Jarv’s Birthday Series Redux: Color of Night (1994)
Hehehehehehe. To quote the not-forgotten monkey: BOOBS, ASS, MINKY! FTW!
Color of Night (release date 19th August in the USA) is a monumentally dumb film, so dumb in fact that it forgot the definite article at the start of its title. It’s also a hilarious one, but don’t let that distract you from the fact that on almost every level this is a cinematic stinker, a borderline skin-flick with a plot that would get laughed out of even the worst airport fiction. It’s so blazingly and crushingly inept, actually, that it doesn’t belong here and should live in the vault along with the other dregs of cinema. That it doesn’t is that it was directed by Oscar Nominated Richard Rush, and stars (check this out) Bruce Willis, Jane March (who incidentally, and quite understandably, hates it), Lesley Ann Warren, Scott Bakula, Brad Dourif, Ruben Blades, Lance Henriksen, Eriq LaSalle and Kathleen Wilhoite. Holy shit, what a cast, and what a fucking laughably awful film. I think the best word for it is “risible”.
Absolutely under no circumstances does this contain Bruce Willis’ cock, but it may contain spoilers below.

Mrs Jarv took the news that I was doing the birthday series again with quiet dignity (apologies to Wolf)
Bruce Willis is a shrink called Bill Capa. Don’t laugh, particularly if you’ve seen it, because I’m not joking, but he’s apparently a brilliant New York psychoanalyst with one of those plush offices with big windows in Manhattan. He’s dealing with difficult patient Kathleen Wilhoite, and doesn’t seem to notice that she may be on the verge of suicide. Just as well the internets weren’t around back then, because on http://www.rateyourshrink.com he’d be getting a lot of damning reviews. Anyhoo, she can’t take any more of his horseshit, so goes and spectacularly throws herself out of the window. Can’t say I blame her, to be honest. Bruce stands at the top and stares forlornly down 60 odd floors at her body splattered all over Broadway. As he looks, her blood fades from red to grey, thereby delicately letting us know that Bruce may have psychiatric issues himself.

I think Bob is a bit suspect. It’s the lycra. Never trust any man that has and chooses to wear his own lycra.
Anyhoo, it’s not just the audience that have spotted this. His dear friend and mentor (some old fuck that I can’t be arsed to look up) waffles a load of psychobabble at him about how his colour blindness is him “repressing emotions” or some such nonsense, and so Bill decides to pack it in and go to LA to visit best bud Bob (Scott Bakula). Which is strange, because despite being best friends, Bill doesn’t seem to know that Bob is a squilloinare book selling psychiatrist ninja with a plush gaff and more money than God. Anyhow, Bob realises that Bill has issues so ropes him into a therapy group filled with the worst nuts outside of Planter’s waste bin.
Nothing happens, so Bill and Bob the flowerpot shrinks go off to compare cocks in some kind of homoerotic lycra clad bike ride thing, and then Bob is unfortunately murdered by a chav in a hoodie. The cops think that Bob may have been offed by the nutty patients (stunning piece of deduction) so rope a reluctant Bill into continue on with the sessions in the hope of making the desperate killer reveal himself (to be fair the patients also demand this despite the fact that Bill has blatantly all the therapeutic ability of Attila the Hun on PCP). This, I feel, is somewhat similar to letting the monkey have the keys to the banana plantation, but I’m not a crack detective on the LA Homicide Squad, so what the fuck do I know.
Bill, however, decides to stay in Bob’s place (er? Hello? Are you allowed to do that, because it looks like squatting to me. Even though he is dead, and I suppose nobody cares). Before you know it he hooks up with local hottie and driving instructor Rose (Jane March) for some grubby (really a lot of, and it is very grubby) sex in pretty much every location possible. However, he’s having problems with his only patients, who are, shockingly, being knocked off by an unknown assailant. Who can it be? The most likely suspect is Tommy, who has serious issues and genius shrink Bill has diagnosed as being like a ticking time bomb, but it can’t be him for two reasons: he’s pulled out of therapy by his stand-up brother Dale, and I’ll come to the other one in a minute.
The killer is not who you think it is. Own up, you think it’s Rose don’t you?
