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8 Million Ways to Die, a review by samuelrichardscott

8 Million Ways to Die (1986) R2 UK

Shortened Review:
Hal Ashby started his career in Hollywood as an editor, hitting the big time when he was awarded the Academy Award for Film Editing for "In the Heat of the Night" in 1967. Three years later, Ashby made his directorial debut, "The Landlord" taking with him the editing styles he had learnt in his previous years. Over his directing career, Ashby made a couple of fantastic films including "Harold and Maude", "Being There" and "Shampoo", however it would be for "Coming Home" with which he would be most successful, earning Ashby and Academy Award nomination for Best Director. Towards the tail end of his career, Ashby earned a reputation for being unreliable, reclusive and eccentric, mainly due to drugs. Unfortunately, his erratic behaviour affected his films, getting fired from "The Slugger's Wife" due to 'creative differences' with Neil Simon and then finally making "8 Million Ways to Die", a film from which he was sacked on the final day of principal photography with the film becoming a commercial failure.

The film stars Jeff Bridges as an alcoholic LA drugs cop, Matthew Scudder, who shoots an unarmed suspect in a drugs raid in front of his family. His life quickly spins out of control resulting in Scudder losing both his job, and his wife. Trying to clean up his act and quit drinking, he is thrown into the deep end when a prostitute begs him for protection and winds up dead. As Scudder is drawn back into the world of vice, he hunts down the hookers' killer among LA's seedy underbelly of pimps and drug dealers.

With a screenplay by Oliver Stone (Natural Born Killers, World Trade Center), the script for "8 Million Ways to Die" is surprisingly tame and formulaic and seemingly strays from the original novel by Laurence Block. Oliver Stone however, is not to blame and was reportedly displeased with the end result as the studio wanted a more "Miami Vice" feel rather than a gritty cop drama, and so Robert Towne was called in to rewrite Stone's screenplay. It also didn't help that Ashby improvised many scenes. Executive producer Mark Damon once stated that Ashby even through the script out, forcing everything to be improvised and whilst I feel this may be an exageration, it would still account for the disjointed feel. Still, as far as the genre goes, the story is a by the numbers affair and certainly passable.

The cast, is another story altogether and is likely the saving grace to an otherwise muddled affair. Jeff Bridges is joined by Rosanna Arquette and Andy Garcia and all put in reasonably good, but not career best, performances. I would've liked to see more scenes with Bridges and Garcia together though. The supporting cast, including James Avery, Lisa Sloan and Randy Brooks, also put in respectable appearances.

I'm not sure if I could out and out recommend the film, as there are many gritty cop dramas from the eighties that are better (see Charles Bronson's filmography). However, despite the disjointed feel, and on-set problems, the end result isn't as bad as the lack of commercial success would suggest.

Full Review:
http://www.dvdcompare.net/review.php?rid=2513

(From Never Ending Movie Marathon (short reviews) on August 26th, 2011)

How Sarah Got Her Wings, a review by addicted2dvd

How Sarah Got Her Wings (2015/United States) IMDb |Trailer | Marvista Entertainment, House Lights Media (United States) Director: Gary Entin, Edmund Entin Writing: Damon Hill (Writer) Length: 87 min. Video: Widescreen :1 Audio: English: Dolby Digital: 5.1 Subtitles:

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Stars:
Lindsey Gort as Sarah
Derek Theler as Jordan
Melanie Liburd as Amanda
Jeremy Luke as Stuart
Caleel Harris as Mason

Plot:
Good Samaritan Sarah Fitzpatrick (Lindsey Gort - The Carrie Diaries, Impastor) has a fatal accident just before Christmas and finds herself in the lobby before the gates of Heaven. Certain that she will be let in, she is shocked to find that her name of not on the reservation list.
However, she is granted the chance to return to Earth as an "angel in training" with the requirement tto help a soul in need. Sarah has the 12 days before Christmas to secure her place on the list leaving her in the race for her after-life.

Extras:

• Closed Captioned

This is a TV movie I found on Netflix. It is one I enjoyed quite a bit. I enjoyed most the characters and the story held my attention with ease. I found it to be worth the time put in to watch it.



(From Christmas 2016 on December 21st, 2016)

My PILOT Marathon, a review by Rich

Danger UXB

Dead Man's Shoes
Newly-promoted Second Lieutentant Brian Ash joins his new regiment only to find that they are assigned to bomb disposal in London. Ash is thrown in at the deep end when he and his men are sent to a bomb site.



When a young Royal Engineer Officer is killed trying to defuse a bomb, he is replaced by raw officer recruit Brian Ash. Ash is shocked to discover that his new unit, the 97th Tunnelling Company, is in fact a hastily formed bomb disposal squad. With the Blitz devastating London every night and making massive demands on Royal Engineers' manpower, he is to take command of 347 Section forthwith. It's not long before he's facing the real thing at close range, with his men looking on from a safe distance, making bets as to whether he'll go the same way as his predecessor...

An enthralling series we never missed on its original showing on TV, and having rewatched its original episode, glad to say the tension, depth of character, and superb writing (upstairs,downstairs creator) have not dated negatively. In fact if you excuse the opening titles and credit rolls it is hard to believe it is 30 years old.
I realise better now it is also historically accurate for this WW2 era, the backdrops are realistic, and the storylines genuinely factual. The acting is spot on, very in-depth and interesting characters from all ranks, and the background storylines behind the bomb disposals are interesting.
Not sure who blindly would get into the series, possibly those interested in history or WW2, or those interested in more modern period costume dramas? For me it is a bit of all of the above, and my nostalgic return to a childhood favourite.
 

(From My PILOT Marathon on September 25th, 2009)