Joel Schumacher
211 connections found
Filmography
The Number 23 2007 
Flatliners 1990 
8MM 1999 
Falling Down 1993 
Batman & Robin 1997 
Batman Forever 1995 
Dying Young 1991 
Trespass 2011 
Phone Booth 2003 
The Lost Boys 1987 
A Time to Kill 1996 
St. Elmo's Fire 1985 
The Phantom of the Opera 2004 
Bad Company 2002 
Cousins 1989 
The Client 1994 
Tigerland 2000 
Flawless 1999 
Blood Creek 2009 
The Incredible Shrinking Woman 1981 View:
Connections, in both directions
Unhinged (2020)
Directed by Derrick Borte
influenced by Falling Down (1993), Phone Booth (2003)
Themes Characters Plot
The film is also reminiscent of Joel Schumacher’s Falling Down, which similarly followed an entitled white guy who’s not nearly as powerless as he perceives himself to be.
Something akin to Joel Schumacher’s Falling Down , but with (more) crunched steel and highway pileups.
Lo que aquí tenemos es Falling Down -un filme exponencialmente superior, dirigido por el recién fenecido Joel Schumacher, acerca de otro hombre blanco estadounidense fuera de sus cabales repartiendo violencia, arrogancia y “white privilege” por las calles de la ciudad- para los fanáticos MAGA.
Unlike Falling Down, a similar movie that starred Michael Douglas and which was directed by the late Joel Schumacher, Unhinged isn't about a character who seems to have been bred by the cumulative frustrations of a dysfunctional society.
In the Joel Schumacher thriller Falling Down he played a chronically outraged character identified only as The Man.
Don’t answer the phone the creep has left in its place, allowing him to taunt you incessantly like the psycho villains in “Speed,” “Phone Booth” and other noteworthy examples of homicidal-rampage cinema.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014)
Directed by Marc Webb
influenced by Batman Forever (1995), Batman & Robin (1997)
Characters
Coming with his own nerdy-comic theme music, Max is uncomfortably reminiscent of Jim Carrey’s closeted Riddler in Batman Forever.
A less-than-worthy sequel to the 2012 picture, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is more reminiscent of Batman Forever (1995) and Batman & Robin (1997), which, in the franchise’s directorial wasteland between Tim Burton and Christopher Nolan, believed that the series could be extended simply by signing big stars to play new villains: Jim Carrey as the Riddler, Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze.
However, his character is painfully underdeveloped, borrowing elements of hero-worship-turned-revenge-seeker we saw in the Riddler in “Batman Forever” and Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce) in “Iron Man 3.”
Unfortunately, he’s even less interesting than the villain from the first movie, with an origin story that’s oddly reminiscent of The Riddler’s from “Batman Forever” and backed by a headache-inducing dubstep anthem.
Original Review: William Bibbiani calls The Amazing Spider-Man 2 "the Batman Forever of the Spider-Man movies."
These aren't modern comic-book bad guys, they're leftovers from "Daredevil" or — ugh — the awful "Batman Forever."
God Bless America (2012)
Directed by Bobcat Goldthwait
influenced by Falling Down (1993)
Plot Themes
What follows is a cross-country kill-for-thrill jaunt (equal parts “Paper Moon” and “Falling Down”) that ends on the set of an “Idol”-like singing show.
In some ways, "God Bless America" is faintly reminiscent of Michael Douglas' 1993 film "Falling Down" -- with a little "Natural Born Killers" thrown in, since Frank, by accident more than anything, ends up with a bloodthirsty teenage accomplice named Roxy (ebullient newcomer Tara Lynne Barr) riding shotgun with him on his road trip from hell.
With rudeness, cruelty and self-absorption now universally heralded American attributes, with cynical political opportunists, unworthy “talents” and lowlifes dominating reality TV, the time is certainly right for a “Falling Down” remake.
Genetically akin to “Falling Down” and “Natural Born Killers,” with a twist out of “The Professional,” “God Bless America” is what’s known in Yiddish as a geschrei or in French a (ital) cri de couer: (ital) an impassioned outburst, a shout to the heavens, a cry from the heart.
Bobcat Goldthwait, directing yet another hilariously inappropriate film rooted in appropriate points, does it again with a Falling Down-esque tale of two people's revenge on stupidity.
