We watch several movies a week. Every Friday, we'll talk a little about some of the movies we watched that we felt were Worth Mentioning.
NUMBER ONE WITH A BULLET (1987)
The buddy cop action comedy Number One with a Bullet was one of the many cool movies made by the legendary company Cannon in the 1980s – and the fact that they only gave it a theatrical release on 228 screens, allowing it to sputter out will less than $411,000 at the box office, is one of the many examples why that company crashed and burned, despite making so many cool movies. This certainly isn’t a buddy cop movie that could compete with the likes of 48 Hrs. or Lethal Weapon (which was released one week later) in the quality department, but it’s worth checking out – especially since one of the lead cops is played by Robert Carradine, who was in the midst of having great success with the Revenge of the Nerds comedy movies at the time.
The film was directed by Jack Smight from a script that was crafted by Gail Morgan Hickman, Andrew Kurtzman, Rob Riley, and James Belushi. When he was working on the script, Belushi was also intended to co-star in the film – and it’s still clear in the finished film that the character of Nick Barzack, played by Carradine, was meant to be Belushi. He feels very much like a Belushi character: he’s an irreverent fellow who lives on junk food (when he’s not eating raw steak) and beer (which he disguises as bottles of Coca-Cola), is always messing with the love life of his clean-cut, healthy-eating partner Frank Hazeltine (Billy Dee Williams), dodges calls from his mother (Doris Roberts), and basically stalks his ex-wife Teresa (Valerie Bertinelli). Despite the fact that Barzack’s behavior is appalling, we’re supposed to root for him, even when he wins back Teresa, who should be staying far away from him.
Barzack and Hazeltine are a pair of Los Angeles cops who are working to bring down a drug-running criminal kingpin – and sure, that endeavor takes up a lot of screen time and leads to plenty of action sequences, including one where a helicopter gunner opens fire on the small plane our heroes are in and another where assassins in semi trucks attempt to smash Hazeltine in a junk yard, but none of that is as interesting as watching Carradine play Barzack.
The movie could have been better, the story could have been more engaging, but I enjoyed watching it and especially enjoyed having the chance to see Robert Carradine as a very unpleasant hero.
SMALLVILLE SEASON ONE (2001 – 2002)
For twenty-five years, I would shock people by confessing that I had never watched a single episode of the “young Superman” show Smallville. How could I have missed it? I’m a comic book fan! Well... I am a much bigger fan of Marvel Comics than of the company Superman calls home, DC Comics, so it makes sense (to me) that it would take me longer to get around to watching a DC project. Also, I wasn’t watching much TV in the years when this show was on the air – and even if I had been watching TV at the time, I wouldn’t have trusted that a “young Superman” show on WB (later The CW) would be worthwhile.
But, people can no longer be shocked by my Smallville ignorance. Now I have not only watched one episode of the show, I have watched an entire season – and it was totally worthwhile.
Created by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar, this take on the Superman story moves the concept up to then-modern day. The pilot episode begins in October of 1989, when the Midwestern town of Smallville is struck by a devastating meteor shower that makes a mess of the place – and from the wreckage emerges a small boy, who is taken in by farmers Jonathan and Martha Kent (John Schneider and Annette O’Toole). The Kents name their adopted son Clark... and over the years, they realize that he is gifted with incredible strength and speed, gifts that Jonathan encourages him to hide from the world as much as possible for his own safety.
In late 2001, Clark is a freshman in high school – and this 14-to-15-year-old is played by Tom Welling, who was 24 at the time and does not, in any, pass for being 14 or 15, even if he does still have a bit of “adorable kid” energy in his expressions. Thankfully, the show doesn’t focus on the number of his age, and Welling does fully capture the essence of Clark Kent / Superman. He comes off exactly as I would expect the character to be as a teen and I can see this version of the character growing into an exemplary adult.
Clark’s classmates don’t quite seem their age, either, despite most of the actors being five to six years younger than Welling. In Clark’s friend group there’s his childhood friend Pete Ross (Sam Jones III), who fills his scenes with “typical teen” energy and doesn’t have a whole lot to do; Chloe Sullivan (Allison Mack), who’s the editor of the school newspaper and intends to have a journalism career after high school; and the girl next door, Clark’s crush, Lana Lang (Kristin Kruek). Unfortunately, Lana is in a relationship with football player Whitney Fordman (Eric Johnson), so Clark is holding on to an unrequited crush for most of the season – and even when it’s clear that Lana also has feelings for him, she feels too bad for Whitney, who’s dealing with issues at home, to dump him for Clark. Whitney’s dad is ill, and Lana knows what it’s like to lose a parent because her mom and dad were killed in the meteor shower.
