Showing posts with label Movie Tie-Ins. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Movie Tie-Ins. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 9, 2023

2001: A Space Odyssey


2001: A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke
July, 1968  Signet Books

If I could see just one movie on the big screen it would be 2001: A Space Odyssey, especially if I could see it on the original Cinerama curved screen setup. Every few years when the movie makes it back into theaters for a special screening I either don’t hear about it or forget about it; the closest I ever came to actually seeing it in a theater was when my wife and I were in London in Fall of 2012 and we were out in the suburbs somewhere, I think the place was called Battlesbridge or something like that, and we passed by a theater that had 2001 listed on the marquee. But the start time was only shown as “Late.” When I asked the snotty British ticket-booth guy when exactly “Late” was, he gave me the snotty British answer that, “It’s generally after the sun goes down and it’s dark out.” I admit, that was very funny, but I was like, “Dude, over in America we have this thing called time.” 

Anyway, I never did see the movie – it had been a long day, and 2001 is a long movie (and not the most snappily-paced one), and the timing just wasn’t right. So I had to be content with my Blu Ray, which I admit I only play every few years, if that. But none of this long preamble has anything to do with the novel at hand, which of course is a well-known book written by one of the more noted science fiction authors of the 20th Century. That said, I’ve never actually read an Arthur C. Clarke novel, even at the height of my sci-fi nerd era as a middle school student in the mid-1980s. Some years ago, in a fit of “vintage space books” collecting, I picked up several of Clarke’s ’60s and ‘70s non-fiction books, like for example The Promise Of Space and Report From Planet Three, but still have not read them – though I have thumbed through them. 

And, judging from this off-hand, casual observation, I want to say that Clarke’s novelization of his own 2001 script reads, for the most part, just like one of Clarke’s non-fiction space books. Whereas Stanley Kubrick’s film leaves much to the viewer’s interpretation, Clarke spends the majority of his novel lecturing the reader on philosophy or explaining how and why this or that happens. In many ways it is a guidebook to a “future” that never happened, same as Arthur Clarke’s non-fiction space books of the era were. For the most part Clarke’s 2001 goes out of its way to leave nothing to the reader’s interpretation, thus cutting out the mystery and esotericism that make Kubrick’s film so fascinating to this very day. 

On the other hand, it is neat to see how this world of 2001 actually works; we’re told how the interstellar craft operate, how HAL 9000 “thinks,” and most notably even what exactly the mysterious Monolith is up to in the Dawn Of Man opening. Again though, this undercuts the drama, and I could imagine Stanley Kubrick (to whom Clarke dedicates the novel) seething at some of Clarke’s “explanations,” mainly because they are rather unimaginative. I mean the Monolith chooses the “Moon Watcher” monkey-man in the Dawn Of Man sequence because he shows the most intelligence of the monkey-men; I mean that’s so much more direct and “duh” than how it’s done in the film, where you wonder if the Monolith itself is directing events (which the novel makes implicit) or if it’s merely the presence of the Monolith that causes the monkey-men to begin thinking. 

This is the line Clarke walks throughout the book. We’ll have a little “narrative material,” where the plot will proceed along, then we’ll have a bunch of expository info-dumping about space exploration. I imagine Clarke must’ve been excited to get this material out to those who wouldn’t be so interested in reading a book about space exploration, but the caveat is there isn’t much “fiction stuff” in his 2001. I mean honestly, if we are looking solely at dramatic thrust and an exciting plot, then the novelization of Moon Zero Two is actually superior. This is of course because there isn’t much plot per se in the film, and Clarke of course follows his own script: the Dawn Of Man sequence, the discovery of the Monolith on the Moon, the flight to Jupiter which climaxes in the psychedelic Dawn Of New Man. While Kubrick follows an absorbing pace (or, conversely, a leisurely pace), letting the visuals tell the story, Clarke must fill pages, gussying up a barebones plot. He does so as if he were writing another of his nonfiction space exploration books; be prepared to learn much of the orbits of asteroids, or what the surface of Jupiter is like. 

That’s another of those little changes to the text – the second half of the film concerns a trip to Jupiter, but here in the novel Jupiter is just the first stop along the way, with Saturn the ultimate goal. That said, there is a sequence – again as if shoehorned in from one of Clarke’s nonfiction books – in which the ship, Discovery, hitches a ride on Jupiter’s orbit to get a boost in speed. This entire sequence is almost lifted from the real-life Apollo 8 mission, which was the first mission in which human occupants of a spacecraft went around the “backside of the moon,” losing contact with Earth. A total “baited breath moment” if ever there was one, but not nearly as dramatic here in the novel – though Clarke does have monosyllabic astronaut heroes Dave Bowman and Frank Poole silently shake hands when the mission completes successfully and they are set on the proper path without any trouble. Curiously this was exactly what real-life monosyllabic astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin did when they landed on the moon over a year after 2001 was published – they silently shook hands. 

All these decades later, 2001 can be seen as its own thing, but it’s clearly intended to be the natural progression of where everyone thought the space race was headed; monosyllabic astronauts Bowman and Poole are terse ciphers, same as their real-world counterparts in the Apollo Program. The Cold War is still on in this 2001, but in the novel it isn’t nearly as pronounced as it is in the film; the only Russian character is a scientist who appears in the brief opening sequence in the Space Station, same as in the movie, but here in the novel we learn he is good friends with Dr. Heywood “Pink” Floyd (not his real nickname, btw). Floyd is our main protagonist after the Dawn Of Man opening (which by the way doesn’t climax with the famous “bone toss” scene of the film), and he too is cut from the same overly-formal and reserved cloth as Bowman and Poole. 

Floyd’s actually less relatable in the novel. The bit of him calling his daughter back on Earth (Kubrick’s actual daughter, I seem to recall) is not in the book, but we do get more about him getting a solo ride all the way from Cape Kennedy to the Moon in a little over a day, all at the behest of the President. Nor is the equally-famous bit where Floyd is introduced, napping in zero-gee on his way to the Space Station, here in the novel. And speaking of which, yes the zero-gee toilet is also in the novel; indeed, we get to see it in action, as Floyd uses it (Clarke focused on the the mechanics of the equipment, I should clarify). We also get a lot more pondering on what the Monolith is, and it’s also carefully explained – several times, in fact – that the Monolith was intentionally buried beneath the surface of the moon three million years ago, and let off a “scream” of radio static when the sunlight touched it upon its excavation. 

In other words, as Floyd explains late in the novel, the Monolith is an “alarm,” one set there by some mysterious race of beings. But otherwise there is a lot of pondering throughout 2001, to the point that the narrative often comes to a dead stop. And it’s all space-geek stuff, too. Like a part where Discovery is coming upon its first asteroid – the orbits of which, we are informed, have carefully been laid out in the navigation so the ship will never encounter any of them on the journey to Saturn – and Poole and Bowman geek out about taking photos of it via missile-launched robot. And this goes on and on, a somewhat thrilling scene…with the caveat that the asteroid is thousands of miles away. But again it’s just a chance for Arthur C. Clarke to show off his knowledge of space exploration and how such things are done, and it’s just more stuff that seems to be shoehorned in from a science journal. 

There is no mystery in Clarke’s 2001. Everything is told in a bald, matter of fact style that comes off as insulting, at least when compared to how the film left so much to the viewer’s interpretation. HAL 9000, referred to simply as “Hal” in the book, also suffers – Clarke is at pains to explain away the AI’s responsibility for the events of the final quarter. Again, the movie leaves it vague; did Hal go nuts, or is it the effect of the Monolith? (Notice how when the Monolith appears, it also teaches how to kill – first the man-apes who kill animals and then their fellows, and later in the film HAL 9000 goes on a killspree.) All the events on Discovery are different in the novel: Poole’s fate, the fate of the scientists still in cryo – even Bowman’s fate is different, as after all this happens, including his shutting down of Hal, he’s on the ship for three more months before we get to the Star Child finale. 

This is what I mean about forward momentum being nil in the novelization of 2001. I mean really. We have this huge catastrophe on the ship…then a few pages later we have Bowman walking around the cleaned-up ship and listening to opera. Even here there is endless pondering and info-dumping; all fascinating if you are looking for science fact, but kind of distracting when you are looking for science fiction. But anyway, I was going on about the explanation on Hal. This is where Heywood Floyd returns to the scene; he calls Bowman (rather than the video briefing Bowman accidentally activates in the film) and tells him that Hal had been programmed with the ship’s true mission, and keeping that knowledge secret caused the AI to go haywire. 

