El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Dec 10, 2012 23:19:20 GMT -5
"DOOMSDAY"Story: unstoppable virus whipes the population of Scotland out. Scotland is walled off from the world, and when the virus turns up in Britain, a special team is sent behind the wall to find a missing scientist and a possible cure. Dear lord, this movie bugged the hell out of me. I know that filmmakers like to reference their favorite movies, pay homage to the films that fed their desire to make films... but this movie is nothing but pieces of great movies sewn together like a giant Frankenstein's Monster of celluloid. It's tied elements of "Aliens", "Escape From New York", "28 Days", "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome", "The Warriors" and "Robin Hood" together into an impossible lumbering beast, lurching from one scene to another, jumping from one homage to the next like John Ritter jumping from channel to channel in "Stay Tuned". For me, it felt like they didn't have anything original to say, so they decided to steal what they could and see if they could get away with it. I guess it's competently done... it does look good, there's some funny bits, there's some interesting gore (both CGI and make-up)... But I hated it. Screw this movie.
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Dec 10, 2012 23:32:45 GMT -5
"THE LEGEND OF BIGFOOT"This is movie #47 (Disc 12, Side 1, Movie 3) of the "Chilling Classics" 50 movie set. Story: supposed documentary of Ivan Marx, tracker on the hunt for proof of the existence of Bigfoot. Tons of wildlife footage (bears, moose, squirrels, cougars, etc.) with narration by Marx about him and his learning of and starting obsession with Bigfoot, mythical creature of the North American mountains. There's also "footage" of Bigfoot here, but it looks too much like a guy in a gorilla suit to be taken seriously... I'm thinking that these scenes were supposed to be 'recreations' and the filmmakers just decided to leave that detail out. Imagine a boring Disney wilderness documentary... wait. Don't do that. Just avoid. Verdict: Trash Good: 14 Meh: 17 Trash: 16
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Dec 10, 2012 23:50:04 GMT -5
"THE DEVIL'S HAND"This is movie #48 (Disc 12, Side 2, Movie 1) of the "Chilling Classics" 50 movie set. Story: engaged man keeps seeing a strange woman in his dreams, finds her in the real world and discovers she's a witch/cultist, leaves his fiance' to join the cult but tries to get the ex to safety and draws the suspicions of the cult in doing so. Odd film... the main character is someone who happily joins a cult and yet still tries to be a nice, likable decent guy. I mean, he worships a demon called Gamba, Devil God of Evil! Don't you know that if you worship something called the Devil God of Evil, you pretty much have to put away the Mr. Nice Guy routine! Cast... Robert Alda (father of "M*A*S*H" star Alan Alda) plays the main character as a smooth operator who never really looks like he's in danger. Neil Hamilton (Commissioner Gordon on the "Batman" TV series) is OK as the cult leader. No one else worth mentioning. Bad script, plot holes, poor acting, and a really poor transfer. The picture looks washed out, the whites get super-bright in some places, and the movie seems to 'skip' forward a second every few minutes, which gets especially annoying during dialogue. Not worth watching. Verdict: Trash Good: 14 Meh: 17 Trash: 17
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Post by Kash Flagg on Dec 10, 2012 23:59:00 GMT -5
I just watched Witchhouse.
Well...it was a movie.
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Gus Richlen: Ruffian
Patti Mayonnaise
Metal Maestro: Co-winner of the FAN Idol Throwdown!