Oh go on then, I’ll tell you: it’s Dale, and this is why:
Bill, aside from being colourblind and possibly the worst shrink in the history of psychiatry (honestly, I’ve seen waffles with more cognitive ability than this dickhead) is also quite obviously blind. He can’t, and believe me he’s the only person that can’t, spot that his paramour/ shag buddy is (DUM DUM DUM) Tommy in disguise. Or Tommy is her in disguise. Whatever. Fuck it. It’s fucking hilarious. Just in case you don’t believe me I present to you Exhibit A:
And Exhibit B:
Anyhoo, “Rose” has formed weird relationships with everyone in the group (seriously) but is being sexually tormented by her brother. This has caused her psyche to fracture, and created the “Tommy” personality. Her brother, in the meantime, is none too chuffed with her sharing her fish taco with everyone around so is knocking them off to get her/ him/ it back. Cue showdown, inventive use of nailgun, Bill saving the day and his eyesight (at least the colour bit of it) returning to normal. Happy fucking ending.
This is a monumentally awful movie. It’s hopeless. March, who is slightly odd looking, exudes sex appeal, and let’s face it is kind of hot. What she does not pass as, under any circumstances is a 17 year old boy with a stutter and anger management issues. That our hero can’t see this induced howls of laughter in me, and every time they appear in any context I was literally crying from it. I cannot for the life of me work out why he’s meant to be so stupid that he can’t see this. Mind you, nobody else can either, and they’re all meant to be porking her too, so maybe this sort of thing is normal for LA.
It also has a weird contempt for psychiatry/ psychoanalysis. Not that I think it’s worth two shits myself, but in a movie about prominent shrinks conducting anger management groups and whatnot, it strikes me as slightly odd to mention Freud and then have the two “doctors” making wanking gestures to each other. Also, if Bob has just published a book in hot-shot analyst Bill’s field, wouldn’t he know about it? Even if Bob hadn’t mentioned it, aren’t they meant to keep up with the latest research? Fucked if I know, but I suppose he is meant to be the worst shrink in history, despite what he keeps telling us.
Furthermore, it is weirdly shot. Rush’s last film was made 14 years before this, which ordinarily sets off warning sirens, and was highly acclaimed. Yet now he’s got delusions of art, which is stupid for a skin flick, and as such keeps staging weird shots where the foreground and background are both in focus. I’m not sure what this is called (conti), but I bet if it’s done properly then it’s quite effective. Not like here, where every time he does it it looks like he’s shooting March having a conversation with the back of Bruce’s head. Don’t get me started on the multiple sex scenes here, let me just say that if you ever wanted to know what Bruce’s dong looks like, then this is your film, and it’s taught me a novel use for toy trucks.
Nevertheless, it’s, against all odds, hugely entertaining. This is a terrible film, awful in fact, yet I spent the entire run time almost crying with laughter. Almost everything is misguided, inept, poorly thought out, badly acted and so forth, yet strangely hysterical. There’s a great little moment, when Bill decides to see a patient out of hours, little knowing that she’s knocking off Rose. So, Rose is aghast to discover Bill’s on his way, pulls her shit together and runs out of the door straight past Bill, who doesn’t fucking see her. He really does give retards a bad name. However, in terms of sheer stupidity, I don’t think anything tops the ambush by the rattlesnake in the mailbox, which is genuinely hilarious for Bruce’s dumbfounded expression if nothing else.
Overall, this is tripe, but I nearly died laughing, so I’m not going to go anywhere near as low as I should. On any critical, technical or artistic level, Color of Night is an atrocious movie, yet because it’s so inept it has a sleazy charm. Not least of which is due to the inexplicable porno score that the film has. Therefore, because I have to acknowledge it as awful, I’m not going high, and I don’t recommend it, yet because it really is one of those so-bad-it’s-good films, I’m going to go bang in the middle and give it 2 out of 4 of the worst thing I could find on the internet (Rosie O’Donnell in fetish gear). This is a disastrously inept, but truly hilarious film, and I suggest watching it with beer.
Until next time,
Jarv.
