Archive for the ‘Crime’ Category
Thursday, May 22nd, 2025
May 13, 2005
UNLEASHED (a.k.a. DANNY THE DOG) is a movie I reviewed when it came out 20 years ago, but unlike MINDHUNTERS I’ve rewatched it a few times over the years. In fact I found some notes and screengrabs from an unfinished review when I last watched it in 2021. It’s a truly international creation, an English-language Jet Li vehicle co-starring American Morgan Freeman, produced and directed by Frenchmen, choreographed by Hong Kong legend Yuen Woo-ping and filmed and set in Glasgow, Scotland, but it feels like it has a unified vision, a very specific take on how to make a 2005 action movie with a big heart.
Li plays Danny, a feral person raised in a cage by the cruel gangster Bart (Bob Hoskins, SUPER MARIO BROS.) and trained to be his attack dog. When Bart needs to intimidate debtors or enemies he simply removes Danny’s metal collar and he will go ape shit, destroying everyone in the room with blunt martial arts savagery. Danny is severely traumatized – is he also developmentally disabled in some way? This is never discussed, but for whatever reason he’s very childlike, and he doesn’t know to yearn for a better life until he happens to find one after Bart is attacked by rivals and seemingly killed. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Bob Hoskins, Jet Li, Kerry Condon, Louis Leterrier, Luc Besson, Mike Lambert, Morgan Freeman, Pierre Morel, Scott Adkins, Yuen Woo-Ping
Posted in Reviews, Action, Crime, Martial Arts | 8 Comments »
Wednesday, May 21st, 2025
May 13, 2005
I think it’s fair to say that, at least at one time, Renny Harlin’s MINDHUNTERS held a revered status around here. When I reviewed it a couple years after it came out I was thoroughly won over by what I described as “a movie that is really fuckin dumb, but in a good way.” Many readers shared my joy and when, on some other review I can’t find right now, a commenter mentioned being a stand-in the the legendary liquid nitrogen kill scene, we treated him like a superstar. I hold much of this movie in my treasured cinematic memories that I bring up from time to time, but have I ever watched it a second time before now? Not that I remember. So this retrospective was a good idea.
(Note: I didn’t re-read the old review until after writing this one, so forgive me if there’s a little overlap.) (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Christian Slater, Clifton Collins Jr., Ehren Kruger, Eion Bailey, Kario Salem, Kathryn Morris, Kevin Brodbin, LL Cool J, Lucas Harper, Patricia Velasquez, Renny Harlin, Val Kilmer, Wayne Kramer, Will Kemp
Posted in Reviews, Crime, Horror, Mystery | 8 Comments »
Thursday, May 15th, 2025
Would you believe Robert Rodriguez & Frank Miller’s SIN CITY had its twentieth anniversary last month? I mean yes it kinda seems like a long time ago, but 20 years ago? That’s a bunch of years. I’m against it.
(Here’s my review from the time.)
Let’s consider how times were different. Rodriguez was well into his career, having just completed his EL MARIACHI trilogy, with FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, THE FACULTY and three SPY KIDS movies snuggled in between them. He was still in his digital photography evangelist period, ONCE UPON A TIME IN MEXICO having convinced him of how a movie like this could be made affordably at his Troublemaker Studios in Austin. Miramax (before being cancelled) were still surprisingly cool about letting Rodriguez (like Quentin Tarantino) do the type of movies they wanted without much interference. The Ain’t It Cool News (also before being cancelled) were still a player with their breathless reports from Hall H presentations and also sometimes some reviews.
Harry and Moriarty were (it seems to me) the loudest voices promoting the idea of “geek culture” and the potential for great comic book movies if they were made by people who really loved the source material and were faithful to it. Possibly even made for adults.
