REPLICANT is the second of three collaborations between director Ringo Lam (FULL CONTACT) and star Jean-Claude Van Damme. The first was the theatrically released MAXIMUM RISK (1996), then this came out in 2001, then IN HELL in 2003. I’m pretty sure I watched this when it first came out and thought it was boring, but I’m a different person now. A replicant of what I was before. Or just older, I guess. But the difference is that now I’m much more appreciative of JCVD the adventurous character actor, and this is one where that side of him really shines.
MAXIMUM RISK gave him a dual role, but not at once – he was a guy who dies at the beginning, then he plays his twin. In this one he plays both the antagonist and one of the protagonists, and they’re both fun characters for him to play. (read the rest of this shit…)
When I first encountered the trailer for INFINITY POOL I spotted Mia Goth, who gave one of my favorite performances last year in PEARL, so I knew I would be seeing it. Then I noticed Alexander Skarsgård, star of one of my other favorite 2022 movies, THE NORTHMAN. And at the end I learned it was the new one from writer/director Brandon Cronenberg, whose 2020 film POSSESSOR really knocked me on my ass, so this was a first show opening day kind of deal for me. And it lived up to my hopes.
It’s the story of novelist James Foster (Skarsgård, 13, BATTLESHIP, THE LEGEND OF TARZAN, GODZILLA VS. KONG) and his wife Em (Cleopatra Coleman, STEP UP REVOLUTION, IN THE SHADOW OF THE MOON) on vacation at a resort in the exotic foreign land of Latoka. It’s a beautiful place on the sea, but it’s creepy – fenced off with guards, tourists aren’t allowed to leave, so the closest thing to visiting the locals is going to restaurants in the resort’s fake downtown area. James is already thinking he was an idiot to believe this trip could break his six year lack of inspiration since publishing his one obscure and poorly reviewed novel. (read the rest of this shit…)
DUAL is the latest from writer/director Riley Stearns, which came to disc this week. I checked it out because I really Iiked his last one, THE ART OF SELF-DEFENSE, which stars Jesse Eisenberg as a “35 year old dog owner” who takes up karate after being assaulted, but is not remotely the movie I’d picture when hearing that description. At the end of my review I wrote, “I really like the feel he has here – a barren, generic town, people who speak oddly, an undercurrent of danger as this strange black comedy kind of turns into a thriller. It’s very unique.”
That sounds quite a bit like this one too, despite entirely different subject matter. DUAL is about clones and is set in a casually dystopian near future (or present?), so it’s technically a sci-fi movie, but it feels like it could be the same world as the previous one. It’s got the same sort of deadpan strangeness, plainness and bone-dry, bleak humor. There’s even some combat training that takes place in a room that might as well be one of the dojos in that movie. I wondered if Stearns ever considered using Allesandro Nivola’s asshole sensei character as the trainer, then I read that Eisenberg was announced as a cast member at one point, so maybe it would’ve been him. (read the rest of this shit…)
THE ISLAND I guess was Michael Bay’s big failure. He held his head high during his public shaming as the asshole who directed PEARL HARBOR, but this time he hit the type of bump that means more to him: he made a movie that didn’t make very much money. In the U.S. I guess it only made $36 million, which would be enough for his monthly Lamborghini allowance but doesn’t even cover a third of the shooting budget. For comparison, PEARL HARBOR made $75 million on its opening weekend.
Of course I’m coming to it eight years and three TRANSFORMERSes later having heard of its growing reputation as Michael Bay’s Not As Bad Movie. So when I was looking for a dumb summer blockbuster to get me in a summer movie mood it leapt off the video store shelf into my cold, reluctant embrace. (read the rest of this shit…)
I guess when THE 6TH DAY came out I was less loyal to Schwarzenegger than I am now. I thought it looked shitty, so I skipped it. And I kinda forgot I never watched it. But now I feel bad that nobody’s going to see the new Schwarzenegger and Stallone movies in theaters so I wanted to show my appreciation for their works by watching a movie from each of them that I skipped before.
With these low expectations THE 6TH DAY worked out well. It’s enjoyable lesser Arnold, clearly better than COLLATERAL DAMAGE and arguably more consistent than ERASER or END OF DAYS. It takes place in “the near future – sooner than you think,” when cloning is a thing. Cloning humans is illegal, but Re-Pets (clones of your dead pets that you can buy) are popular and Dr. Griffin Weir (Robert Duvall) has made strides in cloning human organs for transplants, though not without protest. (read the rest of this shit…)
SHADOW FURY is a cheap-ass 2001 sci-fi action movie about clones. It has one of those inexcusable keyboard-pretending-to-be-an-orchestra scores and the acting and dialogue are at higher cheesiness levels than I’ll usually put up with, i.e. worse than a SCANNERS sequel. But I really liked this movie because it rarely goes more than a couple minutes without a really cool action scene, a clever concept or a (usually unintentional) laugh. It has a similar energy to an early Isaac Florentine, so it fits that the director, Makoto Yokoyama, did second unit and stunts for the Power Rangers. An IMDb search finds 7 specific episodes directed by Florentine with Yokoyama on 2nd unit. So let’s call him the 2nd unit Florentine. (read the rest of this shit…)
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Recent commentary and jibber-jabber
CJ Holden on Skinned Deep: “I remember seeing the cover in the video store back in the days and ignoring the movie because it didn’t…” Dec 3, 09:40
Mr. Majestyk on Skinned Deep: “Always a thrill to get name-dropped in a Vern review. Since these are destined to someday be the sacred texts…” Dec 3, 09:22
VERN on Happy Sweet Potato Day: “I don’t think anyone thinks of it as a religious holiday. When I was growing up it was supposedly about…” Dec 3, 07:05
VERN on Nutcrackers: “Fred – I initially said 4 controversial horror movies but it really seemed like his first HALLOWEEN was well received…” Dec 3, 06:56
CJ Holden on Happy Sweet Potato Day: “Germany used to have Thanksgiving in October, but it wasn’t really anything relevant. More like “another day off”, if I…” Dec 3, 06:19
daniel on Happy Sweet Potato Day: “There are sections in ADDAMS FAMILY VALUES that explain the history of Thanksgiving :) As far as religion is concerned,…” Dec 3, 05:33
pegsman on Happy Sweet Potato Day: “That is sort of what I was angling for, the religious aspect of it. But people here a too classy…” Dec 3, 04:37
Borg9 on Happy Sweet Potato Day: “We can blame the Celts, rather than the Vikings, for Halloween, although it’s still just a harvest festival. I miss…” Dec 3, 04:23
pegsman on Happy Sweet Potato Day: “You’re partly right. All the big ones comes from the Vikings – Yule Tide, a variant of Easter and Midsummer…” Dec 3, 04:06
Borg9 on Happy Sweet Potato Day: “C’mon, pegsman, as an ignorant Briton and, yes, European, I’ve not been in Norway at this time of year, but…” Dec 3, 03:24
clubside on Nutcrackers: “The sad part, Vern? You realize the sad part, right? The sad part? You see it, right there, so near…” Dec 2, 23:07
pegsman on Happy Sweet Potato Day: “Maybe this isn’t the time, but can anyone tell us ignorant Europeans just what Thanksgiving is? Judging from movies and…” Dec 2, 22:19
Franchise Fred on Nutcrackers: “Trying to figure out which DGG horror movie WASN’T controversial. Maybe Halloween ‘18 was mostly well liked…” Dec 2, 21:52
VERN on Nutcrackers: “Hambone – It definitely has a sad aspect to the story, but the overall feeling is positive and uplifting and…” Dec 2, 16:32