The climax is mostly the same, but instead of a psychedelic lightshow it is, once again, a bunch of info-dumping. Bowman, having reached Saturn and knowing he doesn’t have enough oxygen to surive the years until a new ship can be built to come rescue him, gets in a pod and decides to investigate the massive “Big Brother” Monolith that is floating around the planet. Nearly a thousand feet long, this Monolith is “full of stars,” per Bowman’s frantic last call back to Mission Control on Earth – and no, he doesn’t say anything in the film. But even here, while floating through changing worlds with crashed space ships beneath him and strange sights in the varying skies, Bowman still ponders over everything in a factual, reserved, “man of science” style that is impossible for the reader to identify with. And again it just comes off as several pages of Clarke showing off his knowledge of astrology and science. 

It's also kind of goofy – compared to how creepy the finale of the film is. Here there’s no question Bowman is being watched by aliens as he finds himself in a makeshift cottage…complete with even boxes of cereal! And TV shows with “a famous African reporter” on television! All of it, he realizes, stuff from two years ago, when the Moon Monolith was discovered (neither the film nor the book bother to spell out that the stuff with Heywood Floyd is actually in 1999, not 2001). So Bowman theorizes that the aliens used TV broadcasts of that time to create a perfect little cage for him. Then he goes to sleep(!), and we get a sort of psychedelic sequence where he turns into a Star Child advanced human thing with cosmic powers, Clarke calling back to the finale of his Dawn Of Man sequence earlier in the book: “He would think of something.” 

I’m glad I finally got around to reading Arthur C. Clarke’s 2001, but to tell the truth I feel that he took away a lot of the film’s magic. Sure, much of the plot is based around Clarke’s own story ideas and whatnot, but still. His incessant need to explain and exposit just stops the narrative dead at times, and the book has none of the ultramod sixties sci-fi vibe I so love, like the film did…a look which I believe reached it’s apotheosis in Gerry and Sylvia Anderson’s UFO. Undeterred, Clarke went on to write 2010 and 2061 and others in the series, but I doubt I’ll ever read them – though I will read some of his nonfiction space books.

Monday, September 19, 2022

The Nightmares On Elm Street Parts 1, 2, 3: The Continuing Story


The Nightmares On Elm Street Parts 1, 2, 3: The Continuing Story, by Jeffrey Cooper
February, 1987  St. Martins Press

I’ll start this review with an admission: I have never seen A Nightmare On Elm Street nor any of its sequels. But having read this novelization of the first three films in the series – which is yet another book Robert Mann hooked me up with – I now feel that I have. For my friends The Nightmares On Elm Street is essentially a straight-up, no-frills synopsis of the first two films, with the same blasé narrative approach extending to the third film…though it’s my understanding that the plot for the third film, The Dream Warriors, differs here from the actual movie. 

Each film gets about 70 pages of text, meaning that for the most part The Nightmares On Elm Street reads like a collection of novellas. But that isn’t a problem. What’s a problem is that author Jeffrey Cooper turns in the most bland prose I’ve ever encountered in a book; Paul Hofrichter would consider this book poorly written. It’s seriously a wonder it was even published, but I’m imagining the studio was behind the push. Copyright “The Second Elm Street Venture,” The Nightmares On Elm Street was likely timed to hit bookstore shelves at the same time that The Dream Warriors was released, so I’m guessing speed was more of a concern than quality. To be fair, Cooper does appear capable of putting a bit of an emotional drive into some sections, but for the most part the book comes off like he watched the first two movies and just wrote down what he saw, then took the same approach for the script of the third film. 

The most humorous thing is that, reading this book, you’d never get the idea that these movies were violent, R-rated horror flicks. The novel is curiously bloodless and the horror stuff is weak at best, mostly because the prose is so blasé. I mean Freddy Krueger will pop out of the shadows or whatever and there’s zero in the way of terror. I mean it will just be point blank blasé prose, like literally, “Freddy jumped out of the shadows,” and that’s it. It’s lame, is what I’m trying to say, and comes off like the work of an author who doesn’t give two shits about his assignment. In fact, hardly anything is even described. About the most we get is that Freddy wears a “Fedora hat” and has a scarred face. It’s like the author has done the bare minimum requirement to get the novel done. 

So anyway, the book runs to 216 pages, with a section of black and white stills from the first two films. In addition to the novelization of the first three films there’s a several-page “bonus” section detailing “The Life And Death Of Freddy Krueger.” The curious thing is that this bonus section has more bite than anything else in the book; it’s incredibly grim and has the dark humor one would expect from the films, and I wonder if it was even written by Jeffrey Cooper. Otherwise The Nightmares On Elm Street Parts 1, 2, 3: The Continuing Story doesn’t have much going for it, and would only be recommended for the collector. 

Actually, the book is almost written on the level of juvenile fiction. Other than a few utterances of “fuck” or the like, it’s PG at best. All the sex is off-page, but this too was humorous because all the protagonists are teens, for the most part. The sex is one thing in the films, where you can tell it’s a 20-something actors playing the role, but in the book it’s another thing entirely when you’re reading about a 15 year-old girl suffering from “sexual tension.” I mean I hate to sound like a reactionary prude but it made me downright uncomfortable at times. But then I flat-out loved the part where the possessed teen gal begged a guy to sodomize her in The Nursery, so I guess maybe it’s just the bland, boring prose that put me off instead of the content itself. That said, Cooper shows no compassion for any of these kids, so I guess that’s what you’d want from a horror novelist, just no holds barred. But then he shows no compassion because all these characters are ciphers at best. 

Well anyway, the novelization of the first flick takes up the first 70 pages, and again one would never get the idea that this was an R-rated horror movie. Nor does the reader get a good picture of Freddy Krueger, meaning that black and white section is a real help, because the photos do the job that Cooper’s prose doesn’t. No attempt is made of establishing the location nor any of the characters; the vibe really is very much that Cooper’s just popped in the VHS of A Nightmare On Elm Street and typed out the events as they transpired onscreen. We do get a brief prologue, though, that “ten years ago” Freddy, the “Springdale Slasher,” was hunted down and killed by residents of the community. 

From there we jump into the novelization of the first film. Cooper makes no attempt at setting the time or the place, but then that only adds to the skewed fairy tale vibe of the novel. Strangely, a gal named Tina seems to be our protagonist, as it’s through her perspective that the novel opens; she wakes from a dream, one in which Freddy was chasing her, and then goes to school and talks to her pal Nancy about it. But as it turns out, Tina will not be in the novel long, and Nancy will be the protagonist of this section – and also will return in the third section, ie the novelization of the third film. 

So I can save everyone the trouble of the belabored rundown: Freddy Krueger is appearing in the dreams of kids in this area and trying to kill them. The novel does not address the span of Freddy’s reach, though it seems to be confined to this specific area of Elm Street. Not that this is clearly established. For that matter, there is the promise of the theme here that Freddy is going after the children of the residents who killed him a decade ago. This theme bubbles to the surface, only to be forgotten; I’m not sure if it’s the same in the film. But at any rate, we do eventually learn that Nancy’s mother was one of the people who took part in the killing of Freddy, and what’s more she has retained a memento of Freddy’s, which she keeps in the basement furnace. 

The only problem is, even in this thin paperback, there are a ton of continuity errors. For one, the novelization of the first film seems to imply that Freddy was killed via fire: he was burned to a crisp by the town residents who cornered him and torched him. But then, the novelization of the third film – as well as the “life and death” postscript – state that Freddy was burned as a child. Also, the theme of Freddy getting revenge is poorly conceived, with no follow-through. When he tangles with Nancy’s mom at the end of the book, there’s absolutely no payoff to the fact that she was one of the townspeople who killed Freddy years ago – Freddy is just concerned with Nancy. 

There are other gaping plot holes besides. Like in the novelization of the first film, Nancy decides to trap Freddy…and there are all these dream sequences where she’s walking around, fully aware that she is dreaming. How Nancy became an expert in lucid dreaming is not explained. It took me personally years to do lucid dreams, and that was through focused effort. (The trick, by the way, is to sleep for at least six hours, wake up and do something – like walk around the house or whatever – and then go back to sleep. You will slip right into the REM stage due to the fact that you were just sleeping, but you’ve jogged yourself awake enough that your conscious mind is still active and will realize it when the dream starts.) 

But the bigger problem is that Nancy also has unexplained superpowers. Not only can she lucid dream at the expert level, but she also has the ability to pull things out of dreams. This happens most notably in the finale, when Nancy manages to pull Freddy himself into the real world. Of course the question dangles at the end whether this is just another dream, but still; the problem is, in the novelization of the third film there’s another teen girl, Kirsten, who is specifically described as a “dream warrior” whose power is pulling things out of dreams. An older Nancy at first can’t believe this is possible, then is shocked to see Kirsten actually do it…and the reader is like, “Lady, you just did the exact same friggin’ thing like a hundred pages ago!” 

