A History of Violence (2005)

Despite its straight-to-vid provenance, A Killer Within is an interesting murder mystery because the screenwriters gave some serious thought to what they were doing.

The plot:

A straight-arrow lawyer comes home one evening to find his wife murdered and his pre-school son unconscious. Needless to say, the police consider him to be the #1 suspect, despite the fact that the murder was committed in the manner of a recently paroled criminal who had a grudge against the lawyer. It happened just five days after the baddie's parole, and the words "now we're even" were written on the walls of his house. The police lieutenant rightly figures that the murder was either committed by someone who had a grudge against the lawyer, or by someone who wanted the police to make that assumption, and he's leaning toward the latter.

The wimpy lawyer wants to clear himself and find out who killed his wife, so he undertakes his own investigation. He finds that is a lamb who simply cannot do any research by himself in the haunts of wolves, so he hires an alpha wolf to help him - an ex-cop named Vargas who originally arrested the new parolee. Only one problem - Vargas hates the lawyer (who once got him pulled from the force) about as much as he hates the parolee. Say, wait a minute - don't all the clues also point to Vargas as well as to the parolee? I could keep writing those "say, wait a minute" sentences for quite a while, because many other suspects will later enter into the circle of suspicion, either because they had a grudge against the lawyer or because they knew about somebody who did, and could therefore have rigged up a frame. In addition, there is also the possibility that the lawyer killed his own wife.

Four weaknesses come to mind in reviewing my notes on this movie:

Well, the first two are likely to be perceived as weaknesses by most people. The last two didn't bother me at all.

1. One plot element really bothered me. The little boy was going to make a drawing of the person who hurt his mommy, and the father would not let him do so. Dad kept yammering on and on about wanting to find out who really killed his wife, and he kept following all sorts of alternative avenues to prove his own innocence, so it seems to me that it was simply illogical for him to forbid the child from making that drawing. He would have and should have wanted his son to complete the drawing. He did not allow that to happen simply because he was a movie character rather than a real person, and if the kid had made the drawing there would have been no movie. The whole idea was just a cheap trick to run a bunch of red herrings past us. The kid's drawing would have identified Colonel Mustard immediately, but the script wanted us to think it was, in turn, Professor Plum, Miss Scarlett, and Mr Green, before coming back to Colonel Mustard - maybe. You just have to call "shenanigans" on that, although I did appreciate the way the plot incorporated the child's drawing when the boy finally completed it on his own.
2. One other complaint from me. The score. It seemed to me that every frame of the movie was accompanied by some kind of pseudo-orchestral music, and it just didn't stay in the background, but was just conspicuous and persistent enough to be irritating.
3. Some of you may also complain about the gratuitous nudity. Sean Young does a full frontal nude scene as she dives into a pool. It is completely unnecessary to the plot. In fact, it's a flashback which is not related to the story in any way. It was there just to provide an additional lure to sell DVDs. Now that's gratuitous! Of course, I consider that a positive. The trick worked on me. I bought the DVD. In fact I would have been whining if a film like this had no nudity, so I consider that scene as having restored the natural order of the genre universe. Your mileage may vary.
4. Finally, there may be too many red herrings for those not attuned to this type of film, but I accept that as a genre convention.

Having registered those complaints, I'd like to add that the movie maintains a reasonably high level of tension during all of the twists and turns, so that I never reached for the fast forward button while watching the film. The script is not wildly inventive, but it's thoughtful. In fact, the basic script was good enough to carry the director through some problems. In addition, the acting and character development are at least adequate. Giancarlo Esposito was especially good as the disgraced cop, and his role was meticulously constructed, right down to the details of his apartment. Finally the ending of A Killer Within is kind of cool and original, so it's a very watchable film for lovers of whodunits.

I think they did an excellent job with a modest budget.

SEMI-SPOILER SECTION:

This film lets you solve the case along with the screen characters.