Also living in Smallville is Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum), son of scumbag billionaire Lionel Luthor (John Glover). While Lionel is based in the nearby city of Metropolis, he has sent his son to Smallville to run a fertilizer plant. In the first episode, Clark saves Lex’s life when his car crashes off of a bridge – and while this brings the characters close and causes a friendship to develop, it also spells danger for Clark, because Lex becomes obsessed with the question of how he survived a crash that should have been fatal and has the incident investigated meticulously.
A nine-year-old Lex was in town when the meteors fell. He was caught in a shockwave that left him permanently bald. He is suspicious that something strange is going on in Smallville, and he’s not the only one. The meteor fragments were spread around town, and these green chunks of rock have had a strange effect on the place that’s only truly becoming clear years later. Chloe has put together a “Wall of Weird,” displaying some of the weird things that have been caused by the meteor rocks... and Clark, who is becoming even stronger and more gifted in his adolescence, witnesses clear proof in almost every episode that these rocks, which make him sick and weak when he gets near them because they’re Kryptonite, are causing strange events and mutations.
Smallville season 1 leans hard into the “villain/monster of the week” approach – so much so that some people behind the scenes were concerned that viewers would get tired of it. I had the opposite experience; I thought the show got off to a bumpy start, and not just because of the dodgy CGI that’s all over the pilot episode. I just didn’t find the first several villains to be very interesting, and the “hoisted on their own petard” pattern got tired after a few episodes. But then, the writers seemed to find their footing, the stories got more interesting, and I was drawn in.
Over the course of the season, Clark has to deal with the likes of a half man/half insect, a pyrokinetic, a shapeshifter, a freezing person who has to absorb the heat (and life force) of others, an elderly killer who regains his youth, a girl who feeds on people’s fat, a corrupt Metropolis cop, an invisible person, a mind controller, someone who absorbs Clark’s abilities, criminals who can walk through walls, flowers that take away inhibitions, a man with a deadly touch, a queen bee, a telekinetic, and more. There are ups and downs, as some of these villains are much better than others, but I enjoyed most of the episodes. And there are some cool guest stars, like Amy Adams, Shawn Ashmore, Corin Nemec, Cameron Dye, Eric Christian Olsen, Lizzy Caplan, Dan Lauria, and Tony Todd as a man whose exposure to the rocks causes him to have intense seizures.
The thing that surprised me the most about Smallville season 1 was how much I liked the Lex Luthor character. At this point in his life, he is not a villain, no matter how much his father and other scheming associates would like to make him one. He’s a guy who’s trying to do the right thing most of the time – and those attempts often blow up in his face. He develops a charming friendship with Clark that I enjoy watching. I know Lex is going to turn bad someday, because that’s the story and character... but I’m dreading that day. I don’t want to see this guy become Clark’s enemy.
But I’m hooked to see how their story is going to play out. Not only have I watched (a season of) Smallville, I’m now a fan of it.
THE GIRLFRIEND (2025)
Michelle Frances worked in the television world for more than fifteen years, serving as a script editor and/or associate or executive producer on a handful of projects. Her debut novel, a thriller called The Girlfriend, went out into the world in 2018 – and it’s a fun twist of fate that writing a novel led her right back into the world of television, as The Girlfriend received a six-episode limited series adaptation from Naomi Sheldon, Gabbie Asher, and Prime Video.
At the heart of this show is a young man named Daniel (Laurie Davidson), whose life has appeared to be on a great path ever since he was born. Not only is he the son of wealthy businessman Howard (Waleed Zuaiter) and art dealer Laura (Robin Wright), he also has a bright future of his own, as he’s studying to become a trauma surgeon. But things start to go wrong as soon as he brings his new girlfriend, Cherry (Olivia Cooke) home to meet his parents. Sure, Cherry is a real estate agent from a lower income background than Daniel’s family (her mother is a butcher, her father may or may not have passed away), but the issue here doesn’t really have anything to do with class. Laura is immediately suspicious of Cherry, questioning everything about her to an obsessive degree – and the six episode journey will let us know if she’s right to be suspicious of her son’s girlfriend, or if she’s an over-protective mother – made even more over-protective by the fact that Daniel’s sister died as a child – who doesn’t want her baby boy to be taken away from her.
