The day after WYATT EARP came out, HBO debuted a western of their own. BLIND JUSTICE stars Armand Assante (PARADISE ALLEY) as Canaan, a blind gunfighter who wears goggle-like sunglasses, enjoys cigars, and is introduced carrying a baby. When he’s surrounded by bandits he hands the baby to one of them and shoots the others. It made me think this was gonna be a western riff on ZATOICHI + LONE WOLF AND CUB, which sounds like a fun time to me, so I thought oh no, I’m gonna seem like a real heathen if I’m more enthusiastic about the cheap ass made-for-cable western of summer ’94 than the expensive theatrical ones by Richard Donner and Lawrence Kasdan. But I had nothing to worry about.
The baby isn’t his, and is too young to participate in the violence, as good ol’ Daigoro does in LONE WOLF AND CUB. This one’s an infant girl he doesn’t even know the name of because “the poor man” he took her from died before he could tell him her name. “It was a shame I had to kill him,” he says. But he promised to bring her to her mother in some town called Los Portales that no one has ever heard of. In his search he ends up in San Pedro, a border town where cavalry men are holed up, protecting a shipment of silver for the mint, unable to leave because the only road through the canyon is blocked by the sadistic bandit Alacran (Robert Davi, CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS: THE DISCOVERY) and his men. (read the rest of this shit…)
I remember seeing I STILL KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER when it came out. I believe I enjoyed it for what it was – it had the appropriate ratio of competence to goofiness for a slick studio teen slasher sequel in the post-SCREAM era. I did not know or remember that it made less than the first film did on a bigger budget. Of course, this was 1998. They had not yet run over the home video industry, thrown it in the sea and vowed to never speak of it again, so that was where horror movies would thrive, and it at least made enough to justify a DTV sequel.
Things were different then. Horror was more disreputable, even when it was expensive and starred beautiful people from TV shows. Critics had taken to SCREAM, but of course they were gonna hate the goofily titled sequel to SCREAM’s less show-offy, more traditional cousin. But fuck ‘em. This is a solid slasher sequel. Not in the sense of “this is one of the all time great horror movies,” but in the franchise slasher sense of “we took this format and put some enjoyable spins on it and there are some cool touches and some enjoyably dumb ones so I can rewatch it every once in a while and still enjoy it.” That’s what I wanted, and this delivered. (read the rest of this shit…)
Bruce Willis is… THE JACKAL. This one came out in 1997, between THE FIFTH ELEMENT and MERCURY RISING. It was coming off an adventurous couple of years in Bruce’s career that included NOBODY’S FOOL and 12 MONKEYS, and this is more of a normal Hollywood picture than those, but it was still an unusual role for him. He’s top-billed over Richard Gere (who was between RED CORNER and RUNAWAY BRIDE) but playing the antagonist, a very cold and serious assassin hired to kill the head of the FBI.
It comes from director Michael Caton-Jones (DOC HOLLYWOOD) and it’s based on Kenneth Ross’s screenplay to the 1973 Fred Zinnemann film DAY OF THE JACKAL, which itself was based on a 1971 novel by Frederick Forsyth. The new screenplay is credited to Chuck Pfarrer, a national hero because he wrote HARD TARGET and part of DARKMAN. (He was also a Navy SEAL and wrote NAVY SEALS.) Reportedly there was an uncredited rewrite by Kevin Jarre (who has a “story by” credit on RAMBO: FIRST BLOOD PART II). (read the rest of this shit…)
Oh, WATERWORLD, how I’ve been meaning to rewatch you. Maybe I should’ve done it before FURY ROAD, though.
Let’s get the “flop” shit out of the way first. This is still most famous as a big expensive movie that pretty much just broke even. I don’t care. That’s none of my business. I’m old fashioned.
I always thought it was treated unfairly at the time. It was in the news for going over budget and the popularity pendulum was swinging back on Kevin Costner after a bunch of Oscars and hit movies. It became everybody’s target and they were excited for how terrible it was supposedly gonna be. (This article from The Independent at the time examines the reasons for the backlash against Costner.)
Here, let me check if it was nominated for Razzies. Yep, Dennis Hopper won worst supporting actor and it was nominated for worst picture, actor and director. (SHOWGIRLS was the big winner that year.) So that speaks well of the movie if those assholes were against it.