BAU BAU
Posts: 39,173
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Post by Gus Richlen: Ruffian on Dec 15, 2012 12:08:33 GMT -5
NATIONAL LAMPOON'S VACATION (1983): Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) is planning to take his family on a trip to a popular theme park. Only problem is that everything goes steadily wrong, and as the trip goes downhill, so does his sanity. Film is a comic riot from beginning to end loaded with all sorts of cameos and surpise roles. (Rocks/Reccommended) ============================================== THE CASTLE OF CAGLIOSTRO (1979): Hayao Miyazaki's first feature-length film works well as either part of the Lupin III franchise or as a stand-alone film. Lupin and Jigen find out that the cash they stole from a casino is fake, and Lupin decides to head to the source of the fakes. Only thing is, he gets involved in trying to resuce a princess from a forced marriage to a maniacal count. Add in the stoic Goemon, the beautiful and devious Fujiko, and the hapless Inspector Zenigata, and you have an enjoyable film that should not be missed by any anime fan. (ROCKS/RECCOMMENDED)
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Dec 22, 2012 0:13:14 GMT -5
"BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA"Story: trucker Jack Burton gets caught up in trouble in the underside of Chinatown when his friend's fiancee is kidnapped by an ancient wizard who is hunting for a bride to sacrifice... a girl with green eyes... John Carpenter's homage to Asian action/fantasy movies, and it's a hell of a mess but it's also a hell of a lot of fun. Kurt Russell is a howl as a swaggering jackass, spouting macho one-liners that would make John Wayne groan. Kim Cattrall is his romantic interest... I forgot how badly she overacts in this, but she fits with the rest of the insanity. Dennis Dun is fun as Wang Chi, Burton's friend and the 'translator' for the audience, explaining what is happening. And lots more fun from James Hong as the evil wizard Lo Pan, and Victor Wong as the good wizard/tour bus driver Egg Shen. If you haven't seen this yet, why? There is no good reason! Highly recommended.
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Dec 22, 2012 0:35:02 GMT -5
"I BURY THE LIVING"This is movie #49 (Disc 12, Side 2, Movie 2) of the "Chilling Classics" 50 movie set. Story: the new committee chairman for the local cemetery begins to suspect that he has the power over life and death just by changing the pins on the cemetery map. He begins to fall apart as he tries to warn those around him, and they just won't believe him... are they coincidences or is something else going on? This is a pretty damn good movie, that feels a lot like a longer version of a "Twilight Zone" episode. Richard Boone is great as the new chairman, slowly starting to dissolve as he begins to suspect he has this strange power over life and death. The whole movie is just damn creepy... especially leading up to the climax, where the chairman tries to switch some pins and try to bring some of the dead back... Verdict: Good Good: 15 Meh: 17 Trash: 17
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Dec 22, 2012 0:47:37 GMT -5
"DRIVE-IN MASSACRE"This is movie #50 (Disc 12, Side 2, Movie 3) of the "Chilling Classics" 50 movie set. Story: psycho with sword stalks drive-in theatre. Police try to catch him. Is it the jerk manager/former sword-swallower, the weirdo janitor/former sword-swallower, or the local peeping tom? Mind-numbingly bad, terrible acting (well, the banter between the two cops is OK but the rest is pretty bad), bad camera-work (everything is either black or in shadow), and a bad script. The 'final act' is a lame warehouse hunt with a machete-wielding nut, that apparently has nothign to do with the rest of the movie. But the worst is the ending, which is one of those 'open endings' that the 70's loved so much. {Spoiler}When the killer is revealed (or not revealed as the case is), the movie stops and a warning from 'the theater manager' (which assumes that you are watching the movie at a theater) warning the viewer that the killer is loose in the audience. Crap! Verdict: Trash Good: 15 Meh: 17 Trash: 18
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Gus Richlen: Ruffian
Patti Mayonnaise
Metal Maestro: Co-winner of the FAN Idol Throwdown!
