The Good, the Bad, the Weird (2008)

  Brace yourselves:  it's a Korean spaghetti western set during the Japanese occupation of China.

And it's amazing.

Park Chang-yi (Byung-hun Lee) is a bad motherfucker.  So when a train robber named Yoon Tae-goo (Kang-ho Song) steals a treasure map from under his very nose, he is not pleased.  Adding to the mix is bounty hunter Park Do-won (Woo-sung Jung) aiming to bring both of the outlaws down.  But they're not the only ones after the treasure, supposedly buried after the Qing Dynasty.  The Chinese underworld, the Japanese army, and Korean independence fighters are all looking to get paid. 

I cannot stress to you how awesome this movie is.  It's funny and silly and packed to the gills with action.  Far from being just another knock-off, this is a love letter to all things spaghetti western.  Stone-faced killers, rolling tumbleweed, slapdash frontier towns filled with inexplicably good-looking women and filthy men armed to the (blackened) teeth, vendettas, buried treasure, honor, betrayal, and more.  This is the Man with No Name trilogy served with a side of bulgogi. 

Clocking in at 2 hours, 10 minutes, you're going to want to clear your schedule for this one. 

Bell, Book, and Candle (1958)

  Every time I watch this movie, I enjoy it less and less.  I used to at least think it was cute but now I can hardly stand it.  I have never found Jimmy Stewart attractive and he's much too old here to be playing the lovesick swain.  He comes across as a complete fuddy-duddy.  Kim Novak is a beautiful woman who gives great bitch-face, but that hair!  It did her no favors whatsoever.  I almost wish I could have turned the color off so it would have at least matched her eyebrows. 

Gillian Holroyd (Kim Novak) is a card-carrying witch.  When she finds out the new upstairs neighbor (James Stewart) is planning to marry her high school enemy (Janice Rule), she decides to use magic to steal him away.  But she must be careful not to actually fall in love with him or she'll lose all her powers.

Which is about the stupidest thing I've ever heard.  This is explained away by saying that witches aren't truly human; they can only become able to cry or blush when they fall in love with a human.  Presumably, nothing would happen should they fall in love with another witch.  If that's even possible, considering the witches presented here range from harmless busybodies (Elsa Lanchester) to narcissistic (Jack Lemmon) to downright malicious (Kim Novak). 

The beatnik stylings are horribly dated and drab.  The few good lines of dialogue are sprinkled in sparingly, leaving more room for Ernie Kovacs' drivel.

The only reason this movie even exists is because Alfred Hitchcock wanted Kim Novak for Vertigo but her studio refused unless Jimmy Stewart made a picture for them in return. 

Dead Man Down (2012)

  I've never liked Colin Farrell as a leading man.  I think I've probably mentioned that before.  He's okay in smaller roles but I don't think he can anchor a film.

This is his best work to date, as far as I'm concerned.  This was the first time I've felt a sense of something other than pretty-boyness from him.  Maybe it's because he's balanced by Noomi Rapace, who is more than capable of carrying a scene with emotions when he can't. 

I feel like the trailers completely mislead me about this film.  In the original trailer and even in the disc description on Netflix, it makes it sound like Noomi Rapace is after Terrence Howard for what he did to her, when she's not. 

Victor (Colin Farrell) is a thug for mobster Alphonse (Terrence Howard).  His neighbor Beatrice (Noomi Rapace) reaches out to him for a date...so she can blackmail him into killing a man for her.  See, she took a cell phone video of Victor killing someone in his apartment and threatens to turn him into the police unless he takes out the drunk driver who scarred her face in a car accident.  Victor has his own problems, since he's been infiltrating Alphonse's gang in order to get his own revenge.  He really doesn't want to have to stop and take out some random other dude but she kind of has him over a barrel.

These are damaged, fragile people grasping at straws to try and bring some control and order back into their shattered lives.  It's dark and sad and beautiful in its violence.

This might have to be the very first Colin Farrell movie I ever buy.

Behind Enemy Lines (2001)

  You don't see many movies set during the Bosnian conflict.  That alone would make this worth watching.  

LT Burnett (Owen Wilson) is a navigator for a fighter jet tired of pulling surveillance missions as a part of the NATO forces in Bosnia.  When he and his pilot (Gabriel Macht) veer off-mission into the DMZ, their plane is shot down.  Burnett survives but finds himself on the run through enemy territory.  His admiral (Gene Hackman) tries to mount a rescue mission but is hindered by the delicate politics in play. 

It's just a straightforward action film and less a war movie, since most of it is Owen Wilson running through the woods trying not to get shot.  You're probably not going to get emotionally invested in it, but it's competently handled from beginning to end.  It's easily a movie you could throw on for casual viewing.