But man, it’s all so blasé and half-assed. Nothing is described, nothing is explained. About the most Cooper does is inveigh a sense of doom and foreboding in the perspectives of his characters, but motivations and dialog and all that fall flat. Freddy Krueger suffers the most; he appears infrequently at best, and he conveys none of the menace of his film counterpart. For that matter, he comes off like a fool in the novelization of the third film; Freddy gets his ass kicked regularly by the Dream Warriors, so it’s no wonder this section was reportedly changed in the actual movie. Indeed, Freddy is rendered a sort of non-menace in the second and third sections, only killing a few people in the second novelization and taking pretty much the entire narrative to get his act together in the third novelization. Also worth noting is that Freddy turns himself into a woman in the third film – one of the Dream Warriors is a kid named Joey, and in one of Joey’s dreams a hotstuff, barely-clad girl appears and throws herself at him…and, uh, starts to make out with him…only for the girl to suddenly change into Freddy. I’m betting this is another part that didn’t make it into the actual film! 

I haven’t said much about the novelization of the second film, and it’s my understanding Elm Street fans rank that one as one of the worst in the series. It’s easy to see why, as here in the novelization it comes off more like an outline than an actual story: some teen guy moves into Nancy’s old home, “five years” after the first movie, and soon becomes plagued by Freddy. Apparently Freddy wants to possess the kid, or use him to kill for him in the real world, but it’s all so vague. It’s also confusing, because the reader keeps wondering what happened to Nancy in the first film; and when she does appear in the novelization of the third film, Cooper does little to explain the confusing finale of the first movie. (Spoiler alert: but the novelization of the first film ends with Nancy about to be killed by Freddy, who has trapped her in his dream after all…or something.) 

But then, each novelization ends with a “fake out” surprise twist horror ending, which is uninentionally humorous on the printed page. Maybe Freddy suddenly jumping from the shadows before the end credits made teen viewers freak out in 1980s movie houses, but on the printed page – at least in the blasé prose of Jeffrey Cooper – there is little impact. There is also little attempt at capturing the surreal texture of dreams; The Dream Warriors in particular sounds like a promising idea, with a group of Freddy-tormented teens banding together to fight him on his own turf, but again Cooper does nothing to bring the proceedings to life. 

Overall I’d have to say this one is really for the collectors. There was nothing here that made me want to see the actual films, and the novel did not work as its own separate thing, such as a superior novelization might (ie The Rose). But at the very least, The Nightmares On Elm Street Parts 1, 2, 3: The Continuing Story did succeed in one unexpected regard: it put me back on one of my very infrequent horror novel kicks. The last time I was on one was six years ago. Of course this means I’ll soon be reading another William W. Johnstone novel!

Thursday, September 8, 2022

The Terminator


The Terminator, by Randall Frakes and Bill Wisher
November, 1985  Bantam Books

It’s hard to recall how big a deal The Terminator was when it was released; that there was a time when “I’ll be back” was fresh and fun. I think I first learned of the movie due to a poster a friend had in his room, around the time of the film’s release – the same image of Arnold Schwarzenegger which graces the cover of this tie-in paperback. I didn’t see the movie in the theater – I was only 9 when it was released – but I rented it on VHS as soon as it came out and watched it over and over. 

Several years ago I was researching the tie-in novel for The Terminator and discovered that there were two different Terminator novelizations: this one, by screenwriters Randall Frakes and Bill Wisher, and one that was published in the UK and written by British horror novelist Shaun Hutson. At the time, I decided the Hutson novelization sounded like the one I would enjoy more, and so I ordered a copy…and I still haven’t read it. It was in at least 2013 when I bought it, maybe before. At the time, I don’t think this Frakes-Wisher novelization was so scarce, but I can’t remember; I didn’t research this novelization much because it didn’t sound as interesting to me as the Hutson version. Per what I had read, Frakes-Wisher hewed incredibly close to the actual film in their novelization, whereas Hutson went for a pulp-horror approach. 

But as it turns out, the Frakes-Wisher Terminator novelization was included in the latest box of books Robert Mann sent me, and it appealed to me so much that I decided to read it, even though I still haven’t read the one by Shaun Hutson. An important note is that the Frakes-Wisher novelization came out over a year after The Terminator was released. Also, the authors worked on the script itself with director James Cameron. So in this case we don’t have a novelization that wildly veers from the source material. Indeed, the Frakes-Wisher Terminator is pretty much the epitome of a movie novelization in that it is literally a novelization of the movie, with only a few minor tidbits that diverge from the film – and the only “new” stuff is a bunch of background material. And the majority of the background material concerns one-off minor characters. 

It's been decades since I read a Stephen King novel, but his stamp is all over this book. I’m certain the authors were fans; as if confirming this, we’re told that one of those one-off minor characters – the gunstore owner who is shot by the Terminator in one of the movie’s more memorable scenes – is from Bangor, Maine. But man, “background material about one-off minor characters” is pretty much the main thing you get from the Frakes-Wisher Terminator novelization. I knew I was in for a bumpy read when the book opened with four pages of backstory about a random garbage truck driver. You know, the garbage truck driver who witnesses the Terminator as he materializes in the middle of a dark Los Angeles street in 1984. A character who is in the film for a handful of minutes (if that), yet the novel opens with a veritable case study on the guy. 

And folks it goes on like this through the entire novelization. The three punks who foolishly accost the naked Terminator – we get their names, what they are up to, all kinds of filler material about them. Hell, the garbage truck driver even sees them as he’s driving along his route and we get his opinions on them. It doesn’t sound like much, but I’m not joking when I say it is like this throughout the novel. Many years ago I read Gary Provost’s Make Your Words Work, and he used a great metaphor: he said little things like this might seem minor when taken one instance at a time, but if you were to take all those instances and put them together into a suitcase or something you’d find that it was too heavy to lift. Well, I’ve butchered the metaphor, but what I’m trying to say is, this is exactly what happens here – there’s just way too much incidental detail about incidental characters throughout this novel, to the point that the book comes off as a slow-moving bloat. 

Also, there is an almost slavish fidelity to the movie. All dialog is rendered faithfully, all the scenes are here as they are in the movie. But here’s the thing: all the dark humor is pretty much lost. Again, there was a time when “I’ll be back!” and “Get out!” and “Wrong!” would make viewers laugh, just the deadpan dark humor Arnold conveys as the titular Terminator, and absolutely none of that is captured in the Frakes-Wisher novelization. In fact, the novel is just too damn serious, and takes itself way too seriously. This is why I figure I’ll like the Hutson novelization better, and if anything reading this Frakes-Wisher novelization has inspired me to finally read the Shaun Hutson novelization. The uber-seriousness of Frakes-Wisher means that the pulpy fun of the actual film is lost. 

But I don’t mean to come off as too negative. I mean there is some humor here and there, just not much of it. While all of Terminator’s lines are here, including of course “Fuck you, asshole,” the authors present everything point blank, with that same serious vibe. Only minor asides feature any dark humor…like when a random cop is killed by The Terminator. In the film, this cop was played by William Wisher himself, so it’s possible he wrote this scene in the novelization. But anyway, in the book we learn that the cop is responding to a call – and yes we get a lot of detail on the cop and his background – and he sees the Terminator hit by a car. “DOA,” the cop automatically thinks to himself…and moments later when the Terminator slams the cop’s head into a car, killing him, we’re informed that the cop’s last thought is “DOA,” ie referring to himself. I’ve mangled the setup but it was fairly funny in the actual reading. 

Midway through The Terminator I attempted to change my mindset and judge the novelization as if it were 1985 and I hadn’t seen the movie a hundred times. It totally succeeds in that way; one can easily relive the movie through this novel, as every moment is captured here, just fleshed out with emotional depth via the backgrounds or the impressions of the characters. So if you didn’t have the VHS, the Frakes-Wisher novelization would be the next best thing in 1985. Plus it does have a little more that’s not in the film, like more of a glimpse into how the Terminator functions and thinks, and also there’s just a little more on the future world Reese has come from – a future that’s just a few years away now. Here too the authors bring to life minor characters; like say in the actual film, in the flashforward sequence, you might see one of Reese’s comptariots get gunned down. Here in the novel, you’ll be told that compatriot’s name, get a little more detail on him or her, stuff like that. 

And so for people who love the film and just want more of it, the Frakes-Wisher Terminator would totally hit the spot. But I’m one of those readers who likes a tie-in that’s different than the film…even wildly different, like Invasion U.S.A. Or novelizations that hew close to the film, but add a lot of extreme stuff that could never be in a mainstream film, like Coffy. This is why I’m assuming Shaun Hutson’s novelization might be more up my alley, as I’m figuring it will diverge from the film more than this one does. I guess what I’m trying to say is, when I read a movie novelization I would prefer something original, instead of a straight-up literary recreation of the film.

So otherwise there isn’t much else to say. You just get the movie here, but with a lot of extranneous background material. Like we learn more about the other Sarah Connors who are killed by the Terminator, and also we learn that the roommate of the real Sarah Connors is pregnant. More stuff on the restaurant Sarah works at, more stuff on practically every character who appears in the movie, no matter how minor they may be in the scheme of things. The authors most succeed in bringing Kyle Reese to life, though. They totally capture the feral nature of a man – whom we learn here is only twenty – who has lived his entire life being hunted. Kyle’s reactions to 1984 Los Angeles are very much explored here, better than the film, and there’s extra incidental stuff like him stealing a slice of pizza and some candy bars. 

