When Emily picked A Perfect Getaway for this month’s film swap, it made me pose a couple of questions. First, what kind of summertime fun would I get her involved in? Well, that was easy because I had just watched one of The Harder They Come’s lesser cousins, the stream of dub-consciousness 1978 film Rockers, and so I sent her on a trip down Jamaica way. So head over to The Deadly Doll’s House and see if Emily is got her Dread on or if it was just a film filled with dread. The second question was this. Would my perfect getaway include Timothy Olyphant or Milla Jovovich? That’s a question that I had to mull over for a while so more on that in a bit. For now, let me turn my attention to the film at hand today, A Perfect Getaway. Contrary to the trailer which makes the film look like an action packed thrill ride, director David Twohy produced a tense thriller that almost works, but this getaway is far from perfect.

The plot to the film is pretty easily spoiled, and I’m even going to do a bit of that later (don’t worry there will be fair warning). As the film begins we are introduced to newlyweds Cliff and Sydney (Steve Zahn and Jovovich), self proclaimed “American Jedi” Nick and his girlfriend Gina (Olyphant and Kiele Sanchez), and scroungy beach bums Kale and Cleo (Thor’s Chris Hemsworth and Planet Terror’s Marley Shelton). There’s a pair of killers on the loose in a Hawaiian Islands, and during a hike to a secluded beach the couples begin to suspect each other. I really think that’s about all on the plot that need be explained. Anything else would be just an examination of the red herrings (or snappers as the case may be) that run wild throughout the movie, but the problem is they’re not worth examining.

You may be wondering why. After all, longtime fans of The Lair know that while my love for horror runs deep, thrillers and suspense films run a close second. A Perfect Getaway even set out to be a great example of a thriller, but then it hit’s the thirty two minute mark. There, with only a pair of raised eyebrows, the entire mystery of the film was completely spoiled, and yet the next forty minutes of the film continue to play with misdirection for no reason that I could ascertain. For a moment I want to talk spoilers so I’ve made the text in the next paragraph much darker. Highlight it if you dare!

Here’s the thing. It wasn’t the script that made it obvious, and I have a hard time believing the two actors (Zahn and Jovovich) would have so cavalierly tipped the twist. That is unless the director thought that it would be subtle. In my case, it was anything but. I had no problem with the misdirection or have them act in opposition to their character’s true nature, but at last save it for the sixty minute mark. Giving it up that our newlyweds were anything but so early just left me angry and markedly less interested in the remainder of the film.

Ok now we’re back from that, and I think we can all agree that Nic cage is always money in my book. However, I should really talk about the actors in A Perfect Getaway. Tim Olyphant I have but one question for you sir. Why are so good in everything (except Hitman)? From Deadwood and Justified to Go and The Crazies, I’m an Olyphant fan. A Perfect Getaway is no exception for if anyone got away with anything it was Olyphant with the whole film. Milla Jovovich looks typically lovely and turns in a performance that is assuredly equal to Olyphant. The same can’t be said of Steve Zahn. While I love him on season 2 of the New Orleans based show Treme, for my money, he just wasn’t quite the fir for the part. Kiele Sanchez definitely shone when it came to the action sequences, and she provides a good companion for Olyphant. However, being a Southerner, I just wanted to reach through the TV and slap that terrible accent out of her mouth.

A Perfect Getaway almost made off with the goods, but instead it just seemed to give me the business. While it tries to follow the Hitchcockian rules of a suspense film, revealing information to the audience that the characters don’t have, it deals far too fast and loose for its own good. What could have been a movie that got a strong four from me will only end up with a lousy two, and that is on the strength of the performances alone. Now back to my question, my perfect getaway. Would it be with Milla or Tim? After some careful thought I realized there was only one way to answer a question like that. I would have to take them both…. And my wife. After all, how else am I going to get away with sitting on a beach sipping Mai Tais with Leeloo?


That’s all for today folks. Make sure you head on over to the Deadly Dolls to see what she thought of Rockers, mon. It’s sure to be a high old time, and I’ll be back soon with more Summer fun!

