Archive for the ‘Fantasy/Swords’ Category
Monday, May 31st, 2021
Recently I was a guest on the Adkins Undisputed podcast and the subject of the episode was THE LEGEND OF HERCULES, the 2014 movie in which Scott Adkins plays the villain. Somehow I had never gotten around to seeing it, despite knowing about Adkins’ participation, and that it was directed by Renny Harlin (between DEVIL’S PASS and SKIPTRACE, but I haven’t seen those either), and that I tend to go to these F.S.G. (Fantasy Sword Guy) movies and at least somewhat enjoy them. For example I saw the other Hercules movie starring The Rock that came out the same year. I didn’t understand why they made it a world where there was no magic, and I still liked it.
This is the Hercules played by Kellan Lutz, who you may know as one of the young guys in THE EXPENDABLES 3, if not from TWILIGHT. He also starred in a DTV action movie I reviewed called ARENA. And it looks like he played William Shatner in Michael Almereyda’s EXPERIMENTER? His thing is I guess he’s a uniquely babyfaced burly guy. He looks young and doesn’t try to macho up with a beard or something but is also very, like… wide-headed. I guess he’s tall, but he always looks to me like a comics-Wolverine, Ram Man type guy. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Daniel Giat, Dimiter Doichinov, Gaia Weiss, Greek mythology, Johnathon Schaech, Kellan Lutz, Liam Garrigan, Liam McIntyre, Renny Harlin, Roxanne McKee, Scott Adkins, Sean Hood, Spencer Wilding, Stefan Shterev
Posted in Action, Fantasy/Swords, Reviews | 10 Comments »
Friday, March 26th, 2021
RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON is the new Disney animated feature – the computer animated type they’ve been doing since TANGLED. This one is certainly in the Disney mold, and technically about a princess, I guess, but it’s not a musical. It’s a fantasy action adventure set in a mythical ancient kingdom called Kumandra.
Raya (Kelly Marie Tran, THE LAST JEDI) narrates a prologue explaining the whole deal. People and dragons used to live together in Kumandra (cool!) until these fucking pricks called the Druun, who are basically whirlwinds of smoke and chaos, rolled in and turned all the people to stone. The dragons used their magic to create an orb that saved the humans and expelled the Druun, but that turned all the dragons to stone. The humans were saved but fought over the orb and divided into trabies called Fang, Heart, Spine, Talon and Tail, named after their respective regions along a dragon-shaped river.
500 years later young Raya’s dad Benja (Daniel Dae Kim, HELLBOY), the chief of the Heart tribe, trains her in martial arts and acrobatics to protect the orb. She also has an adorable animal pal called Tuk Tuk (voice of Alan Tudyk I, ROBOT, but don’t worry, he doesn’t talk) who’s like a cross between some furry marsupial and a potato bug – he folds into a ball and rolls around to help her. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Adele Lim, Amy Johnston, Awkwafina, Benedict Wong, Carlos Lopez Estrada, Daniel Dae Kim, Disney, Don Hall, Dumbfoundead, Gemma Chan, Izaac Wang, Jona Xiao, Kelly Marie Tran, Lauren Mary Kim, Maggie Macdonald, Qui Nguyen, Sandra Oh, Sung Kang, Thekla Hutyrova
Posted in Cartoons and Shit, Fantasy/Swords, Reviews | 10 Comments »
Thursday, March 18th, 2021
“The only thing that stops me from becoming evil, is fighting evil.”
You know how in HIGHLANDER Christopher Lambert said he had “a kind of magic” because he was an immortal? Well, being in that movie made him a kind of movie icon and imbued him with his own kind of magic. It’s the kind of magic where he can come into MORTAL KOMBAT wearing a robe, act mystical and say “I don’t THEENK so” and somehow seem more cool than laughable. It’s also the kind of magic where he can reunite with the producer of MORTAL KOMBAT and say “why don’t we do another one like that but instead of basing it on a popular video game we’ll use a thousand year old epic poem?”
