"CATCH YOU FUCKERS AT A BAD TIME?"

Spontaneous Combustion

tn_spontaneouscombustionThis afternoon I’m going to see LIFEFORCE in 70mm. I’ll let you know how that goes at a later date. But while I do that please enjoy this review of a later Tobe Hooper movie with fewer naked space vampires in it. Or at least enjoy it to the extent that you could enjoy any review of this particular movie.

SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION is a 1990 Tobe Hooper movie that I remembered being basically unwatchable back in the VHS era. But I was stupid back then. Who knows? Sometimes you gotta re-evaluate your opinions.

And man, I was totally wrong, because I actually did watch this one. Technically speaking it was watchable. Otherwise my impression was pretty accurate.

One thing I had no memory of: the first 20 minutes take place in the 1950s. A young couple, Brian (Brian Bremer, SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT 5) and Peggy Bell (Stacy Edwards, THE BLING RING [Sofia Coppola version]), who could almost be the parents from BACK TO THE FUTURE, have volunteered for an experiment where they will try to survive a nuclear blast protected by a bunker and a radiation immunization. (TIP: Do not fucking take that gig, I don’t care if you’re trying to fund EL MARIACHI!) After surviving the test they’re lionized as American heroes in a news reel, declared radiation free and “the world’s first nuclear family.” (read the rest of this shit…)

September 15th, 2016 | 32 Comments »

The Conjuring 2

tn_conjuring2If you thought the conjuring in THE CONJURING was the only conjuring, you’re in for a big surprise, buddy. Because now there’s a THE CONJURING 2 and I gotta tell you, it is not about dealing with the repercussions of the previous conjuring. It is one or more totally new conjurings.

In case you get your 1-2 word title ghost franchises mixed up, THE CONJURING is the one by James Wan (DEATH SENTENCE, FURIOUS 7) that’s not INSIDIOUS. INSIDIOUS is the one that stars Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne, THE CONJURING is the one that stars Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga. They play the famous “real life demonologists” Ed and Lorraine Warren, who were involved with investigating most of the alleged ghost cases that have been made into movies other than CASPER, which they were not able to investigate due to a scheduling conflict. This chapter opens with them on the case that became THE AMITYVILLE HORROR, but is mostly about the one that became GHOSTWATCH. (read the rest of this shit…)

September 14th, 2016 | 19 Comments »

Firestarter Rekindled

tn_firestarter2aka FIRESTARTER 2: REKINDLED

After watching FIRESTARTER for the first time since the ’80s I sorta remembered there being some kind of a FIRESTARTER 2 made during this century. I am a completist by nature (see my week of CARRIE movies for evidence) and I thought that might be good for a laugh, so I settled in to watch it real quick. Imagine my surprise when, early in the movie, I checked the running time and saw that it was 2 hours and 48 minutes! What I thought was just a DTV sequel was actually a Sci-Fi Channel mini-series (this is in the old, spelling accurate days before SyFy).

I guess technically this is a sequel to the book, not to the movie, because they have flashbacks to scenes from the movie and they’re reshot with Skye McCole Bartusiak (24) as Charlie, Aaron Radl as her dad and Karrie Combs (BRIDE OF KILLER NERD) as her mom. But mainly we have Charlie played by Marguerite Moreau (the MIGHTY DUCKS trilogy, FREE WILLY 2, WET HOT AMERICAN SUMMER). She’s all grown up and keeps a fire extinguisher under her bed for those nights when bad dreams set her bed ablaze. Living under a fake identity, she works at the Millington College academic archive, where she’s trying to uncover information about her dead parents and the experiment that started her firestarting. (read the rest of this shit…)

September 13th, 2016 | 9 Comments »

Firestarter

tn_firestarterFIRESTARTER is a classic tale of ’80s style supernatural paranoia. An innocent father and daughter are on the run from menacing agents of a secret government entity nicknamed “The Shop.” A university experiment with hallucinogens in the ’70s gave dad (David Keith, WHITE OF THE EYE) and now-deceased mom (Heather Locklear, MONEY TALKS) psychic powers, which have passed on to daughter Charlie (Drew Barrymore in her next movie after E.T.). She can sense things, sometimes move things, but her trademark is fire. When she gets angry at people things get hot. Mom and dad had been trying to teach her to keep it under control, with mixed success. You really gotta recognize what a difficult parenting challenge this would be even if The Man wasn’t out to get them.

