I didn’t know what a NYAD was, but it’s the last name of a real life person, Diana Nyad, a marathon swimmer who broke a bunch of distance records in the ‘70s and in 1978 tried to swim from Havana to Key West. She made it about 76 miles in 42 hours but had to quit.
Now it’s 2010, she’s played by Annette Bening (MARS ATTACKS!), she’s been retired since her 30th birthday, and she’s just hitting her 60th. She spends her time with Bonnie (Jodie Foster, HOTEL ARTEMIS), they seem like a couple at first, but they’re just best friends. Quirky lesbian pals. Since she’s been angsty about aging, Bonnie convinces her to get back into exercise, and she swims for the first time in years. That goes well, so she announces out of the blue that she’s going to try the Cuba swim again. Bonnie is kinda like jesus christ lady you cannot be serious and then somehow agrees to be her coach. (read the rest of this shit…)
“THE 51ST STATE is very dear to me, because it was the first time in Hollywood that I didn’t have to deal with dolls.” –Ronny Yu, 2004
Three years after the unlikely career milestone of BRIDE OF CHUCKY, Ronny Yu made easily the weakest of his English-language films – a UK-Canada co-production called THE 51ST STATE, but we call it FORMULA 51 here so people don’t think it refers to DC statehood. (Actually I’m not totally clear what it does refer to. But the number 51 is in the name of a super-drug that’s central to the plot.)
Under any name it’s a thoroughly 2001 film, with wall-to-wall dated music (score by somebody called Headrillaz), annoying whooshes and flash cuts, character names and descriptions written on screen as they’re introduced, a long scene at a rave type dance club, and two stars – Samuel L. Jackson and Robert Carlyle – who had ridden the ‘90s indie wave to the specific level of commercial viability where they could be cast in stuff like this. It’s one of a handful of movies, along with THE NEGOTIATOR and SHAFT, that could arguably be considered a straight up Samuel L. Jackson vehicle. But even though it starts and ends with him he’s kind of a mysterious, unexplained character, while co-star Carlyle gets to have the love story and sex scene. (read the rest of this shit…)
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, eh? More like THE YOU KNOW TO BE HONEST I KINDA LIKED THIS ONE SPIDER-MAN if you ask me.
Over the years I’ve gained a rep as an anti-Nerdite, due to some of my challenging of online conventional wisdom and use of insensitive terminology (some people get mad when I use “nerd” instead of “geek”). But the truth is I rarely miss a comic book movie, and I even like some that you all hate (SPIDER-MAN 3, X-MEN 3, MAN OF STEEL it seems, probly something else I’m forgetting). Not to mention the whole issue with STAR WARS prequels and CRYSTAL SKULLs. Face it, geeks – I like this shit more than the people who like it do!
That’s why it surprises me that I never got around to seeing THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN until now. I mean I had intended to see it in the theater in 3D and everything. But everybody said it was bland and they confirmed that they really were re-doing the original story already so I lost the urgency and never got to it. (read the rest of this shit…)
Yes, it’s true, this is a movie about Mickey Rourke and Bill Murray fighting over Megan Fox because she has wings. Mickey plays a jazz trumpeter (the serious type who always wears colorful suits, a fedora and pointy shoes) who gets in trouble because he accidentally slept with the wife of a gangster named Happy (Murray). So he gets beat up and left in the desert.
When he wakes up he wanders and finds a carnival with a sideshow. That’s where he sees this winged lady. Not riding a ferris wheel – she’s in the sideshow, because she has wings. Not sure if you got that. (read the rest of this shit…)
GREENBERG (Ben Stiller from NEXT OF KIN) is a 40 year old sometimes-carpenter who, after some kind of breakdown and stint in a mental hospital, comes to house sit (crash at) his banker brother’s place in L.A. while the family’s on a business vacation to Vietnam. His plan is to “do nothing,” but he’s a huge fucking baby so he starts getting the family’s nice assistant Florence (Greta Gerwig, HOUSE OF THE DEVIL) to shop for him, have a relationship with the dog for him, etc. Through horrendously awkward maneuvers he gets sloppily into her pants and makes things weird. Then he starts being a dick until she doesn’t want to see him again, but the dog gets sick and he doesn’t have a car so she has to bring him to the vet, etc. Romance does not ensue, just awkwardness. (read the rest of this shit…)
This is a story about the dude who Wrote BEING JOHN MALKOVICH and how if that movie alone didn’t prove that he was some kind of demented genius, then this one does. HUMAN NATURE is the story of a woman with a hormonal problem causing her whole body to be covered with hair, who lives among the animals until she falls in love with a scientist whose life work involves teaching mice the difference between a salad fork and a regular fork. Together they try to civilize a feral man who grew up in the woods thinking he was an ape.
