Archive for the ‘Reviews’ Category
Friday, August 9th, 2002
Well you know me, I’ve been talking about the badass presence of Vin Diesel just as long as anyone has, anyone except for him. I’ve been looking forward to this moronic concept of a Vin Diesel star vehicle, figuring anything this stupid starring Vin Diesel would have to be a good time. You saw my epic dissertation on THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS so you know how I enjoy Vin’s egomaniacal charisma combined with Rob Cohen’s pathetic zeitgeist-chasing high conceptualism.
XXX is completely asinine. And I loved that about it. For about half an hour. Then it just got boring in the exact same way all the modern James Bond movies are boring. It takes a special type of standard lowering to enjoy ANYBODY driving around dreary european villages on motorcycles shooting machine guns and blowing things up in the usual ways. You can only watch a henchman shot into the air by an explosion so many times before you start to ask for more from your badass cinematists. I don’t care if you had a young Clint Eastwood riding piggyback on Steve McQueen, you’d still get bored with this movie before it got to the climax. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Asia Argento, Rob Cohen, Samuel L. Jackson, Vin Diesel
Posted in Action, Reviews | 4 Comments »
Thursday, August 8th, 2002
This is the latest from the director Miguel Arteta and the Writer Mike White, who did CHUCK AND BUCK together. Mr. White also used to write for some tv shows, one supposedly really good and the rest called DAWSON’S CREEK and PASADENA. More recently he wrote the only okay ORANGE COUNTY and had a funny cameo in it. He has a small role here where he gets some laughs. He was the star of CHUCK AND BUCK and he’s a real goofball so when he appears in his movies you always want him to have a bigger part.
Before we move on I gotta ask, is this or is this not the same Mike White who does the zine Cashiers Du Cinemart that I used to always get spam for until dejanews shut down and I changed my e-mail? [UPDATE: I e-mailed the Cinemart Mike White, and he said he was not the GOOD GIRL Mike White.] If so that would also make him the same Mike White who makes the videos trying to point out which parts of Tarantino movies are similar to other people’s movies, which would make him kind of an ass. Somebody told me it was the same dude and I tried to verify it but the closest thing I could find for verification was that the Cinemart guy says he doesn’t have a new issue because he spent all of 2001 finding a new house, and then an interview with Miguel mentions that they auditioned Jake Gyllenhall in Mike White’s brand new house and he threw a chair and put a hole in the wall. That’s a pretty good clue I think but I don’t know if it would hold up in a court of law. I mean I wouldn’t want to besmirch Mike White’s name if there were two of them, like how there’s one George Miller who did MAD MAX and the other one who did the Steve Guttenberg movie where a dog rides on a dolphin’s back. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Jake Gyllenhaal, Jennifer Aniston, John C. Reilly, Miguel Arteta, Mike White, Tim Blake Nelson, Zooey Deschanel
Posted in Comedy/Laffs, Drama, Reviews, Romance | 1 Comment »
Wednesday, August 7th, 2002
This is the story of a man (me), a famous television critic (Gene Shalit) and a children’s action picture called SPY KIDS PART 2. Three entitities living their separate existences. Independent and peaceful. And it coulda easily stayed that way, if not for the simple words of a newspaper advertisement. But it was not to be. Because of those words, our three lives converged. And we would be changed for a while, I guess.
GENE SHALIT OF The TODAY Show RAVES:
“THE MOST JOYOUSLY IMAGINATIVE MOVIE OF THE SUMMER! JUST ABOUT EVERY MINUTE IS FUNNY OR INGENIOUS… IN A WORD, FUN-TASTIC!”