SIN CITY is the movie that took that idea the most literally. Rodriguez wanted not only Miller’s permission to adapt his interconnected anthology series of noir-inspired crime comics – he wanted him to co-direct it with him. The legendary cartoonist was skeptical, but Rodriguez got him to come shoot a test scene – the opening starring Josh Hartnett (HALLOWEEN H20) as a dreamy stranger who woos a heartbroken woman on the balcony at a party (Mary Shelton, WARRIORS OF VIRTUE) but turns out to be hired to kill her. Miller was hooked and they had footage to show other actors what it would look like. When all was said and done the DGA would only allow one of them to be credited since they weren’t an established team (huh?), so Rodriguez resigned from the guild. (read the rest of this shit…)
Would you believe Robert Rodriguez & Frank Miller’s SIN CITY had its twentieth anniversary last month? I mean yes it kinda seems like a long time ago, but 20 years ago? That’s a bunch of years. I’m against it.
(Here’s my review from the time.)
Let’s consider how times were different. Rodriguez was well into his career, having just completed his EL MARIACHI trilogy, with FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, THE FACULTY and three SPY KIDS movies snuggled in between them. He was still in his digital photography evangelist period, ONCE UPON A TIME IN MEXICO having convinced him of how a movie like this could be made affordably at his Troublemaker Studios in Austin. Miramax (before being cancelled) were still surprisingly cool about letting Rodriguez (like Quentin Tarantino) do the type of movies they wanted without much interference. The Ain’t It Cool News (also before being cancelled) were still a player with their breathless reports from Hall H presentations and also sometimes some reviews.
Harry and Moriarty were (it seems to me) the loudest voices promoting the idea of “geek culture” and the potential for great comic book movies if they were made by people who really loved the source material and were faithful to it. Possibly even made for adults.
SIN CITY is the movie that took that idea the most literally. Rodriguez wanted not only Miller’s permission to adapt his interconnected anthology series of noir-inspired crime comics – he wanted him to co-direct it with him. The legendary cartoonist was skeptical, but Rodriguez got him to come shoot a test scene – the opening starring Josh Hartnett (HALLOWEEN H20) as a dreamy stranger who woos a heartbroken woman on the balcony at a party (Mary Shelton, WARRIORS OF VIRTUE) but turns out to be hired to kill her. Miller was hooked and they had footage to show other actors what it would look like. When all was said and done the DGA would only allow one of them to be credited since they weren’t an established team (huh?), so Rodriguez resigned from the guild. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Alex Bledel, Benicio Del Toro, Britney Murphy, Bruce Willis, Carla Gugino, Clive Owen, Devin Aoki, Elijah Wood, Frank Miller, Jaimie King, Jessica Alba, Josh Hartnett, Makenzie Vega, Mary Shelton, Michael Madsen, Mickey Rourke, Nick Stahl, Nicky Katt, Powers Boothe, Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez, Rosario Dawson
Posted in Reviews, Bruce, Comic strips/Super heroes, Crime | 17 Comments »
Wednesday, April 30th, 2025
HAVOC is the long-anticipated, straight-to-Netflix fifth film of Gareth Evans, director of the 21st century classic THE RAID. It contains plenty of the brutal, incredible action you’d hope for from such an artist, but it’s a different type of movie, an atmospheric and stylized (but also ridiculously violent) noir about a deadbeat homicide detective whose claim to heroism is that he’s the one guy in a circle of corrupt cops who felty guilty after they executed an undercover cop during a robbery. Now he has no friends or family and he does dirty deeds for a powerful real estate mogul but if he performs this one difficult task he can be out from under his thumb forever. And in the process he might sort of do the right thing for once.
His name is Patrick Walker (Tom Hardy, THE DROP), and he’s introduced buying his daughter (Astrid Fox-Sahan, Young Wallander) last minute Christmas gifts at a mini-mart, then being annoyed that the clerk won’t wrap them for him. So we get it when his wife (Narges Rashidi, UNDER THE SHADOW) won’t let him come over. (I’m unclear if this starts on Christmas Eve, actual Christmas, or what.) (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Christmas action, Christmas crime, Forest Whitaker, Gareth Evans, Jeremy Ang Jones, Jessie Mei Li, Jude Poyer, Justin Cornwell, Luis Guzman, Narges Rashidi, Netflix, Quelin Sepulveda, Timothy Olyphant, Tom Hardy, Xavier Gens, Yeo Yann Yann
Posted in Reviews, Action, Crime | 23 Comments »
Wednesday, March 5th, 2025
THE ORDER (2024) is a gritty, not too showy but completely riveting true crime movie about neo-nazi bank robbers in the Pacific Northwest, circa 1983. The protagonist is an FBI agent, but one of his specialties is going after bigots, and I support him in that. Anyway it’s kinda like DEAD BANG – he’s a total mess, and he’s pretty much all we got against these guys.