As it turns out, Laura and Cherry are both severely damaged people, and I came to feel very sorry for Daniel as the episodes went on, as he’s an innocent guy caught in between two women who have gone off the deep end.
The Girlfriend is a very interesting mystery and one of those shows that I couldn’t binge through quickly enough. I couldn’t want to see where the story would go next and what would be revealed about Laura or Cherry.
Frances has written multiple novels and I haven’t read any of them, but if they’re as interesting as the adaptation of The Girlfriend was, I need to add them to my reading list.
The following review originally appeared on ArrowintheHead.com
BODYCAM (2025)
A few years ago, we got a supernatural horror film called Body Cam, which starred Mary J. Blige. Now, the Shudder streaming service has teamed with one of their favorite modern genre filmmakers, Brandon Christensen (his previous films, Still/Born, Z, Superhost, The Puppetman, and Night of the Reaper, were all released through Shudder) to bring us another supernatural horror film called Bodycam, which has nothing to do with that Blige movie and presents the title as one word instead of two. So when horror fans have text conversations, we’ll know when Body Cam is being referenced and when we’re talking about Bodycam instead. Another way to differentiate between the two: this is “the found footage one.”
Scripted by Brandon Christensen and Ryan Christensen, the new film tells the story of police officers Jackson (Jaime M. Callica) and Bryce (Sean Rogerson), who respond to a domestic violence call in the early hours of October 13, 2025. After making their way past a group of “tweakers” who are reminiscent of the homeless people in John Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness in that they linger around and are directly tapped into the horror that ensues, they enter a rundown home that’s infested with rats and has occult symbols drawn on the walls.
The situation gets stranger the further they go into the house. There’s an injured dog in a crib. A mysterious hole in the basement floor. And a couple of people who do not respond to questions or orders. Things don’t go well. Within minutes of entering the home, there are three dead people on the scene and Bryce is having a meltdown because he shot and killed a man. He thought the guy was armed, but he was actually holding a baby. And the whole encounter was recorded on his bodycam.
In fact, almost the entire movie is presented solely through the bodycams worn by Jackson and Bryce, although other angles are shown when they’re in their cruiser. At first, Bryce’s primary concern is how he’s going to destroy the footage from his camera... although, even after he’s worried about that, he’s still dedicated enough to recording everything that he’ll set the detached camera aside in just the right spot to film himself making a bathroom phone call. Then, as it becomes increasingly clear that something supernatural is going on here, Bryce has bigger concerns to focus on.
I’ll be up front: I am not a fan of the found footage style, and when I watch a found footage movie I’m often left feeling that it was either a complete waste of time or that it would have been a better movie if it was shot in the traditional style. A found footage movie has to be really good to win me over – and sometimes they do. Despite featuring good performances from the lead actors, along with Catherine Lough Haggquist and Angel Prater in supporting roles, and having some creepy moments, Bodycam did not win me over.
The film is just 75 minutes long (72 when the end credits start rolling), but it reaches that length by stretching the concept to its absolute limit. Even with such a short running time, it manages to drag and feel both longer than it is and longer than it should have been. Cut it down and make it part of an anthology, and it might have worked better. (And director Alejandro Brugués, working from a script by The Blair Witch Project collaborators Gregg Hale and Eduardo Sánchez, did make something like this for Sam Raimi’s short-lived anthology show 50 States of Fright.)
Bodycam did do some things that I liked. The situation at the house has completely fallen apart by the 12 minute mark, and I was concerned that the whole rest of the movie was going to be Jackson and Bryce stuck at the house, debating the issue and jumping at strange noises. Thankfully, the story does branch out into other locations, eventually allowing for the best, most effective sequence in the movie, which involves Jackson having an unnerving experience while driving through city streets and talking to his mom on the phone.
The movie has plenty of horrific ideas, but I didn’t find the presentation to be very engaging. In the end, things sputter out in the usual found footage movie fashion and I was left underwhelmed.
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