Do you remember the solution in Brian de Palma's Body Double? You knew the killer had to be the husband in disguise, because he was welcomed into the house by the family dog. The identity of the killer was all right out there in front of you if you were paying attention. Of course, I missed it, and I don't know anyone who saw the dog's reaction and figured out its meaning, but everything was all right there for you mystery buffs to solve.

This film is no Body Double, but it has an element like that. It will not specifically tell you the identity of the killer, but it will show you somebody who must have been involved in some way, and that in turn will lead you in the right direction. If you don't want the clue, stop reading now.

If you do want the clue, here it is:

There will be a dispute between the husband and the cops about a message which they insist he got, and he insists he didn't get. The police will accuse the husband of framing the parolee for the wife's murder, because he was informed telephonically that the guy had just been released. He, on the other hand, insists that he did not get that message, and had no idea that the criminal had been paroled until after his wife's death. The script shows us in many ways that the lawyer is a scrupulously honest man. The script also shows us that the cop is similarly straight-laced, because he once turned in his own partner for planting some evidence. Since the script goes to great pains to establish the honesty of both men, we must assume that they are both telling the truth about the phone call.

How can that be? The answer is hidden in the seemingly idle banter in the movie.

There is an even bigger clue hidden within phone calls. Pay attention.

As I said, this script is quite thoughtful about those kinds of details. (The head writer is a woman in her fifties or sixties who has never written a previous screenplay! I gather that she is a lawyer by trade.)

Sean Young's full frontal. (Film clip - zipped .wmv. Very short.)

Hello!

Today I'll just send in three clips from the German TV-series Dr. Stefan Frank (1995), a doctor who seems very popular with the ladies.

• First his daughter, played by Anette Hellwig, gets a phone call from him while she is in bed with her lover. That's good news for us because she has to come out of the bed to answer the phone and we get to see her topless.
• Christiane Brammer can be seen in the shower, sometimes blurry, sometimes not.
• Lastly our popular doctor doesn't seem to appreciate Claudia Wenzel's topless but too obvious attempt to get his attention. I wonder why.

That's all for today's contribution from the little land of the bombarded Smurfs.

Scoop's response:

It is widely known that we Americans are a generous people. If Belgium is now facing a critical Smurf shortage, please free to take ours for as long as you need them.

Caps and comments by Jack Snow

Today I have some caps from a German movie called "En garde", starring some young and talented actresses.

Maria Kwiatkowsky (19) goes full frontal in a shower scene, flashes her breasts in a changing cubicle and is seen in a wet shirt in another shower scene.
Pinar Erincin (21) shows her breasts while trying some new clothes
Jytte-Merle Böhrnsen (20) stays dressed, but shows her panties in a major upskirt.

Caps and comments by Dann

Reality Kills

I'd classify this 2002 flick as wimp horror, because it features bloodless kills. That's not too bad, though, because the method of execution is actually pretty cool. Watch the movie to find out. A group of young people, four women and three men, all strangers to one another, are sent to an isolated house to film a reality show. They are not allowed to communicate with the outside world, and the winner, as determined by the audience, will get one million dollars. People start dying, and the survivors panic as they suspect one another of being the killer. This has been done before, and what keeps it from being totally bad is a decent job by the actors, and a script that has some nice small sub-plots between the contestants. While it isn't groundbreaking cinema, it is fun to watch.

Courtney Peldon

Grab bag!

First up from "The House Where Evil Dwells" a topless Mako Hattori.
Then the always delectable Susan George flashes her boobies around in two lovemaking scenes from the same film.
Next Jessica Biel visits with "Conan."
Former child star Jodie Foster drops in on "Leno."
Then we have 2 "Newsbabes of the Week" (we skipped last week), both from "Fox News"...  leggy Paige Hopkins,
and Juliet Huddy.

MOVIE REVIEWS:

Here are the latest movie reviews available at scoopy.com.

NEW ORLEANS COPS BEAT MAN FOR NO APPARENT REASON
Cops Gone Wild - Retired elementary school teacher Robert Davis, who was videotaped being punched by New Orleans cops, says he's baffled as to why. Police originally claimed he was drunk and disorderly, but he says he hasn't had a drink in 25 years and put up no resistance.  He's black and the cops were white, but the police deny race was a factor.  Davis said he'd returned to the city to check on his property and was just looking to buy cigarettes when the cops stopped him, beat him and arrested him.

