Windy City Media Group Frontpage News

THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

home search facebook twitter join
Gay News Sponsor Windy City Times 2023-12-13
DOWNLOAD ISSUE
Donate

Sponsor
Sponsor
Sponsor

  WINDY CITY TIMES

Knight at the Movies: Land of the Dead and Herbie Fully Loaded
by Richard Knight, Jr.
2005-06-29

This article shared 4901 times since Wed Jun 29, 2005
facebook twitter pin it google +1 reddit email


Pictured Lindsay Lohan in Herbie.

It's been 20 years since George Romero's last 'official' living dead movie, Day of the Dead. There have been dozens of other killer zombie pictures to fill the void since then. From camp to gore galore, these imitators of Romero's original Night of the Living Dead and its sequels have multiplied almost as fast as the body count in each succeeding movie. Night of the Living Dead itself has been cut and re-cut in numerous versions, with new 'found' footage added in one edition and has been remade ( in 1990 by Romero's make-up man turned director, Tom Savini ) as has Dawn of the Dead. But as Land of the Dead, the third 'official' sequel so aptly proves, when it comes to killer zombie pictures, nobody does it better than George A. Romero. Once again the writer-director has found the perfect blend of horror, social commentary and black comedy. Midnight movie fans rejoice: you've just been handed another perfect stoner picture.

After the words 'Some Time Ago' appear on the screen, we're given the history of the living dead plague during a Seven type credit sequence and are quickly into the first set piece. The world now belongs to the living dead but survivors have banded together, military style, to conduct raids for food and supplies on the small towns where the dead aimlessly hang out together. The marauders distract the zombies during these night raids with 'sky flowers' ( fireworks ) . While the dead are staring up at the skies, the survivors grab what they can. Conflict quickly surfaces between the principled commando leader Riley ( Australian actor Simon Baker ) and his hedonistic counterpart, Cholo ( John Leguizamo ) .

Both are in the service of a group of ruthless businessmen led by Kaufman ( Dennis Hopper ) , who control the waiting list for accommodations in the fabulous sealed off skyscraper that closely resembles Water Tower Place. The haves get to live inside, shop, and kvetch at the coffee bars while the have nots live in the surrounding burned out slums, scraping by and weakly protesting their fate. But even the have nots are safely ensconced within the walls of the city away from the living dead. Naturally, with Romero at the helm, the walls of this pseudo Jericho are about to come tumbling down and the zombies are about to shuffle in.

Working with his largest budget and most notable cast ( though the unsung cast for Day of the Dead remains my favorite ) , Romero proves to be ingenious in finding new, ever more graphic ways to kill people onscreen. But like the zombie getting his brain sliced off by the helicopter in Dawn of the Dead, there's something both gross and funny about the gore at the same time. Could any other director make cannibalism humorous? Romero also manages to put a nice spin on the stock characters that are selected to battle the zombies and he's always had a knack for creating and sustaining tension. There are elements of many other End of the World movies here—Escape from New York, the Mad Max series, Universal Solider, etc., but again, Romero has his own way of tying them together.

As intended, Hopper's character is horribly evil, a cartoon of villainy so despicable that he's also funny. Whether stomping around his rooftop penthouse while his clock ticks ( a nice nod, I assume, to the prissy Charles Laughton in the noir classic, The Big Clock ) , bellowing at his Black manservant, and announcing with a straight face, 'We do not negotiate with terrorists!' Hopper has the time of his life and hams it up for all it's worth.

The similarities to the current White House administration, whether intended or not, also give the picture a huge lift. There's one ironic moment after another—the perfect movie for the counter culture to embrace. Just one of my favorites is a quick shot of two lesbians passionately kissing before being grabbed and eaten by the zombies. Naturally, my vivid imagination immediately translated the zombies into fundamentalists just waiting for the chance to gorge on our flesh. Perhaps the largest irony of all is that Land of the Dead is one of the most energetic, alive pictures I've seen this year. It's a hoot.

_____

There are very few reasons to see Herbie: Fully Loaded. One might be that you grew up with the original Herbie the love bug pictures and are curious about what another Disney remake has wrought ( the answer: not much ) . Or perhaps you are a fan of teenage tabloid star Lindsay Lohan who, it must be admitted, has an enormous, likeable screen presence. She's also developed into quite the dish and her assets are fetchingly displayed here, complete with her freckled sunny smile and pale pink lip gloss. She's like a teenage Doris Day —who also had a knockout figure that was softened by her perky, virginial persona.

