Random Reviews

[random axe]

Justice League: The New Frontier, from 2008.  WTF!  How is it that no one I know in real life has ever mentioned these movies?  Or, as far as I can tell, seen them?  I can't decide if this one's as good as Crisis on Two Earths, and my guess is that it's not quite as good.  It would be nice if it had been a little longer, although it seemed -- in a good way -- longer than it was.

OK, this is basically a Justice League version of Watchmen's sociopolitical issues except set in the late 1950s, introducing a lot of the characters as they're just getting established, as they have to overcome McCarthyism and mutual distrust so they can band together to fight more-or-less Shub-Niggurath.  And this ain't Comics Code Approved.  There's cursing, there's graphic violence, there's death, there's crap like you probably haven't seen.  It doesn't wallow in it, but it goes there.

And, like Crisis on Two Earths, it has an awesome cast.  I mean, seriously, if this were somehow live-action, would you not go see this cast?  They're voice-acting, but they could play the actual roles, even if the fit is a bit weird or a few of them might be slightly long in the tooth.  It would at least be worth seeing. 

- Kyle MacLachlan as Superman. 
- Lucy Lawless as a gritty Wonder Woman. 
- Jeremy Sisto as old-school Batman. 
- David Boreanaz as Green Lantern. 
- Neil Patrick Harris as the Flash. 
- Miguel Ferrer as the Martian Manhunter. 
- Kyra Sedgwick as Lois Lane.
- Brooke Shields as Carol Ferris (Green Lantern's billionaire aircraft-mogul girlfriend.)
- JFK as JFK.  OK, archival footage, but it fits.

Hell, the Avengers movie won't have a cast that compelling.  They even had a guy named Lex Lang as Rick Flagg.

Anyway, pretty magnificent, and for my money smarter and cooler and more fun than any of the live-action DC movies so far.  The fact that it's animated and not closely leashed by a big studio lets them do all kinds of good things you probably wouldn't get otherwise.

[pdrake]

okay, i don't write movie reviews as well as you, but i just watched, raising hell.

how does crap like this get made? i don't have a job and i'm looking every day and this shit is produced? it's like 12 hours of the worst episode of tales from the dark side.

seriously, do the people and actors involved in this look at it and even feel that they can tell their friends and others that they were in any way a part of this pile of excrement?

dood . . .

oh, and i guess there was a sequel. un-fucking-believable.

yeah, yeah, i know, "why did you watch it?" well, honestly, i heard it was creepy and good. i was working and guess not paying a lot of attention and just kept waiting for the good stuff. not even a money shot of the monster.

[random axe]

Don't watch Unearthed, then.

I'm not sure why horror attracts so many This Looks Like It'll Be Easy directors.  Maybe because the Raimis and Evil Dead are so famous?  Or because they think it'll give them an excuse to have a lot of scenes where it's too dark to see what's really going on?  I guess horror is also like porn in that a certain amount of mechanical production will at least produce the product -- show this, have that, use a lot of fluids, badda bing.

It's real easy to make a bad horror film.  But even so.

[random axe]

Something like a dozen movies on my Netflix list became available for Instant Play.  Alas, Netflix apparently doesn't notify you when that happens.  I just happened to look at the bottom of my Instant queue and see that they'd appeared.  I suppose there's no harm done . . . so long as they don't pass out of availability again before I notice them.

Anyway, I rewatched Star Trek: The Motion Picture, which I've always thought was a strange title.  I guess if they'd called it Star Trek: No, It's A Movie This Time, that wouldn't have gone over well.  And I never thought ST: Phase II was the best title for the proposed second TV series, but it wouldn't have made a worse film title. 

I also would have accepted:

Star Trek:  Holy Crap, It's V-Ger
Star Trek:  This Time, It's Impersonal
Star Trek:  The Next One Will Be Even Better
Star Trek:  You've Waited Long Enough
Star Trek:  To Baldly Go

Because, seriously, as a nation we were jonesing for Star Trek.  I won't pretend it's a prefect movie.  A whole bunch of it is seriously self-indulgent, but, again, it was intended as a fangasm.  There are a whole bunch of bits where the direction stalls out -- the tone gets confused, the acting gets wooden, the pacing falls apart, and it's just awkward.  There are several jumpsuit moments where better underwear was definitely called for.  And it would've been nice to have a story that involved the major cast a little more.

