Recent viewings

[retrorussell]

[Jack]

Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) - Somebody tries to kill this senator chick, so they hire these two security dudes to guard her.  But all they do is argue with each other, and we get a lot of reaction shots from other people like "Jeez, I wouldn't hire these idiots to mow my lawn."  The younger security dude falls in love with the senator, but he's a whiny b***h so she blows him off.  But then she thinks she's going to die so she says she loves him.  But then she doesn't die so she's like "Oh f***...".  I think she spends the rest of the day at the hairdresser.  Meanwhile the older security dude goes to some CGI planet and talks to some CGI people, then he goes to another CGI planet and eventually there's a big CGI battle.  It looked cool but I pressed every button on my PS3 controller and it was like the damned thing was playing itself.  Whatever      3/5.

[Psycho Circus]

It looked cool but I pressed every button on my PS3 controller and it was like the damned thing was playing itself.  Whatever      3/5.

[claws]

First Blood (1982)

Long time no see so I quite enjoyed the revisit. This is my favorite Stallone movie, and the ending still makes my eyes wet  
5/5

Madman (1982)

Fun slasher oozing with atmosphere. Ugly, annoying and pathetic cast though. TP and his belt buckle still rule though, and the hot tub scene is one of the best in cheese. 3.75/5

[Jack]

Salvage (2008) - A shipping container washes up on shore, and it apparently contained some sort of "savage" which gets into a suburban neighborhood and starts killing people.  The military show up and start indiscriminately blowing away just about everybody EXCEPT the savage.  The story centers around a woman and her her one-night-stand, who spend the whole movie acting all terrified because they have no idea what's going on.  And I can certainly sympathize - what's the origin of this creature?  Why is the military killing civilians?  I have no idea.  The acting was good I guess, and it was fairly successful at creating an atmosphere of tension and confusion.  But the story didn't make a bit of sense and the ending was about as trite and unsatisfying as you can get.  3/5.

[lester1/2jr]

Witch Hunt (2008)- narrated by Sean Penn. This documentary chronicles the plight of various parents who though innocent, this is very clear and unambigous from the begining unlike say Capturing the Friendmans, got caught up in the child molestation scare of the early 80's. Most of the interviews are with the parents, though we occasionally see some of the now adult kids. One of the (still) odious unscrupulous, clueless, sheriff/ prosecutor guys even chimes in with some ridiculous, oblivious/unrepentent remarks.

For some reason or other child molestation became the issue of the day back in the early 80's. Many parents and people who work with kids were caught up in it, all as a result of hype, self promoting law enforcement official and most significantly unestablished guidelines for interviewing children in regards to these types of accusations. What started of ostensibly as a way to save children from being victimized ended up victimizing them: they were interviewed for hours upon hours and coerced into lying, their heads were filled with the most vile sexual satanic stuff imaginable and their parents were taken from them and put in jail (as a result of THEIR testimony).

The parents all spent long amounts of time in jail from 6 to 20 years. I think one couple both died in jail. It's sad but the worst is the guy from the sheriffs department talking about how he sees himself as a cowboy and "the mistake that was made, IF one was made" Apparently he either didn't understand what the movie was about or is so utterly detached from reality he thinks someone was actually making a movie about what a GOOD job he and his "cowboy" bretheren did. AS one couple laments " we don't get mad about it, we trust God will eventually dispense justice". One can only hope.


4.5/5

[Rev. Powell]

MAELSTROM (2000): A young woman's life unravels when she has an abortion, then a few days later hits a pedestrian with her car and flees in a panic.  This is not for anyone seeking a traditional narrative: it's an arty, surrealistic, impressionistic portrait of guilt, narrated by a fish telling the story with his last breath as he waits to be gutted by a fishmonger.  It's a Quebecois film, in French.  3.5/5. 

HEARTLESS (2009): Jamie, a photographer with a disfiguring birthmark sees demons on the streets of London, then is drawn into a Faustian deal with a sinister character known as "Papa B."  Ambitious in scope with some effective scenes (especially the scene where Jamie first strikes the Hellish bargain with Papa B), but the mix of dramatic character study, social commentary, surrealism, and horror movie cliches doesn't always gel.  I'm usually good with British accents, but these are so thick I wished there were subtitles.  3/5.   

