"AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS" (1989) Photo Gallery

Below is a gallery featuring photos from the 1989 miniseries, "AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS". Based upon Jules Verne's novel and directed by Buzz Kulik, the three-part miniseries starred Pierce Brosnan, Eric Idle, Julia Nickson and Peter Ustinov: 


"AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS" (1989) Photo Gallery

"HORRIBLE BOSSES" (2011) Review

"HORRIBLE BOSSES" (2011) Review

The summer of 2011 provided moviegoers with a slew of what I would call raunchy black comedies. May saw the release of "BRIDESMAIDS" and "THE HANGOVER, PART II". "BAD TEACHER" premiered in late June. And two weeks later saw the release of the most successful of the bunch, "HORRIBLE BOSSES". 

Directed by Seth Gordon, "HORRIBLE BOSSES" starred Jason Bateman, Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis. The trio co-starred as three best friends who decide to murder their respective overbearing, abusive bosses (portrayed by Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston and Colin Farrell) who they believe are standing in the way of their happiness. Nick (Bateman) works at a financial firm for emotionally-abusive Dave Harken (Spacey), who dangles the possibility of a promotion to Nick, only to award it to himself. Dale (Day) endures sexual harassment from his boss, Dr. Julia Harris (Aniston), who threatens to falsely tell Dale's fiancee that he had sex with her unless he actually has sex with her. And Kurt (Sudeikis) actually enjoys his job under his boss Jack Pellitt (Donald Sutherland). But after Jack dies from a heart attack, the company is taken over by Jack's cocaine-addicted, amoral son Bobby (Farrell). One night at a bar, Kurt jokingly suggests that their lives would be happier if their bosses were no longer around. After a brief hesitation, the trio agree to the idea. In search of a hit-man, the friends travel to a bar and meet Motherfucker Jones (Jamie Foxx), an ex-con who agrees to be their "murder consultant". Jones suggests that Dale, Kurt and Nick kill each other's bosses to hide their motive while making the deaths look like an accident.

I really did not know how I would accept "HORRIBLE BOSSES". Being a fan of the 2009 movie, "THE HANGOVER", I had found myself slightly disappointed by the recent sequel, "THE HANGOVER, PART II". And I was not really anticipating "HORRIBLE BOSSES". But since I was in the mood to watch a new movie, I went ahead and saw it anyway. And I enjoyed it . . . very much.

Screenwriters Michael Markowitz, John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein did a great job in finalizing a script that took several years to finalize. Superficially, the idea of three amateurs committing murder without attracting the attention of the police seems rather ridiculous. Two of the characters, Nick and Dale, certainly viewed the idea with amusement or disbelief. But further transgressions by their respective bosses finally pushed them to the idea with hilarious results. One of the funniest aspects of "HORRIBLE BOSSES" was the problem that the three friends endured to find a professional hit man to do the job. Their search led to a hilarious meeting at a motel with a man who does "wet work" (Ioan Gruffudd) - namely pissing on his clients. The three friends' second search for a hit man leads them to a local bar, where Kurt manages to insult an African-American bartender in an effort to be "politically correct". Their trip to the bar also leads them to "Motherfucker" Jones, an ex-convict who claims to be a hit man. As it turns out, Jones went to prison for video piracy and merely conned the three friends for money. But after agreeing to be their "murder consultant", his advice for them to kill each other's boss led to some hilarious scenes, including one that featured Dale's encounter with the psychotic Dave Harken, when the latter nearly died from accidentally consuming some peanuts.