BAU BAU
Posts: 39,173
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Post by Gus Richlen: Ruffian on Dec 22, 2012 11:31:36 GMT -5
THE BIG LEBOWSKI (1998): Jeff "The Dude" Lebowski (Jeff Bridges) has the bad luck to have the same last name as a famous millionaire. Which results in him getting sucked into what appears to be a kidnapping conspiracy. Or something. The Dude is having a hard time figuring this out. Assisting him (sort of) is trigger-happy fellow bowler Walter (John Goodman at his absolute best) and the scatterbrained Donny (Steve Buscemi). Utterly hilarious film though some may be turned off by the frequent F-bombing. (Rocks/Reccommended) ============================================== ALIEN OPPONENT (2011): An alien spaceship crashes into a junkyard owned by a bunch of sterotypical southern backwoods types (ironically I think this movie was filmed in Connecticut) just after a woman has killed her daughter's abusive husband. To cover that up and take advantage of the alien's crash landing, the two women offer a reward for anyone who can retrieve the dead man's body. This brings out all sorts of unlikeable characters. And really, most of the characters in this slaughterfest ARE unlikeable, with the exception of Roddy Piper's profanity-spouting priest. Overdoing the stereotypes doesn't help either, making this film really unpleasant to watch. (SUCKS/NOT RECCOMMENDED) ============================================== THE SKY CRAWLERS (2008): In a futuristic world of sorts, corporations are the ones doing the warring. In this conflict, eternally young pilots take to the skies in some graphically impressive aircraft. Kannami, one of the pilots, has his suspicions about the whole youth thing, and it turns out that there's something off with all the pilots including himself and their CO, a woman by the name of Suito Kusanagi. If the name of Kusanagi is familiar, it should be to an extent: this beautifully created blend of traditional anime and CGI (some of which is almost photorealistic) is directed by Mamoru Oshii, the genius behind Ghost In The Shell. The movie is quite long (over two hours), but for those patient enough to sit through it, you will be richly rewarded, with breathtaking aerial battles, intricate scenery, and a storyline that sucks you in from the start and doesn't let you go until after the final credits (and trust me, you'll want to stay through the end credits). (ROCKS/RECCOMMENDED)
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Dec 24, 2012 23:48:20 GMT -5
"COMMAND PERFORMANCE" (2009)Story: Joe, drummer for an American rock band working at a show in Russia, evades capture when the arena is taken over by terrorists who are after the Russian President and his two daughters, who are attending the show to see their favorite pop star Venus. Joe teams up with one of the President's escaped bodyguards to save everyone. Dolph Lundgren starred, wrote and directed this movie. Just let that little nugget of information roll around in your brain for a minute. Got it? OK, so now you have a good idea on what to expect from this movie, and it does deliver for the most part. The story is pretty much a straight rip on "Die Hard" with a few twists (the leader isn't after money, not all his soldiers agree with him, the bodyguard doesn't really trust Joe, etc.). There's some fun fight scenes. There's some not-bad dialogue (mainly one-liners from Dolph). It hits all the "1980's action fest" switches, without daring to try anything too original. That being said, it's also all been done before, and while it's OK, there's nothing here really to push it over the edge into 'must see' territory. My major complaint is the camera work. At no time was the camera still. It's always moving side-to-side, zooming in a little, pulling out a bit... and it's done for no reason! I could even understand it if it was a 'found footage' movie and the camera guy was a character in the movie, but it isn't. I complained to my friends that I saw steadier camera work in "The Blair Witch Project". Easily the most distracting part of the movie. Music: bland versions of pop and metal. Dolph does his own drumming (and he's not bad at all). Not worth seeking out, unless you're a huge fan of Lundgren and need to see EVERYTHING he's done (and the guy who brought us the movie was).
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Dec 25, 2012 0:19:03 GMT -5
"FIRECRACKER"Story: pretty but tough blond flies to the Philippines to find out where her sister disappeared to. Sister was a journalist who stumbled onto a drug-smuggling ring run by the local 'kimute' arena owner and his men. Blondie falls for one of the killers as she works her way into the organization... then challenges him in a fight to the death when she learns that he killed her sister. Slightly-above-B-grade chop-socky kung fu flick. It does try to focus more on the story than the fight scenes. The fights were actually better than expected... I went into this thinking I was going to see bad actors waving their arms around and little else, but there was good fight choreography here, just filmed by an inexperienced crew and performed by an inexperience cast. Cast... I liked Julie Kesner as Susanne, the main character. She managed to maintain the balance of being an attractive woman and a tomboyish fighter/action star. Again, her inexperience does show a bit but she did come across as a very pretty woman who could kick my ass if she needed to. Darby Hinton is Chuck, the cold-blooded killer who Susanne falls for, and he plays him as a nice guy with no morals or qualms about killing to get what he wants. His is the most likable murderer I've seen in a movie. I wonder if the filmmakers were planning on him turning face at the end of the movie and decided against it later on... So, if anyone has seen this before, they will remember the one scene from this where Susanna is stalked by two thugs in a construction site and she fights them while wearing nothing but her panties (TOPLESS KUNG FU!). I bring this fight scene up because it is the one scene that feels like it doesn't belong in this movie. I mean, AT ALL. The thugs weren't part of the main villains' gang, the construction site just appeared out of nowhere, there was no reason for Susanna to be there (why the hell would her taxi drop her off BLOCKS from where she was staying?)... It's really the most memorable part of the film and it felt like it was from another movie! (Which I think it was... a 'demo reel' that the producers used to get more money from investors)There's also a 5 minute long sex scene that involves knives. I'll admit that the movie is bad, but it's that kind of fun-bad that makes it worth seeing. I liked it!
