Badass movie reviews - Bad ass movie reviews - www.mediasaurs.com - Santa Cruz, CA

BLOOD TIES IS COMING

2011-01-18T19:46:00.001-08:00

BLOOD TIES IS COMING

Look people, I have been harping about the goodness of BLOOD TIES for quite some time now.
Well, the DVD is dropping Feb the 15th. Why should I be excited? Well Kely McClung has been working and re-rendering the thing for MONTHS. Every time I talk to him, his computer is crunching it. I know he is now done with it, and I can't wait to see this thing in all of its new, fresh glory on this 42 inch flatscreen I just bled myself out for.

It has been awesome watching this "no budget movie" get a distribution deal and ramp up for consumption by the masses.

The plot is thick.

The action is solid.

From the official site:

Ex-Government Operative Jack Davis is being manipulated in a life and death struggle by warring factions within the covert arms of the
Homeland Security Agency in a fight for congressional funding. When his brother is kidnapped while working for a foreign embassy, Jack pulls out all stops in a race to save his brother that takes him from the desolate mountains of Virginia to Miami, Washington DC, and then into the exotic lands of Thailand and Cambodia.

BLOOD TIES is the Award Winning New Movie from William Kely McClung... starring Robert Pralgo (Vampire Diaries, The Blind Side) Erik Markus Schuetz (Ong Bak, Mercury Man) and Kely McClung (American Ninja IV, Kerberos). AOF "Action Film of the Year," Indie Fest USA "Best of Festival," "Best Visual FX," Big Bang "Best Director," Rincon Peurto Rico "Best International Film," End of the Pier UK "Best International Film." We're proud of all the work everyone involved has done on this new movie release - we sincerly hope you like it!!

Kely McClung

The underlying theme here is that BLOOD TIES is a lot of fun. There are going to be a lot of satisfied customers out there!

Check the trailer on Youtube.

Check out the slideshow mashup by Tara Stone

I'm telling you people, I have been clicking reload on pop culture in general, just waiting for this beast to be let out of its cage. I am going to have my "told you so" moment real soon.

-Mediasaurus Rex

BLOOD TIES OFFICIAL SITE

BLOOD TIES THREAD IN THE MEDIASAURS FORUMS

KARL URBAN IS JUDGE DREDD

2011-01-18T19:40:00.001-08:00

KARL URBAN IS JUDGE DREDD

Nov. 21, 2010

Remember the 90s Stallone JUDGE DREDD? Remember all of that stupid stuff like Rob
Scheider and the fact that the Judge took his helmet off? Remember when the Angel family
was introduced and Mean Machine was taken out in about 30 seconds? I have these
memories and they hurt me. JUDGE DREDD didn't have to be an abomination. It didn't have to
be a Stallone vehicle and the source material is stronger than the Hollywood mess that we got.

I clocked a lot of my childhood poring over 2000 AD progs and being scared late at night of
mutants and killer polar bears. The upshot was that I was totally obsessed with the star of the
series, Judge Dredd. Judge, jury and executioner. Yes, at times he managed to get out of
situations that should have killed him by some 9th hour writing tricks, but I loved the concept.

I followed the Judge Child Quest and was blown away by Brian Bolland's art back in the 80s.
John Byrne? Byrne was a slob and a hack. Blolland was putting it down, beautifully.

Well, the Judge Dredd reboot is in production, and Karl Urban is going to be the man. Karl
Urban, you know, Dr. McCoy in that STAR TREK directed by the fool who is responsible for that
LOST trash. Karl Urban, you know, the only actor worth a damn starring with all of those
washed-up actors in RED. Look at the above picture and tell me that this doesn't capture the
very essence of the Judge we all know and love.

I have no hope for TRON or any other remakes/reboots coming down the pipe, but I am lighting
a candle for JUDGE DREDD. I hope to God on high that they get it right.

JUDGE DREDD DISCUSSION AND LINKS IN THE MEDIASAUR FORUMS

-Mediasaurus Rex

EASTBOUND AND DOWN - A BADASS TELEVISION REVIEW

2010-09-30T13:05:00.000-07:00

EASTBOUND AND DOWN - A BADASS TELEVISION REVIEW

-By Mediasaurus Rex

EASTBOUND AND DOWN, HBO’s weekly half-hour television show has my complete attention. Initially, it comes on strong and abrasive, but there is no question about the fact that this half-hour show is funny. The humor is mean-spirited but sometimes whimsical. Mostly it is focused on how funny it can be when a human being lacks a moral compass. There is nothing to like about Danny McBride’s failed major league pitcher, Kenny Powers. Lots of screentime is invested in letting us know one thing: Powers is a despicable human being.

The pilot episode is a relentless, painful focus on the out-of-control piggishness of Kenny Powers. Powers’ entire existence is unforgiveable. Every facet of it is tarnished by sleaze and a general self-absorbed, trashy, world-view. The Kenny Powers story is that he was on top of the world, and he lost it all. His pitching speed dropped, and with that, (more) drug-abuse and irresponsible living set in.

The pilot episode is mostly concerned with Powers taking a job as a part-time gym coach to make ends meet. It is almost cliché how Powers’ teaching methods are limited to ridicule, profanity, and veiled threats of physical harm. Powers’ immediate response to a kid who tells him that his father said that he “ruined baseball” is to say, “If everyone wants to pick on anyone in class, aim for him because I ain’t watching.”

He is also one of the most misogynist characters ever to hold the position of protagonist. Kenny is interested in rekindling his romance with his high school sweetheart April (Katy Mixon), but his attraction to her is all breast-related. When introducing a different female friend to the principal of his school, he instructs her not to “suck him off.”

Over the next few episodes, more of Powers’ uncouth ways are paraded. His coke and ecstasy use with his drug-buddy Clegg (Ben Best) are a particularly disturbing revelation. (A line of cocaine up the nose looks painful enough, but when it is as thick as a banana slug?) Powers’ love/hate relationship with BMW dealership owner and televangelist-coifed Ashley Shaffer (Will Farrell) inches past the line of comfort as well. Even Powers’ relationship with simple sycophant and co-teacher Steve Janowski (Steve Little) is merely varying degrees of cringe-induction. All of Powers’ behavior has a purpose though, and the purpose is completely self-centered.

Powers has run aground in bland, white picket fence America with his jet ski (the panty-dropper) and a trailer full of his own baseball memorabilia. But he never drops his anchor completely. He holds back, knowing that the majors will call him at any second and he will be back on top. He wants it bad. He wants to live the life of a superstar again and leave all of these average people in North Carolina behind. This community would be better off if he would just take off and become someone else’s problem. But he has to learn a lesson or two on humility before he can leave.

The running voice-over is a hubris-dripping, self-worshipping book on tape narrated by Powers himself called I’M F*CKING IN, YOU’RE F*CKING OUT which Powers plays over and over to himself in his spare time. Powers knows that he has lost his mojo and that even if he had the skills to be back in the majors, it would still take divine intervention to make it happen. But he starts taking steroids anyway to “kickstart the training.”

With Steve Janowski, his fawning personal assistant/whipping boy, Powers plays every “catching major league attention” angle that he is capable of. As the first season continues, Powers indeed catches the break he needs to make it back to the top. The surreality of such a blessing lingers just long enough for the six episode first season to pull the rug back out from underneath him. Where will he go? Is he coming back? And what about his re-kindled relationship with April (and her breasts)?

Given that Powers is such a complete jerk, there is an underlying riddle in the show: can the audience ever connect with such a vain, profane, ignorant, mullet-wearing egotist? The beauty of EASTBOUND AND DOWN is that yes, yes we really can. The magic of this show is that through the fog of profanity, sexism, cruelty, and alcohol and drug abuse, the writers manage to humanize Kenny Powers with no real compromise to the afore-mentioned issues.

What seems like an insurmountable creative writing task is deftly handled by Jody Hill, Danny McBride, Ben Best and Shawn Harwell, the creative team behind EASTBOUND AND DOWN. Season Two’s first episode shows Powers re-established in Mexico sporting corn-rowed hair living the life of a cock-fighting kingpin on Janowski’s credit card. Powers demonstrates command over this new niche. He has a rooster that is a killing machine. He also rolls with a pair of thugs (one of them is the extremely foul-mouthed, height-challenged Aaron (Deep Roy)) that seem to be just as devoid of social skills as he is. Powers, riding his moped through the streets of Mexico, flipping off random people, maintains a general superhuman belligerence.

As far as Powers is concerned, baseball is over. He has assumed Janowski’s identity and he is living moderately in squalor. Kenny Powers is built for this kind of low-living. But he still has an ego. Kenny is tempted to bloom as a Mexican baseball player and cross back over to the states. The roids have sped up his pitch and he is going to make as much noise as he possibly can south of the American border. There is still a chance that he can catch major league attention and get back on top.

He is still haunted by April and her breasts, but there is a new woman who has caught his eye named Vida (Ana de la Reguera), and Vida has a nice rear-end. Powers has issues to work through, and they are as complicated as any battle of the flesh could be.

The opening episode of season two of EASTBOUND AND DOWN could aptly be titled “The Re-invention of a Total Douchebag.” Powers built his failed bridge out of middle-class, western America and he now has to do it again out of a crime-ridden neighborhood south of the border. Powers remains just as funny, self-centered, and completely irreverent as ever.

The rest of Season Two has a challenge, though. Will we be able to root for Kenny again? If the masterful storytelling of Season One is any indication, there is no question whatsoever. Soon we will all be rooting for Kenny Powers to transcend his “further behind the eightball” existence. But until that point, it is going to be a lot of fun and laughs watching this moral graveyard of a man swirl around the drain until we can honestly care again.

EASTBOUND AND DOWN OFFICIAL WEBSITE

EASTBOUND AND DOWN in the Mediasaurs Forums

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SHANK - A BADASS VIDEO GAME REVIEW

2010-09-16T21:45:00.000-07:00

SHANK - A BADASS VIDEO GAME REVIEW
By: Mediasaurus Rex

“Still living the dream, eh Butcher?” – Shank

I have been on a SHANK bender. Nighttime hours have been blurring as I play this game into the ground. I can’t stop. I keep on playing the final boss fight over and over and over again, tuning up my reflexes. I am also dropping into really hectic battles and tuning up my Uzi to shotgun skills. This has to stop soon; I mean, I only paid $15 dollars for this game.

Let me back up. Two weeks ago was my birthday. One of my gifts was the download of SHANK by Klei Entertainment (EA is distributing). I already had a hook in my mouth and was being pulled into the boat by the SHANK demo I saw a week before that. I usually download a demo and let it sit on the PS3 for a few days, weeks or months and they get to it. Then I play it down and make a decision. SHANK was different. The stylized cartoon characters intrigued me. I’d seen impressive screenshots earlier of heavily-muscled men, some fit, some fat, all of them angular and clamoring for a piece of Shank, the main character. So in the case of SHANK, I downloaded that demo, watched the intro video, and went straight to work. It was so much fun that I played it through twice, back-to-back. My conclusion was that I wanted more.

Taking its plot cues from B-grade drive-in cinema, SHANK is an over-the-top revenge story. The depth and blackness of the revenge is revealed as the game progresses. I’ll just let you know that within grindhouse film and M-rated video game logic, Shank has every right to rip through his opponents with the ferocity he displays.

SHANK takes a bit to get used to controller-wise. On the Playstation, the cycling through of various weapons is initially difficult on the fly. The first time through the game I found myself relying heavily on the shotgun and the machetes. These are perfect tools for a side-scroller like this that piles the enemies on thick and hard. As I have matured in my gameplay, though, I lean much more on the chainsaw and the excuse to feed enemies grenades. Yes, you can grab a problem character and shove a grenade in his face and watch him pop!

In order for you to comprehend how satisfying this is, I need to really explain where the fun in this game lies.

Enemies are armed to the teeth with Gatling guns, grenade launchers, automatic rifles, flame throwers, and knives of all sorts. When they show up onscreen, you have the option of grappling with them, pouncing on them, shooting them, or hucking a grenade in their general direction. There are also propane tanks placed at points in the game that can really clear problem situations up messily. Sometimes there are dogs in the fray, and those mongrels will knock you out of any combo you might be working and pin you to the ground. With all of these enemies attacking you virtually nonstop, your health bar can take a serious beating, but there are power-up drinks showing up at regular intervals to keep Shank alive. Sometimes, I find myself really beating the hell out of a large opponent something unmerciful, because I know that when he drops, he’ll give me a power-up drink.

The varying degrees of mayhem that can be created are limited only by the player’s creativity. As you play through the game, you can unlock more, increasingly powerful weapons. There are chains for your fists, an Uzi, and opportunities to kill opponents with some of the heavy machinery that they died trying to kill you with. The combos get thick and complex. In short, you need to open 2-3 cans of brutal whup-ass, and then you need to work your way through a 12-pack or a 24 pack without getting touched in the process. I like to pounce on the first thug I see, stab him in the chest twice, then clear the area around me with a few shotgun blasts before finishing my pinned victim off with a chainsaw rip to his chest or two satisfying buckshots to his face. I find myself giddy as I wreak cartoon havoc on everyone in my path.

Shank moves from left to perpetual right, cutting his way through wave after wave of 2D enemies. Think original STREET FIGHTER or DOUBLE DRAGON or ROBOCOP. SHANK’s soul is reincarnated from parts of the original side-scrolling beat-‘em-ups of the late 80s and early 90s.

The scrolling is only part of the equation. Boss fights are a regular occurrence, and if you don’t know what to do, these guys will mangle you and burst your cartoony blood vessels. The death of Shank in a boss round means that you will come back with a hint floating across the screen offering some insight in how to drop your target. All of this is part of the grand revenge story that is concluded with a hard-to-kill final boss.

The cut scenes are on par with anything that is on Cartoon Network, and the hyper-violence adds to the entertainment value. Subject matter, language, and splatter ensure that if you have kids in the household, you can’t do this stuff until well after bedtime. But there is something about the art, the coloring, and the silliness of it all that keeps this game from being a dark study of man’s bleak nihilistic potential. SHANK is harnessed in a framework of fun, and that fun is so compelling that the fact that I have well-over 3000 vicious kills under my belt is completely trivialized. On top of all of this is a “hard mode” that has no checkpoints. You get killed mid chapter? Back to zero. Yeah, those developers at Klei know a thing or two about making it rough.

Couple all of this with Klei’s approachable SHANK blog (with wallpapers and a free soundtrack download) and their entertaining Twitter-feed, and SHANK is a gaming experience that blows a lot of 60 dollar games away. These guys care about their product, and they have lovingly delivered something to my living room that would have sucked at least a hundred dollars out of me one token at a time at the local arcade. SHANK is all about replay. It is all about those bite-sized moments of glory that those of us who clocked arcade time lived for. I used to take my allowance to the arcade and come away with amazing experiences that I could only replicate the next week when I got paid again. SHANK has that kind of feeling about it. When I finally beat that final boss after struggling with him through two separate gaming sessions, I had to go right back into it with him to make sure I’d actually done it.

With all of the unlocks, cut-scenes, and the cornucopia of fun ways to dispatch opponents (don’t forget that grenade feed), SHANK is the most solid fifteen dollar purchase you can make on the Playstation Network. A hundred hit combo unlocks a white ninja costume for you to wear. A hundred and fifty hit combo unlocks the red ninja suit. Also, a hundred chainsaw kills unlocks a Jason Voorhees looking suit to handle business in (my current favorite). Currently I am sweet-talking my wife into playing co-op mode with me so that I can secure more unlockable costumes.

I don’t have a rubric to grade games with, but if I did, this would be a 10 out of 10 hands down.

Check out Klei's SHANK BLOG

Pics, wallpaper and more compiled in our SHANK THREAD

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RESIDENT EVIL: AFTERLIFE

2010-09-16T21:23:00.000-07:00

RESIDENT EVIL: AFTERLIFE

I have been disappointed time and time again by the RE series. They always fall terribly short of whatever mark they are supposed to reach. And now, the fourth installation is here and it really delivers. But the delivery is a bittersweet headgame. Is this movie that valiantly rips off THE MATRIX, THE THING, (Snyder's)DAWN OF THE DEAD and several other films really good?
No, it isn't. But if you have been conditioned (as have I) to expect something weak, you are in for a surprise. RE: AFTERLIFE is a gun, Milla, and headshot worshipping exercise in high-end style over substance. Paul W.S. Anderson is comparable to Tarantino in this regard. Unplug your logic receptors and enjoy the beautiful, slo-mo mayhem. This film picks up right after the
last one, and the answer to the "clone issue" is a big money-shot. The presence of Astaroth is awesome too. What an awesome way to say goodbye to summer.

-Mediasaurus Rex

RESIDENT EVIL IN THE FORUMS
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I'M STILL HERE

2010-09-14T10:25:00.001-07:00

I'M STILL HERE

Perhaps Casey Affleck's I'M STILL HERE documentary about the life and times of Joaquin Phoenix will be a light-hearted romp in the life of a fat, wannabe rapper. I kind of doubt it though. This sounds like one of the most painful, squirm-inducing films I have heard of in a long time. Apparently it details the unravelling of a man who once had the world by the tail. It sounds horrifying to watch. In fact, I would posit that this might very well be the most excruciating horror film to show up in 2010. Morbid curiosity is driving me here, however.

-Mediasaurus Rex

ROGER EBERT'S REVIEW
I'M STILL HERE OFFICIAL WEBSITE
JOAQUIN PHOENIX DISCUSSION IN THE MEDIASAURS FORUMS

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MACHETE - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-09-07T11:10:00.001-07:00

MACHETE - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

By: SITHLORD

If you're familiar with Director Robert Rodriguez's past works, then you should already have a pretty good idea of what is coming. If not, you have to wait about 5 mins. Yes, 5 mins into the movie and you will know what kind of retro-80's directing, cheesy gore, wit 'n humour and naked lithe female forms await you throughout the rest of the film.

Is this a good thing?

Enter Federale Machete: Left for dead at the hands of drug lord Torres (Steven Seagal). Torres has a knack for keeping the same facial expressions throught the entire film. Several times, I thought he was going to ask to be called the Glimmer Man. Machete somehow survives and comes to America and becomes the unknowing pawn in a rather complicated border/illegal immigration/re-election/drug smuggling scheme. Machete is a man of few words (or texts). Reminiscent of Arnold in THE TERMINATOR.

Michelle Rodriguez plays an underground railroad mastermind selling tacos. Not kidding here. She is hot but she tries too hard to be perpetually serious and she tries too hard to be hot.

Jessica Alba is an I.C.E. (Immigration) officer trying to take down "The Network" being run by Michelle Rodriguez.

Cheech Marin shows up late in the film as the coolest Catholic Priest ever to grace a film.

Robert DeNiro and Don Johnson are present but the characters have little substance but are tolerable.

In the what might be the worst bit of casting, Lindsay Lohan plays the daughter of a Senator's aide. It could've only been worse if Paris Hilton was cast instead. I prayed she'd get axed in the film quickly by a manly machete blade.

The gore is over the top as are the action sequences. The humour makes fun of the whole illegal immigration mess as well as presenting obvious Mexican stereotypes.

Robert Rodriguez uses the scenes from the GRINDHOUSE commercial spliced right into the movie. Rodriguez has also stated he'd like his character, Machete, to be the first Mexican superhero. Not so sure about that as Zorro may be the first in my book. Never the less, Rodriguez has great taste in good-looking females, manly ways to dispatch adversaries and sloppy '80s editing.

There are several flaws in the movie, the cheesy gore not withstanding. However, of note are several homages to not only Robert Rodriguez's past works, but also that of Danny Trejo's (Machete) past films. An example of this a car's license plate reads "La Onda." Also, it may be a coincidence, but the 4 men in black with automatic weapons standing outside the church seem to reference Quentin Tarantino's KILL BILL Vol.2

MACHETE is the epitome of cool in a manly movie. The machete blade Machete wields is longer than a Scottish Claymore sword is awesome to behold. I felt the final showdown with Steven Seagal could've been more interesting and not so anticlimatic, but even so, its a fun film.

Intestinal bungie jump for the win!

-Sithlord

Machete Discussion in the MEDIASAURS Forum
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SHANK - A BADASS VIDEO GAME

2010-09-07T10:54:00.000-07:00

SHANK - A BADASS VIDEO GAME
By: Mediasaurus Rex

Every now and then a game comes along that hits all of the right notes. I am going to posit to you that SHANK is that game. It has the side-scrolling beat-'em-up of classics like BAD DUDES, ROBOCOP and METAL SLUG but with a Cartoon Network look similar to SAMURAI JACK.

Violence? Guns, a chainsaw and knives. Spatter and spray. Grenades to toss and
unlockables like a gatling gun and a katana. Not for the little kids. But it is for the adults. Why? This thing is fun, fun, fun! The combo system and the weapon rotation is TOO EASY. That doesn't meant that the game is easy though. There are bosses in this game that will humiliate you. SHANK is on the Playstation Network and whatever network you use for that XBox trash.

SHANK OFFICIAL BLOG
SHANK PICS AND VID LINKS IN THE MEDIASAURS FORUMS
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HATCHET 2

2010-09-02T11:03:00.001-07:00

HATCHET 2 IS COMING

Seriously, what fan of horror didn't like Adam Green's HATCHET? It was a ripping good time in the bayou with Kane Hodder, Robert Englund, Tony Todd and a bunch of actors (including the "jump to conclusions" guy from OFFICE SPACE). It was loads of old-school fun. It even ended with what seemed to be a frame by frame homage to the original FRIDAY THE 13th.

The HATCHET 2 project has been hard to land info on with basic trolling. However, the HATCHET 2 trailer has landed on Yahoo. Is that a belt sander? Victor Crowley is going to be putting in some work this October. With HATCHET 2 and the final installation of SAW, Halloween season should be just about perfect.

HATCHET 2 TRAILER
HATCHET 1 and 2 IN THE MEDIASAURS FORUMS

EXPENDABLES BODY COUNT - SIMPLY BADASS

2010-08-20T13:10:00.001-07:00

This landed in the Mediasaurs email box a minute ago and it is pretty cool.

Click it a few times to see it better.

Contact M-Rex here
Mediasaurs Main Page
EXPENDABLES thread in the forum

THE EXPENDABLES - A BADASS SPOILERIFFIC FORUM REVIEW

2010-08-16T09:59:00.000-07:00

THE EXPENDABLES - A BADASS SPOILERIFFIC FORUM REVIEW
By: SPINAL VILLAIN

The Expendables, a manly, spoiler-riffic BADASS movie review.

Sly Stallone returns in a much anticipated action movie that is sure to get many mixed reviews. And why would it get mixed reviews; meaning that some would hate it and others would love it? Because THE EXPENDABLES isn't just any movie. It's a MANLY movie. Manly movies are not meant for everyday Joes. This is a move that houses the biggest names in both past and present day action movies.
Now, if you're interested in long-winded scripts, thought provoking screen plays or Shakespearean dialogue, you might want stop reading here and go see INCEPTION. If you want a rockin', kick-ass time out at the theater, by all means, read on.

The team of Expendables is being called up for a job.
The mission is supposedly simple, set-up by DIE HARD action movie star, Bruce Willis, who plays Mr. Church(the irony of that is just overly hilarious), a shadowy fellow who offers the job to the two best teams. The other rival merc team leader enters and it's none other than the Governator himself. What ensues is laughable exchange of insults that is based on past movies and characters as well as real life situations. It’s a very enjoyable scene that gets downplayed in the commercials.

Stallone and Statham go on a recon mission that is soon botched and both decide to pass on the job as it is a suicide mission drafted by the C.I.A. intended to either get rid of the mercs or kill one of their own because the C.I.A. doesn't want to get their hands dirty for fear of a press field day if it's discovered.

After a brief, nostalgic discussion with Sly's friend and former teammate, Mickey Rourke, Stallone is struck with guilt because of the girl on the botched recon mission who is now being tortured to give information about The Expendables team. Stallone decides to do this Rambo-style and that a one man army is good enough to satisfy his grief. Long story short, his friends and fellow teammates tag along.

Jason Statham gets a large and prominent roll in this move. In fact, it's as much about him as it is Sly Stallone. Being a merc for hire is hard on Statham's love life and after a month of no phone calls, his girlfriend is already frolicking around in a short mini with some overly macho, easily intimidated ass-wipe.

The Expendables pulls out all the stops when it comes to fire power. The team uses state of the art guns to achieve their objectives. Automatic shotguns, throwing knives, night vision, custom gear and enough C-4 to orbit Ah-nuld Schwarzenegger, are all prominently displayed for an explosive cinematic experience that pays homage to the 80's and 90's action movies.

This movie does have its serious moments, like the waterboarding of the previously mentioned civilian girl to gain information about the Expendables team. And of course, it's Latin America we're in as well, so drugs play a role as well as corrupt American Officials.

The only major gripe I have with movie was Eric Roberts. His character looked like it was molded from a stressed-out, less slicked version of Pat Reilly (ex-L.A. Lakers coach). Most of the screen time he had was pretty much painful to endure. I was glad when Statham, Stallone and Li came back on screen because their manliness and humor brought much needed relief to my eyes and ears due to Roberts over acting and horrible dialogue. A high-school thespian could easily have been cast over Roberts, who, at one time was a great actor. What was director Sly Stallone thinking when he was viewing Roberts’ auditions?

The pros on this movie vastly outweigh the cons. And exactly why is that, you ask? Because I knew precisely what I was going into when I went to see this (besides my trolling from Mediasaurs.com). I knew it was NOT going to be INCEPTION or LORD OF THE RINGS. I knew, rather, it was going to be TANGO AND CASH (Stallone and Statham), or THE BOURNE SUPREMACY, or RAW DEAL or the like. I'm more than fine with that. Sometimes a little less is a little more.

Overall it's a manly movie with hardcore firepower, vintage fight sequences with modern execution, lots of C-4 and a couple of hot chicks to boot, as well as a dump-truckload of testosterone.

Guys night out just hit a new milestone.

More commentary, pics and EXPENDABLES infror in the forums

MEDIASAURS MAIN PAGE

SPARROW'S THOMAS JAMES LONGLEY - A BADASS INTERVIEW

2010-08-11T23:35:00.000-07:00

SPARROW'S THOMAS JAMES LONGLEY - A BADASS INTERVIEW
By: Mediasaurus Rex

There has been a lot of interesting underground noise about SPARROW, an urban legend horror film that recently was filmed in Poland. We have been clocking it in our forums, and we have seen a lot of pics from the set released. As its release gets closer (we're hearing Halloween), SPARROW is gaining even more of an underground buzz. The official SPARROW webpage is full if compiled interviews and tidbits. The film now has an IMDB page and an ambiguous teaser trailer. In our hunt for more, actor Thomas James Longley answered a few of our questions.

IMDB cites SPARROW as your first acting gig. Can you tell us about any other acting experience that you have had?
Well, I recently graduated from the National Youth Theatre in London, and before that I was doing a lot of stage work. I also did a few short films and commercials, but Sparrow was my first feature.

How did you get associated with the SPARROW project?
I was offered an audition by Shaun, the director, and eventually I had to meet with the producer. I then auditioned in front of him and he liked me, so I was offered a role. I was talking to Shaun the other day about this actually, and at one point I was being considered for Duncan. But Eric auditioned pretty darn well for that part, so I was bumped to Matt instead (laughs).

Can you give us a thumbnail sketch of the character Matt that you play in SPARROW?
Matt’s the nice guy—everyone’s friend—which is why he’s the leader, I suppose. He’s an all round fun guy, straight forward, but definitely in charge. You know, there doesn’t tend to be a lot of characterization in teen horrors, but Matt was sort of nicely understandable for me. Something to get my teeth into without there being too much to think about as an actor . . . which allowed me to do a lot of running about, shouting, looking scared.

Every movie set has its "ridiculous story" of either a series of mishaps or something really funny happening. Can you tell us the one for SPARROW?
Hmm, well there were a few days when there were a lot of technical issues, but I suppose the funniest was the amount of takes needed for certain scenes. I wouldn’t dream of giving too much away. Shaun would kill me. But there’s a scene involving Jack [W. Carter] that Faye and I were standing about for, since we were involved before and after it, that took a LOT of takes. It was very difficult for Carter to keep still, as I remember, and it went on all day. Thinking back, it was kinda funny, but it must’ve been so frustrating for him.

How many days was the shoot?
A month, but I was there for about three weeks of it.

What is your favorite horror film?
Oh wow! These kinds of questions are so difficult to answer. I loved THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT when I saw it. But I also really enjoyed SIGNS, you know, the M. Night Shyamalan film. Does that count as a horror? Oh, and there’s this little Canadian indie film called INCIDENT IN LAKE COUNTY that I really like. It’s quite similar to Blair Witch actually.

The official website basically states that SPARROW is about a bunch of high school kids on a camping trip where a historic murder has taken place. Can you add more to this?
To be fair it’s pretty standard teen horror stuff. But at the same time there isn’t really a lead character as such. And because of that, there’s a certain level of absence about the film—perhaps no obvious core—which allows the film to be more terrifying, more genuinely jumpy than an overtly based character piece with obvious leads. It’s hard to explain, but it’s quite clever, really. You’ll know when you see it.

Would you say that SPARROW is more BLAIR WITCH PROJECT or FRIDAY THE 13th?
Both, but possibly leaning more towards the latter. Without becoming too graphic, it certainly has a few surprises.

Is SPARROW more along the lines of psychological horror or will there be splatter as well?
I suppose the film could be split into different sections. For most of the movie that involves the teens, there’s a lot of developing tension, and it begins to get eerie. But of course, a few splatters are shown here and there. And then after a certain point, it sort of descends into chaos.

