Four Really Bad Beatles Tributes on TV and Why the Stars Shouldn’t Do Them

If you were to check YouTube right now, you would find plenty of videos of  Beatles cover bands. That’s all well and good, totally understood. It probably gets you easy paying gigs at parties and local concerts if you’re a struggling musician.

However, if you’re already a star, covering the Beatles–under certain circumstances–is probably not a good idea, even if you’ve had hit remakes of them. It’s probably a zero-sum gain for the well-known. I’ve culled up four examples of “tributes” that end up being anything but, along with the reasons why they’re misguided.

1. You’ll always be reminded you’re not the Beatles nor will you be close.

At the 46th Grammys show, the Fab Four was “honored” by the talents of Sting, Dave Matthews, Vince Gill and Pharrell Williams. Never mind the flubbed title line by Matthews (“I saw her dancing there”) and never mind the fact that they do a decent job covering it. The problem is trying to recreate the ambiance of the Beatles’ debut on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964. It’s bad enough to position the performers almost exactly how they would have appeared back then (making those guys look like the touring cast of Beatlemani), but adding the pictures and constant running videos of the real Beatles as wallpaper is a reminder of the ultimate unattainable goal.

2. It’s easy to be lazy and uninspired staging a Beatles tribute.

The following is a clip from what some have written is the worst Beatles tribute ever. (I have my own choice I’m saving for last) Watching it gave me the distinct feeling the makers of the TV special “Beatles Forever” cared more about having the audience sitting around in the world’s largest living room (a few bongs scattered about would have been a nice touch).  It starts out nicely with Ray Charles, but then quickly takes the steep drop as Tony Randall, Paul Williams, Mel Tillis, Diahann Carroll, Anthony Newley and Bernadette Peters take their shots. All sitting down? Really? Hey, folks will pay attention, they’re Beatles tunes.The most somnambulistic Beatles medley ever.

3.  Staging the productions can be left to people who have no idea what The Beatles were about

On Cher’s variety show, Tina Turner (a Beatles remake hit maker) and Kate Smith joined her for a medley of the Mersey boys’ beats. Not really a bad idea, although Smith looks a little lost during some of it. What really sinks this is the garishness  of it all: Bob Mackie gowns, tinsels, rainbows, Sgt. Pepper’s outfits. The Beatles reflected the consciousness of a generation, but here the songs become fodder for a show coming to Las Vegas. Thank goodness Tim Conway pops in a couple of times to parody the production.

4. The production can be handed to someone who tries to be as experimental as The Fab Four and fails miserably

Dear readers, what follows is the rock bottom worst Beatles tribute ever shown on television. It was presented by Rolling Stone Magazine, which I assume never gave a shit about the group to produce this outrage. Ted Neely (Jesus from “Jesus Christ Superstar”) and Patti LaBelle (who sounds awful here) are part of a crew stuck in what looks like a combination of bad TV variety, very cheap and asinine Off-Off-Broadway experimental theater and self- parody. This is especially true when singers show up in a White House setting dressed in Nixon and Kissinger costumes (!). The great Richie Havens and Yvonne Elliman provide some much needed sanity, but they can’t stop the eventual onslaught, some of which has a (I think, unintentional) Rocky Horror feel to it. You won’t believe your eyes and ears.

All I am saying is –give it a rest.

The Gay Community Needs to Embrace the Cult Movie “Ben & Arthur”

Sam Mraovich as Arthur in “Ben and Arthur”

In a couple of days, one of the local Chicago theaters will be presenting its yearly screening of Mommie Dearest to a (no doubt) enthusiastic crowd. Wire hangars will be handed out and I’m sure there’ll be plenty of laughs galore with Frank Perry’s infamous film.

That film was released over 30 years ago. Since then, there hasn’t been any film released that could qualify as “midnight movie” material that approached a gay sensibility–until Ben & Arthur.  Both Cracked Magazine and Rotten Tomatoes have urged readers to pick up on this movie and make it a cult sensation. I agree. Not only is the time right for this movie to fill theaters with enthralled partying fans, it has the makings of being one of the greatest midnight cult movies ever, rivaling even cine-phenomena like The Room and Troll 2. Seriously. And the gay community should be front and center in pushing this wild movie for the following reasons:

1. Exploitation movies are generally straight-based.

Let’s face it: exploitation movies are usually made to appeal to horny guys who like lots of firepower and babes. Ben and Arthur has plenty of gunplay and horny guys (on the screen, at least) with one of the leads looking good with his shirt off (hence the promo picture). There’s the added bonus of a wrestling tussle between Ben and his wife. In fact, B&A is meant to be, in part, an action film which is part of the fun, especially when the movie looks as though it was shot over the course of a weekend.