So now it’s Take Your Daughter On the Lam Day. They’re hitchhiking, scrounging up change, using Jedi mind tricks. She’s already used to lying to people and using fake names. It reminds me of Starman (TV show), or The Golden Years, like this a Stephen King creation and also using The Shop as the antagonists. Through no fault of their own this family are considered dangerous, and the government wants to either use them as weapons or kill them. Neither seems appealing to them.

This kill-them-for-safety-purposes policy is obviously fascist and heartless, but it’s based in a reasonable fear that if this little girl can blow up cars with her mind what will she be able to do if she grows up? And will she do it? (read the rest of this shit…)

September 12th, 2016 | 22 Comments »

Hell or High Water

tn_hellorhighwaterHELL OR HIGH WATER is one of these contemporary westerns, sort of a NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN fan film about two brothers robbing banks and two old Texas Rangers trying to catch them. It starts from the perspective of Toby (Chris Pine, SMOKIN’ ACES) and Tanner (Ben Foster, X-MEN 3) driving through barren stretches of country highway robbing banks in tiny, impoverished towns from Texas to Oklahoma, in between being brothers, annoying each other, talking around painful shit from their pasts, etc.

They did not cast against type. Tanner is the Mr. Blonde, yelling at and pistol whipping bank employees, causing scenes, screwing a hooker in the same hotel room while his poor brother lays wincing and facing the wall. I think this guy’s gonna be trouble. And Toby is the thief with a heart of gold, or at least the one who looks humanely through his ski mask with big blue sympathetic eyes and isn’t a jerk when a waitress (Katy Mixon from East Bound and Down) has a nice talk with him. (read the rest of this shit…)

September 8th, 2016 | 39 Comments »

Hard Target 2

tn_hardtarget2It’s weird that they would make a HARD TARGET 2, huh? I mean, it’s a DTV sequel, and the kind that doesn’t have any of the same actors or characters, just the title and the premise. But the part that surprises me is that it means the Master Control computer and its algorithms have figured out that we love HARD TARGET, that it’s a title that means something to us. I hope HARD BOILED isn’t next. Maybe STONE COLD would be okay though if they did it right.

Anyway, they went ahead and made it, so I’m glad they got a solid group of people working on it. The director (and also director of photography) is Roel Reine, helmer of such enjoyable DTV part 2s as DEATH RACE, THE MARINE and THE MAN WITH THE IRON FISTS, and he filmed it in Thailand, where he has alot of experience. The script is credited to the relatively unknown Matthew Harvey & Dominic Morgan (FUTURESHOCK: COMET, one episode of Taggart), but a press release also named George Huang, the director of SWIMMING WITH SHARKS. (Not a shark movie. Ask somebody who was into film in the ’90s.)

In the lead is our greatest modern action star, Scott Adkins. He does not sport a mullet or Cajun accent, and he’s not playing Chance “My Mama Took One” Boudreaux or his son Fingers Crossed Boudreaux or anything like that. He’s Wes “The Jailor” Baylor, rising MMA star exiled to an underground fighting circuit in Thailand after accidentally killing his best friend in the ring. (read the rest of this shit…)

September 7th, 2016 | 84 Comments »

I Am Wrath

tn_iamwrathJohn Travolta was the villain in my favorite PUNISHER movie, and in the DTV movie I AM WRATH he kind of gets to be the Punisher. Or at least another government trained killer turned black-clad vigilante hunting down the gangsters who murdered his wife (Rebecca De Mornay, how did they get you in this?).

Actually it starts out more like DEATH WISH or DEATH SENTENCE. Travolta’s character Stanley is a seemingly normal guy, apparently he sells cars (although we only hear about this), his wife is picking him up at the airport and they get jumped by muggers in the parking garage who stab her to death. The police are no help, and let the killer go free even after Stanley identifies him in a lineup. What the fuck?

