Archive for the ‘Reviews’ Category
Tuesday, August 21st, 2012
Remember the excitement we had when we came across MARTYRS, written and directed by Pascal Laugier? A genuinely unpredictable, unformulaic horror movie. One that was brutal and unpleasant enough that I was hesitant about recommending it to people, but great enough that it’s become pretty much universally respected as the must-see horror movie of recent years. Probly of the decade. The pinnacle of modern euro-horror, the most respectable extreme-horror.
When there’s somebody who made something that unusual, that pure, obviously Hollywood knows what to do: string ‘im up. Bring him to the U.S., make him speak English, put him on a HELLRAISER remake. Waste his time in idiotic meetings, showing him that he’s not allowed to do whatever he wants. He must compromise. Show him who’s boss.
So he quit HELLRAISER. But he still made an English language movie starring Jessica Biel. I heard a long time ago that it wasn’t that good, I forget if it was at a film festival or somebody saw a test screening or what. But I believed it. It sounded about right. He was making HARD BOILED, we don’t want to see his BROKEN ARROW.
But the reports were wrong! This is more like his FACE/OFF. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Jessica Biel, Jodelle Ferland, Pascal Laugier, William B. Davis
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 46 Comments »
Tuesday, August 21st, 2012
I gotta confess coming to this one from a place of cinematic ignorance. I’ve seen the original Godard movie, but I don’t remember jack shit about it. I thought it was pretty good, I believe. That’s about all I got. Still, I’m sure less people could tell you anything about the remake than everything about the original. So this makes me smart.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Art Metrano, Jim McBride, L.M. Kit Carson, remakes, Richard Gere
Posted in Crime, Reviews, Romance | 32 Comments »
Monday, August 20th, 2012
TRUE ROMANCE is an entertaining, uniquely textured crime movie, a celebration of youthful love, kitsch, Asian exploitation cinema, and great character actors. At the time it seemed like a new feel, especially coming from Tony Scott. Now it’s more notable as a record of young, undisciplined Quentin Tarantino manning the word processor. (Roger Avary was hired to restructure the original non-linear story and write an ending where the hero doesn’t die – yeah, that sounds like young QT all right.)
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Brad Pitt, Bronson Pinchot, Chris Penn, Christian Slater, Christopher Walken, Dennis Hopper, Gary Oldman, James Gandolfini, Michael Rapaport, Patricia Arquette, Quentin Tarantino, Roger Avary, Saul Rubinek, Tom Sizemore, Tony Scott
Posted in Crime, Reviews | 43 Comments »
Sunday, August 19th, 2012
THE EXPENDABLES 2 is a sequel to THE EXPENDABLES. It is the second one. And all that that implies.
Like part 1 it has an incredible cast of action stars that you never thought could all be in a movie together, making a movie that is not worthy of all of them being together but does get by on the strength of, you know… those guys are all in it.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce, Bruce Willis, Chuck Norris, Jason Statham, JCVD, Jet Li, Liam Hemsworth, Nan Yu, Randy Couture, Scott Adkins, Simon West, Sylvester Stallone, Terry Crews
Posted in Action, Bruce, Reviews | 311 Comments »
Friday, August 17th, 2012
Jean-Claude Van Damme is the most important new Expendables cast member. Even not having seen it yet we know this because he’s the main villain, because he gets an “also” credit and because he’s Jean-Claude Van Damme. So to honor his new role I was excited to go back and watch one of his early movies that I haven’t seen. I was surprised to realize BLACK EAGLE was the only 20th century Van Damme movie I hadn’t seen. I’d have to go up to some of the DTVs starting in 2002 to get to anything else new to me. I was better versed than I realized, but I didn’t know anything about this one.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Eric Karson, JCVD, Kane Kosugi, Shane Kosugi, Sho Kosugi
Posted in Action, Reviews | 44 Comments »
Thursday, August 16th, 2012
When we think of Arnold Schwarzenegger we think of the TERMINATOR movies, PREDATOR, the CONAN movies, COMMANDO… movies that came out in years before, say, 1995. I don’t know if the crazy action/sexism combo of TRUE LIES used up everything he had, or if it was playing a pregnant man in JUNIOR that pushed him over, but by the time he made ERASER in ’96 the salad days were over. There was only some slimy lettuce left.
But I kinda enjoyed watching this one again. I’d say I like it better than THE SIXTH DAY, COLLATERAL DAMAGE and END OF DAYS (although that last one has more distinctive weirdness in it). (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Chuck Russell, James Caan, James Coburn, Robert Pastorelli
Posted in Action, Reviews | 53 Comments »
Tuesday, August 14th, 2012
“Forget it, kid. I work alone.”
You guys know I’m not really big on Chuck Norris. I know, Chuck Norris is so powerful that blah blah blah, something something beard something fist. Good job, internet. Hilarious. He’s famous enough to be considered one of the iconic action stars, but in my opinion he is not on the same level as other Expendables such as Schwarzenegger, Stallone, Willis, Van Damme or non-Expendable Seagal. He doesn’t have as much charisma or as many watchable movies. But I did really dig INVASION U.S.A. and I always heard LONE WOLF MCQUADE was his best or one of his best, so I thought I should watch it in the lead up to his appearance in EXPENDABLES 2: ALSO VAN DAMME.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Chuck Norris, David Carradine, L.Q. Jones, R.G. Armstrong
Posted in Action, Reviews | 57 Comments »
Monday, August 13th, 2012
I hoped this would be one of the better Dolph Lundgren vehicles, because it’s directed by Russell Mulcahy, who used to be so good. This was ’96, his next movie after ’94’s THE SHADOW. I guess this is his punishment, but THE SHADOW is more fun. SILENT TRIGGER is at least watchable, but so are other things that are actually good.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: assassins, Dolph Lundgren, Russell Mulcahy, snipers
Posted in Action, Reviews | 42 Comments »
Sunday, August 12th, 2012
THE SPECIALIST was Sylvester Stallone’s 1994 offering, a present-day palate cleanser between the futuristic DEMOLITION MAN and JUDGE DREDD. It even says “present day” onscreen after a prologue taking place in Colombia in ’84.
That was when black ops explosives expert Ray Quick (Stallone) had a falling out with his partner-mentor Ned Trent (James Woods). They were trying to assassinate a drug lord but Quick tried to pull the plug when he saw that a little girl was going to get blown up with him. Trent of course doesn’t care, and he gets his way (drug lord and girl both blown to kingdom come) but then the two of them fight about it.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Alexandra Seros, Eric Roberts, James Woods, John Shirley, Luis Llosa, Sharon Stone, Sylvester Stallone
Posted in Action, Reviews | 96 Comments »
Thursday, August 9th, 2012
I always root for Mark Dacascos to be in something really good. I love ONLY THE STRONG, and he’s in some other fun ones, like the ridiculous CRADLE 2 THE GRAVE. I’ve watched his movie DRIVE a couple times, not the one with Ryan Gosling but the one with Mark Dacascos. And Kadeem Hardison and Britney Murphy. People used to always try to push that one on me and I never really got into it, but he’s pretty good. He’s a good martial artist. I was always curious about this little known one from 1998 ’cause it’s him starring in some kind of crime movie executive produced by Roger Avary. Could be interesting, right?
Could’ve been. Wasn’t really. But here are a few words about it for the historic record.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Craig Hamann, Frederic Forrest, Joan Jett, John Hawkes, Linnea Quigley, Mark Dacascos, Roger Avary, Traci Lords
Posted in Crime, Reviews | 18 Comments »
