Review: A Tale of Two Coreys

As the title suggests, the chronicling of the frequently entwined careers of Corey Haim and Corey Feldman, from their beginnings as child stars, their tumultuous, drug-abusing ‘troubled’ periods, and their eventual reunion as ‘reality TV’ performers.

 

Initially I was amused at how apt it seemed that this story would be told in Lifetime TV movie format. The Two Coreys were trashy tabloid fodder at least in adulthood, so it kinda made sense to me. Given in particular the bizarre descent Corey Feldman seems to be on in the last while or so, I wasn’t surprised the story wouldn’t be told in a big splashy Hollywood theatrical release. The whole incident of people ‘out to get’ Corey and supposedly stabbing him, an incident that the police say they have no record of. That was a red flag. Then there was that trainwreck where he wanted to ‘out’ Hollywood abusers who molested himself and Corey Haim over the years, but only if he could raise the funds to make a movie about it. Yeah, The Feldman wanted your money. This eventually culminated in a movie screening where ‘OMG the hackers have sabotaged the live online screening!’. Don’t get me wrong. I fully believe both Coreys were indeed sexually abused over the years. That seems pretty obvious to any sane person. Unfortunately, Feldman has become so obsessed with self-promotion over the years that his ‘Truth Movement’ (seriously, that’s the name of the guy’s band) it just overwhelms everything else and makes him seem like a cheap ‘work’, to use wrestling parlance. He’s been his own worst enemy. Then there’s his ever ‘evolving’ stance on the late Michael Jackson’s alleged paedophilia activities. He has given support for MJ for many years, albeit with a brief bit of wavering during the man’s last sex abuse trial. In the wake of MJ’s death, he switched back again to being his #1 fan. Then when “Leaving Neverland” seemed to cement in a lot of people’s minds that MJ was deeply inappropriate with children, Corey gave a half-arsed ‘although I was never abused, I can no longer defend him’ response. Perhaps his views have simply evolved with time as things have become clearer in his mind. Perhaps there are other reasons for it. I know which view is most credible to me. Why am I bringing into question Corey Feldman’s character here (or at least my potentially inaccurate understanding of said character)? Like I said, I fully believe that the two Coreys were indeed molested. I do side though, with Haim’s mother on just who molested her son, not Feldman’s allegation – not mentioned in the film, which was made prior to Feldman’s allegation – that it was Charlie Sheen who abused Haim on the set of “Lucas”. However, Feldman’s increasingly ‘questionable’ behaviour in the last couple of decades (even extending to allegations that he has abused several women over the years, I might add) plays into the whole tabloid-y side of things, a mentality I went into the film with. Corey Feldman just so happens to be an executive producer of the film, though he acknowledges that the ‘real’ story was far too X-rated for Lifetime. Corey’s participation, however hands-on it may or may not have been,  thus lends itself to some background and/or pre-discussion contextualisation.

 

Despite all of this entering my mind when I sat down to watch this 2018 film from director Steven Huffaker (“Love in Moreno Valley”), I quickly realised that no…this is not the medium through which this story should be told. I was wrong. Feldman (who gets co-story credit with about four others, too) citing that the real story would be too ‘X-rated’ is indeed an issue, but more to the point it’s also a far too serious, and seriously disturbing story for what turns out to be an entirely laughable, unconvincing treatment. And believe me, once I started watching, I wised up to the fact that there shouldn’t be anything remotely laughable about this story.