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agent817
Fry's dog Seymour
Doesn't Know Whose Ring It Is
Posts: 21,870
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Post by agent817 on Dec 25, 2012 1:13:31 GMT -5
TURBULENCEPlot: Ryan Weaver is a serial killer who is known as the Lonely Hearts Strangler. Ryan was raised by his aunt, who disappeared 19 years ago when Ryan was 16-years-old. Two years ago, Ryan was convicted of raping and killing 5 women in the Los Angeles area, and Ryan was sentenced to be executed, but on his way to the prison, Ryan escaped. For the two years since the escape, Los Angeles cop Aldo Hines has been after Ryan. In New York City, Aldo finally finds Ryan, and Ryan is prepared to be extradited to Los Angeles. Two days later, on Christmas Eve, TransCon Airlines flight 7 takes off with four U.S. Marshals on the airplane guarding Ryan and another convict named Stubbs. While the airplane is over Akron, Ohio, Stubbs kills all four of the marshals. Ryan then grabs a gun and kills Stubbs. During this melee, pilot Matt Powell and co-pilot Ted Kary are both killed, leaving the autopilot to fly the airplane, and Ryan takes the airplane hostage. Flight attendant Teri Halloran rushes to the cockpit, where she radios the nearest control tower and is patched through to Tower Airlines pilot Samuel Bowen, who tries to help her as Ryan repeatedly tries to kill her. Verdict: I had been curious about this movie for years but today was the first time I had actually watched it. It takes place around Christmas time, so it was sort of appropriate. I also bought it recently for $2 at Walgreens. Anyway, as for the movie itself, I can see that it's really not that good of a movie. It's still entertaining for what it is and it was not really a waste of two dollars. I found it entertaining. Good action and suspense. Lauren Holly looked great in the movie. Ray Liotta played a great villain. So it's not like it was hard to sit through. Not a good movie, but not horrible either. It's up to you on whether you should watch it or not. You could do a lot worse than watching this. It's on YouTube right now as well.
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agent817
Fry's dog Seymour
Doesn't Know Whose Ring It Is
Posts: 21,870
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Post by agent817 on Jan 2, 2013 20:04:13 GMT -5
JETSONS: THE MOVIEPlot: George Jetson gets a job offer: he can run his own sprocket factory. However, the factory is on some distant planet and he's not the first employee from Spacely Sprockets inc. to be sent to the factory. It turns out that the plant is sabotaged because it affects the caves underneath. How does George satisfy his boss and stops the plant from destroying the land of the creatures living below the factory? Verdict: It's been a while since I have last watched this movie and I remember liking this movie as a little kid. I still enjoy it now, though there are some things that don't hold up. I found it grating when I heard Judy talk. I don't have a problem with Tiffany, but she is no voice actress. Big mistake in having her do Judy's voice when Janet Waldo should have just done her dialogue and Tiffany do the singing. She did have some good songs on the soundtrack, though. Also, you can see early CGI in some of the animation elements. I know the only characters who are from the series itself were the Jetson family and Mr. Spacely. It didn't need the other characters like RUDI, Orbity or Henry Orbit. I thought it was an underrated animated flick and I am guessing it was the nostalgia that led me to watch this. It doesn't hold up that well, but it's still enjoyable. Recommended if you're into The Jetsons.