And, of course, it's a recapitulation and expansion of The Changeling, the original episode with Nomad, which wouldn't be a big deal if only Kirk had at some point turned to Spock and/or McCoy and said, hey, doesn't this kind of remind you of that time this happened before?  Then they re-re-used the idea for the funnier, faster-paced, better-loved Star Trek IV, which got away with it by smothering it with cheese, like it wasn't so much a storyline as a bad pizza sauce.  But I digress, and it's not like Trek didn't get away with foolish stretches before.  Or afterward.

Still.  The cast almost looks young, seen now.  The script isn't bad.  And the effects are freakishly good.  OK, a few moments are awkward and dated, or the matting edge is visible, but for the most part if you put this up against a much later big-production SF film with a constant-dollar similar budget . . . Stargate, let's say . . . it still looks awesome and original.  I guess it's time again to thank Hollywood for driving Douglas Trumbull away.

[random axe]

Netflix also sent me Dragon Tiger Gate, a HK kung fu film from 2006.  The DVD was so badly scratched and scuffed that I couldn't get it to play until I had a chance, this evening, to try it on my brother's super-duper-expensive DVD player.

Meh.  Shouldn't have bothered.  Donnie Yen and Yuen Wah, gotta be worth a try.  I didn't watch enough of it to see either of them.  In less than ten minutes I could see that no way was I going to like it.  The lead, Nicholas Tse, wasn't cool, and he might be able to do kung fu . . . but you can't tell from this one.  This film is of the CGI-altered wirework bullshit genre.  I cannot BELIEVE how many reviews I saw that said the fights looked realistic.  Compared to Dragonball, maybe.  This isn't a wu xia or superhero movie, but people can change direction in mid-air just by trying, etc, etc. 

And it's edited all choppy, and they kick people not only right off the ground but through the ceiling, and . . . you know what?  It doesn't even look good for what it is, so just stop right there.  It's a kung fu movie where the kung fu is stupid and fake and looks like crap.  Never mind.

It kills me, too, because I know damn well that Donnie Yen and Yuen Wah, getting older or not, can do amazing kung fu with no wires, no CGI, with the camera just sitting by itself on a tripod.  What a waste.  It might be a little harder to film, but it looks a hundred times as good.  I'd rather rewatch a good older film every time than watch this junk.

[random axe]

Timerider, from 1982, a time-travel Western that I mostly watched (A) because it was made by Michael Nesmith and his compatriot Bill Dear, and (B) because of the cast.  Man, that's a good cast for a very B movie -- Fred Ward, Belinda Bauer, Peter Coyote, and an excellent backup cast.  It does have one of the weaker subtitles in film history, The Adventure of Lyle Swann.

Truth be told, this movie's mostly best for kids in the 10-15 age range, I'd guess, although it has a couple of racy moments which probably aren't racy by current standards.  The direction is very made-for-TV, not cinematic, and the cast acts like they got the script the night before.  Also, much of the plot depends on two things that aren't entirely easy to believe.  First, it takes Fred Ward an awfully long time to realize he's traveled back in time.  It's plausible enough at first that he thinks he's just among backwoods yokels and nuts, but still.  Second, the locals are too impressed by his motorcycle -- and at times a little too confused by it.  I think a lot of them would at least know what a bicycle is.

Still, this isn't really important to the movie, which is fine in a Saturday afternoon Tremors sort of way.  And Belinda Bauer, how did she not get more big parts?  (I would certainly have given her one, wink wink nudge nudge.)  Actually, in RoboCop 2 (where she played the scheming psychologist / cyberneticist / whatever), she struck me as resembling MFM except much too tall.  In Timerider, there are a few scenes where she looks eerily like MFM, except too tall.  Seriously, it was extraordinarily distracting and a little depressing, although of course not many people will have this issue.

