Blood Capsule #387

THE COMPANION (1994)

A review on IMDb compared The Companion to an episode of The Outer Limits (the 90's version).  Yes.  Exactly.  I'm not even sure that I can describe this film any more accurately than that, but I'll try.  This time, the android is a mock human that you can purchase and reprogram to fit your needs.  Gillian is given a "companion" as a gift.  She names it (well, him) Jeffrey and takes him to a remote cabin where she intends to write her next smutty romance novel.  At first, the cybernetic steward acts as a butler.  He cleans, he chops wood, and he knows every Italian recipe under the sun.  The perfect mate?  Well, hold the phone.  He comes off a bit dry, so Gillian takes it upon herself to reprogram his sexuality.  She also enables an option known as "random data."  Big mistake.  It isn't long before Jeffrey is dispatching anyone he perceives to be a threat, and that includes minor nuisances.  He puts an axe (or some other tapered weapon) into the neighbor, a wormy louse played by the late Brion James.

The Companion was made for the USA Network.  That explains why I hadn't heard of it until scouring the web for any movie involving a cyborg.  You can tell it was sculpted for television, but you know what?  It's good.  Like, really good.  There's my critic quote for the Blu-ray release.  Bruce Greenwood is dialed in as the titular robo-dude.  He knows when to play Jeffrey with humility and when to go into "mecha-mode."  Kathryn Harrold is superb as the heroine, even if her decision-making skills are, shall we say, questionable.  Taking the limits of the medium into consideration, the death sequences are lacking...teeth?  The Companion could definitely use an R rating, but that's a paltry charge.  This is the second best flick I watched for Random Robot Month next to...am I really going to mention Evolver again?  Sorry, it was tubular.  The Companion is tubular in its own way.  Director Gary Fleder later helmed Kiss the Girls, which I might revisit tonight.*

*I don't know why I added the asterisk.  Should I leave it?  Yeah, I'll leave it.

Blood Capsule #386

CLASS OF 1999 (1990)

I must claim ignorance.  I haven't seen the punk-centric Class of 1984.  As far as I can tell, it doesn't have anything to do with battle droids, so I'm okay with missing out on it.  I'm sure it's a dandy picture, but this is Random Robot Month.  Priorities and all that.  Class of 1999 is an amalgamation of The Terminator and Higher Learning.  We're in the future again.  Public schools have become infested with rival gangs and all of the violence associated with rival gangs.  To stem the tide, the government issues cyborg teachers to America's most turbulent high schools unbeknownst to the students.  We settle on Seattle's Kennedy High, which is flagged as a "free-fire zone."  Essentially, cops are taken out of the equation.  Three bots are sent to restore order, two of them being Pam Grier and John Ryan (the father from It's Alive, of all people).  Our warring factions are The Razorheads and The Blackhearts, but of course, both sides find a common foe in the new faculty members.

Bradley Gregg is acceptable as the main character, I guess.  He's supposed to be the tough guy.  I don't know.  I mean, I could probably take him.  Joshua John Miller plays his little brother, and if you're looking for a random bit of trivia, he wrote 2015's The Final Girls (an awesome slasher, that).  At the end of the day, the antagonists are more interesting than the protagonists.  Case in point, Stacy Keach has loads of fun as an albino mad scientist with a killer mullet.  He deserves a spinoff sequel.  This flick is never brilliant, but it's never boring either.  The third act is brimming with explosions and sweet robot gore.  I have no problem recommending Class of 1999 to fans of the films I already mentioned.  And mechanical pencils.  Don't forget mechanical pencils.  Class of 1999 II: The Substitute came out in 1994.  It stars Sasha Mitchell (a.k.a. Cody from Step by Step).  I'm putting it on my list of movies to check out...at some point.  Maybe.

YouTubin'

Click HERE.  That is all.

Blood Capsule #385

M3GAN (2022)

So I'm just now seeing this flick.  It may not flaunt a novel premise, but it feels painfully relevant in an era where I could have AI write this review if I wanted.  Don't worry; these are my words.  Does it bother you that I could easily be lying?  Because it bothers me.  That's the conceit of M3GAN.  Technology has officially become creepy.  There is no video game involved, but M3GAN does for the modern day what Evolver did for 1995.  It combines the "killer doll" agency of 1991's Dolly Dearest with the technophobia that galvanized 1993's Ghost in the Machine.  Now that I've gotten 90's references out of my system, let's jump into a synopsis.  On second thought, I probably don't need to recapitulate the plot to you.  Obviously, a little girl befriends the Megan prototype.  Mom - the engineer behind the project - gets suspicious when the nextdoor neighbor's dog goes missing.  Eventually, Megan pushes a kid into oncoming traffic, but the movie is smart about how the stakes are raised.

In Evolver, the corporate types were portrayed in a realistic light.  Here, the bigwigs are more conventionally composed, but in their defense, they don't realize that Megan is on the blink until it's too late.  Just like Evolver, M3GAN wraps a slick thriller around the nuts and bolts of its script.  I don't mean to keep comparing the two, but Evolver set the bar ridiculously high.  That's my problem, though.  I enjoyed this viewing experience anyway.  I'm sure that the film has something meaningful to say about robotics and the fact that AI is a potential source of unrest for many, but it also works on a superficial scale.  I look forward to turning my brain off with M3GAN 2.0 at some point down the road.  Do we have a new horror icon on our hands?  Hmm, the jury is still out, but I'm all for M3GAN merchandising opportunities.  Are we sure that Charles Band didn't serve as executive producer?  I guess we'll know if M3GAN 4 and 5 are shot simultaneously in Romania.*

*I'm pretty sure that Puppet Master 4 and 5 were shot in California, but that's not as funny.