2. Its main theme of gay marriage rights is still relevant today and probably will be for a while.

Produced in 2002, Ben and Arthur deals primarily with gay marriage, which–at the time–was only legal in Vermont via civil unions.  Ten years and eleven state legislative passages later, gay marriage looks increasingly possible for the entire country. The controversy, however, seems destined to hang on while significant opposition continues. This helps keep the movie fresh thematically and even when it passes all 50 states, Ben and Arthur can be viewed through a nostalgic lens, just as I do with movies from the late 1960s and early 1970s.

3. The movie is on the level of anything Ed Wood could have mustered, so it has perennial entertainment staying power.

Ben and Arthur is not just about bad acting or bad writing. Everything
about it is bad, no exaggeration. Out of focus cinematography, actors flubbing lines with no second takes, non-existent continuity, horrible sound mixing–there are no instances of competency apparent during any minute of this film.  Robert Altman said that movies are meant to view more than once and each viewing of Ben and Arthur provides an audience with a newly discovered flub. It’ll easily take several viewings to catch them all. This makes it a rarity, even among bad movies.

4.  Ben and Arthur is one of the most subversive gay-themed films ever.

Sam Mraovich’s film is meant as an earnest plea for the plight of those LGBT folks who want equal marriage protection and, by extension, full civil rights. Fair enough. However, the movie goes completely off the rails and becomes sanctimonious when it excuses such actions as domestic violence, arson and murder. Arthur comes off as one of the most hilariously unpleasant and incompetent characters in the history of gay-themed films. He incapable of taking the proper steps to help protect his new hubby and is, in general, a whiny insensitive asshole. Other characters are lying, murdering charlatans, but he is definitely the worst of the lot. Instead of using sentimentality (a fatal flaw in so many bad socially-minded gay features), Ben and Arthur tries becoming ambitious and eventually becomes unnecessary brutal. It’s a civil rights film, a romance, a revenge picture, an action film, a religious allegory, a fetishistic film, an erotic thriller–and fails at all of them.

So if you’re looking for camp value, you’ve got it. If you want a movie that is misogynistic, homophobic and insulting to religious persons and still hilarious to watch with a bunch of “enhanced” friends. You’ve got to take this movie to heart. It’s one of the greatest cult sensations in recent years.

You can make history with us tonight by attending the first-ever Ben & Arthur interactive screening. Tyler Pistorius, Demetra Meteris and I will be on hand for all the running commentary madness and hilarity.

Bring the following: YOUR CELL PHONE, NEWSPAPER, STUFFED CAT, SUGAR PACKETS

Tonight at midnight at Facets Multimedia
1517 W Fullerton
Chicago, IL 60614
http://www.facets.org
Admission: $5, FREE with Facets Membership. Get one here.

Lew Ojeda

The Amazing, Incomparable “Ben & Arthur” Presented by Legendary Lew is Coming to Facets Night School!

Your life may never be the same after this. Coming Saturday night, May 11th at 11:59pm to Facets Multimedia. Lew Ojeda, Tyler Pistorius and Demetra Materis will be your guides to a fine evening of wild, interactive entertainment.

To join in the fun, bring:
your cell phone
sugar packets
a stuffed toy cat
newspaper

Killer Looks: Legendary Lew Interviews Lauren Whalen on the Cult Appeal of “Drop Dead Gorgeous”

Estrogen deficiency in midnight movie viewing is cured this weekend as Lauren Whalen of Chicago Theater Beat presents “Girls, Guns and Glitter, Don’cha Know: Drop Dead Gorgeous and the Wild World of Mock Doc.”  Legendary Lew gets the lowdown on this influential comedy which joined “Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion” and “Dick” as among the funniest female-centric comedies of the late 1990′s.

LL: Could you tell a little about “Drop Dead Gorgeous?”

LW: It’s a darkly funny and very quotable 1999 mockumentary about a beauty pageant gone bad. In Mount Rose, Minnesota, teenage boys get hockey scholarships or go to prison and teenage girls enter the Mount Rose American Teen Princess competition. Our heroine, Amber Atkins, is an ace tap dancer who works in the school cafeteria and at the local mortuary, and dreams of following in the footsteps of former “pageant girl”, Diane Sawyer. Her rival, Becky Leeman, also has her eyes on the prize – and Becky is rich, the vice president of the Lutheran Women’s Gun Club, and has the stage mother from hell who’s also the pageant organizer. And in the meantime, people are getting knocked off at an alarming rate.

