I Can’t Believe I Rented It – The Punisher
Lethal Weapon. Desperado. The Terminator. What do these three movies have in common? They all did “The Punisher” better than “The Punisher” did.
How hard is it to make a movie called “The Punisher?” All he has to do for about an hour and a half is run around and shoot people. It should be a gun lover’s dream. If you like murderous psychopaths running around a metropolitan area with powerful firearms, then you should like “The Punisher.” But director Jonathan Hensleigh thought that instead of a kill-spree, we would prefer a half-assed soap opera between the bad guys and his version of “The Real World: Liberty City,” featuring Fat Neck and The Kid With Too Many Piercings. Watch the hilarity ensue when their homicidal neighbor almost kills a guy right in front of them.
The movie didn’t start off that bad, because almost everything I would have changed was nit-picking, but things took a turn for the stupid when the Punisher, a trained military killing machine, gave up his tactical advantage of being dead by confronting his cop friends in broad daylight, in front of the courthouse, while they were surrounded by hundreds of reporters. As soon as he did that, I turned to my girlfriend and said, “I see why people didn’t like this movie.”
Things were pretty tolerable until he did that, and it was then that I began to wonder, “Didn’t he watch Lethal Weapon?” I stayed in that mode for the rest of the movie, because Martin Riggs was a better Punisher than Frank Castle. This Punisher had buddies and was almost like the wacky fix-it man down the hall. There was no secret about who he was and it didn’t seem to bother anyone that he was a trained killer who was out for revenge. This was Happy Sunshine Punisher, with a lovely day-glo playset because almost everything he did took place during the day. On a positive note, he was completely wasted for most of it.
I started pondering about what a person would really like to see in a Punisher movie. I’d imagine that there would be some creative gunfights, some torture, and I don’t know, an execution of revenge. If someone knocked off my whole family, I’d probably try to get some getback, too. I just hope the narrator to my life wouldn’t think that anything less than bloody massacres and full-scale warfare would be the right way to go.
Eventually, this movie gets to the part where The Punisher screws his balls back on and gets to killing folk, but before you get there, you have to wade through some half-ass friendship with some people whose names I can’t be bothered to remember and some chick who wants to get down, but he can’t because he’s, you know…grieving. This broad is so selfish that she’s trying to get in his pants even though he just watched 40 members of his family die violent deaths just five months ago, and he’s busy trying to drink his way into Heaven to be with them. Personally, I’m glad he turned down the poon, because I’m so tired of people forcing love interests into comic book movies. He’s a one-man revenge squad, but he’s got time to blow this chick’s back out?
I swear, if he had kissed her, I would have turned the movie off right then and there.
Luckily, he didn’t, because I would have missed Big Daddy Cool Diesel coming on screen and beating the crap out of Thomas Jane. The movie had long since lost my attention by this point, because the soap opera had started with Frank tricking the main bad guy into thinking that his best friend was sleeping with his wife, and the bad guys know that Frank is alive, but can’t find him, but suddenly they do, and start sending assassins from around the world to Frank’s house. See, it’s stupid because Frank is supposed to be the assassin shooting up the bad guy’s house. I know he spends most of the movie drunk, but what the fuck’s he waiting on, for the bad guy to get his costume out of the cleaners? He’s supposed to be getting revenge, but he’s at the fucking lunch counter eating soup, watching the assassin come in and sing him a song?
I’m not making that part up. An assassin comes in, pulls out a guitar and serenades The Punisher. He doesn’t even shoot the guy. This sort of thing never happens to El Mariachi.
The movie just kind of goes on like that. It tries to add things like romance and humor and bullshit to a movie and a character that’s naturally dark and violent. The Punisher is not a deep character. It’s a wonder that a character this simple has lasted so long, but he has. And since he has, when a movie is made about him, it should just involve those simple aspects: Guns and killing stuff with those guns. At night. I guess all of it was an effort to try to make the Punisher interesting, but no one wants the Punisher to be interesting. People want the Punisher to kill people.
Obviously, the right people aren’t getting reamed for these movies, because Jonathan Hensleigh should have never been allowed to make this one. Did producer Avi Arad actually have his eyes open when he read the script? Because at some point during the creative process, someone should have read that script and said, “Wait, what? How does a fake love triangle with the bad guy, his wife, and the gay best friend keep people from not walking out on our movie?” From start to finish, there should have been people dying, starting with the Punisher’s family and ending with the person responsible. Having said all of that, I’d like to go ahead and fill out an application for director of the next comic book movie. At least I know my movie wouldn’t piss me off.
Look, no one looks to the Punisher for emotional depth or because they can relate, they’re reading him because this guy is fucked up and he’s going see to it that he isn’t fucked up alone. The movie should be along those same lines. This isn’t Spider-Man. Frank should have been out stapling men’s nuts to their foreheads, not having an awkward Thanksgiving dinner with the rejects that live in his building.
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Friday, November 2, 2007
For God's Sake, They're Bringing Back "Knight Rider"
As if you didn't need further evidence that Hollywood has run out of ideas ("The Bionic Woman," The Bratz movie, the Hot Wheels movie, so on and so forth), here comes the latest remake of an old TV show: "Knight Rider." Finally, an excuse to try to make that "whoosh" sound with your mouths again.
For those who weren't self-aware in the 80's, "Knight Rider" was a show about David Hasselhoff and his talking car. The show wasn't about much more than that. It was simply an excuse to show a black Trans Am driving really fast and jumping over stuff, with the help of a "Turbo Boost" button. Allegedly, they were supposed to be solving crimes on the show, but I never once saw David Hasselhoff fight anybody or do anything on the show that didn't involve showing his hairy chest and sleeping with women. He didn't even drive the car most of the time, because KITT was smarter than he was.
I personally believe that it was created solely to capitalize on the popularity of "The Dukes of Hazzard," which was a show about TWO guys in a Dodge Charger drove real fast and jumped over stuff. Whatever their intent was, it worked, because I was glued to my TV every week when Knight Rider came on. I enjoyed this show so much that I even watched "Turbo Teen" to get my "Knight Rider" fix, a cartoon about a kid who turned into a talking car when he got wet.
Because the show was so deep and layered, and because there was such a demand for more Knight Rider after the failed "Knight Rider 2000," "Knight Rider 2010," and "Team Knight Rider" pilots, they've decided to bring it back. Hurrah for us. The lead role (the unnamed son of Michael Knight) is being filled by "All My Children" actor Justin Breuning. The abundance of testosterone in my body won't allow me to know who this person is. David Hasselhoff will be making appearances, because after all, nothing is as good as it could be if David Hasselhoff isn't in it, and this casting alone will make sure that the show has Germany's ever-crucial support.
Thanks to Hollywood's willingness to literally scrape the bottom of the barrel for ideas, we should go ahead and look forward to the following shows to be brought back: "The A-Team," "Airwolf," and "Nightboat, the Crime Solving Boat."
For those who weren't self-aware in the 80's, "Knight Rider" was a show about David Hasselhoff and his talking car. The show wasn't about much more than that. It was simply an excuse to show a black Trans Am driving really fast and jumping over stuff, with the help of a "Turbo Boost" button. Allegedly, they were supposed to be solving crimes on the show, but I never once saw David Hasselhoff fight anybody or do anything on the show that didn't involve showing his hairy chest and sleeping with women. He didn't even drive the car most of the time, because KITT was smarter than he was.
I personally believe that it was created solely to capitalize on the popularity of "The Dukes of Hazzard," which was a show about TWO guys in a Dodge Charger drove real fast and jumped over stuff. Whatever their intent was, it worked, because I was glued to my TV every week when Knight Rider came on. I enjoyed this show so much that I even watched "Turbo Teen" to get my "Knight Rider" fix, a cartoon about a kid who turned into a talking car when he got wet.
Because the show was so deep and layered, and because there was such a demand for more Knight Rider after the failed "Knight Rider 2000," "Knight Rider 2010," and "Team Knight Rider" pilots, they've decided to bring it back. Hurrah for us. The lead role (the unnamed son of Michael Knight) is being filled by "All My Children" actor Justin Breuning. The abundance of testosterone in my body won't allow me to know who this person is. David Hasselhoff will be making appearances, because after all, nothing is as good as it could be if David Hasselhoff isn't in it, and this casting alone will make sure that the show has Germany's ever-crucial support.
Thanks to Hollywood's willingness to literally scrape the bottom of the barrel for ideas, we should go ahead and look forward to the following shows to be brought back: "The A-Team," "Airwolf," and "Nightboat, the Crime Solving Boat."
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
The Reboot Movie
A recent trend has begun to take over the recent trend of making comic book movies: The reboot movie. The reboot movie is what happens when you let your comic book movie get out into the public eye without having kept an eye on your maverick director, who wouldn't sign the contract unless he could create his "vision."
What the director fails to realize is that no one gives a crap about his "vision." What the fans want is someone to slap their comic books on the big screen. Losing sight of this is what led to the celluloid afterbirth known as "Batman and Robin," quite possibly the worst comic book movie ever, and the movie that put the fatal shots in the head of the Batman movie franchise. It took eight years before Warner Bros. put out "Batman Begins," mainly because they wanted to make sure America forgot about the Bat-nipples and Arnold Schwarzenegger's dialogue.
While it worked to let Christopher Nolan go in his room, play with his toys, and bang out a movie without studio executives saying things to him like, "his costume looks too faggy (an actual Jon Peters quote, albeit for Superman)," or "can you add some elves and monsters like in 'Lord of the Rings,' (an actual Jon Peters sentiment)" it completely failed when they let Bryan Singer retreat to his "Fortress of Man Worship," secretly ogle Brandon Routh through a telephoto lens and call it a movie. As a result, the franchise reboot was dead on arrival, after they worked so hard to bring it back to life, having seen it die on that fateful day in 1987 when Mark Pillow walked out of the dressing room dressed as the Nuclear Man.
