Pulpmovies Reviews

Set in ‘the not too distant future’, She’s So Cold is a surreal musical tale of love, loss and necrophilia. The film takes placed in a government records office and opens with a woman (Robin Reck) asking to see the tape from the Zeno case. Her documentation is in order, the tape is supplied and she exits to a viewing room.

Once she’s out of the reception area, the three clerks start gossiping among themselves. There is much for them to discuss and, over the course of their conversation they reveal who the woman is, who Zeno is and why he is now in an institution for the criminally insane.

Meanwhile, the woman has started watching Zeno’s taped confession, and this is the point that the film really takes off.

The confession, according to the office gossips, is the most the most popular taped confession. Since the film was made in 1995, I don’t know if the shades of media intrusiveness and news as entertainment are deliberate, but they are certainly far from jarring. The confession is also regarded as being so bizarre that no-one actually understands it.

This is not a normal confession, by any stretch of anyone’s imagination. It involves Zeno (Angel Connell) recreating his crime to a soundtrack of The Rolling Stones’ She’s So Cold. Not only does Zeno lip-synch, perfectly, with the song but writer/director, Angel Connell has also used the lyrics to inspire the imagery. The result is a stunningly original and stylishly disturbing interpretation of the song.

The acting that surrounds this central performance is very solid throughout and the film ends on a rather effective twist involving a photograph. The real strength of this film, though, is in its editing which brings together the disparate elements seamlessly to make for a film that is both very watchable and genuinely unnerving.

Carmen (Jace Nicole) is a pretty unexceptional person. She’s a single mother trying to support her daughter and herself and make her way through life in New York. Her ambitions are modest and revolve around a desire for stability and a loving relationship similar to that enjoyed by her room-mate, Jodie (Naama Kates). In fact, the only thing about Carmen that is particularly notable is her job.

Carmen works in the adult entertainment industry. Specifically, she is an actress in porn films and – for want of a better word – a web-cam celebrity.

Cookies & Cream establishes very quickly what Carmen does for a living and the sort of films she appears in. The film establishes this, though, in a remarkably unexploitative way that makes it quite clear that the nuts and bolts of Carmen’s profession are not going to be particularly focussed on. Writer/director Princeton Holt is clearly much more interested in the character of Carmen herself, her decisions and how these affect the direction she is taking through life.

The film, therefore, is very much a slice-of-life drama that follows Carmen as she ends one relationship and embarks on a new one with a man who, she hopes, will eventually love her for who she is, and not for what she does for a living.

This sort of character study is quite difficult to achieve and it’s a testament to both the writing and the acting that the film accomplishes so much. Carmen is a very well-rounded character and it is very easy to see where she is coming from and to understand what she is looking for out of life. The characterisation goes way beyond this, however, and all of the significant characters we encounter are similarly well drawn. This is especially true in the case of Jodie and Dylan (Brian Ackley), the man she meets and with whom she starts to develop a relationship.

As with the writing, so with the acting. Again, Jace Nicole does a superb job of carrying this film and brings a real emotional depth to her character, but the strength of the cast as a whole means that her performance doesn’t stand out as much as it could have done. While some of the performances are stronger than others, there are no weak performances and all of the cast members do an admirable job of bringing their characters to life.

All of this results in a genuinely compassionate drama populated with engaging and sympathetic characters. As the film progresses these characters increasingly draw you into their world, capturing and holding your interest for its duration.

Cookies & Cream does more than any other film I’ve seen to humanise the people working in the adult entertainment industry. The film moves along at quite a steady pace and without a great deal happening. It’s this pacing that makes the film so effective, allowing the characters space to develop and become increasingly interesting and sympathetic. As the characters develop, the film subtly challenges many of the prejudices – both positive and negative – that surround the adult entertainment industry, presenting us instead with an alternative – and much more realistic view – of a collection of individuals trying to do the best for themselves and for each other.

As a rule, I tend to find that the films I get most out of are the films that are ultimately about people. All of the technical proficiency in the world is wasted if I can’t bring myself to care about the characters and, on this point, New York Lately scores very highly indeed. The film is very much about ordinary people and the lives they lead, specifically, six New Yorkers and their loosely interconnected stories.

Jared (Jared Asato) is a corporate everyman. He’s worked his way up through the ranks to achieve a well-paid and secure position but now finds himself wondering whether this is all that he really wants out of life. and, more to the point, whether what’s right for the company is right for him. His friend, Ringo (John Weisenburger) claims to have all of the answers but as the film progresses it emerges that Ringo’s life is not the perfect existence he claims for himself.

Outside of work, Jared encounters Truly (Susan Cagle), a barista and aspiring singer-songwriter who is trying – and largely managing, in a way that Jared isn’t – to balance her job and her aspirations along with her friendships both old and new. Among these friendships is Veronica (Jenn Dees) who is also seeking something more out of life – in her case an acting career. Although Veronica is managing to find a succession of small roles for herself, she is constantly looking out for her big break. When it arrives, however, she is confronted by the fact that the cost may be higher than she is willing to bear.

Mark (Mark DiConzo) is a voice-over performer who has recently broken up with his girlfriend, Andrea (Molly Ryman) and who is thoroughly failing to move on with his life. Stuck in a vicious circle of moping and loneliness, his obsessing over what he has lost has reached the point where it is affecting his work, his social life and stunting his every encounter.