The Searchers (1956)

  This is one of those epic John Ford westerns that everyone talks about.  It lives up to the hype.

Ethan Edwards (John Wayne) finally returns home from the Civil War to his brother's place.  He's not there long, however, before everyone except himself and the adopted son, Martin (Jeffrey Hunter), is murdered by raiding Comanches.  The two daughters, Lucy (Pippa Scott) and Debbie (Lana Wood), have been carried off.  Ethan and Martin set off to track down the Indians, leaving everything and everyone else behind.  Five long years later, they finally locate Debbie (Natalie Woods).  But has she gone too native to be rescued?

I was a little surprised by how much this reminded me of The Lone Ranger what with the brother's returning home, the clear attraction to the other man's wife, and the quest for vengeance.  John Wayne's Ethan is damn near unlikeable, however.  This is a hard man, used to tragedy, with a stubborn streak about a mile wide.  He treats Martin like crap for the entire film, using him as bait at one point, despite his strong paternal feelings.  If there hadn't been breaks for the other characters, I think Ethan would have eroded all the audience's goodwill.  As it is, the movie zips along its two-hour running time, deftly handled by a true master director. 

I probably wouldn't buy it but it's definitely worth watching.

Beetlejuice (1988)

  It's been so long since I've seen this movie from start to finish.  It's still awesome.  Some of the effects are a little grainier than I remember, and hi-def is not doing those foam pieces any favors but this is still a great movie.

Adam (Alec Baldwin) and Barbara (Geena Davis) are just a normal couple enjoying life...until they drive off a bridge and die.  Trapped in their house as spirits, there is nothing they can do when New York family, the Deetzes, move in and start "remodeling".  Delia (Catherine O'Hara) fancies herself an artist and, with the help of her decorator Otho (Glenn Shadix), proceeds to gut the Maitlands' house.  Her husband Charles (Jeffrey Jones) just wants a place to relax after his nervous breakdown, and goth child Lydia (Winona Ryder) hates everything on principle.  Adam and Barbara do their best to frighten the living, but it's no good as only Lydia can even see them.  In desperation, they turn to bio-exorcist Beetlejuice (Michael Keaton) but find the cost to be higher than expected.

Michael Keaton is amazingly scuzzy as the ghost with the most and, holy shit, remember when Alec Baldwin was skinny?  He's like a beanpole here. 

This is a must-own.  If you don't like this movie, we can't be friends.

Oh, and FYI:  this is my 800th post. 

North by Northwest (1959)

  I have seen the majority of Hitchcock's pictures but this is probably the most famous one that slipped through the cracks.  It is a classic suspense piece that's been parodied and copied about a million times since it came out.  If you hadn't had a chance to see it before, I urge you to give it a shot. 

Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) is your average advertising executive out at lunch when he is mistaken for CIA operative George Caplan.  He is bundled out to a house, where a mysterious man (James Mason) threatens him and then tries to have him killed.  Poor Thornhill escapes but is arrested by the police.  After his attempt at finding the mysterious man's true identity ends in murder, Thornhill goes out on the lam to try and find Mr. Caplan, in the hopes that he will be able to clear up the matter.  On the train to Chicago, he meets the lovely and very accommodating Eve (Eva Marie Saint) but still can't seem to catch a break or clear his name.  Because there is no George Caplan.  It's a decoy the CIA has created to draw fire away from their undercover agent.  Thornhill just happened to blunder into it and must now stay one step ahead of the people trying to kill him.

Filled with Hitch's signature dark humor and some very frank sexuality, this is one of the most polished movies he's ever done.  Cary Grant is effortlessly charming, James Mason is cold and calculating, and it even has a very young, very oily-looking Martin Landau.  It's kind of amazing.

Bee Movie (2007)

  I don't know who this movie was made for.  It's animated, which suggests children, but the idea that children will care about a plot involving bees suing humans for mass enslavement seems far-fetched.  And if the plot is geared towards adults, why is it so stupid?

Barry Benson (Jerry Seinfeld) is not thrilled at the idea of working his entire life in a hive making honey.  On a trip outside, he violates Bee Law by speaking to a human named Vanessa (Renee Zellweger).  When Barry realizes that humans have been keeping bees in order to take and sell their honey, he decides to sue the entire human race.

Let's take a moment to really imagine living in the world of horrors presented here.  Every bug you've ever swatted, every spider you've ever sprayed, every cricket you've fed to a a Burmese Python, has been able to talk not just among themselves but across species.  And not just bugs.  At the end of the movie, there's a scene where a dairy cow is seeking legal advice over milk and cheese production.  Think about that for a minute.  Can you, as a farmer, contemplate cutting your livestock in for a share of the profits?  And what about the beef industry?  McDonald's just became the new Killing Fields.

