Archive for the ‘Reviews’ Category
Wednesday, March 6th, 2024
There’s this weird French filmmaker, Bertrand Mandico. He has a new movie I’ve seen people raving about called SHE IS CONANN. When I read about it, I realized that over the last few years I’ve read about two other movies of his that also sounded really intriguing. So I decided to finally try one.
AFTER BLUE (DIRTY PARADISE) is his second movie, it’s on Shudder in addition to DVD and blu-ray, but it’s not horror. The reductive way I thought of to describe it is “Jodorowsky’s BARBARELLA,” then I noticed that the promo materials from distributor Altered Innocence call it “a lesbian EL TOPO (in space!),” so I guess I’m not the only one to think of it that way. But I think mine is a little more precise.
It’s set on a planet called After Blue, where people moved to when “the Earth was sick, rotten,” and made new rules banning electronics and screens “to avoid the same mistakes.” Everything works differently there. For example, something about the atmosphere makes hair grow on your neck, and for men it grows inward, so they all died off. Luckily, women can be inseminated “with good Earth sperm.” (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Anais Thomas, Bertrand Mandico, Elina Lowensohn, Paula Luna, Pauline Lorillard, Vimala Pons
Posted in Reviews, Science Fiction and Space Shit, Western | 15 Comments »
Tuesday, March 5th, 2024
Revisiting DAREDEVIL obviously made me want to watch ELEKTRA again – this time in a director’s cut, but the differences are minimal compared to DAREDEVIL’s. It’s a different situation anyway because I actually did enjoy ELEKTRA when I saw it on video back in the day, and even wrote a review of it. So instead of “maybe I’ll like it better now” it was a “will I still like it?” situation. The answer is yes, I did.
That’s not a popular opinion. It was a big flop, and scoffed at from all quarters. Roger Ebert called it “a collision between leftover bits and pieces of Marvel superhero stories.” Manohla Dargis called it “The latest Hollywood movie to give comic books a bad name.” Mick LaSalle wrote, “It’s garbage” and complained that it was “twisted” to open with this contract killer character assassinating someone when “we don’t know what he did to deserve this.” At least David Edelstein said it was “only maybe two-fifths” bad because “these Marvel pictures are starting to blur together” (which now seems like a funny thing for someone to have said then), and he was wise enough to say it paled in comparison to A CHINESE GHOST STORY, THE BRIDE WITH WHITE HAIR and THE HEROIC TRIO rather than X-MEN or SPIDER-MAN. Because that’s what it is: one of the American movies that’s not nearly as good as Hong Kong movies. But I still like them. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Billy Bryan, Bob Sapp, Bryan Spicer, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, Christophe Beck, Colin Cunningham, Edison T. Ribeiro, Goran Visnjic, Jason Isaacs, Jennifer Garner, Kirsten Prout, M. Raven Metzner, Mark Houghton, Marvel Comics, Mike Gunther, Natassia Malthe, ninjas, Rob Bowman, spin-off, Stuart Zicherman, Terence Stamp, Tom Woodruff Jr., Will Yun Lee, Zak Penn
Posted in Reviews, Action, Comic strips/Super heroes, Martial Arts | 11 Comments »
Monday, March 4th, 2024
Note: in conjunction with this review I also made my third appearance on I MUST BREAK THIS PODCAST, discussing the movie with Sean Malloy. Thanks for having me, Sean! Always a fun time. CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE EPISODE.
WANTED MAN is the latest film by director Dolph Lundgren (MISSIONARY MAN). If you’re not aware, Lundgren is also an actor, so he stars as Mike Johansen, a way-past-his-prime cop. He’s introduced taking a morning beach jog, and of course he’s Dolph Lundgren (or stunt double – his hood is up), but he’s kinda limping, lumbering around. He has to take a bunch of pills. Later we find out he needs ankle surgery.
And he’s also in hot water. When he pulls up to the station and the protesters and media say, “That’s him!,” we realize oh shit… he’s the cop they were talking about on TV, the one that brutally assaulted a “migrant driver.” He sees the protesters and kinda does a whoops! and comically turns his pickup truck around. Later we see the indefensible bodycam footage, where he repeatedly slams a car door on the poor guy, yells about Mexicans and punches another officer trying to pull him off. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Aaron McPherson, Christina Villa, Daniela Soto-Brenner, Dolph Lundgren, Erma Giron, James Joseph Pulido, Jesus "Rocko" Reyes, Jose Trujillo, Kelsey Grammer, Mexican border, Michael Pare, Michael Worth, Roger Cross, Tony Messenger
Posted in Reviews, Action, Comedy/Laffs | 8 Comments »
Thursday, February 29th, 2024
A little over 20 years ago, in a whole different cinematic era, they made a movie of the Marvel Comics super hero Daredevil. It was a strange, in-between period for comic book movies – they were neither the exciting novelty they’d been in the BATMAN-inspired ‘90s or the dominant cultural force they would soon become with the MCU. BLADE, X-MEN, BLADE II and SPIDER-MAN had come out, so Marvel finally had a track record of successful movie adaptations. But none of these took place in the same world, and there was even a famous outtake from X-MEN where a guy in a Spider-Man costume ran into a scene as a prank, and it seemed hilarious at the time.
