Ask 411 Movies for 01.10.11: The Column that Ties the Room Together!

Posted by Leonard Hayhurst on 01.10.2011

What would a Big Lebowski sequel be like? What happened to the cast of Head of the Class? What does “I’m your huckleberry” from Tombstone mean? All this and more covered this week in Ask 411 Movies!

My birthday was yesterday. I'm not pressing, but where are my presents?

Our YouTube January theme is weird offshoots involving the Muppets. This week, an official Muppet project that got big hype upon its internet debut. The gang performs Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody." My favorite part is Animal just screaming mama.



Actress Anne Francis, 80, died Sunday, Jan. 2, of complications from pancreatic cancer. She starred in the detective series "Honey West," for which she won a Golden Globe and was in films including Forbidden Planet, Bad Day at Black Rock, Blackboard Jungle, Brainstorm, Don't Go Near the Water, Funny Girl and Hook, Line and Sinker.



Actor Pete Postlethwaite also died Jan. 2 of cancer. He was 64. He was nominated for a best supporting actor Oscar for In the Name of the Father. Just this year he appeared in The Town, Inception and Clash of the Titans.



Character actor Bill Erwin, 96, died Dec. 29 of old age. Erwin was nominated for an Emmy for his role as Sid Field on "Seinfeld" and has appeared on numerous other television shows. Movies include Somewhere in Time, Home Alone, Dennis the Menace, She's Having a Baby and Planes, Trains and Automobiles. He often played opposite Billie Bird.



RANDOM AWESOME MOVIE OF THE WEEK: FREQUENCY
From 2000, due to very specific atmospheric conditions John Sullivan (James Caviezel) is able to talk with his father Frank Sullivan (Dennis Quaid) 30 years in the past on his old ham radio. John gives Frank information that saves his life in a fire, but this alters history and Frank's wife (Elizabeth Mithchell) is killed by a serial killer. John then helps Frank to catch the killer in the past, but this positions Frank as a prime suspect to his detective friend (Andre Braugher).

I guess it's not really a time travel movie, because it's only voices reaching across the years. It's a really neat concept that helps to punch up a pretty standard action thriller. It's well paced and smartly adheres to it own internal logic, which is the most basic thing I ask for from a movie. Without realizing when I first picked this movie, it's also directed by Gregory Hoblit who did last week's pick Fallen. Originally, Renny Harlin was going to direct with Sylvester Stallone as Frank.



Q: How can you not include big jake in your top 10 of john wayne movies thats gotta be a mistake
-Guest 6241

A: I like Big Jake, but it's more of a guilty pleasure. It's a pretty standard revenge western with Wayne playing his typical John Wayne character and Patrick Wayne and Chris Mitchum are not their fathers acting wise.

From 1971, a raid on the McCandles ranch (led by Richard Boone) results in the kidnapping of Little Jake and a ransom request of $1 million. Family matriarch Martha (Maureen O'Hara) has her estranged husband Big Jake (John Wayne) found to take the ransom in along with his sons James (John's son Patrick) and Michael (Robert Mitchum's son Chris). John's son Ethan Wayne plays Little Jake, in the movie the grandson of Big Jake. This was the last film of director George Sherman, an old friend of John's. Due to Sherman's poor health, John directed much of the location shooting, but refused to take a directing credit.



Q: How can you not go with The Quiet Man in a John Wayne top ten?
-gpjunk

A: That was a typo last week. That was my favorite John Wayne westerns, not his overall films. In a list of my favorite overall John Wayne movies The Quiet Man and Sands of Iwo Jima easily make it.

From 1952, Sean Thorton (John Wayne) is a retired American boxer who returns to Ireland to reclaim his family's ancestral land. Neighbor "Red" Will Danaher (Victor McLaglen) doesn't care much for Thorton and to broker peace the local matchmaker (Barry Fitzgerald) hooks Thorton up with Danaher's sister Mary Kate (Maureen O'Hara). Thorton refuses to stand up to Danaher, which upsets Mary Kate, because Thorton once killed a man in the ring. However, when Mary Kate runs off, Thorton tracks her down, drags her across the countryside by her hair and challenges Danaher to one of the greatest movie fights of all time.

