Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Road to 500: The New Batch

Well, I've been plugging away at this silly goal like I intended, but because of it I've gotten way behind on keeping track of them on here. As of the time if this writing, I'm up to about 60 movies watched so I'm on track for keeping my goal. Now I just need to carve out some time around the movies and everything else that's been going on around here to actually do the writing portion of this foolish crusade. I'm hoping to get a big update done over the weekend but until then, here's the next sampling of what I've been watching. And keep an eye out for the other features I hinted at a while ago. I'm hoping to transition this blog into an all purpose center for my rants on movies and weird little topics I come up with on top of keeping track of the movies I need to watch. Maybe that'll turn this thing into something people will actually want to read. See you then.


17.
It's a shame that this one didn't get more business. Horror fans like to bitch about the PG-13 rating, but honestly, it gets by without excessive blood or gore by focusing on being more of an amusement park ride. It's gross and insanely fun without crossing the line into serious horror territory. Every other scene is a great set-piece designed for either laughs or gross-out moments, even if the movie starts to feel like it's only stitched together solely for the sake of such moments. It's easy to overlook the flaws in the movie since it pretty much works on the same level of a Looney Tunes cartoon. The actors are simply there for the abuse, even if it does manage to inject some kind of personality into Alison Lohman for the first time in her career. For people still bitching about an Evil Dead 4, there's a perfectly acceptable substitute right here.
Sights within:
-Haunted hanky.
-Staple-face
-World's most horribel example of "sucking face."
-Kitty sacrfice.
-World's worst nosebleed.
-An evil fucking goat.
-Kitten vomit.
-Corpse abuse.
-A great "fuck you" ending.
Grade: A-



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18.
This was the first rerun of the challenge, though I hadn't watched it in a while. The last story with the troll was one of my favorite things in the world as a kid, but one thing I had always overlooked was how funny the rest of the movie was. James Woods in particular is hilarious, but then again, it is James Woods so you probably should have expected it. I always found the second story with the ledge fascinating. When I was about ten years old, I'd find things to climb up on and try to reenact it as best as I could. The show stopper is still the troll. He's designed perfectly and the scenes with him in the bedroom is some of the greatest shit in the world. I think it still holds up now because of the use of practical effects. The monster suit works great and can show a surprisingly full range of emotions and the fact that they actually built scaled sets for it is amazing. The eventual remake will probably be 80% CGI which is depressing enough to want to drink. This is still a great movie and is one of the few that I think is actually great for kids to watch. I'm surprised it's not talked about much anymore.
Sights within:
-World's only cameos by both Cujo and Christine.
-Closet capers.
-A cigarette crazed fever dream.
-Booted pigeon.
-French horn abuse.
-Drew Barrymore right as the drugs began their hold.
-"Fuck you" says the troll.
-Wicked troll knife.
-I guess you could say "he was a big fan?" Ha! Get it?!
-That was awful. I apologize.
Grade: B



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19.
Overall, pretty disappointing, but then again it seems more catered to the mall crowd then someone actually into horror movies. Or maybe it's just that zombies are beyond any sort of saturation point that the only thing anyone can do is make jokes. I'm sorry but when a fucking cell phone commercial is using zombies and Windows 7 is blatantly stealing a scene from Fulci's Zombi, it's time to retire the genre. Of course that wouldn't explain why the middle of this movie drags ass and is devoid of any type of zombie despite its title. If it wasn't for Woody Harrelson, this movie could go fuck itself, that's how insulting it feels. If Woody wasn't around to deliver 85% of the movie's jokes, you'd start to notice how pointless it all is. I'm kind of glad Twilight came around and put the spotlight on vampires, a tired and barren genre no matter what happens in it, just so that it can hopefully steal some of the mainstream's attention and kills some of the endless dumbass zombie movies being crapped out.
Sights within:
-World's most interactive credits.
-Banjo abuse.
-They must have had some deep-rooted hatred for the Native American people.
-Ghostbuster abuse.
-Unwarranted Twinkie fascination.
-The only movie that felt like a tired sitcom.
-How the fuck did anything at the end work in the first place? Who's running those fucking things?
Grade: C-