The Full List for the Birthday Series Redux:
- 2011- The Skin I Live In (2.5 out of 4)
- 2010- The Last Exorcism (2.5 out of 4)
- 2009- Post Grad (1 out of 4)
- 2008- The House Bunny (1 out of 4)
- 2007- Knocked Up (1 out of 4)
- 2006- Volver (1 out of 4)
- 2005- Red Eye (2 out of 4)
- 2004- Dead Clowns (Orangutan of Doom)
- 2003- Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life (1 out of 4)
- 2002- Talk to Her (4 out of 4)
- 2001- Jeepers Creepers (2 out of 4)
- 2000- Gossip (1 out of 4)
- 1999- All About My Mother (1 out of 4)
- 1998- The X-Files (1 out of 4)
- 1997- Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion (2 out of 4)
- 1996- The Last Supper (3 out of 4)
- 1995- The Usual Suspects (4 out of 4)
- 1994- The Color of Night (2 out of 4)
- 1993- Surf Ninjas
- 1992- The Gun in Betty Lou’s Handbag
- 1991- Pump Up the Volume
- 1990- Wild at Heart
- 1989- Bull Durham
- 1988- Crossing Delancey
- 1987- The Big Easy
- 1986- Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
- 1985- Better off Dead
- 1984- Oxford Blues
- 1983- MetalStorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn
- 1982- The Thing
- 1981- Honky Tonk Freeway
- 1980- Schock
- 1979- Rich Kids
- 1978- Coma
“I don’t think anything tops the ambush by the rattlesnake in the mailbox.”
AWESOME.
It’s so fucking dumb. Bruce comes back from his jog, and decides to open the mailbox to see what his bestest bud has got. The snake jumps out. He falls over, stares at it, then threatens it for a while.
It’s so monumentally stupid.
I’ve never seen this, nor do I really remember it coming out, but it certainly sounds borderline genius. Maybe his “artsy” attempt at filiming this was from the perspective of an artsy retard?
It’s an absolute disaster, Pillows. I have no idea what they were attempting here, but it’s not happened at all. There were a lot of these post Basic Instinct shady erotic thrillers and all of them suck to a greater or lesser extent. This one is at least funny as fuck.
It’s absolutely astonishing that he can’t spot that March is the teenage boy. Sheer dumbness.
hehehe This movie is hilarious. March was odd looking, but hot nonetheless. I would’ve gone there.
DePalma always uses that dual focus shot.
I would too. Half Chinese, Half Spanish genes, born and raised posh English.
Course you’re going to hit that combo.
I’m really pleased with this review. I was tempted to be really sarky about it, but it’s just too goddamned funny.
There’s a cracking moment when he pulls Tommy’s Wig off to reveal Rose and the conversation is “Never mind the cross dressing and psychosis, Rose, where’s your brother”
No, it’s not worth getting sarcastic about. That’s like picking on the handicapped.
That’s what I thought, and I honestly was howling with laughter.
Mrs. Jarv was fucking funny as well when we were watching it- when Rose appears, out the blue (well, as much as a question from a woman when watching a film could ever be described as out of the blue) she pipes up with “He does know that’s his patient, doesn’t he?”
I could’ve done without the Rosie O’Donnell rating though.
I thought it was really funny. It actually came up when I was looking for images of the film. It’s the most wrong thing I could find.
I think you should review Exit to Eden as punishment.
I’ve never even heard of that, and having just looked it up…
Bleurgh.
1.77 average so far. I think 2 will probably be beyond me, as I haven’t got enough in the tank to top up some of the shite I’ve had.
I’ve got an average of about 2 so far. But I’ve had some great films. The remainder of the series might drop the average.
I ended up on about 1.9 last time, but I had some true classics propping up a lot of shite.
This time around, weirdly, I’ve got more 4/4 films, (3 as opposed to 2), but lots less 3 and 3.5 (5 as opposed to TEN! last time).
I’ve got a lot less OoD’s as well- I had 4 last time, and they were absolute fucking honk, whereas I think that I’ll have 2 this time.
Basically, this list is a lot steadier between 1-2.5 than the last one.
You’ve only had two 0’s so far: The Collector and Philadelphia Experiment.
When’s that Douglas thing coming?
Incidentally, I tried to rewatch Coma last night, which I’ve not seen in years, and it’s nowhere near as good as I remembered it being. It’s not paranoid enough.