And let's take a second to discuss the romantic sub-plot between the two leads.  Oh, yeah, that's in there.  Barry, a bee, has a dreamy-eyed fantasy about picnicking in the park with Vanessa.  Her boyfriend, Ken (Patrick Warburton), expresses jealousy over how much time Vanessa is spending with Barry. 

And you thought Howard the Duck was creepy.

So, who is this movie for?  Bestiality enthusiasts pushing a vegetarian agenda? Rose Bowl promoters?  People who hate Ray Liotta?

I'll tell you who it's not for:  people who like good movies.

Predators (2010)

  This is a terrible poster.  It looks like it was designed by a 9th grader.  But that's okay, because said 9th grader probably loved this movie.

Your inner 9th grader will love it too, if you let it.

Set as a direct sequel (albeit almost 30 years later) to the original Predator, eight strangers find themselves hurtling though the air towards a jungle.  The only thing they seem to have in common is that, in their real lives, they are surrounded by death.  Soldiers, convicts, cartel enforcers, and killers all, they must find a way to band together if they are to survive being stalked by the universe's greatest big game hunters.

I had very low expectations going into this so I was pleasantly surprised.  Now I'm not going to say it was the greatest action movie I've ever seen but it was entertaining enough in a B-movie way.  Plus, it has Walton Goggins AND Danny Trejo, which is just amazing.  Also, pleased to see Topher Grace in something.  Anything.  I found his character hilarious.  Of course, I expect entertainment from Robert Rodriguez.  Hell, I'm a little surprised Tom Savini wasn't in there somewhere.

It was a little weird to see Adrian Brody in a straight-up action role and it kind of looked like he was wearing a foam rubber He-Man muscle suit.  Very at odds with his face.  I think the best he's ever looked was in King Kong, but that's me.  That's pretty much my only criticism, though.  I don't know that it's a must-buy but if some one gave it to me, I wouldn't immediately trade it in. 

American Mary (2012)

  This was an impulse buy over the weekend.  My local FYE was having a huge sale to get rid of their stock before moving to a new location.  I had heard good things about this movie and it was less than $10 on blu-ray, so I figured what the hell.

I don't know that I would classify this as horror unless medical procedures just squick you right out.  While I have never personally known anyone who has had some of the more extensive body modifications available, I have at least been exposed to them.  Nothing in this movie came as a shock to me, which doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it.

Medical student Mary Mason (Katherine Isabelle) is at the top of her class but struggling to keep her bills paid.  After her professor (David Lovgren) warns her about slipping, Mary heads to a seedy strip club to try and earn some extra money.  The owner (Antonio Cupo) doesn't need another dancer; he needs a surgeon for some off-the-books fixing of a beat-up employee.  He offers Mary $5000 in cash if she'll help him out.  Impressed with her work, one of the dancers with a Betty Boop fetish (Tristan Risk) contacts Mary on behalf of a friend with a problem.  Ruby Realgirl (Paula Lindberg) wants a particular procedure but has been turned down by all the reputable plastic surgeons. 

Thus, Mary begins her descent into the world of underground body modification.  Things don't go off the rails until she is targeted by the very people she longs to be one of. 

If you've seen an episode of Dexter, you've seen about as much gore as you'll see here.  Still, the Soska Twins have created something undeniably stylish, fun, and even sexy. 

R.I.P.D. (2013)

  This is yet another "bomb" this summer that doesn't really deserve to be labeled that.  Reviews I've read keep saying it's just like another Men in Black.  So what's wrong with that?  MiB was funny, action-packed, and had great performances from its two leads.  How is that not something worth emulating?  Plus, the last good Men in Black movie we had was the third one, which came out a year ago.  Considering that we waited ten years for that, I would think people would be overjoyed there was a similarly styled one out in less than a decade.  It's not Oscar-bait by a long shot, but it's a solid summer movie.  Show it some love, people.

Boston cop Nick (Ryan Reynolds) gets shot by his partner Hayes (Kevin Bacon) after he has a change of heart regarding a stash of gold they had liberated from a crime scene.  Rather than face Judgment, Nick joins the Rest in Peace Department, a collection of all the best dead crime solvers out to corral lost souls.  He is partnered with Roy (Jeff Bridges) and sent back down in time to see his funeral.  He wants to reassure his wife Julia (Stephanie Szostak) but he discovers that he no longer looks like himself to the living.  Instead, he looks like an old Chinese guy (James Hong) and Roy looks like a supermodel (Marisa Miller).  Roy is dead-set against following up on Nick's murder but when it looks like Hayes may be trying to bring about the apocalypse, he becomes amenable to persuasion.

