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Recent Viewings, Part 2

Started by Rev. Powell, February 15, 2020, 10:36:26 PM

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Dr. Whom

Quote from: Rev. Powell on August 27, 2022, 06:44:29 PM
MST3K: THE BATWOMAN: The experiment is Mexican junk in which a Batwoman in a bikini (who doubles as a luchador, naturally) fights a mad scientist who's turning wrestlers into fish-men; meanwhile, back on the Moon, Kinga and Pearl are on a time-travel vacation, leaving a flustered Max and Synthia in control. The scenery in Batwoman is nice (I mean Acapulco, of course) and the movie is certainly goofy, but I didn't think the writing on this one held up. To me, this is #7 out of the 8 current Gizmoplex episodes. 2.5/5.

My favourite scene in the movie is when the mad scientist has had a run in with Batwoman, and then sees her without her disguise snooping around his yacht, unlike any villain in any Batman adjacent version ever, he immediately puts two and two together and goes: that must be Batwoman.
"Once you get past a certain threshold, everyone's problems are the same: fortifying your island and hiding the heat signature from your fusion reactor."

Wenn ist das Nunstück git und Slotermeyer? Ja! ... Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.

Dr. Whom

Chungking Express (1994)

This consists of two stories told consecutively. In the first, a brokenhearted cop has a brief infatuation with a femme fatale drugrunner. In the second, another cop who was dumped by his girlfriend attracts the attention of a manic pixie dream girl. Wong Kar Wai is at the top of his game here, and the first section can serve as an example to modern filmmakers that you don't need two hours to create a world and characters. Whether you'll like the second depends a lot upon your tolerance levels for whimsy and manic pixie dream girls. Mine are pretty low.
Anyway, visuals and atmosphere are much more important than plot in both.
"Once you get past a certain threshold, everyone's problems are the same: fortifying your island and hiding the heat signature from your fusion reactor."

Wenn ist das Nunstück git und Slotermeyer? Ja! ... Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.

lester1/2jr

In Snowbeast did they have Baked Alaska for desert at the lodge?

FatFreddysCat

"Max Reload and the Nether Blasters" (2020)
A teenage gamer mysteriously comes into possession of an extremely rare, long-lost '80s video game cartridge. Unfortunately, the game has a curse on it that releases an ancient evil into the world when he plays it. Now he has to assemble a "team" of fellow players (and the estranged programmers of the original game) to try and stop it.
...this was a fun, low budget sci-fi/action/fantasy comedy, apparently funded by a Kickstarter campaign, that should appeal to fans of "Ready Player One," "Pixels," and "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World." The young cast members are fine, and a few familiar faces like Greg Grunberg and Kevin "Clerks" Smith turn up in supporting roles. Not bad for a random Tubi pick.
Hey, HEY, kids! Check out my way-cool Music and Movie Review blog on HubPages!
http://hubpages.com/@fatfreddyscat

Rev. Powell

WALKER (1987): The true story of William Walker, a 19th century adventurer who raises a mercenary army with the backing of Commodore Vanderbilt and goes to Nicaragua to join their civil war and bring democracy to the country, but becomes mad with power and becomes dictator for two years until he's deposed and executed. Imagine "Aguirre the Wrath of God" directed by Ken Russell (if he was obsessed with politics instead of sex and Catholicism). Ed Harris gives a good performance and Alex "Repo Man" Cox keeps the anti-colonialism satire on-the-nose (Walker only speaks English to his mistress, who only speaks Spanish to him) but still effective and cutting. Universal gave it a decent mid-sized budget but barely released the final product, and Cox's career was basically over. Underrated. 4/5.
I'll take you places the hand of man has not yet set foot...

lester1/2jr

Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1920) - pretty good version with the great John Barrymore as the infamous doc. If you liked the 1931 version you'll probably appreciate this. It's a little more basic and it's not one of the great silent films but it does the job.

4/5

Alex

Corbin Nash.

With that name, I expected some sort of 80s US cop show. Well, in fairness it is about a cop. Malcolm McDowell, Rutger Hauer and Corey Feldman all appear in this, although I suspect it isn't top of their resumes. Corey Feldman plays a psychotic vampire drag queen, which might be worth the price of admission alone if this is your thing. The story jumps back and forwards a bit in time, which I managed to follow with no problem, but judging from the reviews caused some confusion for some viewers.

I'd love to rate this one higher for its cast or for the Queeny, but I can't justify it. Not completely awful if you have nothing else you want to do, but not really worth deliberately tracking down (it does have a higher than usual nudity content which might be enough for some).
Hail to thyself
For I am my own master
I am my own god
I require no shepherd
For I am no sheep.

Jim H

Vera Cruz - Interesting Western with Burt Lancaster and Gary Cooper.  They're both after gold they can steal from the Mexican army while escorting it, and it's a question of who betrays who.  This is a clear ancestor to the mercenary films and shifting alliances/betrayals/dark antiheroes of Spagheti Westerns in the 1960s, only in 1954.  It's a solid Western on its own too. 

Burt Lancaster steals the show, with his antihero with a very evil slow grin.  Very entertaining and good performance.  He's ten times more charismatic than Gary Cooper, who is so flat and boring in this one I'm baffled he has two Oscars.  Fast-paced with a lot of violence and surprisingly high body count.  You also get appearances by Caesar Romero, Ernest Borgnine, and Charles Bronson.