One random “new” thing I liked was the bizarre note that the Terminator would break out an X-Acto knife and slice into the thighs of the freshly-killed Sarah Connors, inspecting their corpses. This only served to make the cyborg seem even more weird and dangerous. It isn’t until late in the novel that Kyle reveals that the Sarah Connor of his future has a metal pin in her leg, and the Terminator is checking the corpses for ID verification. But what the cyborg doesn’t know is that Sarah doesn’t have the pin yet – and, of course, she gets it in the very end of the novel, when the Terminator finally explodes and a shard of its exoskeleton impales her leg. Another thing with the novel is that the authors do try to explain a lot of what happens, and why, but they still have to ignore obvious questions…like how The Terminator could know Sarah Connor lives here in LA in 1984 but not that she doesn’t have the metal pin in her leg yet. (The explanation is that “records were lost during the war.”) 

The Terminator is also explored a bit more here in the novel; the authors refer to him as “Terminator” in his sections, ie no “The.” Actually they also refer to him as “he,” but then once his underlying exoskeleton is revealed he suddenly becomes “it” in the narrative. We get a better look into his programming parameters and how much power he has – we learn at reduced power he could last for a few decades – and the authors do a good job of making him seem more realistic. But as I say they miss the dark humor Schwarzenegger brought to the role. Also I had to laugh because as the movies progressed, Schwarzenegger’s poor T-800, which appears in this novel as a perfect machine of destruction, was outclassed by ensuing upgraded Terminator models (T-1000, T-X, etc). You have to wonder why Skynet didn’t just send one of those upgraded models to 1984 instead of the T-800. 

Now as for the action, while all the big scenes are here, and go down identically to how they do in the film, the violence has been almost totally removed.  This I understand is another big difference from the Hutson novelization, which appears to be more gory (always a good thing around here!).  People get shot in the Frakes-Wisher and fall down, and that is it.  There is none of the violence of the film; even the big attack on the police station is fairly bloodless.  Reading this novelization, one would get the impression that The Terminator was rated PG.  Same goes for the Sarah-Reese conjugation, which occurs mostly off-page, and what juicy details we do get are clouded in metaphors and whatnot.

Actually now that I think of it, the vibe of the Frakes-Wisher novelization is closer to the gravitas of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and fittingly Frakes penned the novelization of that one as well (which Robert also sent me a copy of). What I mean is, when you watch the original Terminator, it’s like an edgy John Carpenter sort of thing, kind of low-budget looking but with its own weird punkish drive. All the sequels went for bigger action, better special effects, and etc, but the edgy core was lost – and the edgy core is lost in this novelization, too. It just doesn’t have the neurotic drive of the film, and comes off as too literary. And at 240 pages of smallish print, it’s also too long; again, it has more the nature of a bloated epic. 

But, the Frakes-Wisher Terminator novelization did entertain me, and achieved the goal of a tie-in by making me want to watch the actual movie (again). It also made me want to read Frakes’s T2 novelziation, and it inspired me to finally look into S.M. Stirling’s early 2000s T2 trilogy, the “serious” vibe of which seems to be directly inspired by the work of Frakes and Wisher.

Thursday, September 1, 2022

Robocop


Robocop, by Ed Naha
July, 1987  Dell Books

I did not see Robocop in the theater when it came out, even though I was an action movie junkie and saw the majority of the big ones in the theater (despite being well under the 17 years of age required for R-rated movies). I skipped Robocop because I’d heard it was ultra-violent and I was skittish about such things, even though I eagerly read the gore-soaked pages of Phoenix Force. But reading about exploding heads is a lot different than seeing exploding heads. 

My brother, who is seven years older than me, came home on leave from the Air Force around the time Robocop was released on VHS; he rented it, and I tried watching some of it. Literally the first thing I saw was the mutated guy getting hit by the van and exploding. That was pretty much it for me. I’m not sure when I finally sat down and watched Robocop on my own, but I can say that several years ago I got the Blu Ray, which features the uncut version, and man I loved the hell out of it. It was brilliant in how it operated on two levels: as an ultra-gory action flick you could take straight and as an ultra-gory satire of an action flick. But then director Paul Verhoeven pulled the same trick a few years later in Total Recall

Once upon a time I knew a guy who had two minor roles in Robocop. Humorously, the film was shot in Dallas, despite being set in Detroit, and about twenty years ago I worked at a successful startup based in Carrollton, Texas (essentially a Dallas suburb), and there was a Hispanic guy in his 40s or so who worked there named Tomas who had done some extra work years before. He told me he’d been in Robocop, in two non-dialog bit parts: as a cop and as a gang member (he even re-enacted his scene for this part, to my amusement). Tomas didn’t seem like a guy who would make such stuff up…and, sure enough, when I watched my Blu Ray years ago, I spotted a younger Tomas as a cop.  I did not catch him as a gang member, though, so maybe his face is not on screen for this role or it was just a cut scene.  But I just rewatched the movie for the first time since I got the Blu Ray, and Tomas appears at the 52:46 mark, as the moustached cop who steps out of Robocop’s way in the precinct data room.  

Well anyway, so ends my personal connection with Robocop, as paltry a connection as could be. Now let’s talk about this novelization! Another one Robert Mann has kindly sent me, and once again I am very thankful for it. This is not a novelization I would’ve considered seeking out, but man I’m glad I read it, as author Ed Naha – who around this time was also writing Traveler – has done a great job of capturing the darkly comic vibe of the film. He’s also added a lot more humanity to Robocop than there is in the film. The only thing he does not convey is the gory ultra-violence of the film…but honestly an accomplishment like that would take someone like David Alexander in his Phoenix prime. 

The main thing Naha nails in this novelization is the satirical vibe of the film. I’d love to know whether this was accidental or by design. There is evidence here and there that Naha was at least familiar with who would be playing various roles: main villain Clarence Boddicker is described as having a “high forehead,” which would be an accurate description of future That ‘70s Show dad Kurtwood Smith, who played Boddicker – and I bet it would make for some serious head-fuckery to watch a couple episodes of That ‘70s Show right after Robocop. But anyway Naha really seems to understand that Robocop, at its core, is an over-the-top dark parody of action movies, and he clearly has a good time writing the book. 

First thing to note though is that Naha’s novelization is everything the Robocop rip-off series Steele should have been. It also seems evident that Cybernarc was inspired by Naha’s tie-in novel; some of the descriptions of how Robocop acts and thinks are very similar to those of Rod the robot in Cybernarc. We even get minor mentions that Robocop has a “combat mod” setting, same as Rod. So really Naha’s Robocop could be seen as an inspiration for those later series, and probably other similar ones that I haven’t yet read, like Horn

Another notable thing about the novelization is that it veers – if only slightly – from the finished film. The most notable difference is that Robocop, or “Robo” as Naha refers to him in the narrative, has a lot more personality in the novel, with more dialog and more emotional drive. There are also minor variances in some of the action scenes. Also the proto-meme that derived from the film, “I’d buy that for a dollar!,” is not present in this novelization. However, Naha does serve up a lot of pop culture spoofery, with a Benny Hill-esque show often mentioned, and most humorously there’s the TV show T.J. Lazer, a not-so-subtle spoof of T.J. Hooker, complete with a lead actor in “a badly-designed toupee.” Another random bit of piss-taking occurs late in the novel, when we’re informed by a TV broadcast that 97 year-old Sylvester Stallone has died, due to a failed brain transplant. We’re further informed that his last movie, Rambo 38: Old Blood, will be released posthumously. 

If we’re to take Stallone’s stated age literally, that would place Robocop around the year 2043. However the year is never outright stated in the novel. Even though the vibe is very much 1980s, what with the pop culture references and whatnot, we’re informed off-hand that there’s a moon colony and regular space flight. But otherwise this is a solely terrestial story, the entirety of it taking place in the hellish New Detroit. Otherwise this “future” is less tech-savy than our actual future, with people still watching regular televisions and of course no cell phones or internet mentioned. The cops in New Detroit do have dashboard GPS monitors on their “TurboCruisers,” which probably seemed pretty sci-fi in 1987. 

At 187 pages of small-ish print, Naha’s Robocop does a good job of capturing the vibe of the movie and adding a bit more emotional depth. One gets a better glimpse here of the plight of Robo himself, who of course starts life as a cop named Murphy. Naha I felt did a better job than the film of capturing the horror Murphy undergoes when he is killed in action, and then brought back to life by science, his memory erased. Naha has a recurring stylistic trick of “Good. Very good.” which runs through the narrative, conveying Robo’s gradual regaining of his memory. But as mentioned the one thing Naha does not convey is the nutjob violence of the film; while the novel is certainly violent, Naha does not dwell on the gore, usually going more for the emotions of the people shooting at each other than the sprays of arterial blood. 

