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.
URBAN LEGEND (1998) is, to my mind, one of the most “obviously we’re making this because of the success of SCREAM” horror movies that exists. It’s another young-people-whodunit-slasher, with a similarly constituted cast of pretty young movie and TV stars, but instead of killings inspired by horror movie tropes, these ones are based on popular urban myths. At the time I think I took it as dumb but pretty enjoyable, which is also how I feel about it now, and about many non-classic slasher movies. Like most of them it benefits from age – it’s a time capsule now rather than the latest the genre has to offer, so we have different expectations for it. (read the rest of this shit…)
A RETURN TO SALEM’S LOT is Larry Cohen’s weirdo theatrically-released sort-of-sequel to Tobe Hooper’s TV mini-series of the Stephen King book. But really it just takes the location – the tiny town of Jerusalem’s Lot, Maine – and the idea of doing a vampire story there. It’s not the same vampire or the same type of vampire. It doesn’t connect, from what I remember. But I like that.
Joe Weber (Cohen’s muse Michael Moriarty) is an anthropologist working on a CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST type documentary when he finds he has to come home to look after his troublemaking teenage son Jeremy (one-time actor Ricky Addison Reed, who IMDb claims was cast to play Robin in Tim Burton’s BATMAN in scenes that were never filmed). Joe brings his son to the old, recently-inherited fixer-upper in his birth-town of Salem’s Lot (as some but not all abbreviate it). (read the rest of this shit…)
Before Riverdale, before the Marvel Cinematic Universe, before Christopher Nolan Batman, before 9-11 even, there was a different type of comic book movie: JOSIE AND THE PUSSYCATS. Inspired by the Archie comic book and Hanna-Barbera cartoon, writer/directors Harry Elfont & Deborah Kaplan told a goofy version of the little-rock-‘n-roll-band-tested-by-overnight-superstardom story.
Actually maybe we should forget about comics and consider this timeline: it was a year before American Idol started. The Spice Girls had packed it up the year before. NSYNC and Backstreet Boys were still popular. The movie seems to offer the Pussycats as a refreshing alternative for teenage girls to obsess over instead of boy bands, but it should be noted that Destiny’s Child, Alicia Keys, Jennifer Lopez, Janet Jackson, Brandy, Madonna, Mary J. Blige, Pink, and Aaliyah (plus Britney Spears and Jessica Simpson) all had hits that year. But I guess the Pussycats do stand out by playing instruments. Their songs are kind of sassy pop punk, not good in my opinion but not as intolerable as some in-movie music. (read the rest of this shit…)
From the director of PUNISHER #2 and the star of PUNISHER #3 comes a solid, entertaining period gangster movie. It’s a biopic of Danny Greene, an Irish American union president, gang enforcer and dodger of car bombs in Cleveland, Ohio circa early ’60s through late ’70s. If it had been done as two separate movies maybe it would’ve got an arthouse release and some critical respect, but they did it as one so it was barely released by Anchor Bay and nobody ever heard of it. (read the rest of this shit…)
What this movie is about is pie fucking. There is a kid who fucks a pie in it. There is also a guy who fucks a grapefruit apparently but you don’t see that. But this guy fucks a pie.
The version I saw is the unrated DVD, which I guess has extra pie fucking footage. in the original apparently it was a standing up with the pie position, wheras here it is a missionary position with the kid mounting the pie. The cover of the unrated DVD shows all the young gals on the cover but don’t be fooled, none of them do any pie fucking in the movie, it is only this one guy. (read the rest of this shit…)
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Recent commentary and jibber-jabber
JeffG on War Machine (2026): “I was really loving this movie until about 5 minutes after the giant robot showed up. I love the training…” Mar 25, 06:30
daniel on War Machine (2026): “@KayKay I kind of agree with you, 9 out of 10 times a movie’s entertainment value will trump its politics…” Mar 25, 03:05
anthony sanchez on War Machine (2026): “Vern are you doing a Chuck Norris tribute he was the lengendary badass.” Mar 25, 00:55
pegsman on War Machine (2026): “I know I’m on dangerous ground here, but I feel there are two additional ways to view this movie. And…” Mar 24, 23:46
Muh on Send Help: “I didn’t read the review til now cause I didn’t want spoilers, but regarding Drag Me to Hell…the thing that…” Mar 24, 22:58
Muh on Send Help: “Just saw it…basically it was okay. I thought the twist at the end was going to be a resort of…” Mar 24, 22:48
Muh on War Machine (2026): “Realistically there’s wouldn’t be a Chinese Vern criticizing government propaganda in their movies because his ass would be in prison…” Mar 24, 22:18
Muh on Scream (2022): “If there was no dedication to Wes at the end we’d call them assholes though. It’s the first Scream not…” Mar 24, 22:13
Mr. Shemp on Mother of Tears: “I just watched the fan edit the dude above me recommended and it improves MOTHER OF TEARS by about 40%.…” Mar 24, 21:11
The Allusionist on War Machine (2026): “Hopefully “Dangerous Animals” will put an end to the Jai Courtney curse, because he is completely ferocious in it.” Mar 24, 18:45
VERN on War Machine (2026): “I know what you mean, KayKay. I think if you check my reviews for WOLF WARRIOR 2, RRR and plenty…” Mar 24, 18:14
KayKay on War Machine (2026): “Yeah, I like movies with big, muscled dudes shooting big guns and taking out the trash (whether it’s rastafarian aliens,…” Mar 24, 16:57
Borg9 on War Machine (2026): “Some typos there, not all of them deliberate. Apologies.” Mar 24, 11:09
Borg9 on War Machine (2026): “I’ve largely forgotten this already even though I only watched it last week. This review seems more than fair, but…” Mar 24, 11:03
Petros MT on Protector: “Hey! Thank you for the responce. I also have seen “war machine”. Was the transformer part of the proud boys…” Mar 24, 05:00
URBAN LEGEND (1998) is, to my mind, one of the most “obviously we’re making this because of the success of 
A RETURN TO SALEM’S LOT is Larry Cohen’s weirdo theatrically-released sort-of-sequel to Tobe Hooper’s TV mini-series of the Stephen King book. But really it just takes the location – the tiny town of Jerusalem’s Lot, Maine – and the idea of doing a vampire story there. It’s not the same vampire or the same type of vampire. It doesn’t connect, from what I remember. But I like that.
Before 
From the director of 
What this movie is about is pie fucking. There is a kid who fucks a pie in it. There is also a guy who fucks a grapefruit apparently but you don’t see that. But this guy fucks a pie.