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Jan 7, 2013 1:31:40 GMT -5
"TNT JACKSON"Story: Diana "TNT" Jackson flies to Hong Kong to find her missing brother, only to learn that he was killed when he crossed a drug lord. She falls in love with the lead thug for the gang, uncovers an undercover police operation to bring them down, and fights her new lover to the death because he killed her brother. OK, so I picked up this DVD set of Corman Cult Classics with three "Lethal Ladies" movies: ... and all three of these movies are directed by Cirio Santiago, one of the Philippines' most successful directors (Note: I didn't say "best"). The last movie I reviewed, "Firecracker", is almost a complete remake of "TNT Jackson". Including the topless fight scene, the reveal of the undercover cop, the bar owner who helps her for no real reason, the bad guys plot, almost everything! The differences are the motivation of the thug character (here he's trying to depose his boss, in "Firecracker" his boss is behind the 'situation'), and that everyone else in the remake is not only much better at acting, but much much better at fighting. Jeanne Bell (first African-American to be on the cover of Playboy) is beautiful to look at, but she cannot act at all and has no 'kung-fu' in her. Her fights were shot in slow motion and sped up for the movie. She makes Don Knotts look like Jet Li. Stan Shaw is OK as Charlie the killer/lover, even has a bit of fighting skill, but he's the only person in this movie who looks like he knows a little about what he's doing. The rest of the performances are uniformly bad. It's so bad, it's hard to recommend it to anyone... but it does make interesting viewing with "Firecracker" to show how a movie can go wrong and then go right.
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Post by A Platypus Rave is Correct on Jan 7, 2013 3:09:48 GMT -5
Just saw Rubber with my Brother and Father... It' was bizzare... I mean it is a movie about a psychic killer tire... but that's about the most sense this movie makes It did have one of the greatest opening monologues I've seen in a movie.. I don't want to give it away to the public so I'll spoiler it. {Spoiler}movie opens in the desert with a guy standing around holding like 10 pairs of binoculars, a cop car pulls up besides him hitting a row of carefully setup folding chairs... a man gets out of the trunk of the car looks dead in the camera and says the following...
In the Steven Spielberg movie E.T., why is the alien brown? No reason. In Love Story, why do the two characters fall madly in love with each other? No reason. In Oliver Stone's JFK, why is the President suddenly assassinated by some stranger? No reason. In the excellent Chain Saw Massacre by Tobe Hooper, why don't we ever see the characters go to the bathroom or wash their hands like people do in real life? Absolutely no reason. Worse, in The Pianist by Polanski, how come this guy has to hide and live like a bum when he plays the piano so well? Once again the answer is, no reason. I could go on for hours with more examples. The list is endless. You probably never gave it a thought, but all great films, without exception, contain an important element of no reason. And you know why? Because life itself is filled with no reason. Why can't we see the air all around us? No reason. Why are we always thinking? No reason. Why do some people love sausages and other people hate sausages? No f***ing reason.
Ladies, gentlemen, the film you are about to see today is an homage to the "no reason" - that most powerful element of style.
it then went into this weird movie within a movie framing device where we would occasionally cut back to the audience... and to be honest had they just left it with the opening monologue and then right into the killer tire plot without the framing I would probably have liked it better. that being said I did like the movie as it was well enough... and let's be honest you probably know if you're going to like it or not just based on your reaction to hearing "psychic killer tire"... plus it has Wings Hauser in it!