And finally, there is Elliot (Jeremy Koerner) an author whose best-seller days are behind him and who suspects his wife of cheating on him. He hires a private detective (Vanessa Streiff) to collect the evidence he needs but ultimately discovers more about himself than about his wife.

As is often – and probably inevitably – the case with a film that weaves together multiple plot threads, it does take a bit of time to get a handle on the characters. Once you do start to understand what is going on, however, the strength of the scriptwriting really shines through. All of the characters are well drawn, fully rounded and largely likeable individuals facing dilemmas that the vast majority of us will find familiar.

The strength of the cast also deserves a mention here. Director, Gary King has pulled together a group of actors that not only manage to put in a set of believable and natural performances but also manage to bring out the best in each other. As ensemble films go, this really is one of the most effective I have seen in a very long time.

The looseness of the connections between both the characters and the stories also works well by allowing the the stories to play out naturally without attempting to force them into any sort of artificially neat conclusion.

This is not to say that the various stories are completely unrelated. Common themes do run through all of them of hopes, dreams and disappointments and of love, friendship and betrayal and, ultimately, redemption. I never thought that watching relationships fail could be so heart-warming.

Writer/director, David Noel Bourke has a real talent for capturing the underside of Danish society. I have no idea as to the accuracy of his portrayal of the minor criminals that populate this film, but it certainly all feels sleazily realistic.

No Right Turn centres on four main characters. Johnny (Tao Hildebrand) is a drug-addled drug dealer full of empty plans and married to Nina (Laura Bach), a former prostitute who Johnny believes has abandoned her previous profession for him. Teddy (Lars Lippert) is a client of both Johnny and Nina.

Into all of this steps Monella (Sira Stampe), a painfully shy artist with whom Nina develops a friendship. As the relationship between the two women progresses, Nina eventually tells Monella of her plans to escape Johnny’s seedy world – with his money – and asks Monella for her help…

So far we have all the tropes for a familiar story of betrayal and revenge. But a number of things set this film apart from the run-of-the mill crime thriller, the first one being the atmosphere of the film. Although this is an independent film and not one that is flush with cash, Bourke manages to achieve a great deal with the budget that he has – so much so that the film is more than capable of holding its own in comparison to bigger budgeted films within the genre.

The production values are remarkably high throughout, and the city in which most of the action takes place is a beautifully evoked neon-lit sleazefest of drugs, dive-bars and the low-lives that inhabit them. A selection of very well chosen locations are superbly brought to life by both the cinematography and a soundtrack that really does set the tone for the on screen events.

Not content, however, to remain a straightforward crime story, the film also includes a remarkably well integrated fantasy element. Close to the city is a snow-filled landscape which is not only home to Monella but which also provides a striking contrast to the grim reality of the city.

Ultimately, though, this is a film that depends on the performances of the cast for its success and here, all four of the main characters do a sterling job. This is especially true of Laura Bach and Sira Stampe whose characters’ relationship provides most of the direction for the plot. The two actresses really do bring both Nina and Monella to life in a manner that is engaging, consistent and utterly believable.

It helps, of course, that the characters are well rounded and – if not always sympathetic – interesting enough that you want to know how things will pan out for them. This is especially true of Johnny who really is one of life’s failures, even if he doesn’t realise it. And it does say a lot for the strength of the script that even when faced with someone as unpleasant as this, I still found myself fascinated by his story.

At the end of the day, No Right Turn is a fairy tale masquerading as a crime thriller. The film incorporates familiar themes of innocence and corruption, and guilt and redemption but, by placing these themes into a gritty modern setting, manages to become something utterly unique.

The film has yet to start its festival run but when it does, I heartily recommend that you check it out.

Dumped by his girlfriend, Mick (Tim Woodward) – an unemployed cowboy – resolves to remain on a barstool for the next three months while he tries to find some answers to his life at the bottom of a beer bottle. Then he meets Arcy (Rachel Lien), an aspiring artist. A friendship quickly develops between the two and, as it does so, they begin to transform each other’s lives. Mick, especially, finds himself becoming happier, healthier and much more motivated.

When I read back over that one paragraph summary, it doesn’t sound like a lot. And, to be honest, there isn’t a great deal of plot in this film – it takes place over a couple of days and Mick and Arcy limit their activities to drinking, dancing, talking and walking.

Where the film does score very strongly, however, is in its two main characters, both of whom are well rounded and genuinely sympathetic. It helps, of course, that both Tim Woodward and Rachel Lien put in such strong performances that really do bring their characters to life. So much so that you quickly develop a very real sense of who Mick is and how he gets so burned so easily. And, as the characters come to life on the screen, you do find yourself wanting to know whether, and how, things will work out between the two of them.

The other real high point of this film is the soundtrack from Natalie Illeana which is beautifully integrated into the film is such a way as to very effectively convey both the tone of the film and the mood of the characters.

Although Barstool Cowboy is a very straightforward story, it’s also one that is very well told. The two lead characters are both well rounded and genuinely sympathetic characters are beautifully brought to life by a cast and crew with a very evident talent for visual storytelling. Your reaction to the film’s central message will probably depend largely on the extent to which you identify with Mick but, whatever your reaction, this is a film well worth seeing.