Terry Husk (Jude Law [EXISTENZ] playing a fictional character only a little bit based on the actual lead agent of the case) shows up in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho to reopen an abandoned field office. Sheriff Loftlin (Philip Granger, also the sheriff in JUGGERNAUT, TUCKER AND DALE VS. EVIL, SECRET LIVES, and LITTLE BROTHER OF WAR) kinda laughs at him for coming to what he considers a quiet farm town, and tries to steer him away when he asks about some white power flyers he saw, and if they’re related to the local white nationalist preacher, Richard Butler (Victor Slezak, ABDUCTION). From his reaction I assumed the sheriff was one of the racists, but we later find out it’s that other cop thing: he’s just an idiot who doesn’t recognize the threat. “It’s just talk” is what he says. “They mostly keep to themselves.” (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Alison Oliver, Geena Maszaros, Jude Law, Jurnee Smollett, Justin Kurzel, Marc Maron, neo-nazis, Nicholas Hoult, Odessa Young, Philip Granger, true crime, Tye Sheridan, Victor Slezak, Zach Baylin
Posted in Reviews, Crime | 5 Comments »
Friday, February 28th, 2025
Hey friends, I don’t usually post on Fridays, but I thought I’d squeeze in one more Oscar nominee review before Sunday’s awards – a double feature of Best Actress nominees. I’m rooting for Demi Moore to win for THE SUBSTANCE, but did you know that wasn’t her first body horror joint? Way back in 1982 she starred in Charle’s Band’s third film, PARASITE.
Supposedly it started as a remake (or rip off?) of THE TINGLER, and it’s about a scientist trying to get rid of a weird tingler type thing living inside his chest. But rather than doing the electrified seats gimmick they made it immersive by shooting it in 3D, with the help of Chris J. Condon, who also did JAWS 3D. It is available on a 3D blu-ray, but I don’t have the means to watch it that way, so I can only say that it looks like it has lots of good gimmick shots, like I enjoy.
(3D gimmicks: a snapping rattlesnake, a guy impaled on a pipe with blood pouring out of it, squirting a syringe, lots of guns coming at us, looking up at a creeper on the ceiling dripping slime and then falling at us, lots of sharp-toothed monsters gorily tearing out of people, etc.) (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: 3D, Al Fann, Cailee Spaeny, Charles Band, Chris Hemsworth, Cynthia Erivo, Dakota Johnson, Demi Moore, Drew Goddard, James Davidson, Jeff Bridges, Jon Hamm, Lewis Pullman, Luca Bercovici, post-apocalypse, Rainbeaux Smith, Robert Glaudini, Stan Winston, Tom Villard, Vivian Blaine
Posted in Reviews, Crime, Monster, Science Fiction and Space Shit | 14 Comments »
Monday, February 17th, 2025
A Complete Unknown Pre-Game Triple Feature: HEARTS OF FIRE (1987) / OLIVER & COMPANY (1988) / HOT SUMMER NIGHTS (2017)
I want to review Best Picture nominee A COMPLETE UNKNOWN, but to set the scene I thought I’d first take a look at earlier works from some of the people involved. So here’s a movie starring the subject, one written by the director, and one with the same star.
