Good Time is a Bad Time...in a Good Way

Good Time is a remarkable bad time experience done very well. The first high-profile film from indie filmmaking siblings The Safdie Brothers, Good Time is a caper thriller that harkens back to the rotten core of '70s NYC dramas. A dirty city and its working-class residents are the core of this relentless film.

Former British Twilight heartthrob Robert Pattinson is unrecognizable as Connie, a scruffy petty criminal from Queens, who is trying to pull off a bank heist with Nick, his mentally challenged brother.

One bad turn leads to another and Nick lands in jail. It's up to desperate Connie to scrape together the bail money to spring him. This leads him into one misadventure after another.

And bad, quickie hair dye jobs are the least of his worries.

Good Time plays like a dour, mean version of Martin Scorsese's After Hours. Falling into one failed impromptu plot after another, Connie hopscotches through the night of outer boroughs New York City. There's no glamour and Manhattan glitz in this world of hospital corridors, project high rises, White Castle burgers, empty carnival fun houses, and cold city streets.

The tension is perfectly ratcheted up as we careen along with Connie, making up the path as he stumbles along. The early '80s John Carpenter-esque synth score, by Oneohtrix Point Never provides ample dread-filled ambiance.

This image of underbelly New York is hard to shake. A remarkable "feel bad" journey.

Night Fever: 'It Comes at Night' and Psychological Terror vs. Gore

As summer bakes on and we hit 105 degrees today and 108 tomorrow, we fantasize about being in a dark, shaded forest in October at 55 degrees. That's the setting of this overlooked indie, directed by Trey Edward Shults, that is being billed as a 'horror movie' but is more a psychological drama/thriller.

It Comes at Night stars edgy Joel Edgerton (fantastic, as usual) as Paul, husband and father who is hiding out in a cabin in the woods with his wife Sarah and teenage son Travis after some sort of unnamed health catastrophe has seemingly affected the world (nuclear war, plague, zombies?).

Their life is upended as Will, a young man, breaks into their sealed-up house looking for food, and winds up becoming their captive. They quickly ease their grip on Will and Paul goes with him to bring back his wife and young son to their cabin.

They all return safely to stay in the cabin but let's just say paranoia, cabin fever, anxiety, and creeping fear take hold of everyone involved and things go from bad to worse.

Although promoted with a very "scariest bits" trailer (above), this movie was not a "zombie film" or even much of a gory horror B-movie. It is truly a psychological horror film about survival, family, and fear. Also throw on heavy doses of mistrust and breakdown of society's rules and a dash of the (un)kindness(?) of strangers.

With a tiny budget and few recognizable actors, the small-scale It Comes at Night delivers with a fantastic sense of mood and place, a slow burning turning of the screws, and some stellar acting. Unanswered questions and motivations are littered throughout the picture to put you on edge and keep you guessing what's happening and why are people so cruel.

Deep, dark, and brutal, It Comes at Night scores more with its mundane, quiet take on the end of the world than the latest seasons of cacophony on The Walking Dead.

I'll Take a Big Slice: the Overabundance of '90s in 'Sliver'

After not having seen it for well over a decade, I thought it would be fun to wallow in the early '90s beige depths of Sliver, the film adaptation of the novel by psychological thriller king Ira Levin. It continues his fascination with both the apartment living nightmares of his Rosemary's Baby, with the fish out of water/"Why the hell am I living here?"-isms of his The Stepford Wives. The screenplay was adapted by future Showgirls scribe Joe Eszterhas, right after his mega hit Basic Instinct.

Although the soundtrack boasts some great '90s ethereal pre-trip hop by Enigma, Massive Attack, and Neneh Cherry, it also birthed UB40's dreadful cover of Elvis Presley's "Can't Help Falling in Love with You."

As you twirl your arms to the theme of Sliver's title character Carly (Sharon Stone) below, and feel the herbal ecstasy kick-in ("It's legal!"), it may be best to just peruse the collection of images I've gathered to help makes sense (or not) out of the ridiculousness of Sliver.

Enigma - Carly's Song (featuring Sharon vamping it up in several different wigs and outfits)

Carly/Sharon gives us:

Chokers and parted down the middle cute bobs

Berets and XXL overcoats, all in beige and neutrals

Pearl necklace rope chokers over black velvet (if you please) mock turtleneck gowns, ripped wide open while in a fine dining restaurant

Billy Baldwin as the Carly/Sharon love interest and potential bad boy had his share of looks too.

Skank tank, veins, and a not-needed weight belt while doing cardio.

That's Billy in a nutshell.