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Post by SsnakeBite, the No1 Frenchman on Jan 7, 2013 8:44:15 GMT -5
La Vengeance. Made by Morsay, one of the lowest of low-tier French rappers, whose only claim to fame was being ridiculed for his unbelievably terrible raps, overinflated ego, very rudimentary understanding of French grammar, getting trolled by the Noëlistes (generally considered the French equivalent of anonymous; quite accurate in that it's a mostly irrelevant group of teenage kids who don't do anything really important but keep being given credit for things they didn't do because people want to convince themselves they're part of something special) and most importantly, his laughably mythomaniac claims such as: _ that several French political parties wanted to censor him and his film (they most likely never heard of him); _ that the Illuminati tried to censor him (the Illuminati were created by a novelist for a series of books they didn't claim to be based on reality, then nutjobs decided it was true); _ that American companies are interested in distributing his film in the USA (he even made a video claiming to be shot in the USA during his trip to meet them. In reality, it was shot at an easily recognizable Parisian café that just happens to have the word "New-York" on it); _ that he has already sold over 100 000 DVDs of his film (I'd be surprised if he could afford to produce that may); _ that he has lost SIX MILLION EUROS due to piracy; _ and many more. So what kind of film would a guy like that make? An over two hours long allegedly autobiographic (OK, it does claim to be, but it does claim to be "based on a true story") piece whose writing, editing, acting, storytelling and character development is a notch above Birdemic, but one below The Room. Full version:{Spoiler}The dialog is frequently drowned by background noises or the soundtrack (if you're lucky, it's songs made my Morsay's friends. If you're not, it's songs made by Morsay). Thankfully, most of it isn't very important, as a good chunk of the film is made of padding. Considering how long the movie got, I'm not sure it was necessary to pad it out, but I presume Morsay must have promised his crew and friends to star in at least one scene each, hence the many, many pointless scenes such as Morsay & Co having a barbecue, Morsay and some of his friends stealing candy (!) at a local store, Morsay and a friend + two girls at a restaurant (some cheap place that they desperately try to pass off as a classy restaurant that serves 400€ champagne, yet still makes burgers), Morsay visiting two friends and lamenting on the smell of their feet, etc...
The editing is also very, very odd, making frequent use of cross-cutting between Morsay dicking around and his friend Zehef actually doing important stuff such as launching a clothing business (one the few legitimately based on a true story elements as the two of them are indeed clothes salesmen and created their own "brand"). My guess is that they were trying to show that they're a duo with Zehef as the brains and Morsay as the brawns, but it gets obvious very fast that Zehef would be doing much better if he just ditched Morsay altogether, and the only reason he doesn't is because he's a better person than Morsay.
And that last point is one of the most hilarious things about this movie. It's clearly supposed to be some sort of shameless self-promotion, Morsay trying to depict himself as a former bad guy who turned his life around and tried to make something of himself after going to jail, but the film shows that he really is a terrible person, making no effort to go legit and just living off his friends' accomplishments without actually doing anything constructive himself.
For you see, the "events" of the film (yes, there actually is a plot... well, a sub-plot at least) are kicked off when the two of them go to jail after Morsay & Zehef got into a fight with policemen, sending two of them to the hospital, during an identity control. To Morsay's credit, the guy he attacked was a racist who taunted him and threatened to frame him for possession by claiming a drug sample he has was found on Morsay (BTW, this false accusation thing would mean more if Morsay wasn't shown later actually selling marijuana), but the fact is he decided to start a fight while Zehef was being calm and rational, talking politely with the policemen (he didn't want to show his papers either as he feels they did nothing wrong, which is true, but he actually is rational about it). Oh and Morsay already started being trouble right away by telling a female agent that he refuses to talk with a woman, which would be classy even if the film didn't try to send a message of tolerance. And Morsay being terrible and getting his friends into trouble while Zehef tries to do things right is a theme that carries through the entire film. At some point, he even steals money from two girls he and a friend of his "invited" to a restaurant and leaves before the bill is given, leaving his friend and the girls to pay. When the girls realize what happened, they accuse the friend (who was being honest from the beginning) of stealing the money and leave as well. As a result, the friend ends up having to pay the bill on his own, which he has not enough money for. The scene ends implying that he's going to get beat up by the restaurant's owner and/or arrested by the police and jailed. I'd like to specify that this is supposed to be during the "Morsay is a good guy now" portion of the movie.