Now, Superman is one of those evergreen franchises that can always make money for DC, and they know that a good Superman movie can easily bring in $300 million domestic. Why should they have to wait another 20 years to make another Superman movie just because Bryan Singer couldn't resist making Superman a creepy, deadbeat dad? Why not just pretend that the last movie never even happened?
Just because Singer was so distracted by Routh's package that he forgot that Superman was capable of throwing punches in between knocking up Lois and staring at her in the shower doesn't mean that some other, more talented director won't get it right. And apparently, that's the mentality that Warner Bros. is going with...except Singer is still the director. They just won't let him live betwixt Richard Donner's asscheeks in this outing.
It's a trend that's taking place over at Marvel, as well, where they're trying to repair TWO botched franchises. Hopefully, they won't stop with just these two, because Daredevil doesn't have to have Ben Affleck in the costume to make it work.
In 2008, "Punisher: War Zone" will be released, starring Ray Stevenson as Frank Castle. Ray Stevenson replaces Thomas Jane in the title role and Lee Alexander replaces Jonathan Heinsleigh as a director who's actually familiar with The Punisher. This isn't the first time that a Punisher movie has been made, but if "Punisher: War Zone" turns out to be good it'll be the first time they didn't screw it up. I still fail to see what's so hard about making a movie where the hero is a deranged killer with a van full of guns who drives around town shooting criminals. I used to believe that not even Dolph Lundgren could screw that up, but I was wrong.
Also, in 2008, "The Incredible Hulk" will be released, starring, and apparently, written by, Ed Norton. That might have been too many commas, but what really matters is that this movie needed to be made because the first one was so bad that people at Marvel have felt the need to reassure the public that this one won't suck. Kevin Feige, Marvel Studios' President of Production, said and I quote, "The Hulk movie will be different from this one because this one will be good." The sound you just heard was Feige slapping Ang Lee across the face.
Even the last James Bond movie, "Casino Royale," is considered a reboot. "Star Trek" has a reboot coming sometime down the road. Rumor has it that "Street Fighter" is getting a do-over. Sometimes, this is the best thing you can do for a franchise. You know, just make a movie and hope that no one remembers how badly you screwed up the last one. Maybe the producers of "Resident Evil" or "The Mummy" will read this and take notes. It's never too late to correct your horrible, rage-inducing mistakes.
What the director fails to realize is that no one gives a crap about his "vision." What the fans want is someone to slap their comic books on the big screen. Losing sight of this is what led to the celluloid afterbirth known as "Batman and Robin," quite possibly the worst comic book movie ever, and the movie that put the fatal shots in the head of the Batman movie franchise. It took eight years before Warner Bros. put out "Batman Begins," mainly because they wanted to make sure America forgot about the Bat-nipples and Arnold Schwarzenegger's dialogue.
While it worked to let Christopher Nolan go in his room, play with his toys, and bang out a movie without studio executives saying things to him like, "his costume looks too faggy (an actual Jon Peters quote, albeit for Superman)," or "can you add some elves and monsters like in 'Lord of the Rings,' (an actual Jon Peters sentiment)" it completely failed when they let Bryan Singer retreat to his "Fortress of Man Worship," secretly ogle Brandon Routh through a telephoto lens and call it a movie. As a result, the franchise reboot was dead on arrival, after they worked so hard to bring it back to life, having seen it die on that fateful day in 1987 when Mark Pillow walked out of the dressing room dressed as the Nuclear Man.
Now, Superman is one of those evergreen franchises that can always make money for DC, and they know that a good Superman movie can easily bring in $300 million domestic. Why should they have to wait another 20 years to make another Superman movie just because Bryan Singer couldn't resist making Superman a creepy, deadbeat dad? Why not just pretend that the last movie never even happened?
Just because Singer was so distracted by Routh's package that he forgot that Superman was capable of throwing punches in between knocking up Lois and staring at her in the shower doesn't mean that some other, more talented director won't get it right. And apparently, that's the mentality that Warner Bros. is going with...except Singer is still the director. They just won't let him live betwixt Richard Donner's asscheeks in this outing.
It's a trend that's taking place over at Marvel, as well, where they're trying to repair TWO botched franchises. Hopefully, they won't stop with just these two, because Daredevil doesn't have to have Ben Affleck in the costume to make it work.
In 2008, "Punisher: War Zone" will be released, starring Ray Stevenson as Frank Castle. Ray Stevenson replaces Thomas Jane in the title role and Lee Alexander replaces Jonathan Heinsleigh as a director who's actually familiar with The Punisher. This isn't the first time that a Punisher movie has been made, but if "Punisher: War Zone" turns out to be good it'll be the first time they didn't screw it up. I still fail to see what's so hard about making a movie where the hero is a deranged killer with a van full of guns who drives around town shooting criminals. I used to believe that not even Dolph Lundgren could screw that up, but I was wrong.
Also, in 2008, "The Incredible Hulk" will be released, starring, and apparently, written by, Ed Norton. That might have been too many commas, but what really matters is that this movie needed to be made because the first one was so bad that people at Marvel have felt the need to reassure the public that this one won't suck. Kevin Feige, Marvel Studios' President of Production, said and I quote, "The Hulk movie will be different from this one because this one will be good." The sound you just heard was Feige slapping Ang Lee across the face.
Even the last James Bond movie, "Casino Royale," is considered a reboot. "Star Trek" has a reboot coming sometime down the road. Rumor has it that "Street Fighter" is getting a do-over. Sometimes, this is the best thing you can do for a franchise. You know, just make a movie and hope that no one remembers how badly you screwed up the last one. Maybe the producers of "Resident Evil" or "The Mummy" will read this and take notes. It's never too late to correct your horrible, rage-inducing mistakes.
Sunday, October 21, 2007
"Superman Returns" writers shown the door
The world is going to be shocked to discover that Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris, the writers who tanked the Superman franchise before it even got off the ground by forgetting to write action and excitement into "Superman Returns," have opted not to write the sequel to 2006's historically bad celluloid turd, according to Variety. They also reported dancing in the streets, or at least in comic book stores, before ambulances were called to provide oxygen for the out-of-shape shut-ins who frequent these establishments.
The word is that Warner Bros. wants to start fresh with the next movie anyway, expressing complete surprise that fans didn't accept Superman being a baby daddy, not throwing a single punch, not doing anything "super," being portrayed as a stalker, and Lex Luthor not being a threat to anyone. Bryan Singer was reportedly pleased with how the movie turned out because Brandon Routh was "delicious."
Here's hoping this leads to a cleaning of house, starting with Bryan Singer, and followed by Kate Bosworth and Kevin Spacey, having their roles as Lois Lane and Lex Luthor being filled by actors who actually possess the qualities to perform those roles.
The word is that Warner Bros. wants to start fresh with the next movie anyway, expressing complete surprise that fans didn't accept Superman being a baby daddy, not throwing a single punch, not doing anything "super," being portrayed as a stalker, and Lex Luthor not being a threat to anyone. Bryan Singer was reportedly pleased with how the movie turned out because Brandon Routh was "delicious."
Here's hoping this leads to a cleaning of house, starting with Bryan Singer, and followed by Kate Bosworth and Kevin Spacey, having their roles as Lois Lane and Lex Luthor being filled by actors who actually possess the qualities to perform those roles.
Friday, October 12, 2007
Jackie Chan and Jet Li. Nuff said.
Jackie Chan and Jet Li are going to be in a movie together. If you have any follow up comments to that, I couldn't hear them over the sound of my own pleasure moans.
Apparently, this is old news, but since I was killing myself with work back in April (when IGN first reported the name of this project, it must have slipped by me. Working 18 hours days can do that to a guy.
At any rate, the movie is called "The Forbidden Kingdom," but it doesn't matter what it's called, because I'm gonna see it regardless. They could call this movie "The World's Most Funniest Prison Rape Scenes" and I would still go see it. I'd walk right up to the box-office window and in my loudest voice, say "One ticket for the bloody asshole movie."
And if that wasn't enough, the movie's fight scenes are being choreographed by Yuen Wo-Ping, the guy who made Keanu Reeves a man in "The Matrix," and the guy who contributed to my ongoing love affair with Ziyi Zhang. He also made Donnie Yen slightly more famous than Rongguang Yu, but much less famous than Chow Yun-Fat.
The only problem I can foresee is this "family film" label, which can be the kiss of death for something like this. I'm already actively boycotting the "PG-13 comedy," but can being family friendly hurt this movie that much? I can't imagine anyone even wanting to see a movie with Jackie Chan and Jet Li if they weren't going to throw down and I'm sure the studio knows this.
No one goes to see their movies to see their layered performances. Jet Li almost thought they did, but word must have gotten back to him that his movie career was going to end right after "Fearless" if he didn't go back to kicking guys through walls. The word will travel fast if these two guys don't deliver what we want to see: Both of them, beating the pure crap out of each other.
"The Forbidden Kingdom" will be released in September 2008.
Apparently, this is old news, but since I was killing myself with work back in April (when IGN first reported the name of this project, it must have slipped by me. Working 18 hours days can do that to a guy.
At any rate, the movie is called "The Forbidden Kingdom," but it doesn't matter what it's called, because I'm gonna see it regardless. They could call this movie "The World's Most Funniest Prison Rape Scenes" and I would still go see it. I'd walk right up to the box-office window and in my loudest voice, say "One ticket for the bloody asshole movie."
And if that wasn't enough, the movie's fight scenes are being choreographed by Yuen Wo-Ping, the guy who made Keanu Reeves a man in "The Matrix," and the guy who contributed to my ongoing love affair with Ziyi Zhang. He also made Donnie Yen slightly more famous than Rongguang Yu, but much less famous than Chow Yun-Fat.
The only problem I can foresee is this "family film" label, which can be the kiss of death for something like this. I'm already actively boycotting the "PG-13 comedy," but can being family friendly hurt this movie that much? I can't imagine anyone even wanting to see a movie with Jackie Chan and Jet Li if they weren't going to throw down and I'm sure the studio knows this.