Is SPARROW drawn from an actual urban legend?
I’m not sure, but Matt, the writer, did say he was inspired by a few real ideas. Of course, it’s probably just an exaggeration of an already established urban legend. There are loads out there. So don’t go camping in the woods! (laughs)

How long has SPARROW been in production?
Wojciech Stuchlik bought the rights at the beginning of this year, I think, so not too long. Naturally, as the cast, we were brought into the production latest, so for us it’s all been quite the whirlwind.

How big was the budget for SPARROW?
Very small, actually. About £50,000, when I was last told. It may have risen since, though, due to post-production, but it was done really well and efficiently on a very small budget.

When can we see a US release of the film?
Well, it’s going to do the film festival circuit, so it should be hitting some pretty major US ones. Other than that, it’ll be released on DVD.

When will we be able to see a trailer for it?
It’s out now, actually. But it hasn’t yet been heavily promoted. It’s on youtube I think. [We found the teaser trailer here]

What is next for you as an actor?
Well, I have a few films I’m attached to, so I’m keeping myself busy. I’m looking forward to doing quite a few projects in the US, actually, so I’m excited. It should be a lot of fun.

Check the SPARROW official website here

SPARROW on IMDB here

More SPARROW production pics than you can handle here

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DEAN DIRECTOR OF ZOMBIE PUPPETS - A BADASS INTERVIEW

2010-08-03T11:43:00.000-07:00

DEAN, DIRECTOR OF ZOMBIE PUPPETS - A BADASS INTERVIEW
By: Mediasaurus Rex

ZOMBIE PUPPETS is an upcoming movie that summarizes itself like this on the OFFICIAL WEBSITE:

Once upon a time… the puppet town of “ Crystal Meadow” was attacked by the living dead! Faced with certain death, the cuddly puppets found help from Rags the Bunny, an outlaw who lived in the nearby puppet slums of “Pistol Ghetto”.

Together they learned life lessons, sang songs, killed zombies, and uncovered the cause of the Zuppet Apocalypse.

After hearing about this project from various dark corners, I did what needed to be done. I tracked down the director, Dean and hit him with questions that I and some members of the Mediasaurs forums had come up with. What follows are some of the most interesting responses I have ever gotten in an interview session.

The concept of ZOMBIE PUPPETS is both horrifying and hilarious. Can you give us a thumbnail sketch of its genesis?

Mexican Food and Angst. I was eating a meal with my family at Cocina Del Charro, a local taqueria, and I was basically ignoring everyone, racking my brain for a film idea that would work on a low budget, would be something I would want to see, something other people would want to see, and a film that some eccentric dude of questionable talent (that would be me) could make.

Bad idea after bad idea kept coming, and I got pissed (not drunk, unfortunately). Suddenly, an image popped into my head—it was Grover (from SESAME STREET, of course), his eye hanging from its socket and blood dripping from his lips. He snarled, “brains” and then bit my arm. I basically did a “spit take” with a mouthful of iced tea and announced to my father that I knew what movie I was going to make next, ZOMBIE PUPPETS.

My whole family started LOL’ing, and I went to work.

The promo art at the ZOMBIE PUPPETS website is fantastic, so much so that it could stand alone. Will there be any sort of graphic novel/comic book tie-in with the project?

Thanks, I am glad you like the artwork. It would be a crime not to make an outlet for it. PREPARE for some epic moves in this arena. The design team is experimenting with some transmedia web comic applications, and a graphic novel or comic book is definitely in the near future.

It looks like ZOMBIE PUPPETS will be an R-rated film. Is that correct? Can we expect splatter, profanity, and adult themes? Is it horror? Is it comedy? Will it be for teenagers? Kids?

R-rated, and more splatter profanity and adult themes than you can shake a stick at. It’s primarily a comedy, but it plays on horror clichés, and let’s be honest . . . teenagers and kids are going to see it, and love it, just like I saw ROBOCOP and every 80s video nasty when I was 9 years old. THANKS DAD! (Seriously, parental guidance strongly suggested!)

The film is also pretty sophisticated in how it blends the puppet and horror worlds together, so I hope audiences are both shocked and delighted by the effort we put into the screenplay and concept.

ZOMBIE PUPPETS is made for adults, primarily those adults who remember being kids, watching all the classic Puppet Movies of the 80s, and growing up with HE-MAN and other branded entertainment.

Hopefully everyone finds the idea of innocent puppet animal characters trying to deal with serious life and death issues—in song—freaking hilarious.

The concept and filming of such a project must be baffling. Where are you going to film it? Are you making the puppets? Are you having someone else do that? How many sets do you plan to create?

Puppets are a beast to deal with. Even getting a puppet to like, walk across the room takes 1-3 puppeteers to coordinate, so it takes forever. Also I have no background in puppets, so what the hell am I doing?! LOL. Basically, it’s hard as hell but totally worth it! I mean, if I wanted easy, I would have become a doctor, or a chemist.

The puppets are being designed by a team of really cool dudes out in the Philippines who are just completely the right guys for the job. The puppets are being built by the same dudes behind the Broadway musical “Ave Q,” and we will shoot the whole movie on location in the slums of Manila (Philippines) (sort of like CITY OF GOD meets THE MUPPET SHOW!) and on a few sound stages for the more YO GABBA GABBA style stagey sets.

All the casting /voice work /and some post production will occur state-side out of Los Angeles.

Can you give us some background on James the producer and yourself and how you came to work together on this project?

James and Dean both went to middle school together and were a couple of “brains” in the GATE class. (Gifted and Talented Education!), but in high school they sort of went their own ways. James smoked a ton of weed, lifted weights for 8 years, and became like 200 pounds (he’s now more reasonably sized), and Dean got straight D’s and became a competitive break dancer.

In their 20s James became a serial entrepreneur doing a bunch of tech nonsense, and Dean went to San Diego State and got a film degree. They re-united via the cliché power of Facebook sometime in 2009.

I (Dean) basically convinced James to jump into the film business by telling him it would help him get chicks. The joke was on me because James totally looks like a vampire and has no trouble getting chicks. :(

This is not the WHOLE STORY, but seriously, who cares about James and Dean?

ZOMBIE PUPPETS has "cult hit" written all over it, but what kind of movie aficionado do you think will be attracted to it?

I would say if you’re a fan of the retro 80s puppet movies, the MUPPETS, or any contemporary “hip” children’s programming (like YO GABBA GABBA), you will find something to like.

If you’re into zombies you will also find much to like.

At the end of the day ZOMBIE PUPPETS is being made for the early adapters, but I foresee it becoming the type of film about which a friend goes, “OMG, you haven’t seen this shit yet! Holy shit, get over here right now and check this shit out!”

Also, if this movie can get a young man laid because he reveals that his DVD collection contains ZOMBIE PUPPETS, and the girl goes “YOU ARE TEH AWESOME” and lays him, just like Sam from QUANTUM LEAP, I can finally leap home.

WE ARE CHANGING LIVES HERE!

I am sure that you have already heard comparisons to Jackson's MEET THE FEEBLES. How would you define the differences between PUPPETS and FEEBLES?

We clearly stand in the shadow of FEEBLES -- I saw FEEBLES in the 90s via bootleg VHS acquired from the comic-con, so I was very aware of what Jackson had accomplished with that movie.

My favorite part of FEEBLES is the DEER HUNTER section in the middle, which I always thought was the most entertaining and successful section of the movie, so any similarities will reside there.

With that being said, the movies couldn’t be more different. ZP plays more with the clichés of the horror genre and really tries to paint the picture of a utopian, Disney-esque world that is turned upside down.

How big is the voice cast going to be?

Probably between 6-10, with multiple characters being played by the same actor. As we finalize casting, I will keep you updated. I may even have a surprise or two.

Will there be any moments (as in SESAME STREET) where humans actually interact with the puppets? Will there be any "body-suit" puppets like Sweetums or Big Bird?

Yes! There is one human in the film, a woman with cat ears who plays “Polly Esther” the cat (the female lead). Oh, we gots body suits! Unity Corn the Unicorn and two top secret characters that are the bee’s knees :)

In regards to production value, are you aiming towards THE MUPPET SHOW or more in a Sid and Marty Krofft direction? Or do you have a different ideal?

You are right in the ball park here. To be lame I will say 80% MUPPETS and 20% Sid and marty Krofft.

I am definitely going for nostalgia here and not trying to re-invent the puppet genre. The fun to be had with this concept is taking what is familiar and placing it in a totally off the wall situation.

When can we expect a trailer?

Expect a trailer to ignite teh internetz Jan 2011.

How big is the budget for this project?

I am hoping to finish the whole project for well under six figures . . . but I might lose my mind and blow the farm on some crazy puppet epic.

(The above pic is of Rags, the star of ZOMBIE PUPPETS)

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VALHALLA RISING - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-07-22T21:23:00.001-07:00

VALHALLA RISING - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: Mediasaurus Rex

VALHALLA RISING is a brooding Danish film that is downright mesmerizing to behold. Few words are spoken, religious symbols such a crosses and the full immersion into water are heavily used, and raw, vibrant hand to hand combat is reveled in. If VALHALLA RISING were packaged and sent back in time 30 or 40 years, it would have fit in perfectly alongside the works of Werner Herzog and Alejandro Jodorowski. In fact, VALHALLA RISING owes the bulk of its ruminating spirit to AGUIRRE THE WRATH OF GOD and EL TOPO. Sergio Leone’s meandering spaghetti westerns also figure into this pot of moody gumbo as well. The film is lean on time and dialogue and extremely heavy with ambiguous symbolic messages wide open to all sorts of interpretation.

Imagine my surprise when I settled in to watch VALHALLA RISING, expecting to see some more quirky BRONSON-esque antics courtesy of director Nicolas Winding Refn. However, VALHALLA RISING is about as far from BRONSON as possible. The differences are innumerable. The tone, era, and message of the films are in serious contrast. But both films demonstrate a deep comprehension of flesh on flesh violence. The opening words onscreen read, “In the beginning there was only man and nature. Men came bearing crosses and drove the heathen to the fringes of the earth.” The operative word here is “fringes” which also references the caliber of person that this film is concerned with.

Mads Mikkelson is One-Eye, a mute, tribal-tattooed, one-eyed prisoner who has spent the last five years of his life as a neck-chained combatant in some first century blood matches. He is the prisoner of a pack of gambling, multi-god worshipping pagans. One-Eye is brutal. With a reverse question-mark scar on the right side of his face and some hacked-up, gnarly scar-tissue over his left eye socket, he dispatches his victims with his bare hands or any blunt object he can find. “He is driven by hate, that’s how he survives, why he never loses,” muses one of One-Eye’s captors.

One-Eye manages a neck-breaking scene that is so horrific, barbaric, and original that it forces the viewer to consider how writers Nicolas Winding Refn and Ray Jacobsen came up with such a method of dispatch. The scenes of violence in this film display brain matter, disembowelment, and all sorts of splatter. The foley work is top-notch, and the fleshy impact an axe blade makes sounds so full and wet that those without intestinal fortitude, despite covering their eyes, are not spared.

Through a sequence of extreme bloodletting, One-Eye secures his freedom. Pulling on a leather vest that looks straight out of a Renaissance festival, he throws his lot in with a band of Christian Vikings who are off to find “New Jerusalem” and establish God’s rule there. Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of this film is that these Christian Vikings are just as vicious as the pagans. For a film lacking in dialogue, these guys really do bring the f-bomb. It is rather clear that wherever these bloodthirsty missionaries go, the theme is going to be much more like a BLACK ROBE remix than anything that Jesus was talking about in the New Testament. They speak of women and murder, yet pray fervently for God to work with them. The mood is reminiscent of THE MISSION starring a war-mongering Robert DeNiro. When this band of men finally lands on the shores of North America, there are different gods afoot, and these Christians really aren’t up to the task.

VALHALLA RISING starts in what appears to be the first or second century Scotland. One-Eye is fed and tended by a young boy (Maarten Stevenson) who soon becomes One-Eye’s voice. The first thing he tells the Christians that One-Eye was brought up from hell. The relationship between One-Eye and the boy continues to become more and more intimate as the film progresses. The film is broken into chapters with names like “Wrath,” “The Holy Land,” ”The Men of God,” and “Hell.” Such obvious, angsty religious posturing is left wide open for interpretation. As the chapters progress, the similarities of VALHALLA RISING to APOCALYPSE NOW are driven home with over-distorted guitar effects straight out of a ‘70s acid trip. One-Eye is on a definite mission, but we are left to interpret it through his barbarism and the directions he moves in. Mads Mikkelson completely pulls off this role which is a silent, dangerous yet possibly even more thoughtful beast than his Le Chiffre character in THE QUANTUM OF SOLACE.

VALHALLA RISING is absolutely beautiful. When a defeated foe’s head is hoisted and skewered on a spear, the landscape surrounding the shot is simply fantastic. The atmosphere is constantly cold and overcast, yet there are moments of heat and passionate red backgrounds as well. Vicious sequences enter and exit slow-motion to accentuate the on-screen savagery. Even the most banal scenes of walking, sitting or pondering are deeply saturated with a stunning natural beauty that makes every shot postcard-worthy. The only time the surrounding beauty is muted is during the boat ride to New Jerusalem, where fog and soundstage lighting take over. The message behind the atmosphere of the boat ride is obviously purgatorius, and once the boat lands, the lush, greenery is again everywhere. There is also a psychedelic nature to the narration of the film, with inexplicable foreshadowing and a general lack of coherent “real-time” information, thereby keeping the viewer constantly off-balance.

This is not a mainstream “action-film” by any stretch. VALHALLA RISING is an introspective journey that leaves the viewer perplexed and haunted. People are going to go and see this movie because the word on the street is that it is violent. The film does have some wincingly violent scenes, but such sequences are actually rather sparse. VALHALLA RISING is comparable to a heavy dirge. It is a poem that ponders existence and its purpose. It also ponders whatever higher power is out there and presents religion as the unmasterable puzzle that it is, fraught with misinterpretations. The philosopher Desiderius Erasmus once said, “In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.” One-Eye is not only king, but he also beats some serious ass.

Mediasaurs VALHALLA RISING thread

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THE HIT SQUAD - A BADASS DIRECTOR INTERVIEW

2010-07-16T21:32:00.000-07:00

What follows is an interview with Chris Blundell, director of the upcoming pixilated film THE HIT SQUAD.

THE HIT SQUAD

Q. What gave you the idea to make an entire film pixilated like the video games we all remember?

A. First of all, it started as a matter of need. My artistic skills are a little limited, so doing them in low resolution seemed like a logical step. The lower the resolution, the less mistakes I can make. If I shot in HD then it would be a completely different project.

Secondly, as a kid I loved all of these pixilated stories of Monkey Island, Beneath a Steel Sky, Sam and Max; they had such character and charm that can only come across in very low resolution. As soon as Monkey Island got to game 3, it just felt different. With all the higher resolution graphics, it suddenly seemed strange that Guybrush wasn't smiling when happy or frowning when sad. Our imaginations were used less, and we became a little too distanced from the characters. That's why games are still being made in pixel graphics, even film licensed games like Scott Pilgrim Versus the World. They have a certain character that can't be done in any other medium.

Q. Chris, as writer and director, do you have anyone else working on THE HIT SQUAD? If so, what do they contribute to the project?

A. The Hit Squad core team is mainly myself with additional animators. My colleague Laura Mulhern has taken on a big proportion of production tasks also. But to be truthful, so many people have helped in so many different ways from funding the film, to giving me an idea for a fictional brand of cola that it's difficult to describe! Also Facebook and Twitter have been godsends!

Q. How long have you been working on this film?

A. I came up with the original concept about 2 years ago. I wrote 10 scripts as a TV series, discussed it with TV companies, and nearly got it commissioned. But it got shelved. After that I decided to revisit it and get it released. Since I decided to revive the project it’s been about 4 months, all of it screenwriting and pre-production.

Q. So is this an animated film? Or have you programmed all of the characters?

A. A bit of both! I use a piece of computer game making software to draw and animate all of the characters and backgrounds, but then I take all of the frames and run it through specialist animation software to be able to add certain effects and flourishes.

Q. How do you plan to distribute it?

A. We'll be taking The Hit Squad to film festivals throughout the next year, however we'll be releasing it online through various channels with a simultaneous DVD release which instantly means that we won't be accepted into Cannes and the like as they like to have the world premiere at their festivals. But it does mean that when it's out, it’s out for everyone to enjoy!

Q. Video games are a part of the genesis of this film. Can you cite which games/systems really played into THE HIT SQUAD idea?

A. I'd have to say the Amiga 500 as well as both the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive and the Super Nintendo were the three consoles that the animation is inspired by. The Hit Squad are stuck in their ways, and their success stopped in the early 90s. So that’s why their world is represented in this late 80s, early 90s style. For the geeks out there, we work with only 256 colors which makes us VGA and officially 8 bit.

Q. 80s music is also a major part of this film. What is the genesis for this idea?

A. I just love 80s music, so over-the-top, so theatrical and distinctive. I'm originally a musician and I just think the 80s had such character that no one has managed to replicate since. The invention of synthesizers, drum machines, and turntables was the equivalent of taking a child to a toy store and saying "go crazy." A bunch of coke-fueled musicians suddenly just went mental. The Hit Squad is about what happened when the world got bored of that sound.

Q. Supporters have the opportunity to be a part of this film. Can you elaborate on that aspect?

A. For £40 (go to http://the-hit-squad.com) people can buy themselves into the movie. They can literally be part of a scene whether they're drinking at a bar or knocked over by one of the characters. We're pixilating people and putting them in the film. They send me a photo of themselves, and I or my artists get them pixilated and animated as an extra. For their £40 people also get a free copy of the movie on DVD plus their name in the credits! This is why the cast list is not officially released yet. We're still waiting on some confirmations, and I want to release the cast list all at once. But it will be worth waiting for!

Q. Including supporters, how many roles are in this film?

A. I counted the other day. It's 76 so far.

Q. So originally, you pitched the idea of a pixilated television show. Can you elaborate on that experience?

A. It was a real learning curve. I emailed a lot of different people and got loads of good responses. That's how I knew the idea was good. Unfortunately my screenwriting, storytelling, and character design skills weren't up to scratch, so that’s why the TV project died. I kinda knew it at the time; it felt really unfinished, and I think the TV companies knew it wasn't quite polished enough. Since then, I basically read everything I could about storytelling, screenwriting, directing, animation, and obviously, the 80s. It is only really these years later that I feel like THE HIT SQUAD has matured enough to be released.

Q. What is your next project after THE HIT SQUAD?

A. Funny, this is the second time I've been asked that question, and I haven't even released The Hit Squad yet! I do have another project in the planning stages. It will be something a little more sci-fi based, possibly a series. I'll be announcing my plans after The Hit Squad is released.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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TOY STORY 3 - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-06-22T21:32:00.001-07:00

TOY STORY 3 - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: MEDIASAURUS REX

The makers of TOY STORY 3 not only manage to bring the entire franchise around the corner with a boy who is too old for his toys but also to breathe even more fresh air into the series. By the third installment, a film in a series is usually so watered down and weak that it is a waste of time, but TOY STORY 3 handles its business as if all of the novel ideas that were percolating when the first movie was made never stopped bubbling over. The film doesn’t miss. There is no dragtime; there are no missteps. In a season full of nonstop cinematic blunders and outright moving picture failures, TOY STORY 3 stands above all and gives movie fans a reason to see a film in the theater rather than waiting for the DVD release.

The plot is simple enough. Andy is moving on to college, and he is cleaning out his room. The toys that made this ensemble piece series what it is are getting cut loose. Woody (Tom Hanks) is the only toy that makes it into the “college” box. The rest are all fair game for some form of separation anxiety. In short, the toys wind out in a day care, and on the surface, everything seems happy and loving. But beneath the utopian façade, something really ugly is brewing.

TOY STORY 3 manages to slip in some serious adult concepts and cloak them well with enough humor, whimsy, and fantastic CGI to make the end product feel relatively light. There is even a moment of such angst in the face of a force not dissimilar to DANTE’S INFERNO that completely humanizes every one of these talking playthings. Underneath all of the fun and adventure are messages about commitment, self-sacrifice, generosity, and forgiveness.

What is that ugliness brewing under the surface at Sunnyside Day Care? It is complicated and heavy with spoilers. Just keep an eye out for any character that looks like it escaped from Sid’s workbench in the original TOY STORY. That is the only hint that you need.

The adventure that Woody and crew go on is a hilarious one. Sarge and his bag of green army men are still around, and Sarge is still voiced by R. Lee Ermey, the ultimate typecast drill sergeant in the actor’s guild. Mr. Potato Head (Don Rickles) steps up his game this time out and fully one-ups his “Look, I’m a Picasso!” move. The aliens from the claw machine are back and still relevant. So is Rex (Wallace Shawn), the dim-witted Tyrannosaur who has the personality of a much cuddlier creature. Even the Toyota truck from Pizza Planet makes a cameo.

The introduction of several new characters, including the Fisher-Price phone that we have all seen with its clown-cherub face named Chatter (Teddy Newton) are all welcome. Even Ken (Michael Keaton) of Barbie fame is a welcome meterosexual addition to the group.

What really holds this film together is the fact that Andy’s toys, from Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) to the Slinky Dog (Blake Clark), are an actual, working team. The previous two installations of TOY STORY have demonstrated this as well, and this current chapter in their plastic lives showcases it even further.

Can those geniuses at Pixar do no wrong? All of the Disney/Pixar films have been fantastic. Anytime I hear someone speak up about a Disney/Pixar film that they thought was weak (like CARS or FINDING NEMO) I can usually count at least five voices vehemently coming to the film’s defense. Pixar understands storytelling on the bigscreen. They also have a knack for delivering the kind of moral that would make grandma proud. With brash, rude CGI films like the SHREK or ICE AGE series out there making parents wince with their candid scatological buffoonery, it makes a film like TOY STORY 3 stand that much taller. Sight gags, pop culture references, and old-fashioned comic timing make TOY STORY 3 the kind of G-rated film that won’t have adults in the audience snoring, groaning, or looking at their cellphone clock.

Is there anything bad to be said about this film? There is a lame one-liner from Hamm (John Ratzenberger) that falls so flat that the audience might not catch it. However, that line is delivered after the credits are rolling at the end. Lee Unkrich who has put in co-directing time with Pixar/Disney in the past (TOY STORY 2, MONSTERS INC, FINDING NEMO) sure has earned the full director’s chair this time around. At a time when it is a complete chore to go to the multiplex and suffer through Hollywood’s most disappointing streak of mediocrity yet, TOY STORY 3 throws down and sets a standard. It presents a world of toys with consciousness as if this is the incontrovertible truth. It is the same standard that was set in TOY STORY 1. I just wish more movie-makers would strive for it.

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MICMACS - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-06-02T21:50:00.001-07:00

MICMACS – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
BY: MEDIASAURUS REX

MICMACS, Jean Pierre Jeunet’s latest, brings all of his various traits of directorial quirkiness (witnessed in DELICATESSEN, CITY OF LOST CHILDREN, ALIEN RESURRECTION and AMELIE) into one film. MICMACS is an ensemble piece that is built around one of the most whimsical revenge stories I have ever witnessed. In the hands of almost any other director, this film would have wilted and crashed with such a stripped down, simple plot. But under the creative mastery of Jeunet, MICMACS is one of the most visually compelling and entertaining films out right now.

The film literally drops the viewer in the Sahara desert in its first frames where a man is killed by a land mine. The rest of the film belongs to that man’s son, Bazil (played as an adult by Dany Boon). Bazil is young when his father dies and is a problem at his local catholic school. He does manage to grow up, secure a job at a video store, and whittle away his long work hours mouthing the words of a French-dubbed Humphrey Bogart in THE BIG SLEEP back at a television screen. This existence is cut short by a stray bullet to the head. Bazil survives; however he is now slightly off socially and has a massive scar across his forehead. Consequently, he loses his life as he knew it. Now homeless and jobless, he has to start over.

Through a series of surreal coincidences, Bazil learns of both the company that made the landmine that killed his father and the company that made the bullet lodged in his skull. As MICMACS’ coincidence meter continues to fly off of the chart, it is revealed that both of these armories are across the street from each other. Furthermore, the CEOs of each company, DeFenoullet (Andre Dussollier) and Marconi (Nicolas Marie) hate each other.

Bazil meets and moves in with a group of creative misfits that live in a secret junkyard hideout and proceeds to plot his master plan of vengeance. Functioning much like a comic book team of superheros, Bazil enlists his new group of friends in his revenge plot, and they are just as quirky as the tenants in DELICATESSEN or the characters in CITY OF LOST CHILDREN. There is Fracasse the human cannonball (Dominique Pinon – a Jeunet regular). There is also a cute, skirted, bespectacled numerical fact spewer named “The Calculator” (Marie-Julie Braup). The Gepetto of the bunch is Petit Pierre (Michel Cremades) who makes toys and crude, cartoonish robots. The Contortionist (Julie Ferrier) likes to fold herself into refrigerators and boxes while flirting with Bazil. Remington (Omar Sy) is the resident writer with one too many flowery words to say. The group is rounded out by a matron and a patron: Placard (Jean Pierre Marielle) and Tambouille (Yolande Moreau). With bizarre yoga, strange measurements, and a constant reminder that all equipment that is ever used is recycled, this group of eccentrically superpowered vagabonds pulls MICMACS together to achieve a coherence that a lot of bona-fide comic book movies (like THE LOSERS) fail to achieve.

It is apparent that Bazil’s gang genuinely cares for each other. It is also apparent that if they are going up against arms manufacturers that there will be a heavy dose of explosions and bullets (showing that Jeunet’s lackluster ALIEN RESURRECTION time actually paid off). MICMACS doesn’t disappoint.

In traditional Jeunet style, the camera pans from crazy, unpredictable positions before landing to take in standard shots of scenery. Some of the most random concepts that dance across the screen are merely a part of the way the world of MICMACS works. Examples of this are the different barbaric ways rich people clean and consume prawns, Bazil’s recital of odd facts to stop his panic attacks (accompanied with animated SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK type cartoons), and Winston Churchill’s fingernail clippings. Some pretty solid CGI is used to accentuate various scenes, but it doesn’t overwhelm. MICMACS manages to convey a cluttered, surreal world without the busy visual detritus that Gilliam used to convey THE IMAGINARIUM OF DR. PARNASSUS. The feeling is similar, but Jeneut doesn’t rely on the fantastic quite as hard. MICMACS takes reality and bends it to that point just before the breaking. The world he presents is almost possible. MICMACS fits everything strange and normal together with an unnatural seamlessness that pushes the story along flawlessly.

MICMACS is a live wire of a film. It is French with English subtitles, so read fast or you will miss the onscreen magic. It never strays from its original revenge-based plot, and it explains all of its rapid-fire plot developments, occasionally rewinding the clock and representing scenes with the key missed details. It is entertaining, fun, and raw. This film is a hot-dogging showcase of Jean Pierre Jeunet at the top of his game.

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THE MYSTERY TEAM - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-06-01T22:28:00.000-07:00

THE MYSTERY TEAM - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: MEDIASAURUS REX

Finally, the long-awaited film from the minds of those silly kids at DERRICK’S COMEDY is up for mass consumption. The DERRICK’S COMEDY players, most notably Donald Glover, have been bending pop culture to their will of late. What started as a comedy troupe that pushed out a hefty, mesmerizing blitz of extremely to mildly funny YouTube videos went on to become the Internet hipster’s name-drop of choice, and caused a trending Twitter topic for the first black Spiderman (#donald4spiderman), has released a feature-length film, THE MYSTERY TEAM. This is what will most likely be remembered as the product that “made their mark.”

THE MYSTERY TEAM is a film about three high school seniors who want to still live their glory days as pint-sized detectives a-la THE LITTLE RASCALS. However, the R-rating on this film is a hard one. And while these guys are still living the glory days of solving cases like “sack-lunch fraud” and “two milks at lunch time,” the perverse world around them is closing in and forcing them to grow up.

The gag of a “forced maturing” runs through the entire MYSTERY TEAM film and is ground-zero for the bulk of the laughs. The film chooses at times to get dirty, and the dirtiness that is presented is so vile (such as the loss of a family heirloom in the vagina of a stripper) that the zaniness of the film is interrupted with hard, pornographic facts. Jason (Donald Glover), Duncan (DC Pierson), and Charlie (Dominic Dierkes) are also routinely verbally assaulted by Eric (Xavier Salazar), the ultimate foul-mouthed little kid.

What is a rather simple story is sidetracked and red-herringed so much that by the end of the film, all semblance of logic has been completely foiled. Jason, Duncan, and Charlie are hired for a dime by a little girl named Brianna (Daphne Ciccarelle) to find out who killed her parents. The mystery that Jason, Duncan, and Charlie soon find themselves completely consumed by runs deep and forces these arrested development case-studies to face reality and grow-up.

While working the viewer over with a haymaker of random witticisms such as the introduction and usage of hobo tips from a book called THE WANDERING TRAMP by S.A. Turkington and the use of catch phrases like, “Spill it, skillet,” the humor that should harness and bolster this film runs rather thin. Jason, the master of disguise, does wear ridiculous disguises and brutalizes accents, but such nonsense is only worth a smirk or two. Duncan, the boy genius, brings a host of silly facts to the table, but their demonstrated uselessness is ham-handed comedy at best. Charlie, the strongest kid in town, is a constant dolt-joke that never actualizes into anything. THE MYSTERY TEAM is some quirky fun, but it smacks of the type of cheap silliness that Sid and Marty Krofft presented on sugar-cereal soaked Saturday mornings back in the 70s.

