The Rambling of Man Forsaken
There was too much shine on the movie theater marquee. So much so that I nearly went blind with blue fever and so I turned myself around and ventured far away from that marquee. Far enough to find myself entering into the American jungle of independent cinema. I did not realize how naive I was at that moment but the further and further I traveled into the abyss, I had no choice but to accept the reality that some independent films exist solely off their cult personalities more so that what they actually manage to achieve. Take for instance the following film Deadbeat at Dawn.
The Chosen Film
Released in 1988, Deadbeat at Dawn deals with some pretty cool stuff. The kind of cool stuff that you expect from a early to mid 20 year old to throw into when grinding along to make their debut film. Street gangs. Kung fu nunchaku action. Betrayal. A heist involving a Brinks truck and some other cool stuff of that nature.
In the film, we follow the trials and tribulations of Goose, leader of one of the two gangs fighting over turf, as he navigates through the harsh streets of Dayton, Ohio. His girlfriend ends up getting killed just as he promises to leave the gang life but as his life spirals out of control and is on the verge of suicide, the gang life pulls him back in for one last job but it turns out to be a double cross from the Spyder gang and from there, Goose goes on the run to a pretty kick ass final showdown of various gang members getting the shit kicked out of them from Goose. All this leading towards an ending where there should be no sequel to.
Intermission: The Man Behind The Camera and In Front
Jim VanBebber is the kind of the filmmaker that truly deserved better. At this moment of time, he has only made 2 feature films with the rest of his filmography consisting of short films/music videos/commercials. Out of those 2 films, I only have access to his debut film Deadbeat at Dawn since The Manson Family' is currently out of print from Severin and the only copies floating around are like 100 bucks and I ain't got the cash to commit to a film I saw years ago and spaced out about its existence until now. Except for Germany. Them Germans have that film priced at something reasonable. Might have to import it.
i should give this another watch
In regards to his short films, probably the best of the bunch that I was able to see was My Sweet Satan. That had a real destitute quality in regard to the way that these satanist metal heads were living life thinking they were kings but were just some real dumb ass kids acting tough. That whole acting going too far when they went about killing some kid that ripped off some LSD from them. Good shit.
Ever since the troubled production of The Manson Family, it took like a good 10 years or so to finish it, VanBebber has pretty much lived by the rule that he will only make a film if there's a budget in place since he just doesn’t want to run around and keep on raising money like he did during that production. He just wants to make exploitation films because those are the films he loves and it shows. The problem being that exploitation films died out by the 90’s and ever since having lived by this rule, he hasn’t done much in regards to making a feature.
On the Arrow blu-ray, there is a documentary in regards to his career thus far and along the way are certain people that have a relationship with Jim and they discuss their interaction with VanBebber’s work and him and they all support the dude and love the work that he has done and hope that he can pull off the sequel to Deadbeat at Dawn. Now this being made in 2018, there has been no sequel to this film and judging from the way that the footage looked at the end of the documentary, there being a teaser of sorts for the sequel that never came to be, it’s probably all for the best.
Outside of that particular documentary, there is another entitled Diary of a Deadbeat.
Now this is an eye opening one in the sense that VanBebber is essentially a cult icon to the movie freaks out there. Having only just made 2 films, those 2 seem to be enough to garner him enough of a following of people willing to die for him but the way VanBebber carries himself seems a bit on the bummer end of things.
Day 1 of him being at Cinema Wasteland, a home grown movie lover convention out in Ohio, to sign autographs and do a Q & A following a screening of Deadbeat at Dawn is watching a man get more and more drunk as the day goes on and it reaches a climax of a man in the audience asking the question of what Jim would have done if he was on one of the flights that headed for the twin towers on 9/11. The drunken Jim answers that it was inside job that the government pulled off and from there he makes a scene and leaves in a drunken furor.
This is a fantastic documentary following a man that believes in his own hubris to such an extant that this following is deserved. He refuses to make deals in regard to cutting material out of his own scripts to get them funded and refuses to work in the system for his own state of authorship is one that he doesn’t want interfered. The cost he pays for this is that nobody wants to fund his projects. The end of the documentary has him in the pre-production period of a short that he manged to fund through kickstarter by the name of Gator Green that he has tried to turn into a feature film.
Though 8 years later, its easy to see that the film that never expanded into an actual feature film and is still just a short and the last short that VanBebber has made.
Now The Opinion
Back to the film at hand, this film is a low budget movie and I mean lowest of the low. The story behind the making of the film is far more intriguing than the story within the film as VanBebber dropped out of film school to go out and make his own movie with the money he borrowed to go to film school with.
That's pretty fucking rad and the finished product is pretty radical overall though because of the grittiness he was able to capture on film. Dayton is not an especially beautiful place and the way it looks in this film would make you to believe it was actually a 3rd world country. Some real great tracking shots all throughout and the just the desolate locations these characters find themselves are just fantastic.
With the low budget though, there are some limitations to the material at hand. The acting isn’t all that great except for the two guys playing the rivals.
Paul Harper as Danny, the leader of the rival Spyder gang, and Marc Pittman as Bonecrusher. A true pair of villains that brings the film up a notch in regard to the quality of it.
Those two motherfuckers are great but even so, its very much a showcase for VanBebber and he isn’t necessarily the greatest lead but that could be that the villains are far more worthwhile in remembering. The beats of the narrative don’t necessarily connect all that well to one another and from scene to scene it became this roller coaster of highs and lows until that final showdown comes along.
That final showdown is probably worth the while of watching everything that preceded it. Maybe. If your interest if lost and you don’t feel as though you can find yourself tuning back into the film then skip to that final showdown. Absolutely worth it.
The action overall though is pretty fucking rad. There's a cool knife fight in the beginning that takes place in a cemetery. Melodrama takes place in the in-between but the ending is the real star of the picture. Nunchaku fighting all around, blood flying off in all directions, and a throat getting ripped out is a pretty solid way to end a movie.
As low budget debuts go, this is a pretty solid affair. There's a vision at play and the execution of it is pretty fun overall. It's not a masterpiece but it certainly is easy to understand why there is a cult following for the film.
This is film that shows off a guy's ability to pull off a movie for the most part and should have been a great way to find financing or at least be able to pull off a second film soon after. Who knows what the logistics were after this film was made because the production of his second feature The Manson Family is even more crazy from the lack of funding to the main star walking away from the film. The fact that he was able to pull it off in the end is pretty inspiring stuff.
In the end, Van Bebber has managed to make a solid debut to a career that should gone farther than where it is now.