And remember that candy-stealing scene I mentioned earlier? They get caught and the store calls the police. Morsay and a friend run away (another one was caught right away. Ironically, it was the only one who hadn't actually stolen anything, notice a pattern emerging?) and when a cop catches up to them, he beats him up and steals his gun, yet when he later makes the news he doesn't get into trouble, because apparently the police didn't bother to put a warrant on him for this (also, the store clerks seem to know who he is so it would be easy to find him).
During this whole time, Zehef is shown single-handedly starting and running their clothing business and putting it on the right tracks, which further makes you wonder why Morsay is the leader of the crew when Zehef is clearly more intelligent and rational, and manages to make money in a legitimate, legal way while Morsay abuses everyone he knows and gets them into trouble.
But even if you don't speak French, you may have noticed that the title is "The vengeance" yet I haven't even mentioned any vengeance yet. Well that's because the vengeance only occupies about a quarter of the movie (at some point, I seriously started to wonder if it was Morsay's friends who were going to get revenge on him for everything he put them through) and only really gets into gears very late in the movie. The racist cop he got into a fight with turns out to be the leader of a neo-nazi group (who pumps themselves up for some lynching by listening to every nazi's favorite musician... Skrillex. I s*** you not) and he wants his guys to beat up and/or kill Morsay. When they fail, they hire a guy to stab Morsay, who succeeds but only inflicts a minor wound as Morsay can walk, run and even fight a few scenes later without any problem. Then Morsay, Zehef and their crew beat up the nazis and Zehef snaps and kills their leader, no doubt dooming him to go to jail for at least 20 years, if not more considering he was already jailed, so that's yet another person who had their life ruined because of Morsay's BS.
And let's not forget the many funny little surprises such as the constantly misspelled tile cards, Morsay being convinced that French police works like American police (the racist cop is asked to "turn in his badge". French policemen don't have badges. Policemen are also shown to draw their guns for any reason, which would already be ridiculous in an American film, but would be even more so in France as Policemen are encouraged to avoid using their guns as much as they can and have tasers for situations that don't require lethal force), a nazi with a "tattoo" of a swastika that is clearly drawn on with a sharpie, the blatant and constant placement for Morsay and Zehef's clothing business, etc... TL;DR version:An absolutely laughable film that is supposed to praise Morsay and depict him as a reformed former criminal, but really makes him come off as a terrible person who makes no effort to go legit after being sent to jail while his best friend, who wouldn't have been jailed were it not for him, starts a business and wants to stop doing stupid s***. The titular vengeance is hardly a sub-plot and must take 30 minutes tops of the 2h06 the movie lasts. The film keeps cross-cutting between Zehef starting the company and Morsay pointlessly causing trouble, which probably supposed to give the impression that they are a "brains and brawns" duo but all it does is make Morsay look like a manipulative bastard who keeps using his friends for his own goals. And for a movie that tries to preach tolerance and fight racism, it does a great job of depicting Morsay as the stereotypical racist caricature of a person of Arabic origin used by racist propaganda, with him stealing everything he wants, bragging about living off welfare, getting into fights (with policemen no less) and generally being a nuisance. Ironically, the rest of his crew come off as positive examples of integration, mostly with Zehef who again, tries as hard as he can to get a legitimate business and become a respectable member of society. Objective score: 3/10 So-bad-it's-good score: 8/10
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Jan 8, 2013 0:14:45 GMT -5
"THE LAST STARFIGHTER"Story: after trailer park resident Alex Rogan sets a record on the park's arcade game "Starfighter", he is kidnapped by aliens and told that the game was a test and he is given the honour of being a real Starfighter, going into war to save the known universe from invaders. Alex rejects this, but goes back when he finds out that the rest of the Starfighters are wiped out in a sneak attack. Meanwhile, a robotic replica takes his place on Earth... I remember loving this movie when it came out, so I was happy to find this on Blu-ray. It wasn't as awesome as I remember it. Part of it is that the main actor (Lance Guest) kind of under-acts in his role. I believe that someone under the same circumstances would be more 'blown away' by the whole experience... and he isn't. He just seems to be in a daze. Everyone else seems to be having a lot of fun in their roles (especially Robert Preston as Centauri, in his last role)... it's just Guest who seems to sink here. Except for when he plays his robotic double. Here he looks like he's more into the role and the situation, which made the small bits of this a bit better than the space footage. The special effects... for the time, fantastic. Now they look like a pretty impressive PS2 cut scene. They look fabulous on Blu-ray now, but it all looks too clean and video-game-ish. Also, the battle scene at the end with the Death Lotus was underwhelming. I remember an epic battle, like a "Star Wars" aerial dogfight, and it just... wasn't. So, a movie from my youth proves unsatisfying. It was OK, but I'm not sure I'll be watching it again.