No one goes to see their movies to see their layered performances. Jet Li almost thought they did, but word must have gotten back to him that his movie career was going to end right after "Fearless" if he didn't go back to kicking guys through walls. The word will travel fast if these two guys don't deliver what we want to see: Both of them, beating the pure crap out of each other.
"The Forbidden Kingdom" will be released in September 2008.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Shazam, Wonder Woman casting news
Just when I though that the ruination of G.I. Joe or the completely unecessary Barbie and Hot Wheels movies weren't enough, Satan himself reached up from Hell to hand deliver the latest news on the Wonder Woman movie. Okay, it wasn't Satan, but IGN.com did post it earlier today.
Jessica Biel is apparently the front-runner to play Wonder Woman. That's right, Mary Camden is most likely going to be cast as Wonder Woman. I'm not pissed by it, so that says that either I'm maturing or I'm jaded by Hollywood's process of making movies. I don't think I was going to be pleased with anyone that they cast in this role.
I guess there were worse choices, like Oprah or Drew Barrymore. I just hope Jessica Biel can pull off "aloof," or "threatening." She might have done it in "Blade: Trinity," but that movie looked like it was going to suck in advance. I do know that she's mastered being "afraid," but I've seen porn stars in horror flicks get that one down.
But on the positive news front, The Rock is in the running for two roles in the upcoming "Shazam!" movie. He's the lead choice for both Captain Marvel and Black Adam.
He says that it's "up to the fans" to decide which role he plays. If that's the case, let me start the campaign to get The Rock cast as Black Adam. It's clearly a no-brainer to anyone familiar with The Rock and Black Adam, but this being Hollywood, they'll probably screw it up and cast him as Polly Pureheart, visiting from the "Underdog" movie. If this comes to pass, it would be one of the greatest castings ever, and make me feel a little better about the fact that they're turning one of the premier heroes of the DC Universe into an "action-comedy" movie.
Here's hoping that I get to see The Rock plant Captain Marvel into a wall. Keep your fingers crossed.
Jessica Biel is apparently the front-runner to play Wonder Woman. That's right, Mary Camden is most likely going to be cast as Wonder Woman. I'm not pissed by it, so that says that either I'm maturing or I'm jaded by Hollywood's process of making movies. I don't think I was going to be pleased with anyone that they cast in this role.
I guess there were worse choices, like Oprah or Drew Barrymore. I just hope Jessica Biel can pull off "aloof," or "threatening." She might have done it in "Blade: Trinity," but that movie looked like it was going to suck in advance. I do know that she's mastered being "afraid," but I've seen porn stars in horror flicks get that one down.
But on the positive news front, The Rock is in the running for two roles in the upcoming "Shazam!" movie. He's the lead choice for both Captain Marvel and Black Adam.
He says that it's "up to the fans" to decide which role he plays. If that's the case, let me start the campaign to get The Rock cast as Black Adam. It's clearly a no-brainer to anyone familiar with The Rock and Black Adam, but this being Hollywood, they'll probably screw it up and cast him as Polly Pureheart, visiting from the "Underdog" movie. If this comes to pass, it would be one of the greatest castings ever, and make me feel a little better about the fact that they're turning one of the premier heroes of the DC Universe into an "action-comedy" movie.
Here's hoping that I get to see The Rock plant Captain Marvel into a wall. Keep your fingers crossed.
Friday, August 24, 2007
The G.I Joe Movie: Here They Go Again
Just when the pain in my soul hadn't recovered from "Transformers," the Hollywood executives at Paramount have decided to reach inside my chest again, pull out my lungs and piss on them in front of me.
G.I. Joe is to be released sometime next year, because Hollywood hasn't kicked me in the balls enough. Keep trying, Hollywood. I think I can still produce kids out of the left nut. A perfect target for when that He-Man movie is finally released.
Here is the synopsis for the movie, as reported by Variety: "G.I. Joe is now a Brussels-based outfit that stands for Global Integrated Joint Operating Entity, an international co-ed force of operatives who use hi-tech equipment to battle Cobra, an evil organization headed by a double-crossing Scottish arms dealer. The property is closer in tone to X-Men and James Bond than a war film."
What the hell does that even mean? G.I. Joe is supposed to be a reference to our Army, and the term "G.I." doesn't even have any significance outside of our borders. I can't imagine an international organization pandering to us like that. Also, the fact that it's based in Brussels and is an international squad kinda goes against that "Real American Hero" part. I mean, G.I. Joe being American is right there in the name.
And Cobra isn't led by a double-crossing Scottish arms dealer. It's a ruthless terrorist organization led by Cobra Commander (and later on, Serpentor, when things started getting really ridiculous).
The changes are being made because Paramount is concerned about whether or not they can successfully market a movie about the U.S. Military at a time when our military is viewed in such a negative light around the world. They openly admit that it will be a "tough sell" and so they're changing things up to assure that "as many people as possible around the world will want to see it. " My solution to this would be not making the movie, but I'm not a movie executive. I don't think that there's a huge demand for a movie about G.I. Joe, so I'm sure no one would miss it if it wasn't there. Or, you could just not make the changes, because after all, it's G.I. Joe, not U.N. Squadron.
There was also talk of including G.I. Joe's overseas counterpart, Action Man. Thankfully, they didn't do it, as it would have just become two versions of every character. By the time I got overseas, Action Man was just the G.I. Joe line with a new logo on it. Plus, Action Man was always a stupid name. Was that really the best they could do? It could be worse, though; they could have called it "Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles."
Wait, what? You're kidding, right? No, for real. "Hero Turtles?" I thought I just made that up.
Of course, what it all should come down to in the end is the characters and giving the fans what they want. I don't have much faith that they will, because after all, you saw what I thought about "Transformers." G.I. Joe was a show based in Reaganomics, Cold War America. There's was an emphasis on big guns, cool planes, and hardcore patriotic action stars. The kind of guys that chewed glass and liked the salty taste of their own blood. Like an entire group of Rambos that couldn't shoot, but things would blow up anyway.
This movie most likely won't be that way, but at least I won't have to worry about this movie focusing too much on humans and the government, because that's what this one is about. But no quote screams "failure" like the one from Paramount producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura: "My experience with beloved properties is that characters, attitude and tone are even more important than plot." Just the perfect attitude to dash the hopes of fans of a long-dead property. Reading between the lines, it says that they'll get all the catchphrases in the movie, which will be nothing more than a series of explosions. The hero will have a love interest. Roll credits.
With thinking like that at the helm, (it's directed by Stephen Sommers, director of "The Mummy," a series so bland, even The Rock couldn't make me like it) I can't wait for He-Man now. They'll probably make He-Man more slender, because they don't want to upset anyone thinking that he could be on steroids. Man-At-Arms will be his gay sidekick to promote acceptance.
G.I. Joe is to be released sometime next year, because Hollywood hasn't kicked me in the balls enough. Keep trying, Hollywood. I think I can still produce kids out of the left nut. A perfect target for when that He-Man movie is finally released.
Here is the synopsis for the movie, as reported by Variety: "G.I. Joe is now a Brussels-based outfit that stands for Global Integrated Joint Operating Entity, an international co-ed force of operatives who use hi-tech equipment to battle Cobra, an evil organization headed by a double-crossing Scottish arms dealer. The property is closer in tone to X-Men and James Bond than a war film."
What the hell does that even mean? G.I. Joe is supposed to be a reference to our Army, and the term "G.I." doesn't even have any significance outside of our borders. I can't imagine an international organization pandering to us like that. Also, the fact that it's based in Brussels and is an international squad kinda goes against that "Real American Hero" part. I mean, G.I. Joe being American is right there in the name.
And Cobra isn't led by a double-crossing Scottish arms dealer. It's a ruthless terrorist organization led by Cobra Commander (and later on, Serpentor, when things started getting really ridiculous).
The changes are being made because Paramount is concerned about whether or not they can successfully market a movie about the U.S. Military at a time when our military is viewed in such a negative light around the world. They openly admit that it will be a "tough sell" and so they're changing things up to assure that "as many people as possible around the world will want to see it. " My solution to this would be not making the movie, but I'm not a movie executive. I don't think that there's a huge demand for a movie about G.I. Joe, so I'm sure no one would miss it if it wasn't there. Or, you could just not make the changes, because after all, it's G.I. Joe, not U.N. Squadron.
There was also talk of including G.I. Joe's overseas counterpart, Action Man. Thankfully, they didn't do it, as it would have just become two versions of every character. By the time I got overseas, Action Man was just the G.I. Joe line with a new logo on it. Plus, Action Man was always a stupid name. Was that really the best they could do? It could be worse, though; they could have called it "Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles."
Wait, what? You're kidding, right? No, for real. "Hero Turtles?" I thought I just made that up.
Of course, what it all should come down to in the end is the characters and giving the fans what they want. I don't have much faith that they will, because after all, you saw what I thought about "Transformers." G.I. Joe was a show based in Reaganomics, Cold War America. There's was an emphasis on big guns, cool planes, and hardcore patriotic action stars. The kind of guys that chewed glass and liked the salty taste of their own blood. Like an entire group of Rambos that couldn't shoot, but things would blow up anyway.
This movie most likely won't be that way, but at least I won't have to worry about this movie focusing too much on humans and the government, because that's what this one is about. But no quote screams "failure" like the one from Paramount producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura: "My experience with beloved properties is that characters, attitude and tone are even more important than plot." Just the perfect attitude to dash the hopes of fans of a long-dead property. Reading between the lines, it says that they'll get all the catchphrases in the movie, which will be nothing more than a series of explosions. The hero will have a love interest. Roll credits.
With thinking like that at the helm, (it's directed by Stephen Sommers, director of "The Mummy," a series so bland, even The Rock couldn't make me like it) I can't wait for He-Man now. They'll probably make He-Man more slender, because they don't want to upset anyone thinking that he could be on steroids. Man-At-Arms will be his gay sidekick to promote acceptance.
