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Posts Tagged ‘Leon Russom’

The Primevals

Monday, June 3rd, 2024

THE PRIMEVALS is about an expedition to a forgotten land in search of ancient creatures untouched by evolution (but a little bit by aliens), and the incredible thing is that we as viewers are witnessing a similar miracle. The Ray-Harryhausen-esque fantasy film was first conceived and pitched in the late ‘60s by stop motion animators David Allen, Dennis Muren and Jim Danforth, and then had various false starts in the ‘70s and ‘80s, so by the time it was filmed by Allen with funding from Charles Band in 1994 it was already a throwback. Then Full Moon Entertainment’s financial situation stalled the completion of the animation, and the movie was left in limbo when Allen died of cancer in 1999.

You’d think that would be the end of it, but fortunately Allen left the storyboards and puppets with the right person – his friend Chris Endicott, an FX artist for many Full Moon and Marvel pictures. Another couple decades later, through Indiegogo funding and the hard work of many of Allen’s animator and VFX friends, the movie was completed and premiered at the Fantasia Film Festival last summer. I was able to see it a few weeks ago at the Seattle International Film Festival, and I had a great time with it. (read the rest of this shit…)

Double Dragon

Tuesday, April 6th, 2021

DOUBLE DRAGON (1994), loosely based on the video game series, is a sci-fi fantasy action kids movie from the director of THE RETURN OF BRUNO and the producers of NATURAL BORN KILLERS. I do not personally consider it to be a good movie, but upon this rewatch I found it somewhat enjoyable on the strength of its specific only-in-the-‘90s strain of complete inexplicability.

It stars Mark Dacascos (a year after ONLY THE STRONG, a year before KICKBOXER 5 and CRYING FREEMAN) and Scott Wolf (the same year Party of Five started) as martial artist brothers, Alyssa Milano (in the window between Who’s the Boss? and EMBRACE OF THE VAMPIRE) as the leader of a vigilante group, and Robert Patrick (who had only done FIRE IN THE SKY and two T-1000 cameos since T2) as an evil gang leader/businessman obsessed with obtaining an ancient Chinese medallion that would give him super powers. It takes place in the cyberpunky post-The-Big-Quake New Angeles in the futuristic year of 2007, with all the satirical billboards and colorful street gangs that implies. (read the rest of this shit…)