Sounds completely silly and random, right? But what surprised me, a film expert, was the amount of Substance in there. If this were just a regular, make you laugh kind of comedy it would still be the most original, and funniest, in a long time. There were less than ten people at the showing I went to and I was embarassed because I was laughing harder than anyone else. But believe me, I’m the one that’s right. This movie is fuckin hilarious. (read the rest of this shit…)
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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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THANKS EVERYBODY. YOUR FRIEND, VERN
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Recent commentary and jibber-jabber
Aktion Figure on How To Blow Up a Pipeline: “Nah Vern, this is all on me. I’m trying to parse out why I had that knee-jerk reaction to a…” Apr 18, 07:41
Mr. Majestyk on Legend of the Eight Samurai: “Solid review. What got me about the ending was how it recontextualized what up until then I had thought was…” Apr 18, 05:37
renfield on How To Blow Up a Pipeline: “Glad you caught this one Vern. Chapo Trap House did a cool interview with the filmmakers… the details about how…” Apr 17, 23:11
Adam Caka TaumpyTearrs on Legend of the Eight Samurai: “I finally got my epic Bastard Swordsman write-up done, and Maj I linked your remix in my review! https://adamsoverduereview.wixsite.com/adam/post/bastard-swordsman-1983 Still…” Apr 17, 22:36
VERN on How To Blow Up a Pipeline: “I mean, maybe it’s a spoiler, but the fictional characters aren’t poseurs. They do blow up a pipeline. I guess…” Apr 17, 21:59
Mr. Majestyk on Cosmopolis / Maps To the Stars: “Miguel: Thank you for bringing GINA to my attention. I loved every second of it. A sleazy exploitation thriller, a…” Apr 17, 21:00
Glaive Robber on How To Blow Up a Pipeline: “Oh, a little off-topic… has anyone heard about this new martial arts movie Absolute Dominion? Directed by Lexi Alexander, with…” Apr 17, 20:31
Glaive Robber on How To Blow Up a Pipeline: “@Vern, hadn’t heard that Legendary was upset with it, but I’m not surprised. PIPELINE is pretty straightforward, but “Cam” gets…” Apr 17, 20:29
Aktion Figure on How To Blow Up a Pipeline: “Vaguely heard of this one. You make it sound alright but, man, I dunno. It gives me (from the outside)…” Apr 17, 20:03
KayKay on G20: “Am with Petros. Am always down for some Viola Davis and the DIE HARD template never ever gets old for…” Apr 17, 18:15
VERN on How To Blow Up a Pipeline: “JTS – Whoops, thanks for the correction. Glaive – Oh wow, I didn’t know that. The article I found said…” Apr 17, 14:21
Glaive Robber on How To Blow Up a Pipeline: “Very frustrated about that Faces of Death redo/reimagining. Supposedly that thing wrapped two years ago, and no distributor will touch…” Apr 17, 12:29
JTS on How To Blow Up a Pipeline: “Great review. I also really liked this one. Lukas Gage wasn’t the villain in the Road House remake, though, that…” Apr 17, 10:59
VERN on G20: “Petros, I think my “it’s fine I guess” review was much more damning than your exaggerations of how bad it…” Apr 17, 10:13
I didn’t know what a NYAD was, but it’s the last name of a real life person, Diana Nyad, a marathon swimmer who broke a bunch of distance records in the ‘70s and in 1978 tried to swim from Havana to Key West. She made it about 76 miles in 42 hours but had to quit.
“THE 51ST STATE is very dear to me, because it was the first time in Hollywood that I didn’t have to deal with dolls.” –Ronny Yu, 2004
Yes, it’s true, this is a movie about Mickey Rourke and Bill Murray fighting over Megan Fox because she has wings. Mickey plays a jazz trumpeter (the serious type who always wears colorful suits, a fedora and pointy shoes) who gets in trouble because he accidentally slept with the wife of a gangster named Happy (Murray). So he gets beat up and left in the desert.
GREENBERG (Ben Stiller from NEXT OF KIN) is a 40 year old sometimes-carpenter who, after some kind of breakdown and stint in a mental hospital, comes to house sit (crash at) his banker brother’s place in L.A. while the family’s on a business vacation to Vietnam. His plan is to “do nothing,” but he’s a huge fucking baby so he starts getting the family’s nice assistant Florence (Greta Gerwig, 
This is a story about the dude who Wrote BEING JOHN MALKOVICH and how if that movie alone didn’t prove that he was some kind of demented genius, then this one does. HUMAN NATURE is the story of a woman with a hormonal problem causing her whole body to be covered with hair, who lives among the animals until she falls in love with a scientist whose life work involves teaching mice the difference between a salad fork and a regular fork. Together they try to civilize a feral man who grew up in the woods thinking he was an ape.