Another reason to see the movie might be that you have little ones clamoring to be taken on an outing. If that's the case you know what to expect: the theater in which you see the picture is likely to be filled with other screaming, piping children running up and down the aisles during the quiet parts. When Herbie falls in love with another Volkswagon ( a newer model ) and when Matt Dillon the villain gets oil sprayed in his face, there will be giggles aplenty. Adults may also enjoy the nonstop '70s rock songs on the soundtrack and be fascinated by the presence of Michael Keaton ( Michael Keaton?!? ) in the movie ( you'll have plenty of time to ruminate on what happened to his career ) . There's not much else to do except count the number of times lesbian director Angela Robinson manages to sneak in quick shots of coupled women aka lesbians.

This last, finally, is the reason for the GLBT community to do their part and celebrate one of our own. Herbie: Fully Loaded might not be the greatest way to spend 90 minutes but it's worth supporting. When a company like Disney, where 'family' is everything, doesn't hesitate to entrust one of their sacred franchises to a 33-year-old bi-racial out lesbian, then maybe things are looking up.

_____

Local Screening of Note: The Great Water, a Russian import from gay-friendly Picture This! Entertainment, is the story of the friendship between two young adolescent boys ( one of whom is played by an actress ) interred in a Russian orphanage after WWII. A Chicago premiere, it opens this Friday, July 1 at the Gene Siskel Center.

See www.siskelfilmcenter.com .


This article shared 4901 times since Wed Jun 29, 2005
facebook twitter pin it google +1 reddit email

Out and Aging
Presented By

  ARTICLES YOU MIGHT LIKE

Gay News

JP Karliak morphs into non-binary character for Disney+'s X-Men '97 2024-03-22
- series X-Men '97, a revival of the popular X-men: The Animated Series that's both continuing the ongoing mutant storyline and breaking new ground along the way. The character of Morph now looks more like the comic ...


Gay News

WORLD Uganda items, HIV report, Mandela, Liechtenstein, foreign minister weds 2024-03-21
- It turned out that U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Senior LGBTQI+ Coordinator Jay Gilliam traveled to Uganda on Feb. 19-27, per The Washington Blade. He visited the capital of Kampala and the nearby city of ...


Gay News

SHOWBIZ Queer musicians, Marvel situation, Elliot Page, Nicole Kidman 2024-03-21
- Queer musician Joy Oladokun released the single "I Wished on the Moon," from Jack Antonoff's official soundtrack for the new Apple TV+ series The New Look, per a press release. The soundtrack, ...


Gay News

SHOWBIZ Lady Gaga, 'P-Valley,' Wendy Williams, Luke Evans, 'Queer Eye,' 'Transition' 2024-03-15
- Lady Gaga came to the defense of Dylan Mulvaney after a post with the trans influencer/activist for International Women's Day received hateful responses, People Magazine noted. On Instagram, Gaga stated, "It's appalling to me that a ...


Gay News

SHOWBIZ Jinkx Monsoon, Xavier Dolan, 'Frida,' Lena Waithe, out singer 2024-03-08
- Two-time RuPaul's Drag Race winner Jinkx Monsoon is headed back to the New York stage, joining off-Broadway's Little Shop of Horrors as Audrey beginning April 2, according to Playbill. The casting makes Monsoon the first drag ...


Gay News

SHOWBIZ Queer actors, icons duet, Hunter Schafer, Oscars, Elizabeth Taylor 2024-03-01
- Queer actor Kal Penn is set to star in Trust Me, I'm a Doctor—a film that chronicles the final days of actress/model Anna Nicole Smith, whose overdose death in 2007 at age 39 sparked a tabloid ...


Gay News

Dorian Film Awards: 'All of Us Strangers' takes top prizes 2024-02-27
- February 26, 2024 - Los Angeles, Ca. - For its 15th Dorian Film Awards, GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics fully embraced All of Us Strangers, writer-director Andrew Haigh's fantastical and tear-inducing tale of two ...