[random axe]

I forgot that Belinda Bauer was also in the great underknown film The American Success Company, where she was the gorgeous evanescent and slightly dim but demanding wife of Jeff Bridges, a downbeaten man who tries to turn his life around by kidnapping and impersonating himself with the help of a prostitute played by Bianca Jagger.

But anyway.

Saw Girly, aka Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny & Girly, a 1970 British horror / exploitation film that nowadays wouldn't pass for either and could almost be aired uncut on USA any afternoon.  The basic story is one of a demented family (whose members may not actually be related) living in a big rundown estate outside of London.  The kids (who are probably around 20) go into town occasionally to bring new people back to the estate, one way or another, and the family plays games with them until the guests are dead.  But a new guest arrives who is keen to stay alive but not so keen to escape, which upsets things a bit.

The Girly of the title is played by fine the under-used actress Vanessa Howard, who is fairly eye-popping as a psychotic Lolita here in schoolgirl outfits three sizes too small.  The violence is almost entirely off screen, often described or shown symbolically.  It works fine.  It's more of a charming dark comedy than a horror film, but there's a bit of suspense, especially as to how crazy and what kind of crazy the various characters are.  If it were remade today, it would probably be even broader and wind up too much like House of 1000 Corpses.

[random axe]

Looooong night, and I forgot one from a little while ago.

Horsemen, a horror film from last year.  And what a horror it is, oy.  Dennis Quaid plays a police detective who could have quickly and easily solved a string of gruesome Bible-inspired murders if only he'd ever seen three bad 'gritty' horror movies.  Lame.  Seriously, there are exactly two twists of any significance at all in this movie, and you should be able to guess both of them within about sixty seconds of meeting the relevant characters.

Even better, the film's directed in the most pretentious tiresome artiste style -- all while still recycling one sad cliche after another without a hint of irony.  I mean, are there crime scenes?  Of course, so we must have jump-cut shots timed to the flash of crime-scene cameras.  A moment of trauma?  Have the perspective character walk down a hallway in slow motion, ignoring what's going on around him, with the sound drowned out by a high-pitched tinnitus whine.  And so on.

Plus, it's violently dumb, implausible, and poorly constructed, meandering about in confusion and filmed with an impatient camera that seems to need to go to the bathroom.  Oh, and is there an overpowering abuse of the close-up?  Of course there is.  And its main gore gimmick, which is just not that great, appears to have been ripped off from Embodiment of Evil a year or two earlier.

Ziyi Zhang plays an 18-year-old who was adopted by Peter Stomare at age 8 but still has a strong Chinese accent, which is about logic par for the course.  And how is it Quaid can't get better films than this?  I mean COME ON.  He is trying so damned hard in this movie, and he doesn't suck, but here he is again.  IMDb says he's playing the John Lithgow role in the musical remake of Footloose coming out next year, and I gotta say I'm not going to hold my breath on that one.  But that one's gotta be better than this one.

[random axe]

I also started watching the recent remake of The Stepfather.  The original is a cult classic, so I guess I can see why they remade it, but you can't really replace Terry O'Quinn or Jill Schoellen.  Dylan Walsh and Sela Ward don't stink, but they replace Schoellen and the nicely creepy electra issues with oedipal issues revolving around some Dawson's Cricket (Penn Badgley?) who doesn't seem to be all that much. 

The script really has very little too it, though, and it really doesn't give you the feeling that any exciting twists and turns lie ahead.  I was bored senseless and gave up after about half an hour that felt like at least an hour.  Good cast, no tension.  Director has mostly done TV work, and the film has the look and feel of a TV movie -- but at least the camera is nice and steady, important details are in the frame, and there are very few extreme close-ups.  I'll take unexciting but effective camerawork over trendy crap anyday.

[random axe]

Annnd fortunately I took a whirl on one I'd never heard of, The Goods, from last year.  Basically, it's PCU crossed with Anchorman and Used Cars.  Jeremy Piven is the exaggerated fast-talking head of a specialist-for-hire sales team that's contracted to save a struggling car dealership.  It's just rapid nonsense, frequently absurd and crass and random, and I don't always like this kind of thing, but the tone here works for me.  I laughed regularly.