Saturday, August 18, 2007
I Can't Believe I Rented It - Action Jackson
The only way this movie could be any more awesome is if they retroactively added “Eye of the Tiger” to the soundtrack and a training montage. That would take it off the scale of recordable words of human speak and into the realm of telepathy between dogs or the binary language of moisture vaporators. It’s got action, it’s got explosions, and it’s got both Vanity’s and Sharon Stone’s exposed breasts. I could end this review right now and you’d completely understand.
I never saw “Action Jackson” when it first came out. Even at the age of 10, I just didn’t like the look of the whole thing. I mean, he was a black guy, so naturally, his name had to rhyme? I seriously thought about these things as a child. I’ll tell anyone who will listen about how I never liked the Junkyard Dog or Roadblock from G.I. Joe because I couldn’t identify with their stereotypical antics, like dancing all time or talking in rhyme. So, I took a pass on “Action Jackson” assuming it would be more of the same.
Then, when I was visiting some friends back in Jackson, “Action Jackson” was put on and they all crowded around the TV to watch, because they loved this movie. I didn’t watch it all, but I did see one part that piqued my curiosity…Action Jackson ran down a speeding taxi on foot. I thought to myself, “This movie must be terrible. I have to see the rest.” So one day when I was in Wal-Mart, the Devil’s Store, I saw it in the five dollar bin. I bought it, and probably three or four other movies that I didn’t need to get.
That movie sat on my movie rack, in the plastic, for about two years. Then, yesterday came, and feeling the need to make fun of something, I decided to finally watch it. And you know what? This is probably the most awesome thing I’ve seen all day. And I don’t feel bad ruining it for you if you haven’t seen it, because the movie’s almost 20 years old. Personally, I’m hoping for a 20th anniversary DVD to be released, with updated pictures of Apollo Creed, who plays Action Jackson, so I can see if he’s still wearing eyeliner.
This movie has every 80’s action movie cliché. A disgraced, over the top, renegade cop that’s living on the edge, a police chief that’s breathing down his neck, a respectable businessman who’s actually a murderous scumbag, complete with henchmen, hot women who get naked, the monologue where the bad guy details his plot to the hero, the romance between the hero and his love interest, no matter how trifling or shady the girl actually is, and let us not forget, the clever quips during and after the fighting. Not to mention, in true 80’s fashion, explosions where there probably shouldn’t be explosions (because in the 80’s, gas tanks were protected by a layer of aluminum foil wrapped in dynamite) and the rotating cast of men that you will only recognize from other 80’s action movies. It’s possible that I have a genetic defect that won’t allow me to dislike this movie.
What else does it have? It also has a scene that is so ridiculous that it came through the mists of time to embed itself in my brain, slap it in the face, and force it to make me spend $5.88 on this DVD.
Sharon Stone (because I couldn’t be bothered to remember her movie name) and Action Jackson are crossing the street, when Sharon makes the mistake of asking out loud why he’s called “Action.” In movies, you just don’t do things like that, because the Spirit of Dramatic Irony will be forced to drop an anvil on you or make zombies come out of the sewers. In this case, he sent a guy in a taxi to run them over, right on cue.
They jump out of the way, and at this point, the computer in his head starts giving him options. He can A:) Make sure the girl is safe. B:) Call for back-up. C:) Chase down a speeding cab on foot. And in true 80’s action movie fashion, he decides to pick the most ridiculous option possible, but because he’s black, he has to give it some flavor. So for a good two minutes, he’s running alongside a car that’s moving at least 50 miles an hour, yelling at the guy to pull over. The guy just sneers that 80’s henchman sneer at him and keeps driving, so Action Jackson leaps off of the ground, onto the roof of a parked car, and soars through the air and lands on the roof of the cab.
The henchman starts to swerve to get him off, but Action Jackson has the Grip of Righteousness on his side, so he stays on. Then, the guy starts shooting at the roof of the car, but that never works and all it does is piss off Action Jackson, a mistake that he warns you throughout the movie that you should never make, because it gives him superpowers or something. So he punches through the wind shield, which he could do without slicing his hand to ribbons because he braced himself, and starts grabbing on the guy, who slams on the brakes.
Action Jackson flies off the hood and rolls about half a mile down the road, and without a scuffed knee or anything, jumps to his feet and starts screaming nonsense at the guy, who sneers again and slams on the gas. And just when you thought the ridiculous couldn’t get no more ridiculouser, Action Jackson leaps into the air, clears the car by at least three feet, does a flip in the air and sticks the landing, just as the cab somehow leaves the ground and crashes into the building at the end of the street. The only reason this doesn’t cause an explosion was because Action Jackson had to get down there and see that the guy somehow got away without a trace.
And right after that, Sharon Stone winds up getting killed by Coach (Craig T. Nelson), who is her husband and the main bad guy. Coach frames Action Jackson for her murder and that sets up another 80’s mainstay: Action Jackson is on the run for a murder he did not commit and must clear his name and expose the insidious plot. While he was on the run, he hooked up with Vanity, who is Coach’s mistress, and forced her to help him because Coach was trying to kill her, too. Vanity spent a good half hour trying to get Apollo to give her the business, but he didn’t, because he was trying to get ready for the fight with Rocky. Or keep them alive. I can’t remember which.
I fail to see how you could walk away from a movie like this without a smile on your face. The only person who probably wasn’t happy with the results was Vanity, who played the junkie with a heart of gold (and panties of imagination). She was finally exposed as someone should only be holding a mic if she’s handing it to someone else AND as an actress who should only be called in if the waitress at the café down the street gets hit by a bus. If she’s ever worked again, it’s proof to me that she gives really good head.
I still liked “7th Heaven” though. That’s probably the best nonsensical song I’ve ever heard. And I liked “Action Jackson,” too, even if they expect me to buy that this cop was so dangerous that they took his gun license away, yet kept him employed as a cop. Or if they expect me to believe that one can drive a Ferrari at top speed through a crowd of people without hitting anyone before going up two or three flights of stairs. Or if they expect me to believe that Coach is a threat to anyone except Stuart or Luther.
For all its faults, I still loved it. I think I loved it because of its faults, mostly because they just don’t make movies like this anymore, and if they do, they call those “direct-to-DVD,” and usually those are so bad that they make my skin burn. It was a nice little throwback to the days when you could invent drinking games based on the cast or the amount of explosions in the movie. Next time you and your friends get together, put this movie on and every time you see a guy that you saw in another 80s action movie, you have to name the movie he was in and take a shot. You also have to take a shot for every explosion. I expect to see more than a few of you in the ICU or a liver transplant list.
Watch this movie because I saw Carl Weathers in some commercial last week for a product I couldn't even name. He's about one stint in rehab away from winding up on "the Surreal Life." He could use our support right now.
I never saw “Action Jackson” when it first came out. Even at the age of 10, I just didn’t like the look of the whole thing. I mean, he was a black guy, so naturally, his name had to rhyme? I seriously thought about these things as a child. I’ll tell anyone who will listen about how I never liked the Junkyard Dog or Roadblock from G.I. Joe because I couldn’t identify with their stereotypical antics, like dancing all time or talking in rhyme. So, I took a pass on “Action Jackson” assuming it would be more of the same.
Then, when I was visiting some friends back in Jackson, “Action Jackson” was put on and they all crowded around the TV to watch, because they loved this movie. I didn’t watch it all, but I did see one part that piqued my curiosity…Action Jackson ran down a speeding taxi on foot. I thought to myself, “This movie must be terrible. I have to see the rest.” So one day when I was in Wal-Mart, the Devil’s Store, I saw it in the five dollar bin. I bought it, and probably three or four other movies that I didn’t need to get.
That movie sat on my movie rack, in the plastic, for about two years. Then, yesterday came, and feeling the need to make fun of something, I decided to finally watch it. And you know what? This is probably the most awesome thing I’ve seen all day. And I don’t feel bad ruining it for you if you haven’t seen it, because the movie’s almost 20 years old. Personally, I’m hoping for a 20th anniversary DVD to be released, with updated pictures of Apollo Creed, who plays Action Jackson, so I can see if he’s still wearing eyeliner.
This movie has every 80’s action movie cliché. A disgraced, over the top, renegade cop that’s living on the edge, a police chief that’s breathing down his neck, a respectable businessman who’s actually a murderous scumbag, complete with henchmen, hot women who get naked, the monologue where the bad guy details his plot to the hero, the romance between the hero and his love interest, no matter how trifling or shady the girl actually is, and let us not forget, the clever quips during and after the fighting. Not to mention, in true 80’s fashion, explosions where there probably shouldn’t be explosions (because in the 80’s, gas tanks were protected by a layer of aluminum foil wrapped in dynamite) and the rotating cast of men that you will only recognize from other 80’s action movies. It’s possible that I have a genetic defect that won’t allow me to dislike this movie.
What else does it have? It also has a scene that is so ridiculous that it came through the mists of time to embed itself in my brain, slap it in the face, and force it to make me spend $5.88 on this DVD.
Sharon Stone (because I couldn’t be bothered to remember her movie name) and Action Jackson are crossing the street, when Sharon makes the mistake of asking out loud why he’s called “Action.” In movies, you just don’t do things like that, because the Spirit of Dramatic Irony will be forced to drop an anvil on you or make zombies come out of the sewers. In this case, he sent a guy in a taxi to run them over, right on cue.
They jump out of the way, and at this point, the computer in his head starts giving him options. He can A:) Make sure the girl is safe. B:) Call for back-up. C:) Chase down a speeding cab on foot. And in true 80’s action movie fashion, he decides to pick the most ridiculous option possible, but because he’s black, he has to give it some flavor. So for a good two minutes, he’s running alongside a car that’s moving at least 50 miles an hour, yelling at the guy to pull over. The guy just sneers that 80’s henchman sneer at him and keeps driving, so Action Jackson leaps off of the ground, onto the roof of a parked car, and soars through the air and lands on the roof of the cab.