Not a great film, but worth a watch.  7/10.

FatFreddysCat

"Piranha" (aka "Piranha 3D," 2010)
An earthquake causes a fissure beneath an Arizona lake that allows prehistoric, very hungry piranhas to surface from an underground cave... just as hordes of Spring Breakers arrive for a week of fun, sun, and fornication. You can probably figure out how well that works out for everybody.
Alexandre ("High Tension") Aja's affectionate homage to Joe Dante's 1978 fish tale is fast-moving, extremely gory, and loaded with quality T&A. What more do you need to have a good time?
Hey, HEY, kids! Check out my way-cool Music and Movie Review blog on HubPages!
http://hubpages.com/@fatfreddyscat

lester1/2jr

#2199
the Andy Baker tape (2021) - decent found footage drama/ horror that could have used a female presence to soften it up a bit*. If these movies are any indication, youtube stars are really ruthless in their quest for fame and fortune. Then again, it could just be a convenient way to get them to do ridiculous and dangerous things? who knows

An annoying social media guy finds a long lost half brother through an ancestry site and figures he could use it as a gimmick on his show. When he meets the guy, something is clearly off about him but it seems to work on camera so he perseveres. One plot hole is the youtube show itself that he makes seems pretty stupid.


4.25/5 a step up from the typical found footage experience

* or something. I just think it's weird when there are no women in a movie

edit: true to the films focus, the imdb reviews seem to be full of fake 10/10s written by friends

FatFreddysCat

"Metallica: Some Kind Of Monster" (2004)
Documentary makers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky ("Paradise Lost") spent nearly three years filming Metallica through the long, slow process of creating the still-controversial St. Anger album. The result is a fascinating, warts-n-all portrait that shows the troubled band members dealing with Jason Newsted's exit, James Hetfield's first trip to rehab, and the lengthy group therapy sessions with a "performance coach" hired by their management, who helps them hash out some long-simmering personal issues that have been held back for years.
This flick probably won't make you like St. Anger any better, but at the very least you'll understand why it turned out to be such a mess. At the time, the band members were so screwed up that they had no business trying to make a record.
Netflix has paired this doc with a mostly pointless, 26 minute follow up short called Metallica: The Monster Lives, in which the band sits down ten years later to discuss the effects that the documentary experience had on them.
Hey, HEY, kids! Check out my way-cool Music and Movie Review blog on HubPages!
http://hubpages.com/@fatfreddyscat

Rev. Powell

SQUEAL (2021): A man traveling in Latvia accidentally runs over a pig and returns to the pig-farmers' home, where the locals chain him up in the pig-sty. Described as a "dark fairy tale," this horror-adjacent feature never really develops in a solid direction, and isn't as interesting as it should have been given the kinky premise. 2.5/5.
I'll take you places the hand of man has not yet set foot...

FatFreddysCat

"Requiem For A Scream" (2022)
A group of twenty-somethings (led by the always-welcome Cassie "Sharknado" Scerbo, who still can't act worth a damn, but her cleavage is glorious as ever) gathers at a secluded lake house to honor the passing of one of their friends. Unfortunately, their party is crashed by a masked killer who records the screams of his victims and uses them to compose a symphony of death sounds.
...this Tubi Original is nothin' fancy, just your typical low budget slasher junk. The cast is decent, there's a few good kills, and the "symphony" bit is an interesting hook, but  the characters are all such idiots that they deserve everything that happens to them.
If this is the best that Tubi can come up with for original content, the bigger streaming services like Netflix, Amazon, etc. probably won't have to worry much about the competition.
Hey, HEY, kids! Check out my way-cool Music and Movie Review blog on HubPages!
http://hubpages.com/@fatfreddyscat

Rev. Powell

OFFSEASON (2022): A woman is called to a remote island just before the bridge to the mainland shuts for the season to investigate the desecration of her mother's grave. A good performance by the lead and some spooky moments in the back half can't save a horror movie that feels to familiar, and purposeless, to boot. 2.5/5.
I'll take you places the hand of man has not yet set foot...

Dr. Whom

xxxHolic (2022)

This is the live adaptation of the manga. High school student Kimihiro Watanuki has the ability to see evil spirits, and is constantly harassed by them. He comes across the magic shop of Yuko, a witch who has the power to grant wishes, at a price. He wishes to lose his ability so see ghosts, and in return becomes the cook/servant for Yuko. However things get complicated, and he discovers there may be a use for his ability after all.

The movie remains faithful to the original look and feel of the manga, and is clearly done by a fan. The director went to extraordinary lengths for the visual design, and the writer managed to cobble together a mostly coherent plot out of the rambling story lines of the manga. The whole thing falls a bit flat, however. While it is not bad, it feels more like an episode of a drama than a fantasy extravaganza. The main actors do a decent job, but none stand out.
Mainly of interest for fans of the manga.
"Once you get past a certain threshold, everyone's problems are the same: fortifying your island and hiding the heat signature from your fusion reactor."

Wenn ist das Nunstück git und Slotermeyer? Ja! ... Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.