"HORRIBLE BOSSES" benefited from some funny performances by the supporting cast. Well, most of the supporting cast was funny. Only Donald Sutherland, who portrayed Kurt's amiable boss, was never given a chance to display his talent for comedy. Thankfully, the likes of Ioan Gruffudd, Julie Bowen, P.J. Byrne and Bob Newhart received the chance to tickle the audiences' funny bones. The three actors hired to portray the "horrible bosses" proved to be horrifying in a hilarious way. If I have to be honest, Dave Harken was not the first aggressive psycho he has portrayed in a comedy. His performances in"SWIMMING WITH SHARKS" and "THE MEN WHO STARED AT GOATS" come to mind. Despite his past experiences with such characters, Spacey still managed to make it all look fresh in his portrayal of Nick's manipulative and aggressively controlling boss. Jennifer Aniston's performance as Dr. Julia Harris was a revelation. Mind you, her Rachel Green character on the television series, "FRIENDS" was very complex. But I have never seen her portray such a scummy character before . . . and with such comedic skills. Colin Farrell's appearance in the movie was not as long as Spacey and Aniston's, but it was just as funny. In fact, I would cite Farrell's performance as coke-addicted and self-delusional Bobby Pellitt as the funniest of the three performances. His rants against the employees he wanted fired struck me as one of the funniest scenes in the movie. And finally, it was good to see Jamie Foxx in a comedy again. Actually, he had a supporting role in the 2010 movie, "DUE DATE" and he was funny. But his role in that movie seemed mildly amusing in compare to his hilarious portrayal of "Motherfucker" Jones, the criminal wannabe, who seemed more adept at video pirating and posing than being a hardened criminal. 

But the craziness of "HORRIBLE BOSSES" could have easily fallen apart without Seth Gordon's direction and especially the performances of the three leads - Jason Bateman, Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis. As funny as the movie was, it was bizarre enough to fall apart at the slightest misstep. One, the trio made a solid and charismatic comedy team. I would go as far to add that they could easily rival the comedic team from the "HANGOVER" movies. Jason Bateman is deliciously sardonic and witty as the ass-kissing Nick Hendricks, who spent most of his professional career toadying to guys like Dave Harken. I have never been aware of Jason Sudeikis before this movie. I am aware that he had co-starred with Aniston in the 2010 comedy, "THE BOUNTY HUNTER", but I do not even remember him. He was certainly memorable as the trio's verbose lady's man, who first talked his two friends into committing murder. But the funniest performance came from Charlie Day, who portrayed the slightly nervous and "hopelessly romantic" Dale Arbus. It is quite apparent that most of the other characters - including his two buddies - have no real respect for him. Nick and Kurt did not take his complaints of sexual harassment by his boss seriously. One, I suspect they find it hard to believe that any female would find him attractive and two, society views the idea of a man complaining of sexual harassment by a woman seems ludicrous. But it was the hilarious and socially awkward Dale who found an effective way of dealing with the sexually aggressive Julia without any problems, whatsoever.

There have been some complaints about "HORRIBLE BOSSES". Some critics have complained that the movie was racially or gender-wise offensive. Others have complained that it was silly. I agree that"HORRIBLE BOSSES" was silly . . . but in a positive way. Besides, most comedies of this manner tend to be rather silly. But thanks to a wacky script and a first-rate cast, the silliness in "HORRIBLE BOSSES"made it the most enjoyable comedy I have seen in quite a while. I really look forward to its DVD release.

"HEAVEN AND HELL: NORTH AND SOUTH BOOK III" (1994) - Episode One Commentary

"HEAVEN AND HELL:  NORTH AND SOUTH BOOK III" (1994) - Episode One Commentary

If there is one chapter in John Jakes' NORTH AND SOUTH saga that is reviled by the fans, it the television adaptation of the third one, set after the American Civil War. First of all, the theme of post-war Reconstruction has never been that popular with tales about the four-year war. More importantly, fans of Jakes' saga seemed to have a low opinion of "HEAVEN AND HELL", the 1994 adaptation of Jakes' third North and South novel, published back in 1987. 

My opinion of the 1994 miniseries slightly differs from the opinions formed by the majority of the saga's fans. The three-part miniseries failed to achieve the same level of production quality that its two predecessors had enjoyed. But unlike the second miniseries, 1986's "NORTH AND SOUTH: BOOK II", this third miniseries was more faithful to Jakes' original novel - as I had pointed out in a previous article. And to my surprise, I discovered that some aspects of the miniseries were an improvement from the novel.