Sometime.
Any time in particular? You know you’re going to have to watch it again if you leave it much longer.
I’m already at that stage. I was going to see if I could just use wiki to aid my recall. I’ll have a look.
Well, theres a decent plot synopsis. May have dodged a bullet.
Hehehehehehehe
I’m sure you’ll enjoy it more this time.
*goes away to edit Wikipedia*
I didn’t know it was about a Lesbian Space Octopus. How have you struggled?
If it had an LSO I would not have been bored to death.
More films should have Lesbian Space Octopi. Think how much more interesting all about my mother would have been if it turned out that she gave birth to a LSO.
Lesbian Space Octopus: Vampire Hunter.
Dunno if this will work, but it should be the Dredd teaser. I can’t see it myself.
or try this…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TztlWa8a2ik
Either of those work? And are correct?
I’ll go for a smoke and find out.
*puts huff on*
They both work.
That looks like absolute honk. Outtakes from Robocop 2.
Although this is funny:
Snyder took power?
Dredd should be so fucking easy- you start with The Day the Law Died (Jude Law as Judge Cal). Then you have Block War or Judge Death, and then move on to Necropolis (which is the best one).
You need a fucking drug to sit through Snyder. SLO-MO indeed.
They’ve fuglied up Headey, as well.
It looks pretty horrible in all honesty. Still, it’s Dredd, so much like you with Tinsquared I’m drawn to the fecker.
No matter how awful.
Can’t see it turning out as well for you as it did for me then.
No, I’m quite prepared for it to be a gigantic festering ballsack. It may yet usurp the worst of the year award.
Who’s it directed by?
This is the automatic 0 chang picture for it:
“Gaze into the fist of Dredd!”? Is that actually from the funny book?
Yes. In context, that’s his response to Judge Fear who kills people with “Gaze into the face of fear”.
It’s directed by Pete Travis, who is at least English, like Headey, so there’s an outside chance of him understanding it. Also written by Garland, so again, it might not go completely pear-shaped at Script level (probable third act meltdown though).
Why can’t they just do it properly?
It’s also a deliberate pisstake. Lots of Dredd is like that.
This is where Stallone got it so badly wrong, and where this new one looks also like it’s fucked the pooch. It’s satire.
Okay, fair enough. Out of context it’s pretty lame.
Totally lame.
Agree.
It’s the picture that fanboys always go nuts for. Because it’s “badass”.
Ugh. He directed Vantage Point. Here’s a list for you. Terrible films with great trailers.
Not seen it because I thought it would suck balls.
The other thing with Dredd, and I’m going to use Judge Death as an example, is it’s all such a pisstake. Death for example, was the son of a travelling dentist and serial killer so grew up a sadist (“While dentistry provided some opportunities…”). He decided that as all crime was committed by the living, life itself was ergo a crime.
See what I mean? That’s tongue in cheek. And the Dark Judges/ Sisters of Death are both ultraviolent and genuinely frightening. They’ll never be done properly on screen.
Dunno about any of that. When you mention Dredd, I just see Sly, Rob and Armand. “Oy yam da yaw!”
Oh god, stop it.
It’s not funny.
You’re bloody lucky that the Berg didn’t mangle Tins. Sly arseraped not one but THREE classic Dredd stories in one hit in that film: The Day the Law Died, Cursed Earth, and Block War.
Well, Berg is slightly more trustworthy than Pete Travis or that knobjockey who directed the Sly one.
I read years ago that Danny Cannon turned down Die Hard 3 in favour of directing Judge Dredd, because he was a huge JD fan.
Fucked it right up.
I wonder what his version would have been like. Sly had his mitts all over the screenplay. As a big fan of JD, surely his own version would’ve been different.
Does Dredd ever take his helmet off in the funny books?
Nope.
That’s not a big deal for me. It’s daft to expect a film with him as the central character to have him with his helmet on at home. He also doesn’t get arrested for crimes and shit like that.
He did go into the Cursed Earth and the Angel gang was straight from the comic, but he went as a judge.
Why is that okay and you get so worked up about Spiderman?
It’s a context thing.