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20.
If I had seen this movie when I was 10, it'd be one of my favorites along with The Monster Squad or Night of the Creeps. I still love it now, but there's something different that gets impressed somewhere in your head as a child than as an adult. The movie's nothing more than Jack Brooks trying to deal with his anger problems until he finds that beating the ever-lovin' shit out of monsters is the perfect release. Trevor Matthews is so good as Brooks, it's hard to imagine that he originally was just a producer and writer before being convinced to give the role a shot. The effects are gloriously '80's, foam and latex are everywhere without a single shot of CGI anywhere that I can remember. And Robert Englund is obviously having a ball and chewing all of the scenery he can. Just a great, fun movie that manages to capture the feeling of a bygone era while telling a new story rather than just retreading the same shit (*cough*Eli Roth Rob Zombie*cough*).
Sights within:
-World's best tirade involving egg rolls.
-Awesome monster designs.
-Robert Englund as filthy as you've ever seen him.
-Canine abuse.
-A kick-ass plumber not named Mario.
-Canadian "surry" abuse.
Grade: B+



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21.
Bleh. Wasn't expecting much, didn't get much. Some of the dialog was funny, but other than that everything else has been done before with much more compelling characters. It comes across like it's trying too hard to be the next Heathers but feels just as generic as any other Hollywood genre movie being churned out, only with a vocabulary that makes you want to hold Diablo Cody hostage and force her to read classic English literature. Megan Fox does what she always seem to do, look like a used up ex-porn star with all of the personality of a table lamp. Amanda Seyfried's trying too hard for something that's not really worth it. The only real acting highlights come from Adam Brody, surprisingly, as a rock star who doesn't give a shit about anyone, and J.K. Simmons, who's always awesome. It's not a horrible movie, but it's nothing you'll even try to remember once it's over.
Sights within:
-An awesome kick to the face.
-I guess anyone can try to come up with their own slang terms. Samoflange. There. Just did it.
-You really think anyone would buy that she's a virgin?
-World's only case of wildlife voyeurism.
-Vomit with spikes. Trendy.
-Lance Henrikson abuse.
-It's a movie made for hipsters to watch on Halloween and feel even more self-important.
Grade: D+



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22.
Yep, The Asylum makes original movies, too. Well, as original as you can get with vampire movies, anyway. Van Helsing somehow lives on until modern day, working as a greasy British doctor when the vampire who claimed his wife returns and begins creating a new army of vamps. There's some scenes of Van Helsing training a bunch of glorified extras while the evil vampires are menscing it up in your typical abandoned warehouse set. It's just all so...pedestrian. Some shit happens, and then some more shit happens, until it finally ends. You can't bring yourself to care about any of this, even if you tried. There's worse out there (trust me), but there's a hell of a lot better, too.
Sights within:
-Apparently the filmmakers thought night=coating everything in blue during post.
-World's worst ADR.
-Van Helsing crahses what appears to be an AA meeting to recruit vampire hunters, who all die three minutes into battle.
-Editing abuse.
-That lady looks like she has to pee the whole damn movie.
Grade: D



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23.
You gotta give it to them, they're ambitious. Another Asylum movie dealing with vampires, but this one suffers from too much plot and planning. It tries to ape the Blade and Underworld movies by creating this labyrinthine mythology delivered by fledgling actors with about an hour and a half of build-up before eight minutes of "action" occurs. Something to do with vampire society going back on a promise or something or another and they have to kill Elizabeth Bathory who's in the movie for a combined six minutes, despite endless monologues about how terrifying she is. They try, dammit, they try. The actors do their best, with only Rhett Giles rising above the rest of the production. The story needs to worked on more, but even them the movie's feeling tedious as long as it is, so I don't know what to do about that. I think with a bigger budget and better talent pool, this could function as a decent television series, albeit one I still wouldn't watch.
Sights within:
-World's worst reference to London After Midnight.
-There's chapters in this fucking thing? It's that long?
-Horrible sound editing.
-"Ahhh, yes." Enough already, shit.
-Secret bunker abuse.
-World's worst Dracula design.
Grade: D+