The henchman starts to swerve to get him off, but Action Jackson has the Grip of Righteousness on his side, so he stays on. Then, the guy starts shooting at the roof of the car, but that never works and all it does is piss off Action Jackson, a mistake that he warns you throughout the movie that you should never make, because it gives him superpowers or something. So he punches through the wind shield, which he could do without slicing his hand to ribbons because he braced himself, and starts grabbing on the guy, who slams on the brakes.
Action Jackson flies off the hood and rolls about half a mile down the road, and without a scuffed knee or anything, jumps to his feet and starts screaming nonsense at the guy, who sneers again and slams on the gas. And just when you thought the ridiculous couldn’t get no more ridiculouser, Action Jackson leaps into the air, clears the car by at least three feet, does a flip in the air and sticks the landing, just as the cab somehow leaves the ground and crashes into the building at the end of the street. The only reason this doesn’t cause an explosion was because Action Jackson had to get down there and see that the guy somehow got away without a trace.
And right after that, Sharon Stone winds up getting killed by Coach (Craig T. Nelson), who is her husband and the main bad guy. Coach frames Action Jackson for her murder and that sets up another 80’s mainstay: Action Jackson is on the run for a murder he did not commit and must clear his name and expose the insidious plot. While he was on the run, he hooked up with Vanity, who is Coach’s mistress, and forced her to help him because Coach was trying to kill her, too. Vanity spent a good half hour trying to get Apollo to give her the business, but he didn’t, because he was trying to get ready for the fight with Rocky. Or keep them alive. I can’t remember which.
I fail to see how you could walk away from a movie like this without a smile on your face. The only person who probably wasn’t happy with the results was Vanity, who played the junkie with a heart of gold (and panties of imagination). She was finally exposed as someone should only be holding a mic if she’s handing it to someone else AND as an actress who should only be called in if the waitress at the café down the street gets hit by a bus. If she’s ever worked again, it’s proof to me that she gives really good head.
I still liked “7th Heaven” though. That’s probably the best nonsensical song I’ve ever heard. And I liked “Action Jackson,” too, even if they expect me to buy that this cop was so dangerous that they took his gun license away, yet kept him employed as a cop. Or if they expect me to believe that one can drive a Ferrari at top speed through a crowd of people without hitting anyone before going up two or three flights of stairs. Or if they expect me to believe that Coach is a threat to anyone except Stuart or Luther.
For all its faults, I still loved it. I think I loved it because of its faults, mostly because they just don’t make movies like this anymore, and if they do, they call those “direct-to-DVD,” and usually those are so bad that they make my skin burn. It was a nice little throwback to the days when you could invent drinking games based on the cast or the amount of explosions in the movie. Next time you and your friends get together, put this movie on and every time you see a guy that you saw in another 80s action movie, you have to name the movie he was in and take a shot. You also have to take a shot for every explosion. I expect to see more than a few of you in the ICU or a liver transplant list.
Watch this movie because I saw Carl Weathers in some commercial last week for a product I couldn't even name. He's about one stint in rehab away from winding up on "the Surreal Life." He could use our support right now.
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
I Can't Believe I Rented It - Godzilla
When I sat in the theater watching “Jurassic Park: The Lost World,” there was a scene where a T-Rex gets loose in New York City and starts rampaging all over the place, and I, like so many others, no doubt, had a revelation. No, not that I shouldn’t have gone to the movies to watch “The Lost World,” but that it was just a matter of time before they made another “Godzilla” movie. And in 1998, our worst fears came to pass.
I didn’t go see it, though, and the reviewers ripped it apart. It was one of those times I decided to listen to the critics. Time passed, though, and with the passage of time comes two things: forgetfulness and in some cases, dementia.
In 2003, I met a girl who had “Godzilla” on DVD. She said it wasn’t as bad as everyone said, but I didn’t believe her. I borrowed it from her because I wanted to see just how bad the movie was. I mean, this was a failure of “Waterworld” proportions. The summer of 1998 had “Godzilla” plastered everywhere. There were fast food tie-ins, soft drink promotions, video games, even toys. None of it sold and “Godzilla” became the poster child for summer blockbuster excess.
I started to watch that movie after 30 minutes, I was already doing something else, with absolutely no memory of what I had seen, but I never gave the movie back, because I forgot. Then, came a fateful night in 2007, when my dementia kicked in and I made myself watch the entire movie. What follows is the recollection of my horrible, horrible decision.
In thirty minutes, you should be able to tell if the movie you’re watching is going to suck. Except for “Transformers,” which despite a really good first hour, provided me with two blogs worth of material, every movie pretty much fits into that. After 30 minutes with “Godzilla,” it was pretty easy to see why it flopped. The movie purposely opens in the South Pacific for one reason and one reason only: So they could have an Asian man says “Gojira” on camera.
But besides making fun of the way Asian people talk, this movie was goddamn boring. There’s no other way to say it. I don’t know where moviemakers get the idea that we’d rather see regular humans and government interworkings instead of iconic characters, but “Godzilla” showed Ang Lee and Michael Bay the path that they would later walk with “Hulk” and “Transformers.” And both of those movies were terrible.
For what felt like at least three hours, we got to watch the excitement of a nerd biologist researching a giant lizard and how it got pregnant. Along the way, we got to meet the mysterious Frenchman, the mayor of New York who’s trying to get re-elected, the military guy who’s stuck with the mayor, the governor of New York, the other military guy who’s actually on the ground, a news cameraman and his girlfriend, and an aspiring reporter who just happens to be the ex-girlfriend of the nerd biologist. What do any of these people have to do with a giant lizard rampaging through New York? Except for the nerd and the guy with the guns, not a damn thing.
Honestly, I think the screenwriters forgot what movie they were writing at times, because there were whole hours that went by where they weren’t even talking about the eminent threat to Manhattan and by proxy, life on Earth. I mean, there was a failed relationship to talk about, or the re-election campaign, or the how the ex-girlfriend keeps getting screwed over by her boss at the news station. These are pressing concerns, people! We can’t be bothered with the giant lizard that’s trying to kill us all.
I swear, I thought I was watching Transformers again. Are you sure Michael Bay didn’t direct this?
No, we have the creators of Independence Day to thank for this one. I know this because plastered above the title of the movie is the statement, “From the Creators of Independence Day.” Thanks for telling us that, Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich. Now, I know where to send the shit sandwich for letting this one get out, sucking harder than the virgin girl who’s dealing with her first ‘materhead. It was the sort of experience that makes old ladies drink and babies explode.
I can only imagine what it was like for the people who actually had to sit through this in the theater, because once you adjust for inflation, the people in 1998 would have paid at least $77 to watch this. At least the people who worked for Tri-Star back then were getting paid for this abuse. Which leads me to wonder…how much money would you accept to let someone kick you in the groin?
The special effects were good, and truthfully, I’ve got no problem with the way Godzilla looked, mainly because he wasn’t a robot Godzilla or a turtle with jets for legs or a giant moth. Clearly, there was no opium usage during the creative process. The short time that you got to see Godzilla actually rampaging through the city was pretty okay. Too bad there wasn’t more of it. But where the awe-inspiring moments left off, the ridiculous scenes took over. For instance…
The first time Godzilla comes into full view, he’s just breaking buildings, running all over the place, doing his thug thizzle. Then, he walks up on the nerd biologist (played by a “trying way too hard to be nerdy” Ferris Bueller), gets right up in his face, and just stares at him. And Ferris Bueller stares right back, with all the childlike wonder he can muster. In the background, the music from E.T. when he makes the bikes fly is playing. I swear it is. Now think about that for a second. The perfect killing machine is standing in front of you, wondering what you taste like, but the music is laying out a mood of magical wonder and jumping over the Army on your bike.
As stupid as that sounds, what’s stupider is…Godzilla just walks away. And what’s stupider than that is, the U.S. Army, who was standing right behind him, had to be told to fire on the giant lizard that just destroyed half the city. I guess they were waiting to see if Ferris Bueller and the lizard were going to share a touching kiss. And who would want to ruin the chance to see some “interspecies erotica?”
Godzilla goes running through the city, outruns the gunships that are firing all over the place, then hides somewhere in the city. I would ask how, but it might ruin the illusion of ridiculousness that this movie has worked so hard to create. Although, you probably should remember this scene of Godzilla running at least 150 miles an hour through Manhattan, because later on he’s unable to catch a cab that’s directly in front of him.
Nor could his babies catch the people that were on foot in front of them. Yes, Godzilla has babies. Much like Superman, Godzilla is apparently a “baby daddy.” And his babies are susceptible to Vaudevillian slapstick, because when the people are running from hundreds of mini-Zillas, they’re able to get away when Ferris Bueller pushes some basketballs and a gumball machine into their path. Dear God, Godzilla has given birth to the cast of a Hanna-Barbara cartoon. I think I saw that trick on “Jabber-Jaw.”
Of course, the lizards all die in the end, and the most incompetent military in history manages to get out of this mess without accidentally letting off their grenades in the truck or running over their feet with their tanks. But who was it who actually saved the day? The French guy. That’s right, New York got saved by a French guy. Sure, it was The Professional, but he’s still French. And we just can’t have that.
I’m sure most of you have gone through life not having seen this and I would just like to suggest that you keep doing what you’ve been doing. I have just laid my life and my sanity on the line to assure that you continue to do this. Never see this movie. If you have any respect for me at all, you’ll slap anyone across the face who owns this movie. Just do that for me. Now, I’m going to go throw up.
I didn’t go see it, though, and the reviewers ripped it apart. It was one of those times I decided to listen to the critics. Time passed, though, and with the passage of time comes two things: forgetfulness and in some cases, dementia.
In 2003, I met a girl who had “Godzilla” on DVD. She said it wasn’t as bad as everyone said, but I didn’t believe her. I borrowed it from her because I wanted to see just how bad the movie was. I mean, this was a failure of “Waterworld” proportions. The summer of 1998 had “Godzilla” plastered everywhere. There were fast food tie-ins, soft drink promotions, video games, even toys. None of it sold and “Godzilla” became the poster child for summer blockbuster excess.