Dredd doesn’t take it off when he’s out working. If he’s at home having a cup of tea and reading the paper or whatever, it’s the equivalent of Peter Parker.
The equivalent of what Spidey films do is to have him take the helmet off just before getting in a punch up with Rico or whatever. That would be totally wrong (and is what the Sly film did) and would piss me off.
The only Street Judges that take the helmets off are the Psi-Division, and that’s entirely different.
Also, you only ever see Dredd fighting crime or whatever.
There’s so much crap in the Screenplay that I don’t blame Sly for- the knocking together of the stories (there’s more, actually- Rico as well), extraneous characters such as HAmmerstein (ABC Warrior robot).
It’s all such a fucking mess. Overegged the pudding.
Should have been the Day the Law Died.
It really does upset me.
I want a proper Judge Death film. He’s a great villain. His origin is fucking spectacularly brilliant, and he’s frightening, evil, and downright unstoppable.
Death’s Origin- particularly the bit where he’s doing his first judging session and kills everyone in front of him is hilarious. When he’s justifying it, his superior questions him, and he replies with:
“How many of our convictions reoffend?”
To which the guy response is something like 90%
Death’s reply: “How many of mine will reoffend”
“Those last two only came in for a divorce”.
Dredd beats him through being smarter, and more persistent.
They “saved” Death for the sequel to the first one, which is a blunder. A trump card is only effective if you play it.
How old is Headey? She seems to have been around forever.
Better or worse than Total Remake?
Guess who…
Bradshaw?
I’m starting to think Winstead sucks.
I never really rated her to be honest. I never got why the nerds wanked themselves over her.
Close. Just as useless. Just fatter and more orange.
I’ll tell you something for nothing: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies will be a fucking awful film. It’s a one joke concept that can’t support a run time.
Yes, it would suck.
I’ve read it, and it is quite funny. No way can it sustain a film. No way.
What the fuck does this mean? Seriously, what’s wrong with him:
It’s honestly like a howler monkey on speed is hammering at a keyboard.
Also, I hate that AICN Youtube bollocks. It makes me physically sick. It’s not funny, it’s not cool, it’s just a morbidly obese shut in manchild wanking in public.
Never seen it. Absolutely no interest. It as horrible enough seeing him in The Faculty.
Watched the one that drew Col to flame him, just out of curiousity. Never doing it again.
The reason I’ve not reviewed the faculty is because of him,
He’s made that comment for no other reason than to reference that movie. Time after Time is completely and utterly unrelated to ALVH, other than they have fun with historical figures.
Well, that’s not entirely true. From all reports ALVH doesn’t have fun with anything.
It’s also so he doesn’t have to actually right a review-
Better summarised as: Wurble wurble blah blah wurble jizz SUCKS OFF FILM wurble jizz blah THEY GAVE ME PWESENTS
I clearly know nothing about Dredd. I’ve been reading the TB, and that shitty trailer has universal approval.
The only good thing about Nu-Dredd is that it’s got a sensible budget- $45m. This means it stands a good chance of making some cash, which means that I may get Judge Death in a sequel.
I actually saw a good idea from the nerdlings. There are a lot of really cool shorter Dredd Stories- such as Rico, or the Angel Gang, or Competitive Eating (Belly Wheels!) and they could have done it Sin City Style.
That might have worked.
Yes, you are wrong, nerds are right.
I thought this was assumed.
Why? What’s “so appropriate” about it. That is just totally devoid of meaning. What a useless fucking comment.
Jarv you nailed Harry’s ‘voice’ so well up there I thought for a second–til I read swelled up like a baby hippo– that it really was his writing. You nailed the line where it just switched focus and tense halfway through and pretends that nothing has changed.
Cheers. He’s actually quite easy to do.
‘like murals come to life’ He’s straight lying now. I noticed ebert gave this a positive review, but it’s his usual ‘don’t know what to say, the theater was cool, the (liquid)popcorn was tasty, Im going thumbs up’. But with Harry, he’s flat out lying about it. It isn’t beautiful in the least and it doesn’t look epic. It’s the flattest ugliest looking big-budget movie to release this summer. Course, summer’s not over yet.
I don’t know why you guys try and unscramble the rantings of a person incable of writing down more than one coherent sentence in a row. It leads one to madness.