The Summer months are officially upon us, and that means that often this genre film buff’s mind turns from the gloom and doom of dark winter horror and thrills to the Summery delights of action flicks, teenage romance, and killer animals. The last of these has become an exceedingly campy and popular staple of the poorly spelled SyFy network, but I have to admit that I’ve never sat down to watch one of these made for TV masterpieces. However, when I ran across a Blu Ray of Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus, an Asylum Home Entertainment rip off of SyFy’s oceanic themed animal attack flicks, I couldn’t resist. I figured at nothing else I would get three bucks worth of enjoyment watching ’80’s icons Lorenzo “The Renegade “ Lamas and Debbie (Deborah, cause she’s all grown up now) Gibson  of Electric Youth  fame fight off a pair CGI nightmare. I wasn’t wrong, at least not exactly. Just when I thought that I might have wasted my money, Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus snatched victory from mid-air, literally.

Deborah Gibson stars as oceanographer Emma MacNeil who is cruising around the Artic in her mini-sub checking out the whales when a government helicopter stops by to test out some experimental sonar. The sonic waves make the whales freak out and ram a nearby iceberg unleashing the titular pair of prehistoric creatures. The Mega-pus puts the moves (and some serous devastation) on an oil platform while Mega-Shark gets frustrated trying to find a meal big enough and tries to pluck a plane from the sky. MacNeil gets canned from her ocean research job for taking the sub without permission, and she soon finds herself falling in with Japanese scientist Seiji Shimada (Vic Chow) and a team out to stop the giant creatures. After one botched attempt, the team is taken prisoner by government jerk face Allen Baxter (Lamas) and made to continue working on how to capture the creatures. Eventually, and kind of shockingly, a plan to pit the two against each other propels the film to its climatic final confrontation.

If you go into watching Mega- Shark vs. Giant- Octopus without expecting a movie that would be called Mega-Shark vs. Giant-Octopus, then I’m not quite sure what you expected. Perhaps someone mislabeled your copy of Magnolia, and instead of a serious film full of maddeningly morose characters, you ended up watching one of the dumbest films ever made. The fact that you didn’t realize it wasn’t Magnolia and watched the whole thing while wondering if P.T. has lost his mind, however, is on you. If you go into the film expecting a campy movie about two cartoonishly large creatures duking it out while and 80’s pop princess looks on, then you’re in lick because that’s what you’d be getting.

I’m not going to spend a ton of time defending or lauding the film’s action, direction, or performances. Doing so would only be a fool’s errand. Mega vs. Giant (as I’m going to call it for brevity henceforth) is an enjoyable film simply because it is so misguidedly bad. I’ll be completely honest and say that the scene of the shark snatching a plane out of the sky practically paid for the movie in and of itself, and the final battle between the two was also nearly as entertaining. Everything else in between is just filler, but it’s filler that features Debbie Gibson. Now when I was about 12 or 13 years old I had the biggest crush on Debbie Gibson, and now some twenty years later I am happy to report that I still have the biggest crush on Debbie Gibson. I can’t say the same for the Lamas.

Lorenzo Lamas is never the best actor, but back in the day Renegade was a pretty decent Sunday afternoon distraction when it cam on after the block of Hercules and Xena. Here he just shows up to be a harass government stooge that isn’t beyond throwing some racism at Vic Chow’s character despite him being one of the scientists trying to stop the monsters. Lamas’ character didn’t do the film any favors, and while I’m sure he was showing up to cash a check, it still seemed puzzling that it would have been worth cashing. As for Chow, while he should be one of the driving forces in the film, I often forgot he was around even though he had a stilted, forced love scene with Ms. Gibson. In fact other than Gibson’s oceanographer and her sub co-pilot, just a few hours after watching the film I already have trouble coming up with other characters.

In the end, Mega vs. Giant needed no characters, no plot, and no sense to be made because in the end the Mega-Shark fighting the Giant Octopus was all the film really needed. Though I do have to reiterate splicing in a few shots of Debbie Gibson probably wouldn’t have hurt. I can’t imagine that Mega-Shark vs. Giant Octopus will be a title I will find myself prying off the shelf with wild abandon every time I want to watch a film, but if I have a friend come over and they’re in the mood for something stupid and absurd, it would be one of my go-to choices. Will I pursue the Asylum indirect sequel that features both Gibson and her former rival Tiffany? You bet your boots I will, and when I do you folks will be the first to know. I hope you enjoyed the kickoff of the Summer season here at the Lair. So when you’re inside trying to beat the heat, remember to come back here all Summer long for a bunch of cool films.