MEDIA COOL

MEDIA COOL

This month’s Media Cools were written by Bill Holdship, John Kordosh and Richard C. Walls.

LA BAMBA (Columbia Pictures)

This is a fine summer rock ’n’ roll movie—all the “working class hero” elements are there in the proper places, though they almost seem like cliches at this point in time—but it’s really less memorable than the two most recent classics of the genre, American Hot Wax and The Buddy Holly Story. The actors are excellent; the music is super-fine (though, for some reason, I had a most difficult time with Marshall Crenshaw as Buddy Holly, but not Brian Setzer as Eddie Cochran— and Los Lobos shine). The story is pretty standard stuff, though, and one wonders how much literary license writer-director Luis Valdez took (Ritchie Valens really did have a blonde girlfriend named Donna, but the recurring plane nightmares are most questionable). The biggest problem for me is that Lou Diamond Phillips—as good as he is—looks absolutely nothing like Ritchie Valens, and that made if really difficult to suspend any kind of disbelief at all. Still, the fact that a 17-year-old kid could go from the garage to the top of the charts with little more than pure talent back then may make you think a little bit and mourn that innocence, goodnight my love, ooh! my head, and all. B.H.

ARE YOU LONESOME TONIGHT? by Lucy de Barbin & Dary Matera (Villard Books)

This is strongly reminiscent of my fave DC Comics stories of the ’60s, the “imaginary tales.” The plot here? “What if Elvis Presley had an affair with this woman no one’s ever heard of, resulting in a daughter no one’s ever heard of.. .and she never told him??” Lucy de Barbin’s the long-suffering lover, going through Elvis’s life making observations like: “As I watched him eat his hamburger, my thoughts turned.” Kinda puts you right there, huh? Best of all, though, are Matera’s stumbling attempts to justify de Barbin’s story, like: “Albert Goldman’s investigation ... is by far the most penetrating.” By far the most gutless is more like it. Sorry about the new-found “daughter” and all, but the way I see it, we’re all Elvis’s children. So where’s my money?J.K.

STRAIGHT TO HELL

(Island Films)

Well, now I’m not gonna say this is the worst movie I’ve ever seen in my life—because I’ve seen some pretty rotten movies in my time—but I can’t recall ever seeing a movie that was any stupider and more difficult to sit through than this one. Alex Cox makes a so-so weird film called Repo Man, and a slightly better one about the two biggest dopes in rock ’n’ roll history, does pretty well with both of them, so he gets a million dollars to make this terrible piece of self-indulgence. It’s not funny, though I think /f thinks it is, but I’m not really sure. It’s supposed to be a parody of the spaghetti western, I guess, starring some aging punk rockers. But the bandits in this western drive cars, drink lots of coffee, attempt to have sex and try to kill each other when they’re not befriending each other. It has no rhyme or reason to it whatsoever. Didn’t Elvis Costello—who plays the “coffee butler” here—once say something about not being around to witness his own artistic decline? Costello, Strummer, Cox, the Pogues and all involved should be ashamed of working on this debacle, while co-writer/star Dick Rude should probably be embarrassed by his name alone.B.H.

DRAGNET

(Universal)

Well, I don’t know. I thought this was pretty funny—probably the best thing Aykroyd’s done since Saturday Night Live (he’s been involved with some pretty lousy films)—and a real entertaining way to spend two hours. Tom Hanks is always great, and Alexandra Paul is perfect as “the virgin” Connie Swail (the running gags are what make this film). Go see this. It’s good for some laughs, and that’s always a real nice thing. But then I liked Harry & The Hendersons and despised Top Gun—so what do I know? B.H.

MISERY by Stephen King (Viking)

His best, I think, since The Shining, with lean plotting and the sentimental digressions kept to a minimum. And even though King continues his irritating (and moodshattering) habit of inventing (or culling from the Maine backwoods?) singularly cutesy slang words and expressions, this time one of the main characters—there are only two—has the excuse of being a raging, psychotic child trapped in a middleaged woman’s body. It’s she who has captured our hero (a variation on John Fowies’ The Collector, which King acknowledges), a famous writer of gothic potboilers, whom she tortures into writing one last magnum opus. There’s no supernatural angle, but the horror gets pretty intense. Maybe it’s a needed balance that King has an amiable yokel side to his writing since, for all his flaws, he’s one of the most able and meticulous sadists to ever get involved in the storytelling biz... and just when you’re starting to think you can laugh at this stuff, he tightens the screws. R.C.W.

UL’ TEE GOMIGS PRESENTS PETE BUCK (Lil’ Tee Comics)

You know that R.E.M. have really become an important part of popular culture when they get a whole comic book devoted to them. Peter Buck is portrayed as a sort of rock ’n’ roll superhero who has to battle “The Format Fuhrer,” a Hitleresque character attempting to homogenize rock ’n’ roll. Pete knows he has to take action when the Fuhrer leaves Michael Stipe with amnesia, remembering only the lyrics to “Stairway To Heaven.” Of course, Pete keeps getting sidetracked during his hunt, as he has to keep stopping to sit in with various bands. Ex-Replacement Bob Stinson shows up at the end to give our hero a hand. Real clever stuff. ($3.50 to Logan, 2665 Lexington Rd., Athens, GA 30605.) B.H.