[Jack]

Slasher (aka Blood Cult, 1985) - A slasher is loose on a college campus and killing off girls in their dorms.  And taking forever to do it - these scenes stretch on for 5 times longer than they should.  And forget about any T&A - not a chance.   An elderly sheriff investigates, and investigates, and investigates some more.  And he narrates the movie for us too, just to kill some more time.  His daughter is a librarian and gives him a book which luckily explains who's behind the murders, and a farmer calls him and gives him the location of the killer.  Even though the solution to the whole case is basically handed to him it, this still stretches on for the majority of the movie's run time.  We're talking stupendously boring here.  A very Z-grade production, half the dialogue is so muffled and poorly recorded it's barely audible.  1.75/5.

[claws]

The Fog (1980) Blu-ray (Germany, Region Free)

Carpenter's classic shines and sparkles in HD. The ultimate presentation so far. Still a great movie as well. 5/5

[Couchtr26]

The Good the bad and the ugly - I loved this movie and can't believe I didn't watch it earlier.

If you haven't already check out the other two (I prefer A Fistful of Dollars myself).  Also, some other suggestions are Django, Keoma, and Mannaja.  They are some of the better in the genre. 

Island of the Dead (2000) - A very boring Malcolm McDowell vehicle.  He plays a developer that wants to construct a city for the unfortunates of New York on Hart Island where the cities unknown dead are buried.  You think zombie movie but no maggots and flies seem to kill everyone. 

[lester1/2jr]

Porn theatre (2002)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqG7QeO_0xQ

This was definately alot gayer than I thought it would be. I don't think I would have rented it had I know there would be like a dozen different vignettes of guys having sex with guys dressed as women or just other guys but it kind of rocked in it's own way.

A moviehouse shows heterosexual porn movies and yet is full of guys who are there having sexual relations with the various trannies there to be had sex with. They are like, generally not like A- list sort of cross dressers but no one seems to mind. One police officer who happens by asks " why don't they show gay films?" and this is really an excellent question but who I am I to judge. This is how they go about things at this place.

I can't really reccomend this because it really does have an awful lot of homosexual sex. Unless you're gay, and even then you might not be into transexualism. Still, I kind of liked it. The people are funny, the situations are comic in their own way and their is even some romance between the theatre owner and a pair of suitors pursuing her. If you are looking for something really way way out there give it a try, otherwise I'd say stear clear. points for originality though.

4/5


And God Spoke (1993) - Not that funny parody of the movie business. I remember back in 2005 when David Lee Roth replaced Howard Stern. He did some sort of show and was quoted as saying "this is easy". Stern said "if it's easy, you aren't doing it right". something to that effect. This movie reminded me of that quote. It's not an amazing idea to show a bunch of guys making a movie about the bible that runs into some trouble and they end up having to do it on a shoestring buget and have various Spinal Tap type predicaments. You'd really have to do be Jerry Seinfeld or something for it to be moderately awesome.


Borat is a mockumentary done right: over the top and edgy and crazy. This is really mediocre. There were one or two funny things, I liked when the corny director posed in "director" positions for the photographer but in general they just go through the motions and no surprise this thing has not been remembered to any real extent. As this was the early 90's you can bet there were some Tarantino esque retro cameos: Lou ferrgino and amazingly Eve Plumb from the Brady Bunch, who looks totally different but has the unmistakeable Jan voice all right.

3/5 (charitable)

[bob]

Troll 2. This is truely one of the best bad movies out there.  5/5 

[claws]

Heathers (1988)

Best satire about teenage suicide. Always enjoy this movie, lots of great quotes. 5/5

Dead Heat (1988)

Silly but solid action-comedy with some horror mixed in. A bit uneven at times but pretty good for what it is. 3.75/5

[Jack]

Blood Sisters (1987) - A murder takes place in a whorehouse so the cops shut it down.  Thirteen years later a group of sorority initiates has to spend the night in this supposedly haunted place.  Sigh...sometimes when you aim for cheesy goodness you hit dull and kind of stupid instead.  The characters might as well have been wearing shirts saying "victim #1", "victim #2" etc.  I just didn't care.  I'd say maybe I wasn't in the mood for it, but I WAS in the mood for it.  I guess I'll try to finish it up tonight.

[claws]

Joe Bob Briggs' DVD commentary is the best thing about Blood Sisters. When it comes to Roberta Findlay movies I prefer Tenement, The Oracle and Shriek of the Mutilated.