Gay News

SAG Awards honor Streisand, few LGBTQ+ actors 2024-02-25
- Queer entertainers made their mark—although not a major one—at the 2024 Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards, held Feb. 24 in Los Angeles. The event was live-streamed on Netflix for the first time. Indigenous and Two-Spirit actor ...


Gay News

WORLD Caribbean ruling, Pussy Riot, Russian raid, Canadian warning, anti-trans bar 2024-02-23
- The top court in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines dismissed a challenge to colonial-era anti-gay laws, Reuters reported. Javin Johnson and Sean Macleish—two gay men who had pushed to decriminalize ...


Gay News

SHOWBIZ Kristen Stewart, Rock Hudson, Talia Keys, 'True Detective,' Marvel comic 2024-02-23
- At the Berlin Film Festival, Kristen Stewart defended her photo shoot for a Rolling Stone magazine cover that went viral and divided audiences on social-media platforms, per The Hollywood Reporter. "The existence of a female body ...


Gay News

Second Glance Productions hosts LGBTQupid Soiree 2024-02-16
- In celebration of Valentine's Day, Chicago based film and media production company Second Glance hosted The LBGTQupid Soiree. The event, which was focused on spinning attitudes on this particular day, was presented at The iO ...


Gay News

SHOWBIZ Elton John, Hannah Gadsby, video game, Jennifer Lopez, queer thriller 2024-02-16
Video below - Sir Elton John has sold his Atlanta home and is now auctioning off more than 900 of his personal items that were kept in the 13,500-square-foot condo, The Daily Mail noted. The massive collection includes rare ...


Gay News

GALECA announces nominees for the Dorian Film Awards 2024-02-07
--From a press release - Feb. 5, 2024 - GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics, consisting of over 500 entertainment critics, journalists and media icons, today announced the group's democratically chosen nominees for its 15th Dorian Film Awards. All of ...


Gay News

SHOWBIZ JoJo Siwa, Tom Holland, Bowen Yang, Pet Shop Boys, Mariah Carey 2024-02-02
- In the wake of Nigel Lythgoe exiting So You Think You Can Dance, queer personality JoJo Siwa is returning to the series, per Deadline. Siwa, who was a judge on season 17 of the Fox show, will replace Lythgoe, who left ...


Gay News

Leather Archives & Museum announces 2024 Fetish Film Forum 2024-01-27
--From a press release - CHICAGO, Illinois—After a wildly successful inaugural year, including a 10-film series at the Leather Archives & Museum and a 5-film series at FACETS, the Leather Archives & Museum is thrilled to announce the continuation of Fetish ...


 


Copyright © 2024 Windy City Media Group. All rights reserved.
Reprint by permission only. PDFs for back issues are downloadable from
our online archives.

Return postage must accompany all manuscripts, drawings, and
photographs submitted if they are to be returned, and no
responsibility may be assumed for unsolicited materials.

All rights to letters, art and photos sent to Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago
Gay and Lesbian News and Feature Publication) will be treated
as unconditionally assigned for publication purposes and as such,
subject to editing and comment. The opinions expressed by the
columnists, cartoonists, letter writers, and commentators are
their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay,
Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature Publication).

The appearance of a name, image or photo of a person or group in
Nightspots (Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times
(a Chicago Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature
Publication) does not indicate the sexual orientation of such
individuals or groups. While we encourage readers to support the
advertisers who make this newspaper possible, Nightspots (Chicago
GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay, Lesbian
News and Feature Publication) cannot accept responsibility for
any advertising claims or promotions.

 
 

TRENDINGBREAKINGPHOTOS







Sponsor


 



Donate


About WCMG      Contact Us      Online Front  Page      Windy City  Times      Nightspots
Identity      BLACKlines      En La Vida      Archives      Advanced Search     
Windy City Queercast      Queercast Archives     
Press  Releases      Join WCMG  Email List      Email Blast      Blogs     
Upcoming Events      Todays Events      Ongoing Events      Bar Guide      Community Groups      In Memoriam     
Privacy Policy     

Windy City Media Group publishes Windy City Times,
The Bi-Weekly Voice of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Trans Community.
5315 N. Clark St. #192, Chicago, IL 60640-2113 • PH (773) 871-7610 • FAX (773) 871-7609.