So here we have a movie that has a KOMBAT-esque logo, a techno and industrial soundtrack (Front 242, Juno Reactor, KMFDM, Junkie XL, also Anthrax), a big climactic fight with a crude CGI monster, and yes, it is also a recognizable adaptation of the story of Beowulf (Lambert), the monster Grendel (uncredited Vincent Hammond, also a suit performer in FULL ECLIPSE, THE RELIC and SPECIES II) and the king Hrothgar (Oliver Cotton, FIREFOX, WONDER WOMAN 1984). (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Beowulf, Christopher Lambert, Dimension Films, Gotz Otto, Graham Baker, John Medlen, Lawrence Kasanoff, Layla Roberts, Oliver Cotton, Patricia Velasquez, Rhona Mitra
Posted in Action, Fantasy/Swords, Monster, Reviews | 9 Comments »
Wednesday, March 10th, 2021
A few weeks ago I reviewed a 2019 movie I was really excited about called GUNDALA. It’s a pretty great Indonesian martial arts movie directed by Joko Anwar, based on a comic book (also Indonesian) that started in the ‘60s, and it’s supposed to launch an MCU-inspired movie franchise called the Bumilangit Cinematic Universe.
When I read up on the BCU for that review I learned a little bit about the other characters they’ll be making movies about, and some of them have already appeared in movies. IMDb listings of Indonesian films are not very complete, but based on my research I think there’s a 1981 version of GUNDALA; a 1954 version of SRI ASIH; seven (give or take a few erroneous double listings) about Barda Mandrawata – The Blind Man From the Ghost Cave, an incredible sounding character whose new movie is to be directed by Timo Tjahjanto (THE NIGHT COMES FOR US); and three about a wandering warrior named Mandala.
Out of all of those titles I could only locate three, and the first I’ve gotten my hands on is THE DEVIL’S SWORD (1984) starring Barry Prima as Mandala. This character is supposed to be played by Joe Taslim (THE RAID) in the BCU’s MANDALA: THE DEVIL’S SWORD, and if that’s like a slicker, more modern version of this, I can’t wait. This version is directed by Ratno Timoer (who both directed and starred in some of those Barda Mandrawata movies) and it’s kind of a cross between a CONAN THE BARBARIAN wannabe and a low budget kung fu movie (complete with wirework), plus some sexploitation thrown in for flavoring.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Advent Bangun, Barry Prima, Gudhi Sintara, Indonesia, Mandala, Ratno Timoer
Posted in Action, Comic strips/Super heroes, Fantasy/Swords, Martial Arts, Reviews | 5 Comments »
Tuesday, March 2nd, 2021
Six months after AMERICAN POP we got another animated-feature-for-adults-with-a-rock-soundtrack. This entry in the ink, paint and rock ‘n roll mini-genre is not directly about the music, but heavily emphasizes its soundtrack, basing sequences around it not quite like FANTASIA, but not completely unlike it. And some of the visual subject matter definitely shares its DNA with the kind of stuff they put on the album covers for this kind of music.
HEAVY METAL was based on the comics anthology magazine Heavy Metal, which is an English translation of the French magazine Métal hurlant. If they had translated the title literally it would’ve been HOWLING METAL, so it would’ve sounded about fifteen to twenty times cooler, but I bet it wouldn’t have been turned into an animated feature with a soundtrack featuring Sammy Hagar, Nazareth and Black Sabbath. And Devo and Blue Öyster Cult and Cheap Trick and Journey and Grand Funk Railroad and Stevie Nicks. And Riggs? Not the same one we’re thinking of, I don’t think. I don’t know who Riggs is. But he has a song on this.
