I got an email recently from Ricardo S., who recommended I should see this new movie SECUESTRO EXPRESS which he said was very popular in his country of Venezuela and “We usually don’t give a shit about our own films here, because, they usually suck balls.” So I filed that title away in the back of my mind and remembered to rent it and now here is my review.
I should mention that when I say he emailed me “recently” what I mean is that the email is dated November 1st of 2005. But I mean, that’s late 2005, at least it wasn’t January of ’05. Cut me some slack. Anyway don’t ever say I don’t follow through. (read the rest of this shit…)
13 ASSASSINS is a pretty straightforward and thoroughly badass samurai picture from director Takashi Miike. I know that guy’s known for making 2 or 3 crazy fucked up movies a year. I think the only one I’ve seen before is AUDITION, which I thought was a pretty good romantic comedy but not quite up to the hype as the most fucked in the head movie you ever saw. Pretty well done though. Anyway, this is different. (read the rest of this shit…)
INSIDIOUS (new this week on home video formats) is the latest from James Wan, the director of SAW. He didn’t do any of the SAW sequels though, if that’s what you’re thinking. This is only his fourth movie. I didn’t think SAW was that great and never saw his other horror movie DEAD SILENCE, but I’m kinda rooting for the guy to turn into a consistently good director because of how much I dug DEATH SENTENCE, his vigilante movie starring Kevin Bacon. Also ’cause he’s the only Chinese-Australian director I ever heard of, and that’s kinda cool. (read the rest of this shit…)
Let me tell you man, I’m not trying to commemorate the tenth anniversary of this movie. There’s no celebration here at all. It’s just analysis, I swear.
I saw FINAL FANTASY in the theater when it came out, found it incredibly boring, and really didn’t want to ever watch it again. Here is my review from back then. But I thought it was important to revisit for this study because, despite being a huge financial and artistic failure this movie did break alot of new ground that has turned out to be relevant to the movies of the decade since.
HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN – which came out this week on the dvd and the blu-ray – stars Rutger Hauer (BLIND FURY) as the titleistical armed derelict. I don’t think he ever gets a name, he’s just an old drunk who rides the rails into Hope City, better known as “Fuck City,” a small Canadian town overrun with barbaric crime and ruled savagely by a psychotic crimelord called “The Drake” (Bryan Downey) and his two douchebag sons, who I think are supposed to be modeled after Tom Cruise in RISKY BUSINESS. They wear sunglasses and letterman’s jackets but participate in public beheadings and sex slavery. Some of the cops are corrupt too, and one likes to serenade the local prostitutes with smooth come-ons like “You’re so hot I wanna cut off my dick and rub it all over your tits.” (read the rest of this shit…)
It’s been a lackluster-verging-on-so-so movie summer. I kinda liked the X-MEN one, THOR was okay, SUPER 8 was pretty good, TRANSFORMERS was enjoyably awful. Definitely my favorite so far is FAST FIVE, and I love that movie but let’s face it, it’s no RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK. We want to see adventure. We want to see thrills. We want to see ancient artifacts, that’s what summer movies is about. CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS is no RAIDERS either, but it’s a worthwhile 3D extravaganza about adventurers exploring the contents of a mysterious cave that went untouched by man for 32,000 years. It’s full of amazing visuals and ideas and raises alot of questions.
I guess I should mention it’s a G-rated documentary about cave paintings directed by that weirdo Werner Herzog. So alot of it is just the camera slowly panning back and forth across the same cave wall while squeaky violins and creepy chants lull you into a trance. In 3D!(read the rest of this shit…)
note: this review is excessively long and convoluted and takes forever to get to the point, but only as a clever form-is-an-extension-of-content type reference to the movie it describes, in my opinion. Unfortunately I could never match the feel of the movie no matter how hard I tried. It’s like when some asshole reviews a Dr. Seuss movie in rhymes or some shit like that.
introductory remarks/overture
My friends, we have lost. Michael Bay has defeated us. First he invaded the shores of the genre we hold most dear. He brought us gifts of explosions, while behind our backs he robbed us of the very language of geography and context we use to communicate what is exploding and who or what is endangered by said explosion. Then he confiscated our property, buying up our favorite low budget horror classics to rebuild as slick, soul-less product – just to crush our spirits. And now he has completely subjugated us. (read the rest of this shit…)
Today, as we celebrate the opening of the third Steven Spielberg produced Hasbro adaptation about overly detailed space robots with different accents wiggling around and smashing buildings, let’s also take a moment to note the tenth anniversary of that one time when Spielberg tried to make a thoughtful robot movie.