But 22 minutes in we get the JOHN WICK twist. Stanley smashes through a wall in his house and pulls out a suitcase full of guns, cash and passports – the ol’ emergency preparedness kit. Turns out he was a scary black ops dude who retired for his wife. No wife, no way to stop him from killing again. (read the rest of this shit…)

September 6th, 2016 | 16 Comments »

Kickboxer: Vengeance

tn_kickboxervengeanceIn this age of reboots one thing I didn’t see coming was a respectful attempt to resurrect the magic of KICKBOXER. Produced by Cannon when Jean-Claude Van Damme was still a new star, the original is a seminal film in the foundation of the western-star martial arts movie. Part of the beauty of the era it helped ignite was its disposability; there was such a hunger for this stuff on VHS that they kept churning out KICKBOXERs and BLOODSPORTs and BLOODFISTs with whatever Next Jean-Claude Van Damme they could get. And the combination of these basic story formulas and the appeal of seeing thick-accented martial artists try to act cool between flying kicks made for many enjoyable evenings for people all around the world.

Things have changed. Far fewer straight up action movies are made than in the ’80s and ’90s, and viewing them is not as common of a ritual for young people growing up. The fringe market of DTV has mostly shifted to VOD, a riskier business model since people actually have to watch the movies for them to make money. So, weirdly, this new KICKBOXER (released to VOD on Friday) was made with care, in hopes of people liking it. You can tell they’re genuinely trying to recapture what was fun about those movies, but in a modern context – by which I only mean it has nice digital cinematography of sunny Thailand and many of the opponents are played by famous UFC fighters. (read the rest of this shit…)

September 5th, 2016 | 30 Comments »

Blood Father

tn_bloodfatherBLOOD FATHER is the kind of simple story that I like. Ex-con, now-sober John Link (Mel Gibson, GET THE GRINGO) tries to help his long-missing daughter Lydia (Erin Moriarty, THE KINGS OF SUMMER) get away from a cartel that wants her dead. To do it he has to violate his parole, go into bars, talk to bad people from his past (people he did time for who are still free, people he did time with who are still locked up), and of course kill some people. He’s reluctant – in fact he’s pissed about it – and his sponsor Kirby (William H. Macy) is freaking out. But by diving back into this darkness (while trying to keep the guns and the meth out of Lydia’s purse) maybe he can find some kind of redemption. He can see that her life is a huge mess, and he knows where she got that from.

This is a badass tough guy movie, but the action (blunt, old fashioned) is pretty slim. Doesn’t matter, it’s a character movie. Gibson, with beard and craggy face, looks cooler and scarier than ever, and at one point he has an explosion of anger that recalls both his mad, lethal history of craziness on screen and its less fun counterpart in real life. But mostly he’s that grumpy dude who’s actually a sweetheart. Crotchety about the AA shit, but genuine about staying clean. Living in a much worse trailer than Riggs, but seems to be an active member of his trailer park community, not some loner. Pissing off his ex-wife, but mostly by not letting go of his obsessive search for their runaway daughter. (read the rest of this shit…)

September 1st, 2016 | 31 Comments »

Don’t Breathe

tn_dontbreatheDON’T BREATHE is the new film by EVIL DEAD remake director Fede Alvarez, and the most up-my-alley new horror movie I’ve seen in at least a couple years. Once it really got going I found myself alternating between wincing and having a big smile that I couldn’t get off my face. It’s produced by Sam Raimi, and I daresay it is almost a non-supernatural spookablast™. I’m not gonna say it’s as good as DRAG ME TO HELL, but that might be the last time I had this much fun watching a horror movie in a theater.

Now, keep in mind, I also liked EVIL DEAD. I had a great experience with some friends who all got a big kick out of its eviscerating-all-previous-standards-of-what-can-be-done-in-an-R-rated-movie audacity. Then almost everybody else I knew, both in life and in the comments here, seemed genuinely offended that I found any redeeming quality of any kind in that movie. It might be the most backlash I ever got for a positive review.

But I think this is different! It’s dark, and it definitely Goes Too Far at one point, but I think it’s more of a crowdpleaser. I think some of you guys will love it? (read the rest of this shit…)

August 31st, 2016 | 35 Comments »

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