The pacing of the humor in THE MYSTERY TEAM is much more like Chris Farley’s BEVERLY HILLS NINJA than something more frenetic like John Leguizamo’s PEST. Jokes about vomit, the consumption of dog urine, digging around in feces, and renting versus purchasing “eight balls of cocaine” are all grin-worthy, but THE MYSTERY TEAM lacks a specific scene that gives it comedy hall of fame rights, like the Baby Ruth in the pool from CADDYSHACK. Funny lines like, “Do you know what happens in jail? No TV.” are strong, but not strong enough. The mean-streak that this film flaunts is at times cringeworthy, such as when Leroy (Peter Saati) repeatedly tells his ditzy girlfriend Destiny (Kay Cannon) not to perform any fellatio while he is gone.

There is no question that THE MYSTERY TEAM is a comedy and built on the chassis of some great ideas. But it never completely finds its footing. It is a comedy in the sense that CORKY ROMANO or THE ANIMAL are comedies, but not in the sense of something great, like the aforementioned CADDYSHACK or even HAPPY GILMORE. THE MYSTERY TEAM is mostly a tedious diversion. Hopefully it is merely a placeholder before DERRICK’S COMEDY really delivers something worthwhile.

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SHREK FOREVER AFTER - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-05-25T21:22:00.001-07:00

SHREK FOREVER AFTER – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: The Mad Hatter

SHREK FOREVER AFTER (also mercifully known as SHREK: THE FINAL CHAPTER) begins by introducing us to Rumpelstiltskin (Walt Dohrn). This little imp is known for duping unsuspecting patrons into sucker deals and has his eye on getting control of Far Far Away. He had King Harold and Queen Lillian (John Cleese and Julie Andrews) all primed and ready to swindle when Shrek found Princess Fiona.

That was the start of things for Shrek and Fiona (Mike Myers and Cameron Diaz) who have since added three little bundles of joy to their brood and like many new families, soon find themselves in a rut of feeding, changing, play dates, and time spent with the same old friends. It's enough to drive an ogre crazy, and it ultimately does. Shrek throws a temper tantrum during his triplets’ birthday party and storms off like an ogre.

It's around here that Rumpelstiltskin catches up with him and offers him one of his too-good-to-be-true deals. Shrek can go back to being an intimidating care-free ogre for a day. In exchange, 'Stiltskin will take a random day from Shrek's childhood. Doesn't sound so bad, does it?

Bad news for our smelly green hero: 'Stiltskin takes the day he was born. Thus, 'Stiltskin’s deal with Harold and Lillian comes to pass, and he swindles them out of their kingdom. Also Shrek and Fiona aren't married, he has no children, ogres are hunted within the kingdom, Donkey (Eddie Murphy) lives a life of servitude, Puss (Antonio Banderas) is fat and lazy. Essentially it's Bedford Falls with an imp playing Mr. Potter.

Shrek can undo it all, but he has a day to do so, otherwise . . . well . . . y'know.

More than one person has told me that it was all the pop culture references in the first Shrek movie that made it work so well. I've never bought that. I've always believed the fact that SHREK was based on a great story was what made that first film work so well. In many ways, it felt like the fairy tale that The Brothers Grimm forgot—a clever one that felt fresh in the face of all the animated sweetness we'd been handed for so many years.

Now, by this fourth entry in the series, we've all learned what happens when clever becomes complacent. It's bad enough that much of the winks and nods are ones we've already seen, but now they've all been grafted on to that same "what if?" story that we've seen far too many times. Even with that in mind, I still wanted to enjoy this Shrek offering a lot. But sadly the amount of times I laugh per film has been dwindling as the series has gone on. Now I'm only snickering at throwaway lines (Donkey to Gingerbread Man: "What you talkin' 'bout cracker?").

There is never a moment in SHREK FOREVER AFTER that you think things might not work out. Every new road block these characters encounter seems to come with instructions tacked to them on how they can be overcome. Ye, Far Far Away is still bright and beautiful, and yes, it's fun to hear the flute sample from The Beastie Boys' "Sure Shot" worked into a fairy tale. But that wasn't what made the first chapter work, and it certainly isn't enough anymore.

Then there's the continuing love affair with 3-D. While I loved what Dreamworks did with HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON, there wasn't a single detail of SHREK FOREVER AFTER I felt merited a 3-D experience. Thus, I opted for a 2-D screening. While I can see a moment or two where the 3-D might have been nifty, there wasn't a moment I thought I was missing out. Memo to Hollywood: We're over the novelty; you officially have to try harder. Don't believe me? Look at the opening weekend box office for this film.

Indeed, watching Shrek work through his midlife crisis is about as entertaining as listening to Big Bird consider mutual funds or sitting patiently while Goofy gets his biopsy results. ‘Stilskin might have been a fun character on his own, and Puss seems to own every line he is given, but ten years on I have officially grown bored of anything and everything that happens in Shrek's swamp.

Sorry Shrek my man. Next time try buying yourself a sportscar. Might make for a more entertaining movie.

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ROBIN HOOD - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-05-20T21:18:00.000-07:00

ROBIN HOOD – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

By: The Mad Hatter

For the second time in a week, I bought a ticket for a film with chatter of bad buzz ringing in my ear. At least this time, it wasn't an entire week's worth of bad buzz. At least this time around, the chatter wasn't based on comparing a sequel to its original. And with ROBIN HOOD, I think that the negative chatter is not so much due to the movie being bad as people not getting the story they expected to get.

The story begins in the late 12th Century. Richard the Lionheart is in the final throes of his crusades when he gets killed in battle. As the battle continues to rage, four infantrymen break free from the stockade and head for home. The group is led by an archer named Robin Longstride (Russell Crowe). As they try to flee for home, they come across the king's guard getting ambushed by the traitorous knight, Sir Godfrey (Mark Strong).

Thinking quick, Robin and his men disguise themselves as the fallen knights, knowing it will ease their passage home. Amongst the guard is Robert Loxley who with his dying breath, begs Robin to take news of his demise to his father in Nottingham. He likewise entrusts Robin with his sword, asking he return it to its rightful place in his father's hand.

Successfully passing as knights, the men return to England and hand over the crown of the fallen king to the queen mother. The crown is swiftly passed to Prince John, the next in line, who very quickly shows his hand at being strict where it comes to his subjects paying their due taxes. He likewise appoints Sir Godfrey to go about collecting what he's due, unwittingly empowering Godfrey to hasten a French invasion.

Robin, meanwhile, is off to Nottingham where he meets Lord Loxley (Max Von Sydow) and his daughter-in-law Marion (Cate Blanchett). Upon learning of Loxley's death, they both convince Longstride to take his place in order to avoid having their property taken by the crown. Longstride agrees, and somehow, an entire town accepts him as Loxley even though they look nothing alike.

Sheriff of Nottingham? Peripheral character. Outlaw? Not so much.

Astounding feats of Archery? Once in a while. Mis-marketed film? You betcha.

The production of ROBIN HOOD was plagued with indecision, and that indecision has led to much dissatisfaction with the film. What we have here is an origin story, but you'd never know that from the bold title nor from any of the high energy marketing. At one point in the film I thought to myself, "Geez, it feels like we've been setting up Robin's back story for a while." Then I looked at my watch and realized the film had forty minutes left to wrap things up.

Had this film been billed as ROBIN HOOD: SECRET ORIGIN, reaction to it might have been a bit more favorable. As it stands, it contradicts every legend of Nottingham ever told. From Errol Flynn to animated foxes, no movie has ever put the man in tights into this particular narrative. That said, this isn't a bad movie; it just isn't what audiences are expecting.

Russell Crowe does a serviceable job even if he doesn't have much chance to rob from the rich and give to the poor. His accent is indeed slightly muddled, but I'll give him points for attempting one. In some ways, he is playing “Maximus-with-a-Bow,” but he doesn't hold the film back and is as good as he needs to be. Nobody in the cast is really given much to work with, but of everybody, Mark Strong seems to most understand what he's there to do.

Strong is the dastardly villain in this story, and it’s a role he's perfected well in the last eighteen months. After him, Oscar Isaac has his moments but doesn't have a clear enough part to dig in to. He's slimy, weaselly, and cowardly but never needs to be one of these traits for any longer than two minutes at a time.

Since ROBIN HOOD is Ridley Scott's film, I tried to consider where it would fit within his spectrum of films, and sadly it isn't as good as GLADIATOR or KINGDOM OF HEAVEN (the latter was hardly a hit with audiences or critics). For me much of the reason comes down to never tapping into the determination of either of those films. Both of them were stories centered on one man trying to rise to a challenge. ROBIN HOOD spends so much time with Longstride trying to take Loxley's place in many ways that by the time occasion comes for him to rise, we've stopped caring.

I enjoyed what I saw in ROBIN HOOD—bad marketing, and strange story be damned—but I don't know who else will. Those looking for Russell Crowe to kick ass and take names would be better served renting GLADIATOR. Those looking for the legend of an archer and his band of merry men would be better served renting Errol Flynn's 1938 classic. If you're looking for a decent tale of medieval life and a notion of where the whole legend begins, give this movie a look.

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LUCID DEMENTIA - A BADASS BAND INTERVIEW

2010-05-17T21:45:00.001-07:00

LUCID DEMENTIA - A BADASS BAND INTERVIEW
By: Mediasaurus Rex

Recently, I had the opportunity to interview Sheldon of LUCID DEMENTIA. I’d been playing their music rather regularly (you can get a feel for it here ), and the more I listened to them, the more I wanted to know about them. When I found some footage of them online with a giant demon-looking puppet I was hooked. Was LUCID DEMENTIA a goth puppet-show? Were the rumors that I’d heard of some horror/music hybrid accurate? Are they really opening for ANDROID LUST in Houston on June the first at a club called Numbers? Is their music part of the soundtrack to a horror film called SWEATSHOP? Who were these people, and when would I be able to see their stage show? I had to get to the bottom of the groovy beats and socially-conscious lyrics on the pronto. What follows is some really valuable information about a band that has the potential to really go somewhere.

Can you give us a brief history of the band?
Lucid Dementia, the Band, (actually, the full name of the band is “The Fall and Rise of Lucid Dementia as Performed by the Tribe of the Tantrick Puke Whores”) was [formed] in 1996. After the release of our 1st CD, Twisted, the title song ended up on an international compilation for Female Industrial Artists through COP International, which gave us immediate world-wide exposure. A local Club owner took us under his wing and got us started on the local stage, [an opportunity] which eventually spread out to [performances in] surrounding Texas Cities. Lucid Dementia has undergone various line-up changes, with mainly me, Luci (the puppet) and the drummer as the long-time stand ins. We have been on 1 tour outside of Texas to Colorado Springs and back.

How many members are in the band?
There are MANY “Dementians” (People that help the band in various forms, as well as ex-band members that are no longer able to play with the band but are considered to still be band members). Currently the official line-up number is 5.

Can you describe the genesis of your mascot (Lucid Dementia)?
When I wrote and produced the 1st album, I did it without regard for how I was going to perform it. I had recently been studying about Alfred Jarry and how he performed his Absurdist play “King Ubu” by using simple puppets and such, and that inspired what eventually became “Luci.” I really wanted to do something fantastic, and very different from anything else that was out there.

The story of Luci is this: (Here is a snippet)

“There is another place and another existence, and it cannot be described in human words or even imagined, but it is a place that is of a much higher state than the humans. It should be said here that in this existence, there is no sexuality, no male or female. Humans are known of at this place, and although they are studied, they are used as an example of what we would call evil, and it is against the law to behave in a human fashion. Luci De Mentia was found guilty of this crime and given the most severe penalty—to spend an unknown amount of time among the humans. Luci, in her existence, was a kind of queen, and the crime she committed, the human behavior, was ever so slight, yet again, in her existence, it is an abomination and actually rarely happens. Luci is imprisoned to the human existence, and she is not given a body; she is put here like a ghost. After being here for 13 years, Luci found a suitable body—a timid young man with an insane need to make music. His mind is unstable and makes for perfect manipulation. He is her grand puppet.”

Luci is in constant amazement that human beings, as unintelligent and primitive as they are, are able to walk on their hind legs.

What can the audience expect from Lucid Dementia (the mascot) in a live show?
Half the audience demands Luci, the other half demands Sheldon, so we try to give them both. Normally, we begin the show with Luci for 2 or 3 songs. She IS the lead singer of the band and performs like one. She WILL bite audience members if she can, and she is not above jumping into the audience if necessary. She has a hypnotizing effect on most audience members; some just become disturbed.

What can one expect from the band in a live show?
LUCID DEMENTIA performs a kind of hardcore industrial horror show. We don’t seek to shock audiences; we seek to amaze them. There is always blood, sometimes just drooling; other times there have been live vivisections or brain surgeries. It really depends on how much time the band has and how quickly we have to get offstage if there is another band playing after. We tend to whip audience members into frenzy, so it’s a really bad idea for a quiet, or laid back band to play after us. So far the only one that could pull that off well was Clan of Xymox.

Can you detail the rowdiest live show you have ever performed?
In San Antonio I once fell off a stage into a stack of speakers and messed up my leg really bad, then performed on one leg for the rest of the show. Later someone threw a bottle at my head. Holly had gotten into a car accident that night, and as we found out later, she was performing with a concussion. We once performed at a Punk House in Colorado , and I jumped off stage with Luci on, and a bunch of punks jumped on me and punched and kicked the crap out of Luci and me. That was pretty fun. The last time we did a live vivisection on stage, we had different girls from our dance fan club called The Go Gore Grrls on stage with us, and everyone was smacking each other in the face and hair with blood and gore.

You draw a lot of musical influences from across the board; what are you finding most influential on your music of late?
I used to live in an old house my Uncle built in the 50s and moved out about 5 years ago. Moving out of there and living in a normal house gave me a perspective on some messed up things that I went through while living there. So the next album we are currently working on is inspired by those experiences. It’s probably going to be 13 songs about ghosts. Musically, my core is punk—true punk music, not that pop crap that passes for punk nowadays but true in your face punk music. That is my back ground. This was back when there was no “Goth” or “industrial” or “alternative” but when it was all punk. To me, industrial was the natural evolution of punk music. LUCID DEMENTIA is part of the next evolution of industrial music. That’s what I try for anyway. I let everything influence me, and I hate to be tied down to any one genre. The new LUCID DEMENTIA music will be more aggressive. If I had to name my top current influences: Thrill Kill Kult, Ethyl Meatplow, Mindless Self Indulgence, (Old) Ministry, Cabaret Voltaire, and Hardwire.

There is a sort of b-movie/horror movie kind of vibe that you guys have; can you elaborate on your film tastes?
The name “Lucid Dementia” means “being very clear about issues that are very unclear.” LUCID DEMENTIA is a horror movie. Then again, life is a horror movie. Unless you are very, very lucky, sooner or later something really horrible is going to happen to you whether it’s getting tied down and tortured or dying slowly in a nursing home. I know it’s a horrible way to live, but when things are going well in my life, I start hearing the JAWS theme playing because I know it’s only a matter a time before the next horrible event happens. Can you tell I was tortured as a child? I’m big on Science Fiction horror movies: all the ALIEN movies, lately PANDORUM, and most zombie movies. The movie our music is in is pretty awesome (SWEATSHOP). One of my favorite things to do is watch a bad horror movie and make fun of it, so B-movies are great too.

TWISTED (my personal favorite) is a song about religion, right? Can you tell us the story behind this song?“Twisted” was the first LUCID DEMENTIA song I ever wrote. It is also the most lo-fi song ever recorded for LUCID DEMENTIA. It is also the most famous LUCID DEMENTIA song. It’s all about what everyone thinks “god” is, and pokes fun at how people fight over the concept of “god.”

What are the band's plans for the rest of 2010?
1. Play live as much as possible.
2. Record new music as much as possible.

How did your music get featured in that episode of CBS' NCIS?
They were looking for “poppy” gothic music. The fine folks at COP International recommended us, as well as other folks in bands they talked to. It’s nice to have fans in high places.

Your website says that you will be touring heavily for your next album. Will you be hitting the west coast?
We want to tour more than anything. We would love to start playing outside of Texas more. Right now the economy seems to be making that really difficult, as well as gas prices. A lot of venues have closed as a result of this. As soon as the demand is there, though, we will be everywhere we can.

Anything else you want to add?
Check out the trailers with Lucid Dementia music:
http://www.blogger.com/www.sweatshopfilm.com

LUCID DEMENTIA will be opening for ANDROID LUST June the first in Houston at a club called Numbers.

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THE GOOD THE BAD THE WEIRD - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-05-14T20:59:00.000-07:00

THE GOOD THE BAD THE WEIRD - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: Mediasaurus Rex

I don’t think I am alone in saying that I have struggled my entire movie-going adult life trying to stay awake through the entire THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY. The Clint Eastwood vehicle is a long-winded mood piece that is ground-zero for the 60s era spaghetti westerns. Director Ji-woon Kim’s update of the film runs about thirty minutes shorter than the Sergio Leone classic, but it is all about wicked pacing and style. THE GOOD THE BAD THE WEIRD is an Asian film, frenetic and wonderfully shot, that takes all of the standard western movie cues and adrenalizes them with modern action-film mayhem.

What starts as a convoluted, hard to follow tale about a map, a train robbery, and more bullets than ever necessary gels in its second act with three main characters playing a delicious round of egotistical tug-of-war. There is Park Do-wan (Woo-sung Jung) who is the good. Do-wan is a bounty hunter who never smiles and cocks his rifle with a spin of the gun like THE TERMINATOR. Do-wan is a stoic; he channels old-school Eastwood with clarity. He is on a mission, and his hat is low over his face. The bad is Park Chang-yi (Byung-hun Lee), a man who at a distance, looks strangely like Prince in his 80s incarnation. Chang-yi’s hair hangs over his right eye perpetually. His left eye always looks weepy. Chang-yi is a killing machine though. He uses bullets with inhuman skill and in one particularly brutal scene, slashes his opponent with a knife multiple times while dancing around him counter-clockwise. The weird is Yoon Tae-goo (Kang-ho Sang), an aviator hat and Lennon sunglasses-wearing smart aleck who has a history in Korea that he would like to forget. Tae-goo is a criminal trying to make his way in the world. Unfortunately, the pride-dashing bounty on his head is merely the lamentable value of a piano.

The plot is rather simple. All of these characters are killing and stealing their way through northeast Asia in the 1930s. Chang-yi has been hired to rip a specific map off of a bank chief who happens to be riding on a train. However, before Chang-yi and his crew of savages can stop the train, Tae-goo has already made a hold-up of his own, securing the map and setting off a chain of events that brings Park Do-wan hot on his trail. The story is about the treasure map that allegedly leads to some goodies squirreled away before the fall of the Quing Dynasty. As more and more bandits, professional criminals, and even the Japanese Army tear the Manchurian desert apart in search of Tae-goo and his map, the film becomes more of a tribute to the ROAD WARRIOR than any western in recent memory.

In some ways this film is an unconventional marriage of IT’S A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD and THE STING put to Tarantino-style gunplay. But the key of it all is this film’s nonstop quirk. Fire-eaters, ducks, a running theme of mouths full of half-chewed food, and a classic brass diving helmet are just a few of the random items that permeate this film. THE GOOD THE BAD THE WEIRD also features mouthy henchmen that ask the wrong questions and a sloppy guy with a machine gun turret who, when shot, mows the rest of his crew down. There is also the classic opium den scene and some of the most precise bullets fired since BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID. If it was in a western, THE GOOD THE BAD THE WEIRD salutes it.

This is a self-titled “Oriental Western” where convention is flipped, pinned, and tied up in obscure knots. The seamless CGI in this film (most notably a hawk with a carrion rabbit in its beak) trumps silly modern American throwback movies like INDIANA JONES AND THE CRYSTAL SKULL with ease. The world of THE GOOD THE BAD THE WEIRD is a violent one, where bullets of exponential quantities are blasted at some characters, missing some entirely while the plasma of others sprays the camera lens.

What keeps the film going and locks the viewer in is the fact that THE GOOD THE BAD THE WEIRD is nonstop fun. Wide camera shots suck up the desert and kick dust in everyone’s face. Moments of peril are edited out at times and at others zoomed in on. A running, squirm-inducing theme of chopped fingers keeps the pacing on the dangerous side. Tae-goo’s behavior counters this darkness as he behaves like a complete clown thief. Do-wan is as macho as they come, swinging from cargo ropes, firing his rifle from above, and never missing a target. Chang-yi is a wiry, muscularly ripped menace, sporting two cartilage piercings in his left ear and some vicious scars on his face. THE GOOD THE BAD THE WEIRD drips with style, contains just enough substance, and references its predecessors with nonstop superiority. Hollywood should be taking some serious notes on what Ji-woon Kim has done here because it is damn near flawless.

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DARK CRYSTAL 2: NO THANKYOU

2010-05-10T21:42:00.001-07:00

DARK CRYSTAL 2: NO THANKYOU
By: Mediasaurus Rex

It has come to the point where once a week I hear a new idea from Hollywood that is completely retarded. If there is an idea that I have heard of this week that has pissed me off to the highest of pisstivity, the notion of a sequel to THE DARK CRYSTAL is it. The idea of a sequel to this 80s classic has been in the air for years, but now it seems to have some teeth. Furthermore, the bozos who are to helm this thing scare me to death with their mediocrity. Have you seen UNDEAD? Have you seen DAYBREAKERS? These are movies that are mediocre at best in the horror scene. What moron decided that Peter and Michael Spierig should helm such a sacred project? The only way a sequel could possibly be palatable is if Jim Henson were raised from the dead. I said as much in my TWITTER FEED. Oh, and another thing, didn't the original DARK CRYSTAL end on such a note as to kill any notion of a sequel? Not according to this link.

*shoots self in face*

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IRON MAN 2 - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-05-06T21:29:00.001-07:00

IRON MAN 2 - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: Mediasaurus Rex

There has been a lot of online whinging about IRON MAN 2, but the truth of the matter is that it is a lot of fun. IM2 is completely Robert Downey Junior’s vehicle. It is Downey’s charisma, ego, and personality that hold the whole film together. Downey has been cut loose to present Tony Stark AKA Iron Man the way he wants to. It is all Downey, and he has such a spark and well-conveyed lust for life that the film is superglued together by his performance.

Other actors attempt to steal his thunder (most noteably Samuel Jackson), but they can’t compete with Downey’s constant upstaging kinesis. When Tony Stark tells Senator Stern (Garry Shandling), “I am Iron Man; the suit and I are one,” he might as well be talking about his own presence in the film. If there was no Robert Downey Junior, there would be no Iron Man. Downey is the backbone of this cinematic enterprise; he knows it, and he is completely cocksure on the subject. His Stark perpetually says, “Mute” to whatever electronic chatter is in the air because he is in control, and any hindrance to that needs to shut up and listen.

It is true that if IM2 is placed up against its predecessor, it comes up short. Part of this is due to the fact that the expectations for the original IRON MAN weren’t particularly high. When IRON MAN actually delivered and then some, an impossible bar was raised for IM2 to hurdle over. IM2 simply cannot bring what is required of it. This doesn’t mean that it has “failed” or is a “mess.” What it does mean is that even though it doesn’t clear that hurdle, it is a good movie that will stand up over time. As a matter of fact, for the most highly anticipated film of 2010, IM2 holds its ground well. It stands a solid two or three feet above anything else in the mainstream multiplex today.

The tone of IM2 is more that of a quirky comedy-drama than an action-packed superhero film. There was a lot of sharp dialogue in the first IRON MAN, but there was also an omnipresent suspense. IM2 has a greater amount of clever chatter, but the atmosphere is much lighter. Stark’s sickness and internal conflicts aren’t enough to ratchet up the tension whereas Obidiah Stane (Jeff Bridges) in the first IRON MAN really kept the menace oozing both in the fore and background. Part of this new flippant air has to do with IM2’s lighter, PG rating. Although IM2 is not the disjointed mess that SPIDERMAN 3 or WOLVERINE was, it still has more plot and silliness than necessary which damages the final product.

The plot is relatively simple but heavy with tangents. In short, Tony Stark is in need of some new form of energy to power his heart and his Iron Man suit because that palladium he harnessed in a cave is killing him. Corpselike veins are threading themselves over his body, and his blood toxicity is up. This is Tony’s secret, and he hides it well while living his rock-star industrialist role to its fullest. Stark’s life is full of complications though, and they are close to him and hounding incessantly.

Stark’s main problem is that the government wants Tony to turn his Iron Man suit over to the military. The televised hearings on this subject, featuring the oddly bloated Senator Stern are showcase fodder for Stark’s textbook narcissism.

There is also a heavily-tattooed, Eastern Bloc brute named Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke) who has managed to recreate and harness the arc light power of the suit for his own means. Rourke has parked his customary cinematic tobacco intake for this film, and his kid-friendly prop of choice for Vanko is an everpresent toothpick. When he is on the screen slashing everything with his electrified horsewhips, it is fantastic. However, it is made clear early in the film that he is really no match for Stark or his battle suit.

There is also Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell), a sleazy weapons manufacturer who likes to call Stark “Anthony,” and manages to speak long paragraphs of dialogue that mean absolutely nothing. Hammer wishes he could be as cool and smart as Stark and even has his own fat US military weapons contracts but suffers from a debilitating case of Stark penis envy. Justin Hammer is the money behind the chaotic battle at the end that blows everything onscreen to pieces, but he is really more of a dork than a menace.

Other complications include the sexual tension between Stark and Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) that hits high gear with “arguing over each other” dialogue reminiscent of classic episodes of MOONLIGHTING. S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Nick Fury is still pestering Stark about his nebulous Avengers initiative. And a new pose-striking legal secretary named Natalie (Scarlett Johansson) has caught Stark’s wandering eye.

Stark has his hands full, and every time he goes to blow off some steam, things go crazy-wrong. He is attacked by an electrified Vanko while racing his car on the Monaco GP track. And later, at Stark’s birthday party (where he does a little drunken DJ scratching and repulsor ray skeet shooting) one of his backup Iron Man suits is stolen by his buddy Lt. James Rhodes (Don Cheadle) to the tune of ‘Robot Rock” by Daft Punk.

There is an awful lot more, and the plot threads make for long passages in the film sans Iron Man himself—the guy the audience wants to see. Stark has a lot of loose ends to cauterize and relationships to mend before the film ends, and he handles them all rather well. However the viewing experience is really bogged down by all of the manufactured plot developments required for a cast this large to find and interact with one another. Unfortunately, IM2 is more or less reduced to the pornographic standard of keeping the audience in wait for Stark to suit up. But when Iron Man is onscreen throwing fists and weaponry about, the movie hums along perfectly.

IM2 contains everything that a blockbuster comic book film should have. It showcases a heavy serving of loud explosions, pretty women, fantastic state of the art weaponry, and high-tech gadgetry. When the action breaks onto the screen, it is nothing short of fantastic. The mime-like Iron Man mask manages a look of pissed-off indifference followed with over-the-top beatings and destruction of anything and everything in the vicinity. An example of the even more high-powered nature of Stark’s Iron Man is an explicit tripling of his suit’s firepower. Seriously, multiply that tank scene in the first IRON MAN by three.

IRON MAN 2 is a well-crafted, long-winded (over two hours), enjoyable sequel. No expense was spared for this film. But with a paring down of its over-zealous script, IM2 could have been better. In a few years, there will inevitably be IRON MAN 1 and 2 DVD/Blu-Ray double-packs for sale. They will be worth the purchase, but the first film will always be the stronger one. IRON MAN 2 is no GODFATHER 2 or EMPIRE STRIKES BACK. But then again, it isn’t like any of the countless sequels out there that don’t even deserve to be mentioned. It has its problems, but considering the legacy that it has created, it has done well to step up and deliver.

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HARRY BROWN - A BADASS DISMISSAL

2010-05-05T21:36:00.000-07:00

HARRY BROWN - A BADASS DISMISSAL
By: Mediasaurus Rex

There is no real reason why Michael Caine should get the respect he does. HARRY BROWN is Caine being the same shmuck he has always been, except this time he is trying to channel Travis Bickle.

HARRY BROWN is a vigilante movie, and it really has nothing going for it other than some disturbing scenes of a seedy area in Britain called "The Estates." The Estates are similar to what we in America would refer to as "the projects."

Michael Caine plays Harry Brown, an ex-military man with a shrouded past. In fact, his past is so shrouded that when the film ends, there is little that can be said for it. The truth of the matter is this: the only reason Harry Brown was written with a military background is so that he would be able to shoot guns in the third act of this mean spirited film.

When Harry's friend is killed, he dives into the criminal element and chalks up a decent body count. Emily Mortimer plays the detective who is trying to figure out what is going on with Harry. When she does find out, she spares him. In a nutshell, that is the film. It is a retread, and it is vicious. HARRY BROWN is GRAN TORINO with teeth. HARRY BROWN is a cliche of a film built on the TAXI DRIVER chassis with no creativity whatsoever. This film doesn't deserve a serious review; it deserves a good punt into the bargain bin. What a waste of my time.

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CELESTE - MORTE(S) NEE(S) - A BADASS ALBUM REVIEW

2010-04-28T22:23:00.000-07:00

CELESTE - MORTE(S) NEE(S) - A BADASS ALBUM REVIEW
By: DEREK

While CELESTE have been around since 2005, I hadn’t heard of them until very recently. I saw a thread about them on a message board where everyone had good things to say. I went in with no expectations, gave it a download, and damn, I am very impressed. From the first note on this album, I was hooked, and it isn’t until the fifth track that I even realized that I had been sitting there listening for about 20 minutes; it’s that engrossing and comprehensive.

Try to imagine if CULT OF LUNA were a black metal band, and if CONVERGE were a slower, more post rock styled band. Mash those together and you might have a decent enough starting point to pin down CELESTE’s sound. They label themselves “Black Metal/Hardcore/Metal” on their MySpace page, so take that for what it’s worth. I can’t really compare this band to any other band out there, and that’s exactly why they’re awesome. It has been so long since I have heard a legitimate new sound in this style of music, so instead of trying to compare and contrast them with other bands, I’m just going to speak freely on why you should check this album out.