Jeff Bridges borrowed a little too heavily from his True Grit character, but his interaction as his Avatar, the Victoria's Secret Angel, were golden.  Ryan Reynolds has not had a lot of luck with comic book adaptations and that is just a damn shame.  The man is incredibly talented at comedy and action and just seems tailor-made for those kinds of parts.  Mary Louise Parker is just having a banner year, by contrast.  She was adorable in RED 2, and hilarious here as well, as Nick and Roy's acerbic boss Proctor. 

So go on, embrace the summer popcorn flick.  God knows we need at least one of them this year that isn't specifically geared towards children.

RED 2 (2013)

  I'm really starting to like Byung Hun Lee.  He seems to be better than his source material in the G.I. Joe movies.  Here, it seemed like his accent was a little stronger but he also got the chance to be funny and to show more than one emotion.  He also seems to have no problem getting naked, which we can all appreciate.

I'm sure all of you have seen the first RED.  If not, rectify this situation. 

Frank Moses (Bruce Willis) is trying to build a new life in retirement with his girlfriend, Sara (Mary Louise Parker).  That is, until Marvin (John Malkovich) shows up and tells him that the government is after them...again, this time for their involvement in Project Nightshade during the Cold War.  Frank wants to keep Sara safe, but she is desperate to get in on the action.  After Frank is brought in for questioning, only to have the room shot up by professional Fixer Jack Horton (Neal McDonough), he decides that the only way to stay ahead of the killers is to find Project Nightshade:  a portable nuclear device smuggled into Russia over 30 years ago.  This will mean evading both top assassins Han Cho Bai (Byung Hun Lee) and his old friend Victoria (Helen Mirren), plus dealing with Russian counterintelligence officer Katja (Catherine Zeta-Jones), Frank's ex.

This was a quieter movie than the first, with more time spent on dialogue and less on explosions.  That's not a dig against it.  This movie is hilarious from start to finish and I fully intend to buy it when it becomes available.  Catherine Zeta-Jones is kind of superfluous, just as she was in Ocean's 12, but it's okay.  There's more than enough other things happening to keep you entertained.

The Four Musketeers (1974)

  Apparently this was filmed all at once with the previous Three Musketeers but released in two parts after the producers realized it was long enough for two films.  The actors were pissed when they found out about it and now there's a clause in every guild contract that says you can't do that anymore.  That's a pretty decent legacy for what would otherwise be a throwaway period comedy.

Not knowing all that until I was researching this, I was initially impressed that they managed to get such good continuity between movies. 

Milady du Winter (Faye Dunaway) is super-pissed after her scheme to ruin the Queen of France (Geraldine Chaplin) was foiled by D'Artagnan (Michael York) and his lady love Constance (Raquel Welch).  She and Count Rochefort (Christopher Lee) begin their revenge by kidnapping Constance while the musketeers are distracted by the siege of Protestant rebels at La Rochelle.  Our heroes manage to take La Rochelle and rescue Constance, depositing her in a convent, at roughly the same time.  Cardinal Richelieu (Charlton Heston) wants Milady to assassinate the Duke of Buckingham (Simon Ward) so he'll stop funding the heretics.  She agrees, in return for a signed warrant giving her carte blanche to kill D'Artagnan and his mistress.  Athos (Oliver Reed) overhears the plot and threatens to kill her if she proceeds.  She knows he'll do it, too, because they used to be married.  She just can't help herself, however, and a huge showdown ensues at the convent.

Every adaptation of this book is different, so much so that I can no longer remember what the book actually says.  This one ends with kind of a downer, which I actually preferred to the sappy comedy of the first one.  I think it would be interesting if they recut this to make it one long epic, they way it was initially intended, and see how well it would flow from beginning to end like that.

Beauty and the Beast (1991)

  I can't believe how old this movie is.  /headdesk

This was my Disney princess, the first one that looked like me instead of mile after mile of pretty blondes. 

Belle (Paige O'Hara) wants her life to be more like the books she reads, instead of predictable and boring like the village she lives in.  Her father, Maurice (Rex Everhart), hopes to take his latest invention to a fair and win enough money to get her the type of life she deserves.  He gets lost along the way and ends up at a castle filled with talking furniture.  The master of the house is a monstrous beast who locks Maurice up for trespassing.  Belle tracks him down and offers to exchange places.  The Beast, under a curse, agrees in the hopes that she will fall in love with him and break the spell, but he's a little unsure how to go about making that happen.  His faithful retainers, Lumiere (Jerry Orbach) and Cogsworth (David Ogden Stiers) try to help, with the kindly advice of Mrs. Potts (Angela Lansbury). 

This is the gold standard for retellings of this fairy tale.  Don't let anybody tell you differently.

Shakedown (1988)

  It's a wonder anyone survived New York City in the 80's.  I found this lost gem (also known as Blue Jean Cop outside of the States) while I was poking around on Wikipedia.  It's available on Streaming from Netflix so I thought why not?