Just watched the Dredd trailer. I didn’t realise Christian Bale was in it.
You’re either referring to deep focus shots or someone using a split-focus diopter (basically a lens made up of two half-lenses, each with a different focal length so they can get things in focus at different distances). If you don’t use a split-diopter, you need a lens with a large depth of field and shit loads of light to have two objects in focus.
The little R2 unit is correct, De Palma used them a lot with a split-focus diopter. So did QT use it in Pulp Fiction (the shot of Willis entering with the samurai sword while the hillbilly had his back turned). But Orson Welles is the one who really first used deep focus (but without a diopter) and masterfully. For example the shot of when Susan Alexander is in bed, having overdosed, while CFK bust into the bedroom in the bg, and the bottle of pills in the fg, all in focus (of course, they had to resort ot film trickery back then – the pill bottle was a propt that was like way bigger than a normal bottle so they could make it look like it was closer to the camera). Sergio Leone was another maestro with the deep focus shots (pistole and hostler in focus in the fg, with another gunfighter in focus in the bg).
Very entertaining review Jarv to a car wreck of a movie. Good job. Hard to believe Rush directed the Stunt Man.
I just thought of something. I hadn’t seen this movie since it came out on video/cable, and even then I was half-asleep during it, but I just realized…
Maybe Bruce Willis did know that Jane was pretending to be a young boy? Maybe his character is, you know, into that kind of thing but represses it.
He doesn’t. It’s a surprise to him when it’s revealed.
Also, he’s not alone- all the therapy group are porking her and they don’t know either.
It’s a diopter here. There’s no depth of field when he does it.
Cheers, Conti, I’d not have known.
i don’t think I’ve heard of this let alone watched it. Yeah i would do that broad she’s odd looking like a bad wax figure or something.
She spends a good half of this film full frontal nekkid. And there’s a Bruce Willis dong shot for Koutch.
I know i paid to see this but I swear i have zero recollection even after reading jarv’s excellent review. Maybe it was so bad i just blanked it out
You’re suppressing emotions, TKD.
Could be R2.
Maybe the sight of Bruce’s schlong snapped some synapses.
The again i have no recollection of the last boy scout either or of striking distance. But I know i paid to see them as well.
Was Bruces schlong exposed in all of them? Could that be the common link, or were they just crap movies?
There’s no need for Bruce’s cock in this film at all. It’s shoddy film-making.
Mind you, March gets so many full-frontals that it’s probably payback.
Don’t recall there being dong in either LBS or SD. I like LBS but it’s got a mean streak that film. SD is complete shit. Whoever thought to cast a horse alongside Bruce, who spends half the movie ON A BOAT, should have their head examined. Horses don’t fair too well on speed boats.
No dong in either of those two films. SD is a nailed on OoD film
Has she done anything since? Her picture above makes her looks a bit odd. So Kman is a fan of Brucies package?
Whod’a thunk it?
March?
Not really. She’s most notable for the Lover, which was before this. She was perfect for that film.
To be fair, she was more of a pony or a colt back then. She did not hit full on horsiness until a few years later
To sum up, the film was shit, but the
autodefenestration scene was aces?
Pretty much.
Morbius!
You old day walking reprobate!
Whats shaking?
Not bad. Can’t beat a good defenestration scene.
I’m with you on that one! It’s a piece of crap, but somehow it’s enjoyable trash. And, really, I can’t help but find Jane March alluring. You should check out ‘The Lover’, for more March madness! 🙂
Cheers Thorn. I’ve seen (slept through) the lover. Not a bad film, but the source material is so dull that it struggles to get over it.
Ha! I’d forgotten that caption – I did it for ‘Xtro 2’ or ‘3’ I think. Wilhoite’s not quite got the Koslo goggle-eyes look perfected though.
Gotta see this one, sounds remarkably stupid. Whatever happened to Jane March? Come to think of it, whatever happened to Bruce Willis?
Very funny, Jarv.
It was Xtro 2. Cracking Caption.
This is a hilariously bad film. Loads of nudity. March has had a muted career, she was mostly a model to begin with anyway, but turns up on the odd thing here and there.
Cheers Wolf.