 

Right from the get-go there are problems. Although Justin Ellings convincingly portrays young Corey Haim and Casey Leach in particular is a very convincing visual likeness to the older Haim, the two actors playing Corey Feldman at different ages are a total bust. Young Elijah Marcano looks more like a young John Cusack than Feldman, and as the older Feldman, actor Scott Bosely gets saddled with a clearly whitewashed, Corey Feldman-approved version of himself. The characterisations of the two really are ridiculously unconvincing, with Haim for the most part being seen as the more worldlier one and a douchebag hellraiser, whilst Feldman is seen as a moody, corrupted innocent little lamb. Both of these guys were acting since well before they were teaming up together as teen hunks, and both definitely had drug issues. So it’s clear as day that either Feldman had a say in what we’re seeing on screen (and indeed, he's given credit on-screen), and/or what is being presented on screen is done in a way so as to not elicit a lawsuit from the one still living ‘Corey’. Feldman apparently stated that TV movie restrictions were to blame for what is and isn’t depicted, and he’s right to some extent, but it’s still completely unconvincing for other reasons as well. It makes for laughable viewing, and as I’ve said, this story shouldn’t be funny. At all.

 

Almost nothing convinces here, for instance the young woman playing actress Kerri Green (Haim’s co-star in “Lucas”, Feldman’s co-star in the following year’s “The Goonies”) has the completely wrong hair colour. That may not bother everyone, but it’s still a noticeable inaccuracy in a film that doesn’t give the character enough screen time for the poor actress to convince otherwise through their performance. They could’ve then at least gotten the hair right. Brandon Howard is seven different flavours of ridiculous as Michael Jackson, who here is seen exclusively as Feldman’s confidante and mentor, the same Feldman who in 2019-20 says he can no longer defend. That’s not the problem, I’m just being snarky there. The problem is that Howard looks absurd and nothing like the real MJ, couldn’t they have just used one of the many MJ impersonators out there? It’s not like great thesping was a requirement given the quality of the rest of the film. Howard is unable to be taken seriously, and looks even weirder than Jackson himself did. Then there’s the absolutely dreadful, not remotely convincing characterisation of filmmaker Joel Schumacher. Here he’s just some random director yelling at the Coreys for being late and in shitty condition on-set after wild partying. Meanwhile, did the late Carrie Fisher really try to help Feldman on the set of “the Burbs”? It’s quite possible (Fisher was certainly experienced enough in drugs to have some sage knowledge), but I believe nothing about the scene depicting that situation here. It comes off as exactly what it is: A bad moment in a bad TV movie played by unconvincing actors playing real-life people poorly written. Even worse, the film skips from this scene set in the late 80s right to the filming of their reality show “The Two Coreys” in 2007. No “Prayer of the Rollerboys”, “Fast Getaway”, or “Fast Getaway II” for Haim. No “Meatballs IV” for Feldman, no softcore “Blown Away” for the duo, no Michael Jackson trials discussions…none of that. That’s not just me looking for my film buff needs to be met. A fairly sizeable chunk of the story of these two men would be found in the period in which these films and incidents occurred. What we do get is a truly disastrous moment that was memorably shown on the final episode of “The Two Coreys”, but the film pretends it’s an actual conversation with no cameras around. Yeah, that’s some bullshit right there, and this is a film where Feldman and Haim openly admit the series was scripted.

 

Honestly, about the only interest point here is in the casting of a few familiar faces in smaller parts. Former “Days of Our Lives” hunk (and Rob Lowe doppelganger if you ask me) Patrick Muldoon is amusing as Feldman’s douchebag, over-the-hill musician father, who is seen as only a step up in parental guidance from his trashy mother (played for the moderate ham value it’s worth by Ashley Scott). The real surprise was looking at IMDb afterwards and realising that the actor playing one of the known abusers of Feldman and Haim Marty Weiss, was a contemporary of the duo…Keith Coogan of “Adventures in Babysitting” and “Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead”. I couldn’t believe it, dude was unrecognisable.

 

An inappropriately sanitised, biased, and frankly laughable depiction of subject matter that deserved a more serious-minded treatment. This just won’t do. The teleplay is by Peter Sullivan (who seems to have had a writing/producing hand in every Christmas TV movie of the last 5 years or so), Hanz Wasserburger (“Christmas in Palm Springs”, “The Christmas Gift”), and Jessica Dube (“Mississippi Requiem” with James Franco and Amy Smart) from a story by Wasseburger, Sullivan, Feldman, and two others.

 

Rating: D