Editor Jack Murray said director John Ford did such a great job of in camera editing that all he had to do was attach the film in order without any cutting. Ford shopped the picture around for years without any takers. Wayne got Herbert Yates of Republic Pictures to back the film only if Wayne, O'Hara and Ford would make a western for the company as well, which turned out to be Rio Grande. The movie was shot on location in Cong, County Mayo, and it looks today much the way it does in the movie. Fans visit the area still and are known locally as "Quiet Man Crazies."



Q: You are right on with the best of John
Wayne westerns. Just once, I wish a network, any network, would show some balls and run any of these movies uninterrupted. Especially the Searchers. Any other western is a distant second.
-Guest

A: As gkctex mentioned in the comments last week and what I was going to write, you need to check out Turner Classic Movies. They show all movies uninterrupted and often play Wayne movies.

I'm guessing what you're referring to in your frustrations is American Movie Classics, which often shows Wayne films, but with plenty of commercials and cuts. When I was a kid, AMC was what TCM is today. They had channel hosts, no commercials during movies, good documentaries and shorts and they actually showed American movie classics. Now they show Halloween IV in a constant loop every October. That will probably get me comments.

Q: Marty's daughter in Back to the Future is named Marlene, not Maggie.
-Um…Me

A: Yeah, should have explained that last week in my fantasy synopsis for Back to the Future IV. Maggie McFly is the name of Marty's great-great-grandmother, as shown in Back to the Future III and played by Lea Thompson. In my version, Marty and Jennifer's daughter would be named after Maggie.

Q: why would evil Biff (from part 2) care about other demensions? he is still rich and powerful in his time line.
-Griff

A: It's a movie, roll with me. Evil Biff is super greedy and egotistical, so if he discovered other dimensions where he's a big loser, don't you think he would want to either destroy them or take them over?

And as Bemini wrote in the comments last week "Legion of Biffs" will be the name of my band if I ever form one. I play a mean keytar.

Q: Leonard, what exactly does that mean? "I'm your huckleberry."

Also, Leonard, and I can't believe I'm asking this but I'm surprised with zombie's being the hot topic, there's not a bunch of zombie-related porn out there. I googled "zombie porn" and other than some youtube shorts, I didn't really get much. Are there any zombie porn movies? And yes, I realize that I should be getting help. First 3-D porn questions, no zombie porn, who knows what's next! Thank you, as usual.
-BFF

A: There was some debate in the comments last week as to what the exact line from Tombstone was. In both instances of Holliday saying the term in the movie to Johnny Ringo it's "I'm your huckleberry."

According to Wikipedia, huckleberry is archaic American slang which can mean a lot of different things. A huckleberry plant produces very small berries, so huckleberry came to mean something small. A popular phrase was "a huckleberry over my persimmon," meaning something was a bit beyond one's grasp or talent. Playing off of that, being a huckleberry away from achieving something, "I'm your huckleberry" means you're the right person for a job or task. So basically Holliday was telling Ringo he was the man he should be challenging, not Wyatt Earp.



There is Zombie Strippers, which is not a hardcore porno, but does star porn actresses and features plenty of boobs. From 2008, government experimentation leads to a zombie outbreak with ground zero as a local strip club. While men hit with the virus turn into pretty standard zombies, women become undead super beings. The patrons at the club are actually more turned on by the zombie girls so some of the regular strippers purposely become zombies. With Robert Englund, Jenna Jameson, Tito Ortiz, Penny Drake and Roxy Saint.



Also from 2008 is Zombies! Zombies! Zombies! also known as Zombies vs. Strippers. A doctor working on a cure for cancer is attacked by a junkie and the cure is mixed with drugs. The concoction turns the junkie and a bunch of hookers into zombies. The hookers former pimp and some local exotic dancers team up to take them out. With Tiffany Shepis, Hollie Winnard and Jay Laga'aia.



I found mention of a couple other movies, Porn of the Dead and Dawna of the Dead, but there doesn't seem to be any feature length hardcore zombie based movies. Sincerely I didn't want to look that deep, I just bought a new computer a few months ago.

Q: BTW that FF4 trailer was cool but what I dont understand is why the conscious effort to have short guys play "The Thing"?
-The R

A: I don't have a real answer to this, but I don't want it to be said I ever shirked a question. According to IMDB, Michael Chiklis, who played the Thing in the most recent two big budget films, is five foot eight and a half inches tall. According to the official Marvel Wiki, the Thing is six feet tall and weighs 500 pounds. I think the perception is that he's a short squat tank-like creature, in contrast to the larger, muscled Hulk.