“Drop Dead Gorgeous” has great turns from Kirsten Dunst (doing her best Minnesota accent, don’cha know), Denise Richards (way before Charlie Sheen), Kirstie Alley (as the horrid stage mom) and Ellen Barkin (as Amber’s beer-guzzling mama). Allison Janney is fantastic as Amber’s drunk and horny neighbor – she’s said she gets asked more about this movie than she does about “The West Wing”, if you can believe it.

LL: When people think of midnight movies, male-based films in certain genres usually come to mind–scifi, horror, exploitation. Since “Drop Dead Gorgeous” is centered around female characters at a beauty pageant, where do you think the overlap is with the usual midnight movie?

LW: Cult film is largely a boys’ club. When I worked at Facets, it took me years to get comfortable talking movies with the “cool kids” (mostly men). I’m the only female presenter this session at Night School – even when that’s not the case, I’m one of two or maybe three in an eight-week session. I can’t speak for my entire gender, of course, but I do try to present female-driven films (like “Mulholland Dr.”) or ones with strong female characters (like “Brick”) because there is a place for women in the midnight movie world.

“Drop Dead Gorgeous” isn’t a “boy movie” or a “girl movie”. (I don’t think any movie should be classified this way.) Yes, all the main characters are women and it’s about a beauty pageant, but it’s got this absurdist vibe that’s also strangely true to life. Beauty pageants are fascinating, and they are bizarre, and those in the world are obsessed. In “Drop Dead Gorgeous”, someone is literally killing to win, and there are cat fights and explosions and carnage galore. It’s this hilarious juxtaposition of sequins and bright smiles, and blood and fire. Twisted intelligence that has you laughing and shaking your head equals the quintessential midnight movie.

LL:  What engages you most about the humor in “Drop Dead Gorgeous?”

“DDG”‘s director, Michael Patrick Jann, is an alum of the comedy collective The State. If you’ve seen “Reno 911!”, “Party Down” or “Wet Hot American Summer”, you’re familiar with this group. They were a bunch of film and theater majors from NYU’s Tisch School for the Arts that had a show for a couple of years on MTV, then split up and infiltrated Hollywood. When I was a 14-year-old theater geek, I’d watch The State in my basement. Jann directed a lot of sketches and would often appear shirtless. I have him to thank for my entrance into puberty.

Hormones aside, The State had this really odd sense of humor that’s carried through all their work. It’s very base yet artistic, theatrical and dark, abstract but sort of childlike too. It’s smart – which appealed to me a lot as a teen, and now – but doesn’t take itself too seriously. As a director, Jann takes every opportunity for humor, whether it’s slapstick or clever or uncomfortable. He pulls absolutely no punches. Just brilliant.

Also, I just really like glitter.

LL:  What other potential midnight movies, if any, would you compare this movie to?

LW: “This is Spinal Tap”. Anything in the Christopher Guest oeuvre. “Wet Hot American Summer”. “Team America: World Police”, which has been featured at Night School in the past. “Death Proof”.

Thanks to Lauren for the interview! Be sure to check out her reviews at Chicago Theater Beat.

Girls, Guns and Glitter, Don’cha Know: Drop Dead Gorgeous and the Wild World of Mock Doc
Saturday night May 4th, 2013 at 11:59pm
Facets Multimedia
1517 W Fullerton
Chicago, IL 60614
Admission: $5, FREE for Facets Members. Become one here.
All students: receive one FREE small popcorn with valid student ID.

Mediatrocities #7: Legendary Lew Interviews Chris Hefner on His Upcoming New Feature “The Poisoner”

Chicago filmmaker Chris Hefner recently sat down with me and talked about his new movie The Poisoner, which will debut soon at The Portage Theater (you can help him screen the film sooner by visiting his website and buying a deluxe screening ticket).

Chris is a wonderfully talented director, whose first feature The Pink Hotel had a successful debut at The Music Box Theatre. Our talk discussed everything from his filmmaking approach and his start behind the camera to current methods of radically independent film production and distribution. If you have any interest at all in making films on the cheap but have them not looking that way, you really should give a listen.

This episode hosted by Legendary Lew. Produced and directed by Lew Ojeda. The closing theme is “Ghostsong” by Daniel Knox.

 

Arias with Your Mouth Full: Legendary Lew Interviews Michael Smith on Manoel de Oliveira’s “The Cannibals”

This Saturday night at midnight, indie filmmaker and instructor Michael Smith will present Portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira’s very rarely seen and incredibly strange opera, The Cannibals (Os Canibais), for Facets Night School. Straddling between the two cinematic worlds of art house finesse and grind house excess (think Marco Ferreri’s La Grande Bouffe), The Cannibals promises to blow your mind (if you don’t blow your chunks in the process).