On Morte(s) Nee(s), CELESTE are clearly in complete control of the chaos they’ve created. This music is harsh and grating but not without structure. You won’t find any melody here, but it is ripe in discord which adds a feeling of immense atmosphere to the music. Repetition is the key here, and they just keep pummeling you with dissonant octave riffs until you are lulled into some sort of hypnotized trance. There are many layers to every song, but I never felt lost. There aren’t any verses or choruses on the album, but the songs ebb and flow together and within each other so well that you’re never left sitting there thinking, “What was the point of that song?” This album is cohesive and answers to many metal fans’ objection to the lack of cohesion in today’s scene.

I really like the production of Morte(s) Nee(s). It is clean, but it doesn’t feel polished. I feel like I’m hearing them playing live through a really nice PA and with a great sound engineer. The amps sound natural, without too much compression, and the kick drum slices through the mix to keep you on beat if you ever get lost in a song. The vocals are fierce and scathing in a higher register, with a passion that not many have in their vocal approach. Every member gives a stellar performance, so I’m sure they didn’t rely in any way on some studio magic trickery.

The only complaint I have, if I have to have one, is that most of the songs sound the same. They use the same writing methods and similar notation throughout the album, but it’s all so good. I generally don’t like to listen to just one song when I listen to music, but I put on albums that I want to hear from front to back. This album feels like one long song to me, and I have no problem with that, but if you like variety on your album, there isn’t too much here.

I feel dumb for being so late in the game on CELESTE. They have 4 releases now, and I’ve just heard of them last month. If you are a fan of any style of modern heavy music, I think there is something for you in this album. They aren’t aligned to any set genre, so there really is a lot of crossover potential between many types of musical fans. Do yourself a favor and check this album out. Did I mention it’s free? Head over to their label’s website where you can download or stream Morte(s) Nee(s) and all of their other releases for free, and if you like it enough, they take donations for however much you feel like giving. This is one of the better albums I’ve heard not only this year, but in a long time.

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DEFENDOR - WOODY IS A BADASS

2010-04-25T13:22:00.000-07:00

DEFENDOR - WOODY IS A BADASS

I might very well be the biggest Woody Harrelson fan on the planet. A dope-smoking pacifist who convincingly chameleons his way through a series of military/lawmen/psychopath roles, it is clear that Harrelson has mastered his craft.

Too bad the film itself sucks. Every comic book notion and every seedy crime film twist has been harnessed to make the plot of DEFENDOR. It works but on a lame TV Movie sort of level.

However DEFENDOR is another master thespian-cementing step for Woody; this time he is a mentally challenged, marble-hurling, wasp-siccing, crime-fighting vigilante named DEFENDOR. Think of Mickey Rooney’s character in BILL but with a 6 foot stature, a few more brain cells, and a superhero complex. His character, Authur Poppington, is in way over his head with crooked police, human trafficking, Serbian gangsters, a family that loves him, and a heart-of-gold hooker with a dirty smoker's voice. The problem is that the movie is so trite, so cliché, and so improbable that it never grows legs and walks.

Nothing new is presented in DEFENDOR, but we get to see Woody really, really act. Too bad Elias Koteas is once again playing a morally bankrupt character. Too bad Sandra Oh is limited to playing a conflicted psychiatrist that is underdeveloped as a character. Kat Dennings is also wasted as a mouthy, meth-headed streetwalker. They are all flat except for Woody who uncannily becomes this retarded DEFENDOR character and rises up against horrible plotting and film pacing to deliver a solid performance. When this movie hits its final moments of the third act, you've seen the solution to all of the problems coming for quite some time. Woody just has to act his way through it. He does a fine job of it too. It is just too bad that the rest of the movie is nothing but meh.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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KICK-ASS - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-04-19T21:22:00.000-07:00

KICK-ASS - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: THE MAD HATTER

"What the f*ck have you done lately?"

That line comes from Mark Millar's comic book series, "Wanted." In a nifty, self-aware way, it's at the centre of the film KICK-ASS which is also adapted from a Millar comic series. The mantra of a group of kids who know they are capable of more, it's a shot to the chest for any of us who stand on the sidelines and don't have the guts to stand up for what's right. And it gives a shockingly violent movie a lot of heart.

The film starts with Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson), an unspectacular teenager yearning to be something more. Inspired by the comic books he surrounds himself with, he decides to go vigilante and fight crime as a superhero. Small problem though—he has no powers and no training. During his first act of justice, he gets pummeled within an inch of his life. The up-side is that to save him, doctors had to graft a lot of steel plates onto his skeleton, leaving him rather impervious to pain.

His next time out goes much better; not only does he win the fight, but he gets massive YouTube exposure thanks to gawkers with their camera phones. Dave is now much more than a mere mortal; he's Kick-Ass, here to save the day, your cat—whatever you need.

Meanwhile, we are introduced to Damon Macready and his daughter Mindy (Nicolas Cage and Chloe Grace Moretz). After being framed and sent to prison during his daughter's infancy, Damon has grown a tad overprotective and angry. He wants vengeance on Frank D'Amico (Mark Strong), the mob boss who set him up. He reaps his vengeance by becoming "Big Daddy," loading up on weapons—lots of them, legal and wildly illegal alike—and thwarting Frank's business at every turn. Oh, and he trains his daughter to help him.

Know those girls that would rather play hockey than play with dolls? Mindy is like that; but replace the hockey stick with a butterfly knife. She becomes Hit Girl and with Big Daddy, reaches out to Kick-Ass to make him a better hero.

The three of them start taking on Frank's goons, leaving him with precious few resources. So Frank turns to his son Chris (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), who suggests the only way to find a hero is to become a hero. Chris follows the Kick-Ass formula of grassroots heroism and becomes Red Mist, an internet phenomenon in his own right, hoping that Kick-Ass, Hit Girl, and Big Daddy will take the bait and reach out to him. Maybe then he can crawl out from under his father's massive shadow.

Aaron Johnson draws us in as the titular character, Kick-Ass. His body language perfectly captures a kid whose guts have decided to do something extraordinary but whose brain still isn't convinced. He's that guy you see on the high dive at the pool, arms wrapped around his torso, taking ages to decide whether to jump or take the climb of shame back down the ladder.

Great as Johnson is, he is damn near upstaged by Moretz and Cage. It's their relationship that makes the film a winner. They kick ass better than Kick-Ass kicks ass, but behind the cowls and capes, they are a father and daughter whose relationship is very loving and very real. Cage hams it up appropriately (often doing his best Adam West meets William Shatner), but there is never a moment where we doubt his devotion to his daughter. He isn't putting her through this to follow in his footsteps; he only wants her to be able to protect herself. You can see in her eyes that she knows this isn't completely normal. But she loves her dad, and he hasn't let her down yet, so she follows his lead.

These characters are all reasons enough to see the movie, but it's watching them come out and play that makes this an intense experience. Despite being less than two hours, the film is loaded with action sequences, all of which are expertly choreographed. Hit Girl is at the centre of the best ones which is what makes them slightly more unique. Not since Gogo Yubari swung her mace in KILL BILL has a schoolgirl amassed such a bodycount.

Much has been made of how the film earns its R rating. Hit Girl uses language that would make a sailor blush, the violence is pretty intense—bodies cook, limbs are lost, bullets fly—and none of it has artistic merit. But I don't believe that makes the film overly exploitive. It is based on a violent comic book after all. It just means that the film isn't for young kids.

Intensity aside, what KICK-ASS does best is get the human element right. Kick-Ass' ambition, Hit Girl's devotion, and Red Mist's isolation all work. These kids are not caricatures; they are very human and very relatable. You look at their faces, and you can see the unrest and desire. Deep down in all of them, they know they'd rather be the one in the middle of the fray than a spectator standing on the sidelines with a camera.

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HOT TUB TIME MACHINE - A BADASS 10 POINT TAKEDOWN

2010-04-18T22:32:00.000-07:00

HOT TUB TIME MACHINE - A BADASS 10 POINT TAKEDOWN
[Originally entitled HOT TUB TURD MACHINE]
By: Jakob

Although it makes more sense in 2010 to make an homage to 1980s teenage sex/romantic comedies than it did in 1998 with THE WEDDING SINGER, enough time has passed now to really play-up on the decade's cringing sense of nostalgia. HOT TUB TIME MACHINE only succeeds in this due to the fact that a lot of the original films weren't really as good as we remember.

They are all, however, better than HOT TUB TIME MACHINE.

The film tries to do too much with as little effort as possible. The results are predictable—a total and unremitting mess. Here is a list of the top-ten flaws in HOT TUB TIME MACHINE:

1. Too many main characters
The premise of the film is three men, Adam (John Cusack), Lou (Rob Corddry), and Nick (Craig Robinson), hitting their mid-life crises return to the site of their wildest party weekend—a ski hill pointedly reminiscent of the one in BETTER OFF DEAD—where they are transported back to 1986 by way of a hot tub. Tagging along is Adam's nephew, Jacob (Clark Duke), who serves as straight man on their hijinks-ensuing quest.

Along the way we watch as the three men make peace with the past and their current crappy lives, and Jacob comes out of his Second Life-playing, basement-dwelling shell. Only he doesn't actually come out of this shell, but we're meant to understand he does, EVEN THOUGH WE'RE NOT SHOWN IT.

On paper the premise is awesomely radical to the max. The problem is these kinds of stories only work well with one or two main characters, either as a buddy movie or an ensemble but with additional members of the cast relegated to the background. This is especially important when so much time is spent on gags aping scenes and characters from '80s films, not to mention the on-going shenanigans of Crispin Glover's accident-prone bellhop, the ski-patrol douchebags, or the unnecessary cameos by Chevy Chase as the mysterious repairman.

We don't have time to watch Jacob learn how to talk to people (girls) without texting, Nick work through his marital problems, Lou his existential problems, Adam his, uh, marital and existential problems. There's really only enough time to tell the story of two of the main characters. Though enjoyable to watch as ever, Cusack's character Adam doesn't bring anything to the table. You really feel like he's only there because Cusack was in BETTER OFF DEAD, and he's needed to make the gimmick work.

Nick's story is equally unaffecting. Perhaps without Lou's and Adam's stories, more could have been done with his frustrated musician character other than a nod to the Chuck Berry scene in BACK TO THE FUTURE.

Really, the only two character arcs of any worth in the film are Lou's and Jacob's. The characters are the only two with a genuine connection and a need to grow from mutual antipathy to love and appreciation. If their stories had been given room to develop, the movie could have worked. We would have actually seen Jacob evolve from an antisocial basement-nerd into a socially functioning young man instead of just a few weak gestures in that direction.

The film needed streamlining in the character department whether the Lou and Adam characters had been blended to suit Cusack or the role of Lou had been given to another actor.

This last point is important because . . .

2. Rob Corddry is NOT Jack Black.
Rumor has it Jack Black turned down the role of Lou because the character has no redeeming qualities and is ultimately unlikable. Black contractually only plays characters who are ultimately sympathetic it seems. Yet when Black (who Lou was very clearly written for) turned down the part, the character was not changed to suit Rob Corddry's strengths (which are?).

The thing is Black could have given the character some more depth and elevated Lou from a one-dimensional douchebag into a character whose journey was worth my time to follow. You don't realize what you've got until it's gone. Much like you don't realize you'd ever write a review lamenting the loss of Jack Black's acting ability until you do.

3. Homophobic humor
It’s difficult to tell if writers of HOT TUB TIME MACHINE are merely homophobic or if the gay jokes were a misguided attempt to capture the spirit of '80s comedies and their off-color humor. There are some really unfortunate jokes in those old films—Long Duk Dong in SIXTEEN CANDLES comes to mind—but rewatching them now, there isn't the malicious intent this film seems to harbor. When Lt. Harris stumbles into the gay bar in POLICE ACADEMY, the humor is in his discomfort. Also the leather-daddies are portrayed as powerful individuals deserving of, at least, a back-handed sort of respect. In REVENGE OF THE NERDS Lamar's literal limp wrist becomes a strength in the games. Both of those films poke fun at homosexuality, but it's in a friendly manner. In HOT TUB TIME MACHINE, being gay or being confronted with homosexual situations is portrayed as the WORST THING THAT COULD POSSIBLY HAPPEN EVER. The joke goes beyond showing Nick and Lou in uncomfortable situations and moves the humor to a mean-spirited place.

4. Patriarchical messaging
There is a running gag in the film where the character Nick is seen to be "less of a man" because he'd made the "progressive" gesture of hyphenating his surname to Webber-Agnou when he got married. The predictable outcome of the film is he returns to the present as "Nick Webber" again, this time with a wife who worships him. The message that millennia of women taking their husband's names somehow did not lessen them in the same was as a man taking his wife's name is subtly yet staggeringly offensive.

5. The young dudes > the old dudes.
Mostly seen in brief flashes in mirrors, the actors who play the 20-year-old versions of Adam, Lou and Nick are more compelling than their 40-something counterparts, yet they are given almost no screen time. Every time I caught a glimpse of the young Lou, I wished I were watching a film with him in it.

Furthermore, the elements for a brilliant homage/parody of an '80s teen-romp are all there, But they are wasted potential.

6. Blaine and Chaz are wasted.
Every '80s comedy has the privileged douchebag nemesis to the main character(s). Often they have names like Blaine and Chaz. Sometimes they actually have the names Blane (PRETTY IN PINK) and Chas (BACK TO SCHOOL). These characters, with their perfect hair and neck-constricting collars, are an integral part of these films. They are the challenge our hero(s) need to overcome on their quest to coolness, losing their virginity, or winning the girl.

It was brilliant to see these archetypes recreated so perfectly in HOT TUB TIME MACHINE as Lou's ski-patrol rivals, but it was only to be disappointed later as they were cast aside to make room for Cusack's relatively pointless storyline.

The rivalry between Lou and the militaristic, RED DAWN-worshiping Blaine should have been the central story in the plot and not one of three equally developed (or ignored) threads. Also, in keeping with films like CAN’T BUY ME LOVE, Lou's love interest really should have been Blaine's girlfriend whereas she was a character who existed outside that storyline altogether.

7. Jacob is wasted
Continuing with the theme of wasted potential, something HOT TUB TIME MACHINE excels at, Clark Duke's Jacob is another prime example. Really, aside from Crispin Glover, Duke turns in the only truly enjoyable performance in the whole debacle. Corddry's Lou is too seedy and weak to truly identify with or respect on any level, and Cusack's ambient charm can't quite disguise the fact that he's phoning his performance in. But Duke is enjoyable and entertaining in every scene he is in, further argument that the plot should have been built around him and Lou instead of the de facto focus, Cusack.

There is also the classic set-up, as mentioned in point 1, for Jacob to come out of his shell. Separated from technology and texting devices, he's going to learn how to communicate with real live girls, right? That's what the point of making him a Second Life-addicted nerd is right? Not really.

There's not much point to a lot of his character's set-up. They sort of touch on the idea he's been changed by his experiences in 1986, but the pay-off either ended up on the cutting room floor, or they didn't bother to fully flesh-out the scene figuring the audience could fill-in the formulaic plot-points for themselves. Well, yes, the audience can. Sure, we're pretty smart on the whole. But that doesn’t make up for what is increasingly missing from Hollywood films—basic storytelling.

8. The ending is bullshit
I'm sure I won't really be spoiling anything if I tell you that when they make it back to present day, it's an alternate timeline where all their lives are vastly improved (similar to BACK TO THE FUTURE). I will be spoiling it slightly if I tell you Lou stays in 1986 and makes everything better for everyone. That's great, right? Except he's the only one who benefits from the new and improved 24 years! Yes, they all have better careers and personal lives, but they don't have memories of any of it. It would be heartbreaking to have only the memories of two-and-a-half broken decades but photos on your walls of the perfect life you could have lived.

We all wonder about those other lives that might have been, but to have PHOTOGRAPHIC PROOF taunting you every day . . . that's a subtle kind of hell I'd never considered before. And it's a hell that might actually have made an interesting film in itself as Adam and Nick's lives slowly revert to the crap they left behind when they realize they don't have the memories and skill sets built-up over 24 years to function in their "new" lives.

9. What is Chevy Chase doing in this movie?
Okay, Chevy Chase, once you recover from how old he's suddenly become, is great. But the PLEASANTVILLE-esque mysterious repairman character is one more element too many. They had a choice to make: Crispin Glover's bellhop or Chevy Chase. They didn't choose. Both are in here.

To be fair, Glover is used excellently, and just the right amount of time is spent on him. That's about the only successful turn in the whole film. But this is at the expense of the Chase character feeling like the straw that breaks the camel's back—too many ideas, too many strong characters, no balance whatsoever.

10. Anachronisms—musical and otherwise
THE WEDDING SINGER is clever in that the filmmakers never say exactly when in the 1980s it is supposed to take place. So when MIAMI VICE (1984) seems to be contemporary with THRILLER (1982), it's not really a problem. It's almost an "alternate-universe" take on the '80s.

HOT TUB TIME MACHINE is set specifically in 1986. A lot of the details are spot on, but the occasional song or prop item strikes me as out of place. Though NEW ORDER's "Blue Monday" is a perennial classic, it might be more believable for Blaine and ski-patrol's "fight song" to be a song that was actually popular in Middle America in '86. New Wave and pop were dead by then. Bon Jovi and hair metal were freakin' huge. Given Blaine's patriotic stance, "Born in the USA" might be an acceptable choice. I think the intent was that Blaine listens to "faggy" pop music instead of rock (Lou's defining music), but guys like Blaine don't really listen to New Order unless it happens to be a current top-ten hit. There's also an absurd tacked-on sub-plot where Lou fronts "Motley Lou" (replacing Vince Neal), and, it's implied, writes "Home Sweet Home," a song released in 1985. Google tells me the yellow Sports Walkman was actually released in 1986. But I swear it wasn't until '87 or '88 before anyone actually owned one. An older model perhaps would be more accurate though less iconic and recognizable in a 2-second shot. Although this is the kind of nit-picking that used to drive me mad watching movies set in 1962 with my dad, I still feel like more attention to anachronisms was paid in films like BACK TO THE FUTURE and STAND BY ME than was paid here.

One thing I'm thankful for, that this film helped me realize, is that if I ever do find a hot tub time machine, I'm throwing a Terminator in and making sure director Steve Pink is never born. I never would have thought about that before.

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GOD OF WAR 3 - A BADASS VIDEO GAME REVIEW PART 2

2010-04-16T19:30:00.000-07:00

GOD OF WAR 3 A BADASS VIDEO GAME REVIEW Part 2

GOD OF WAR 3 is so ridiculously good that I had to hack, slash, and pummel my way through the entire game before coming back and writing another review installment. The game sticks with the vengeful spirit of the franchise and either maintains it or ratchets key elements (such as onscreen violence) up a notch or two. Furthermore, as the game progresses, it gets prettier and prettier. No wonder it took Sony three years to bring this to the table. They cut no corners whatsoever. If Kratos is in a castle, it is opulent. If he is in a forest, the greenery is idyllic. If he is dodging balls of lava, you feel the heat. In my first time through, I found one glitch that forced me to fight an extremely harrowing battle again. The glitch (which I will mention when I chronicle that part of the game) and a button issue (which I address at the end of this episode of the review) are the only problems that I have experienced so far. Otherwise gameplay is seamless. The controllers respond perfectly, and the story that is being presented is fascinating.

In my personal life, all other media intake has ground to a standstill. Compared to GOW 3, movies, music, and television really sound like muddled voices calling to me from the unseen end of some underwater tube. But alas, in my gushing, I digress. I will do my best to keep my reporting on Kratos’ adventure as free from big spoilers as possible.

Part of what makes Kratos work so well is that he is a proxy for everyman. Kratos is a man who is in too deep and is lashing back at everything. He accidentally slaughtered his family while in a blind rage, he has an issue with the gods, and he is going all in with his Blades of Exile because he has NOTHING TO LOSE. Kratos represents a man who simply doesn’t give a damn about the consequences. He is free in the sense that he has already lost everything and died as both a man and a god yet still functions. “Death cannot hold those with purpose,” is what Athena says to him. Kratos has a singular purpose, and that is to wreck each and every beloved character in classic Greek mythology.

Kratos has been to hell and back in each incarnation of the GOW series, and he goes back to Hades two more times before GOW 3 ends.

Part one of this review ended with Kratos finishing off Poseidon. Directly after that and Gaia’s betrayal, he dives headlong into the River Styx and enters Hades to knock out the god of the underworld. Before Kratos can put his Spartan boot up Hade’s brimstone ass, he has to deal with waves and waves of enemies and puzzles.

Hades looks like a portly lead singer for a GWAR-type metal band. He has a vented, horned helmet on his head, and his shirtless torso is punctured with randomly placed needles and spikes. Hades carries himself like a cross between SOUL CALIBUR’s Astaroth and the TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE’s Leatherface. Hades is a big, beefy man with a well-fed belly and this crazy new weapon called “The Claws of Hades.” The atmosphere of the battle with the god of the underworld is gloomy and drab. The aforementioned claws that he uses against Kratos glow as they rip into all that are in their path. Hades swings the claws in such ways that Kratos is both jumping and not jumping, like some form of hellish incarnation of DONKEY KONG. The hunks that Kratos rips out of Hades’ flesh (starting with an entire pectoral muscle and also featuring a hacked out love handle) crawl back to him, and need to be snuffed out before he can rebuild himself. More and more chunks are pulled from Hades until he resembles the Mutoid Man from SMASH TV. The arms of the damned reach out of the ground like Polanski’s REPULSION and Kratos has to get his scorched earth on. Every battle with each god that Kratos works through is varying degrees of epic warfare and hand to hand combat; Hades is no duckwalk.

Fresh out of hell, Kratos now tracks the sun god Helios to the city of Olympia which sits at the base of Mount Olympus. On his way there, he runs into Gaia one more time. Apparently, after Zeus wrecked her arm and threw her over the side of the mountain, she spent her time at the base of the mountain mustering up her power to get back to her battle with the gods. Kratos is done with the dirt-woman though, and he finishes wrecking her arm and shoves her out of the way. What is cool about this is that it is such a minor part of the game. Kratos has a brief moment where he actually puts the Titan known as Mother Earth in check. The urgency of Kratos’ murderous rampage has no time for minor Titans like Gaia. Zeus is Kratos’ target, and his intensity has caused him to become a complete revenge machine. Gaia is in the way, and Kratos has other enemies to slash through.

One such enemy is the Chimera that blocks Kratos’ attack on Helios, the next god up to bat. The Chimera is a freaky-looking snake/goat/lion creature that breathes fire. This goofy but dangerous abomination proves to be more of a headache than Helios himself. The fight is surprisingly difficult. The Chimera stands between the ballista that must be fired at the sun god and Kratos. Kratos forces Helios’ crash-landing and before he can reach the god, a bunch of Olympus guards cover Helios 300 Spartan-style. When a pissy Cyclops shows up, a couple of well placed slashes to the brute demonstrate that Kratos is now able to hop on the back of the Cyclops after it is damaged and control him like those little pig-brats with battle axes did in GOW 2. This method of cutting through opposition is one of the coolest aspects of GOW 3. This dispatching of Helios may be one of the weakest god-takedowns in the game, but it is worth it. With Helios’ head ripped clean-off, Kratos now has a portable flashlight-noggin that lights up dark areas and hidden treasures throughout the rest of the game. Furthermore, the head can be used as a stunner to flashburn nearby eyes.

Speaking of weapons, another cool part about this installation of the GOW franchise is that Kratos comes in armed with some of his previous tools. Most notable of these are the wings of Icarus (he killed Icky in part 2). These make for some spectacular flying sequences that help Kratos cover all sorts of vertical ground, both up and down in this version.

GOW 3 feels like the previous episodes of the franchise. The only complaint that I have heard is that the game is a “mash-fest.” The only reason a person is really going to mash the buttons to get through a situation is that they don’t know what they are capable of. Like any fighting game, the mashing of buttons might get the job done, but precise attacks guarantee it. The L2 button lets Kratos cycle through his growing list of magic weapons that he is amassing (such as Helios’ well-lit dome). The L1 button is used to inflict damage with standard weapons like the Blades of Exile or the Claws of Hades. As the game progresses, the PS3 controller becomes fully armed. Magic is released from the R2 button, and if I have one complaint about the game, that would be it. Perhaps it is the way that I hold the controller, but I tend to bump the R2 button randomly against my knee, and when magic is all you have to get a bunch of harpies and satyrs off of your back, you don’t want to misfire it over some BS real-time controller mishandling.

This game exceeds all of my expectations. I will publish another installment in the next bit as I work my way through the game a second time. Replay value? You have no idea.

-Mediasaurus Rex

GOD OF WAR 3 THE BADASS VIDEO GAME REVIEW PART 1

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HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-04-15T23:34:00.001-07:00

HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: The Mad Hatter

I didn't run to see Dreamworks' latest animated feature right away like I usually do for new releases I want to see because I’d heard a lot about it here and there—how a lot of people really loved it—and the unfortunate side effect of such ravings is that my expectation bar gets set way up in the clouds. Funny thing though, when I finally did see HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON two days ago, it didn't just meet that lofty bar; it soared far above it.

The film begins in the Viking town of Berk which routinely gets raided for sheep and other food by various species of dragon. The people pride themselves on being dragon slayers and defending their home turf, especially their leader, Stoick (Gerard Butler). However, every chain must have a weak link, and in Berk it's Hiccup (Jay Baruchel). Hiccup is Stoick's son and desperately wants to join the fray but is just far too small and clumsy in most people's eyes. He's reduced to working in the blacksmith's shop with Gobber (Craig Ferguson).

During one raid, Hiccup steals away and sets up a bola-firing contraption. He actually manages to snare a Night Fury, the most feared dragon of them all, but when he tracks it down, he can't bring himself to kill it. He frees it and watches it fly away into a canyon. When Hiccup gets back, Stoick reluctantly enrolls him in dragon training where Hiccup's crush on a real slayer-in-waiting, Astrid (America Ferrera), goes into overdrive while watching her prowess. It's here that he is told that dragons will go for the kill in battle, every time. This leads Hiccup to wonder why the Night Fury let him walk.

Hiccup returns to the canyon and discovers that the Night Fury's tail has been injured, thus handicapping its ability to fly. He also discovers that with patience and respect, a human can befriend a Dragon. Thus he earns the friendship of the Night Fury, a dragon he eventually names Toothless. Once the two have bonded, Hiccup engineers an artificial fin for the dragon’s tail, enabling it to fly again. And it lets Hiccup fly with him.

In Toothless and Hiccup, Dreamworks have added characters to their stable that are instantly relatable and loveable, no small feat as they've been trying to do that since Shrek first stepped from his outhouse. For this I give full credit to directors Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois. These gents were the creators of LILO & STITCH, one of Disney's last great 2-D animated films, a fact which obviously can't be mentioned in the marketing.

Amusingly, this film made me take a step back on my crusade against 3-D. By now my stance is well-known: 3-D is a gimmick, a cash-grab that I really don't want to encourage. However . . . HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON has been specifically rendered in 3-D from the get-go, and thus it feels intentional and actually rather thrilling, especially during the flying sequences. During such moments, there are daring, sweeping camera moves and exciting POV shots that took me up out of my seat and momentarily gave me the rush of what it could be like to ride a dragon. It almost pains me to say this, but indeed, if you don't see this in 3-D, you aren't getting the full experience.

Along with the thrilling action and the two scoops of laughs, HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON got me because of an overall sweetness that isn't manipulative. Every dragon is given a lot of character, especially Toothless (who incidentally, reminded me a lot of my own black cat in many of his mannerisms). Hiccup's relationship with his father is something we've seen before, but for some reason it feels truly genuine here. Likewise the budding bond between Hiccup and Astrid is sweet to watch, since they have a delicate chemistry with each other.

HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON reminds me of being young and finding the guts to go on the highest fastest roller coaster with your hands held up in the air. It's brave, it's exciting, and it's the sort of experience movies so seldom deliver. I can't recommend it highly enough and do myself hope to see it at least one more time in a theatre . . . maybe twice.

-THE MAD HATTER

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CLASH OF THE TITANS - A SPOILERRIFIC MOVIE REVIEW

2010-04-14T20:58:00.000-07:00

CLASH OF THE TITANS - A BADASS SPOILERRIFIC MOVIE REVIEW

By: SPINAL VILLAIN

Note: Saw the 2-D version.

******HEAVY SPOILERS*******

I am aware of the bad hype surrounding this movie. It's hard to avoid with remakes; more often than not they fail to deliver.

Suffice it to say, this movie is hardly an exception.

The movie begins with a small story explaining the current state of things in the world and on Mt. Olympus. This is actually a good thing as it explains in more detail how the Kraken came to be.

The movie progresses very quickly. We barely see Perseus as a child, and the next thing you know, he's on a quest for revenge against the gods. Silly as it sounds, I actually found this aspect quite refreshing as this is one of the few movies in the history of cinematography that doesn't revolve around a man trying to save his wife or girlfriend or just some hot piece of ass. Nope, Perseus is all about his cold-dished revenge against the god Hades who killed his father, mother, and sister.

As Perseus departs Argos (the city doomed to die by the Kraken), he now has an entourage to help him in his endeavors against the gods. Draco, the head of the entourage, is an unlikely face, and I had to look twice until he spoke (he has an unmistakable accent); it was Mads Mikkelson who played Le Chiffre in CASINO ROYALE. Once I realized it was him, I was waiting non-stop at the edge of my seat for Mikkelson to hit Perseus in the nads. It never happened.

Much of what was in the original has been redone or re-imagined. Some of it works; some of it falls flat like bread with no yeast.