Roland Dalton (Peter Weller) is a public defender about to leave it all behind and join his fiancee's (Blanche Baker) daddy on Wall Street when he gets handed One Last Case.  Michael Jones (Richard Brooks) is a crack dealer who shot and killed a cop.  He fully admits that part, but claims it's self-defense instead of murder.  The dead cop never identified himself as a police officer, just pulled a gun and demanded money, so Jones defended himself.  Roland talks to his cop buddy, Richie (Sam Elliott), about the case and is told to watch his ass because if there's one thing corrupt cops don't like, it's somebody nosing in their business.

Was Sam Elliott ever young?  I swear, that man was born with a salt and pepper mustache. Also, keep an eye out for John C. McGinley in a sort of proto-Dr. Cox from Scrubs role. 

There were parts of this movie where I wasn't sure if it was being funny on purpose or just accidentally.  With 80's movies, it's hard to be sure.  Pretty much everything about their hair and wardrobe is now unintentionally hilarious.  Be sure to really savor the bad cop leader's magnificently coiffed mullet. 

I can't help but feel bad for this movie.  It was trying to tap into that Lethal Weapon buddy cop magic but it just doesn't get there.  It might be time to dust this one off and bring it out of the cold oblivion of obscurity, though.  

Beastly (2011)

  Love may never be ugly, but this movie sure is.  Yikes. 

In this update of Beauty and the Beast, high school senior Kyle (Alex Pettyfer) has it all:  he's rich, popular, and good-looking.  He's also a raging asshole, espousing not even "style over substance" but "style is substance" type of attitude.  But when he runs afoul of teen witch Kendra (Mary-Kate Olsen), he finds his inner ugliness manifested outwardly.  Kendra gives him until the next Spring to find someone who will love him.  Kyle decides it should be scholarship student Lindy (Vanessa Hudgens), and begins stalking her.  Discovering that her father (Roc LaFortune) has killed a man in a drug deal, Kyle pressures him into sending Lindy to Kyle's Long Island mansion to live.  Adopting the name Hunter, Kyle will have to dig deep to find something worthy of her love before the flowers bloom again.

I have to say, I was not expecting this to be quite so adherent to the letter of the story.  I'm pretty sure everyone would have gotten the point of the transformation without that whole "give my teenage daughter as a hostage to some tatted-up weirdo" storyline.  Which made no sense anyway.   

You know what else didn't make any sense?  The "beastly" make-up in no way hides Alex Pettyfer's features.  This is logical from a marketing perspective because you want your pretty-boy star to be instantly recognizable to fans.  But then you're asking those same fans to believe that Lindy, who has gone to the same school with this kid for three years, can't recognize that her mysterious captor "Hunter" has the exact same height, build, eyes, mouth, and voice as the school club president who conveniently "disappeared" senior year?  And don't try to con me with "they ran in different circles".  That motherfucker's face was on every wall of that school.

Neil Patrick Harris is the one bright spot in this otherwise braindead "update".  As the blind tutor, he brings every ounce of charisma he can muster.  I probably shouldn't be so harsh on Hudgens and Pettyfer, since the only other things I've seen them in were Sucker Punch and Magic Mike, respectively.  Neither has been done any favors here, but Hudgens I think has already bounced back.  Pettyfer's IMDb page is looking a little light.  Guess it does take more than just a pretty face.

The Beach (2000)

  This was Danny Boyle's (Trainspotting, Slumdog Millionaire) third big movie.  For about two thirds of it, you can't really tell.  When it veers into complete insanity, though, it has his name all over it.

Richard (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a kid putzing around through Thailand, looking for some experience outside of the normal tourist stuff.  Really, he's just looking for any experience, something that will show him that there's more to life than what he's had so far.  When his crazy neighbor Daffy (Robert Carlyle) tells him about a secret beach on an island that is as close to paradise as man can get, he is intrigued.  There are snakes in every Eden, however, but Richard refuses to heed the signs, taking the map Daffy left him and two French tourists, Etienne (Guillame Canet) and lovely Francoise (Virginie Ledoyen) in search of this mysterious island.

What they discover is a whole commune of like-minded people, held together not by ideology but by the sheer desire to escape from the world.  Sal (Tilda Swinton), the leader, warns the three newcomers that the other half of the island is owned by a ring of drug farmers.  Their peace has been bought with the promise that no one else can ever know about the beach.  Everyone goes to great lengths to keep their paradise hidden. 