We’ve been looking at the other movies of that summer, so we can see in context that it’s somewhere in the upper range of quality for what was in theaters at the time. It’s for sure less embarrassing than BATMAN FOREVER or MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS: THE MOVIE, more impressive than CONGO, arguably better than JOHNNY MNEMONIC or JUDGE DREDD. It didn’t deserve all the hate that it got.
TROPIC THUNDER pretty much won me over only a few seconds in when I realized that the rapper character played by Brandon T. Jackson called himself “Alpa Chino.” Completely ridiculous and totally plausible. So many rappers are obsessed with SCARFACE, CARLITO’S WAY and THE GODFATHER, and so many name themselves after notorious figures: Capone, Noreaga, Moriarty, Scarface, Rick Ross, Freeway, 50 Cent, Beanie Sigel, Irv Gotti, Young Gotti, Daz Dillinger, Kenn Starr, Jim Jones, Hittler. And I seriously only made up two of those names. So the possibility of Alpa Chino’s Booty Sweat Energy Drink actually existing is so likely that I think most of the crowd really wasn’t sure if the movie had started or if this was a real advertisement. (read the rest of this shit…)
As much as I agree with Vern’s take on the wretched DIARY OF THE DEAD, I disagree with him here. But I’ll get into it when I publish my review later in the week. For now, here’s Vern, who has been Sweded.
You might know the premise. Mos Def works at an all VHS video store. Jack Black is magnetized (long story). (No, come to think of it, short story. He climbs into a power plant and gets shocked.) Jack Black’s brain erases all of the videos in the store, and Mia Farrow demands to watch GHOSTBUSTERS. So they dress up, go to the library and tape their own ridiculous home-made version of GHOSTBUSTERS directly onto the tape. Because they don’t want Danny Glover to know they fucked up. And it goes on from there. (read the rest of this shit…)
Hi, everyone. “Moriarty” here with some Rumblings From The Lab…
Okay, so it’s not the first one ever. Or even in the first hundred at this point. But it’s before mine, and it’s by Vern, so there’s two things it’s got going for it. Check this out:
What’s up fellas –
I heard some shit about your butts were numb or something like that. Sorry to hear about that I hope you get well soon.
Anyway here’s the deal. I saw KING KONG. Not sure if you know about this one but it is a remake of an older picture from ’33 or so. This version is by Pete Jackson who won an Oscar, etc. You LORD OF THE RINGS fans will know who I’m talking about. If not there is always the internet. I’m not sure if they have IMDB translated into elfish, but I’m sure you can find the information somewhere or other. (read the rest of this shit…)
Sometimes a movie comes along without much of a push, and without much commercial appeal, and not very many people go to see it or even hear about it. But most of those who do are pleased to find that it is an unusually good picture. They tell their friends about it, they write rave reviews of it. Then your connection in the home video industry, Pornographical Jerry, hooks you up with an advanced preview cassette of the picture and you give it a shot. And holy shit, it turns out to be the best movie you’ve seen in a long fucking time. Now you can’t wait to use your power and responsibility as an acclaimed Writer on the films of Cinema to promote the movie, so you try to time your review to come out on the day it is released so that all the little Outlaws out there will storm into their chain video stores and say look asshole, where is it? Where is Jesus’ Son fer cryin out loud, don’t give me that never heard of it look, this is a highly acclaimed movie. “Oh, you mean the one on Vern’s sight? Right over here, sir.” (read the rest of this shit…)
In Hollywood they have a saying that goes something like, “if you can’t think of anything funny, put a movie star in a fat suit.” On some magazine I saw on a news stand they had another saying that goes, “Fat suits: the new blackface.”
It’s true too. I mean the less acceptable it becomes to make fun of the gays, the more people need somebody else to pick on. So they start pickin on these big folks.
I don’t know why but for some reason people think it’s hilarious to see a celebrity made up to look all fat. They did it on Big Momma’s House. They did it on one of those sitcoms that is popular now, I believe it was either Friends or Cheers. The one about the kids in the apartment who have relationships, etc. Also Eddie Murphy did it. He thought it was so funny he based two movies around it. And within each movie he had to play four or five different fat characters in order to try to fill the whole movie with laughs. (read the rest of this shit…)
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if that's your thing:
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EXTRA CREDIT: Review them on Amazon! That would really help me out. Unless you didn't like them, in which case forget I said anything.