DAREDEVIL was a test of what The Ain’t It Cool News and other self-declared “geek” voices on the internet had been preaching. In fact, Harry Knowles wrote a rave review of the script more than a year before filming started. It’s meant to be a dark, gritty and faithful adaptation of a character beloved by comics fans, but not very well known to civilians. Sure enough it was a hit, though only enough to get a spin-off and not multiple sequels like Blade, the X-Men and Spider-Man got. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Ben Affleck, Cheung-Yan Yuen, Colin Farrell, Coolio, David Keith, Erick Avari, Ericson Core, Graeme Revell, Jeff Imada, Jennifer Garner, Joe Pantoliano, Jon Favreau, Mark Margolis, Mark Steven Johnson, Marvel Comics, Michael Clarke Duncan, nu metal, Paul Ben-Victor, Tanoai Reed
Posted in Reviews, Action, Comic strips/Super heroes | 27 Comments »
Wednesday, February 28th, 2024
SHOWDOWN AT THE GRAND is a little indie movie with a premise and setting that are right up my alley. It’s sort of like MATINEE for people fixated on the movies of the ‘70s and ‘80s instead of ’50s and ‘60s. To me it doesn’t really build much from there, but it uses two top shelf actors in novel ways, applies elbow grease to areas where I didn’t expect it to, and has an overall enthusiasm that makes it worth recommending.
Dolph Lundgren (JOHNNY MNEMONIC) is in this movie, and that’s obviously what brought my eye to it, but the star is Terrence Howard (HUSTLE & FLOW), who plays George Fuller, owner of an old time one screen theater called the Warner Grand. He’s a larger-than-life figure who dresses like a cowboy and lovingly lectures everyone he sees about the supposed greats of forgotten exploitation movie history, making it sound like a religious sermon. Showing movies is his life, and maybe his home – if he has a house or apartment outside of the Grand we never see it. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Dolph Lundgren, Elizabeth Righetti, John Savage, Jon Sklaroff, Mike Ferguson, Orson Oblowitz, Piper Curda, Terrence Howard
Posted in Reviews, Action | 8 Comments »
Monday, February 26th, 2024
John Frankenheimer’s RONIN is a movie that kicked my ass in a multiplex in the year 1998 A.D. The thing that really stuck in my head about it was the car chases, of course – specifically the one where they end up going the wrong way in a tunnel. But I also remembered it being very tough and smart, I was pretty confident it would hold up, and man was I right. This is a ’90s classic. But timeless.
The title is a metaphor comparing former intelligence agents and soldiers to masterless samurai. It’s about a group of them, apparently serving no higher cause, just letting whoever-the-fuck hire them for their particular set of skills. Sam (Robert De Niro between GREAT EXPECTATIONS and ANALYZE THIS) is a former CIA guy who’s in Montmartre to meet IRA operative Deirdre (Natascha McElhone, THE TRUMAN SHOW), who’s putting together a team that also includes the Frenchman Vincent (Jean Reno doing penance for GODZILLA), Englishman Spence (Sean Bean, GOLDENEYE), German computer expert Gregor (Stellan Skarsgård right before DEEP BLUE SEA) and American driver Larry (Skipp Sudduth, MONEY TRAIN, 54). They will be stealing a metal case from a heavily armed convoy, so they discuss what they know and don’t know about how it will go down, how and when they’ll do it, what equipment they’ll need, where they’ll get that, how they’ll prepare. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: car chases, David Mamet, J.D. Zeik, Jean Reno, John Frankenheimer, Michael Lonsdale, Natascha McElhone, Robert De Niro, Sean Bean, Skipp Sudduth, spies, Stellan Skarsgard
Posted in Reviews, Action, Thriller | 31 Comments »
Thursday, February 22nd, 2024
Seeing LISA FRANKENSTEIN pushed me to do something I’ve been meaning to do for years – rewatch JENNIFER’S BODY (2009). Uncharacteristically, I came right home from the theater and put it on. It made a good double feature.