Blood Capsule #384

THE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME (1979)

While this isn't much of a "killer robot" flick (although we do see a roving band of diabolical automatons), it's worth mentioning as a "waste of Jack Palance" flick.  You didn't realize that was a subgenre, did you?  Here, he is the de facto despotic leader of Delta 3, a distant planet in something that tries to pass itself off as an H.G. Wells adaptation.  In reality, The Shape of Things to Come has very little in common with its supposed source.  We're knee-deep in the future.  Earth has successfully colonized the moon, but we are dependent upon a radiation drug for survival.  Unfortunately, the drug can only be found on Delta 3.  How are there humans on Delta 3?  No, I'm asking.  The script casually mentions this other planet that seems to be habitable.  I'm thinking too much.  Palance would make for a grand villain, but he only pops up for the first and last fifteen minutes.  The in-between focuses on Starstreak, a rogue spaceship that hasn't been tested.  I feel like I'm hemorrhaging readers.  I don't blame you.

Wrestling is on in the background.  I'm waiting to see the AEW Women's Championship match between Thekla and Thunder Rosa.  Thekla is cool.  She's way more interesting than The Shape of Things to Come.  Let's be honest; I'm in autopilot mode.  Oh, I forgot to mention that this is a Canadian film.  The budget is low, although the sets are quite stately.  The robots?  Mid.  The Shape of Things to Come came out in an era where audiences had acclimated to Star Wars standards.  As such, it feels desperately out of time.  Director George McCowan also helmed Frogs.  NOTE: I'm returning an hour later to tell you that Thekla won the match.  Yay!

Blood Capsule #383

EVOLVER (1995)

Ever heard of Evolver?  I'm guessing not.  I've never heard anyone make a passing reference to this flick, and if it wasn't for a back issue of Fangoria (never let anyone tell you that you can't live in the past), I wouldn't know about it either.  Imagine if you will that one of the killbots from Chopping Mall decided to embark on a solo career.  Now imagine this bot voiced by William H. Macy.  That almost sounds contrived, but I'm telling you, this thing exists.  So what is an Evolver?  It's a virtual reality game in beta mode.  Teenaged Kyle wins a contest and thus, wins the right to test Evolver in his own home.  Essentially, he and his friends play laser tag with an advanced robot that could be called a dummy run for Siri or Alexa.  Any 90's kid will tell you that the period between, say, '92 and '95 was rife with virtual reality mania.  As it relates to horror, it's practically a subgenre all its own.  Evolver starts with that kind of deliciously dated cheese.  I was instantly reminded of 1994's Brainscan, which has long been a favorite of mine.  But then...

...something happened.  Evolver evolved.  The film seriously shaped up and entertained the bejeezus out of me.  I can't quite put my finger on it.  Maybe the script used sleight of hand to lubricate the receptors in my brain.  Ethan Embry is likeable as a normal 16-year-old who is so invested in video games, he doesn't notice the obvious signs that a girl is crushing on him.  I was going to say "I've been there," but I was usually the one with the crush.  The pace?  You knew I was going to comment on it.  Everything glides along with a reserved urgency (???).  You're never too far away from a well-earned red herring or a wacky death sequence.  Evolver has a mean streak.  The stakes are high from the very beginning, as the storyline cleverly nudges Kyle's little sister into danger.  There is a capitalistic corporation involved, and I was ready to deal with those tropes, but amazingly, the bigwigs in the film are the first folks to kibosh the project.  They actually react in a realistic way.  Go figure.

I could easily write a few more paragraphs.  I realize that we're not even halfway through Random Robot Month, but this is definitely the hit of the bunch.  5 Z'Dars?  Why not?  By the way, I'm pretty sure that Evolver is on DVD, but you can also watch it on Tubi.  Check it out pronto.

Lunacy, huh?

Click HERE to watch me rant about JCW.  It's not...good.

Blood Capsule #382

TARGET EARTH (1954)

Here we have a film that more people should know about.  See, this is why I do what I do.  I don't know why Target Earth has been condemned to obscurity, but if you'll just hand me that shovel over there, I'll dig it up and praise its peculiarities accordingly.  Our story begins with a woman waking to find that her city of residence (Chicago, if I'm not mistaken) has been evacuated.  Later, we learn that she was never supposed to regain consciousness at all.  She tried to overdose on sleeping pills, which adds dramatic weight to her character.  It's a sidenote, but I thought it was a nice touch on screenwriter James H. Nicholson's part.  Random trivia!  Nicholson later co-founded American International Pictures with Samuel Z. Arkoff.  Okay, I have seriously derailed myself.  It happens.  Anyway, the woman eventually finds a few other folks who were left behind.  Is it the end of the world?  While I wouldn't describe this landscape as post-apocalyptic, it's certainly a grim situation made all the more grim by the presence of...giant robots!

We never find out where they came from, though a levelheaded Richard Denning posits that they most likely arrived from Venus.  It's a full-scale invasion, but we only ever see one robot.  It's a testament to Target Earth that the atmosphere is wrought with unease.  We don't need to see the rest of the world in chaos; we feel it.  Of course, I'm me, so I loved the robot action.  As far as robots go, it's no Gort from The Day the Earth Stood Still, but it's charming nonetheless.  With a satisfying climax, everything is wrapped up in a breezy 75 minutes.  Given its early release in relation to other sci-fi blue chippers, I'm surprised that Target Earth doesn't command more respect from the nerd community at large.  As a nerd myself, I remain perplexed.  Definitely check it out.  I usually try to end with a stupid joke.  Nah, just check it out.