*  Buying cigarettes?!  Oh, then he had it coming!
*  It was for his own good: cigarettes are bad for your health.
*  Maybe the New Orleans cops just beat up a black guy to keep in practice.
*  He's a retired elementary school teacher, so at least he's used to unprovoked violence.



TOP TEN UBERSEXUALS
You Know: "Pussies" - The author of a new book called "The Future of Men" released a list of the Top Ten Ubersexuals: men who embrace the positive aspects of masculinity ("M-ness"), such as confidence, leadership and compassion, without the negatives, such as disrespecting women, emotional coldness, or knowing nothing cultural besides sports or beer.  And unlike metrosexuals, they "spend more time more time grooming their minds than their hair."  Counting down from #10: Jon Stewart, Guy Ritchie, Pierce Brosnan, Ewan McGregor, Barack Obama, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Donald Trump, Bill Clinton, George Clooney, and the #1 ubersexual, Bono.

*  I don't know about their minds, but Bono, Donald Trump and Ewan McGregor definitely spend no time grooming their hair.
*  This book was written by a woman, but I don't need to tell you that.



CHINA LAUNCHES ASTRONAUTS
Space Wok - Wednesday, China launched two astronauts into orbit for a five-day "glorious and sacred" mission, to demonstrate China's confidence and ability at space travel.  They allowed the launch to be shown on TV for the first time, and made a point to note that while the capsule, space suits and life-support technology were bought from Russia, they'd been modified by China and all the equipment launched into orbit is Chinese-made.

*  For instance, the rocket was launched by lighting the fuse on a giant firecracker.
*  And every one of the booster rockets was pointed at Taiwan.
*  The space suits were sewn by 10-year-olds and cost just $2.99 apiece, wholesale.
*  This is the first step in getting volunteers to live on the moon: insuring there will be authentic Chinese takeout available.



DOG SNIFFS OUT HIS CAT BURGLAR MASTER
"BAD Dog!" - Police in Hanover, Germany, came to a man's house to arrest him for burglary, but he ran out the back door and hid.  So they used a dog to sniff him out.  Not a police dog: his own dog.  He'd left behind his American Staffordshire Bull Terrier, Lumpi.  The cops released Lumpi into the yard, and he immediately trotted to the garden next door and with tail wagging, ran up to where his owner was hiding in the bushes.

*  He must be part Rat Terrier.
*  The suspect was arrested, and Lumpi was put in the Witness Protection Program.
*  He should've gotten a cat...A cat would NEVER do that.



CEMENT MADE FROM DOG POOP
It's A Dung Deal - Berlin scientist Friedrich Lentze has applied for a patent on a new kind of cement made from dog poop.  He said dung has been used as building material for centuries, and that tons of dog poo have be cleaned off the streets anyway.  He said it makes "a great mortar with fantastic insulating properties," so he'd developed a process that combines it with modern materials to make it into a new type of odorless, insulating cement.

*  One huge problem: Dogs can still smell it.
*  He expects it to become the #2 insulator on the market.
*  A really appropriate use: sidewalks.
*  If your dog's poop can be used as cement, maybe you should change his diet.



MUMMY DEAREST: RUSSIANS NOT READY TO BURY LENIN
Weekend At Lenny's XXXVI - Vladimir Putin has suggested that the preserved body of Lenin, who died in 1924, finally be taken off display in Red Square and buried.  Several senior lawmakers agreed, but some Communist Party members threatened massive civil disobedience.  Now, Mikhail Gorbachev is urging Putin not to be so hasty, saying the "moment has not come yet" for the nation to be ready to bury Lenin.

*  He's too good for tourism!
*  But, come on!  What a rotten leader!
*  We buried John Lennon 25 years ago, and he was actually worth hanging onto.