Medusa's back story gets explained a bit better than in the original version. But the effects for Medusa are too over the top, and she is far too pretty to be the queen of the stone age. The original Medusa was slow and ugly; this one is fast, agile and actually not so bad on the eyes. I didn't like it.

Calibos is a huge sack of fail.

The Stygian sisters didn't really hit he mark either. The scene was shorter than I would have liked, and their seeing eye was actually a large eye held by stringy flesh. I preferred the glass orb from the original movie.

Perseus's gifts from the gods are actually limited this time around to a single sword. The sword is cool-looking and only opens up for Perseus, but that's it. In the original, we get to see Burgess Meredith drop the sword through solid marble "without leaving the slightest blemish on the blade." I was hoping for something along those lines to show us how crafty the gods are at forging, but alas, another disappointment. No shield, except from Perseus’ entourage, and no helmet or red cloak.

FAIL.

Things I liked in the movie:

The boat ride to Medusa's prison was pretty cool. It provided a slightly more tense and epic feel—one of the few in the movie.

A few notable laughs are made in an attempt to lighten mood. They are mostly just mild chuckle worthy jokes, but at this point, it's almost all we got.

Many of the effects are good and easy on the eyes.

The most epic owning of a man's wife I have ever seen in a movie. That's the Zeus we all know and love!

Things that just didn't work:

Zeus' body armor—why does Zeus need to wear armor like he's on a quest for Excalibur while he's in Olympus? He doesn't even adorn the ridiculously shiny armor when he leaves Mt. Olympus!

Calibos—you'll see.

Hades—one of the worst voices in a movie I have heard. It sounded like he needed an inhaler the whole time.

Perseus' love interest gets tossed about in the desert sand and rock while escaping from larger than life scorpions, and when it's all said and done, her little white mini dress is still so white it should be the display for a Clorox commercial. Furthermore, her knees and elbows are not skinned, dirty or bruised at all—cinematic fail.

We never get to see the Kraken really destroy Argos, as in the original.

Perseus is a fisherman with no weapons training AT ALL, and he bests a professional soldier the very first time he trains. Next thing we know he's doing back flips off of walls and ridiculous sword play—bogus.

Overall the movie is decent to look at and with a few laughs here and there. We almost get a feeling like we are going to get our money's worth, but that feeling is short-lived.

Save your money people; you’ll thank me later.

-Spinal Villain

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REPO MEN - A BADASS TAKEDOWN

2010-04-08T16:14:00.001-07:00

REPO MEN - A BADASS TAKEDOWN
(pulled from the forums and dusted off for your consideration)

I have seen this piece of crap movie, and I don't know if I will be able to contain my anger on the subject.

There is a cute twist thrown in at the end that sort of makes you go "hmmm," but it doesn't diffuse the improbable nattering that happens through the rest of the film.

I guess Jude Law is playing himself, a father who is distanced from his kid and hooks up with a lounge singer/crack-whore/totally rebuilt woman that looks like a soft-featured man.

Forrest Whittaker is on such thin ice in my mind that I am speechless. Let's not forget that this man starred alongside Stayin' Alive in BATTLEFIELD EARTH.

Let's not forget his string of horrific films, most noteably STREET KINGS and PANIC ROOM. I did like his turn in THE SHIELD though. I liked it a lot. I haven't seen THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND or whatever that was, and maybe I should. Let's also not forget that his career-starter was FAST TIMES. This is a man who could be doing a lot better than slumming through movies like this.

I cited somewhere that REPO MEN was unoriginal all the way back to Monty Python's THE MEANING OF LIFE. Wouldn't you know that there is a scene in REPO MEN in which a TV is playing the particular Monty Python scene that I cited?

Liev Schreiber is another guy who shows up in nonstop trash. I say nonstop because people all want to cite what a great job he did as Sabertooth in WOLVERINE. But truth be told, WOLVERINE is trash. If he put in any worthwhile work, it was in THE OMEN and a movie called TWILIGHT that has nothing to do with vampires
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119594/
Other than that? What's he got? THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE? DEFIANCE?

The REPO MEN story is ridiculous. America files for bankruptcy. You can sign on to get new body parts for ridiculous prices and low monthly fees. If you miss 4 payments, they come and repo your stuff.

The opening scene shows Jude Law putting on surgeon garb before he extracts the organ. But you never see that again. These guys are doing back-alley organ-abortions.

Law's wife wants him out of the repo biz, so much so that she divorces him. You think that the plot will pick up when a freak accident forces Mr. Law to get a heart from the company that he repos for, right? Think again.

Law runs around with his rebuilt crack whore and tries to function, and the repo men are coming, specifically the aforementioned LAST KING OF SCOTLAND.

Whittaker's and Law's onscreen relationship is one of the most unbelievable pairings I have ever seen, and I put that on COP OUT. Apparently they were friends in the 4th grade and have gone through the military together. Apparently they are really close. But you know what? A convo that they have at the bar where Whittaker jokes about having to repo his own grandfather shows that these two people don't really know each other. They are casual at best.

FX? Great.

Plot? Stupid.

Acting? Ok.

There is also an OLDBOY homage at the end. Law has to go down a hall and cut through a zillion people. He uses knives, a hacksaw, oh, and a HAMMER. It is too obvious, and it feels lame. If I wanted to see someone cut through a hall of people, I would watch OLDBOY.

I give this move 5 mad faces. Meaning I am completely pissed off.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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Un prophète (A PROPHET) – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-04-07T18:21:00.000-07:00

Un prophète (A PROPHET) – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

Un prophète (A PROPHET) is a sharp, French prison flick that continually hits the refresh button on the prison film genre. Superior Machiavellian hustles, sex, drugs, and a completely exploitable prison system make this two and a half hour epic worth every minute. There is no glorification of prison society in this film. The reality that is presented is a desolate one where even beneficial prospects are bathed with grim shadows. Somehow, all of this negativity is delivered with a modicum of hope, driving the film through to its optimistic ending.

When 19 year old Malik (a convincingly skittish Tahar Rahim) shows up in a French prison system for a 6 year stint, he is so inexperienced that the countdown to his “welcome to prison” thrashing is ticking overtime. The beating that Malik takes is relatively mild, but the stage is set. Malik has nothing and is no one. He is serving time for “attacking cops,” but this is all we know about him. He has no family, no friends, and he is illiterate. Malik has absolutely no connections and nothing to lose. Not only that, but he is a half-breed “dirty Arab,” and this leaves him with no strong racial ties. This cements his position at the bottom of the food chain. What Malik does possess is a natural intelligence, and his new prison life feeds this intelligence with a series of barbaric, twisted lessons.

One could look at Malik’s prison moves through a video game lens. He has to kill sub-bosses and go on missions before he can win the game. The sub-bosses and missions get more and more hectic as the film continues.

Scenes that lightly smack of such American prison films as AMERICAN ME and ANIMAL FACTORY permeate the landscape as Malik attempts to find his way. Like the main characters in these films, Malik finds himself free-falling into an amoral hole that offers little hope and no spiritual redemption. He has to go through this vortex, and as he does, Malik literally grows up and becomes a man before our eyes.

Brooding, elderly Corsican thug, Cesar Luciani (Niels Arestrup), forces Malik to kill a snitch named Reyeb (Hichem Yacoubi), and his return is protection. Malik can’t get out of this obligation; when he tries to, he is choked out with a plastic bag over his head. The scene in which Malik murders Reyeb is so riveting and stressful that it is a relief when the blood finally sprays.

After Malik becomes a murderer, he is saddled with Reyeb’s ghost who resides in his cell, much like the victims congregated in the theater in AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON. Reyeb becomes Malik’s smoking buddy, offering odd pieces of information and assuming the role of a powerless guardian angel. The title of the film can be loosely applied to this and other more subtle scenes of spiritual significance. Malik is protected physically by Cesar and his thugs, but his tormented inner man gets some level of peace from the ghost of Reyeb.

Cesar’s treatment of Malik is that of vicious, fatherly disdain. Malik listens closely to Cesar’s henchmen and eventually learns their Corsican language, thus becoming bilingual and moving deeper into Cesar’s circle. There are perks to being Cesar’s eyes and ears such as a television, DVD player, and a visit from a prostitute, but despite these comforts, Malik’s prison existence is still uncompromisingly bleak.

Malik earns a day pass, given for good behavior in the French prison system, and is forced to hustle for Cesar outside of prison while doing a little multi-tasking hash dealing for himself. The jobs that Cesar has Malik doing on the outside tend to involve precarious situations and terse conversations had while staring down the business end of a gun. However, Malik’s life outside of prison is presented as bright and exhilarating. When Malik takes a short business flight on a plane, his childish wonder and lack of decorum are a treat to watch.

In prison, Malik’s only bright spot is the education that he starts with his friend Ryad (Adel Bencherif). Ryad teaches Malik to read and write. This aspect of their relationship comes to an end soon when Ryad is released. Then Ryad becomes Malik’s hash-slanging lieutenant on the outside, but their relationship is tainted by Ryad’s recurring testicular cancer and the chance that he will die and leave his wife and child behind. Through Ryad, life on the outside is presented with the “two sides of the same coin” view. Prison has its problems, and so does freedom.

The French prison game isn’t all brawn and force (though such methods are employed) it is mostly cerebral, laced with copious amounts of treachery and overt verbal intimidation. When Malik cinches all of his loose ends together and makes his play, it is electrifying to watch. Vengeance is dealt, and while it is subtle, it is crushing. But this isn’t a film that ends on a bummer note. There is hope in its final frames, making the whole mechanism work seamlessly.

A PROPHET presents prison in the hopeless sense of a film like MIDNIGHT EXPRESS. The standard prison gladiator themes from American films like LOCK-UP, UNDISPUTED or even PENITENTIARY are absent in A PROPHET. Battery-filled sock beatings are administered and punches are thrown, but this is definitely not the ripped Hollywood prison machine that we have grown accustomed to. Malik is a skinny, chain-smoking kid who can barely grow a moustache. None of the other prisoners in this French penitentiary are swollen with muscle either. Moreover, outside of a few hefty bellies and a few taller than average men, these are some of the least formidable-looking inmates ever presented in a prison film.

Director Jacques Audiard keeps the pacing almost unfairly brisk. As plot elements unfold, some of it happens so fast that the viewer is only left with fragments of past offscreen moments. Stuff happens before the camera gets there. This method of plot-delivery keeps the viewer off-kilter. Violence seems to be around every corner, and moments where the tension seems to have been lifted explode with the unexpected. Freeze-frame, floating word introductions to new characters remind the viewer that A PROPHET also considers style and isn’t solely concerned with its intricate storyline.

Unlike the typical prison film, A PROPHET’s plot focuses on the strategy of the takeover and isn’t entirely reliant on the brute force behind it. It is thick, balanced, and displays the raw, morality-free survival mechanism that kicks in when men are behind bars. It is a haunting, intelligent, fast-paced character study that tells us in a new palatable way that prison is still both a life and soul-killer.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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THE THING PREQUEL - INCOMING SUPER-FAIL - NOT BADASS

2010-04-06T15:50:00.000-07:00

THE THING PREQUEL - INCOMING SUPER-FAIL - NOT BADASS

The 1980s was arguably the best decade for science fiction and horror films. One needs to look no further than BLADE RUNNER or THE THING. Those films can't be reproduced. In short, no one should bother to talk an executive at 20th Century Fox about a BLADE RUNNER prequel. But a remake-happy-moron did get to the execs at Universal Studios, and a prequel for THE THING is gearing up for an early 2011 delivery date. Universal Studios has been failing hard lately, and this will be another chapter in their book of stupid decisions. Apparently the prequel will be a study in what the hell that Husky-alien was doing at the Norwegian camp before a pre-BACKDRAFT Kurt Russell poured scotch into the back of his chess-computer, schooled Wilford Brimley, and lit everything up with a flame thrower. I suppose the prequel footage will show the Norwegians slashing their wrists and freezing to death. WHO CARES?, WHY?, and PLEASE STOP are all swirling in our heads right now.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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HOUR OF PENANCE- PARADOGMA - A BADASS ALBUM REVIEW

2010-04-05T21:42:00.001-07:00

HOUR OF PENANCE – PARADOGMA – A BADASS ALBUM REVIEW
By: DEREK, vocalist for THE FACELESS

HOUR OF PENANCE, a brutal death metal band from Italy, first caught my attention with 2008’s The Vile Conception. The pulverizing combination of extreme speed and unrelenting aggression was great, but the lack of diversity in tracks left more to be desired and at times felt robotic. Now they have returned with Paradogma, released March 31 on Unique Leader Records.

This album is a BEAST, sickeningly fast in all aspects, churning out inhuman performances from every member of the band. If you like fast blast beats in your death metal, you can stop reading here and go pick this album up. The drummer, Mauro Murcurio, is a sadist behind the kit, cranking his appendages up to 11 on this one. The speed also harbors one of my chief complaints with the group though.

On The Vile Conception, I felt that I was listening to the same song over and over again. Every time it was an excellent song, but music this brutal and this fast can grow tiresome to even the most seasoned listener. I am stoked to say that HOUR OF PENANCE seem to have come to the same conclusion and slow it down at times on Paradogma. They’ve introduced slower parts into their songs that you can actually bob your head to without getting dizzy, and it really highlights the intensity of the rest of their onslaught as shown in the excellent track, The Woeful Eucharisty. The track, Malevolence of the Righteous, brings things down to a crushing mid tempo the entire way through to give you a breath of fresh air before pummeling you into another dimension for the rest of the album.

We’ve established that the drums are insane, and the same can be said for the guitars. These guys never let up, and keep it interesting throughout. They remain technical without becoming a noodling, self-indulgent wankfest but never abandon their original goal: to make you want to destroy any and everything around you.

Although with most music, especially metal, the guitar gives the standout performance, in HOUR OF PENANCE’s case, I have to say that that award goes to the vocalist, Francesco Paoli. This guy is, in my opinion, the best vocalist in death metal today. I have never heard anyone achieve such speed and clarity, and he does it with style. For those of you who aren’t so familiar with this style of music, if you thought BONE THUGS were fast, think again.

I haven’t had a chance to read the lyrics, but I doubt HOUR OF PENANCE is rewriting the book here. Based on the song titles, it seems to be an assault on Christianity, which is always a good, somehow still not played out, lyrical theme. Also brought to the table are some ethereal wailing cries that really add atmosphere to the overall sound of the songs as in the epic closer, Apotheosis.

I only have a couple, very minor gripes with the album. Borrowing heavily from NILE and BEHEMOTH, HOUR OF PENANCE definitely wears its influences on its sleeve. It even has that Middle Eastern feel at times that both of those other bands have pioneered and mastered. That isn’t to say that the style isn’t enjoyable, but when those parts hit, it’s hard not to dock them for it.

Another problem comes with the production. Everything sounds good—I’m probably even happier about the actual sounds on the album (the drums actually sound real this time!)—but the mix is disappointing. With a band whose best performances come from the drummer and vocalist, I find the snare drum and all of the vocals to be quite low in the mix compared to everything else (it’s all quite loud). Hiding the elements that set HOUR OF PENANCE apart and above the rest of the bands out there just doesn’t make any sense to me.

Paradogma is likely to be a big hit on the death metal scene in 2010. If you like scorchingly fast ferocity, look no further. Sure, the songs can be hard to discern from one another, but at least every song has the formula mastered. This is NILE or BEHEMOTH on crack. This is brutality at its finest. If this doesn’t make it onto my top 10 list this year, I don’t even want to know what’s in store for me.

For fans of: NILE, BEHEMOTH, ORIGIN

Track Listing
01. Paradogma
02. Thousands Of Christs
03. The Woeful Eucharisty
04. Malevolence Of The Righteous
05. Caged Into Falsehood
06. Incestuous Dynasty Of Worms
07. Adversary Of Bigotry
08. Incontrovertible Doctrines
09. Spiritual Ravishment
10. Apotheosis

DEREK, vocalist for THE FACELESS

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THOR = STUPID. THE BADASS TRUTH

2010-04-04T10:27:00.000-07:00

THOR = STUPID

When I was a kid, I collected comics HARD. I was a Marvel fan first and foremost. I had the AMAZING SPIDERMAN delivered to my door for years. But there was one corner of the Marvel Universe that was completely broken. It was a stupid, unspoken zone that no one read or cared for. It was a corner that couldn't decide whether it was a modern-day story or a lame re-imagining of less-than-Greek mythology. That corner was THOR. THOR rarely showed up in the rest of the Marvel Universe because he was completely unrealized. He is now a part of the AVENGERS, but the Avengers could assemble fine without his foppish golden locks. Is he a Norse god or a modern individual? Depends on what comic you read. Why make a movie about this putz? Shouldn't Branagh be directing some cool Shakespeare film? THOR is destined to suck.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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CLASH OF THE TITANS - ANOTHER BADASS PRE-RANT

2010-04-02T22:15:00.000-07:00

CLASH OF THE TITANS - HAVING A HARD TIME CARING HERE
By: The Mediasaurus Rex

There has been a nonstop promo blitz for this for the past several weeks. The idea of
remaking a mediocre film is rather typical of Hollywood these days. The movie is out,
and apparently it is in a mediocre 3D.

MORE ON OUR NEGATIVE DISPOSITION HERE

We haven't seen it yet, but the review is coming.

PICS DISCUSSION AND MORE IN THE FORUMS

FOLLOW THE LACKLUSTRE REVIEWS ON ROTTEN TOMATOES

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BADASS VID REVIEW: SCARFACE

2010-03-30T14:35:00.000-07:00

This is the first in our video series that offers concise movie reviews of the classics.

Produced by: THE MAKE STUDIO

Beats courtesy of: MR. DAPPER

CLICK FOR THE SCARFACE VIDEO REVIEW

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BADASS VID REVIEW - INTRO BEATS

2010-03-30T14:30:00.000-07:00

We've been putting together our concise video review series. I must say that this intro is groovy, and it gets groovier the more you watch and listen to it.

Produced by: THE MAKE STUDIO

Beats Courtesy of: MR. DAPPER

CLICK HERE FOR THE INTRO CREDITS

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WALL STREET 2 FAIL

2010-03-29T13:10:00.001-07:00

WALL STREET 2 FAIL

It has been over 20 years since the original WALL STREET. The Internet was ablaze with praise for the WALL STREET: MONEY NEVER SLEEPS TRAILER. However, news just dropped recently that the new film has been rated PG-13. This is a problem because WALL STREET was originally an adult-themed film for adults. It seems that the focus is now on teeny-bopper favorite Shia LeBeouf and not on old-school-fresh- out-of-the-pen Gordon Gecko (Michael Douglas). The new trailer actually has a hard, cynical edge to it that smacks of THE BLUES BROTHERS. What 13 year old is actually a fan of this movie? It was originally supposed to be released this last Feb, but has been moved to April. Oliver Stone is the director, and we are open to being corrected here, but this might be his first PG-13 film. This whole endeavor is beginning to reek of FAIL.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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2010-03-24T21:48:00.000-07:00

COP OUT – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

COP OUT is an extremely light, low-violence, high-profanity buddy cop film. It has all of the well-lubricated trappings of a Saturday night TV movie. This film is so trite and inconsequential that there isn’t much that can be said for or against it. The plot, one-liners, and silly circumstances are all so simple that it is work to remember any of them even directly after viewing the film. Even the soundtrack is horribly worn-out, featuring the Beastie Boys’ NO SLEEP TILL BROOKLYN and Poison’s EVERY ROSE HAS ITS THORN. Part of the truth behind this film’s shortcomings is the title of the production, “COP OUT,” which admits to blatant carelessness as the excuse for the end product. Another part is that the script was penned by television writers Rob and Mark Cullen. The essence of COP OUT is as follows: fanboy favorite Kevin Smith directs, Bruce Willis scowls, and Tracy Morgan hams it up.

For fans of Tracy Morgan, COP OUT has several enjoyable moments. Morgan’s random-assed, profane shtick is the glue that holds the film together. He is a good-humored slob in this film, perpetually wiping his nose, drooling, and having food fall out of his mouth. As a movie-quote obsessed law enforcement misfit named Paul Hodges, Tracy Morgan hits the notes he always hits. During the entire film, Hodges obsesses over his wife Debbie (Rashida Jones) and whether or not she is sleeping with his smarmy neighbor. Hodges is very clear about his love for her, saying such sappy lines as, “You got me open like a research monkey.”

But, Morgan is just doing Morgan here. In fact, it is a matter of time before someone makes a fan-film of COP OUT using Morgan’s SNL and 30 ROCK material because less the profanity, all elements of Morgan’s performance in COP OUT have been presented before. The notion that Morgan has been a NYPD officer for almost a decade is completely ludicrous. But with a title like COP OUT, what is to be expected?

Much as Morgan recycles his schtick in COP OUT, Bruce Willis as Jimmy Monroe delivers a pastiche of Willis doing Willis. He plays Morgan’s partner and “straight guy” in this comedy, managing to deliver a sleepwalking John McClane from DIE HARD. Monroe isn’t as hyper as John McClane, and he isn’t as hung over as 16 BLOCKS’ Jack Mosely, but he is all Willis. He is once again a snide, bullet-headed tough-guy who resists any and all that hold any authority over him. His most serious nemesis is the rich, smug bastard Roy (Jason Lee) who married Monroe’s ex-wife. Willis is looking weary in this role, and when a young red-handed perpetrator refers to Monroe as a “Professor X looking motherf*cker,” he isn’t far off the mark.

COP OUT’s plot is loosely built around a tazer-happy robbery that ends with the loss of Jimmy Monroe’s prized collectable baseball card. Monroe was going to cash in the card to pay for his daughter’s wedding. Earlier in the film, Roy egotistically offered to pay for the wedding, but Monroe’s pride is what drives the plot. Monroe and Hodges are both on a 30 day suspension for some Youtube shenanigans and have nothing better to do than to track down the thief. Dave (Seann William Scott) provides a lot of Ritalin flavored humor as the completely imbalanced thief of the aforementioned card.

Monroe and Hodges eventually track the card down to baseball paraphernalia obsessed gangster Poh Boy (played by a seriously typecast Guillermo Diaz). Poh Boy is a local Mexican gangster that holds court in a Catholic church and torments his victims with baseballs cracked at them with his Louisville Slugger. There is also a stolen Mercedes and a different kidnapped Mexican gangster’s mistress in the mix. A lot of coincidence and a lot of law-breaking force Monroe and Hodges into business with Poh Boy, and the silliness remains constant.

With a borderline brilliant performance by a patently foul-mouthed Susie Essman and an obnoxious turn by Kevin Pollack, COP OUT has all of the potential to be something really funny. But unfortunately, a lot of the humor in this film fizzles. Most of the jokes are smile but not laugh-worthy.

This is definitely a buddy-cop film though and has all of the trappings of such classics as the James Caan/Alan Arkin classic FREEBIE AND THE BEAN, the Gregory Hines /Billy Crystal RUNNING SCARED, or even a ridiculously fluffy LETHAL WEAPON. But the end product is buoyed by nothing. The action is minimal, the jokes are more miss than hit, and a strange sort of goofiness takes the center stage with such antics as a car chase through a graveyard and a demonstration of a parkour fail.

I think that the biggest question in the minds of most people who watch this film will be “what was Kevin Smith thinking?” There are one or two moments in this film that feel completely Smithian, but COP OUT feels mostly like a bloated, generic production that could have been helmed by any number of moderately talented directors.

COP OUT could easily be interpreted as the final demonstration of Smith selling out. Add this to his over-the-top milking of his fat-boy chastising on Southwest Airlines, and it is safe to say that he’s just taken the easy road this time around. COP OUT is nothing special; it is a bland diversion at best. All of the familiar pieces are in place, but it is nothing more than a late-night mediocre TV movie with a creative assortment of profanity.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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CAPTAIN AMERICA - A BADASS TAKEDOWN

2010-03-24T19:50:00.000-07:00

CAPTAIN AMERICA - A BADASS TAKEDOWN

For the past several weeks the fanboy universe has been exploding with rumors and speculation about who will be the next Captain America. It has been rather sickening because Captain America is a lame Marvel Comic character to begin with. The Falcon is much cooler. Yesterday, the world was ablaze with the news that Chris Evans will be Captain America in the upcoming movie. While it is great that there will one day be an Avengers tie-in film with Nick Fury (Sam Jackson) and Iron Man (Sherlock Holmes) this Chris Evans character is about as weaksauce as weaksauce gets. Chris Evans is the smart-assed asshat that played The Human Torch in those two horrific Fantastic Four movies. I cite Evans' character and performance as the stupidest of that stupid series. Somehow the powers that be feel that he should foul-up yet another part of the Marvel Universe. This whole endeavor reeks of FAIL.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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THE RUNAWAYS - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-03-23T21:13:00.000-07:00

THE RUNAWAYS – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: The Mad Hatter

There's nothing that brings this music geek more joy than discovering new music. Be it a smaller act that hasn't broken big yet or a bygone band that I wasn't into before, there's little in the world that can beat a cache of new tracks I can play to death for a week or three. So in that respect, I’m thankful to this film for introducing me to the music of The Runaways. But while this music geek is satisfied, this movie geek is amazingly dissatisfied. Perhaps it's because after thirteen dollars and just shy of two hours, I still don't feel like I know the members of The Runaways.

The story begins in the summer of 1975 when we're introduced to sixteen year old Cherie Currie (Dakota Fanning). Cherie lives for glam rock, has a loving sister, and seems to spend most days wanting to break the shit cycle her life has become. At the same time, we meet young Joan Larkin (Kristen Stewart), or Joan Jett as she prefers to be called. In a time where the boys are dressing like girls, Joan wants to dress like a boy. Not only does she want to dress like a boy, she wants to play electric guitar like a boy.

Joan spends many nights at Rodney's English Disco, a club in L.A. that features bands like David Bowie and The Stooges. It's here that she sees music producer Kim Fowley (Michael Shannon) and talks him into forming an all-girl rock band. Fowley likes the idea—believing there's money to be made—and sets out with Jett to fill in the ranks. Topping the list is the need for a lead singer, a role that blonde bit of jailbait named Currie just might be able to fill.

I wanted to like THE RUNAWAYS, I really did. But wowsers, what a mess.

The film has a few good qualities to it, not the least of which are the two lead actresses, which save it from being a complete failure. As Cherie Curie, Dakota Fanning successfully makes the jump to an adult acting career. Every moment she is behind a microphone, she cuts the audience with a vicious charisma that a child actor isn't capable of.

Equally impressive is Kristen Stewart. Admittedly, I came into the movie ready to rip the once-and-future Bella to bits . . . but I can't. She has done her homework and does indeed bring much of Joan Jett's swagger and sneer to her performance in THE RUNAWAYS. If I have any knock against Kristen Stewart, it's that she isn't quite given enough to do.

Beyond the leading ladies and an appropriately killer soundtrack, the film is damn near forgettable. It focuses more on the story of Cherie Currie than any of the other four young ladies, which would be fine if it didn't treat her story like so many other junkie cautionary tales I've already seen. Besides the fact that I didn't get to know any member of the band not named Joan or Cherie, the story of their success felt to me like it was over before it began. I mean one scene they're playing a club in the American midwest, and the next scene they're packing for Japan. Shouldn't there have been a night or two at The Whiskey in between those two career steps?

While director Floria Sigismondi has given certain moments an edgy visual flare, especially a kick ass sequence of the band performing "Hollywood," her pacing feels like a six year-old telling you what they did in school that day. The film includes some truly abrasive editing and pulls the impressive trick of both luring you into what is actually “The Cherie Curie Story” yet still telling you very little about her. The movie has so many moments where it feels like it could be an indie film touchstone of rock & roll, but instead of getting on stage and slaying the crowd, it pisses its pants, and runs out the side door.

I'll spot THE RUNAWAYS one point on the scoreboard: it did set me directly on a mission to get music by the titular band on to my iPod. But besides that token gesture of pointing me towards a musical blind spot, I'm left feeling ripped off and wondering what might have been.

-The Mad Hatter

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CLASH OF THE TITANS - A BADASS TAKEDOWN

2010-03-23T10:38:00.001-07:00

CLASH OF THE TITANS - A BADASS TAKEDOWN

The Hollywood remake machine is still in overdrive. But this might be another instance where they shouldn't have bothered. The fact is that the original CLASH OF THE TITANS is technically, a stupid film. The original Harryhausen animation was about as good as it got during that time, but that was it. Harry Hamlin couldn't act and Lawrence Olivier was asleep at the wheel. The story of the Medusa, the Kraken and Calibos were all great if the viewing audience was 8 years old. This new PG-13 version is CG heavy and looks extremely light in the intelligence department. Watch the trailer and see for yourself. This time around, the Medusa looks strangely hot and the Kraken looks more than a little like that horrible American remake of GODZILLA. Starring "the modern everyman" Sam Worthington? It is hard to get excited for this thing.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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PREDATORS TRAILER - A BADASS TAKEDOWN

2010-03-22T15:06:00.001-07:00

PREDATORS TRAILER - A BADASS TAKEDOWN

When Arnold put that original Predator down, it should have stayed down. Now there is an awful lot of fanboy hoopla about this upcoming PREDATORS movie. The PREDATOR franchise is a failed one. All of the movies since the original have sucked, and here comes a new one. Watch the trailer and see that this is THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME crossed with SECRET WARS. This is THE PEST without Leguizamo. This is SURVIVING THE GAME without Ice-T.