There is prescience both here and in the movie that New Detroit has fallen into ruin, overcome by crime, and the cops are powerless to stop it. But rather than a “Defund the Police” movement, the cops aren’t around – and eventually go on strike – because they’re just outnumbered by the violent criminals. “Super predators,” as they were referred to at the time, even by left-leaning politicians who were unafraid of being called racist. Thus corporations have stepped in to take control of some police precincts, in particular megacorp OCP, which runs the New Detroit precinct. Cops wear OCP patches on their uniforms and are treated like just another product in the corporation’s portfolio. One wonders if this will become a reality someday, but again a dfference here, same as in Colony, is that these fictional future corporations are devoted solely to profit. 

So only in the “bloodthirsty corporate executive” aspect does Robocop seem dated. Hell, even the ‘80s-esque TV shows in this mid-21st Century setting are believable, given the endless spate of remakes, reboots, and recyclings Hollywood gives us these days. I mean hell, even Robocop itself has already been remade, though I never saw it – and don’t know anyone who did. And I don’t know what the point would be, as surely the Hollywood of today couldn’t give us something as skewed as Verhoeven’s original. But as for the future setting, Naha doesn’t beat us over the head with it, and in fact doesn’t go for much set-up or world-building. It’s the future, crime is rampant, and the cops are owned by a corporation, and that’s pretty much it. 

Also, cops are still seen as the good guys in this future; there’s absolutely none of the stigma of today, and further the cops aren’t hamstrung by politicians. If anything the impression Naha gives is that it’s that the criminals are just too populous and too heavily-equipped, and the cops aren’t a match for them. He presents New Detroit as a bombed-out hellhole, one that you’d have to be insane to be a cop in. But when we meet him Officer Murphy has just been assigned to the precinct, and Naha puts more focus on Murphy’s home life than the film did. To the extent that you really feel bad for Murphy and his loss. In fact, we learn that Murphy and his wife, Jan, are fighting on his first day at work – which as we know will be his last day at work. As Murphy, at least. 

The plot of Naha’s Robocop so follows the film that I’ll save you all the misery of my usual rundown. It only diverges in the little details, and, mainly, the fact that Robo has more personality here. But the elements of the film are all here, like Murphy being partnered with a tough female cop named Anne Lewis, though it’s the ‘80s now and Naha refers to her as “Lewis” in the narrative. In other words she isn’t “Anne,” as she would’ve been if the book had been written a decade or so earlier. But all this stuff is basically the same as the film, including the brutal murder of Murphy by Boddicker’s men – brutal, but not as brutal as the film itself, particularly the uncut version. But then, Murphy does get his hand shotgunned off in the book, too. 

Some of the action scenes are different, in particular an early one in which Robo stops a convenience store robbery. Robo also has occasional one-liners, like when a perp shoots at him and Robo responds, “Now it’s my turn!” Again, he’s more of a standard tough cop action hero than the robot of the film. Other minor but notable changes: Boddicker’s awesome line “Bitches leave” is instead here, “Okay, sluts. Take a hike.” Not nearly as impactful, I’d say. Also, there’s a different ending. Whereas the movie ends with Robo proudly announcing his name is “Murphy!,” the novel continues after this scene with an epilogue in which Robo picks up a stray dog, to be his new companion, and gets back in his TurboCruiser to kick ass. 

Naha’s writing in Robocop is strong and he moves the story along with good imagery. However he is a terrible POV-hopper. We’ll be in one character’s perspective, then a paragraph later we’re in someone else’s, and then someone else’s after that, and there’s nary a line break to warn us. As ever this makes for a bumpy read. Naha wrote for Creem, I believe, and his snarky rock attitude is in effect throughout; for example, we learn some recurring cop characters in the New Detroit precinct are named “Manson” “Ramirez,” and “Starkweather,” ie the last names of some of the more infamous serial killers. Wait, I just checked Google and these characters are in the film, too, so it wasn’t Naha’s doing. But I’m sure a guy who could come up with a spoof of T.J. Hooker would’ve appreciated that. 

Overall I really enjoyed Robocop, to the extent that I intend to watch the movie again sometime. I’m also inspired to check out Naha’s novelization of Robocop 2, which Robert also sent me. I’ve seen that movie exactly once: when it came out in the theater and I was 15 years old. I can’t recall if I liked it…I remember being annoyed with the punk kid in it. But at least I saw it in the theater, even though I was still underage; I recall my dad bought tickets for me and my friend. I also saw Predator 2 with the same kid a few months later, and that one I loved; in fact I’m sure I’m one of the very few who prefers Predator 2 to the first Predator. And I’m not ashamed to admit it.

Thursday, August 25, 2022

Hard Target


Hard Target, by Robert Tine
September, 1993  Berkley Books

I can’t recall if I saw Hard Target in the theater; I’m thinking I didn’t, and probably saw it later on VHS or laserdisc. I also have a hazy memory of seeing the fabled workprint at some point in the dim past…I seem to have vague memories of watching a blurry video copy with the timecode on the screen, the extra gratuitous violence, and lots of scenes that didn’t make it into the completed film. Well anyway, I’ve always ranked Hard Target as one of Van Damme’s best films, despite the unfortunate mullet he sports in it, and certainly the best movie director John Woo made in the US. 

Who knew there was a novelization? Once again I have Robert Mann to thank for sending me this book. Penned by ubiquitous tie-in novelist Robert Tine, the Hard Target novelization is notable for featuring some of the cut scenes that feature in the workprint. But one thing the novel lacks in a serious way is the graphic carnage Woo brought to the film. Tine’s action scenes are curiously bloodless, more outline-esque than anything and lacking much impact. In fact, “outline-esque” sums up the novelization; Tine, judging from this and his Eraser novelization, is not a tie-in novelist who brings a lot of “new stuff” to his novelizations. For the most part, Hard Target reads like a narrative summary of the film. The positive note though is that it does have some sequences in it that didn’t make it to the finished product. 

I get the impression that Tine wrote this before production began, or at least he was not privy to the production. The characters are not described like their film counterparts, in particular old man Douvee, who is described as “rail-thin” in this novelization…but was played by rotund Wilford Brimley in the film. And there’s none of the balletic heroic bloodshed of Woo’s action choreography; in fact, the action scenes are pretty boring here in the novel. What Tine’s novelization makes clear is that the story for Hard Target was pretty anemic, and it was only John Woo’s stylistic excess that made it memorable. With that missing, Hard Target the novel comes off like a tepid retread of The Most Dangerous Game

Now as for the “new” stuff, honestly it’s pretty minimal. And most of it is material that appeared in the workprint. Like a minor crony gets his ear chopped off by a pair of scissors, something which is graphically shown in the workprint. There’s also a part where main villain Emil Fouchon (Lance Henriksen) plays a piano. There’s also a part where hero Chance Boudreaux (Van Damme) gets it on (off page) with female protagonist Natasha “Nat” Binder (Yancy Butler). The ending also appears to be different, with Chance and Nat about to go off in a Happily Ever After. But then it’s been decades since I saw the actual film, so maybe that’s how it ended. There might be other subtle differences here in the novelization that would be more apparent if I were to actually rewatch the film, but I’d rather watch Miami Vice

So the novel follows the film, or perhaps that should be the screenplay, rather apishly. Wait, another difference – I got the impression, reading the book, that Chance Boudreaux could’ve been played by just about any action star. In other words, Chance’s martial skills aren’t much focused on, and he basically just does basic “action hero stuff” throughout, with none of Van Damme’s flash. This could be another indication that Tine was writing before production; I read somewhere the John Woo originally envisioned Kurt Russell for the lead role in Hard Target, and yes he certainly could have played the Chance Boudreaux of the novel. 

Another difference is that Boudreaux is more of a ragamuffin in the novel, practically destitute and living hand to mouth in New Orleans as he waits for the opportunity to continue working as a merchant seaman. But then the poor and the homeless are a central subplot of Hard Target, something made even more obvious here in the novel. Hey, sort of like that fourth season episode of Miami Vice, “Badge Of Dishonor!” Sorry, let me get back on track. Also, no mention is made of Boudreaux having an unfortunate mullet. He’s basically a cipher here, and late in the novel it’s explained he was a Marine and such, but there’s no real personality given him in the book. This makes it really hard to buy the ensuing relationship between him and Nat. 

The novel also follows the opening of the film, with Nat’s estranged father, a ‘Nam vet, being chased by Fouchon’s men. (Fun fact: The screenwriter, Chuck Pfarrer, played Binder in the film.) The setup is that Fouchon rents out his commandos to the mega-wealthy, who go along on a sort of big game hunt, with the prey of course being man. The hunted men are former soldiers who have come upon hard times, and they take the crazy job in exchange for money; if they can make it to a certain location, they will go free. However we know from the sequences in Fouchon’s perspective that he’ll never let one of his prey escape; this opening sequence proves it, as Fouchon’s latest client, Mr. Chang, fails to kill Binder…who does indeed make it to the safe location, and thus should go free. But Fouchon kills Binder anyway. 