I started to watch that movie after 30 minutes, I was already doing something else, with absolutely no memory of what I had seen, but I never gave the movie back, because I forgot. Then, came a fateful night in 2007, when my dementia kicked in and I made myself watch the entire movie. What follows is the recollection of my horrible, horrible decision.
In thirty minutes, you should be able to tell if the movie you’re watching is going to suck. Except for “Transformers,” which despite a really good first hour, provided me with two blogs worth of material, every movie pretty much fits into that. After 30 minutes with “Godzilla,” it was pretty easy to see why it flopped. The movie purposely opens in the South Pacific for one reason and one reason only: So they could have an Asian man says “Gojira” on camera.
But besides making fun of the way Asian people talk, this movie was goddamn boring. There’s no other way to say it. I don’t know where moviemakers get the idea that we’d rather see regular humans and government interworkings instead of iconic characters, but “Godzilla” showed Ang Lee and Michael Bay the path that they would later walk with “Hulk” and “Transformers.” And both of those movies were terrible.
For what felt like at least three hours, we got to watch the excitement of a nerd biologist researching a giant lizard and how it got pregnant. Along the way, we got to meet the mysterious Frenchman, the mayor of New York who’s trying to get re-elected, the military guy who’s stuck with the mayor, the governor of New York, the other military guy who’s actually on the ground, a news cameraman and his girlfriend, and an aspiring reporter who just happens to be the ex-girlfriend of the nerd biologist. What do any of these people have to do with a giant lizard rampaging through New York? Except for the nerd and the guy with the guns, not a damn thing.
Honestly, I think the screenwriters forgot what movie they were writing at times, because there were whole hours that went by where they weren’t even talking about the eminent threat to Manhattan and by proxy, life on Earth. I mean, there was a failed relationship to talk about, or the re-election campaign, or the how the ex-girlfriend keeps getting screwed over by her boss at the news station. These are pressing concerns, people! We can’t be bothered with the giant lizard that’s trying to kill us all.
I swear, I thought I was watching Transformers again. Are you sure Michael Bay didn’t direct this?
No, we have the creators of Independence Day to thank for this one. I know this because plastered above the title of the movie is the statement, “From the Creators of Independence Day.” Thanks for telling us that, Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich. Now, I know where to send the shit sandwich for letting this one get out, sucking harder than the virgin girl who’s dealing with her first ‘materhead. It was the sort of experience that makes old ladies drink and babies explode.
I can only imagine what it was like for the people who actually had to sit through this in the theater, because once you adjust for inflation, the people in 1998 would have paid at least $77 to watch this. At least the people who worked for Tri-Star back then were getting paid for this abuse. Which leads me to wonder…how much money would you accept to let someone kick you in the groin?
The special effects were good, and truthfully, I’ve got no problem with the way Godzilla looked, mainly because he wasn’t a robot Godzilla or a turtle with jets for legs or a giant moth. Clearly, there was no opium usage during the creative process. The short time that you got to see Godzilla actually rampaging through the city was pretty okay. Too bad there wasn’t more of it. But where the awe-inspiring moments left off, the ridiculous scenes took over. For instance…
The first time Godzilla comes into full view, he’s just breaking buildings, running all over the place, doing his thug thizzle. Then, he walks up on the nerd biologist (played by a “trying way too hard to be nerdy” Ferris Bueller), gets right up in his face, and just stares at him. And Ferris Bueller stares right back, with all the childlike wonder he can muster. In the background, the music from E.T. when he makes the bikes fly is playing. I swear it is. Now think about that for a second. The perfect killing machine is standing in front of you, wondering what you taste like, but the music is laying out a mood of magical wonder and jumping over the Army on your bike.
As stupid as that sounds, what’s stupider is…Godzilla just walks away. And what’s stupider than that is, the U.S. Army, who was standing right behind him, had to be told to fire on the giant lizard that just destroyed half the city. I guess they were waiting to see if Ferris Bueller and the lizard were going to share a touching kiss. And who would want to ruin the chance to see some “interspecies erotica?”
Godzilla goes running through the city, outruns the gunships that are firing all over the place, then hides somewhere in the city. I would ask how, but it might ruin the illusion of ridiculousness that this movie has worked so hard to create. Although, you probably should remember this scene of Godzilla running at least 150 miles an hour through Manhattan, because later on he’s unable to catch a cab that’s directly in front of him.
Nor could his babies catch the people that were on foot in front of them. Yes, Godzilla has babies. Much like Superman, Godzilla is apparently a “baby daddy.” And his babies are susceptible to Vaudevillian slapstick, because when the people are running from hundreds of mini-Zillas, they’re able to get away when Ferris Bueller pushes some basketballs and a gumball machine into their path. Dear God, Godzilla has given birth to the cast of a Hanna-Barbara cartoon. I think I saw that trick on “Jabber-Jaw.”
Of course, the lizards all die in the end, and the most incompetent military in history manages to get out of this mess without accidentally letting off their grenades in the truck or running over their feet with their tanks. But who was it who actually saved the day? The French guy. That’s right, New York got saved by a French guy. Sure, it was The Professional, but he’s still French. And we just can’t have that.
I’m sure most of you have gone through life not having seen this and I would just like to suggest that you keep doing what you’ve been doing. I have just laid my life and my sanity on the line to assure that you continue to do this. Never see this movie. If you have any respect for me at all, you’ll slap anyone across the face who owns this movie. Just do that for me. Now, I’m going to go throw up.
I Can't Believe I Rented It - Elektra
Well, truth to tell, I didn’t rent it. It was on FX one weekend, and if you’re the least bit familiar with FX, you know that they can’t show re-runs all the time. There’s no way in Satan’s Hell that I would have spent money to see this movie. It’s not that it was bad. It just wasn’t worth the imaginary money that I wasn’t going to spend.
“Elektra” is a spin-off of a movie that’s only claim to fame is that Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner (Bennifer 2), met on the set. That movie would be “Daredevil,” a movie that was only allowed to be made because “Spider-Man” brought in $403 million dollars. It’s not like anyone was clamoring for “Daredevil”, so judging by that, there might have been about 17 or 18 people looking forward to this.
In the lead role, Jennifer Garner plays a Greek assassin who died, but didn’t die, in “Daredevil.” Instead of trying to get into a blind man’s pants or going after the Kingpin, the man who was trying to have her father and boyfriend killed, she goes after some guy and whispers in his ear from across the room. That leads her to find some kid breaking into her place, who develops a girl-crush on Elektra and tries to hook Elektra up with her dad. Because, you know, there always has to be a love interest in these movies. And because a PG-13 rating and child protection laws won’t let Elektra get down with the girl.
So she goes and has dinner with these people, and in one night, she becomes so attached to these perfect strangers who practice breaking and entering at her house, that when her next assignment is to kill those lovable prowlers, she backs out and risks her life to save them from ninjas.
That led to them going on the run and hearing some claptrap about a ninja clan called the Hand whose members are mostly known for getting killed by Wolverine. And since the ninjas weren’t enough to take down Elektra while she’s rescuing these people, the Hand decide to step outside of their own reality, pull The 8 Devils on Kimon from my “Ninja Scroll” DVD and bring them into this movie.
I swear, anyone who’s seen “Ninja Scroll” knows that all they did was change the names of those guys. Unfortunately, they left all of their excitement and coolness back in the other DVD.
Then, it comes out that the 8 Devils are after the girl, because she’s the treasure or something, which I think might just be a nice way of saying that she’s going to be introduced to the child sex ring in Asia. Apparently, one of the 8 Devils, Typhoid Mary, used to be the treasure, and caught so many diseases that now she can spread them at will. It must be cool to be able to mentally control your gonorrhea.
And after that piece of information is revealed, the girl reveals that suddenly, she is an instrument of destruction who has the fighting skills to shove “the glow” up Leroy Green’s ass. The girl is flat-out awesome. So awesome that she could have, you know, been of use when Elektra was killing herself trying to fight off a horde of ninjas or men who turn into stone all by herself. Apparently, it’s more dramatic to reveal that you can stomp ass when you’re not in any danger.
That led to the girl getting her ass in trouble anyway, the 8 Devils getting killed, and Elektra having a showdown with the son of the boss of the 8 Devils and beating on her just long enough to make the people who have never watched movies before think that she could lose. I hope that was the end, because I really don’t remember much else past that.
I won’t get into the mistake that is casting Jennifer Garner as Elektra, because I really try to temper my “Dork Side” when I write these things. I would question the wisdom of making a movie about a superhero that no one outside of the comic book store has ever heard of. At least Meteor Man was an original creation. I would also question making a stand-alone, spin-off movie for a character who’s only notable story involved all of the main characters from the movie she was spun-off from.
But, having said all that, the movie wasn’t good or bad. It just was. It came on, it had a couple of cool scenes, it didn’t make my blood pressure rise or throw anything at the TV, and it ended, roll credits. It was pretty much a B-movie from the 80s. It was generic as generic can get. If you had added some cats, you could have called it “Catwoman” and no one would have known the difference. And for those who are curious, no, I still haven’t seen “Catwoman.” Unless you count the first time it was released under the title, “Batman Returns.”
“Elektra” is a spin-off of a movie that’s only claim to fame is that Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner (Bennifer 2), met on the set. That movie would be “Daredevil,” a movie that was only allowed to be made because “Spider-Man” brought in $403 million dollars. It’s not like anyone was clamoring for “Daredevil”, so judging by that, there might have been about 17 or 18 people looking forward to this.
In the lead role, Jennifer Garner plays a Greek assassin who died, but didn’t die, in “Daredevil.” Instead of trying to get into a blind man’s pants or going after the Kingpin, the man who was trying to have her father and boyfriend killed, she goes after some guy and whispers in his ear from across the room. That leads her to find some kid breaking into her place, who develops a girl-crush on Elektra and tries to hook Elektra up with her dad. Because, you know, there always has to be a love interest in these movies. And because a PG-13 rating and child protection laws won’t let Elektra get down with the girl.
