Future Shock (1994) — Triskaidekafiles

FUTURE SHOCK

WRITERS: Eric Parkinson, Vivian Schilling, David DuBos, Matt Reeves

DIRECTORS: Eric Parkinson, Oley Sassone, Matt Reeves

STARRING: Vivian Schilling as Jenny Porter

Scott Thompson as Georgie

Martin Kove as Doctor Langdon

Sam Clay as Steven Forrest

Bill Paxton as Vince

QUICK CUT: A psychiatrist does his best to help his patients confront their fears.

THE MORGUE
Dr. Langdon - A helpful psychiatrist using cutting edge technology to help better his patients.

Jenny - A woman worried about all the violence in the world, and fears it is coming for her.

George - A mortician’s assistant who believes in order, and everything being in its place.

Steven - A hypochondriac who is frozen in place from the fear of how anything can go wrong.

TRISK ANALYSIS: Welcome back, Triskelions! It's the end of August, so time for the traditional anthology movie. You know the drill. This year is a bit of a treat I've wanted to share for ages. It's a scifi anthology movie from the early 90s called, Future Shock.

Now, I have a weird history with this movie. I remember being in the video store in the early 90s, looking for something to rent, and they had these comics in a small display at the register, called Future Shock. Me, being a comic nerd, grabbed it and bought it, since it caught my attention.

The comic itself was a bit meh, but it still sparked the imagination and intrigued me. I knew it was a promotional thing for this movie here, which I rented as soon as I found it on the shelves.

But wait, there's more! The lead actress in the first short, one Vivian Schilling, who also wrote it, had a novel advertised in the tie in comic, as well as another movie she wrote and starred in; Soultaker. Which I also had to see when I found it.

You know you have some clout with a movie if you can get your credit over your face.

Now, that title should sound familiar to fans of Mystery Science Theater 3000. It was the first movie of the final season that Mike and the Bots riffed. And was a rare instance where I got to be all excited BECAUSE I KNEW THE MOVIE!! and I rambled about it to friends. So yeah, I have a weird history with THIS movie. But let's dive into the actual thing we're here for!

So we open up on Vivian's character, Jenny, talking about statistics of violence, and you instantly know she's a very paranoid person. Not entirely without cause, but the world is not helping her state of mind.

Jenny is seeing her therapist, Dr. Langdon, and he offers her a new therapy, asking if she has heard of the term, virtual reality. He goes through a bunch of gobbledygook and in short, no one can be told what Future Shock is, they have to see it for themselves.

Coming this fall from Apple, it’s the new iBrainwasher.

Langdon shows off his gadget, asking her to look at the light, but after a brief flash, she decides that no no, this is not for her, and heads home. Maybe next time!

After a car ride home, with a radio report referencing the events of Soultaker!, and another about some wolf attacks on dogs in the area, Jenny settles in for the night in her big house, all alone, while her husband goes off on a business trip for a few days.

Jack is actually getting really exhausted with his wife's paranoia, with all the security precautions he's installed, the walls he's built around the house, and so much more.

Following a failed attempt to get a friend to come over to spend the night so she's not alone, Jenny gets ready for bed...by grabbing one of her husband's shotguns.

Ahh, all the essentials for a quiet night in bed!

Now...to be honest, from here on out, this short is pretty straightforward. It's about ten more minutes of Jenny reacting to sounds and getting increasingly agitated.

They actually do a good job at straddling the line of, is it Jenny's paranoia? Is it something real? Option 3? as the tension builds for the poor woman.

She even sees herself come running up to one of the large windows, and real Jenny shoots the paranoia Jenny delusion out of fear. Which just totally wrecks trying to keep the house secure.

Eventually, her cat sneaks outside. Jenny follows to get her back, but the door closes and locks behind her. Because of course it does.

She wanders around outside chasing the cat...and that's when the woofs come for her. They chase her all around the outside of the house, until she sees a trellis off to the side.

It gives way as Jenny tries to scale it though, and the wolves break her fall. And her skin. And a few bones.

But then then things glitch out, and the wolves are gone, and she's being licked by the neighbour's dog. Her clothes are fine, the wounds are gone, and all is well.

Until, Dr. Langdon arrives, and says their time is up, and IT WAS ALL A...well, it was all a VR simulation in her head, but close enough.

Oh, and her neighbour? Notices the doctor and asks who he is, why he's there, which makes me question A LOT OF THINGS. Do the simulants have some level of autonomy and sentience? Do they live beyond the sessions??

Back in Langdon's office, Jenny feels much better now, now that he has seen that she doesn't have to worry about all the people as possible dangers...she only has to worry about the wolves! Wait, is that not the lesson here??