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24.
I don't even know if it's worth writing about this movie. I'm sure just about anyone that could care has at least heard about it if not have actually watched it. I will say that I think I'm reaching saturation point with it. It didn't feel as fun watching it as it usually does, which could just be from knowing every single detail to the movie before it happens. It's still worth throwing on every once and a while if you feel like having something comfortable play while you work on other things. I just wish sometimes that I could watch movies like it was the first time with certain movies. I remember when this first hit video back when I was about 14. My brothers and my friend who lived down the road had rented it and we watched three times back to back, and then watched it twice more the next day before having to return it. The sheer pandemonium was mindblowing to a teenage boy. I wish I wasn't such a jaded movie watcher sometimes and could watch movies like I did back when I was a kid.
Sights within:
-Quentin Tarantino playing the one role he always looked like he was born for.
-Cheech Marin abuse.
-World's most hurtful condoms.
-Cock gun.
-Fred Williamson taking out fools with a pencil.
-Shotglass abuse.
-Just...what is the explanation for the fucking rat thing anyways?
-Death by disco-ball
-I miss when KNB effects didn't look like pink plastic to me.
Grade: B-



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25.
People always give the type of movie that premieres on the Syfy Channel a bad name, but then they'll turn around and make cult films out of some broke down Roger Corman movie he doesn't even probably remember making. That just seems like backwards thinking to me as films such as this one really are the modern day version of the old Corman movies being schlepped around as "classics." The only difference I see is that Corman's rubber suits give them a slight more charm than Syfy's impersonal CGI, but other than that, they're the same damn movies. I always get a kick out of them even if they all start to suffer from the same faults. I can handle the bad CGI, poor characterizations, genre actors showing up for their paychecks, and whatever whack-job title they come up with. The one thing that never fails to diminish these movies is that they run out of steam around forty-five minutes in. I'm always into them at first, enjoying their C-level storytelling, but as it goes on it wears out its welcome, limping its way to whatever hackneyed idea they have to kill the monsters. This one tries a little harder with its old west setting and out-there monster design which makes it more enjoyable than most of them. It's watchable for a late Saturday night flick, which is probably why Syfy is always showing them then.
Sights within:
-Nothing screams "characterization" than having some loudmouth yelling about her every nuance four minutes into the movie just to get it out of the way.
-World's weirdest Syfy design. Just what in the fuck are these things supposed to be?
-I like how they're supposed to be able to outrun a horse but are never animated past the same clunking around they do throughout the whole movie.
-The beginning looks great with the fog and rain that disappears depending on what shot it is.
-James Marsters sounds like he had just read the script for the first time before each one of his lines.
-Plutonium theory abuse.
-World's most inept sheriff.
-The two dumbasses plan on reselling plutonium for a ton of money even though it was just explained to them that no one else in the world knows what the hell it is.
Grade: C



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26.
Part of Spain's answer to Masters of Horror, the Six Films to Keep You Awake was a series of films made by Spain's leading horror directors. This one comes from the director of Who Can Kill a Child?, which I consider one of the best of the killer children genre so I was looking forward to checking this one out. A woman and her daughter movie in with a doctor to be her assistant and help her perform illegal abortions at night. The woman becomes pregnant after a night stand, causing her own dilemma over planned parenthood. It's not a bad movie, just not much happens. I love slow burn movies as long as they're actually engaging and builds up to something, but this just seems to plod along with a few tangents thrown into the plot that end up meaning almost nothing before the uneventful climax. Nothing horrible, but it's also something I won't remember much of in another few weeks.
Sights within:
-One shitty temp score that somehow stayed in the final movie.
-World's most blatant coercion for an abortion.
-Fetus abuse.
-The daughter's not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed.
Grade: C-








Movies Watched: 8
-Drag Me to Hell (Blu)
-Zombieland (Blu)
-Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer
-Jennifer's Body (Blu)
-Bram Stoker's Way of the Vampire
-Bram Stoker's Dracula's Curse
-High Plains Invaders
-Blame
New Movies Bought: 21
-Four Eyed Monsters
-Saw 6 (Blu)
-Now Eat
-Wall Street
-Talk Radio
-Born on the Fourth of July
-JFK
-Persona Non Grata
-Looking for Fidel
-Heaven and Earth
-Nixon
-Stop Me Before I Kill
-Cash on Demand
-Maniac (1963)
-The Snorkel
-Never Take Candy From a Stranger
-These Are the Damned
-The Crazies (2010) (Blu)
-The Dead Are Alive
-Stigma
-Slithis
Unseen DVDS: 3222
Unseen Blu-rays: 70
Unseen VHS: 121
Unseen DVD-R'S: 5




Can you remember remember my name

1 comment:

  1. Fun fact about Asylum: The CEO rolls around the office at all times on 80's-style rollerblades, and Transmorphers was edited in less than 2 days.

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