All as in the film, but here we learn posthaste that the novel will not have the stylistic flair of the movie. Also the vibe is different; one does not get the impression here that Fouchon has a huge team of hunter-killers at his disposal. Also he himself takes place in the hunt, and he doesn’t use any special weapons or specific gun like the film. Mostly he just issues steely-cold orders to his men, particularly Pik Van Cleave, a South African who is in charge of the hunting dogs (Arnold Vosloo in the film). Checking imdb.com, Vosloo’s character is called “Van Cleaf,” and also there’s no credit for a “Mr. Chang,” so this could be more indication that Tine was writing before production. Mr. Chang also factors in the final action sequence of the novel, so the character might have just been written out of the film. 

The movie makes more sense out of how Chance and Nat team up – but again, I haven’t seen the movie in forever. Here in the novel it’s kind of hard to understand why they do. There are vague mentions that the New Orleans cops are threatening to go on strike (one of the reasons Fouchon has recently set up shop here), thus the homeless population does not get any attention. Nat’s dad, then, was a nonentity so far as the cops are concerned, so she desparately seeks someone to help her around the city. It’s just all very hard to buy – “My dad’s missing, I need some stranger to help me look for him!” But regardless she convinces Chance to help her by offering to pay the amount he needs to pay for the resinstation of his merchant seaman card. 

It's also really hard to buy that Chance sees more to the story; when it’s soon learned that Nat’s father is dead (his corpse found in a burned-out building), one would think Chance’s job has come to an end. I mean he was hired to help find the guy, and he’s been found. But Tine has it that Chance and Nat continue working together. And of course, Chance notices something the cops overlooked – that one of Binder’s two dog tags are missing – and he goes around looking for clues. This is how Chance stumbles upon Fouchon’s plot, in which “runner” candidates are sourced from a local business that’s run by a sleazy guy who hires bums to hand out XXX flyers. When Fouchon finds out about this, first he has Van Cleave take a pair of scissors to the sleazy business owner’s ear, then he tells Van Cleave to find Chance and kill him. 

From there on, Hard Target is essentially an endless action scene. Oh, I forgot to mention, but despite the recent murder of her dad, Nat still finds the time to get down and dirty with Chance. The scene plays out with the two kissing, and then Nat leaves…but then she comes back to Chance’s place and says she changed her mind. This bit is repeated in the end, only the other way around – Chance says he plans to go off on the latest merchant sailing and then comes back to Nat and says he changed his mind. But anyway the boinking is off-page; the chapter ends here. But soon after this Chance and Nat separate; when it’s soon clear that people are trying to kill Chance, he sends Nat off with his uncle, Douvee, whose job is to keep Nat safe. 

This leads to dual-pronged action scenes, with Chance taking on one portion of Fouchon’s forces and Nat and Douvee facing the other. Tine tries to work in some comedy with oldfashioned swampscum Douvee boasting about his moonshine and complaining about having to ride a horse. But it’s all pretty messy; for example, at one point Nat hurls a molotov cocktail at Mr. Chang, and Tine writes that Chang “vanishes” in a burst of flame. One would get the impression that Mr. Chang is no more. Yet he appears again, with no explanation, later in the book to hunt Chance and Nat along with two other clients Fouchon has quickly hired for the hunt to kill Chance. Also, the separation of Chance and Nat serves no purpose, as soon enough they (along with Douvee) are reunited and working together against Fouchon. 

The biggest problem is that Tine is not at all invested in his action scenes and brings nothing to them. It comes off like he’s lazily just lifted material directly from the screenplay: 


With the pizzazz gone, one is left with a curiously flat and uninvolving “action novel.” Chance’s motivation is also really hard to buy; he’s very much a cipher. I felt that the movie did a better job of investing him in the tale – and also in the film you really wanted to see Fouchon and Van Cleave and the others get blown away. Here I had absolutely no emotional investment in the story…it was all just too bland. Oh and one thing to note – the finale does feature Chance dropping a grenade down Fouchon’s pants, which I believe happened in the film. Here in the book Fouchon manages to get it out and tries to disarm it, to no avail. 

In closing, Robert Tine’s Hard Target did not come off as a fine novel on its own, and it did not make me want to see the film again. I’m not saying it was terrible, though. It was interesting at the very least just to picture someone other than Jean-Claude Van Damme as Chance Boudreaux (again, the character’s a lot more “Kurt Russell” here in the book), and I appreciated the stuff that didn’t make it into the film. Oh, and random note – yes, Chance punches a snake and then bites off its tail here in the book, too.

Thursday, August 18, 2022

Grizzly


Grizzly, by Will Collins
April, 1976  Pyramid Books

I’ve never seen the movie Grizzly, and I’m not sure if I’ve ever even heard of it. It’s possible I’ve seen the poster, which appears to be the most remembered thing about the movie. But this is another one of those “I can’t believe they did a novelization of that” situations – and once again I have Robert Mann to thank for sending me his copy. I’ve failed to mention Robert in my previous tie-in novel reviews, but over the past year he has been sending me boxes of tie-in paperbacks, like Lethal Weapon and That Man Bolt!…just tons of great books I’ve been happy to receive, and I’ve been meaning to thank him in the reviews. 

This paperback was included in the most recent box, and also Robert noted about it: “It was a quick read thriller that was at least entertaining. The movie was horrible!” I haven’t reviewed a horror novel on here in a long time, so I decided to read Grizzly first. Robert was very correct – the novel turned out to be a quick read, and it was entertaining for sure. This is due to the skill of the author, “Will Collins,” which turns out to be the pseudonym of Edwin Corley, a well-known author at one time. Corley takes what is a goofy concept and treats it with some gravitas; I’ve never read Peter Benchley’s Jaws (and hell I haven’t even seen the movie – though I did see Jaws III in the theater and had Jaws IV on VHS), but I’m assuing it was written in a similar style…for clearly Grizzly is like the wildlife take on Jaws. And speaking of which, last year Robert also sent me the novelizations of Jaws II and Jaws IV, and I intend to read them as well someday soon. 

The novel sticks to the horror template, with various characters meeting, uh, grisly fates at the claws of a giant grizzly bear that’s running amok in a park in Iowa. The cover says the grizzly is 18 feet, but the novel implies that it’s 15 feet, but why quibble. Another callback to the horror trope is that most all of the victims meet their gory fates just as they’re about to have sex, or stripping down for sex, or merely thinking about sex. To be sure, though, the only actual sex scene in Grizzly occurs off-page. That said, the novel caters to the rugged masculine ethic of the day, as displayed in contemporary “nature run amok” horror novel The Deadly Deep – a nice reminder of the days when popular fiction was written and marketed for a male readership. 

Proving this posthaste, the novel opens with a park ranger who is “a slim girl, tightly contained in a uniform that seemed a size too small.” Corley does his best to convey her ensuing jiggling and whatnot, and later in the novel we’ll even have a part where she strips down and gets in a waterfall as preparation for a little outdoors lovin’. Surprisingly though this busty Playmate-esque ranger isn’t the lead female character; instead it’s a local gal in her thirties named Allison Corwin who is a professional photographer. But don’t worry, as we’re assured Allison’s attractive too, and the male hero of the yarn, Kelly Gordon, has already been putting the moves on her before the story begins. But as mentioned no actual sex material occurs in the novel – though we do get a lot of dialog about it, including the absolutely unforgettable line: “Harry simply went ape screwing to Bolero.” 

Stuff like this is clear indication Corley is having fun and not taking the material too seriously, which jibes with the eco sermonizing that frequently runs through the text. Way too much of Grizzly comes off like proto-climate change ideology, with lectures on how poor old mother nature is just suffering unmerciful because of man. White man, be assured, because we also learn in an aside that American Indians respected nature and etc, etc…the sort of stuff that once appeared in a pulp paperback tie-in but now no doubt is lectured as “the science” in universities across this once-great land of ours. 

I had to look on imdb.com to see who played these characters; I was unable to get a visualization of them from the narrative, so I’m guessing Corley wrote the novel before production began. At any rate Kelly Gordon is the ruggedly masculine protagonist of the tale, very much in-line with the Marlboro Men-type protagonists of the era. Whereas today youth is key, in the ‘70s protagonists were often older, more experienced in various fields, and such is the case with Kelly, a 38 year-old Vietnam vet who acts as the chief park ranger, though he reports to a paper-pushing administrative government dweeb who has achieved his position due to politics. 

