I don’t know why I never got around to seeing the THE CROW sequel from the director of SIX-STRING SAMURAI. Always was curious. Still took me 19 years. Lance Mungia’s THE CROW: WICKED PRAYER, just like the previous one, was meant for theaters, but I think it only played somewhere around here? Wiki(dprayer)pedia says its theatrical run was only in Seattle and only for one week, and I do remember seeing an ad for it and being confused, but I was thinking it was in Eastern Washington. Anyway, I didn’t go.
When I saw DOMINO on opening day in 2005, I really thought it was the worst shit ever. In fact, at some point I earnestly added a “the worst shit ever” tag to my review of it. Tony Scott’s most chaotic ever visual style and editing just scraped against me and took me out of the story (to the extent that there was one), and I fixated on that and raged against it in my review. This had happened to me only a couple of times before: first with CON AIR, then ARMAGEDDON, and later it would happen with TRANSFORMERS and DOOMSDAY. But DOMINO is the most stylistically aggressive of any of those, and arguably the most pretentious.
In my review I said Scott was trying to seem young and edgy, compared it to getting his ear pierced. In my mind at that time he was the guy who directed TOP GUN, and TOP GUN was a movie for jocks, military lovers and top 40 listeners. When that one came out I didn’t notice that its style was revolutionary, I just knew everybody loved it including my entire sixth grade class, which meant it was the height of mainstream popular culture about a year or two before I would start kneejerk rebelling against such things. So to have the TOP GUN guy, almost 20 years later, trying to do what screenwriter Richard Kelly calls on the commentary track “punk rock,” was just a joke to me. (read the rest of this shit…)
“He had an uneventful childhood. He played baseball with the other kids on the block, became fascinated with the antics of what later became his heroes – The Three Stooges, read Spiderman comic books, thought Jerry Lewis was hilarious and the Little Rascals even more so. What influenced Raimi to become the ‘horror meister’ of slash and gore films is not found in his past.”
—Dead Auteur: How a 20-year-old ex-college student carved out his horror niche in Hollywood by Sue Uram, Cinefantastique, August 1992
Immediately following Raimi’s very serious director period, his career changed drastically again. After so many stabs at the mainstream, he finally made the leap to genuine blockbuster filmmaking, bringing one of the most famous characters in the history of American pop culture to the big screen for the first time. This is not the use-Intro-Vision-to-stretch-the-budget-enough-to-try-to-compete-in-summer of DARKMAN and ARMY OF DARKNESS, or the work-with-huge-stars-but-scare-off-boring-people-by-doing-something-different-with-them of THE QUICK AND THE DEAD. I’m talking a super hero event movie with ten times the budget of DARKMAN, working with Sony Digital Imageworks to pioneer effects techniques that nobody was even sure would be possible, and finally sharing his talents with pretty much the widest audience possible for a movie. (read the rest of this shit…)
THE PAPERBOY is the new one from Academy Award nominee for Best Director Lee Daniels. That’s the guy that did PRECIOUS, BASED ON THE NOVEL PUSH BY SAPPHIRE as well as SHADOWBOXER, BASED ON THE IDEA THAT HELEN MIRREN AND CUBA GOODING JR. ARE ASSASSINS AND SHE RAISED HIM BUT ALSO THEY’RE FUCKING AND SHE HAS CANCER. I feel like the critical community embraced PRECIOUS without really picking up on how nutty it was, or doing a background check on Mr. Daniels’s previous work. So they did cartoony “wh-wh-whUHHH?” double-takes when THE PAPERBOY played at Cannes and had a part where Nicole Kidman territorially pisses on Zac Efron from HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL. Because it’s a Lee Daniels movie. (read the rest of this shit…)
WAYS YOU CAN SUPPORT THE SHIT OUT OF VERN & OUTLAWVERN.COM
if that's your thing:
1. Patreon
Toss me a couple bucks a month, support the good shit, also get access to a bunch of exclusive writing. This is my primary source of writing money that has allowed me to cut down to part time at the day job. Thank you!
2. Buy my books from your local bookseller or somebody
(NOTE: My ten year contract has passed on the Titan books, so I don't get residuals on them like I do WORM ON A HOOK and NIKETOWN, but I would love for you to read them because I'm proud of them)
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.
3. If you ever buy from Amazon, go through my links or search engines
(you pay the same amount you were gonna pay anyway they cut me a little slice)
I also have an Amazon UK one:
(I can't get the search box widget to work anymore, so click on MOONWALKER and then search for what you want.)
4. My exciting line of fashion and leisure products
(I get a couple bucks per item, you get a cool t-shirt, mug or lifestyle item)
5. Spread the word
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
* * * *
Recent commentary and jibber-jabber
Curt on Army of Darkness: “ARMY OF DARKNESS had a showing this month at my local indie/arthouse theater as part of their annual Halloween series.…” Oct 29, 02:00
Muh on Weapons: “I’m with Dread, the ending was amazing. Everyone I know who’s seen it has loved that sheyit. I simply threw…” Oct 28, 21:10
Skani on Weapons: “SPOILERS……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… Amy Madigan’s death fell flat for me. I appreciated the symmetry and karma of it all, but I thought…” Oct 28, 19:13
Dreadguacamole on Weapons: ““I didn’t care for it. It’s a lot of buildup for not a whole lot of payoff” I dunno. There…” Oct 28, 17:58
Skani on Weapons: “SPOILERS The mystery and general world-building in GET OUT are both much better. WEAPONS sets itself up as a sort…” Oct 28, 15:55
BuzzFeedAldrin on It Chapter Two: “For all of you turtle freaks out there, the miniseries Welcome to Derry seemingly goes out of its way to…” Oct 28, 09:07
Muh on Bring Her Back: “I had REALLY thought she was going to suceed and the daughter was going to turn away from the mother…” Oct 28, 08:33
Muh on Weapons: “I’m sure the cops DID triangulate, but they had already done a search of the house in question and found…” Oct 28, 08:30
Mr. Majestyk on Weapons: “Having slept on it, I’ve decided to leaven my criticism a little. It is watchable. I did not feel like…” Oct 28, 08:20
MaggieMayPie on It Chapter Two: “CJ it’s funny that you mention the tv miniseries alongside Twin Peaks because those are the two things that after…” Oct 28, 06:45
CJ Holden on It Chapter Two: “BTW, I do think that the TV version still holds up. Well, “holds up”. When it came out, it seemed…” Oct 28, 01:45
Adam C aka TaumpyTearrs on Skinned Deep: “I read this review last year, filed it away on my watchlist, and forgot as much as possible in the…” Oct 28, 00:53
Mr. Majestyk on Other: “Filming a zombie outbreak in one shot is a lot easier when said outbreak consists of one person at a…” Oct 27, 20:19
Mr. Majestyk on Weapons: “I’d almost convinced myself I was going to like this one, but sadly, I didn’t care for it. It’s a…” Oct 27, 19:37
Comrade Question on It Chapter Two: “IT was a super fun time in the theater with a crowd. IT HARDER was a good movie to watch…” Oct 27, 18:43