Taking the "worlds greatest criminals" to some planet to be hunted by dreadlocked aliens is in short, stupid. Furthermore, it is directed by Nimrod Atal, the same clown who attempted to kill Matt Dillon's career with ARMORED (which I had a lot of hope for). Watch the stupid TRAILER, and read more in the PREDATORS THREAD in the MEDIASAURS FORUM.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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GOD OF WAR 3 - A BADASS VIDEO GAME REVIEW PART 1

2010-03-19T21:23:00.000-07:00

GOD OF WAR 3 - A BADASS VIDEO GAME REVIEW PART 1

It has been a few years since I shook with rage, belting profanities at the television while trying to complete the Challenge of the Titans in GOD OF WAR 2. It has been so long, actually, that I now think of the emotional trauma with pleasant thoughts. That all happened back in the days of the PS2. At the time, I knew that the PLAYSTATION 3 would be the platform for GOD OF WAR 3, and I have patiently waited for both.

GOD OF WAR 3 is now here, and I am currently making my way through it. Kratos, the tormented, mysterious bastard son of Zeus, is on a serious mission. He is out to kill all of the gods of Olympus, and from what I have seen so far, he just might do it. Kratos still sports the battle wound in his sucked up stomach from GOW2. The ghost of Sparta is a buffed-out, snarling man whose method of dispatching his opponents has gotten even more violent in this incarnation. His all-out street brawling and bare-handed decapitation and disembowelment of his opponents are now amped to a constant roid-rage assault. Kratos doesn’t smile and has no time for small talk. The gods need to run and hide because this man who has mastered time itself is out to kick some serious god-ass. I am nowhere near done with this thing, but what I have accomplished so far is worth writing about.

I am barely in the first leg of the story, but while I work my way through the game, I will post plot highlights. But before that happens, some really cool aspects of the game should be explained, the very first one being the overall look of the game, which is on some grand-scale, epic-sauce. The world that Kratos inhabits is huge, intricate, and beautifully sculpted. At times, the horizon appears to go as far as the eye can see, and it is covered with all of the details of an ancient land. The GOD OF WAR series has always pushed the hardware to its graphic limits, and the beauty presented in GOD OF WAR 3 is definitely up to speed with the PS3. The biggest steps that GOW3 makes in its adjustment to the PS3 are the easily presented jumps from cinematic cut scenes to actual gameplay. This brings a new, powerfully theatrical element to the game. And it should be noted that controlling Kratos is just as fluid as it ever was. One can mash through this incarnation or time attacks and finish enemies with finesse. It is pretty to watch, exciting to participate in, and the blood, intestines, and gore are nothing shy of absolute, chaotic beauty.

Between GOW3 and TEKKEN 6, my left hand has started to cramp up a little bit in the center of the palm. If this continues, I will have to pull a Roy Baty (BLADE RUNNER) and jam a nail through my hand. “Not…yet!” (More on BLADE RUNNER in a bit.)

GOW3 starts in the thick of battle, right after GOW2. Kratos has beaten the Fate Sisters into submission and has brought the titans forward to storm Mount Olympus. Zeus and his buddies are looking over the edge and see the chaos coming. Kratos is riding on the titan Gaia’s arm, looking to straighten Zeus out once and for all. He did get his hands on Zeus the last time around and put an unholy beating to the god. Kratos was about to finish the job when Athena stepped in and took the death blow. With the death of Athena, Kratos lost his only decent connection with the Olympians. His complete focus on toppling the gods that have toyed with him his entire life has consumed him. All Kratos wanted was a break from his nightmarish past. He’d formally requested a memory wipe. So the gods gave him a few tasks, implying that they would grant his request. But in the end, Kratos was tricked and saddled with even more hellish memories. His comprehension of the gods is correct: they are power-hungry liars with no real concern for human suffering. In GOW3 Kratos is presented as one seriously pissed off, undead Spartan cleaning house.

The gods, while looking like silly, second-rate Whitman Comics superheroes, are actually rather formidable. Titans are getting tossed off of Mount Olympus rather easily. A human-sized Poseidon dives straight into one titan’s chest and pulls him down into the ocean. Poseidon is no joke. If you know your mythology, he is the brother of both Hades and Zeus. His father is Cronos. He is the dude that runs the ocean. But, like his slutty brother Zeus, Poseidon has a history of running buck-wild with human women. One of the products of such conquests is Theseus. Kratos handed Theseus his ass in GOW2, so it makes sense that Poseidon is first up to bat.

What Poseidon unleashes upon Gaia and Kratos is really rather cool. The game is barely ten minutes in, and suddenly, stuff gets biblical. The attack of the Leviathan is an interesting one. Leviathan is a horse-headed, crab-legged sea-serpent. It digs into Gaia with its crab legs, and Kratos has to go head-to-head with it. This is reminiscent of the Hydra that Kratos has to tame with spikes to the head in GOW1. This reference to GOW1 is all that there is though. Gameplay against the Leviathan is heavy duty. Kratos is required to rip its ribcage open and attack its heart. It is an action-packed showdown with water, crab legs, and noise in all directions. The platform is Gaia, and there is even an upside down sequence in it all.

After the Leviathan is dropped, the war with Poseidon is on. Kratos’ beatdown of Poseidon may be one of the most violent cut/action scenes ever committed to a mainstream video game. There is a headbutt, multiple fists and boots to the face, and a general slamming of Poseidon’s head into all rock formations in the area. The smoothest thing about it all is that the beating is shown from Poseidon’s POV. The end of Poseidon is an “I want more life f*cker” eyeball poke straight outta BLADE RUNNER, followed by a snapped neck. Poseidon’s tossed body lands in the water and generates a Tsunami. Epic? Absolutely.

Kratos can’t quite get his hands on Zeus though. As Gaia reaches the top of Olympus, Zeus topples her and sends her falling down the mountain with a horribly severed forearm. She is no longer working with Kratos and in fact, tells him that he was just a pawn. The games of the gods and the titans are afoot. And with that, Kratos falls into Hades again. However, it is apparent that this time around, he is finally going to get his hands on the god of the underworld and hopefully administer a Poseidon-status beating to this guy.

In all of this, Athena has appeared in her post-goddess form, still eager to assist Kratos, even though he killed her. Like I said, the games of the gods and the titans are afoot. I will post another update on the storyline as I get further along. What I can say at this point is that GOW3 is delivering as much and more of a punch than its predecessors. This is the must-have game for the PS3, period.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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DARK FANTASY - A BADASS STUDY OF INDEPENDENT FILM-MAKING

2010-03-18T21:11:00.000-07:00

DARK FANTASY – A BADASS STUDY OF INDEPENDENT FILM-MAKING

By: HERB WEST

Do you want me to show you what my fantasies are like?

DARK FANTASY is an ambitious little film by Ian J. Keeney that takes us into the mind of a serial killer. It stars Cristoph A. Nowaczyk as Art, a recently paroled murderer, and he gives off a creepy, weasely, unlikable vibe from the start. DARK FANTASY can be best described as a crime thriller with a descent into madness. The film follows Art as he tries to resist his urges to kill while either bedding, or outright raping, every hot girl in town.

We also have a Sam Jackson-type character who is not what he appears to be. For most of the film, we're not sure if he is a thug, a villain, a cop, a combination of all of those, or something else entirely. About half way through the film, we find out that nothing is as it seems, so we as an audience just have to try to keep up. Much like SHUTTER ISLAND, this is a film you have to go into with an open mind and knowing as little about it as possible.

I'm not even going to try to explain the plot because it would be doing a great disservice to it. Instead, I will explain why I think DARK FANTASY should be looked at as the template for all future independent films. I know that this is unlikely, and I'm not suggesting that anyone rip DARK FANTASY off. I'm just saying that the following film-making theories represented in DARK FANTASY are sound.

DARK FANTASY makes good use of imagery.

A good example is the nude woman lying face down in bed at the crime scene. Ever since GOLDFINGER, this has been a powerful image if competently directed. In scenes like this we don't need to know what happened. We don't need to see blood or gore. We don't need a coroner character to come in and pronounce the woman dead. We already know something ugly and terrible has happened, and our minds fill in the rest.

DARK FANTASY uses realistic nudity and violence.

Nudity in Hollywood films is usually presented in three contexts:
1. Shower Scene
2. Teenagers skinny dipping.
3. Love scenes bathed in blue light “darkness” where we see a leg, a breast, a face, a butt, a side view, a breast again, etc., all set to some cheesy music.

In real life when you see nudity or violence, especially when it's unexpected, it usually is dark or from a skewed perspective, such as out of the corner of your eye. It's never going to be perfectly framed shots under perfect lighting.

I'm not saying that all indies need nudity, some get by just fine without it. This is just one good example of why Indies have a lot going for them right now. Independent filmmakers can decide what they want to do without meddling executives. I want to see realism in films, not what these ridiculous, pampered Hollywood execs think the real world is supposed to be like. On the flip side of that, I've already encountered porn that tries to pass itself off as Independent film, and that is absolutely not what I am talking about either. I'm just saying that if you're going to use nudity in small films, it might as well be realistic. The same applies to violence.

DARK FANTASY is not afraid to use adult themes.

This goes right along with the above paragraph. DARK FANTASY is not afraid to push the boundaries with themes of rape, incest, and homosexuality. Before anyone panics, it is not that type of film per se. Actually, most of these themes are just hinted at, and I find that even more disturbing. Much of it is just a line or a quick scene that we're not even sure if we saw or heard correctly anyway. Because of the nature of it, we're never sure if any of it is real or not.

I can understand why Hollywood would always want to try to go for a PG-13 rating so they can market a film to the widest audience possible. This is reasonable, even though it usually means having a totally watered down version of what may have been a good film. I guess I can also understand why certain Indies would want to try for a PG-13 rating, but the fact is that young people are not interested in independent films. Teenagers are not going to have the patience for these movies, so why even try to go for a lesser rating? It doesn't make any sense. Almost every big budget film is eventually released as an unrated DVD anyway, so small filmmakers might as well just throw everything they have at their films from the beginning.

Independent films find an interesting way for the actors to play more than one part.

I'm sure that many Indies are done on a small budget, so that means many people involved have to work on many different areas of the production. DARK FANTASY found a good way for one person to play many different roles, while still making some kind of sense. It also finds a way to have more than one actor play similar, if not the exact same, characters. The acting leaves much to be desired, but it at least seems like these people were trying. I just don't think these cast members had any idea what to do with this type of material. This is a film that should be remade someday after the most obvious comparison has been forgotten.

Note to Hollywood: When you finally realize that Rob Zombie is a complete clown and reboot Halloween for the third time, hire Myles MacVane to play Dr. Loomis as soon as possible. Just do it. Pay him anything he wants. Don't believe me? Check out DARK FANTASY, and see for yourself.

-Herb West

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GREEN ZONE - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-03-17T21:14:00.001-07:00

GREEN ZONE - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: The Mad Hatter

If one were to step outside into the Iraqi sunshine in The Green Zone, they might see people taking photos like tourists. They might see administrators in suits walking to and fro like they owned the joint. In short, they might think that since The Coalition took Baghdad and fortified this ten square kilometre area, the success of the mission was well in hand.

But as all the political maneuvering of Matt Damon's latest film shows us, one shouldn't be so naive.

GREEN ZONE begins with American forces having already taken over Baghdad; they are now tossing site after site in the hunt for weapons of mass destruction. Chief Roy Miller (Matt Damon) leads a squad that has searched site after site and so far has come up with jack squat. Making his mission all the more frustrating is the fact that Miller and his team are working off page after page of American intelligence, all of which is getting systematically disproven.

After Miller finally speaks up—and quickly gets shut up by senior officers—he is approached by a CIA employee named Martin Brown (Brendan Gleeson). Brown has specialized in Middle East intelligence for years and seems to understand what is going on better than anyone else. He suggests to Miller that things aren't what they seem and that he might want to dig a little deeper . . . on his own.

Contradicting Brown's ideas is Clark Poundstone (Greg Kinnear), a high-ranking Washington administrator. He is convinced that his heavily guarded source "Magellan" has given him credible inside intel, and Poundstone has no problem saying so to Miller as well as New York Times reporter Lawrie Dayne (Amy Ryan). If a high ranking Washington administrator tells you that a CIA employee is offbase and that the raw data is to be trusted, he probably knows what he's talking about, right?

GREEN ZONE is well aware of its mission, and that mission isn't to be a totem of the antiwar movement. It sacrifices validity for entertainment. Its story of a soldier calling his own plays and working in direct competition with his own commanding officers won't be used as an example in any debate of American policy anytime soon. But you know what folks? There's nothing wrong with that.

GREEN ZONE is more interested in taking a building-block kernel of truth and using it to construct an intense bit of political intrigue. The audience follows right in step with Chief Roy Miller for every intense moment of the play he has called. It doesn't matter to the movie, or to the audience, that Miller couldn't possibly call a play like this. And this clearly needs to be credited to the creative pairing of director Paul Greengrass and star Matt Damon.

There are few directors working in Hollywood today who seem to be able to do intrigue and action better than Greengrass. Admittedly, his use of hand-held "shaky cam" can be a bit much for some viewers, but he has a way of grounding action sequences so that the action becomes more plausible and intense, and less about mach-six editing and expansive pyrotechnics. Damon meanwhile works rather well as an action star because he finds a way to retain his everyman demeanor, shrugging off the superhero persona that makes many A-list actors unbelievable in moments of peril.

While GREEN ZONE isn't terribly much more than a straight-up action flick, it takes direct aim at our collective conscience by continually reminding us that America's rallying cry for the need to invade Iraq was at best, questionable and at worst, dead wrong. In the opening act, the frustration is palpable as Miller's teams keep coming up empty in the search for weapons of mass destruction. Hindsight makes that frustration infinitely worse.

-The Mad Hatter

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BROOKLYNS FINEST - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-03-12T21:48:00.000-08:00

BROOKLYNS FINEST - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

BROOKLYNS FINEST is a beautiful, perfectly-acted, straight-up retread. Director Antoine Fuqua has brought absolutely nothing new to the cops ‘n robber genre with this one and may have in fact set it back.

Fuqua’s TRAINING DAY is a 40 oz classic. It is LA, rapper-heavy, weed-laced and rife with clichés. But TD is about as street as a west coast crime film gets. Both Denzel Washington and Ethan Hawke really do present their moral tug of war with the streets well. Yes, TD was essentially a familiar tune, but it had lots and lots of style.

BROOKLYNS FINEST carries a new batch of boiler plate banalities to the table, and the style is now gone. Perhaps Fuqua is saying something about his take on the East Coast, which seems to be a general incomprehension of the vibe. What this film presents is three tired-ass storylines from better, previous crime films. The film is a gratuitous, unoriginal, high-budget clone that means nothing when all of its parts are summed up. Oh, there is a far-fetched plot point akin to the girl’s wallet in TD, but it comes off as some seriously weaksauce.

The three trivial plotlines are so absolutely stock that they really do hurt the senses. There is the DEEP COVER ripoff with Tango (Don Cheadle) morally buried in his undercover work. Tango’s close relationship with his dope-slanging crime homie, Casanova (Wesley Snipes), makes for a harsh internal conflict when the police powers that be decide that it’s time to set him up.

Then there is the good cop who has to make crooked decisions in order to survive as in TO LIVE AND DIE IN LA. Sal (Ethan Hawke) is scheming to get his growing family out of their too small house. The wood mold is affecting his wife Angela (Lili Taylor) who just happens to be pregnant with twins. Sal is actually at the point of considering farming one of his older children out to live with his sister for lack of room.

Lastly there is the shopworn “burned out and seven days away from retirement” character Eddie Dugan (Richard Gere). Dugan is a wake-up-with-a-shot-of-whiskey, Russian-roulette playing, separated-from-his-wife-while-banging-a-centerfold-status-hooker type of twaddle that we have all seen before. LETHAL WEAPON and both BAD LIEUTENANTS circle this sort of drain. Dugan has seven days left on the force and really doesn’t want to make a difference during this time, but by the third act, he is forced to.

The template laid over it all is a smoldering tension between the police and civilians over a civilian murder at the hands of a crooked cop (a plot element straight out of STRANGE DAYS). Brooklyn’s famous streets from THE FRENCH CONNECTION are about to get rocked. This template is locked in with an unfathomably huge barrage of standard cop film themes featuring Catholic angst, a high-end, coke-snorting whore, a sexy, ball breaking female Federal agent, a politic-heavy IA investigation, topless girls processing cocaine and cash in a drug den, and a double-digit body count. Add some over-the-top product placement featuring RIM’s Blackberry, Sony’s PLAYSTATION 3, BMW, AUDI and scores of other products, and the film is a fully-decaled, useless, corporate Humvee.

What can be said in favor of BROOKLYNS FINEST is that every headlining actor hits the proper notes and communicates all of the emotion required to present their specific roles perfectly. Also, the supporting cast which is populated by familiar faces from THE WIRE (Michael K. Williams, Hassan Johnson, and Isiah Whitlock Jr.), as well as Vincent D’Onofrio and the perpetually sweltering Ellen Barkin, all chew the scenery when onscreen.

The film’s editing, from personal conflict to personal conflict within the three stories, is well done. The film’s third act strikes a STAR WARS kind of note with all of the conflicts going down warfare style simultaneously and key and not so key characters getting clipped, smoked, choked, and knuckled down.

Fuqua knows his story, and he knows how to pull some juicy character depth out of his actors. While some of BROOKLYNS FINEST’s elements smack of exciting action film badassery (Sal going on a DEATHWISH murder-spree to get his paper), the grand bulk of it is mired in recycled, old-hat regurgitations of late night television cop-shows.

However, aesthetically, BROOKLYNS FINEST is not a mess by any means. This is a well written, super lubricated, by-the-books production. In truth, it is a great albeit longwinded time filler that will certainly entertain as it is supposed to, but that entertainment brings no new facets to the genre. An unfortunate aspect of it all is that BROOKLYNS FINEST might just herald a new run on unoriginality in cop films because of its pristine, glossy presentation. It looks and feels so familiar and good, but BROOKLYNS FINEST is unoriginal and vacuous at its core.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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ALICE IN WONDERLAND - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-03-09T21:57:00.001-08:00

ALICE IN WONDERLAND - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
-By HERB WEST

What people need to know and understand is that Burton's ALICE IN WONDERLAND is HOOK. Both films are based in the world of famous children's stories and are made by “visionary” directors. Both have the exact same theme of the hero who had adventures in a magical world as a child now grown up and having forgotten everything. Both have the now grown up heroes having to relearn the magic to save the day. Both are also epic fails of filmmaking.

As others have pointed out, this is not a retelling of the classic Alice story or its sequel, Through the Looking Glass. This would be considered the third part of the story, with the same characters. Yes, the World of Wonderland has been turned into a kid's adventure movie along the lines of Narnia or the Golden Compass. This world is now called Underland, and it's pointed out that Alice had always just mispronounced it. Alice and the Mad Hatter are now action heroes. I'm not kidding.

The film opens with a fancy gathering that doubles as Alice's engagement party. Alice is proposed to, panics, and runs away only to fall down the rabbit hole. From there we go through the classic “Eat Me Drink Me” antics where Alice grows and shrinks in size. You would think one scene would be enough but not for Tim Burton! For the rest of the film Alice fluctuates in size for no apparent reason except to put her in strange situations such as flying through the air on a hat or standing naked in front of everybody at the Red Queen's palace.

Is it the Red Queen or the Queen of Hearts? I don't even care enough to find out.

In this version, there is a prophecy about Alice liberating Wonderland or Underland or whatever it is by killing the Jabberwocky in an epic battle. This isn't really a spoiler since this ridiculous plot is jammed down our throats 10 minutes into the film. It's all foretold in a scroll, and we see the drawing of the battle three times before it happens.

I couldn't feel for one character in this film because the whole thing is so soulless and joyless. Crispin Glover as the Knave of Hearts is so bland I wanted to puke. For some reason, they decided to CGI his head onto a tall lanky body and give him erratic movements. It is totally distracting and the worst CGI I've seen in years. Why the Hell would you hire Crispin Glover and then paste his head on a skinny body anyway? Helena Bonham Carter, with her bulbous little head, is shrill and grating as the Red Queen. Johnny Depp should be great, but the Mad Hatter just feels like all of Depp's previous characters jammed into one. The big part of the problem with the Hatter is that he is forced into every aspect of the story whether it makes sense or not. Obviously it is just to get as much screen time for Depp as possible, but it ends up being pointless. I am now convinced that Anne Hathaway is a perfect specimen of woman, but even her White Queen comes off as hypocritical and bland.

The totally CGI characters are no better. Most of them are just slightly amusing at best. We have talking flowers, Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee who do absolutely nothing for the plot, a cocky mouse character that wields a hat pin like a sword, and a couple of rabbits (one mad, one not). I thought Alan Rickman as the blue heroin worm was alright, but when Whoopi Goldberg and the Hallmark Channel do a better Cheshire Cat than a Tim Burton Production, you have a serious problem.

All of the backgrounds are bright and colorful like you'd expect, but that's it. There is nothing that makes any of it memorable. This brings us to the film’s most obvious problem: the 3D marketing.

I am one who was fascinated by the 3D in Avatar because it was the best I had ever seen. It is so good that it really feels like the alien forest is coming alive right in front of your eyes, particularly some of the giant plants and lightening bug creatures. The 3D in ALICE is absolutely nothing like what we see in Avatar.

This is something that people need to understand before they pay to see ALICE in 3D. I cannot stress this enough!

I'll tell everybody right now, do not pay to see this in 3D. All you will do is spend more money, and you'll have to sit there with the uncomfortable, recycled, glasses on for no reason. In hindsight, I don't regret watching the film because I was just killing time anyway, but I do wish I would have just seen it in 2D. There will be other 3D films coming that will have to be better than this.

There are a few interesting scenes. One was when a 12 inch Alice had to cross a moat filled with decapitated heads. Alice has to jump from head to head, and it really feels like old school Burton. In another scene, the Mad Hatter is kidnapped by the Red Queen and put to work making hats for her. For those that don't know, the whole idea of Mad Hatters came about in the 1800's when hat makers still used mercury to make hats. Over time, these people would develop mercury poisoning, and the symptoms would include vision, hearing, and speech impairment, a lack of coordination, and mental illness. Because people at the time didn't realize Mercury was poisonous, it just appeared that those in this profession were all mad. Hence, mad as a hatter.

When the Hatter is happily making hats for the queen, I thought that they may bring up the real history of hat makers who were the victims of poisoning. Alas, Burton doesn't have the balls. The one standout is when the Hatter realizes for the first time that he's mad, and Alice comforts him. There's a sadness and confusion to it comparable to that in EDWARD SCISSORHANDS, but it's over in a moment.

And a couple of good scenes do not a good film make. I suppose it could have been worse, but to me ALICE is almost totally forgettable. Kids will probably like it, but I doubt many adults will. By the time the film gets to the giant chessboard war toward the end, I just wanted it to be over. When the Hatter turns into a cartoon and starts dancing with his head spinning around like Linda Blair in the EXORCIST, I wanted to gouge my eyes out with my 3D glasses. ALICE is at times visually appealing, but it has no other redeeming value. In the end, ALICE IN WONDERLAND is generic and pointless. I would not watch this again if it was free.

-Herb West

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BULLETFACE - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-03-08T22:03:00.001-08:00

BULLETFACE – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

Albert Pyun makes movies that are lower in budget and tend to challenge his audience. He knows what provocation is. When THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW first appeared in theaters in 1975, Pyun was first in line on the first day. And he went to see the film daily until it was pulled for lack of attendance. THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW really provoked audiences at the time. While watching Pyun’s latest film, BULLETFACE, I felt a similar provocation. So strong was this feeling that I actually had to stop watching the film in order to process my reaction.

BULLETFACE is a revenge thriller at its nucleus. Other aspects are introduced and woven in, but this film is built around a payback core. The film starts with a series of horrible mishaps that lead to some of the heaviest moments that BULLETFACE has to offer. In San Ladero, Mexico, Dara Maren (Victoria Maurette), a crooked DEA agent, is helping her brother Bruno (Michael Esparza) smuggle women across the border for a gangster named Eric Muller (Eddie Velez). Bruno takes blood samples of the women because they have to be “clean.” This is a regular thing between Dara and Bruno, and while it looks like prostitution on the surface, it is something a lot more sinister. The connection between the siblings is strong. There is an unforeseen shootout with Eric where Dara is struck in face with a bullet, and Bruno takes one to the gut. The Mexican Federal Agents soon swoop in and bust them both. At sentencing, Dara chooses to take a twenty-five year sentence at a US/Mexico prison facility in Mexicali, Mexico in order to have her brother returned to California as a free man. All of this happens before the opening credits are finished.

While in prison, Dara is flesh fodder for the male guards, and the series of brutal rapes that she is subjected to takes all of the cringeworthy aspects of THE ACCUSED and I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE and ratchets them up with even more force and degradation. These scenes are disturbing and realistic. They are raw and bloody. And other rape scenes featuring Dara’s cellmates (which are referenced through the rest of the film in flashback) might be what BULLETFACE will be most remembered for.

Dara has put herself in this vulnerable position to protect her brother. To her the bond that they have is worth enduring these shocking levels of extreme abuse. But when Bruno is killed on the outside, Dara has nothing to lose.

Her prison wounds are so severe a month after her brother’s death that Dara needs to be transferred to a real hospital for the weekend. In a HE GOT GAME type of scenario, Ned Walker (Steven Bauer), a DEA Special Ops Agent, springs Dara for the weekend. Her mission is to use her connections to determine a new drug that is taking over. Dara’s planned ulterior motive is to find out who killed her brother. On the quest for the drug information and the truth behind her brother’s killing, Dara proceeds to cut a relentless, violent swath through Imperial Beach California.

Local crimelord brothers Robert and Eric Muller have been putting the finishing touches on a spinal fluid drug that is extracted violently from the victim’s neck with a needle-gun. Their warehouse is complete with the dead, naked bodies of failed experiments in the background and muted screams in the air. All of this modern human experimentation is taking place under the demented, watchful eye of Doctor Shockner/Saeed (Alan Abelow). The result of their “red-cap” drug, when not fatal, is a high that features completely-red eyes and an immortality complex. The conspiracy and usage behind the drug is rumored to go all the way to the top, with police and higher authorities using it. Dara at one point muses that it is “immortality for sale with a kicker.”

Randall Fontana’s story is an interesting one. The idea of a cannibalistic new drug is nothing new. The film RAVENOUS featured a high and immortality/strengthening with the eating of human flesh. BULLETFACE’s presentation of this new drug and the high body count used to perfect its effects are intriguing to watch.

Victoria Maurette completely throws herself into her role as Dara. She wears her psychological damage with a twitchy, hard carapace. Dara is presented as a woman who has seen too much and is plagued by her demons. She flashes back regularly to her harrowing prison past, and it is a hindrance to her. But when queried about how she got out of prison, she wryly states that she got out for good behavior and “you’d be surprised what you can do when you are motivated.” She is able to trivialize her trauma, but her nervous laughter speaks of unresolved pain.

Dara also talks about karma. Ironically, her own suffering in prison is karmic payoff for her human trafficking. And after Dara has paid her dues and taken her damage she is looking to administer some of her own. She wants to be the retribution, the complete payoff for the death of her brother. “I am their karma,” she says. This underlying theme demonstrates that BULLETFACE is more than just “another exploitation flick.”

With her ‘69’ tattoo and her Marlboro chain-smoking, Dara really does channel the badass. Her smoky voice and her whiskey and lager swaggering also show her powder-keg potential. Her orientation to the world around her is that of a person of large stature, which just isn’t the case. Dara is actually so small that when holding a .45, she might as well be holding a nail gun. She is all business; she has just a few hours to get the information that she needs and has no time for the sexual advances of her ex-lover Shannon (Jenny Dare Paulin).

Albert Pyun’s direction brings all of the film’s rough-edged elements together. There are many, many characters, and they are all introduced with a freeze-frame and their name written across the screen. Pyun uses close-ups, hand-held shots, and jagged editing which all make for some entertaining viewing. It is evident that he is in complete control of the film and is choosing what he wants you to see no matter how painful it might be.

BULLETFACE is a B-Movie with all of the exploitation and taboo subject matter it can muster. It is independent through and through. The budget for this film was about $120,000. Gunfire, double-crosses, and crooked Feds are infused in the storyline, giving it a modern noir feel. Some of the acting leaves a bit to be desired. Similarly, the effects, while conceptually strong, do miss at points.

My mistake in watching BULLETFACE was to step away from it after viewing the harsh prison rape scenes and try to process them. Had I watched the film all the way through without stopping, the complete package wouldn’t have wrecked me as hard. Taken in isolation with no buffering context, the individual images of rape are a bitter pill to swallow indeed. The rape scenes featuring sodomy and irrumatio while only showing the thrusting pelvises are extremely rough and hard to take. But taken in the context of a revenge story, the vicious aspects of such scenes are more tolerable.

Albert Pyun has set out to get a reaction from his audience, and BULLETFACE succeeds. This is not a film for the faint or the tender of heart. It packs a serious punch and begs a second viewing because of all of the characters and varying nuances in the plot. It is a boundary-pusher that remains strong in its resolve. It also ends on a note that leaves it open for a franchise. BULLETFACE wants you thinking about it, and I have been doing just that for the past few days.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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THE AVON BARKSDALE STORY: LEGENDS OF THE UNWIRED - A BADASS DOCUDRAMA REVIEW

2010-03-05T22:45:00.000-08:00

THE AVON BARKSDALE STORY: LEGENDS OF THE UNWIRED - A BADASS DOCUDRAMA REVIEW

THE AVON BARKSDALE STORY: LEGENDS OF THE UNWIRED (ABSLOTU) is not a documentary but a docudrama. Calling something a docudrama leaves a door wide open for poetic license. This is one of the several problems with this production from K.A.J Enterprises. If you were a fan of HBO’s THE WIRE, there is no doubt in my mind that you still have a hankering for more of that Baltimore story. The character development was top-tier, and the stories that were told rang strangely true. ABSLOTU wears an unspoken badge stating that WIRE fans will catch a glimpse of the world that they seriously invested in. They won’t.