You get the idea for this anthology. Each short is a patient visiting Doctor Langdon, and the story is exploring that person's fear. It bothers me a little that these stories aren't *real* per se, but oh well. It is what it is.

The next patient is George, a mortician's assistant, who is bad with money. He sees a bargain and HAS to get it, even if it's not something he needs, because he's *saving money*! This leads to him not paying his bills.

I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday, for a therapy session today!

So, George lays back while the BrainDrainer does its thing, commenting that the world is so dog eat dog...excuse me, that was the last story, get your own!

George finds out he's about to get evicted, so he puts up a flyer that he has a room for rent. This catches the eye of a shifty fellow dressed all in black, and very 90s shades.

Also, this short is suddenly widescreen. It makes me wonder if this was a separate short film, filmed this way, and they wiggled around to make it fit in.

Following some work at the morgue, George heads home where he meets that mysterious stranger, a man named Vince.

A man who rushes into the house as police sirens whiz by. I'm sure that's nothing!

And that’s when you know your movie is gonna get good.

Instantly, you get the sense of what kind of man Vince is. I mean, if the sirens weren't enough of a clue. He clearly changed the flyer George left to say the room was supposed to be furnished, manipulates George into moving his bed, some dressers, a tv, and all kinds of stuff that's rightfully his into Vince's room. And he is constantly weaseling out of giving a straight answer about rent.

George builds up his courage at work, and writes out a script, to confront Vince when he gets home and set the record straight about who is in charge.

A plan that goes horribly wrong when he barges in on Vince banging some girl he brought home. Vince gets upset at the insinuations he's taking advantage of George, and makes it all about him, as these kinds of people do.

I have a very important job as a Colonial Marine!

But! Vince declares that if it will make George feel better, he'll go get the money right now, and leave his guest all alone with George!

So, he leaves, and George goes to keep Satan's Slut company, until she gets bored when Vince never comes home for the rest of the night. ...Imagine explaining to someone "Satan's Slut" on your resume?

Vince finally shows up in the morning, and he has the rent money! In...quarters. Huh. Eh, I'm sure it's fine!

These cartoonish bags might as well have dollar signs on them.

Oh, and George's car is all covered in crepe paper, because Vince 'happened' to end up in some kind of parade. We learn shortly, thanks to a news report over the car radio, that somewhere got robbed and the car escaped...into a parade.

While George hears this at a stop sign, a car of college students show up, and they become INSTANTLY pissed. Because it turns out someone painted their frat sucks on the side of George's car.

They pile out of the car with bats and hammers, and go to town on the man's vehicle with them.

Well that should make it harder for the cops to ID the car.

George thought he had seen the last of Satan's Slut, but she turns up unexpectedly at his place of work the next day. But being a morgue, she arrives as a dead body.

This is the worst time to blurt out her name, because the cops are there, trying to ID her, since she has no head. Yeah, Bill Paxton being a Highlander would track.

Oh, and there's this running gag with George's boss, Kafka, being unable to speak, only using gestures and nods and such. And it really...bugs me. Sorry.

George rushes home to confront Vince, maybe, but peeks in the window first, seeing him wrapping something up in a bag, with a bloody cleaver nearby.

He follows the bag into the dumpster, and discovers it's...a watermelon. Hey, Vince is also guilty of wasting good, with how much he tossed away!

Unfortunately for George (A constant state for him in this movie) the garbage truck comes by, and dumps the dumpster he's in, with him in it.

So he returns to work, covered in trash, frazzled from...everything, and the cops suspecting him, thanks to his bizarre behaviour.

George tries to explain it's his roommate, he's the guy they're looking for, but he ends up having to make a run for it when he just sounds increasingly unhinged.

He rushes home, stopping only to buy a handgun so he can take care of his Vince problem once and for all.

When he gets there though, the cops aren't far behind, and see him brandishing a weapon. He gets shot accidentally, and ends up in a hospital bed.

Vince shows up at the hospital to let Georgie know how bad he feels, and they lost the apartment, and that he's going to stay right by George's side until he's better!

...To which George responds by trying to kill his roommate, and the stress causes his heart to give out, and he dies in the bed.

But he wakes up fine and dandy back in Langdon's office, and the doctor declares that we didn't make much progress, see you next week! Well, that as pointless!

The next guy is Steven, and his session starts...with him dead in the street, and spends most of the time in the afterlife talking with his friend Marshall about how they got here.

Huh, I would have expected heaven to have better lighting.

Look, I'm just gonna cut to the chase here; Steve is afraid of everything, but not quite in the same way as Jenny was. Whereas she was paranoid about things getting her because of violence, Steven worries about every little thing that could kill you.

