"CATCH YOU FUCKERS AT A BAD TIME?"

SIFF: OUTLAW VERN Sees PISTOL OPERA and MISSING PERSONS!!

Hey, everyone. “Moriarty” here with some Rumblings From The Lab.

I’m giddy. I get to publish reviews by Outlaw Vern and Clarence Beaks, two of my favorite AICN contributors, in the same day. Vern’s in Seattle, checking out the scene at the Seattle International Film Festival, and has the following report to file:

Dear Harry and Moriarty,

Vern here. I saw two more movies at SIFF and here is what they are.

MISSING PERSONS

First of all I saw MISSING PERSONS which is a low budget computer animated feature done by two twin brothers named Matt and Dan O’Donnell. At least I think there are two of them, they are twins. And no these are not the creepy american twin animators who speak with british accents, you’re thinking of the Quay brothers. This is a completely different set of twin animators, as far as I can tell.

The credits only list these two guys, and then the songs, so apparently they did the entire thing themselves (all the animation, all the voices, even apparently designed the software, etc.) so it’s pretty impressive. On the other hand, for this reason it is not always up to the technical standards expected by most grown adults who watch cartoons. (read the rest of this shit…)

June 11th, 2002 | 2 Comments »

FBI takes advantage, To Afghanistan and Back by Ted Rall

Man I can’t believe this shit. I was too slow to see it coming. When FBI people right and left were coming forward to admit they blew it in regards to this whole September 11th deal, who woulda thought they would use it to their own advantage? Yeah, we knew alot of things, we didn’t do shit, 3,000 people died. The only way we can prevent this from happening again is if we get rid of all those stupid “don’t spy on your own people” and “probable cause” rules.

If you step back and take a look at it, you see that there is no logic in this. They had information that they refused to act on (whether out of incompetence, laziness, or pressure not to screw up the pipeline negotiations with the Taliban – take your pick) – so the way to fix this problem is to get more information to not act on? It makes about as much sense as the sport “rollerball” in the movie Rollerball (2002). (read the rest of this shit…)

June 7th, 2002 | No Comments »

Outlaw Vern Reports On BIGGIE & TUPAC From SIFF!!

SPOILER ALERT !!

Hey, everyone. “Moriarty” here with some Rumblings From The Lab.

Vern is one of my very favorite Internet writers about anything, much less movies. A reformed outlaw who channelled his energy into writing about films after his last stint inside, he’s been a constant presence on the web for the last few years, and he’s got a voice all his own. Here he is with a look at the new documentary from the always controversial Nick Broomfield:

Dearest Harry and Moriarty,

It has been a while since I’ve had my works printed on your page there (ain’t it cool news) but this time I got somethin that I think will move your heart. I know how much Tupac and Biggie Smalls mean to you young people today so I’m sure both of you are very anxious to see BIGGIE AND TUPAC, the new documentary about them from Nick Broomfield (who directed the Heidi Fleiss picture and maybe more in this vein, KURT AND COURTNEY). Because Tupac means to a young man like Harry or Moriarty the same thing Bob Dylan or Johnny Cash meant to their dads, only with more tattoos and brighter colored suits. (read the rest of this shit…)

June 3rd, 2002 | 23 Comments »

Undercover Brother

I’ve always been a man who enjoys this one kind of movie hero, let’s call it the counter-hero. The counter-hero is the type of hero who fits the usual mold of the action hero or super hero or what not, but who represents a set of values closer to yours or mine than of the assholes you usually see in movies.

For example you got Snake Plissken or Roddy Piper in THEY LIVE, who are sort of an anti-Rambo. They go around by themselves and take on armies and blow shit up but they aren’t doing it in the name of the american government or military conquest or nothing. Snake is the anarchist Rambo, Roddy is the anti-alien-republican Rambo. John Carpenter pictures are full of these type of characters. (read the rest of this shit…)

June 1st, 2002 | No Comments »

How High

What this is is Bob Dylan’s son decided to direct a completely retarded pot comedy starring Method Man and Redman. Now those names may sound like a couple of cartoon comic strip heroes but really they are just two rappers who found that music was too limited a form of expression to communicate their message. Now they are speaking in the language of Cinema, and the dialect of Friday.