MAN ROBS TRAIN WITH BOW AND ARROW
An Arch-ery Criminal - Sunday night, in a robbery straight out of the Old West, Juventino Vallejo-Camerena allegedly boarded a Union Pacific freight train stopped in Montclair, California, and took it over by threatening the engineer and conductor with a bow and arrow.  They were the only people on board, and they escaped and called police.  When the cops arrived, Vallejo-Camerena pointed an arrow at them, and they responded with gunfire.  He was treated for shots in the wrist and forearm, then taken to jail.

*  What bad luck...This is just not his century.
*  He was stunned that they had those newfangled things called "guns."
*  His arrows aren't the only thing with a head made of flint.



NOBEL LITERATURE JUDGE QUITS IN DISGUST
But Her Dust Jacket Photo Was Hot! - The Nobel Prize for Literature is announced tomorrow, but the Swedish Academy was rocked Tuesday when longtime judge Knut Ahnlund resigned in disgust over last year's choice, Austrian writer Elfriede Jelinek.  Ahnlund called it a travesty to place her alongside Camus and Hemingway.  He said she's a "lackey to ideology" whose novels and plays are "engulfed in cliche," "violent pornography" and "a conglomeration of text shoveled together without even a trace of artistic structure."  But he said the other judges didn't notice because most hadn't read more than a couple of pages of her work.

*  Hey, they tried!...Oh GOD, how they tried!
*  Heck, when I was in school and had to write book reports, I'd read at least THREE pages!
*  They chose it because it was so representative of modern fiction...Plus, it was the best thing they looked at.
*  If they only gave Nobel Prizes to books they'd read, they'd all go to Harry Potter.



LOST CAT FOUND INSIDE PYTHON
Is It Scratchy? - Sunday in Miami, an escaped giant Burmese python was found with a suspicious bulge in its middle.  Andres Rodriguez feared that it was his family's missing Siamese cat, Frances, and the story made international news.  But his mother still isn't sure.  To solve the mystery and set her mind at rest, fire officials took the python to a vet to be X-rayed to see what the bulge was.  The vet confirmed that it was indeed a cat.

*  Of course, it might not be Frances...If we're lucky, it's Garfield.
*  The vet had never seen a python with hairballs before.
*  It ate a cat for dinner?  Must be a Korean python.
*  Poor Frances, R.I.P...."Rest In Python."



LIVE AND LET DYE: "BLOND BOND" CHOSEN?
His Hair Has More Highlights Than His Career - An unsourced, unconfirmed Daily Mail story claimed that the 007 movie producers have picked Daniel Craig to become the first "blond Bond."  Craig is little-known, but the producers think the series doesn't need a big name, and they want a younger actor for a fresh start.  Craig has said he doubts they'll mess with a winning formula, but he doesn't like that 007 films are more about gadgets than feelings.

*  It makes him cry.
*  His first movie will be called "The Spy Who Loved Me For My Personality."
*  The producers wanted a big name who was really young and blond, but Dakota Fanning wouldn't agree to a sex change.
*  The source of the story: Daniel Craig's PR agent.



BRITNEY'S NANNY IS HER HUSBAND'S EX
Is He A Hypnotist Or Something? - Tabloids are claiming Britney Spears is not only friendly with ex-"Moesha" star Shar Jackson, whom Kevin Federline dumped for Britney when Shar was eight months pregnant with his second child, but Britney has now hired her as their nanny.  They say after Britney gave birth, Kevin started going out partying and golfing.  Since Shar is familiar with his bad behavior, Britney asked her to move in, thinking that having all his kids under one roof will make Kevin appreciate the value of family and want to stay home.

*  Hey, it worked on Jude Law.
*  Britney may have to buy a double-wide.
*  Kevin will learn to appreciate what it was like to have a Mormon family in 1860.
*  It's pretty drastic letting his ex move in with them, but if Britney lost him, where would she ever find someone better?



*  California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill requiring schools to offer tests in Spanish, saying that immigrants have to learn English to succeed in America

...Present company excluded

... At least, we think that's what he said.

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