What if he trips in the shower? What if he goes skydiving and the chute doesn't open? All those little things, the risks of life, weight him down, and freezing him from ever doing anything.

We go through a bunch of Steven encountering opportunities and letting them pass him by because all he can think about is how they can go wrong.

Following an unwarranted earthquake scare, his budding girlfriend asks him out, but he's still concerned of the impending quake. Paula leaves him sitting under the table, and heads out the door, frustrated at his inaction.

But Steven finally mans up, and chases after her. He follows her to her car aaaand....gets hit by a car driving down the road as he's crossing.

In the afterlife, Marshall points out that nothing is safe, as he chokes on another olive, the same thing that killed him.

Steve is gobsmacked that he's STILL doing that, and Marshall delivers the most poignant response, "Yeah but...I like eating olives." Weird movie to find such an important life lesson.

Anyways, the EMTs bring Steven back to life, and he wakes up inside Langdon's office. The movie ends with Langon using the device on himself, raising a bunch of questions.

Before I wrap this up, I just wanted to mention four things, as a bit of bonus content, because this lesser known film has a lot going on that I’m weirdly aware of.

1. This is the first review where I didn't use the art that came with the DVD. I used the poster that I remember from the comic ad, and the VHS tape. I like it better, so nyah. Here's the DVD art for anyone curious though. I guess it’s fair, Bill Paxton is the biggest draw over anyone else in this movie.

2. Since I've mentioned the comic a few times, and I still have it! here's a handful of pages, just as a bit of a treat. I initially was SUPER excited to share this movie, because this is both an obscure movie, with an even more obscure tie in, that I thought anyone who HAD heard of it, might be intrigued by there being an actual comic. But then I discovered, of course, that Linkara has covered the comic and movie (check!), so this is less of breaking news. Ah well!

I am genuinely bummed the movie didn’t include that final twist of making Langdon a patient instead of the doctor, and Jenny is HIS doctor. It would’ve added a nice little oomph to the movie. Also, for some reason, half the guys in the comic all look like Paxton’s character, and it’s weird.

3. And you might notice from those images, wait, that wasn’t in the movie! Well, that’s because there is a deleted fourth story that was still in the comic, almost as a prologue! It’s about a dumb jock who is an early test subject of the device. They play for him a stripper video scenario, and his brain explodes, after someone accidentally switches it to a male dancer. I get why it's not in the final movie though, because having the device murder people sets the wrong tone, since it has to come first. Plus it's so separate from Langdon's experiments, with a whole other set of characters, it would be a poor fit. Also, it's the complete opposite of what we see the device do for the rest of the film. The deleted short was included on the DVD, so here's a few images from that!

The greatest weapon known to man, the single floppy disc.

Of course the new technology is used for porn.

THIS is deemed perfectly safe for public use? Is this cleared by the FDA??

4. And finally, the last story, about Steven? You find out in the behind the scenes feature that it's directed by some guy named Matt Reeves. Yes, THAT Matt Reeves, who would go on to direct one of the best Batman movies, almost 15 years later, and is hard at work on the sequel as I type this. Lookit this little babyfaced Matt Reeves!

TRISK ASSESSMENT

Video: It leaves just a bit to be desired. You can tell this was a direct to video release from the early 90s. I wish it looked better, but it is what it is.

Audio: Average.

Sound Bite: "If you hadn't eaten that olive, you'd still be alive!" "Yeah, but...I like olives."

Body Count: Not much this time out, sadly.

1 - Satan's Slut shows up dead at the morgue

2 - Georgie dies from stress.

3 - Steven is suddenly dead on the road.

4 - Marshall chokes on olives.

Best Corpse: Steven by the sheer virtue of we actually get to see the body and there’s blood pouring from his head. Even if it was just a near death experience, I’m counting it.

Blood Type - D+: Like I said, there’s a bit of a splat above, but it’s otherwise mostly bloodless.

Sex Appeal: Very limited.

Drink Up! Every time you see The Device.

Movie Review: This is a pretty solid anthology. Nothing to write home about, but slightly above average, and well made. It is VERY safe though, especially thanks to removing the deleted stripper scene. The acting is solid, Paxton is always a highlight, and it’s shot pretty well. The stories are creative, if a bit on the nose at the end of the day. I do find it curious that the comic had Langdon as a much more sinister force, controlling his patients for some purpose. But the final product just has him all friendly and helpful. Again, playing it safe, probably aiming for making it a franchise. Three out of five dogs.

Entertainment Value: It’s very much of its time, and the highlight story is definitely The Roommate. Just 30 minutes of watching Bill Paxton be a menace. The other stories are fine, but don’t capture the same level of ridiculousness. It’s a good watch, an interesting curiosity, and at least worth a watch. Three out of five bags of quarters.