You've probably heard the joke about the starlet who was such a terrible actress that when she somehow landed the lead in a stage production of THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK audience members shouted "They're upstairs!" when the Nazi soldiers arrived.
That's how I felt watching these twits (one of my favorite terms I've picked up from watching Monty Python) replaying CUJO only without the suspense and scares.
Now, my standards aren't picky when I'm watching movies on Chiller or SyFy. Generally, I'm a cheap date. And I had gingerbread cookies from the Mexican bakery and a big glass of iced tea.
But the characters were annoying, the situation increasingly ludicrous, and I soon realized that the sooner a character was ripped asunder and eaten by the bear, the sooner that character would stop talking.
One character, the younger brother's girlfriend, is eliminated before we can get really irritated with her. But the two brothers and the older brother's wife really were irritating. And their conversation was essentially a ploy to stretch an anecdote out to feature length.
Finally the older brother makes a run for it. He gets to the fringes of civilization. While he crosses the parking lot of a bar he sees that the bear has followed him.
And he winds up back at the car with his wife and brother because the bear made him come back. This happens offstage, so we have to take his word for it.
Let me confess at this point, I used the fast-forward button. A lot. I'm not a paid reviewer, so I can't get fired for this.
One of the highlights was when the door of the car swings open and we see the reflection of a huge studio light used during the outdoor shooting in the window.
I checked out the crew on IMDb. The first-billed screenwriter is not a native speaker of English. Really? Well, actually, I figured as much. But far more shocking is that the co-author is none other than Ethan Wiley who wrote the horror comedy HOUSE back in 1986. His career went downhill- he did one of the entries in the Children of the Corn franchise and this continues his decline.
I am grateful to Chiller, though, for showing this to the very end of the closing credits. It turns out that the wildlife preserve in California where the film was made suffered great damage in a wildfire and there's an effort being made to help restore it to functionality. The bear's performance is certainly more effective than any of the humans' because the bear is not saddled by any dialog. No wonder it looks so happy in the closing credits playing with what's left of the protagonists' car.
The closing credits also let us see someone in a uniform wander across the camera's field of vision, and at some point someone takes a flash picture of the bear. Yep. If Martin Scorsese was watching this, he probably was taking notes for his next production. You betcha.
That's how I felt watching these twits (one of my favorite terms I've picked up from watching Monty Python) replaying CUJO only without the suspense and scares.
Now, my standards aren't picky when I'm watching movies on Chiller or SyFy. Generally, I'm a cheap date. And I had gingerbread cookies from the Mexican bakery and a big glass of iced tea.
But the characters were annoying, the situation increasingly ludicrous, and I soon realized that the sooner a character was ripped asunder and eaten by the bear, the sooner that character would stop talking.
One character, the younger brother's girlfriend, is eliminated before we can get really irritated with her. But the two brothers and the older brother's wife really were irritating. And their conversation was essentially a ploy to stretch an anecdote out to feature length.
Finally the older brother makes a run for it. He gets to the fringes of civilization. While he crosses the parking lot of a bar he sees that the bear has followed him.
And he winds up back at the car with his wife and brother because the bear made him come back. This happens offstage, so we have to take his word for it.
Let me confess at this point, I used the fast-forward button. A lot. I'm not a paid reviewer, so I can't get fired for this.
One of the highlights was when the door of the car swings open and we see the reflection of a huge studio light used during the outdoor shooting in the window.
I checked out the crew on IMDb. The first-billed screenwriter is not a native speaker of English. Really? Well, actually, I figured as much. But far more shocking is that the co-author is none other than Ethan Wiley who wrote the horror comedy HOUSE back in 1986. His career went downhill- he did one of the entries in the Children of the Corn franchise and this continues his decline.
I am grateful to Chiller, though, for showing this to the very end of the closing credits. It turns out that the wildlife preserve in California where the film was made suffered great damage in a wildfire and there's an effort being made to help restore it to functionality. The bear's performance is certainly more effective than any of the humans' because the bear is not saddled by any dialog. No wonder it looks so happy in the closing credits playing with what's left of the protagonists' car.
The closing credits also let us see someone in a uniform wander across the camera's field of vision, and at some point someone takes a flash picture of the bear. Yep. If Martin Scorsese was watching this, he probably was taking notes for his next production. You betcha.