Now I gotta be honest. Normally I don’t pay attention to these fuckwads on the ads. I am one of the most important film Writers today and I never been quoted once. So obviously these people aren’t the cream of the crop. But there was something about this quote from Gene Shalit that intrigued me. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Robert Rodriguez
Posted in Family, Reviews | 4 Comments »
Friday, August 2nd, 2002
Hey folks, Harry here… I finally met Vern when I went to Seattle recently. Just so you know, Vern is actually a Paul Bunyon looking muther. He’s literally like 6’11” 310lbs – solid as a granite dildo slammed home! He has most of his original teeth, and a few he’s knocked out of others’ heads that he keeps in a ju-ju medicine bag that hangs around his neck – “Nobody fucks with the Vern!” – He reminds me of a redneck John Sayles. Without further thumb twiddling, here’s Vern…
Dear Harry,
Usually I address my stories to you AND moriarty, but now that you’ve been to seattle, it’s like we have some kind of bond, you know. who needs that old “professor” joker anyway. all he does is drone on and on. “this is a great little piece of character acting” blah blah blah. Isn’t he still on 1986 in the best of the ’90s list? GET IT THE FUCK TOGETHER, moriarty. jesus. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Hayao Miyazaki
Posted in AICN, Cartoons and Shit, Family, Reviews | No Comments »
Friday, August 2nd, 2002
There are bigger fans of M. Night Shymalan than me. He seems a little too nice to me, trying too hard to please everybody. They call him a new Spielberg but if so he’s a new Spielberg who skipped over the young vital years of Spielberg when he made shit like DUEL and JAWS. Still, I really like this young man’s style. He seems to have a couple of trademarks already. He treats supernatural themes very seriously and in a unique style that tricks mainstream audiences into thinking they are not watching a genre picture. He populates his stories with precocious child actors and movie stars who give uncharacteristically quiet performances. His stories have themes of tragedy and loss, and they are much more about character and suspense than about actual action. SIXTH SENSE was about discovering what’s goin on with these ghosts, not running from them or fighting them. And UNBREAKABLE was a super hero movie without a single scene of somebody swingin on a rope or shooting a laser or something. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: aliens, Joaquin Phoenix, M. Night Shyamalan, Mel Gibson
Posted in Mystery, Reviews, Science Fiction and Space Shit, Thriller | 1 Comment »
Saturday, July 27th, 2002
Well what this movie is about is Austin Powers is a spy from the ’60s who likes to have sex and use different british slang, etc. He has bad teeth and a hairy chest and because the dude who plays him, Michael Meyers, wishes he were a rock star, he also has a band in one part. This is the third in a series of pictures thought to be parodies of James Bond but obviously more like homages to Derek Flint, but with dick jokes and one dude playing most of the roles.
The plot of the first one was about Mr. Powers being frozen cryogenically because his archnemesis Dr. Evil was frozen and sent into space. And then they both get revived in the ’90s, and they have trouble catching up with the different changes. Also Mr. Powers has to pee really bad when he gets unfrozen, and that type of crap. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Beyonce, Jay Roach, Mike Meyers, Seth Green
Posted in Action, Comedy/Laffs, Reviews | 3 Comments »
Wednesday, July 24th, 2002
Well here we are with another slightly above average horror picture from Stuart Gordon, the guy who did REANIMATOR and a couple other halfway decent movies, but who seems to live next door to Full Moon Video or something. By this I do not mean that he only makes movies about little bastards like ghoulies, demonic toys, subspecieses, dollmen, shrunken heads, puppet masters, and etceteras. All I mean is that he seems to share alot of stylistic choices, collaborators and straight to video horror blood with those guys. But this is one of his movies that seems a little better. A little.
I know this one got a small amount of theatrical play here in seattle and that alone is an amazing accomplishment for Stuart these days. In case you are wondering it is not about dragons. If you look closely there is no R. In fact it is about a village of fish people, which could only mean that it is based on stories by Howard P. Lovecraft. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: H.P. Lovecraft, Stuart Gordon
Posted in Horror, Mystery, Reviews, Thriller | 1 Comment »
Sunday, July 21st, 2002
Well we know the spanish can do good modern horror, and the japanese can do it, and there’s that one canadian dude. But what about the Brits? They had the great Hammer Studios way back when, and they made the Wickerman I believe, so they got a good tradition going. But it’s been a while since I’ve heard about a real good one. To be honest I haven’t paid too much attention to the british culture lately. All I know is they got those annoying crime movies and that tv show where you go into your friend’s house, repaint it and glue a bunch of pinecones and inner tubes together as decorations.
