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The Last Broadcast
It was Blair Witch when Blair Witch wasn't cool
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The Last Broadcast
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Starring Stefan Avalos, Lance Weiler, David Beard
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Directed by Stefan Avalos & Lance Weiler
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Wavelength Releasing
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87 Minutes
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DVD and VHS Release, Nov. 1999
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Review by Tasha Robinson
 he plot should be familiar by now. A group of inexperienced but
enthusiastic 20-something filmmakers heads into the woods to put together
an amateur documentary about a spooky local legend. They disappear under
mysterious circumstances. The footage they shot in the woods is found and
assembled into a "documentary" that hints at what happened to them but ends
without revealing the entire truth. The resulting film, actually a work of
fiction, is touted as the real thing on a Web site that offers deceptively
convincing timelines, photos and interviews with people close to the case.
Many audience members see the movie unaware that they're watching fiction,
and are horrified as they see what the three filmmakers supposedly saw.
It really should sound familiar. After all, The Blair Witch
Project has been seen by millions of people and has grossed over $137
million at the box office. But this isn't The Blair Witch Project.
It's The Last Broadcast, a remarkably similar movie that first
opened in March of 1998.
Broadcast has its own distinguishing marks. In this case, there
are four filmmakers rather than three, and they're exploring the myth of
the Jersey Devil rather than the Blair Witch. Two members of their coterie
are eventually found dead and mutilated. The third disappears entirely, and
the fourth is convicted of the murders. Where Witch is presented
without context or explanation, Broadcast's ostensible director,
David Leigh (Beard), is an active, vocal presence. His narration ties the
film together as he explains how he researched the murders and assembled
the victims' footage to explore the shallow, powerful, misleading nature of
the mass media and to try and clear the name of the railroaded
"murderer."
Striking similarities
Broadcast never made it to the mainstream on anything like the
scale of Witch, though it made the rounds at independent film
festivals and drew significant technical interest as the first film to be
shot entirely with digital equipment and edited entirely on a PC. It's a
competent, involving movie, clearly low-tech but well-acted and
characterized by a loose, realistic docudrama style. But its sudden revival
and video release indubitably owe a debt to Witch's popularity, its
unquestionably extensive similarities with the earlier Broadcast,
and the uneasy suspicions the media has raised about the connections
between the two.
Not that the filmmakers themselves are pointing fingers. A published
timeline of the two movies' history--one Avalos describes as "dead accurate" as far
as he knows--raises a variety of disturbing issues, including similarities
between the films' trailers and posters as well as their Web sites and
central concepts. Similarities between the two films' cinematography are
evident too, right down to individual images.
But most reviews have been very hesitant to throw stones on anybody's
behalf, since neither film's creators are charging headfirst into the fray.
Instead, Avalos is commenting on the circular irony of the situation, as
media explorations of Broadcast dovetail with Broadcast's
explorations of the media. "The whole thing has been very interesting to
watch, to see how stories circulate and rumors spread. The whole thing has
fit perfectly into our movie," Avalos says. "It's so surrealistic."
Legal and creative issues aside, Broadcast stands as a clever,
polished movie, despite its purported rock-bottom $900 budget ($155 of
which went toward food, according to Avalos and Weiler). It preaches a
little too much and consequently telegraphs its twist ending, but it does
actually have an ending--which, while satisfying and shocking, is probably
too conventionally conclusive to bowl over Witch's hardcore
fans.
Probably the most significant difference between these two films is that no
one I've seen Broadcast with has gotten horrendously nauseous from
the jumpy cinematography. Too bad I can't say the same for Blair
Witch.
-- Tasha
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Now and Again
The three-billion dollar man
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Now and Again
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Starring Eric Close, Dennis Haysbert, Margaret Colin
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CBS
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Fridays, 9 p.m.
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Review by Kathie Huddleston
 ichael Wiseman (John Goodman) is a regular guy who works as an
executive for an insurance firm. He loves his wife and teenage daughter,
and he can't help but do the right thing, even if it means he has to go up against
the bigwigs at his shady company. When Michael gets passed over for a
promotion, he goes out and gets drunk. Then, on his way home, he is accidentally
pushed off a subway platform and lands in front of a train.
Michael wakes up in a room where a mysterious man, Dr. Theodore Morris
(Haysbert), explains to him that he is nothing more than a middle-aged
brain hooked up to equipment that keeps him alive and allows him to
communicate. The U.S. government
has been trying to create a human who can go places and do things a normal
human can't. While they have been able to genetically bio-engineer a
superhuman body, they couldn't make a brain.
Morris tells Michael he has two options. He can agree to have his brain transplanted into
a new body and work for the government, or he can die. If he agrees to work for
the government, there's
a catch. He can never make contact with anyone from his past. If he does,
it will mean his immediate death and the death of anyone who knows about
him.
Michael makes his decision, and when next he wakes,
his brain is in a perfect body that has superhuman strength and
speed. At first, Michael (now played by Close) is excited to find out what his
new body can do. However, it
isn't long before he starts to miss his wife Lisa (Colin) and his
daughter Heather (Heather Matarazzo). Michael even starts to miss himself when he
looks in a mirror.
Michael manages to escape and see Lisa without letting her know who he
is. After he gets caught by Morris and some government goons, Michael knows
one thing. He wants to live. Meanwhile, a mild-looking Chinese gentleman
has been unleashing nerve gas at various points around the globe, and he's now
threatening the United States. Michael, the government's untried
secret weapon, may be the only hope.
Style, class and heart
Now and Again has been called an action-drama-comedy-romance by
executive producer Caron, and that's a pretty accurate description of the
series so far. Although it could have been a rehash of The Six Million
Dollar Man (after inflation), Now and Again takes a different approach. It can't be pinned down to any
specific description.
Now and Again has what many television series are missing today:
heart. It's a classy show about a sweet guy caught up in extraordinary
circumstances. None of this would work if Close wasn't believable as the
born-again John Goodman. Close gets lots of help from his co-stars, who
could turn into the kind of ensemble cast that makes a series great.
Haysbert is a standout as the humorous and mysterious Dr. Morris.
Caron shows that he knows how to mix
his genres and spot talent (as he once did with Moonlighting and a
little-known actor named Bruce Willis). The production values are
top-notch, and the writing is humorous and stylish.
There's no point during the first episodes where the audience is
allowed to forget that there are big things at stake. A madman is on the
loose, and he's doing terrible things to innocent people. While viewers may know
that Michael is going to stop this bad guy, they don't have a clue how he's
going to do it. And that's good television.
For the most part, the series takes its fantastic premise and runs with
it. While some might wonder why in the world the government would spend
three billion dollars to implant the brain of an insurance guy into their
precious secret weapon when they could wait for a more appropriate brain,
that's one of those little details Caron will hopefully explain somewhere
along the way.
Whether or not Now and Again will be able to live up to its initial
promise is anyone's guess. And whether CBS will give it the time it
needs to blossom is another question mark. However, if this series can pull
off a miracle, say one as small a transferring a brain into a genetically
bio-enhanced body, Now and Again could be a winner.
-- Kat
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