LL:  The Cannibals has been rarely shown in The United States. Could you tell us a little about the film?

MS:  The Cannibals is one of the very best films of Manoel de Oliveira who is one of the world’s greatest living directors. Oliveira is best known in America not for any specific films but rather for having a freakishly long career. He directed his first film in 1931 (in what was still the silent era in his native Portugal) and he is currently in pre-production on a new film at the age of 104. But the movies themselves, which are made in conscious opposition to Hollywood conventions and have not been widely distributed in America, are great: they tend to be rigorous, deliberately paced literary or theatrical adaptations centered on the theme of doomed love. I think The Cannibals is an ideal introduction to Oliveira’s work because it shows off his playful side: it’s funny, surreal and very subversive. It shows the strong influence of Luis Bunuel.

LL: How is The Cannibals a bridge between art house cinema and midnight movies?

MS: I would describe it as a midnight movie disguised as an art film. I think it was brilliant of Oliveira to tell this particular story as an opera. It’s an adaptation of a 19th century novel but he hired a contemporary composer, Joao Paes, to write an original operatic score and libretto. Literally every line of dialogue in the movie is sung and the score is excellent. However, the film becomes weirder and weirder as it goes along until it reaches the climax, which is totally insane. I think Oliveira chose to work with the form of opera because no other artistic medium is so closely identified with the upper class — the true subject of his satire. He’s making fun of his target audience! Without giving anything away, I would say he wanted to cloak his movie in the semblance of respectability and “high art” in order to deliver a kind of sucker punch at the end. I almost want to compare The Cannibals to Takashi Miike’s Audition in terms of how it works. (If you’ve seen that film you know that it lulls you into a state of near-boredom before presenting a mind-fuck of an ending that is effective precisely because of what comes before.) I also hasten to add that it’s not necessary to understand anything about opera to appreciate this film. I myself know little about opera.

LL: Were there any other operas commissioned directly to cinema?

MS: I’m not aware of any. It’s very rare to have any kind of musical film in which all of the dialogue is sung. Les Miserables is an obvious example but that’s, of course, an adaptation of a well-known musical play and had a built-in fanbase. The only other film I can think of that comes close to fitting the bill is The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. Jacques Demy commissioned Michel Legrand to write the original score and Demy himself wrote the dialogue, all of which is sung, but the style of the music is not that of an opera. So I think Oliveira’s achievement is singular and highly innovative.

LL: What do you wish to accomplish by presenting The Cannibals to a crowd accustomed to exploitation, sexploitation and violent trashy films?

 MS: I’m glad that you asked. I hope to broaden viewers’ horizons as to what their perceptions of a midnight movie is. The Cannibals is not exploitative or trashy and yet, in a lot of ways, it’s far weirder than many of the movies to which those labels are often attached. This film is so odd, in fact, that I myself don’t even know how to fully process it! This is also a big part of the reason why I want to show it: presenting it to an audience will hopefully inspire everyone present to work together in making sense of it in our discussion afterwards.

My thanks to Michael Smith for the interview. You can read his posts on the blog White City Cinema. It’s definitely worth your time.

Come feast your eyes and ears on The Cannibals at Facets Night School.

Saturday night April 27, 2013 at midnight

Facets Multimedia

1517 W Fullerton

Chicago, IL 60614

Admission: $5, FREE for Facets members! Become one here.

Watch the Great Indie Surreal Film “The Pink Hotel” Free

Chicago’s own excellent talent Chris Hefner presents his first feature, The Pink Hotel, available now on Vimeo. If you haven’t seen it, give it a watch, as you will not see films like this one very often. If you live in Chicago, know that there are many incredible artists like Chris trying to work independently and share their great visions.

Chris will be the special guest interview on “Mediatrocities” coming up later this month. Look for it. For now, you can help him out by heading to his Etsy store and buying a ticket for the debut of his new feature The Poisoner at The Portage Theater. Support your local indie artists!

Facets Night School’s Dominick Mayer Purrs Over Rene Cardona, Jr. and Night of 1000 Cats

This Saturday night those of you who crave pussy in your midnight movies will see plenty of them on the screen when Dominick Mayer, editor and critic for HEAVE Media, presents “Knockoff Henchmen, Helicopter Seduction and Night of a 1000 (sic) Cats. ”  The movie has been widely available for years on VHS and DVD, but never like this, for Mayer was able to obtain a rare 35MM extended version of the film. With it’s extra 20 minutes and presented in glorious, eroding MagentaColor®, this promises to be the ultimate in grindhouse viewing. You’ll be able to feel the mildew and wonder if the guy sitting in your row will flash you in the men’s room.