ABSLOTU does tell the story of the real Nathan Avon Barksdale. It goes to great lengths to chronicle his history and even sports some serious interview time with the man himself. This docudrama also looks into other actual human beings that were fictionalized on THE WIRE. Part of the thrust is to show that David Simon, the man behind THE WIRE, lifted these people and some of their stories for the HBO series. Simon was following the Barksdale cases back when he was a reporter at the Baltimore Sun. Serious WIRE-heads have heard whispers about Simon’s pillaging of real-life “bad actors” for his show, and ABSLOTU makes this a part of that argument.

What ABSLOTU succeeds with is the presentation of the heroin trade on the streets of “Bodymore Murdaland” and how a youngster could rise to power. The film also speaks to the corruption of the project police and the way young kids are exposed to NC-17 levels of real-life violence. Interviews with Avon, his mother, his lieutenant, a cellmate, and some local boxing coaches do a great job of painting the hopelessness of the drug-dealing lifestyle and how lives are ruined by it. Avon himself walks with a limp from a lost foot due to his shenanigans as a young punk. Unfortunately the sensationalism of the whole presentation keeps it from really being something special.

This production could have been tweaked in any number of ways to let the gravity of Avon’s behavior sink in. Avon is a man who dealt with the courts on murder, attempted murder, manslaughter and all sorts of assault. The stories of his viciousness (braining a man in court with his metal cane for example) are so brazen, it is no wonder Simon swooped Avon’s name and legend for THE WIRE. Barksdale’s own mother even nonchalantly tells of her son shooting someone in the leg and that individual bleeding to death.

Barksdale breaks down his drug wars and his ninety-four percent cut solution. He tells of dropping manhole covers off the fourteenth floor of the projects to scare competition and lightly refers to it as “dropping pizzas.” He speaks of how he loved crooked cops because he could throw some dollars at them and they would leave him alone. When Avon is on the mic in this docudrama, it is really something to behold because he is such a badass. It is a real letdown when the film leans on other means to get the Avon story across.

For instance, there are various re-enactment scenes that are corny, high-school camera hijinks status. When guns are fired, there is a small flame animation at the muzzle while the acting and dialogue is forced and unnatural. Think of the worst crime re-enactment footage you have seen on the lousiest, broken-rate, syndicated television show, and that is what you get in ABSLOTU. It is understandable that some of the crimes needed to be re-enacted, but the amateurish way in which these are handled with is rather painful.

The force that should be holding this docudrama together is Wood Harris who portrayed Avon Barksdale in THE WIRE. But Harris is obviously out of his element, and there is even a moment when Barksdale verbally snaps at Harris that really shows who is running the show.

The weakness of Harris’ interview pieces are minor compared to the real problem with ABSLOTU which is the narration of Troy May. May’s delivery is overwritten and actually smacks of that sleazy CHEATERS-style, re-enactment television narration.

Couple this with a soundtrack from the (impossible to Google) rapper Zin-Jin and the (similarly scarce) production company BrownVision Media Group, and the whole docudrama falls even shorter. The mediocre, rap music listed for ten different songs is limited to long repetitive rehearsals of lyrics like, “Its time to die, motherfucker, time to die.” These pieces of music are laid over the dramatic re-telling of the Barksdale gang’s exploits and come off sensationalized and powerless.

There is some good underneath it all though. This Barksdale character is a real talker. He presents himself as the uncle that your parents warned you to stay away from. There is no question about his criminal nature or his ability to smoke someone point blank if necessary. What is cool about him, though (in that forbidden uncle way), is his sense of humor and his relaxed tone. He does joke about the violence he used to deal out and the lack of a statute of limitations in regards to murders he may have been involved in.

Nathan Avon Barksdale is now a reformed thug that somehow survived twenty or more bullets (he claims to have three bullets in his head). He is a definite street legend and fascinating to watch. Barksdale’s nephew even volunteers information about how the Barksdale family is now trying to positively change the community, and Avon himself gives a heartfelt plug for the education of the youth. He is as street as they come; watching him is akin to observing some fantastic natural occurrence that doesn’t happen too often.

If you miss THE WIRE, ABSLOTU doesn’t bring it back. This production is so shady that when WIRE characters are shown in photographs with their hood counterparts, their faces are blurred out. Part of this lends to the street authenticity of this docudrama, but it really smacks of a bottom of the barrel budget and a capitalization on THE WIRE.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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THE CRAZIES - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-03-02T21:36:00.000-08:00

THE CRAZIES - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

-By SPINAL VILLAIN

I haven't seen the original CRAZIES, so I wasn't prejudiced for or against this movie in any way. Having seen several trailers for this movie already, I was hyped, but deep down I was asking myself "will this bring anything new to the table"?

The film starts off with the center of a town burning. Cars are torched and banners are falling ablaze. It reminded me of the opening credits of TERMINATOR 2 minus the cool soundtrack and apocalyptic vision. At first I assumed the story started there. It doesn't. The story actually starts two days before with a small glimpse of a small rural life in a farming Iowa town. It is opening day at the baseball field, and much of the town is in attendance cheering their children and school on.

From this point the movie takes a grim turn as a drunken mechanic walks on to center field with a double-barreled shotgun. Those of us that have seen the trailers already know what's going to happen next, but that's not what the film wants. THE CRAZIES wants you to take the ride of discovery as if you were one of the townsfolk. And it's a fun ride.

Timothy Olyphant plays David Dutton, the town Sheriff. He has a calm demeanor and typically plays a scenario out with his gut instinct and rationale. In a town where everyone knows each other, Dutton is out to keep everyone happy and safe. It’s clear early on that he's about people and not procedure.

But when the bodies start racking up and Dutton finds himself investigating what was once a "full of shit" tip, the plot quickly thickens, and how deeply the town is in trouble becomes very clear. We find the government is watching via satellite very early on, and it doesn't take this Perry Mason character long to figure out military intervention (or containment) is inevitable.

Dutton quickly finds the root cause of an illness that is spreading. He even has a plan to stop it. Bureaucratic red tape has other plans. When Dutton confronts the town mayor about shutting off the towns’ water supply, the same Cheney-esque style of ignorance/stupidity portrayed in THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW in which a politician is worried more about his reelection bid than his constituents’ well-being is presented.

After all, shutting down a farming towns’ water supply in early spring means bankruptcy for the town, and as we all know, people place blame at the top. What follows next is a priceless piece of "civil disobedience."

From this point on, Dutton’s steadfast endeavors to put a halt to this now potential pandemic are irrelevant as the National Guard shows up and buses everyone to a concentration camp-style staging area.

This brings about a scene straight from OUTBREAK but far worse. As townsfolk try to escape, they are gunned down, leading to a riot of all the "infected" running amok and a forced evacuation by the military post-haste.

Things go to hell in rapid time. The audience is privy to all kinds of clues that lead up to the inevitable end of this catastrophe as Dutton and his wife Judy (Radha Mitchell) and Deputy Russell Clark (Joe Anderson) try to make their escape.

Unfortunately, as with all Hollywood movies, a certain amount of disbelief is required to enjoy THE CRAZIES. I just can't see anyone getting their hand impaled and still having enough function in it to punch someone in the face or even fire a gun let alone drive.

But THE CRAZIES does bring some new elements to the screen. Also, as the film’s credits roll, a small clip plays that answers an important question about the virus in a particularly funny way.

This film doesn’t have a lot of gore but does have a decent amount of blood and decay. A few predictable "jump" scenes fill in the gaps, but what surprised me were at least two scares that also got the rest of the audience. The director apparently wanted us to feel too safe at specific times, and then POW! Excellent!

The acting was on par. I especially liked Tim Olyphant and Radha Mitchell's performances. And overall, THE CRAZIES will make a solid rental for those who will miss the theatrical release.

-Spinal Villain

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AVATAR - A BADASS MOVIE ANALYSIS

2010-03-01T09:22:00.000-08:00

AVATAR - A BADASS ANALYSIS

-By Tom Carney

Note: The following could be greatly expanded. However space considerations will not allow that. The themes which are presented are present in many of the minor characters as well as in the entire way the film was made.

I look at this film as a work of art, in the same sense that a painting, a lyric poem, a play or novel is a work of art. It is an extended metaphor which serves as the vehicle for an inner-realized truth or concept. So I am not looking at this film as a film critic. My personal view is that as good art, it does not beat one over the head and shoulders with didactic moral pronouncements. The film does an excellent job of delivering the heart of its insight on a multidimensional level. Hence, this film is speaking to many people on many levels.

For me, the baseline insight has to do with consciousness and humanness. Corporal Jake Sully is a human being. The word corporal comes “from the doctrine that the bread of the Eucharist becomes or represents the body of Christ” (Merriam-Webster’s Online Dictionary). Jake’s last name, Sully, actually means “to make soiled or tarnished: defile” (Merriam-Webster’s Online Dictionary). Jake’s name as well as his crippled body are metaphors for the ruinous, corrupting results which inevitably flow from the actions of the consciousness which dominates humanity on the planet from which he comes, Earth. Other characters in the film model other kinds of defilement.

The film unfolds on a moon of the planet Polyphemus.—It is interesting to note that Polyphemus is the name of the Cyclopes who trapped Ulysses and his men in his cave and proceeded to eat them two at a time. In the myth, the “wily” Ulysses manages to blind the Cyclops and escape.—The moon, named Pandora, is a totally harmonious and beautiful home, which I assume is nothing like the barbarous place, Polyphemus.

An Aside:
The moon, Pandora, relates to the Pandora myth, and has many levels of meaning. I personally cannot accept the analysis of the myth that has Zeus creating Pandora, the first woman, as punishment for Prometheus stealing the fire. This is the same basic spin, the angry hateful god who punishes wrong doers, that was put on the Garden of Eden metaphor. It is a sophistic effort to obfuscate the real message of the Prometheus metaphor.

In my view of this myth, the Fire which Prometheus apparently stole was being held hostage, not by God or Zeus, as He was called in those days, but by the Other Guys. Why would God, who created us in his image, the image of fire, want to keep fire from his incarnated Self?

Prometheus’s stealing of the Fire was more like liberating it and making the Path to the Light available for everyone. Prometheus was an earlier Avatar. He demonstrated with his life and actions the path for Humanity into the Light. We must be willing to sacrifice everything to gain entrance into the Light.

Likewise, the creation of woman, Pandora, as a punishment to mankind for stealing the Fire is as silly as the spin put on the Garden of Eden metaphor. It must be admitted, however, that these spins have been accepted as truth for a very long time. However, present common sense simply rejects them as nonsensical.

The planet Pandora is an appropriate metaphor for the function of Woman as an essential aspect of evolution. The Planet carries the feminine frequency of Goodwill. This is obvious, in the harmony and beauty of the planet’s workings. It is also underlined in the way consciousness works in these human beings. Their role on Pandora is stewardship. They are guided by the recognition and embodiment of the Principles of Essential Divinity, Goodwill, and Unanimity and the Laws of Right Human Relations, Group Endeavor, and Spiritual Approach.

The frequencies of the Father and the Mother are present in both the men and the women through the agency of Love. Love as a relating energy is very visible in the harmony and balance of the nature kingdoms. Love is also present in many of the scenes which show the human relations with nature and each other, especially in those involving the interchanges between Zoe (a name pregnant with allusions.) and Jake like the scene in which Zoe is infuriated because she has to kill several animals to save the child Jake, and including the mating of Zoe and Jake—a metaphor of the power of love to bridge between planets.

In this respect we can see the ruined and corrupted Corporal Jake Sully whose Fire has been banked and all but snuffed out by the dominant consciousness on his home planet as coming to Pandora and being resurrected, made whole and clean. His sleeping Fire, the consciousness of love for all beings including himself, is re-ignited through the ritual sacrifice of his ruined body and the expulsion of his self-hate distorted consciousness.

In the final scenes we see the defeat of the archetypes of self-hate, that consciousness which is truly alien to humanity: the psychotic character of Colonel Miles Quaritch and the amoral, totally self-centered and calculating Corporate Executive, Parker Selfridge. Of the two, Parker Selfridge is the more dangerous. He is a metaphor for the Other Guys. These individuals use people such as Colonel Quaritch in whom the human consciousness has been totally alienated to gain their ends without regard for anything that might stand in their way, including the Home Tree which they systematically destroy and the Soul Tree which they intend to destroy. The attempt to use Jake Sully for their ends fails because he has retained a spark of human consciousness which is reignited.

Thus Jake becomes a true Avatar. He carries the frequency of determination, of the Will to Good, the Will to overcome adversity, and through the fusion of his will with the Goodwill of the people of Pandora, basically saves the people, and by extension, the planet from destruction

At the end of the film we see the long line of Earth humans returning to their planet. It is possible that the consciousness of many, or at least some, of the men and women who lived through the events on Pandora was stimulated and brought to life again. Thus, in a kind of reverse play of Ulysses’ escape from Polyphemus, they leave the planet of two eyed and return to the planet of the One Eyed of their origin. They are seed carriers, viruses that may help other Earth humans to throw off the alien, single eyed consciousness which sees and values personal power and the dense physical plane and has gained dominance over their Planet.

In the end the shape, color, size of the body in which consciousness is housed is not the point. It is clear that the alien consciousness is embodied by many of those who came from Planet Earth. It is love which is the point, love which requires two eyes to see Truth. The beauty and possibilities of how the Will to Good of the Father and the Goodwill of the Mother can manifest when joined through the agency of Love is infinite. Pandora is an excellent example.

-Tom Carney

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TRON LEGACY - JAKOB'S BADASS INFO DROP

2010-02-27T20:04:00.000-08:00

TRON LEGACY hype has been ridiculous this week. JAKOB, the Mediasaurs’ Canadian connection, was in on the event.

Finally the houselights dimmed. The Scotiabank IMAX theatre in Toronto, half-full of devoted Tron fans, was about to show us . . . something.

We didn't know what. Speculation was rampant. Was it going to be the new trailer and then a pre-screening of Alice in Wonderland? Was it going to be a scene titled "The Pit Cell"? This possibility seemed most likely since the viral website from which this collection of dedicated nerds had scored free passes to this event is called www.pitcell.com. What everyone was hoping, of course, was that they'd show the whole film—nearly a year before its release date.

Why else would there be a strict no cell phone policy? Certainly they'd be showing more than just a trailer. A trailer is, after all, just a commercial, and you want as many people as possible to see your commercial, right? And the hoops people needed to jump through to get these tickets were too numerous for a paltry reward. Love and dedication should be rewarded, right?

Clearly, something big was going to go down. You could feel it in the air. The vibe in the theatre was electric, and now that the lights were down, lightening was about to strike.

Except it didn't.

It was just the trailer—the trailer that anyone will be able to see with Alice in Wonderland starting next week. And it wasn't even a good trailer.

If there'd been any lingering fears that a Hayden Christensen-type block of wood was going to be cast to play Kevin Flynn's son, those fears were realised. The kid is entirely uncharismatic except for a slight whiff of douchebag.

Of course, he's the star of the trailer which focuses on the real-world setup of the new movie. After a heart-to-heart with Bruce Boxleitner and street-racing his motorcycle, Flynn Jr. finds a secret lab in the back of Flynn Sr.’s abandoned arcade and gets zapped into Tron-land. Then there are a few quick flash-cuts of lightcycles, recognizers, and identity disc duels with hot program babes, and the trailer ends.

It's about a minute long.

And entirely underwhelming. You could feel the pheromones of disappointment expelled by the audience seeping into your skin as it dawned on everybody that this was it. It wasn't even shown twice. Expletives were muttered as people dejectedly tossed their 3D glasses into the basket on their way out.

Speaking of the 3D, it's old school crap 3D. It's not even in the same game, much less on the same court as Avatar. And it was clearly a Disney afterthought that Tron needed to be cutting edge.

The original trailer (first leaked, what, a year ago?) was far more inspiring. It created a sense of anticipation and a hunger for more Tron. I can see why they didn't want this new trailer leaked hence the no cell phone rule. When the angry mob of nerds starts blogging about this event tonight, Disney won't want them to be able to illustrate their postings with poorly framed cell phone video of this boring-ass trailer.

Jakob Rehlinger, nerdhurdles.com

MEDIASAURS TRON 2 thread

NINJA ASSASSIN - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-26T17:13:00.000-08:00

NINJA ASSASSIN - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

“Ninjas? More like Nonjas.”

—Pops Racer (John Goodman), SPEED RACER

Sometimes watching a film that has had nonstop bad press can be a good thing. When something great happens onscreen, it is all the more enjoyable because it wasn’t expected. But in the case of NINJA ASSASSIN, there is nothing whatsoever that makes the experience pleasurable. This movie is a slick, well-choreographed, broken machine.

At first it really looks like it is going to work, but soon it becomes apparent that the film's inner workings are hopelessly flawed. The truth of the matter is that Andy and Larry Wachowski produced this film, and their names brought the fanboys to the multiplexes. The Wachowskis have earned fanboy cred as a result of their involvement in the well-received MATRIX series. But since then, their heavily panned yet superior SPEED RACER is the only thing that they have done worth mentioning. And NINJA ASSASSIN is a mistake that would be better if it just went away.

That being said, NINJA ASSASSIN does manage to follow basic film convention. There is a protagonist, an antagonist, and some serious conflict. There is a story arc and conclusion. This is all a credit to Wachowski disciple James McTiegue who has directed the film. NINJA ASSASSIN looks and feels like it should work, but it is absolute, blood-soaked cornball. The plot is so completely asinine that it is basically nonexistent. What substitutes for plot are pornographic geysers of blood and hacked body parts. When viscera aren’t being punctured, the film lags.

NINJA ASSASSIN starts with some punk Yakuza named Hollywood (Sung Kang) getting a tattoo at the needle of a Tattoo Master (Randall Duk Kim). Their unrealized conversation about respect and tattoo pain is interrupted by the delivery of a wax-sealed envelope containing black dust. The Tattoo Master tells of a time fifty-seven years ago when he saw an envelope with such dust that was followed by a bloodsoaked ninja attack. Accordingly, this story is followed by one henchman’s DEAD ALIVE-status beheading, complete with tongue lolling in the now exposed mouth. The lights are knocked out, and there are slashed, gushing torsos and legs chopped. The ninja is unseen, and bullets won’t hit him. Wounds splash as if they are blood-filled water balloons. The Tattoo Master doesn’t survive the ninja attack this time around.

This tsunami of blood and appendages gets the attention of Mika (Naomie Harris), a forensic researcher, and her buddy Maslow (Ben Miles) at the Berlin Europol Headquarters. These two reveal all of the details of a network of ninja clans via more stilted conversation.

The ninja clans are comprised of young orphans turned ninja in a strange secluded compound. They are trained by a sadistic reverse-Mr. Miagi named Ozunu (Sho Kasugi). Ozunu is the type of sensei that disciplines his pupils with a blade slash to the face or by reaching into their chests to attack their heart like the high priest in INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM. Ozunu raises ninjas that are trained killers, and for the monetary value of one hundred pounds of gold, they will eliminate any target.

Running parallel to the Mika and Maslow story is that of ninja assassin Raizo (Rain), told as a dirty ripoff of KUNG-FU. Raizo flashes back constantly to his old master Ozunu’s teachings. His most specific lesson is that weakness compels strength and betrayal begets blood. In these flashback sequences, young disciple Raizo (Yoon Sungwoong) comes up in the ninja ranks. There is a botched love story with teen Raizo (Joon Lee) and a free-spirited teenage ninja girl Kiriko (Anna Sawai) that ends in her punishing death and sours Raizo’s feelings towards the clan. When Raizo is full-grown, he rejects his training, slashes Ozunu’s face, takes a bunch of ninja stars to the gut and cinematically falls off of a skyscraper into a body of water. If this film were more intelligent, the water that he falls into could symbolize a baptism into humanity. This film isn’t intelligent, however, and Raizo proceeds to rack up a triple-digit blood-avalanche of ex-ninja buddies.

The rest of the film is annoying as Mika earns Raizu’s respect but inadvertently brings him in to the custody of the authorities. What organization he is being held by is so nebulous that it is stupefying. The CIA, FBI, and Homeland Security are all mentioned, but then there is also the GDR and the aforementioned Europol. Whoever is running the show does not have a chance when the blood-flood ninja brigade storm the compound looking for Raizu. The all-out ninja-versus-mystery-military-operative showdown essentially blood-surfs the plot to the end of the film. Raizu is taken back to his original ninja training grounds for execution.

The CIA/FBI/WTF team follows with Hummers, helicopters, grenades, and bazookas. When they drive through the wall of the compound, there are so many bullets being fired in random directions that the word absurd is completely deflated. What follows is more impalings, lost limbs, neck stabs, ninja stars, and katanas than I have ever seen before in one film sequence. Add a football stadium sprinkler system for the bloodspray and splatter, and this scene becomes one of the silliest showdowns in mainstream film history.

In the classic kung-fu movie final confrontation, Raizu has to go to war with his old sensei Ozunu. This battle is reminiscent of a video game boss-fight with one of those completely overpowered bosses that has you throwing down your controller and screaming profanities. Ozunu can disappear and reappear, and he gloats, reminding Raizu that he sucks. The silhouetted katana fight sequences make for some amusing shots, so do the falling ashes of the burning compound, but the suspension of disbelief collapsed in the opening scene. All that is left is the hope that this film will end soon.

B-movies are supposed to be fun. NINJA ASSASSIN is an ugly task. Its few attempts at humor are mired in such obvious timing and setup problems that they force groans and winces. This film is a disservice to better films with smaller budgets that actually give a damn about what they are doing. NINJA ASSASSIN is a mixture of all that has been wrong with martial arts films for the past forty years with some fresh air blown through and some nice effects on top. The only positive thing that can be said about this film is that there wasn’t an obligatory graphic rape scene which seems to be a cornerstone of the seedier elements of this genre. NINJA ASSASSIN is broken. There is nothing that resonates afterward, and hopefully, in time, this unnecessary piece of trash will be forgotten.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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EDGE OF DARKNESS - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-25T22:08:00.000-08:00

EDGE OF DARKNESS – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

EDGE OF DARKNESS was marketed as a Mel Gibson beat-‘em-up. In this regard, it is mildly successful. When EDGE OF DARKNESS is running full-tilt in its second act, it really feels like PAYBACK 2.0. Unfortunately, with its cliché, long-winded government conspiracy plot, the frenetic pacing isn’t maintained. Mel Gibson plays a hybrid of his Porter character from PAYBACK and his Tom Mullen from RANSOM. If you cook EDGE OF DARKNESS up and scoop off the impurities, the film is obviously RANSON remixed as an absentee father in the middle of some treacherous plot. He just wants to know who took his daughter so that he can kill them.

Mel Gibson’s return to cinema is a welcome one. He has racked up a respectable syllabus in his checkered career. Gibson does badass and has been doing it since the late ‘70s. It is too bad that he chose EDGE OF DARKNESS to be the film that is supposed to wash his drunken, anti-Semitic rant out of our brains. EDGE OF DARKNESS isn’t particularly bad, but it isn’t particularly good either. Gibson’s Tom Craven is a “safe” starring role that just about any modern leading tough guy could have done. It does feel like it was tailor-made for Gibson, but Bruce Willis could have pulled it off too.

EDGE OF DARKNESS opens with a straight-out-of-film school juxtaposition. Dead bodies are shown floating in the Connecticut River immediately followed by boiler plate, dated home-film footage of a little girl on a beach interacting with her father who is holding the camera. The next scene is the here and now with Craven meeting his 20-something daughter Emma (Bojana Novakovic) at a crowded train station. Dead bodies floating in the water followed immediately by this scene of a father and daughter; we know what to expect.

Although Craven fantasizes that he has a close connection with his daughter, he doesn’t know where she works, who her boyfriend is, or how she passes her time. It is a no-brainer that Craven is scripted as a police detective. So when the obviously physically ill Emma takes a Youtube worthy shotgun blast to the chest, Craven is ready to spring into all sorts of dirty-detective action.

Craven hustles and soon learns that Emma was blowing the whistle on Northmoor, the company she worked for. He also learns that this company is up to some corporate/international nuclear weapons tomfoolery. Emma’s blood vomiting underscores a subplot featuring radiation poisoning and dementia.

EDGE OF DARKNESS is a standard action film. Just about everyone is corrupt, and certain smiling, helpful faces at the beginning of the film are proven to be double-dealing backstabbers at the end. Those that aren’t criminal are smoked too soon by assassins that are too handsome and drive what look to be government-issue black-ops vehicles.

Craven’s character is straight from an action movie cookie-cutter. He isn’t the only one. As a matter of fact, every character in EDGE OF DARKNESS is a bland retread except for Ray Winstone’s Jedburgh. Jedburgh just happens to stick out because he is a British-accented man in an American film full of bad Bostonian accents. By the time Jedburgh, a clandestine securities officer, meets with Craven, all of the clichés are in place, and nonstop tension, action, and macho one-liners ensue.

Craven’s exchanges with Jedburgh show a mutual respect and a code of honor that are supposed to cultivate the yin and yang attraction/repulsion of DeNiro and Pacino in HEAT. It is really too bad that EDGE OF DARKNESS doesn’t zero completely in on this aspect of the plot.

Mel Gibson’s acting strength as a man grieving the loss of his daughter isn’t weak at all. His grizzled face and hoarse voice speak to an inner spiritual fatigue and devastation. Gibson’s acting is also solid as he warms up his human vengeance machine and starts seriously knocking fools out. He even manages to pull off the “stumbling in pain while firing” maneuver that he performs in PAYBACK. This is a role that Gibson has played before, and there is no new wrinkle in his delivery. This is a film that could have been tacked on as a Massachusetts afterward to the LETHAL WEAPON series.

EDGE OF DARKNESS is a Mel Gibson movie through and through, and the Tom Craven role fits him perfectly. The downside is that if you have clocked substantial Mel Gibson time or even substantial action movie time, you already know how it is going to play out. EDGE OF DARKNESS has a couple of crazy action sequences, but the bulk of the film was better in its original form elsewhere.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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SHUTTER ISLAND - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-23T21:38:00.000-08:00

SHUTTER ISLAND – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: The Mad Hatter

"Do you really want to know?"

We've all heard those six words at some point, and in all of us they evoke a certain unease. They answer a question with a question and tell us that we're not going like the truth. That's the feeling that lingers over much of SHUTTER ISLAND, that every single answer we get in this mystery will lead to further and more unsettling questions.

US Marshals Teddy Daniels (Leo DiCaprio) and Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo) are dispatched to Shutter Island to investigate the disappearance of a patient from a federal hospital for the criminally insane. The facility's chief administrator, Dr. John Cawley (Ben Kingsley), seems as perplexed as the marshals are, wondering how in the world it’s possible for a patient to get away from such tight security. However, he is also quietly worried since there are few safe places on Shutter Island to hide. So the longer the patient is missing, the more likely it is that the patient is dead.

As Daniels heads the investigation, he begins to fight off flashbacks of traumatic moments in his own past. He fights off memories of a liberating the Dachau concentration camp during World War II. He also has to contend with visions of his dead wife Dolores (Michelle Williams). She was killed when their apartment was burnt down by an arsonist who just so happens to have been committed to Shutter Island. She still haunts his quiet moments and seems intent on warning him to let it all go, leaving us to wonder, let what go?

As a vicious storm moves into the island making outside communication and departure impossible, Daniels and Aule start digging deeper into the goings on of Shutter Island. Unfortunately, every answer they get leads to six more questions, each more unsettling than the last.

SHUTTER ISLAND is a dark descent into the human psyche, but not one that seems concerned with the actual weight of a true psychological thriller. It's clear early on that things aren't always what they seem and that all the audience can do is continue further down the spiral. At first though, it feels a lot like pulp fiction—the genre, not the Tarantino film. You know the one—a storm is coming, the ferry can't leave the island, the phones are down, and the power goes out.

But it's at this point that the story really makes its mark. DiCaprio wears our tension and our fears on his face as he tries to put this puzzle together (and we get a good look at that face since he's in every single scene). We get prodded and poked with various faces giving us various explanations for what's going on, and much like Leo, we're left in a sad confusion as to which story to believe. After all, when the logic is being given to you by patients in a mental hospital, it leaves you in a quandary about which nut in the nut jar you think is being the least nutty.

Martin Scorsese hasn't made this sort of movie in a while. It echoes back to CAPE FEAR and BRINGING OUT THE DEAD, neither of which are the sorts of titles people bring up first when talking about the man's greatest films. That's not to say that this isn't a great Scorsese film. It's a complete vision and yanks you out of the reality you know for over two hours. It is filled with moments of deep despair, all of which are shown with gothic elegance. In a way, it's fitting that its release date was pushed to this late winter slot since the film echoes the mood of this time of year—a desire to find the promise of spring amongst the last throes of cold darkness.

Occasionally, I end up liking a movie that a lot of people hate, and in some ways, I wonder if SHUTTER ISLAND is that sort of film. It's not a "Leo Movie" though Leo is in it. It's not a "Scary Movie" though there are moments of true terror. So if either of these is what you're looking for, move on. However, if you feel like striking a match and trying to make sense out of the whispers in the darkness, then SHUTTER ISLAND is the movie for you. Just be careful which of those whispers you decide to believe.

-THE MAD HATTER

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THE COLLECTOR - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-19T20:05:00.001-08:00

THE COLLECTOR – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
*mild spoilers*

THE COLLECTOR offers no explanations as to the origins of its seedy antagonist. The writers who penned this film know the playbook too because they have mentioned in all of their promotional materials that they wrote SAW IV, V, and VI. Unfortunately, what they have presented to us this time around is almost completely unfair to the audience. THE COLLECTOR presents a creative, sadistic killer facially encased behind an uncomfortable-looking polyester gimp-mask. He is cut from the classic Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, Michael Meyers sort of Leatherface, aggressive killer cloth.