The movie originates from Canada, specifically producer Ivan Reitman, whose directorial work STRIPES came out the same summer. He’d also produced serious genre movies SHIVERS, THE HOUSE BY THE LAKE and RABID, so this movie being much more of a sci-fi/fantasy/horror type deal than a comedy is not completely out of the blue for him. He’d also produced NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ANIMAL HOUSE, making him a pioneer of cinematic adaptations of magazine brand names. I wonder if he ever tried to do HIGHLIGHTS’ GOOFUS AND GALLANT? If not they must not have Highlights in Canada, because that’s just a no-brainer. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: adult animation, Alice Playten, Bernie Wrightson, Dan O'Bannon, Daniel GOldberg, Don Francks, Elmer Bernstein, Eugene Levy, Gerald Potterton, Harold Ramis, Ivan Reitman, Jackie Burroughs, Jimmy T. Murakami, John Bruno, John Candy, John Halas, Len Blum, Marilyn Lightstone, Moebius, Richard Corben, Richard Romanus
Posted in Cartoons and Shit, Fantasy/Swords, Reviews, Science Fiction and Space Shit | 31 Comments »
Monday, February 22nd, 2021
As someone who finally got into Paul Wesley Snipes Anderson’s RESIDENT EVIL series pretty close to when it was finally wrapping up, I was thrilled to hear that the director and his wife/star Milla Jovovich (HELLBOY, not the Ron Perlman one) had purchased the film rights to a fresh new video game franchise copyright property trademark. Without any judgment on (or implied knowledge of) the respective video games, I feel that there is potential for a series called MONSTER HUNTER about monsters and hunters who hunt monsters to be better than one about zombies and umbrellas or whatever. And I loved that one!
So I had planned to see this Toho co-production based on the works of Capcom in the biggest, if emptiest theater in Seattle, until shit (the pandemic) happened and that was not possible for me. But as soon as they made it available for digital “purchase” I paid the four-or-five-dollars-more-than-the-movie-ticket-would’ve-cost and now that file access is MINE.
It begins in a world of fantasy. Pirate ships are sailing through sand. Ron Perlman (HELLBOY, the Ron Perlman one) is there. Tony Jaa (KILL ZONE 2) is there. Monsters attack. Tony gets knocked off the boat. It is sand, so he doesn’t drown, but he’s left behind.
Then we switch to a different desert, the type in our world, in our time. It even has latitude and longitude listed on screen. I think they might mention directions and clicks at some point if you want to check your map and follow along at home. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: dragon, giant monster, MC Jin, Meagan Good, Milla Jovovich, Paul W.S. Anderson, Ron Perlman, T.I., Tony Jaa
Posted in Action, Fantasy/Swords, Monster, Reviews, Videogame | 19 Comments »
Monday, February 15th, 2021
Well, I could’ve sworn it was a little more recent than this, but Paul World Series Anderson’s THREE MUSKETEERS came out in 2011 – two RESIDENT EVIL chapters ago, plus a POMPEII and a MONSTER HUNTER. I don’t remember if I just didn’t get to it or if I was immune to the charms of the Andersonography at that moment in time, but whatever the reason, I fuckin blew it. I can imagine the warm feeling I would’ve had watching an early afternoon show in a huge, mostly empty theater at Pacific Place. And I bet the 3D would’ve been amazing.
But at home on 2D blu-ray ten years later was good too. Maybe I should be thankful I saved it for a time when this specific type of escapism is more precious. Like that 2001 movie THE MUSKETEER that I reviewed recently, it’s loosely based on the Dumas novel and completely unembarrassed to pimp it out with modern cinematic trends and PWSA fixations, including but not limited to speed-ramping, acrobatic fight choreography and cool steam-punk weapons and vehicles. It takes the silliness much further than THE MUSKETEER, and has a much bigger budget – the climax involves two armed blimps engaged in a pirate ship battle in the sky – and I thought it was a whole lot of fun. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: adventure, Alex Litvak, Andrew Davies, Christoph Waltz, Dexter Fletcher, Freddie Fox, Gabrielle Wilde, James Corden, Juno Temple, Logan Lerman, Luke Evans, Mads Mikkelsen, Matthew Macfadyen, Milla Jovovich, old timey adventure, Paul W.S. Anderson, Ray Stevenson, The Three Musketeers, Til Schweiger
Posted in Action, Fantasy/Swords, Reviews | 46 Comments »
Wednesday, December 16th, 2020
After I watched DR. WAI IN “THE SCRIPTURE WITH NO WORDS” for the specific reason that it was a Jet Li movie directed by Ching Siu-Tung, I realized I should watch the more recent movie that fits the same description. THE SORCERER AND THE WHITE SNAKE (2011) is another fantasy martial arts romance, outlandish in a different way than the other one because it’s based on a Chinese legend about animal demons.