Wow, I never would’ve predicted this: THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS has aged well. Or maybe I just wasn’t ready for it back when I first saw it. Skimming over my intentionally pretentious and off-topic original review I can see that I saw it as an attempt to exploit a fad. This is supported by all the old dvd extras (now on blu-ray) which make a huge deal about it being based on a Vibe article about street racing, and how they went to watch races and ran from the cops and all the cars and extras in the car show scenes are real racers who responded to a web posting. They wanted us to know this “street racing” was a real thing happening somewhere at night, and director Rob Cohen and friends are on the front lines ready to show us what’s going down. (read the rest of this shit…)
Lara Croft (Angelina Jolie)’s trade is a “tomb raider,” which is like an asskicking archaelogical adventurist. It’s just like whatsisdick, the guy with the hat from that other movie that also used the word “raider” in the title – but don’t worry, that’s a coincidence. Lara’s introduced in what looks like some sort of an ancient crypt. She’s wearing short shorts, a The Phantom belt, spinning two pistols. Her crotch and her large, pointy boobs are somewhat emphasized, in my opinion. Might just be me.
Wouldn’t you fuckin know it, her search for treasure is interrupted by a large robot. Cue the electronical music and the wire-assisted acrobatics (remember we’re just two years after THE MATRIX). The fight is too forced to be very exciting in my opinion, but it ends on a nice touch: after killing the robot Lara takes a breath, then laughs to herself. (read the rest of this shit…)
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Recent commentary and jibber-jabber
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I got an email recently from Ricardo S., who recommended I should see this new movie SECUESTRO EXPRESS which he said was very popular in his country of Venezuela and “We usually don’t give a shit about our own films here, because, they usually suck balls.” So I filed that title away in the back of my mind and remembered to rent it and now here is my review.
13 ASSASSINS is a pretty straightforward and thoroughly badass samurai picture from director Takashi Miike. I know that guy’s known for making 2 or 3 crazy fucked up movies a year. I think the only one I’ve seen before is AUDITION, which I thought was a pretty good romantic comedy but not quite up to the hype as the most fucked in the head movie you ever saw. Pretty well done though. Anyway, this is different.
INSIDIOUS (new this week on home video formats) is the latest from James Wan, the director of SAW. He didn’t do any of the SAW sequels though, if that’s what you’re thinking. This is only his fourth movie. I didn’t think SAW was that great and never saw his other horror movie DEAD SILENCE, but I’m kinda rooting for the guy to turn into a consistently good director because of how much I dug 
Let me tell you man, I’m not trying to commemorate the tenth anniversary of this movie. There’s no celebration here at all. It’s just analysis, I swear.
HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN – which came out this week on the dvd and the blu-ray – stars Rutger Hauer (BLIND FURY) as the titleistical armed derelict. I don’t think he ever gets a name, he’s just an old drunk who rides the rails into Hope City, better known as “Fuck City,” a small Canadian town overrun with barbaric crime and ruled savagely by a psychotic crimelord called “The Drake” (Bryan Downey) and his two douchebag sons, who I think are supposed to be modeled after Tom Cruise in RISKY BUSINESS. They wear sunglasses and letterman’s jackets but participate in public beheadings and sex slavery. Some of the cops are corrupt too, and one likes to serenade the local prostitutes with smooth come-ons like “You’re so hot I wanna cut off my dick and rub it all over your tits.” 
It’s been a lackluster-verging-on-so-so movie summer. I kinda liked the X-MEN one, THOR was okay, SUPER 8 was pretty good, TRANSFORMERS was enjoyably awful. Definitely my favorite so far is FAST FIVE, and I love that movie but let’s face it, it’s no RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK. We want to see adventure. We want to see thrills. We want to see ancient artifacts, that’s what summer movies is about. CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS is no RAIDERS either, but it’s a worthwhile 3D extravaganza about adventurers exploring the contents of a mysterious cave that went untouched by man for 32,000 years. It’s full of amazing visuals and ideas and raises alot of questions.
note: this review is excessively long and convoluted and takes forever to get to the point, but only as a clever form-is-an-extension-of-content type reference to the movie it describes, in my opinion. Unfortunately I could never match the feel of the movie no matter how hard I tried. It’s like when some asshole reviews a Dr. Seuss movie in rhymes or some shit like that.
released June 29th, 2001
released June 22nd, 2001
released June 15th, 2001