It sounds like a funny idea, a sort of satirical Falling Down, but somehow the shoddiness of the film-making and the flatness of the writing dilute the anger and inspire a numbing tedium.
Beauty and the Beast (1946)
Directed by Jean Cocteau
influenced The Phantom of the Opera (2004)
Visuals
With its numerous candelabras held by gilded human arms (an idea stolen from director Jean Cocteau's "Beauty and the Beast"), stylish full-length mirrors and translucent drapes, however, they might as well be in the basement of the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland.
The staging is generally indifferent, save for a few scattered shots that prove Schumacher had seen Moulin Rouge! sometime in the three years since its release, and the utterly tacky lift at the start of the garish, over-lit "The Phantom of the Opera" sequence that proves he'd also seen Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast , and inaccurately assumed that he had earned the right to lick that film's taint, let alone pilfer one of its most famous images.
And for that matter, there are clearly intentional references to Jean Cocteau’s Beauty and the Beast.
There are moments when the movie seems desperate to approach the lyric surrealism of Emeric Pressburger and Michael Powell's ''The Red Shoes" and Jean Cocteau's ''Beauty and the Beast," the foulness of Dario Argento's own Faustian ''Phantom" adaptation, or, at least, the insanity of Brian De Palma's ''The Phantom of the Paradise."
After sweeping down a corridor of arms holding candelabras (see Cocteau's "Beauty and the Beast"), the Phantom leads the girl onto a gondola to bring her to his candlelit grotto.
Starting the film in Santa Cruz on the same boardwalk on which The Lost Boys was shot in 1986 is definitely not an accident.
Instead, it's remembered for The Lost Boys, which is just The Goonies wearing plastic vampire fangs.
As the film opens, we see young Adelaide watching her TV; on the shelf next to the TV are VHS tapes of films including The Goonies and C.H.U.D, soon after there’s a sneaky reference to The Lost Boys (which might go over some people’s heads, but is a lovely touch).
Peele sets a prologue on the 1986 Santa Cruz, Calif., boardwalk (site of the 1987 vampire flick “The Lost Boys,” as it happens), where a little girl named Adelaide (Madison Curry) wanders away from her parents and into a beachside house of mirrors with an unnerving secret.
The flick opens at a nighttime carnival in Santa Cruz in the mid-1980s ( The Lost Boys , anyone?).
Peele sets Us’ tone with a dark beginning on the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk circa The Lost Boys.
Sweet Smell of Success (1957)
Directed by Alexander Mackendrick
influenced Phone Booth (2003)
Characters
Outfitted in designer threads and sporting a Bronx accent by way of Dublin, Farrell enters in full swagger as Stu Shepard, a public relations smoothie cut from the same sharkskin cloth as Tony Curtis in "Sweet Smell of Success."
Review of the movie Stars: Colin Farrell, Kiefer Sutherland, Forest Whitaker, Katie Holmes, Radha Mitchell Director: Joel Schumacher Rating: R for pervasive language and some violence Opens Friday nationwide Sporting more of that amazing facial stubble that achieves uniformity throughout filming, Farrell plays a married New York publicist who starts out as a Sweet Smell of Success-caliber heel.
Sporting more of that amazing facial stubble that achieves uniformity throughout filming, Farrell plays a married New York publicist who starts out as a Sweet Smell of Success-caliber heel.
Colin Farrell delivers a solid performance as Stuart Shepard, a sleazy publicist straight out of the classic noir Sweet Smell of Success.
The horror influences range from films like The Lost Boys and Let the Right One In.
…short of a conscious spoof like From Dusk Till Dawn and The Lost Boys (1987), or a complete revamp of the genre.
It’s bloody and fun, with an 80s vibe similar to “The Lost Boys.”
…it’s all very Lost Boys…
The film’s design tips its hat to inspiration ranging from 1987’s “The Lost Boys” to 18th century Italian artist Giovanni Battista Piranesi.
There are also gallons of blood flowing, and a real sense of impending danger throughout even when references to The Lost Boys or You’ve Got Mail (surely this is the first movie to feature both?) abound.
It's all interlaced with an emotionally impactful story about friendship and deeply buried secrets and memories that has shades of the 1987 horrors The Lost Boys and A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors .
What We Do in the Shadows (2014)
Directed by Jemaine Clement
influenced by The Lost Boys (1987)
Characters Themes
- while the script cunningly plays with your expectations (as well as referencing The Lost Boys).
Jonathan Brugh’s Deacon nods to the bad-boy bloodsuckers of The Lost Boys, while Ben Fransham’s Petyr – bald, ghastly white and with a mouth full of crooked fangs – is a genuinely unsettling evocation of the great Nosferatu.
There are nods to The Lost Boys and Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula, among others, plus some set pieces that are simply genius: not least the scene where the housemates, getting ready for a night out, are unable to see their own reflections and have to rely on each other’s drawings.
By embracing a parodic self-fashioning based on films like Blade, Nosferatu , The Lost Boys, and Twilight, these vampires reveal how mainstream cinema's cultural hegemony need not be an instrument of aesthetic oppression, but can instead be one of productive self-creation.
A parody's effectiveness depends heavily on the knowledge of its subject, and the reach of directors/writers/performers Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement proves to be gratifyingly deep and wide, riffing on lore that runs the gamut from Vlad the Impaler woodcuts to sparkly Twilight pretty boys, and seemingly everything in between—one running gag will have fans of The Lost Boys plotzing.
He has history as an undead Nazi and now takes pleasure in ordering around his human servant (Jackie van Beek) and pranking people with tricks he picked up from The Lost Boys.
What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Nobody blends Wick isms with the protective-father fodder of Taken and the I’M-NOT-IMPOTENT insistence of male-rage sagas like Falling Down and Death Wish .
Directed by Ilya Naishuller and written by Derek Kolstad, “Nobody” actually taps into a similar mentality that Michael Douglas’ protagonist character had in the 1993 crime thriller “Falling Down.”
What’s revealed is: Hutch hasn’t so much gone berserk (this isn’t as layered as “Falling Down,” for example, a movie it vaguely resembles at first), as a long-dormant piece of him has finally snapped out of its fog.
Except this isn’t Falling Down , and there is much more to Hutch than anyone could imagine.
What begins as a riff on "Falling Down" — an average man is fed up and blows his top — becomes something more, and something more fun, as Hutch is revealed to be a long-dormant government asset, code name Nobody.
At that point, and after being emasculated by a cop who arrives on the scene, the next-door neighbor, and Brady, it appears Hutch might end up going down the "Falling Down" path and be the average guy who's finally had enough, snaps, and doles out some long pent-up justice.
The Covenant, on the other hand, feels a little like a cross between The Lost Boys and Zapped!, replicating the boy-band evil superhero vibe of the former and the flip a girl's skirt up with your dirty telekinetic mind of the latter.
The opening steals blatantly from the 1987 teen-vampire flick The Lost Boys, when a team of sexy young bad boys make a gravity-defying entrance to a night-time outdoor party.
“The Covenant” is one part “The Lost Boys,” one part “The Craft,” and two parts David DeCouteau with homoerotic undertones, overtones, mid-tones and all.
Chicago (2002)
Directed by Rob Marshall
influenced The Phantom of the Opera (2004)
Music Themes Visuals
Rob Marshall�s Chicago was a far superior example, blending not only great musical numbers, but songs that complemented the overall cynicism of the script and matched with an exuberance by the actors.
“Chicago” revived the genre and brought in audiences consisting largely of people for whom musicals aren’t usually their “thing.”
Everything was in place for The Phantom of the Opera to be a landmark musical, comparable to Moulin Rouge and Chicago: a great story and wonderful songs, all it needed was believable performances.
Indeed, some may even say it's too much of a throwback to fit into the new, post-"Chicago" musical paradigm.
Schumacher’s is a gloriously sweeping film that eschews the aggressive editing of Moulin Rouge! (or Chicago, for that matter), and that’s exactly what’s called for.
Enter Lou as Will’s latest caregiver, and here come the plot references to “My Fair Lady,” “Educating Rita,” “The Bucket List,” “Pretty Woman” (Lou even wears a red dress to a musical performance, ala Julia Roberts) and even “Dying Young” (in which Ms. Roberts played a caregiver to a wealthy patient played by Campbell Scott).