In a way it doesn’t seem like that long ago, but in other ways it seems like ancient history. It was Diablo Cody’s second movie, coming two years after JUNO, which won her the best original screenplay Oscar. Director Karyn Kusama was on her third movie, trying to make a comeback after AEON FLUX (2005), her one studio project after the indie smash GIRLFIGHT (2000). Since then she’s done THE INVITATION (2015) and DESTROYER (2018) and lots of acclaimed television. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Adam Brody, Amanda Seyfried, Diablo Cody, Greg Nicotero, Howard Berger, J.K. Simmons, Johnny Simmons, Karyn Kusama, Kyle Gallner, Megan Fox
Posted in Reviews, Comedy/Laffs, Horror | 12 Comments »
Wednesday, February 21st, 2024
I’m a fan of the Academy Award winning screenwriter Diablo Cody. I enjoyed JUNO and TULLY and her directorial debut PARADISE, but it was YOUNG ADULT and its more friendly cousin RICKI AND THE FLASH that made me a die hard. Two movies about women who are assholes. My life is so different from either of theirs, but somehow Mavis Gary and Ricki Rendazzo are two characters I relate to deeply.
Of course she’s also got a foot in horror world – she wrote JENNIFER’S BODY for Karyn Kusama and even did some script revisions on the EVIL DEAD remake. She’s said she didn’t have to do much on that, but I still wonder if she was the one who named the dog Grandpa. Now she’s returned to the genre, sort of, with LISA FRANKENSTEIN, a teen movie with a zombie and some murders, directed by Zelda Williams (KAPPA KAPPA DIE). (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: '80s nostalgia, Bryce Romero, Carla Gugino, Cole Sprouse, Diablo Cody, Frankenstein, goth, Henry Eikenberry, horror comedies, Kathryn Newton, Liza Soberano, Zelda Williams, zombies
Posted in Reviews, Comedy/Laffs, Horror | 7 Comments »
Tuesday, February 20th, 2024
DESIERTO is a straight ahead chased-by-a-sniper thriller that I know at least one person has encouraged me to review, but I couldn’t find who. Thanks for the recommendation, whoever it was. I remembered it after watching THE COURIER last week, because The Courier himself, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, plays the sniper in this one.
It’s directed by Jonás Cuarón, son of Alfonse and co-writer of GRAVITY. This time he co-wrote with Mateo Garcia. It’s about a group of Mexican migrant workers trying to cross the US border illegally, and encountering a crazy fuckin asshole (Morgan).
I don’t remember them ever saying the main characters’ names, but Gael García Bernal (THE LIMITS OF CONTROL) plays our protagonist Moises, a sometime mechanic who is trying to return to his family in Oakland after being deported for a broken tail light. When the truck they’re being transported on breaks down in the middle of the desert, their guides Mechas (Diego Cataño, SAVAGES, THE MULE) and Lobo (Marco Pérez, AMORES PERROS) reluctantly lead them on foot through a dangerous area they don’t know very well called the Badlands.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Alondra Hidalgo, Diego Catano, Gael Garcia Bernal, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Jonas Cuaron, Lew Temple, Marco Perez, Mexican border, snipers
Posted in Reviews, Action, Thriller | 4 Comments »
Monday, February 19th, 2024
As you can see in my reviews of VENOM and MORBIUS (I didn’t write about VENOM: LET THERE BE CARNAGE for some reason, but it’s probly the best one), I sort of have a soft spot for the In Association with Marvel Comics Universe, the last vestige of the era when the movie rights to different Marvel characters were sold to different studios. I definitely don’t consider these to be among the better comic book movies, but there’s something charmingly out of fashion about them that I get a kick out of. They seem magically transported from another time when super heroes were still kind of niche and many of the movie adaptations were trying to make them palatable for normal people, but the people in charge were clueless business assholes who didn’t know what normal people were like anyway, so they ended up making them accidentally weird. The VENOMs are the best merely because they’re a chance for one of my favorite actors to get a paycheck for being a big goof, but all of them have a similar late ‘90s/early 2000s kind of attitude that now seems kind of novel.
What I’ve come to realize is that I tend to go to movies with a mentality of “show me what you got, movie” while some people go to them with more of a “listen up you dirty sonofabitch, you can’t slip one past me.” So I’m gonna be listing a bunch of stupid things in this movie because those were the things that made it fun for me, while others will cite those exact same things as proof that this movie is terrible. We’re really not that far off, I’ve just learned how to get a chuckle from some silly shit instead of get mad at it. If it’s the right type of silly shit. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Adam Scott, Burk Sharpless, Celese O'Connor, Dakota Johnson, Emma Roberts, IAWMCU, In Association with Marvel Comics, Isabel Merced, Jill Hennessy, Kerem Sanga, Kerry Bishe, Matt Sazama, Mike Epps, S.J. Clarkson, Sydney Sweeney, Tahar Rahim, Zosia Mamet
Posted in Reviews, Comic strips/Super heroes | 16 Comments »