Maybe because I was running errands all day and I had to keep pausing it, but this movie felt like it was three hours long.  I kept waiting for something interesting to happen, or at least for the characters to stop being such complete snots.  Richard is almost completely unlikeable, lacking any and all redeeming characteristics.  He is such a typical self-centered twenty-year-old I wanted to reach through the screen and slap him.  Also, having Tilda Swinton in charge of anything is always going to turn out badly.  Look at Narnia. 

Also, I'm not usually one to point out continuity errors, but I loved that he was out in the woods for weeks and yet his hair never grew out.

Moral of the story, kids?  Don't invite Leonardo DiCaprio on your Southeast Asian vacation. 

The Promise (2005)

  It says "moderate violence" but it's still PG-13. 

This movie was so pretty, I almost forgot that every character in it is an asshole.  Some asshole goddess named Manshen (Hong Chen) tells a starving orphan that she can grow up to have incredible beauty, riches, and fame but the catch is that she can never have true love.  Since that means nothing to a seven-year-old, the girl agrees and becomes Princess Qingcheng (Cecilia Cheung), most favored royal concubine.  So favored, in fact, that the asshole Lord of the North, Wuhuan (Nicholas Tse) deposes the asshole Emperor (Qian Chang) and sends his fastest assassin, Snow Wolf (Ye Liu) to kill the Emperor's favorite asshole general, Guangming, the Lord of the Crimson Armor (Hiroyuki Sanada).  Snow Wolf succeeds in grievously wounding Guangming, preventing him from coming to the Emperor's rescue.  Guangming tells his slave Kunlun (Dong-gun Jang) to put on the armor and save the Emperor.  As long as he doesn't raise the face mask or speak, no one will know the difference. 

This is a great plan, except that Kunlun kills the Emperor for attacking Qingcheng and rides away with her.  He is pursued by Wuhuan to a cliff face, where he is told that if he jumps off, Qingcheng will be spared.  He does so, and thus, the love triangle is set.  Princess loves the General because she thinks he rescued her, General loves the Princess because who wouldn't, and the slave loves the Princess because she's gorgeous.

There's a lot of talk about honor and love and everyone has a destiny but who cares because, holy shit, costumes.  Seriously, this movie is ob.sessed. with flowers and feathers.  Everybody is either wearing the inside of a queen-sized duvet or a parade float's worth of roses.  It's amazing.  The CGI is kinda dodgy and the ending opens a huge paradox that made my brain hurt, but it's not bad overall.  I'll probably end up buying it just for the costumes.  Just look at this.

How am I going to pass that up?

G.I. Joe: Retaliation (2013)

  Oh my God, this movie was so dumb.  And not just "it's a summer popcorn flick!" dumb or "it's based on a line of toys!" dumb.  It's "dropped on its head as an infant" dumb.  It makes Rise of Cobra look like Citizen Kane.  

You guys know the deal with this film, right?  How it got pushed back from summer 2012 to March because it didn't test well?  Apparently, the test audiences were disappointed with how few scenes Channing Tatum had so they went back and shot some completely superfluous ones that could be added in to the finished film.  It didn't change the plot in any way, and served only to bog down the opening of the movie.  Without those scenes, the movie zips along from one action piece to another.  That's all that's really expected of it. 

The Joes, led by Duke (Channing Tatum) are sent into Pakistan to retrieve a couple of nukes after their president gets assassinated.  They get the nukes no problem but are betrayed by their government when it comes to extraction.  Only four Joes survive:  Roadblock (Dwayne Johnson), Lady Jaye (Adrianne Palicki), and Flint (D.J. Cotrona) by jumping into a well, and Snake Eyes (Ray Park) by not being anywhere near Pakistan.

The first three Joes manage to get from Pakistan all the way to Washington, D.C. where they learn that the President of the United States (Jonathan Pryce) has declared them a terrorist organization and is claiming Snake Eyes killed the Pakistani president and was captured.  But, surprise, surprise, it's not Snake Eyes, it's actually Storm Shadow (Byung-hun Lee) who just wanted to get into the super-secret prison where Destro and Cobra Commander (Luke Bracey) were being held.  After being freed, Cobra Commander joins up with his buddy Zartan, Master of Disguise (Arnold Vosloo, but mostly Jonathon Pryce) to take the world hostage by forcing everyone to fire and then self-destruct all their nuclear weapons.

The Joes, operating out of an abandoned gym, manage to put all of this together and, with the help of Original Joe Colton (Bruce Willis), save the day.

I will go ahead and admit, I thought the first movie was at least fun, while being completely ridiculous.  This movie is just ridiculous.  They re-use the same trope they did with the Baroness by having Storm Shadow suddenly realize he had been manipulated since childhood and decide to team up with the Joes.  There was also an undercurrent of blatant sexism that I did not enjoy at all.