Episode One of "BOOK THREE" struck me as a solid return to John Jakes' saga. Not only did it re-introduce some of the old characters from the previous two miniseries, but also introduced new characters. Ironcially, one of the new characters turned out to be the oldest Main sibling - Cooper Main. As many fans know, his character was left out of the first two miniseries. Why? I do not know. But Cooper was introduced as a humorless man, embittered by the South's defeat. And Robert Wagner gave one of the best performances in the miniseries in his portrayal of Cooper. Another praiseworthy addition turned out to be Rya Kihlstedt, who portrayed Charles Main's new love interest, actress Willa Parker. Not only did Kihlstedt did a great job in portraying the idealistic Willa, she had great chemistry with Kyle Chandler, who took over the role of Charles Main. Many fans had howled with outrage over Chandler assuming the role of Charles, following Lewis Smith's portrayal in the previous miniseries. So did I. But after seeing Chandler do a superb job of conveying Charles' post-war angst and desperation to find a living to support his son. James Read gave a solid performance as a grieving George Hazard, who seemed to be having difficulty in dealing with the death of his best friend, Orry Main, at the hands of their former enemy, Elkhannah Bent. Cliff De Young made a surprisingly effective villain as Gettys LaMotte, the manipulative and vindictive leader of the local Ku Klux Klan.

Unfortunately, there were performances that failed to impress me. I got the feeling that director Larry Peerce harbored an odd idea on how a 19th century upper-class Southern woman would behave. This was quite apparent in the performances of Lesley-Anne Down as Madeline Fabray Main and Terri Garber as Ashton Main Huntoon. The performances of both actresses struck me as unusually exaggerated and melodramatic - something which they had managed to avoid in "BOOK I" and "BOOK II". Fortunately for Garber, she occasionally broke out of her caricature, when portraying Ashton's more sardonic nature. Down only got worse, when her voice acquired a breathless tone. Being a fan of character actor Keith Szarabajka from his stint on "ANGEL" and other television and movie appearances, I was shocked by his hammy performance as a vengeful Kentucky-born Union officer named Captain Venable, whose family had been ravaged by Confederate troops. His performance was one of the most wince-inducing I have witnessed in years.

Episode One possessed some bloopers that left me scratching my head. Cooper's sudden appearance in the miniseries was never explained by the screenwriters. Neither was the introduction of former slave Isaac, who was portrayed by Stan Shaw. And I am still curious about how Gettys LaMotte learned about Madeline's African-American ancestry, let alone the other neighbors in the parish. I do not recall Ashton or Bent telling anyone.

Fortunately, Episode One was filled with excellent scenes and moments. One of the scenes that really seemed to stand out featured George and Madeline's argument about the state of post-war Mont Royal. Charles' hilarious introduction to a Cheyenne village involved marvelous acting by Chandler and Rip Torn, who portrayed mountain man Adolphus Jackson. One other scene that had me on the floor laughing featured Ashton, who became a prostitute in Santa Fe, kicking a smelly would-be customer out of her room. The episode featured very chilly moments. One of them featured Gettys LaMotte's creepy rendition of the KKK theme song (I forgot that De Young was also a singer). Another was the murder of Adolphus Jackson and his nephew Jim by a Cheyenne warrior named Scar. But the best scene in the entire miniseries (and probably the entire trilogy) was Elkhannah Bent's murder of Constance Hazard, George's wife. I found it subtle, creepy and beautifully shot by Peerce. Also, Philip Casnoff and Wendy Kilbourne acted the hell out of that scene.

Despite some bloopers that either left me confused or wincing with discomfort - including some hammy performances by a few members of the cast - I can honestly say that"HEAVEN AND HELL:  BOOK III" started off rather well.  Better than I had originally assumed it would.

"FROM PARIS WITH LOVE" (2010) Photo Gallery

John Travolta and Jonathan Rhys-Meyers co-star in this 2010 action movie about a CIA hunt for a terrorist ring in Paris.  Pierre Morel directed:  


                                   "FROM PARIS WITH LOVE" (2010) Photo Gallery