This story of the relationship between a quadriplegic man and his caregiver is hardly the unvarnished version — it’s got less in common with “The Sea Inside” than with Julia Roberts’s “Dying Young.”
The Wolverine (2013)
Directed by James Mangold
influenced by Batman & Robin (1997), Batman Forever (1995)
Characters Visuals
Svetlana Khodchenkova, as Viper, is supposed to be villainous but comes across as only vampy; she recalls Uma Thurman as Poison Ivy in ‘‘Batman & Robin,’’ only less interesting.
Estúpido também em seu terceiro ato, que apela para revelações ridículas e que praticamente se limita a mostrar uma batalha que traz Wolverine e seu adversário despencando várias vezes em um túnel vertical aparentemente tão extenso quanto a pista de decolagem de Velozes e Furiosos 6 , Wolverine – Imortal é prejudicado por uma vilã que, do figurino à composição da atriz, remete perigosamente à ridícula Hera Venenosa que Uma Thurman viveu em Batman & Robin (batam três vezes na madeira e se benzam).
It’s like somebody slapped Batman Forever onto the end of The Dark Knight.
(Hitchcock himself entertained the idea of making a thriller centered on a phone in the 1960s—an idea that evolved decades later into the 2003 film Phone Booth .)
We’ve seen a similar framework go horribly awry (Phone Booth, The Call), yet The Guilty breathes new life into this low-budget, high-concept subgenre.
To Möller’s credit, his first feature is more like “Locke” than “Phone Booth,” with the single location and the real-time approach feeling appropriate to the story he’s telling, rather than just a gimmick.
Yet in film the convention often falls into dramatic hyperbole (think of Phone Booth's godlike sniper), or become afraid of their own high concept, and bolt for open space (cf The Call).
But The Guilty , with the telephone as its core tool, has more in common with films such as Joel Schumacher’s Phone Booth and, particularly, with Locke , in which during a two hour car drive and 36 calls Tom Hardy squeezed every last drop of panicked perspiration out of a real-time marriage breakdown coupled with unexpected forays into concrete engineering.
Really, he's a vampire who thrives on his cult of personality; there's a reason that movie was called The Lost Boys.
With a nod to J.M. Barrie and "Peter Pan," these vampiric Lost Boys are living out every child's fantasy, but they would probably rather be normal kids than hanging upside down from the ceiling of a derelict, underground hotel.
Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping (2016)
Directed by Akiva Schaffer
influenced by Flatliners (1990)
But the bizarre peripheral characters—including a personal chef (Justin Timberlake) who lives to watch Conner eat and a roadie (Bill Hader, completely in his element) obsessed with Flatliners, “the Joel Schumacher film shot by Jan De Bont”—never really mask Popstar’s generic plot, which finds Conner’s DJ and former Style Boyz bandmate, Owen (Taccone), trying to reunite him with Lawrence (Schaffer), the estranged third Style Boy, like a child trying to get his divorced parents back together.
The gags here vary from big set pieces to satisfying runners to tiny, absurd touches; this viewer most appreciated the latter, like when Bill Hader’s roadie explains how he spends his free time “flatlining,” inspired by the movie Flatliners, and there’s just something about the way he off-handedly continues, “directed by Joel Schumacher, shot by Jan De Bont” that is totally irresistible.
The movie’s premise is said by screenwriter Larry Cohen (himself no slouch in the gripping-movie department, having directed It’s Alive! and God Told Me To) to be a project that Hitchcock had long desired to develop.
It's written by the king of exploitation films Larry Cohen ("God Told Me To"/"Q") and directed by the ham-fisted Joel Schumacher ("Batman Forever"/"Flatliners").
Although, the song is a strange choice given the lyrical content is about and inspired by Joel Schumacher’s 1987 horror gem The Lost Boys .
Angie dances in her booth — aggressively and without a smile, much to her boss Ray’s (Bishop Stevens) chagrin — to a darkly sultry Gunship song featuring a smoldering saxophone solo from none other than Tim Cappello, an accomplished musician best known to horror fans as the Sax Man from The Lost Boys .
Yet Schumacher was also a screenwriter and since his best scripts were humorous ensemble pieces like "Car Wash," it seems strange that he couldn't juice up this concept-ridden screenplay--by Janice Fischer & James Jeremias and Jeffrey Boam.