Ok, so Duke is the Captain, right?  He dies and the mantle of leadership gets passed to the next highest rank, in this case, it would be Lady Jaye, a lieutenant.  Instead, she makes a point of saying to Roadblock, a sergeant major, that he is in charge now.  She also had her hair down for 80% of the runtime, even in uniform which made my eye twitch, and the one moment of character-building was her sob story about how she joined the military because Daddy always wanted a boy and didn't think women should serve in combat.  He died before she could rub it in his face.  Boo hoo.  Then, what do you know, a surrogate father-figure shows up and treats her just like dear old dad did, refusing to learn her name and according her only the most basic interest.  But, hey, at least she fared better than poor Flint, who barely had any lines at all.

I was pleased to see Christopher Eccleston and Joseph Gordon-Levitt both had the good sense to stay away from this turkey.  I don't know what Jonathan Pryce was thinking.  The real winner here is Arnold Vosloo, who had approximately 2 seconds of face time and still got decent billing.

The Lone Ranger (2013)

Nominated for:  Best Makeup and Hairstyles and Best Visual Effects    People have been trashing this movie left and right. Currently, it is sitting at 25% on rottentomatoes.com and is on track to show a $50 million loss.  Disney is probably burning all their Lone Ranger 2 script ideas as I type.

And that is a damn shame, because this movie doesn't deserve to be consigned to the bottom of the heap.  It has its problems, true, but it's not nearly as bad as critics have been making out.

John Reid (Armie Hammer) is a bright, shiny new prosecutor come home to Colby, Texas.  He happens to be traveling on a train also being used to transport known outlaw and suspected cannibal Butch Cavendish (William Fichtner), as well as a crazy Indian with a dead bird on his head.  Reid tries to stop the inevitable escape but winds up shackled to Tonto (Johnny Depp) and crashing the train.  His brother, Dan (James Badge Dale), who is better in every way, deputizes him as a Ranger anyway and they head off into the canyons to track Cavendish and his men. 

Everybody gets shot.

While digging their graves, Tonto is confronted with a pure white spirit horse pawing at John Reid's feet.  After trying to convince the horse he really wants to bring Dan back, Tonto gives up and accepts that he is stuck with John as his spiritwalker, the only one who can help him get vengeance for his slaughtered tribe.

This movie was a riot.  It was one of the funniest movies I have seen all year. I was so pleased to see William Fichtner getting a major part like this.  His villain is superbly creepy.  Barry Pepper is almost unrecognizable as the Army cavalry officer behind all that blonde hair, but you'll know Tom Wilkinson's voice immediately.  I haven't seen Luther, so I can't really say that Ruth Wilson was amazing but I wouldn't have known she was British if I hadn't looked it up.  Also, apparently, she was Princess Betsy in Anna Karenina.

Which brings me to....Armie Hammer.  God love that boy.  They have been trying like hell to make him as squeaky clean as possible.  We get it.  He's good-looking, likeable, and has the world's whitest teeth.  Between this and Mirror, Mirror, he's so sweet it gives me cavities.  I want to see him get down and dirty in a role, not this pretty-boy bullshit.  There is just something missing about him, and I think that's it.  Ugly him up if you have to, Hollywood, but give me some R-rated Hammer.

Dead Man on Campus (1998)

  This is not a movie I ever imagined I would watch.  I don't regard the 90's as a great decade and this movie practically bleeds grunge.  There was so much plaid I thought I was at a Canadian family reunion.  This was also the time period where Hollywood tried to convince us that Tom Everett Scott was a "thing".  

Strait-laced Josh (Tom Everett Scott) is at college on an academic scholarship, which means he has to keep at least a B+ average.  This proves difficult when his hard-partying roommate Cooper (Mark Paul Gosselaar) moves in.  With Josh about to lose his scholarship and the girl of his dreams (Poppy Montgomery) and Cooper facing work in his father's janitorial business, they decide their only course of action is an obscure college rule that says if your roommate commits suicide, you automatically get an A.  The unscrupulous pair scour the campus for the most depressed, suicidal sucker they can find.

Despite some very cute opening credits, I found the humor in this movie aimed more at silly than dark.  Better Off Dead it is not, but enjoyable enough if you like that sort of thing.

Pulp Fiction (1994)

  I know, I know, it's practically a violation of the Geneva Conventions to have never seen this movie.  Sue me.  The way people talk about this thing, you'd think it was the start of a new religion.  Maybe it is.  The Church of Tarantino.  Hail, motherfuckers!

The movie is told as a series of interconnected non-linear vignettes basically revolving around a crime boss named Mr. Wallace (Ving Rhames).  Two of his henchmen, Jules (Samuel L. Jackson) and Vincent (John Travolta) are sent to retrieve a briefcase, but run into some difficulty.  Later, Vincent is called upon to take Mr. Wallace's wife Mia (Uma Thurman) out for a night, with some terrible consequences, while Butch (Bruce Willis), a low-level boxer, takes Wallace's money for a rigged fight, then runs.