I haven’t yet gotten to the titular grizzly, who believe it or not has his own narrative sections. In some ways Grizzly reminds me of Snowman, which was also about a massive monster attacking a resort area, but whereas that one was totally sci-fi horror (complete with a giant monster), Grizzly tries to retain a semblance of realism. The grizzly, who is referred to as “The Beast” in his narrative portions, is a sort of throwback to the prehistoric era – or so it is quickly theorized at one point in the novel, so as to lend some unneccesary credence to the tale. The tale opens with the grizzly being kicked out of his usual foraging area high atop a mountain due to land developers; as I say, there is a definite eco-bent to the narrative, with man’s destruction of nature and whatnot often mentioned. But then personally I’d take a shopping mall over an 18-foot grizzly with a fondness for human flesh, so I fail to see Corley’s point. 

To his credit (or perhaps that should be to the script’s credit), Corley gets started on the horror action quick. Unlike Snowman, this nature-run-amok tale doesn’t spin its wheels in plodding setup. We’re introduced to the curvy rangerette (not a term used in the book, btw), then meet a few of the other rangers, and then we’re introduced to a pair of college gals who happen to be camping. They become the first victims of the bear, and Corley proves his horror-writing skills in an effective sequence. He’s also got the lurid vibe down pat because one of the gals happens to be talking about sex (with a park ranger she just met) shortly before meeting her fate…and also we get the tidbit that the girl happens to be having her period, the scent of which has gotten the grizzly’s attention! It’s all pretty violent, no doubt more graphic than the film version: 


Another thing the story doesn’t waste time on is people refusing to belive they are in a horror novel – I’m no expert on the genre, but “I don’t believe in any stupid old monsters!” seems to be a recurring schtick in it. That doesn’t happen here, so far as Kelly Gordon and his fellow rangers go. They come across the bloody remains of the girls and immediately know a bear is amok, promptly taking the necessary safety precautions. We get a bit of detail on how wildlife parks operate – Kelly is adamant that the rangers moved all the bears in the area to the high country months ago – and also we see some of the stupidty of the administrative ranks. The rangers work on the situation, demanding that campers move out of the vicinity…and of course, a few stubborn ones ignore the order, to their gory regret. 

With the help of a “hot-shot naturalist temporarily assigned to the park” named Arthur Scott, it’s soon determined that the attacking bear is actually a grizzly. Arthur Scott vies with Kelly Gordon as the star of the show; he’s a rugged individualist type himself, but one who likes to dress up in animal hides and lurk in nature for days, observing animals in the wild. In fact, there’s a bit of a Predator foreshadowing here when Arthur decides to buck the other rangers and go out after the giant grizzly on his own. Unfortunately for him he isn’t Arnold Schwarzenegger, so it doesn’t go very well. This stuff was cool, though, and I liked it that Arthur was the only character who really took the fight to the bear, going out in the element of “The Beast” cloaked in animal skins and armed with an experimental dart gun. 

It wouldn’t be ‘70s eco-horror without a bit of random casual sex, though, and Corley also delivers on this – though as stated all the sex is off-page. Kelly and Allison find the time to get it on in a remote cabin in the woods, in the midst of the grizzly’s carnage. This part is enjoyably ‘70s with them mixing drinks and shooting the pre-sex breeze while the other rangers are out in the dark woods waiting in ambush for a massive bear that’s chewing up random victims. However it’s also very ‘70s in that Allison has no bearings on the plot; she takes some photos of the carnage (and vomits), but eventually heeds Kelly’s advice that she get the hell out of the park until the bear is found. So in other words we don’t have any of the mandatory “female empowerment” of today with rugged female characters also taking on the bear; even the curvy ranger babe, Gail Nelson, doesn’t amount to much in the narrative, other than the aforementioned scene where she strips down by a waterfall, deciding to take this moment to finally give the goods to a hunky fellow ranger. You don’t have to be a horror veteran to guess how this scene plays out. 

The book also doesn’t shirk on the grizzly carnage; there are frequent attacks on hapless campers, both in the woods and in civilization. The latter plays out in a sequence more akin to a supernatural thriller, with the grizzly attacking homes and a restaurant – one that happens to be owned by Allison’s dad, and is also one of the reasons why she decides to leave until the bear is taken down. But speaking of which that’s one element in which Snowman was superior…but then, that novel featured guys with frigin’ nuclear crossbows going after the titular monster. Here, we just have Kelly piloting a helicopter while one of his colleagues takes aim with a big gun. It’s cool and all, but nowhere in the crazed realms of the other novel. 

All told, Grizzly was a quick and fun read, with that “full ‘70s flavor” I demand in my fiction. (Can’t recall where I read that phrase, but I love it.) It was so good that in my mind Grizzly will just be a novel, and I see no reason to seek out the film someday. Well, I did read that the actress who plays the curvy rangerette was a Penthouse model, so maybe there is a reason.

Thursday, July 14, 2022

Lethal Weapon


Lethal Weapon, by Joel Norst
March, 1987  Jove Books

Even though I was obsessed with action movies as a kid in the ‘80s, I didn’t see Lethal Weapon until around 2001. It just didn’t seem like an “action movie” to me, a la Rambo or Predator. It seemed more like a cop movie. In fact, I recall thinking it looked like a bigger-budgeted episode of Miami Vice. But as mentioned I finally saw it in 2001, mostly because at the time I was checking out all the films that had been written by Shane Black, a guy who should’ve been huge…sort of a proto-Quentin Tarantino, but it wasn’t until the 2000s that he started directing his own movies. 

Anyway, this Lethal Weapon novelization is notable because presumably it’s based on Shane Black’s original script, and not the revised version that was ultimately filmed. There’s a lot of stuff here that’s not in the movie, and overall I found the novel superior to the movie. Author Joel Norst, aka a novelist named Kirk Mitchell, delivers exactly what you would want from a movie novelization: a novel that stands on its own. He adds background material and thematic work that certainly wasn’t in Black’s script, and there’s a voice of experience in play throughout. It wasn’t until I finished the novel that I learned Kirk Mitchell had been a cop, but I was not surprised; he inserts a lot of cop-world detail in Lethal Weapon, but never to the point that it’s bogged down in “realism.” This is still the novelization of an ‘80s action movie, with the appropriate fireworks…there’s just a lot more emotional grit and introspection here than in the film. 

It's now known that Shane Black claimed his Lethal Weapon script was inspired by Warren Murphy’s Razoni & Jackson series, but that is not evident in the novelization. In fact, the most similar comparison would be the novelization of Hickey & Boggs, which itself was supposedly the inspiration for Razoni & Jackson. What I mean to say is, there’s none of the race-fueled bantering of Razoni & Jackson; the bantering humor here comes more from the disparate personalities of the co-protagonists. In fact race is hardly mentioned; other than the early establishment that Roger Murtaugh (Danny Glover) is black, Mitchell doesn’t beat us over the head with the fact. And absolutely nothing is made out of Murtaugh being paired with white partner Martin Riggs (Mel Gibson). The bigger deal is that Riggs is a nutcase known for his shootouts. 

One thing that doesn’t come off as well in the novelization is the cutesy schtick Shane Black came up with of “M” and “R,” ie Martin Riggs and Roger Murtaugh. In the film you’d never notice, but here in the novel Mitchell will arbitrarily refer to the characters by either first or last name in the narrative. Meaning, you’ll be reading about “Riggs” doing something, and then suddenly he’s being referred to as “Martin,” and your mind initially misreads the “Martin” as “Murtaugh.” Well hell, maybe it’s just me. I found the “Riggs” and “Roger” stuff especially confusing. But this was Black’s way of showing how his heroes were two sides of the same coin; Mitchell takes this into even further thematic territory, carefully establishing in the opening sequences how Roger Murtaugh is terrified of violence intruding into his family life, thus going to exorbitant lengths to ensure their safety. Martin Riggs, meanwhile, walks directly into the path of a sniper without even bothering to crouch for cover. 

Another bit of thematic backstory here in the novel which I’m certain is solely Mitchell’s contribution is that Riggs’s old trainer at the police academy committed suicide; we’re informed that suicide is common among hardbitten cops. Riggs hasn’t taken that step yet, but he’s close; we learn early in the novel that Riggs’s wife of eleven years died just two months ago. Here in the novel it’s established that she had a weak heart due to a childhood bout of rheumatic fever, and one day she just passed on while Riggs was out on the job. Now he keeps his TV constantly on, set to the channel she was watching when she was died (which appears to only play old movies), and he spends most of his days drunk off his ass – that is, when he isn’t engaging in what is now referred to as “toxic masculinity.” 

Reading this Lethal Weapon novelization is a frustrating experience, because it’s another lesson in how the original screenwriter knows how to turn in a compelling story…a compelling story that is ruined by producers, directors, rewriters, and actors. The first quarter in particular is excellent and better than anything in the actual film. We are treated to several instances in which Riggs’s lack of self-care is proven in action. First he stops a random kidnapping attempt when, coming out of a convenience store, he blows away a trio of armed guys who are trying to make off with two young women in their van. Riggs doesn’t even bother calling it in and just high-tails it out of there with his six-pack of beer. There’s another part where he challenges a patrolman to a race to Las Vegas (as in the film, the novel occurs in Los Angeles); here Mitchell shows his cop roots with the patrolman going through the various hoops that will fool his dispatcher into thinking he’s busy for the next few hours. 