So she goes and has dinner with these people, and in one night, she becomes so attached to these perfect strangers who practice breaking and entering at her house, that when her next assignment is to kill those lovable prowlers, she backs out and risks her life to save them from ninjas.
That led to them going on the run and hearing some claptrap about a ninja clan called the Hand whose members are mostly known for getting killed by Wolverine. And since the ninjas weren’t enough to take down Elektra while she’s rescuing these people, the Hand decide to step outside of their own reality, pull The 8 Devils on Kimon from my “Ninja Scroll” DVD and bring them into this movie.
I swear, anyone who’s seen “Ninja Scroll” knows that all they did was change the names of those guys. Unfortunately, they left all of their excitement and coolness back in the other DVD.
Then, it comes out that the 8 Devils are after the girl, because she’s the treasure or something, which I think might just be a nice way of saying that she’s going to be introduced to the child sex ring in Asia. Apparently, one of the 8 Devils, Typhoid Mary, used to be the treasure, and caught so many diseases that now she can spread them at will. It must be cool to be able to mentally control your gonorrhea.
And after that piece of information is revealed, the girl reveals that suddenly, she is an instrument of destruction who has the fighting skills to shove “the glow” up Leroy Green’s ass. The girl is flat-out awesome. So awesome that she could have, you know, been of use when Elektra was killing herself trying to fight off a horde of ninjas or men who turn into stone all by herself. Apparently, it’s more dramatic to reveal that you can stomp ass when you’re not in any danger.
That led to the girl getting her ass in trouble anyway, the 8 Devils getting killed, and Elektra having a showdown with the son of the boss of the 8 Devils and beating on her just long enough to make the people who have never watched movies before think that she could lose. I hope that was the end, because I really don’t remember much else past that.
I won’t get into the mistake that is casting Jennifer Garner as Elektra, because I really try to temper my “Dork Side” when I write these things. I would question the wisdom of making a movie about a superhero that no one outside of the comic book store has ever heard of. At least Meteor Man was an original creation. I would also question making a stand-alone, spin-off movie for a character who’s only notable story involved all of the main characters from the movie she was spun-off from.
But, having said all that, the movie wasn’t good or bad. It just was. It came on, it had a couple of cool scenes, it didn’t make my blood pressure rise or throw anything at the TV, and it ended, roll credits. It was pretty much a B-movie from the 80s. It was generic as generic can get. If you had added some cats, you could have called it “Catwoman” and no one would have known the difference. And for those who are curious, no, I still haven’t seen “Catwoman.” Unless you count the first time it was released under the title, “Batman Returns.”
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
The Follow Up to My Transformers Review
I've never done this before. I've never felt the need to actually respond to comments I've received about something I've written. Maybe I went a little bit too far. Maybe I should...
Nope. I'm not taking none of it back. This movie sucked.
I don't know what cartoons in the 80's has to do with anything. We're not talking about the cartoon. We're talking about the movie. But since cartoons were brought up, every cartoon has episodes where the title character isn't the focus. I wasn't paying nine bucks to watch them, either.
And since black characters in cartoons were brought up, I was never big on them, either. Jazz in the show never embarrassed me. Roadblock did. And Jazz in the movie made me roll my eyes. I'm glad he died. But just because the cartoon did it makes it okay for the movie do it almost 25 years later?
I never brought up dialogue outside of one line delivered by Prime. But since it was brought up, just because the dialogue on the cartoon wasn't that good, doesn't excuse the movie from having corny dialogue in any way, shape, or form. No one spent $200 million on an episode of Transformers.
I never said I expected this movie to be like the cartoon. There isn't a person in this life or the next who has ever heard me say that or express this sentiment. I always knew it wasn't going to be like the cartoon. And I went into the theater with low expectations. It's just always sad when you even your lowered expectations are exceeded.
I never said anything about Transformer names not making sense. I just never liked that Bumblebee wasn't a Volkswagen, and allegedly, that one wasn't Michael Bay's fault. Score one for him.
Regarding the Autobots being completely useless: Man, it's a two-and-a-half hour movie. I don't have time for Prime to learn how to man-up and fight his sworn enemies. He's been at it for a million years. If he can't get it now, he's never gonna get it.
Regarding what Michael Bay wanted to show in this movie: I already saw Armageddon. I already know how he thinks the U.S. Government would react to a threat from outer space. He just threw some Independence Day in there for good measure.
Someone tell me this...was ANYTHING that was going on with the Army, Sector Seven, the hot chick (she was okay), the hacker, and the other computer people even necessary? No, for real...that was integral to the story?
I have to admit, there were a couple of moments in this movie that gave me goosebumps. I think all of them were during times when Prime was talking. There were a couple of moments here and there that were pretty exciting. But when they're spaced out by things like the guided tour around the SECRET FACILITY or some half-assed love story or finding out if Tyrese and Johnny Knoxville are going to get to where they're going, I was yelling at the screen "GET THE FUCK ON WITH IT!" Seriously...I don't care. Outside of Sam himself, there wasn't a single human being in this movie that they couldn't do without and I will argue with anyone on that point. Now, if you were able to look past that...fine. But for me, I paid nine bucks to see giant robots. I know I've said that a lot, but that's my problem with this movie. I didn't get what I paid to see.
There's nothing I said where I complained about changing the mythos of the cartoon or comic book. Say what you want...the movie got judged on its own merits. In fact, everyone else did all the nitpicking about the cartoon. I mentioned the cartoon one time, and that was when talking about Bumblebee. And even that is minor, because he could have been a Volkswagen with Mr. Fusion powered time-circuits, wings, and a horn that's powered by love and happiness, and the movie still wouldn't have been good.
I don't dislike things because they're not like the source material...except for Resident Evil, because they didn't even try. They could have called that movie Speed Hyper Death Kill Zombie Ultramix 4 and you would have never known the difference. But the thing is, just put a good movie out there. I thought Spider-Man was a good movie. The first time I saw X-Men, I thought it was good. Batman Begins was flat out awesome. I watch Smallville religiously. Teen Titans was one of the best comic related cartoons ever. And none of those things is completely true to the source material. But what they are is well written. They didn't make me want to leave the theater (or change the channel) when there wasn't something exploding on screen. Transformers can't say that.
Overall, it was like being on Jackass. Yeah, you get brief moments of fame and a little bit of money...but look at what you had to go through to get there. If you had completed the 7th grade like your mother said, you wouldn't have to swim in raw sewage to pay your rent.
Oh, and Shia LeBeouf was great. I can't wait to see him in something that's actually good.
Nope. I'm not taking none of it back. This movie sucked.
I don't know what cartoons in the 80's has to do with anything. We're not talking about the cartoon. We're talking about the movie. But since cartoons were brought up, every cartoon has episodes where the title character isn't the focus. I wasn't paying nine bucks to watch them, either.
And since black characters in cartoons were brought up, I was never big on them, either. Jazz in the show never embarrassed me. Roadblock did. And Jazz in the movie made me roll my eyes. I'm glad he died. But just because the cartoon did it makes it okay for the movie do it almost 25 years later?
I never brought up dialogue outside of one line delivered by Prime. But since it was brought up, just because the dialogue on the cartoon wasn't that good, doesn't excuse the movie from having corny dialogue in any way, shape, or form. No one spent $200 million on an episode of Transformers.
I never said I expected this movie to be like the cartoon. There isn't a person in this life or the next who has ever heard me say that or express this sentiment. I always knew it wasn't going to be like the cartoon. And I went into the theater with low expectations. It's just always sad when you even your lowered expectations are exceeded.
I never said anything about Transformer names not making sense. I just never liked that Bumblebee wasn't a Volkswagen, and allegedly, that one wasn't Michael Bay's fault. Score one for him.
Regarding the Autobots being completely useless: Man, it's a two-and-a-half hour movie. I don't have time for Prime to learn how to man-up and fight his sworn enemies. He's been at it for a million years. If he can't get it now, he's never gonna get it.
Regarding what Michael Bay wanted to show in this movie: I already saw Armageddon. I already know how he thinks the U.S. Government would react to a threat from outer space. He just threw some Independence Day in there for good measure.
Someone tell me this...was ANYTHING that was going on with the Army, Sector Seven, the hot chick (she was okay), the hacker, and the other computer people even necessary? No, for real...that was integral to the story?
I have to admit, there were a couple of moments in this movie that gave me goosebumps. I think all of them were during times when Prime was talking. There were a couple of moments here and there that were pretty exciting. But when they're spaced out by things like the guided tour around the SECRET FACILITY or some half-assed love story or finding out if Tyrese and Johnny Knoxville are going to get to where they're going, I was yelling at the screen "GET THE FUCK ON WITH IT!" Seriously...I don't care. Outside of Sam himself, there wasn't a single human being in this movie that they couldn't do without and I will argue with anyone on that point. Now, if you were able to look past that...fine. But for me, I paid nine bucks to see giant robots. I know I've said that a lot, but that's my problem with this movie. I didn't get what I paid to see.
There's nothing I said where I complained about changing the mythos of the cartoon or comic book. Say what you want...the movie got judged on its own merits. In fact, everyone else did all the nitpicking about the cartoon. I mentioned the cartoon one time, and that was when talking about Bumblebee. And even that is minor, because he could have been a Volkswagen with Mr. Fusion powered time-circuits, wings, and a horn that's powered by love and happiness, and the movie still wouldn't have been good.
I don't dislike things because they're not like the source material...except for Resident Evil, because they didn't even try. They could have called that movie Speed Hyper Death Kill Zombie Ultramix 4 and you would have never known the difference. But the thing is, just put a good movie out there. I thought Spider-Man was a good movie. The first time I saw X-Men, I thought it was good. Batman Begins was flat out awesome. I watch Smallville religiously. Teen Titans was one of the best comic related cartoons ever. And none of those things is completely true to the source material. But what they are is well written. They didn't make me want to leave the theater (or change the channel) when there wasn't something exploding on screen. Transformers can't say that.