It plays out just as luridly as the old serials it's named for, saturated with color and sleaze.  Initially, I was nonplussed but it grew on me over the course of the running time.  I thought it was better than Reservoir Dogs but not as good as Kill Bill. 

Darkman 3: Die Darkman Die (1996)

Happy 4th of July, everyone!  Celebrate with your favorite hero.  Or your hero's second sequel, whatever.

  Once again, Arnold Vosloo can't get top billing in a movie where he's the hero.  What's up with that? 

I wish I could say this recaptured the sense of fun and potential of the first Darkman movie, but it looks like it was filmed pretty much concurrently with Darkman II. 

Darkman (Arnold Vosloo) is still trying to get his skin formula to work, buying medical equipment with the money he gets from ripping off bad guys.  But when he blatantly robs Peter Rooker's (Jeff Fahey) drug dealing, he draws some very unwanted attention.  Rooker is looking for something to juice up his henchmen and he is very impressed with Darkman's ability to not feel pain.  And he's not the only one.  Dr. Bridget Thorn (Darlanne Fluegel) was one of the original doctors that worked on Darkman when he first got blown up.  She was the one who severed his nerves in the first place and she tracks him down in order to fix her mistake.  Excited at the prospect of being able to feel again, Darkman allows a woman he doesn't know to perform major surgery on him.  This turns out to be a stupid idea, as she is working for Rooker all along and plans to use Darkman's adrenaline samples to create a super-steroid.

This movie is pure cheese.  On the plus side, it makes Jeff Fahey's involvement in Machete make a lot more sense.

   Additionally, I watched the mini-series Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome this weekend as well.  It's not as in-depth as Caprica but it's okay.

Young William Adama (Luke Pasqualino) is a hotshot ensign fresh out of the Academy and assigned to the Galactica during the First Cylon War.  He is looking forward to making a name for himself but his commander (Brian Markinson) thinks a more staid mission will cool him down.  Adama is assigned to a "milk run" with co-pilot Coker (Ben Cotton), who is finishing up his mandatory second tour, on a four-day mission to transport goods and pick up spare parts.  The goods in question turn out to be software engineer Dr. Becca Kelly (Lili Bordan), out on a super-secret mission. 

The Crying Game (1992)

  Penis.

That's the big reveal here, folks.  I spoiled it for you.  My bad.  Now we can move on.

Jody (Forest Whitaker) is a British soldier who gets captured by the IRA at a carnival.  They plan to use him to trade for one of their imprisoned compatriots.  Until the deadline, Fergus (Stephen Rea) is assigned to guard Jody.  Being a hospitable sort, Fergus soon befriends the man, leading to a conflict of interest when his superior, Maguire (Adrian Dunbar), orders him to shoot Jody.  Things go badly and Fergus soon finds it's in his best interest to disappear for a while.  Feeling guilty, he heads to Jody's hometown to look in on his girlfriend Dil (Jaye Davidson).  Fergus finds himself drawn in, despite his misgivings.  But the IRA has not forgotten about him and sends his old girlfriend Jude (Miranda Richardson) to bring him in for one more job. 

Pretty much the only reason anyone talks about this movie is because of Dil and the aforementioned penis but I would like to think that we've all moved beyond that now, 20 years later.  I would like to think that it's more than a simple shock, that it has a greater message like "Love can open your mind to things you never imagined" but maybe not.

Penis.

Darkman II: The Return of Durant (1995)

  Hey, remember when I watched Darkman?  That Sam Raimi-directed comic book movie with Liam Neeson as a dude with no face?  They made two sequels to that.  Except that by 1995, Liam Neeson was too good to do a no-budget B-movie (or he read the script, which is legitimately terrible) so they recast him with Arnold Vosloo.  Yeah, Imhotep from The Mummy played the good guy.

Dr. Peyton Westlake (Arnold Vosloo) is still knocking over criminals to fund his research into a stable skin solution when he gets word that another scientist, Dr. Daniel Brinkman (Jesse Collins) may have broken the 99-minute UV barrier.  Unfortunately, Brinkman is holed up in his family's old electrical plant (what, your family doesn't have one?) that just so happens to be exactly what crime lord Robert G. Durant (Larry Drake) needs to power his new super-weapons.  Yeah, see, he survived the massive helicopter crash from the first movie and was just in a coma this whole time.  You can tell because he has a scar on his face now.  Anyway, he's a bad guy and he does bad things.  Westlake is a good guy and does slightly less bad things.

This went straight to video, unsurprisingly, and has all but disappeared.  It's watchable, if you can enjoy extremely low-budget offerings.