Ferrell's touch is evident, and the cast just seems to be enjoying it.  Kathryn Hahn looks so familiar, but looking down her IMDb resume, I think the only things I've seen her in are maybe three episodes of Crossing Jordan and Anchorman, although I don't remember her part in Anchorman.

[random axe]

Alien Trespass, a 2009 homage to 50s SF films.  Will from Will & Grace plays a Leading Scientist and an alien who copies his form.  Robert Patrick plays a cop.  To be honest, I was pretty bored.  The production values are good, and the saturated-color sets look nice, but it's kind of a dull wandering 50s SF film except the picture's crystal clear.

I guess I watched about half before I actually dozed off.  As a tribute, the tone's not quite right, and there are a few tiny jokes here and there, but this is not a parody like Monarch of the Moon.  Eh.  A nice effort, harmless result, but eh.

[SANMAN]

LUCY AND RAMONA, AND THEIR BUDDY SUNSET SAM!

I have this on VHS and cassette somewhere.

[random axe]

Yeah, I would pick up the DVD if I saw it cheap somewhere.


Battle For Terra, a strange little CGI SF film from 2007.  A lot of people have noticed similarities to Avatar -- humans come to ravage ecologically pristine alien world inhabited by tree-dwelling low-tech peaceful aliens, but a guy from the human vanguard gets a little emotionally involved with a female alien and becomes unhappy with the human plan, yadda yadda.  I really don't think Avatar in any way ripped this one off.  I think it's just a very old and generic SF trope.  I mean, I'm sorry, but this is basically FernGully, too, just for starters.

Anyway, Battle For Terra is a bit of an oddity.  The beginning is a bit twee for adults, but a lot of the movie is a bit dark and intense for little kids.  Probably about 10-15 is the right age range for this.  Also, although it has Evan Rachel Wood and Luke Wilson in the lead roles (and David Cross as the not-wisecracking robot and Brian Cox as the hardline general), the cast is littered with big names in small roles:  Mark Hammill, Dennis Quaid, Rosanna Arquette, Beverly D'Angelo, James Garner, Danny Glover, Amanda Peet, Ron Perlman, Danny Trejo . . . weird.  Not a bad thing, just weird.

The story is occasionally a little half-baked, but the animation is mostly nice, and the fight scenes and spaceships and such are non-generic and look sharp.  It's not Spirits Within, but it's easy to sit through and has a better ending, so there's that.  I heard critics really hated this movie, though, which doesn't seem warranted.

[random axe]

Eating dinner / unpacking movie was Monster in the Closet, a very unusual Troma film from 1986, although it was filmed a few years earlier.  What makes it unusual is that it has no gore, has almost no nudity (just Stella Stevens in a shower with some brief exposure of the north slope), and has a bunch of actors who have had careers outside Troma.

Seriously, they're mostly in small roles, but it has John Carradine, Claude Akins, Donald Moffat, Henry Gibson, Paul Dooley, and the aforementioned Stella Stevens.  Kind of surprising.  Oh, and the kid scientist is played by a young Paul Walker, of Fast and Furious, et al.  So there's that.

I chose it at random, but it's basically another parody of 1950s monster movies, which Netflix is clearly convinced is what I want to see.  And it's pretty funny, also sending up as many SF and horror films as it has time for.  It's all very gentle, and with the lower half of certain parts of Ms Stevens edited out, it would be no more risky for USA than Saturday the 14th.  It does slow down in the middle, but it's fine to have on in the background, and it has a lot of nice little touches.

[random axe]

Return of the Living Dead II, eh, not so much bad as flat.  Doesn't recapture the magic of the original, despite reusing some of the cast and making a few sly references.  It's too tame and aimless, although the doctor is fairly funny.  Well, you can't have everything.

IMDb tells me that the original's German release title was Verdammt, die Zombies kommen, which is possibly the best and funniest news I've had all week so far.  I may start using that phrase at work whenever a clustomer comes into the shop.