DAMNATION ALLEY (1977)

At the beginning of the movie military personnel witness complete thermonuclear war from an underground military bunker. Two years later the world is completely fucked.  An explosion in the base causes the four remaining soldiers to leave the base in their two gigantic 12-wheeled armored vehicles. They head out for a cross-country trip to Albany, where they've heard some recorded radio broadcasts.

Naturally, along the way they run into various bad guys and mutated creatures, but not as many as you'd expect. In fact the majority of the movie is pretty boring with just a lot of talking between the two leads: Jan-Michael Vincent and George Peppard (who has a terrible Southern accent).

The most fascinating thing to me about DAMNATION ALLEY is not really the movie itself (it's about as exciting as a lame episode of a sci-fi TV show), but the story behind the movie. I would love to see a well-researched documentary about the behind-the-scenes making and financing of this movie. According to IMDb and Wikipedia, the budget for this film was $17M, which in 1976 (when it was made) was a sizable budget. The makers, 20th Century Fox, where also releasing one other science fiction film that year, but they didn't have as much confidence in it and only spent $11M (originally $8.25M but it increased due to delays) on it. That film was fucking STAR WARS.  When you watch STAR WARS the story is impressive and it looks great, so what happened on the set of DAMNATION ALLEY to make it look like hammered goat shit?! It boggles the mind.

Worth checking out, but it's nothing special. I remember seeing it on TV when I was a kid and the armor-plated flesh-eating cockroaches scared the shit out of me. Watching it now thought it looks hilarious and you can even see the strings pulling the roach horde.

5 CENTIMETERS PER SECOND (2007)

Hmm, I think I'm going to have to kill my cleaning woman cause it suddenly got really dusty in my living room towards the end of this movie. Did I say kill? I meant fire.

Told in three segments, 5CPS is the touching story of a young teenager, Takaki, who changes schools a lot. He falls in love with Akari and even though they try to continue their innocent relationship after he moves they eventually drift apart over time. During this period he moves even farther away to yet another school and here a young girl, Kanae, secretly falls in love with him. They become friends, but he always seems distant.

5 CENTIMETERS PER SECOND is an amazing film in every way. The story is mature, well told and touching; the music is perfect; the voice acting is emotional and the animation is beautiful! Not only is it jaw-dropping just to look at, but the cinematography so natural in it's movements that you forget at moments that you're even watching a goddamn cartoon. I was so impressed that I actually watched it twice back-to-back. Highly recommended for lovers of animation and/or romantic motherfuckers like myself.

FLESH AND THE DEVIL (1926)

Probably the most popular of her silent films FLESH AND THE DEVIL is about two life long friends who unknowingly fall for the same woman and all the shit that goes down between them because of this. According to rumor the first time John Gilbert ever saw Garbo in real life was during the train station scene where his character sees Garbo's character for the first time. He fell in love with her, or at least Garbo the movie star, instantly and even left his wife for her. Who knows how true that story is, but they did have a heated romance while filming this movie and it really shows. In their kissing scenes shes grabbing him with both hand like she's a vampire. Pretty hot stuff, especially for 1926!

I liked the idea for the story, but the movie is too long and the narrative too lumpy and some of the acting (by supporting characters) is way too over dramatic. None of that really matters though cause when Garbo is on the screen I'm in absolute Heaven. At this stage in her career they could have made a three hour movie about her grocery shopping and I'd be glued to the screen the entire time.

Enjoyable silent film, but mainly just to see Garbo and Gilbert gettin' steamy.