This part, while entertaining, just shows how Lethal Weapon comes from a different era; it would be hard to imagine a movie today where the hero cop throws all safety concerns to the wind and races another cop at 130 miles per hour through sleet and rain for several hours, even evading fellow cops along the journey. But it’s still kind of funny, like when Riggs is pulled over by Highway Patrol and comes up with a story that he’s transporting a baboon heart for an emergency operation. Coupled with his wanton drinking and smoking, all this serves to make Martin Riggs seem even more dangerous in our coddled “Nanny State” era than he did in 1987. 

But the most notable element of Riggs’s disinterest in safety is one of the best sequences in the novel, and another that didn’t even make it to the film. Actually it did, but the scene was cut; I recall seeing it as a deleted scene on the DVD. But here in the novel it is so much more powerful – with the added element that it has extra resonance in our post-Uvalde world. Riggs responds to a call that a sniper has holed up outside a daycare; when Riggs gets to the scene, he finds the cops sprawled around and more concerned about their own safety than the kids trapped inside the building with an active shooter. Even though there is a veritable army of cops present, they show no interest in doing anything except waiting for SWAT, which is stuck in traffic. When Riggs is informed by a disinterested cop that one kid was shot in front of everyone and “is probably dead now,” Riggs goes into action. 

None of this material survived in the scene as filmed, which you can see here. I’m not sure if this sequence is the product of Mitchell’s imagination or was in Black’s script, but it is vastly superior to what director Richard Donner actually filmed. For one, the sniper is even worse here in the novel; we learn he’s killed a few kids, and also he’s wearing a gas mask to protect himself from the inevitable tear gas the cops will shoot at him. And when Riggs goes into action, he doesn’t just blindly walk into the fray as Mel Gibson does in the cut scene; instead, he relies on the fact that the gas mask will obstruct the sniper’s view, and his “Hello, Mr. Sniper” dialog is intended to distract the killer rather than to just taunt him as in the film. Also, Riggs here sees first-hand the shot kid the disinterested cop told him about, and the child is indeed dead, but Riggs manages to save another young kid who is hiding on the playground. Here we even get a reference to Miami Vice, which I wonder if was in Black’s script…surely he must’ve realized the similarities between his screenplay and the hit TV show. 

The first quarter of the novel is where all the major differences are. Mitchell proves himself just as good at bringing to life the much less danger-prone Murtaugh; indeed Mitchell seems to identify with Murtaugh more, and if I’m not mistaken the sequences from Murtaugh’s perspective slightly outnumber those from Riggs’s. As mentioned Murtaugh is terrified something bad will befall his family, and Mitchell does a phenomenal job of weaving this element throughout the story via random, incidental details – like later in the book when Murtaugh’s hotstuff, 17 year-old daughter Rianne is necking (as they once called it) in a car with her boyfriend, and we’re informed the car doors are locked because Murtaugh drilled this into Rianne from an early age. What I mean to say is Mithcell skillfully develops the disparity between his two protagonists in ways that Black was unable to in his script – I mean a script isn’t going to tell you incidental background stuff like a novel can. 

I ended up enjoying the first quarter of Lethal Weapon most of all, with the two protagonists separate. Around page 70 however they are teamed up, and the story begins to more resemble the film. One thing I noticed in the novel is that it follows more of a procedural vibe than the movie; as mentioned, Mitchell was a cop, and thus peppers in just enough real-world details of a crime investigation to lend the tale the right amount of versimilitude. And the plot is the same as the film; a call-girl – the daughter of a guy Murtaugh knew in ‘Nam – has jumped to her death from a high-rise, only it turns out she’d really been poisoned, and in investigating the murder Murtaugh and Riggs will discover a plot that ultimately takes in a global drug operation run by former ‘Nam badasses. 

One thing missing here in the novel is the age difference that was really played up in the film. In the novel, both Riggs and Murtaugh are ‘Nam vets; Murtaugh is older, as the novel opens on his fiftieth birthday, but Riggs can’t be much younger. He too fought in ‘Nam, and we’re told he was married for 11 years. Also, Murtaugh was still in the shit in the late ‘60s, so it’s not like he was fighting in ‘Nam in the earliest years of the conflict. The novel also makes it clear that Murtaugh was a Green Beret in ‘Nam, so in a way he’s just as much an ass-kicker as LRRP guy Riggs. But it’s the age difference that’s not much a factor here; indeed, Murtaugh’s famous “I’m too old for this shit!” line does not appear in Mitchell’s Lethal Weapon novelization, implying that it’s something that was come up with during production. 

Curiously I found my interest waning as the action increased. This surprised me, as I’m an action junkie. But I really did enjoy the first half of Lethal Weapon more, with Riggs and Murtaugh engaged in their separate lives before becoming embroiled in an investigation together. But due to the demands of the action genre things pick up, same as in the film, with frequent explosions and gunfights. One thing Mitchell makes more clear in his novelization is that Riggs finds his meaning with this case; when the villains start going after Murtaugh’s family, Riggs takes on a new drive, telling Murtaugh’s wife that there’s “no one better at making war” than himself. Oh another thing not in the novelization is the spelling out of the title phrase; it’s been many years since I saw Lethal Weapon, but I seem to recall it was stated that Riggs himself was registered as a lethal weapon or somesuch. Here in the novelization, this phrase only appears in a sequence from Murtaugh’s perspective, when he realizes that Martin Riggs is exactly what he needs: a “lethal weapon” who will take on the bad guys who have kidnapped Murtaugh’s teenaged daughter. 

Oh and speaking of teenaged, there’s another bit here in the novel that’s about as unacceptable in today’s world as the race to Vegas. When meeting Murtaugh’s family, Riggs is momentarily taken aback by teen daughter Rianne’s beauty – and body. There’s even a part where he sneaks a look at her shapely rear while Murtaugh is otherwise distracted. Riggs later realizes that this is the first time he’s felt any “sexual urges” since his wife’s death…and nowhere is it belabored that he’s felt these urges due to the sight of an underaged girl. At any rate, this leads to yet another sequence that was not in the film; Riggs picks up a streetwalker and takes her back to his place…and pops some popcorn so they can watch old movies all night on TV. This part was wisely cut, and also it reminded me of Pretty Woman…of course Pretty Woman came out later, but still. 

The villains are more military here in the novel; led by a never-named “General,” the group includes in its ranks Joshua, as memorably played by Gary Busey in the film (who would reunite with Danny Glover a few years later in the underappreciated Predator 2). Joshua in the novel is more creepy than Busey’s portrayal, and also he’s as close to being albino as you can get without being Edgar Winters. He’s the lead heavy in the novel, same as the film, and as the novel progresses it becomes more like the movie, only with minor variations – like when Riggs is captured and tortured, here in the novel Riggs is strapped up in a bathtub, not hanging from a girder or whatever it was in the film. But while the action scenes are similar, they are just better played out here in the novel. Most notable is the bit where Riggs, with a long-range gun, raises hell when the General’s goons try to exchange Murtaugh for Rianne. Mitchell develops this sequence a helluva lot better than the film does, and this extends to the emotional content. Whereas Murtaugh just lamely yells “Everything’s gonna be all right” to his daughter before the shooting starts in the movie, here in the novel Mitchell really brings home how terrified a father would be in such a situation: 


The finale is especially different and an indication of how much change the script went through in production – and how much society has changed as well. Believe it or not, but Mitchell’s novel – and presumably Shane Black’s original script – ends with the Murtaugh family and Riggs going to church on Chrismas day. With Murtaugh introducing Riggs to the congregation and the preacher grumbling that Riggs hasn’t been there for a long time. Not only is it a lame way to end the story, but it’s also an indication of how much things have changed…I mean imagine a Hollywood action film ending with the heroes going to church. I guess even in ’87 this would’ve seemed odd, and it would seem positively bizarre today. But then in a way I appreciated it for this very reason. I’m not a religious man by any means, but it seems clear to me that western society has sort of lost its way with the abandonment of Christianity – I still recall my mind being blown last year when I was into all that Space Race stuff and saw how the astronauts would pray during their missions and whatnot. Imagine such a thing happening today! They’d probably get sued for mixing religion with “the science.” 

Well anyway, I really did enjoy Lethal Weapon. It joins the ranks of Hickey & Boggs and Invasion U.S.A. as a novelization that’s better than the film it’s based on. Mitchell’s writing is strong throughout, and I look forward to reading another of his novelizations I have, for the Chuck Norris vehicle Delta Force (which I saw in a jam-packed theater when it was released in 1985 – and the audience enjoyed the hell out of it in a totally non-ironic way).