First up chronologically is the rock ’n roll drama HEARTS OF FIRE (1987), which starts out like LIGHT OF DAY but goes a little A STAR IS BORN. It follows 18 year-old singer/guitarist Molly McGuire, played by Fiona, a real singer who at the time had two albums on Atlantic Records and had guest starred on an episode of Miami Vice. Molly fronts a bar band in a small town and one day she’s surprised to see reclusive former rock legend Billy Parker (Bob Dylan, PAT GARRETT & BILLY THE KID) sitting at the bar. She scares him off with her gushing, but on another night he impishly appears in the crowd shouting a request for “The Unusual,” his song she told him was her favorite. Actually I guess it’s a John Hiatt cover, but he comes up and performs it with the band – a highlight of their small time rocker lives. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Bette Midler, Billy Joel, Bob Dylan, Carl Weintraub, Disney, Dom DeLuise, Emory Cohen, Fiona, Jack Kesy, James Mangold, Jim Cox, Joel Esterhaz, Joey Lawrence, Julian Glover, Maia Mitchell, Maika Monroe, Mark Rylance, Richard Marquand, Richard Mulligan, Richie Havens, Robert Loggia, Roscoe Lee Brown, Rupert Everett, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Susannah Hoffman, Taurean Blacque, Thomas Jane, Tim Disney, Timmy Cappello, Timothee Chalamet, William Fichtner
Posted in Reviews, Cartoons and Shit, Crime, Drama, Music | 8 Comments »
Wednesday, February 12th, 2025
A sincere trigger warning here: ON THE COUNT OF THREE (2021) is a movie about suicide. So please skip this one if that would bring up thoughts you don’t want. This is a very dark buddy comedy and in the opening scene the buddies have agreed to shoot each other. One of them hesitates at the last second and knocks the gun away (“I balked on that one, sorry,” he says), and they agree to have one last day, unencumbered by any worries about the future, before they go through with it.
Outwardly it would appear that the more messed up of the two is Kevin (Christopher Abbott, POSSESSOR, POOR THINGS, WOLF MAN), who has been severely troubled his whole life and tried to overdose by himself only three days ago. His best friend Val (comedian Jerrod Carmichael, also making his directorial debut, not counting two HBO documentaries) is seemingly more grounded, but he’s the instigator here, busting Kevin out of the psychiatric hospital, driving him to an alley next to a strip club and asking him to do this. When he asks Kevin if he was serious about wanting to die the other day or if it was just a cry for help, Kevin is offended. “That’s rude.” (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Christopher Abbott, Henry Winkler, J.B. Smoove, Jerrod Carmichael, Tiffany Haddish
Posted in Reviews, Comedy/Laffs, Crime, Drama | 3 Comments »
Tuesday, February 11th, 2025
RODEO (2022) is a raw, low key, French crime drama about the world of motorcycles. Specifically it’s about one woman, Julia (Julie Ledru, Furies), a.k.a. Unknown, who loves to ride. It just kind of throws us into her life and she’s not big on talking or being vulnerable, so we never really learn much about where she’s coming from other than what can be gleaned by what she’s up to at the moment, or by doing the math from the little details. For example her mom is only mentioned as someone who will call the cops on her if she sees her, her dad only when she lies about him as part of a scam. As she falls into an underworld the movie doesn’t hold our hand explaining what’s going on, but it’s mostly straight forward anyway. They steal motorcycles, fix them up, sell them, ride them. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Antonia Buresi, Julie Ledru, Lola Quivoron, motorcycles
Posted in Reviews, Crime, Drama | No Comments »
Thursday, January 23rd, 2025
I watched EMILIA PÉREZ before the Golden Globes, because it was the movie with the most nominations. I figured that was a Globes-specific Netflix-is-good-at-marketing situation, because I’d only ever seen it trashed online, and not a single non-critic I talked to had even heard of it, even though it had been available on Netflix for months. But this morning the Oscar nominations were announced and it’s in the lead with 13 nominations, tying OPPENHEIMER, among others. Only ALL ABOUT EVE, TITANIC and LA LA LAND ever got 14. So oh jesus, I better finish this review and get it over with before The Discourse™ gets even dicier.
See, this is a touchy subject because it has made history by earning its star Karla Sofía Gascón a Best Actress nomination – the first ever for a trans woman – so I imagine as we speak word is spreading among bigots that they have always cared deeply about the fairness of women’s arts awards. And yet much of the criticism I’ve heard comes from trans critics. Note that it also tied most movies throughout history for the least GLAAD Awards nominations (zero). (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: best picture nominees, Edgar Ramirez, Jacques Audiard, Karla Sofia Gascon, Mark Ivanir, Netflix, Selena Gomez, trans, Zoe Saldana
Posted in Reviews, Crime, Musical | 9 Comments »
