorority (even though she is treated like garbage by the sorority sisters).  Alessandra Torresani isn’t terrible in the role, but she doesn’t exactly elevate the material, either. Though, even the best actresses would struggle with this role; there really isn’t much substance to the character. 

There is also an inexplicable subplot about a private detective trying to find Marylynn. The dumbass stumbles around the campus for nearly an hour only to be killed by Marylynn’s ghost in gruesome fashion.  This subplot might have been effective had there been some ambiguity over Marylynn’s fate, but the movie tips its hand right off the bat. As a result, the private detective is just mere filler. He has no actual function in the story and could have easily been written out. 

American Horror House, like most bad horror movies, often violates its own rules in a cheap effort to build suspense. It is established throughout the movie that ghost have the ability to teleport, yet in the movie’s climax, when the two remaining survivors are trapped in the attic, the ghosts rather than teleport into the room instead try to break down the door. Why? At one point, the generic male love interest fights off a ghost with his fists.  Which begs the question: Was this always a ghost story? It often has the feel of a zombie movie, especially during its final minutes. Did it start out as a zombie movie, or are the filmmakers just lazy? I vote the latter. 

Of course, the main selling point of American Horror House is its gory special effects. The problem with gore effects is that they have become so common place on television that they have lost their ability to shock. In the 1980s, splatter movies were something you rented as a dare.  You were considered a brave soul if you made it through a movie like The Evil Dead and were the subject of ridicule if you chickened out.   The gore effects in American Horror House are often achieved through bad looking CGI, so rather than being “shocking” or “disgusting,” they are just laughable. It makes for a great example on how not to make a horror movie.  

Credits

Cast: Morgan Fairchild (Morgan Fairchild), Alessandra Torresani  (Daria), Jackie Tuttle (Colleen), Dave Davis (Lloyd), Salina Duplessis  (Sarah), Cameron Deane Stewart (Derek), Sarah Ellis Smith (Marylynn), Gralen Bryant Banks (Detective Hammond), Isabel Cueva (Miss Pena), Sydney Spies (Missy), Carol Jean Wells (Rosemary), Jennie Kamin (Riley), Ashton Leigh (Tish), Ramona Tyler (Sandy Adams), Cait Taylor (Kaylee).

Director : Darin Scott
Screenplay: Anthony C. Ferrante
Running Time: 83 min.