Q: Funny you should mention that bit about Christopher McDonald, I actually had no idea who you were talking about until you said Shooter McGavin. That's how I described Grease 2, "Shooter McGavin's in it!"

This may be just for Canadians, but Tyler Labine is called by name. No matter what he'll accomplish as an actor, he'll forever be referred to as "Jimmy from Breaker High". On a related note, Ryan Gosling was for a long time referred to as "Sean from Breaker High".

Ed O'Neill is Al Bundy, and Ted McGinley is Jefferson D'Arcy.
Reginald VelJohnson is Carl Winslow. Jaleel White is Urkel. Dennis Haskins is Mr. Belding.

Have you seen the new True Grit? I'd be interested to hear your take and how you think it compares to the original.

Keep up the awesome work.
-Vince

A: Thanks for answering my question to readers from last week on what actors will always be a certain character to you.

I have seen the new True Grit and I really liked it. I was kind of shocked at the very downbeat ending, that was the biggest difference from the original to me. I could see John Wayne not liking the ending at all. I love Jeff Bridges, but to me he seemed to be doing a mix of Dude Lebowski and Bad Blake from last year's Crazy Heart. That's not to say he wasn't good though, but maybe it was too much like I expected. Hailee Steinfeld was fantastic and a great improvement of Kim Darby in the first movie. She had good chemistry with the principals and delivered the stylized dialogue of the Coen Brothers well. I think what appealed to the Coens in the scriptwriting was probably the mixing of archaic slang with very literate speech. No huckleberries are mentioned though. You can hear my review of the movie and other recent releases by tuning into The Valley ran by my friend Ron Adams of the Monster Bash.



Q: Did you ever see the Generation X tv movie back in the 90s? I just barely remember it. IIRC, it wasn't great by any means, and it kind of sucked for them to go with a lesser-known mutant group for it, but the idea of any live-action X-Men series had me excited at the time.
-Mike R

A: The television movie from 1996 was supposed to serve as the pilot for a series. Due to budget constraints, some new characters were created to replace members of Generation X in the comics at the time because some powers would have been hard to recreate realistically. Emma Frost (Finola Hughes) and Banshee (Jeremy Ratchford) are teachers at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. They recruit Jubilee (Heather McComb) to join a group that includes M (Amarilis), Mondo (Bumper Robinson), Skin (Austin Rodriguez), Buff (Suzanne Davis) and Refrax (Randall Slavin). The main plot has a mad scientist (Matt Frewer) who was once affiliated with Frost kidnapping Skin to use his brain to give him psychic powers. I have not seen the movie and the commercial below doesn't make me want to. It seems on the level of the David Hasselhoff Nick Fury movie. I think coming out of this era Marvel realized that they needed to pump more money and effort into film properties than they had to make them work. If they didn't, they just piles of cheese so thick you could bust out the nachos.



Q: Just thought of an old TV show entitled Head of the Class. What's been up with the cast?
-Go

A: "Head of the Class" ran on ABC from 1986 to 1991. It centered around the students in the Individualized Honors Program at a Manhattan high school. Their history teacher was idealistic aging hippie Charlie Moore (Howard Hesseman, aka Dr. Johnny Fever from "WKRP in Cincinnati") who expected more than just good grades from his students. Hesseman left in the final season and was replaced by Billy Connolly who got his own short-lived spinoff "Billy" the next season. I assume you're curious on the primary students, so that's who I'll cover below.

Dan Frischman (Arvid Engen): After "Head of the Class" Frischman played on "Keenan and Kel" as Kenan's boss at Rigby's grocery store. He also had a guest spot on "Seinfeld," finding Jerry's stolen shoe collection at a yard sale. He was seen on VH-1's "I love the 80's 3-D" as well. He does magic and stand-up comedy along with owning a production company with friend Brian Robbins.

Brian Robbins (Eric Mardian): As mentioned above he runs a production company with Frischman. Since the 1990's he's been active as a producer, writer and director. Films he's directed include Ready to Rumble, Good Burger, Varsity Blues, Hardball, Norbit, Meet Dave, The Shaggy Dog and The Perfect Score. He has also served as a producer on "All That," "Keenan and Kel," "One Tree Hill," "Smallville," "Blue Mountain State" and "Sonny With a Chance."