Here’s my interview with this very learned fellow:

LL: Night of 1000 Cats was made by Rene Cardona, Jr., the great Mexican exploitation director who should as well known as Ed Wood but isn’t. Could you give us a little about him?

DM: Honestly, the more I try to find about Mr. Cardona, Jr., the more questions I ultimately end up facing. I can tell you this: He was a ridiculously prolific filmmaker, putting out 99

Rene Cardona, Jr.

films as a director between his credited start in the 1964 and his death in 2003. Many of his films are out of print or hard to find; on this spectrum, Cats is definitely more obscure than something like Guyana: Cult of the Damned or Tintorera (the latter a delightful Jaws ripoff that you should find if possible), but at least it can be tracked down with relative ease. “Obscure” is relative here, though; he’s very much an unsung talent.

LL: What drew you to this movie? I know this film was one that I strongly considered for Night School.

DM: A few years ago, a friend of mine bought it out of the dollar bin at F.Y.E. largely because of the mistranslated title; the American DVD release boasts the deliciously trashy title Night of a 1,000 Cats, and if you pronounce the number as “one thousand,” the appeal of such a film pretty much sells itself.

Dreaded kitties waiting for their next beautiful meal

That said, once we actually threw it on, I was totally blown away. It’s an amazing piece of exploitation trash, and from a filmmaking acumen (or lack thereof) standpoint, it’s fascinating on the level of something more reputed like The Room. More than anything, I wanted to show a theater full of people this thing, provide what context I can and, more than anything, watch people who haven’t seen it react to it. To cycle back to your intial question, this has that intangible “youhave to see this” factor to which exploitation cinema aspires.

LL: I’m excited that you’re presenting the 35MM print of this film. Have you seen it and do you know what differences there are between this and the DVD/VHS released versions?

DM: First off, huge thanks to a gentleman named Harry Guerro for being goodly enough to share his personal print with us. Anyway, I can’t say I’ve seen the 35mm print; it’s because of Jason Coffman‘s offhand mention of seeing it in Philadelphia at Exhumed Films’ 24-Hour Horrorthon last year that I was even aware such a thing existed. I figured this was a bargain bin curio and no more, so I’m thrilled to be screening it. All I know is that there’s about 20-25 minutes of footage in the original version that doesn’t exist on DVD. A bonus if you’re reading this and on the fence about coming: to the best of my knowledge, this is the first-ever Chicago screening of Cats in its purest form.

LL: How would you compare this with other horror films about killer animals?

DM: How many others make you wonder if the animals onscreen are actually in mortal peril? Because this one totally does. It also has maybe the least intimidating evil animals in horror history.

LL: What do you hope viewers will take away from this movie?

DM: If a stranger lands his helicopter in your backyard and asks if you want to see his castle in the middle of the forest, the correct reaction is to politely demur. 

Thanks, Dominick!

Facets Night School Presents: Knockoff Henchmen, Helicopter Seduction and a “Night of a 1,000 Cats” (IN RARE 35MM)

Saturday night April 13, 2013 at Midnight

Facets Multimedia

1517 W Fullerton

Chicago, IL 60614

Admission: $5, FREE for Facets Members (become one here)

One FREE small popcorn for students with valid student ID

Viral Pro-Hollywood Oscars Tribute Video Shut Down by Disney Because Stupid Pill Overdose

Send out for a documentary crew, because you just can’t make up this shit. Nelson Carvajal, a Chicago editor/blogger/filmmaker decided to spend some time a couple of months ago, creating a montage that honored the Best Picture winners before this year’s Oscars telecast. It not only went viral, but gained some good press for a job well done.

Leave it to Disney to step in and ruin it all. Claiming a copyright infringement, the studio that gave the world this has now forced Carvajal’s video off Vimeo. His was a video that praised Hollywood, followed fair use rules, and one that could spark  interest in viewers  to…oh, I dunno, perhaps seek out those movies. Heaven  forbid, that could even lead to DVD sales. Isn’t this the studios’ point of forcing the removal of videos in the first place?

 

 

Mediatrocities Podcast #6.1: Remembering Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert 1942-2013

Lew Ojeda and Tyler Pistorius remember the influence Roger Ebert had on their lives and discuss the future of film after his passing. Included are a few choice clips of classic Ebert from his long-running classic TV series.