Overall, it was like being on Jackass. Yeah, you get brief moments of fame and a little bit of money...but look at what you had to go through to get there. If you had completed the 7th grade like your mother said, you wouldn't have to swim in raw sewage to pay your rent.
Oh, and Shia LeBeouf was great. I can't wait to see him in something that's actually good.
Saturday, July 14, 2007
Transformers: Ass Pain From Beyond the Stars
I just have to get this out there: Stop trying to ruin my childhood.
The latest death strike against my happiness was called “Transformers,” which must be Hollywood-ese for “attractive people doing stuff with flashy camera angles.” It was a movie that I wasn’t asking for and probably could have gone the rest of my life never wanting to see. I already saw the Transformers movie, back in 1986. It was called “Transformers: The Movie,” and it came out at a time when the word “Transformers” still meant “giant robots that punch each other.” I was tricked into seeing it by four so-called friends who swore to me that it was awesome. But it wasn’t, and I hate you all. Don’t let me see you in the street.
The movie, despite the extremely leading title, was really about a boy named Sam who was a budding huckster with no ties to his family, because for most of the movie, he was trying to sell off valuable family mementos so he could buy a car for himself. And one of those mementos was a pair of glasses that the hapless Autobots would need to find the thing that created their entire race. Meanwhile, the Decepticons were using their natural robotic gifts, like hacking into computers and killing things, to reach the same goal. I wouldn’t doubt it if the Decepticons had spent the last million years giving the Autobots swirlies and stuffing them into lockers, because if the Autobots couldn’t figure out that they were also highly advanced robots that could talk to our primitive computers, they deserve to lose.
But, because they had the humans on their side, led by Sam the Invincible, the Autobots triumphed in the end. Lucky for them that everything landed on Earth, so their weak-kneed leader, Optimus Prime, could lean on the broad shoulders of Sam Witwicky. Good thing they didn’t land on the Planet of the Apes or the place where the Klingons live, because Prime would have been in SO MUCH trouble. By God, Sam doesn’t live on the Planet of the Apes.
It really is just that bad. There isn’t a single thing that the Autobots can accomplish for the entire movie without Sam or some other human holding their hands through it all. Maybe all of them should have transformed into short buses, because there wasn’t a robot among them who wasn’t almost fatally retarded. I swear there was a part where they had to call poison control because Bumblebee couldn’t stop drinking Drain-O.
And that’s what I don’t like about this movie. It’s about the damn humans. I said a year and a half ago that if I wanted to see movie about humans doing stuff, I’d watch damn near anything else, because when a Transformers movie comes out, I want to see giant robots punching each other. This sort of approach works if the evil thing looking to destroy mankind isn’t interesting (like an asteroid), or can’ts speak for itself (like Aliens or Predators) but the Transformers written properly have more personality than the half-developed human characters that make up this movie. There’s the hot chick who can fix cars, there’s the black guy, there’s the socially awkward nerd, there’s the mean military guy. You’ve seen these characters in other movies, and they were probably also directed by
But not only do they manage to make giant robots uninteresting, they make them generic and unable to be told apart. I’ve put together more exciting movies with the toys in my room. The best part is when Six-Shot stops humping Barbie, then scolds Batman for being a child molester. Little boys in speedos hanging around with reclusive billionaires can’t be a good thing.
There was a scene in the movie where the Decepticons start attacking the Autobots, and there was a pause in the action for almost a full minute because we had to watch the hot chick and Sam make eye contact and reach for each other. In the middle of a battlefield. With missles and giant robots flying overhead. Because when you’re surrounded by world-ending destruction, you might as well try and get some first. And when the shit’s going down and there are arms and heads and shit flying all over the place, who actually needs to see it, when you can see the blossoming romance between Sam and his stroke-material?
When they actually did give the robots screen-time, most of it was taken up by Bumblebee and a robot that transforms into a clock radio. Clock Radio (because they couldn’t be bothered to give him a name) was clearly inspired by some of the Star Wars droids, because not only was he one of the few robots who did ANYTHING without human assistance, he made all sorts of cute bleeps and bloops and bounced off of walls and stuff. He was kind of like an evil R2-D2.
Bumblebee was Sam’s car who loved Sam so much that he looked 20 years into Sam’s future and saw that he was never getting laid. Because Bumblebee couldn’t pleasure him without violating the laws of nature, he decided to try to get him some from the hot chick. Why was he named Bumblebee? Because there had to be a character named Bumblebee. And because making him a Volkswagen Beetle like he was in the cartoon would have made his name make too much sense, they made him a Mustang and hoped no one would notice. Then, they made his robot form look like a bumblebee. Problem solved.
And where is it written that all black people in movies have to be loud, full of jokes, and able to dance? I swear, even the black robot fit that description, and couldn’t make it through his introduction without cussing and break dancing. Luckily for us all, he was killed, filling in another requirement for black people in movies: the black guy always dies. Normally, this would upset me, but since he was the proof that cooning even takes place amongst the stars, I took it as a mercy killing.
Well, what about the CGI? Because after all, that’s what we came to see, right? It would have been good if they had allowed you to actually see it. There were times when they were standing around and talking and that looked okay. But when the fights started…because the robots themselves look so plain and indistinct, you just get a blur of metal pieces every time the robots fight each other. That’s right, the last 30 minutes of the movie looked like a spin cycle with metal shards in it.
Overall, this movie was just an extreme letdown. You’d think that a movie that was about giant, shape-changing, robots from another world that hate each other and fight would have been enough, but when your name is Michael Bay, you have to add flashy camera tricks, jokes, and a scene where The Autobots have to hide in Sam’s backyard so his parents don’t see them. Yeah, as ridiculous as it sounds to hear about 30 foot tall robots that shake the ground when they walk trying to hide in a residential area, imagine having to sit through it. Optimus Prime breaks something and says, “My bad.” Oh, the comedy gold!
As a result of the tinkering, my worst fears were realized: A shit movie where the title characters became background players was released to the world. And people have been led to believe it was a good movie, and as a result, I was led to believe that I should see it. A movie about cybernetic beings from beyond the stars who have been waging war on each other for millions of years, and yet when they get to Earth, they become so inept that they have to depend on a 17 year old nerd virgin and the cool kids from your high school to survive. Because if “Transformers” taught us nothing else, it’s that the world can only be saved by the attractive. Jesus Christ, this is what
Look, I really tried to like this movie. I gave it a chance. I really did. I knew it wasn’t going to be anything Oscar-worthy, or even Tony-award worthy, but maybe if
Bring on the Underdog movie, so I can go ahead and drink that cup of bleach and end my suffering.
Monday, January 29, 2007
I Can't Believe I Rented It - Superman Returns
The following might be offensive to gay people. Just know that it's nothing against you, I really just don't like Bryan Singer. That is all.
"I didn't know it were possible for one movie to suck the balls of another until I saw "Superman Returns." Actually, it shouldn't surprise me that this movie had that ability, judging by the alleged ball-sucking skills of its allegedly homosexual director, Bryan Singer. Allegedly."
Those were my original thoughts as the opening credits rolled across the screen. Okay, so my thoughts read like I was writing them for a column. So what? The point is, I was judging the movie before it got started. And let's face it, it's hard not to do that the movie can't get through the opening credits without ripping off a movie from 1977.
And I knew Bryan Singer was going to do it. I knew he was going to reuse parts of the original score and I knew he was going to reuse Marlon Brando's voice, being a huge fan of "Superman: The Movie," but I don't understand why. I loved those first two Superman movies as much as the next guy, but not enough to where I would actually copy parts of that movie and put them into my 2006 update. And if I worked for Warner Bros, I would be wondering exactly what the hell he spent $200 million dollars on. Maybe he spent it on male strippers or a special lens to look longingly into Brandon Routh's eyes from afar, because it certainly wasn't spent on originality.
Or entertainment, for that matter, because unless I misjudged how entertaining Superman being a stalker could be, this movie was pretty damn boring. Whether he was watching Lois in the elevator or looking through the walls in her house, this was a creepiest Superman I have ever seen. Since Bryan Singer was so intent on "tweaking" the costume, he should have just given him a dirty trench coat with a "S" on the back.
Congrats on being the only Superman to make me uncomfortable, Brandon Routh. I hope you're proud. I know you worked hard at making me shudder at the fact that a man can watch me use the toilet from space.
As far as the rest of the cast, I'm probably just nitpicking, but I don't like my
I guess my main problem with this movie is not because it's poorly written or that he tried to shoehorn things in, because that's not the case. My problem is mostly that it was goddamn boring, but also because I simply don't agree with some of his choices of direction. I guess Singer just preferred having a dopey Lex Luthor instead of one that people would, I don' t know…actually take seriously. And since I didn't go to film school, I never learned the rule that said, "Through Brando, all things are possible. You are nothing without Brando." After all, he was so invaluable the first time. Then again, what do I know? I'm not the director.
I mean, if I was the director, I would have made sure I had things like action in my action movie. But because he was so focused on that fantasy about tonguing down Brandon Routh's muscular chest, Bryan Singer actually forgot to add things like tension, excitement, and confiict to the movie. He might have gotten so lost in the dream that he thought he was actually on the set of "Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman," because I don't think Superman punched a single thing during the whole movie. That would be kinda like Bryan Singer not dreaming about Brandon Routh's crotch. Not a day passes by where it doesn't happen.
In the end, the whole thing played out like The Hulk: In both, the title character had maybe 20 minutes of total screen time and the rest of the movie was a bunch of relationships between characters I didn't care about. Listen, if I didn't care about Cyclops in three X-Men movies, what makes you think I'm going to care about him in this one? You know what would have made me care? The part where he tried to kill Lois with his optic rays for letting him believe that was his kid for all these years. That part had to get edited out so we could get 30 more seconds of watching Superman get shot in the face in slow motion.
I swear, gay people really need to stop making superhero movies. I'm just saying. Between Joel Schumacher, Bryan Singer, and whoever invented "Captain
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