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Jan 8, 2013 23:32:01 GMT -5
"TOO HOT TO HANDLE"Third on the "Roger Corman's Cult Classics Triple Feature: Lethal Ladies" pack. Story: Samantha Fox is a rich woman, a smart business mind, a vivacious woman... and a contract killer. While she goes about killing several of Manila's top crime lords, she plays sex games with the lead detective in her case. What will she do when he tries to stop her? Definitely the most 'erotic' of the three, especially since it appears that the main character (played by Cheri Caffaro) gets turned on by watching violence and death. There's even an awkward scene with her getting aroused by watching a cockfight. She's all right, but her love interest/top cop is a dud here. He never seems to get angry, or show any real emotion, just a Sherlock Holmes-esque 'elite' attitude, even when trying to bed his suspect. Badly filmed by Cheri's husband, Don Schain, with some very inept martial arts fights. Laughably bad. Fun if you love crap, but avoid if you don't.
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Jan 11, 2013 23:42:18 GMT -5
"DREDD"Story: Judge Dredd and recruit Anderson go into Peach Trees Block to investigate three bodies thrown from the upper floors. The block's drug lord, Mama, locks the block down from the rest of the world and sends her army of thugs out to kill Dredd and Anderson. Loved this movie. Karl Urban ( "The Lord of the Rings" movies, "Star Trek" reboot) just nails it as Dredd, with a great performances by Olivia Thirlby ( "Juno") as Anderson the psychic rookie and Lena Headley ( "300") as Mama. Actually, I didn't find anyone in this movie that looked like they were hamming it up or not capable of their roles. Everyone felt like they were in that future. Great cast. Kick-ass battles, with some nicely done special effects for blood splatter and exploding heads (warning: kinda gory). This is the first movie in a long time that I can remember that comes up with a damn good reason for 'bullet time' scenes. The movie looked fantastic as well. I've heard criticism about how the look of the city didn't match the comics, but I think that it works for the movie and not against it. It made the movie look more like it was a possible future and not just a conceptual piece of art (or horror). What they did to to make the world look like MegaCity 1 they hit right on the head. Loved it, highly recommended.
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El Pollo Guerrera
Grimlock
His name has chicken in it, and he is good at makin' .gifs, so that's cool.
Status: Runner
Posts: 14,896
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Post by El Pollo Guerrera on Jan 20, 2013 23:44:53 GMT -5
"THEY LIVE"Story: John Nada is a drifter, wandering through the world looking to get a job and get a foothold on life. Living in a 'tent city', he stumbles on to a group that is working towards a revolution against "them"... and then he finds a pair of sunglasses that shows him who "them" are... One of the most fondly-remembered movies of my youth. 1) One of the greatest fight scenes of all movies. Classic brawl between Nada (Roddy Piper) and Frank (Keith David, "The Thing") must be seen to be appreciated. 2) One of the greatest reveals of the '80's. The scene where Nada first tries the glasses and starts to explore the real world is stunning. But the rest of the movie is not that great. Piper can't act, Meg Foster looked like she was not there mentally, the guy who shows the heroes around was like he was trying to be a parody of a Bond villain, the special effects were half-assed, the alien make-up looked like bad rubber masks... Damnit, I still love this movie, but it is bad.
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