But now maybe they got the next horror visionary. A newcomer by the name of Neil Marshall, he wrote and edited a couple earlier movies and this is his debut as writer/director/editor/credit hog. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Kevin McKidd, Liam Cunningham, Neil Marshall, Sean Pertwee, werewolves
Posted in Action, Horror, Reviews | 9 Comments »
Monday, July 15th, 2002
Hey folks, Harry here… From what Vern says here, you’d be better off renting Seymore Butts’ WISE CRACKS or Seymore Butts’ TWO BUTTS ARE BETTER THAN ONE starring Seymore Butts’ Young Buns. Of course there are always foreign film options like CUM GUZZLING GEISHA GIRLS or THE TWIN PEAKS OF MOUNT FUJI, but that’s entirely up to you. Then there is Rav’s favorite all time title of SHEMALE YUM TAKES ON ASIAN AMERICAN LADYBOYS or Quint’s fave – PRINCESS ON THE PORCELAIN. But there is always Moriarty and mine’s favorite that we love to watch on those lonely nights: BRIDGET THE MIDGET: TATTOO MENU & A PIERCING EXPERIENCE. Join us if you will, or be like Vern….
Well boys there’s nothin like a mediocre straight to video sequel to start off your day. I didn’t even know they were makin a sequel to this one until I got ahold of the screener tape. I guess alot of people would ask “Who the fuck cares about VAMPIRES?” and laugh it off. It’s always weird when out of the blue they got a sequel to some movie you never knew anybody really thought about anymore, like URBAN LEGEND or MIMIC or MEN IN BLACK.
But I like most of Mr. Carpenter’s works and I think VAMPIRES is one of the good ones. James Woods is great throwin on the leather jacket to put his skinny old man frame in the Kurt Russell/Roddy Piper role. I guess he made up alot of his lines and maybe that’s why they work (Roddy Piper did the same in THEY LIVE. I bet poor Ice Cube stuck to the script in JOHN CARPENTER’S DISAPPOINTING GHOSTS OF MARS. I still can’t believe his name was “Desolation Williams.”)
Nothing about VAMPIRES seemed real radical but it had a feel of its own. How many vampire movies take place mostly in daylight in sunny, dusty Mexico, with that famous John Carpenter “it’s really a western” tone? And it just had a raunchiness that was much needed at the time, with the most macho dialogue of any John Carpenter movie, all the main characters being sadistic assholes, and lots of the ol’ latex-and-blood-packs gore effects. I don’t remember any god damn morphing in that picture. The master vampire tore Mark Boone Junior in half, and it was organic. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: DTV, DTV sequels, vampires
Posted in Action, AICN, Horror, Reviews | 2 Comments »
Friday, July 12th, 2002
I heard a rumor, or actually I just saw it on the ad, that REIGN OF FIRE is supposed to be the perfect summer movie. And in a way I think it is. Because it takes a good special effects extravaganza premise – the world is obliterated by firebreathing dragons and a small community of survivors fight back in postapocalyptic england – and treats it much smarter and more dramatic than you’d expect.
Yeah, this is a movie with computer animated dragons, and a bunch of people fighting them. But the emphasis of the story is not on the fighting. It’s always on the drama. After a prologue and a MAD MAX-like dragons-take-over-the-world explanation montage, you get basically a DAY OF THE DEAD setup. Here is this community of survivors living in spruced up castle ruins using what limited resources they can find to survive. You find out about their whole system – how they eat, their security system, how they use birds for lookout and what they teach their kids to do if they see a dragon. There’s also a little I AM LEGEND in there because they treat the dragons scientifically. They are not magical. They explain how they breathe fire, how they reproduce, the best way to kill them. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Christian Bale, Gerard Butler, Matthew McConaughey, Rob Bowman
Posted in Action, Fantasy/Swords, Reviews, Science Fiction and Space Shit | 2 Comments »