Or that’s what they’re trying I think. The mentality is more along the lines of worthless attempted-comedy garbage like Revenge of the Nerds and Jay and Silent Bob Strikes Back. This is one of those movies where established adult music stars are playing teenagers, like House Party or Purple Rain, the movie where Prince is driving around on a motorcycle wearing fluffy scarves and purple leather coats with tails, but still lives with his parents. This is also one of those movies where the stuffy college dean and rich boyfriend and nerdy hall monitor dude either a) are the butt of some outrageous joke and they get so mad steam practically starts sprayin out their ears or b) get stoned, lose the starch from their collar and show that, believe it or not, they really know how to party! (read the rest of this shit…)

May 22nd, 2002 | 1 Comment »

Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones

STARWARS VOL. II: ATTACK OF THE CLONES

a.k.a. YODA VS. DRACULA

This is a picture that most people already have an opinion on, that will never change, whether they’ve seen it or not. This is only one of those opinions.

First of all, I enjoyed this picture. I laughed at some of the cornball speeches, the sometimes stiff acting, and a couple bad puns. But you know, I can get into this space ‘n robots shit sometimes, and for one main reason: Dracula. As you know from my review of Lord of the Rings Part 1, I enjoy any picture where some dude has a duel with Dracula. This one raises the bar by making the dude be a little green space-elf/Shaolin monk. (read the rest of this shit…)

May 16th, 2002 | 36 Comments »

Waking Life

It took me a while to get to this one because 1) cartoons are only for children and 2) it wasn’t nominated for the best animated feature oscar so it must not have been any good. so I watched Jimmy Neutron instead.

Actually that is all bullshit. I know this movie was beloved by critics and people alike. I even talked to one dude who hates all Richard Linklaters other movies but liked this one. As you probaly already know this is a movie that Linklater shot on digital video, then had computer animators paint over the video in their computer programs and turn it into surreal computer art type business. What the plot is about is this kid is dreaming, but he can’t wake up, and everywhere he goes people talk to him about free will or lucid dreaming or show off that they have some wacky quirk like they pretend their car is a boat. (read the rest of this shit…)

May 8th, 2002 | 31 Comments »

Spider-Man

Spider-man, Spider-man. Sam Raimi, Spider-Man. Bruce Campbell cameos. Spider-man. Spider-man. That is a song I Wrote.

Anyway. This is a picture by Mr. Sam Raimi only it is based on the popular children’s comic strip, “SPIDER-MAN”. If I remember right what that was about was a nerdy kid who gets bit by a magic spider so he puts on a red and blue bodysuit and swings around on webs saving people. This works on account of he now has magic spider powers to climb up buildings, make wisecracks, etc. My internet research indicates that the webs actually did not shoot out of his wrists, as any logical person might assume, in fact they were shot by mechanical laser watches or some stupid shit that Peter Parker invented and this apparently is the building block on which all Marvel Comics are built and should never be altered if Sam Raimi doesn’t want to face a fate similar to that of Salman Rushdie (i.e. years of fear and hiding, followed by a cameo in Bridget Jones’s Diary). (read the rest of this shit…)

May 3rd, 2002 | 37 Comments »

Whoops, that’s right, we DID know there would be terrorist attacks. Our bad.

Hey, remember when I was a paranoid conspiracy nut? And I was saying this ridiculous stuff about Bush knowing about 9-11™ in advance? Not even a year later now and even the mainstream press admits… whoops, if I wasn’t right, at least I was closer than they were.

At the beginning of the Enron scandal the Bush regime said they’d had only a half dozen meetings with Enron. Now that they need to distract us from this one they’re saying at least 60. And who knows how toned down that figure is.

If we can expect the same pattern in the “whoops, we were totally lying when we said 9-11™ was out of the blue” scandal then it’s hard to imagine the horrors they will be confessing to in the coming months. (read the rest of this shit…)

May 1st, 2002 | No Comments »

Jason X

JASON X is the future of slasher franchises left over from the ’80s, and not just because it’s about Jason Voorhees being frozen and defrosted in outer space 450 years later. No, this is the future because it finally figured out a good approach to keeping these stupid characters going. This isn’t trying to update things by infusing the same old crap with last month’s stale gimmicks. See for example the upcoming Blair Witch/webcast Halloween picture you see advertised before JASON X (although I do like seeing Buster Rhymes say “Trick or treat motherfucker!” – wouldn’t he make a better Dolemite than LL Cool J?)

No, this one works because it works as a genuine dumb slasher movie, as a parody of one, and as some weird pop culture accident where a familiar series got thrown into the wrong genre unexpectedly. It’s a more consistent attempt at the BRIDE OF CHUCKY approach to modern slasher sequels. Take the character and cliches from the earlier sequels, put them in a way more ludicrous situation (and it really is WAY more ludicrous in this case) and have fun. (read the rest of this shit…)

April 27th, 2002 | 33 Comments »

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