Dan Schneider (Dennis Blunden): Schneider also got into producing and worked with Robbins on "All That," "Keenan and Kel" and other Nickelodeon shows. A New York Times article referred to Schneider as the Norman Lear of children's television. He's created pretty much most of Nickelodeon's current live action series lineup including "Victorious," "iCarly," "Zoey 101," "Drake and Josh," "What I Like About You" for the WB and "Guys Like Us" for the UPN.

Robin Givens (Darlene Merriman): Givens was once married to Mike Tyson. In 1997 she married her tennis instructor and filed separation the same day. In Jan. 2004, Givens critically injured Maria Alcover, 89, after striking her in a crosswalk. Charges were dismissed and a civil suit was settled for an undisclosed sum. "Forbes" magazine in May, 2009, reported the IRS was going after her for $292,000 in unpaid taxes. She still does some television guest spots and low budget movies.

Tony O'Dell (Alan Pinkard): I couldn't find a lot on what he's doing now. The imdb lists his last credit as being two bit parts on "The George Lopez Show" in 2002-2003.

Leslie Bega (Maria Borges): She had the recurring role of Leah on "CSI" and Valentina on "The Sopranos." She's also a professional chef specializing in the use of raw foods.

Khrystyne Haje (Simone Foster): She does low-budget movies and guest spots on various television shows. She also has been featured in commercials for LensCrafters and Fidelity Investments.

Tannis Vallely (Janice Lazarotto): Is a casting associate with the Debra Zane Casting Agency and has worked on casting such recent films as Devil, It's Complicated, Away We Go, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Indiana Jones and the Kingdome of the Crystal Skull, Ocean's Thirteen, Ocean's Twelve, War of the Worlds, Dreamgirls and The Terminal.

Joher Coleman (Jawaharlal Choudhury): Does movies and television appearances along with stage work and voiceovers for cartoons and commercials.

Kimberly Russell (Sarah Nevins): She had the small role of Katharine in Precious: Based on the novel Push by Sapphire and did voices for Disney's The Princess and the Frog.



Q: I read recently that Jeff Bridges said he would be interested in doing a sequel to The Big Lebowski. You've done a lot of fantasy scripting lately, so what's your idea here.
-Mike

A: Set in Aug. 2001 (a month before the events of 9/11 as mentioned by the Stranger in narration), Jeffrey "The Big" Lebowski has died. However, due to a mix up it's the Dude's obituary that runs in the Los Angeles Times. Walter tells the Dude to go with it as people spend millions of dollars and hatch elaborate schemes to stage their own deaths and here the Dude has it drop right into his lap.

Maude left L.A. after the events of the first film, but returns for her father's funeral with a young boy in tow. The Dude believes it's his, but Maude tells him his sperm was inadequate and she was knocked up by a Belgium ski instructor a month after leaving L.A. She returned not only to bury her father, but to close out the Little Lebowski Urban Achievers Program and claim the money for herself. However, all of the funds disappeared shortly before her father's death. The main suspect is her father's new assistant who replaced Brandt six month ago, Reginald J. Gadfly (Jack McBrayer). She hires the Dude to track him down.

It's revealed that Reginald is really Bunny after a sex change. She used the shut up money Maude gave her for the surgery and she hatched the plan to get back at the Big Lebowski by slowly poisoning him. She's going to use the money stolen from the Achiever's foundation to have a sex change back. Walter is so disgusted that he shoots and kills Bunny, then gives the gun to the Dude. The Dude freaks out, but Walter explains that they can't charge a dead man with murder. So out of necessity the Dude rolls with being dead and flees to Canada. At the airport bar before leaving he meets and talks with the Stranger. The Dude then turns to the next seat and finds Maude's son. He has a note pinned to him telling the Dude the child is his and she decided it was good for him to spend some time with his father and she suggests they go elk hunting.



Next week we'll take a look at The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and the continued importance of television ratings and sweeps periods.

As a musical bonus this week, enjoy Majic Conner shredding out big time on the most misunderstood of instruments, the keytar.



Don't die.

"Nihilists! Fuck me. I mean, say what you like about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it's an ethos."