Li plays the titular sorcerer, a truck trying to carry explosives across a shaky rope bridge, and of course Whitesnake play themselves, performing many of their hits as well as debuting songs from that year’s album Forevermore. At least I assume that was what Ching intended, but he caved to the bean-counters, so instead Li plays a skilled Buddhist demon hunter called Abbott Fahai, and early in the movie we are abruptly confronted with the sight of two beautiful human lady torsos with scale-covered breasts and giant snake body lower halves, rolling around sexily on top of each other. It’s one of those things where I’m kind of icked out by it but also very happy for whatever number of people there are out there who are into snake ladies and are sorely underserved by mainstream cinema. Merry Christmas, you pervs.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Charlene Choi, Ching Siu-Tung, Eva Huang, Jet Li, Raymond Lam, Vivian Hsu, Wen Zhang
Posted in Action, Fantasy/Swords, Martial Arts, Reviews | 3 Comments »
Monday, December 14th, 2020
I’m going to be on a podcast soon where the topic of the week is Jet Li movies. There are still many I haven’t seen, so I wanted to fill in a couple of blanks before recording. DR. WAI IN “THE SCRIPTURE WITH NO WORDS” from 1996 seemed like an important one to get to because it’s directed and choreographed by the great Ching Siu-Tung (his directorial followup to WONDER SEVEN, although he choreographed A CHINESE ODYSSEY: PART ONE – PANDORA’S BOX in between). He’s perhaps best known for directing A CHINESE GHOST STORY and action-directing A BETTER TOMORROW II, SHAOLIN SOCCER and HERO, but I also love his outlandish, heightened style in movies like NAKED WEAPON and one of Seagal’s weirdest, BELLY OF THE BEAST.
In the epic opening scene I was ready to get seriously Ching Siu-Tunged… there’s like a hundred guys pulling a giant mechanical ox that looks like a He-Man vehicle, and the guy driving it goes rogue and makes it fart a fire ball. But I quickly found that Ching’s usual fantasy historical period setting of The Martial World is a story-within-a-story, intercut with the marriage troubles of its supposed author, filling his martial arts adventure fiction with childishly autobiographical symbolism where he’s the hero and his wife is the villain. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Charlie Yeung, Ching Siu-Tung, Collin Chou, Jet Li, Rosamund Kwan, Takeshi Kaneshiro
Posted in Fantasy/Swords, Martial Arts, Reviews | 4 Comments »
Thursday, September 10th, 2020
Other than my long-held above average Ms. Pac-Man skills, I cannot claim to be a gamer. I have very little experience playing the video game Mortal Kombat, so I mostly know it as the one they play on acid in Larry Clark’s BULLY. But I’m only human; I have the same weakness for mystical fighting tournaments, magic ninjas, monster violence and spines being pulled out as anybody, button-masher or otherwise. So I’m always open to checking out any cinematic developments related to the Mortal Kombat intellektual property, and that’s good because the recent DTV animated feature MORTAL KOMBAT LEGENDS: SCORPION’S REVENGE is one of the franchise’s best konkoktions to date.
Although I kind of enjoy the silly PG-13 live action movies MORTAL KOMBAT and even MORTAL KOMBAT: ANNIHILATION, I appreciate that this cartoon is super-duper hard-as-fuck R strictly for violence. No boobs, don’t remember the cursing, a few references to balls (because Sonya Blade repeatedly crunches Johnny Cage’s), but the rating is for tons and tons of bloody, reprehensible bodily deconstruction. Pretty frequent finishings and fatalities and flawless victories in this one. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Ethan Spaulding, Jennifer Carpenter, Joel McHale, Jordan Rodrigues, video games
Posted in Action, Cartoons and Shit, Fantasy/Swords, Reviews | 6 Comments »
