'Trumbo' disappoints, 'The Stuff' is creepy funDate: 4/22/2016 In this column, I’ll look at “Trumbo,” the new biopic of the acclaimed screenwriter and “The Stuff,” a Blu-ray restoration of director Larry Cohen’s outrageous horror satire.
The Stuff
By the mid-1980s director and writer Larry Cohen was on a roll. He was one of the most prominent independent moviemakers of the time.
His films included “It’s Alive,” “The Private Files of J. Edgar Hoover,” “Hell Up in Harlem,” and “Q,” among others.
His films, often horror or science fiction, may not have always been the most polished productions, but their saving grace was the audacious quality of his visions. Cohen’s scripts had ideas. He was clearly not content with recycling the standard tropes of either genre.
His satiric horror film “The Stuff” has just been restored and released on Blu-ray by Arrow Films and it’s quite a package. There is an outstanding documentary on the making of the film as well as other extras.
The star of the show is the movie itself that has a wonderfully outrageous premise. A watchman at a mine sees something that looks like whipped cream bubbling up from the ground. He touches it, smells it and then tastes it.
It tastes great and is soon being sold across the nation as a low-calorie all natural dessert. The ice cream industry is appalled and hires industrial spy Mo Rutherford (Michael Moriarty) to find out what The Stuff really is.
What he comes to understand is The Stuff is alive.
Cohen based his screenplay on the idea the American public doesn’t necessarily know what’s in their food, such as Coca Cola’s secret formula.
With a solid cast of New York-based actors (Andrea Marcovicci, Paul Sorvino, Garrett Morris, Danny Aiello, Patrick O’Neal and others), "The Stuff” offers viewers something quite different.
I will take interesting ideas any day over a run of the mill script with no holes or the slickest special effects.
Cohen is still writing, although his last work as a director was in 2006 – not bad for a guy in his mid-70s.
“The Stuff” is entertaining and original and I’m happy to see it made available for new generations.
Trumbo
You may not know the name “Dalton Trumbo,” but if you’re a film fan, you certainly have seen at least one movie of his, perhaps “Roman Holiday,” Exodus,” or “Spartacus,” to name just three.
Trumbo led a very compartmentalized life. A devoted Communist, who believed Soviet Russia was a great system for government, Trumbo was the highest paid screenwriter in Hollywood and lived a decidedly non-Soviet lifestyle.
Those contradictions didn’t make it to this film, which plays Trumbo as a much more benign leftist.
His fame, for many, came when the House Committee on Un-American Activities asked him to testify. His refusal led to a year in prison and then he was blacklisted in Hollywood.
Trumbo spend the 1950s writing scripts under pen names for producers such the King Brothers, who made low budget movies. During this time, two of his scripts won Oscars, although he wasn’t allowed to pick them up.
He came out of his blacklisting with Kirk Douglas and Otto Preminger billing him as the screenwriter for “Spartacus” and “Exodus,” respectively.
The film is well acted with star Bryan Cranston outstanding as Trumbo who sticks to his principles and pays for it. John Goodman, as is his habit, steals every scene he’s in as one of the bombastic King brothers.
The result is an interesting story but perhaps not as compelling as certainly I would have liked. Based on what I’ve read Trumbo is softened quite a bit.
As a film historian, “Trumbo” is a frustrating film for me to watch. There are inaccuracies that range from minor – movie posters on the walls of the King Brothers’ office for films the pair did not produce – to medium – Trumbo and his family moved to Mexico City following his release from prison and didn’t stay in southern California – to major – actor Edward G. Robinson did not name Communist sympathizers before the Congressional committee, although the film shows he did in an effort to save his career.
Trumbo’s story is rich enough as is and making these changes was totally unnecessary.
Although on many levels a good effort, “Trumbo” misses the mark.
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