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(I can't get the search box widget to work anymore, so click on MOONWALKER and then search for what you want.)
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Tell your friends about my reviews and my books and everything. Only cool people though please, we don't need a bunch of suckers and/or chumps around here.
THANKS EVERYBODY. YOUR FRIEND, VERN
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Recent commentary and jibber-jabber
Steven E on Sinners: “I left the cinema thinking this was a really good film but one that was probably and frustratingly a slight…” Apr 25, 16:41
Skani on Sinners: “Very much looking forward to this one and the surely much crappier UNTIL DAWN. Gonna avoid this review to stay…” Apr 25, 13:44
Ben C. on Sinners: “I had a great time with this movie. Man, it’s a real rollercoaster – beautiful to look at, emotional, super…” Apr 25, 13:17
MaggieMayPie on Sinners: “I came out of this movie buzzing. The scene you talk about everyone bringing up first thing – absolutely. Everything…” Apr 25, 12:37
Chase on Sinners: “When its all kicking off in the bar one of the Jordans is wearing a waistcoat which was surely a…” Apr 25, 11:58
VERN on Sinners: “For me it’s gonna be hard for him to ever top CREED (a perfect, miracle movie in my mind) but…” Apr 25, 11:57
Ben Railton on Sinners: “I asked (in a random comment on a different review, and obviously after Vern had already seen this one, but…” Apr 25, 11:32
DEKE RIVERS on Cabo Blanco: “The movie is better than I thought. It’s not that much like Casablanca, but it does look like something Bogart…” Apr 25, 08:17
Franchise Fred on Urban Vengeance: “And his name is Jack Urban? Sold!” Apr 24, 19:42
Miguel Hombre on Urban Vengeance: “Can’t fault a filmmaker who gives the stunt crew a screen credit at the start of the film (after his…” Apr 24, 10:49
Andrew on Dark Skies: “I knew a bullying asshole who was, unfortunately, webmaster of a forum I was a member of, and insistently mocking…” Apr 24, 10:37
John_Matrix on Ninja Scroll: “Easily one of the best anime/ninja films ever. The line “…..Genma! Burn in your golden hell” lives rent free in…” Apr 24, 02:48
John_Matrix on Dark Skies: “The only finishes Vern offers are “Unvarnished”, and occasionally “Teal Sparkle”……but that’s usually out stock. Not glazing, but Priest had…” Apr 23, 23:28
VERN on O’Dessa: “Justin – Well when you put it that way yeah, I would definitely take HIGHLANDER: SEARCH FOR VENGEANCE over O’DESSA.…” Apr 23, 22:40
June 25, 1994
I remember seeing I STILL KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER when it came out. I believe I enjoyed it for what it was – it had the appropriate ratio of competence to goofiness for a slick studio teen slasher sequel in the post-SCREAM era. I did not know or remember that it made less than the first film did on a bigger budget. Of course, this was 1998. They had not yet run over the home video industry, thrown it in the sea and vowed to never speak of it again, so that was where horror movies would thrive, and it at least made enough to justify a DTV sequel.
Bruce Willis is… THE JACKAL. This one came out in 1997, between 
SPOILER ALERT !!
Hey, everyone. ”Moriarty” here.
SPOILER ALERT !!
Sometimes a movie comes along without much of a push, and without much commercial appeal, and not very many people go to see it or even hear about it. But most of those who do are pleased to find that it is an unusually good picture. They tell their friends about it, they write rave reviews of it. Then your connection in the home video industry, Pornographical Jerry, hooks you up with an advanced preview cassette of the picture and you give it a shot. And holy shit, it turns out to be the best movie you’ve seen in a long fucking time. Now you can’t wait to use your power and responsibility as an acclaimed Writer on the films of Cinema to promote the movie, so you try to time your review to come out on the day it is released so that all the little Outlaws out there will storm into their chain video stores and say look asshole, where is it? Where is Jesus’ Son fer cryin out loud, don’t give me that never heard of it look, this is a highly acclaimed movie. “Oh, you mean the one on Vern’s sight? Right over here, sir.” 
In Hollywood they have a saying that goes something like, “if you can’t think of anything funny, put a movie star in a fat suit.” On some magazine I saw on a news stand they had another saying that goes, “Fat suits: the new blackface.”