The film starts with a drunken middle-aged couple returning to their house late at night. The camera’s view of the house is obscured by a construction site with a lot of caution tape hanging about. Upstairs they find a large travel trunk. The power for the house has been cut, and there is an unnerving thump from the trunk. The man, against his wife’s will, opens the case, and the scene ends abruptly with a scream as he is rushed by a figure from behind.

What follows are some intense opening credits that directly reference the intro credits of SE7EN, right down to the pounding industrial music. There are flashes of this Collector guy dragging his trunk, house blueprints, and spiders. As the film progresses, we do learn backhandedly that the Collector is an exterminator. The insects also seem to reference the Buffalo Bill killer in SILENCE OF THE LAMBS. But unfortunately this aspect of the story (and its hypocritical nature because he seems to actually like insects) is never really developed at all.

THE COLLECTOR’s plot is mostly concerned with an ex-con named Arkin (Josh Stewart) who decides to rob a couple, Michael (Michael Riley Burke) and Victoria (Andrea Roth), for whom he has been doing window-work. The robbery is the result of multiple points of pressure put on Arkin, most noteably his from his bitchy ex-wife Lisa (Daniella Alonso). Arkin is presented as a generally good fellow who is willing to sit and play tea-party with the couple’s young daughter, Hannah (Karley Scott Collins). But then again, he is also willing to share a cigarette with their older, more sensual teenaged daughter, Jill (Madeline Zima).

The setup of Arkin connecting with the daughters is cynically in place so that he can later attempt to protect them. Michael and his self-botoxing wife Victoria are their throwaway parents that never really connect with the audience, even when they are screaming for their lives.

The film doesn’t really kick into gear until Arkin breaks into the house and starts working over the safe upstairs. The dressed-in-black, masked Collector has already been at the house for some time, however, torturing Michael and Victoria downstairs. He has also left a series of vicious booby traps throughout the house. How vicious? The chandelier is festooned with butcher knives, waiting to drop. There are also fish hooks dangling at eye level, and there is a thick patina of acid on one of the floors. Viewers will also have to wrap their heads around spring-loaded wires that wrap, drag, and throw victims into all sorts of trouble. Some of the depraved kills in THE COLLECTOR manage to one-up ugly exploitative films like SAVAGE STREETS. Oh, and that ominous traveler trunk is there too, thumping.

In truth, the amount of time to lay out all of these traps probably would have taken a construction crew a solid workweek to implement. Some of the shots within the house have so many wires crisscrossing the scenery that the effect is that of spiderwebs. This Collector guy has even added extra deadbolts to the doors.

If there is a hole in THE COLLECTOR, this would be it. Of course, knowing the writers of the SAW films, there probably isn’t just one Collector on the loose. We do at one point see the Collector (Master Trap Exterminator) in his exterminator garb earlier in the film, working on Michael and Victoria’s house with his face obscured by a ventilation mask. He seems to have an apprentice at this point. However, the inevitable sequel will have to straighten that question out.

The rest of the film is riveting. The second and third acts of THE COLLECTOR have been finely tuned to stress the viewer completely out. Finding and saving little Hannah is the main reason why Arkin chooses to stay in the house and put up with the Collector’s headgames. The shift Arkin makes from petty thief to the only possible savior this family has is fascinating.

Arkin is on the make for the goods in the safe for as long as he possibly can be. In the process, he takes some serious booby-trap damage. Meanwhile, the Collector inflicts some brutal torture-porn atrocities on those that he gets his hands on. There is a heavy amount of blood and creative splatter in this film, coupled with multiple reasons like Arkin’s midnight stolen-goods exchange meeting and a 9-1-1 call, for the viewer to want to know what time it is in the film. What lifts THE COLLECTOR out of the standard horror pile is the nonstop urgency of it all. Arkin has to keep quiet and play headgames of his own in order to stay one step ahead of the Collector, and truthfully, it is a hell of a lot of fun.

It is no mistake that Arkin’s showdown with the Collector smacks of Schwarzenegger’s screaming match against the alien in PREDATOR. THE COLLECTOR is alien in all respects. He has no fear, and I put this on the policeman’s neck he snaps. He is completely remorseless. He is also a weirdo. What the hell is a jarful of Madagascar cockroaches supposed to do if held to a wound and then heated up with a lighter? No idea, but this is how the Collector likes to get down. It is as if he is actually some form of an insect. The spider motif that is running through the film (multiple scenes are built around spiders crawling in various places and the “webs” that people need to avoid) obviously fits the bill, but a little more on the Collector’s arachnid obsession would have driven this point home perfectly. The closest that we get to this truth is when the Collector eyes a spider in the rafters of the basement and then lets it out of a window. This is his only moment of tenderness in the whole film.

The Collector is a cruel badass, and Arkin rises up to the challenge and meets him with his own level of badassery. The parallel is a cool one. Who has the strongest will? THE COLLECTOR pits two seriously stubborn, flawed individuals against each other in a high-class mansion and lets them go at it. Some of the tactics are far from original (like the velociraptor fake-out from JURASSIC PARK), and other methods are bang-on, like Arkin’s “freshman pranking” of the Collector’s dog.

While there is a supreme lack of explanation as to what drives the perverse Collector to do what he does, there is no question that he is very good at it. There is also no question that this film is a testing step in the waters of a franchise. THE COLLECTOR has had a lot of underground press surrounding it and a limited theatrical release which has further stoked the curiosity fire. This is a film that had a lot of thought put into it. THE COLLECTOR is some solid horror entertainment, and when the imminent sequel drops, hopefully there will be more of an explanation of who this guy is and what he is all about.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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THE WOLFMAN - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-17T20:34:00.001-08:00

THE WOLFMAN – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

By: The Mad Hatter

THE WOLFMAN is a remake of the 1941 classic of the same name. It begins with an unseen monster ruthlessly kill a man in the woods. The man is Ben Talbot (Simon Merrells), and his death brings his brother Lawrence (Benicio del Toro) back home like the prodigal son. Lawrence needs to know how his brother died, especially after seeing the eccentric state of his father John (Anthony Hopkins) and the sorrow of his sister Gwen (Emily Blunt).

His search for the truth sends him to a gypsy camp. Moments before Lawrence can get answers, the camp is attacked (in pretty cool fashion, actually) by a primarily unseen beast. In an act of bravery, Lawrence saves a child and draws the beast, a werewolf, away. He is badly bitten on the neck but ultimately survives thanks to the gypsies. However before they bring him back to his father, they whisper among themselves about what they believe he will become.

Before long Lawrence is having nightmares. He’s also demanding Gwen leave for London, getting visited by a Scotland Yard inspector (Hugo Weaving), causing villagers to melt their silver spoons down into bullets, and getting an amazingly screwed up case of “father knows best,” all before the first full moon.

In case you didn't know, this movie was delayed like no tomorrow as the effects wizards tried to get the look of Wolfie just right. Well I don't know if they just threw in the towel or ran out of funding, but Fuzzy still doesn't look that hot. It's strange; nearly seventy years have gone by since Lon Chaney, and yet this wolfman doesn't look too much more believable. Hell, the werewolves in NEW MOON looked better than this creature who looks more like a hybrid of a gorilla and a sasquatch.

As if the effects weren't crummy enough, we get a cast who all must be feeling the credit crunch, since almost all of them do little more than look sad. They also look bewildered, constipated, or all of the above. Emily Blunt's accent changes with each scene which boggles the mind when one considers she's a Brit for starters. And then there's Anthony Hopkins doing his best Malcolm McDowell impression. I'm pretty darned sure this is his worst performance ever, and I'm the guy who saw INSTINCT. He's subscribed to the Walken School of Ignoring Punctuation, but unlike Saint Christopher, he can't pull it off.

There's some pretty darned good talent at work in THE WOLFMAN, but I have to believe that the highest paid of all of them was composer Danny Elfman. The only reason I can think of for his textbook scary movie score to be played so freakin' loud all movie long is that it cost the filmmakers so much to get him to do it. This is actually a pity because THE WOLFMAN did have a few good scenes, and unfortunately, all the tension is removed from them by the furious strings coming from the score.

Perhaps the only good thing that could come of the silliness that is THE WOLFMAN is that Hollywood might take it as a cue that movies that scared our grandparents are "ooga-boogas" from a bygone era and just don't adapt very well. Argue amongst yourselves on the merit of Coppola's DRACULA and Branagh's FRANKENSTEIN, but for me this is the final nail. It gave me a laugh here and there, and did provide one especially good kill, but none of that was enough to change my opinion that this movie is nothing but an immense waste of time and money.

-The MAD HATTER

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BLACKING UP and director ROBERT CLIFT - A BADASS INTERVIEW

2010-02-16T21:29:00.000-08:00

BLACKING UP and director ROBERT CLIFT - A BADASS INTERVIEW

BLACKING UP is a documentary that will make you think. A shorthand view of what is presented is basically the effect of hip-hop on white American society and a querying of the concept of “white rappers.” There is also an incisive look at the posture of hip-hop within white American culture, and a rather complete takedown of the word, “wigger.” I watched it several weeks ago and wrote up a review of it here: http://mediasaurs.blogspot.com/2010/01/blacking-up-badass-documentary-review.html.

But I still had questions regarding the film and the concepts behind it, so I was fortunate enough to secure BLACKING UP’s director Robert Clift for a follow-up interview. This is a man that has thought the subject all the way through. His responses below are rather fascinating.

What was the inspiration behind tackling this touchy subject?

The idea for the film came after moving to Bloomington, IN to start graduate school at Indiana University. I was living in an on-campus apartment with other graduate students, right next to 3 fraternities. IU is what people call a “dry campus,” which basically means people hide their drinking a bit more than on other campuses. Because of this, most of the frat parties seemed to be indoors. But one day, toward the end of the Spring semester, one of the frats had a party outside that was very, very loud. I looked out my window and there were about 100 people, a podium set up, a dj, some very large speakers, a bunch of kegs, those red drinking cups and banners announcing that it was that particular fraternity’s “annual hip-hop battle.” The scene struck me; it probably wouldn’t today, but it did then. I had never seen a hip-hop event made up almost entirely of white people. Wow, I thought, all these white kids in the middle of Indiana, 30 minutes from the alleged birthplace of the KKK, listening to hip-hop on a sunny spring day. I wanted to know more. . . . . So I grabbed my camera and went over to the battle. When I got through the crowd and to the podium, the finalists were on stage. One was white and one was black. It was like the setting for the ending of “8 Mile,” except the racial dynamics were totally inverted. Instead of a mostly black crowd with a black emcee as the crowd favorite—and with the underdog, Eminem, overcoming the racial obstacles to beat the black emcee—the crowd was mostly white with a white emcee as the crowd favorite and a black emcee that was trying to win over the racial animosity of the white crowd. The results were also the opposite of the movie – not only did the black battler not overcome the racialized sides of the audience as Eminem did but played right into it, almost starting a huge fight and causing the crowd to jeer at him when he accused the white battler of wanting to be black. It got pretty tense. The crowd didn’t think it was fair for the black rapper to bring race into the battle. It was fine to talk about women and mothers and penises, but not about race. So that pretty much ended up being the footage I used to raise money for the film, and it’s also the footage that is at the opening of the film. Through all the editing, that footage—the first footage I shot—stayed there, at the top of the film. It works the same in the film as it did for me, as a way in to the film’s issues.

White kids rapping is by definition subversive to white middle class social conventions and decorum. How much of this concept is explored in your film?

White kids rapping can be subversive, but it’s not inherently so. In many cases, it plays right into race, class, and gender hierarchies. But the question of when it is subversive and when it is not, of what the white hip-hop fan or performer means, politically speaking, is what the whole film is about. It’s central to the film. Is it, as you asked, subversive? If so, when? In what circumstances and why? Those questions are treated throughout the film. And in a way where they can’t be simply dismissed as either-or, yes-or-no. There’s too much happening, I think, for people to easily take a one size fits all position, which is not to say that some cases don’t seem pretty clear. Still, I tried to incorporate a variety of perspectives—people with different motives and completely different relationships to hip-hop—so people had to think about the distinctions between them. They’re not all the same, and I think it’s important, if we are not going to be tone-deaf to how race works in this country, to think about those differences.

How long was your production?

The bulk of the shooting was in 2004–2005. I did most of the editing in 2006. After that the film sat on the shelf for a few years waiting for people’s nerves at PBS to calm a bit after the FCC’s fining rampage following Justin Timberlake and Janet Jackson’s “wardrobe malfunction” at the 2005 Super Bowl. http://www.current.org/fcc/fcc0613indecency.shtml. It seemed like everyone was getting fined. Even Martin Scorcese’s documentary about the blues brought down a fine on one station.

What was your budget?

Much smaller than needed. This is why I ended up, in most circumstances, running camera, doing sound, setting up lighting, and eventually doing most of the editing. When I did have help, it was great. Matthew Nauser did great camera work. Danny Hill was great with organizing shoots. In Bloomington a number of very talented students of mine helped. Also a fellow graduate student, Matthew Guschwan.

What equipment did you use on your production (cams/mikes)?

The main camera was Panasonic’s first version of the DVX100, a Sennheiser wireless lav mic, a boom mic, a tripod, and a scattered mix of cheap, half-functioning, lighting set-ups. I acquired equipment as funding became available so the shooting got better as the production went on. At first, I just had the camera and wireless mic, and no light or boom mic. For most of the interviews, I just put the camera on a tripod and let it run so I could focus on the interviewing.

Can you give us a thumbnail sketch of your other film STEALING HOME: THE CASE OF CUBAN BASEBALL?

Well, Stealing Home played on PBS in 2001. It’s a film that uses baseball to look at politics, both in Cuba and in Cuba’s relationship with the United States. Almost everything we hear about Cuban baseball in the United States focuses on the individual player, how much he could make in the Major Leagues, how little he makes in Cuba, how he has to ride bicycles to practice, how he might compare to other Major League players, how it’s a shame that we (US spectators) can’t see him play on TV (for an American Major League team). It’s all so absurdly one-sided that it seemed impossible not to ask, what happens to baseball in Cuba if all the players are mined for talent? Is there not a league there, with spectators, with announcers, with coaches, with a whole infrastructure, that would be sitting at home watching the US Major Leagues? Is that fair? Would baseball in Cuba then resemble baseball in the Dominican Republic? What is baseball like in the Dominican Republic? It all becomes political very fast, with tensions between the individual and the collective, between American interests and Cuban interests, between Major League Baseball and La Liga Nacional Cubana, all playing out through baseball.

Every production has a crazy story, what was the craziest story in your production of BLACKING UP?

The “wardrobe malfunction” at the 2005 Super Bowl. I never thought something like that would affect me. When it happened, I thought the whole thing was kind of funny. It ended up making it very difficult to even make a documentary about hip-hop and had me sitting on the fence for a long time just waiting for the climate to change. That one event, in the middle of the Super Bowl and with Justin Timberlake and Janet Jackson, ended up changing the landscape of television for years. That still amazes me.

Where do you see yourself going in regards to film after BLACKING UP?

I’m writing my dissertation for the Department of Communications and Culture at Indiana University, Bloomington. I also just finished directing another documentary, with Hillary Demmon, called Road Comics: Big Work on Small Stages. It was part of a collaboration with an Anthropology Professor at IU, Susan Seizer, who served as the film’s producer and whose research was the foundation for the film. The film stars three comedians who work the Midwest comedy circuit: Tim Northern, Stewart Huff, and Kristin Key. I’m waiting on news of how the film will be distributed, but I’ll be sure to spread the word when I know more.
BLACKING UP is playing through the next month on PBS. Check your local channel’s schedule for times and dates.

-Mediasaurus Rex

Read the original review of BLACKING UP here

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DAYBREAKERS - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-11T22:15:00.001-08:00

DAYBREAKERS – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

A good horror film should stay with you for the rest of your life. It doesn’t need to be too gross or too offensive; what it needs to do is force you to consider concepts and realities that you haven’t thought about. Good horror is a vehicle that takes me to a bent town that I haven’t been to before. However DAYBREAKERS took me to a town called, “I have seen this movie already only done better.” Sticking with the metaphor, DAYBREAKERS took me to a pedestrian ghetto outside of a rather original town named BLADE 2.

Both BLADE 2 and DAYBREAKERS are about vampire mutations. Both films contain varying degrees of para-military vampire-ops that handle their business with state of the art, military-grade weaponry. Both films feature a reluctant vampire. Both films also prefer the flash-burn explosion of any killed vampire. Furthermore, the ripoff of BLADE 2 is completely obvious in the first scene of DAYBREAKERS in which a young vampire girl writes her suicide note and then goes out to kneel before the rising sun. She lets off a raw, dying-animal squeal as she flames, disintegrates and collapses in a glowing heap of golden ashes.

Next we meet Edward Dalton (Ethan Hawke) who is invisible in the side-view mirror of his car. The year is 2019, and vampires now rule the earth. There are a few humans, but they are being rounded up because the vampire population is starving from a lack of blood. Dalton is the chief hematologist of the Bromley Marks Blood Bank. He works directly under the blood-for-profit man himself, Charles Bromley (Sam Neill).

The majority of the film chronicles the insidious evils of Bromley himself and his Bromley Marks Blood Bank. The remaining findable humans have been pricked and neatly seated upright, naked, pale, and bleeding out on huge shimmering, sterile columns. What is dripping down is the last of the world’s blood supply.

Dalton is in charge of finding a synthetic blood substitute. He is on top of his game, but he hasn’t cracked the code yet. A test subject takes a sample dose of the latest attempt, and his temperature increases eight degrees. Then he suddenly projectile-vomits a geyser on the chest of a nearby nurse, his face rapidly blemishes and pustulates, there is a false beat of sanity, and then his head pops like a blood-filled surgeon’s glove.

If this isn’t enough of a problem, Dalton also has a gung-ho brother named Frankie (Michael Dorman) who is in the neo-vampire military hunting down humans. Frankie’s contrived, refound humanity much later in the film is treacley-sweet and just as vomit inducing.

On the whole, vampire society is crumbling. Graves are dug up and punk-vamp kids suck on corpses looking for blood. A Bromley Marks slideshow presented to both Dalton and Bromley demonstrates that as vampires starve out, they lose their intelligence and take on the classic physical traits of NOSFERATU.

As mentioned above, humans are the tiny, hunted minority in this future. There is a TERMINATOR/ MATRIX/ ROAD WARRIOR interlude with a resistance faction of humans. But it is frail. This aspect of the film is weak when we first meet these people right down to the point where these people get taken out. It isn’t a spoiler for me to tell you that they get smoked because they are nothing more than whispers of cliché, throwaway characters you have seen in better movies. These poor bastards might as well be introduced onscreen with laser scope dots on their foreheads.

Dalton does manage to run across some humans who have found a way to cure vampirism. Elvis (Willem DaFoe) is a former vampire who has become human again thanks to a serious, sun-scorch treatment that smacks the vampire out of you. Clearly DaFoe is an actor that could do anything. He could have pulled off THE WRESTLER; I am sure of it. Why did he choose to saddle himself with a role that requires a weak southern accent that sounds eerily like Slim Pickens as O.L.D. BOB in THE BLACK HOLE? Why is he dropping cornball lines like, “I do love a good barbecue,” and “We’re the folks with the crossbows”?

Hawke’s Dalton is also guilty of trite, throwaway lines. When he utters, “I can’t remember what its like to be human,” Hawke’s not even trying to work for his paycheck.

Part of the issue here is that we have currently blown out the walls in movies, television, music, and literature with vampire market oversaturation. There is nothing new or original in the concept. DAYBREAKERS makes the anemic reach for the reversal of the lame, vampire movie plague, but the result feels like a drunken, five minute noodling with the script of the superior (yet flawed) BLADE 2. There is not a moment in this film that doesn’t seem completely staged, prepped or under some sort of off-camera duress.

If there is anything remotely amusing about this film, it has to do with the shape of this futuristic vampire society. Chain-smoking is the norm. Extra blood-shots are currently not available at the local corporate coffee shop. Also, there are sun-screening domestic Chryslers that squawk “UV warning” in that same know-it-all voice that seems to accompany all futuristic vehicles. The police presence is pronounced, and people with pointed teeth and ridiculously colored contact lenses are everywhere.

The society is amusing but unconvincing. DAYBREAKERS plays it close and keeps its societal vampire musing within the confines of Edward Dalton’s immediate life. The scope of world-wide vampire infestation is never remotely realized in this film. It is only mentioned and then assumed.

With two slight twists involving corporate skullduggery and re-humanized blood, DAYBREAKERS grinds out its last act with Elvis and company driving into the future in a SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT car with “From the ashes spring new life,” hick-decaled on the side. “We have a cure, we can change you back, It’s not too late,” is what Dafoe’s voiceover trails out with.

This film would be perfect if it was running a metaphor about our loss of humanity within society. It would be worth poring over if it was about the loss of the world’s moral compass and the few people left who wish to fight for some shred of decency in a damned culture. If the metaphor extended to the Bromley Marks Blood Bank as a warning about certain businesses and banks and how these monopolies are, in essence, causing us as a society to cannibalize ourselves, the film would be worthwhile. The corpses of the bodies of the dead vampires engulfed in flames could speak to society’s latent fear of death, whether the end of existence or the beginning of life as a slave in hell. Sadly, none of these weightier points could possibly be housed on a carriage as weak as DAYBREAKERS. Forget about this trash. Trust me, after I post this review, I will be doing my best to do just that.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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WOMEN IN TROUBLE - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-10T21:31:00.000-08:00

WOMEN IN TROUBLE - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

WOMEN IN TROUBLE is a busy, interconnected, offensive slab of exploitation written and directed by Sebastian Guiterrez. Guiterrez knows his exploitation well. This is the man who penned the screenplay for SNAKES ON A PLANE. He has also penned other cheeseball classics like GOTHIKA, THE BIG BOUNCE, and THE EYE. With such a lame resume, one has to wonder how he secured an actress like Carla Gugino for the starring role as Electra Luxx, a pregnant pornstar. One also has to wonder how he has secured Gugino for the sequel to TROUBLE which will be called ELECTRA LUXX. Oh wait, Gugino is Guiterrez’ girlfriend in real life.

Other well-known stars round out this film’s tedious gridwork plot such as Josh Brolin and Elizabeth Berkley, but this is Gugino’s show, and she does well with it. In fact, Gugino’s acting happens to be the brightest aspect of TROUBLE. The rest of the film is more or less a loquacious, deep pondering on all things trashy with a strong Virgin Mary theme.

TROUBLE starts with a nun staring into the camera. The background is dark, and the nun is framed in what appears to be a confessional booth. She bows her head as if to go to prayer. However this is not a nun but a porn star named Electra Luxx (Carla Gugino), and she is not in a confessional but a jail cell set in the middle of a porn shoot. Before Luxx, Holly Rocket (Adrianne Palicki), and some guy named El Capitan (Ermahn Ospina) are able to give this jailhouse set its sexual perspective, Luxx’s phone rings. The news is that she is pregnant. A quick, stylistic visual montage expresses Luxx’s feelings on the subject which are akin to a nuclear holocaust.

Luxx later finds herself in a stalled elevator with Doris (Connie Britton) who is in the middle of some strange cellphone wranglings with her sister Addy (Caitlin Keats). These two spend the bulk of the film in varying stages of undress, conversing in this elevator. It is this point of the film where the classic multi-player template from better films like Robert Altman’s SHORT CUTS or even Lawrence Kasdan’s GRAND CANYON begins. What is at play is the fact that all of the characters that are later introduced are interconnected in some way. It is a flashy editing job, but most of these characters are sporting varying degrees of despicable, and it is hard to connect with them.

Holly Rocket is an up and coming porn star who has vomiting issues when performing cunnilingus. Holly also has a tendency to be hit by cars. She is presented as the ditzy porn-star/hooker with a heart of gold. She does know her higher math though, but this seems like more of a strange scripting fluke than an actual development of her character. Holly is sexually attracted to a “working girl” named Bambi (Emmanuel Chirqui).

Maxine McPherson (Sarah Clarke) is a therapist who’s husband Travis (Simon Baker) is sleeping with her client Addy. Addy is the sister of Doris who is stuck in an elevator with Electra Luxx. Addy runs into Holly and Bambi, and they all go to a “dyke bar” run by Rita (Rya Kihlstedt).

Meanwhile there is a subplot featuring the musician Nick Chapel (Josh Brolin with a dirty British accent). Ground zero holding all of this garbage together is Charlotte (Isabella Guiterrez) who is a thirteen year old that can see through the piles of BS all of the adults in her vicinity are shoveling at her. Charlotte also likes to pretend that she is smoking cigarettes, but there is no real explanation for her behavior other than the fact that she is definitely imbalanced.

Such a gnarled plot with minced editing and nonstop, uncomfortable introductions to characters who may or may not matter would be tolerable if there was a payoff to be had. But on top of this comes a torrent of behaviors and lifestyle-choices specifically geared to get under your skin. One example is Electra’s creepy sales pitch for a plastic vagina molded after her own that is a top seller.

Rapid-fire, quirky dialogue is one thing this film has going for it. If one were to take a second viewing of this film, the dialogue would still deliver. One-liners and witticisms are constant and rather inventive although not particularly funny.

TROUBLE is a lot of work to get through. Initially it is a serious task to stay on top of the references and sub-references in order to determine the connections between all of the characters. And TROUBLE never realizes completely where it is going. It jettisons itself off in a particular direction and then proceeds to drift and sink. At the midway-point where the script’s neurotic learning curve is mastered, there is no prize for unraveling the puzzle. The trickery afoot is that the viewer is supposed to feel some form of accomplishment because of the mental reconnaissance that this film requires. Regrettably the payoff is barren. With a sequel in the works, perhaps the payoff will come around later. At this point, WOMEN IN TROUBLE is flat, flat, flat. If you want some fun modern exploitation without a lot of pontificating moralization, stick with lighter fare like BITCH SLAP.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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BULLETFACE and director ALBERT PYUN - A BADASS INTERVIEW

2010-02-09T21:24:00.000-08:00

BULLETFACE and director ALBERT PYUN – A BADASS INTERVIEW

I first noticed director Albert Pyun’s name back in 1989 when I watched CYBORG at an East Texas hellhole theater. The movie went on to become one of my all-time favorites. This wasn’t his first film though. His 1982 film, THE SWORD AND THE SORCERER, is the first project that put him on the map, and he has been making his mark ever since.

Pyun has racked up a formidable syllabus of films as director. Some are notorious, like CAPTAIN AMERICA (1990), and others are cult favorites like MEAN GUNS, BRAIN SMASHER, and NEMESIS. Along the way Pyun has worked with the best in the business. Currently he is gearing up for the DVD release of his latest project BULLETFACE. IMDB gives this summary of the storyline:

Bulletface is about a dirty Federal Agent (Victoria Maurette), who's busted and imprisoned in Mexico. She's given a 60 hour furlough to return to Brownsville, Texas to bust up the drug cartel who set her up and are about to bring a new, highly addictive drug to market. The drug is made from human spinal fluid...tapped from the living.

I was lucky enough to secure some of Albert’s time and ask him some questions about his experiences and his latest film.

What do you feel is, hands down, the best movie you have made in your career?

I think the film that came closest to my vision of it was MEAN GUNS. I think INVASION and LEFT FOR DEAD are interesting, but the budget restraints prevented them from really working well for a broad-based audience. I also think BRAINSMASHER. . . . A LOVE STORY, DOWN TWISTED, DECEIT, OMEGA DOOM, and POSTMORTEM are flawed, but I am more [or] less satisfied how they came out. I made some poor choices, and if I could go back and refine, I would. I loved my director's cuts of CYBORG and ADRENALIN: FEAR THE RUSH. They could have been my best films instead of the films they are now . . . or maybe not. I think my director's cuts of CAPTAIN AMERICA and TICKER are far superior to the release versions.

Is it true that you trained under Akira Kurosawa, and if it is, how would you describe your relationship with him?

Brief. Language (I spoke no Japanese) was a problem. And I was very young. Eighteen. Most of my time was spent with his brilliant DP, Takao Saito and the production staff at Mifune Productions. I worked quite a bit with Toshiro Mifune. Working in Japan certainly taught me discipline and stamina. They worked fourteen days straight, then a day off, then another fourteen days straight. Everyday was like a seventeen hour shoot day. The crew would sleep at the studio because there wasn't time to go home. Very tough. But no one complained, and everyone was highly motivated and tireless.

What is the best production you have worked on in your career?

Oh, that's hard to say. I've certainly gone through a lot of bad situations but just as many great ones. I tend to work with the same people over and over, and we're all very loyal to each other. The best situation under horrendous circumstances was probably my upcoming TALES OF AN ANCIENT EMPIRE. Where I felt everyone, including me, was in sync and doing our best work. DOWN TWISTED was great as well. We got a lot of help from the PREDATOR production which was shooting in Mexico at the same time. Thanks for those lenses!

What was the worst?

Geez. There are clearly a couple at the very tippy top of the list, but I need to be discreet. Maybe after I retire I can answer that in detail. I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. But I can say I worked with three of the worst people I've ever met between 2000 and 2004. My Axis of Evil.

You have worked with just about every major action movie star; who is your favorite?

I don't know. You don't really think of it in terms of favorites but how they worked with the film in making it work. Each has a different style, from Van Damme to Sheen to Hauer and Seagal. They bring different things and have different working styles. The funniest [were] Burt Reynolds and Christopher Lambert. The most generous was Seagal. The most creatively challenging, Hauer. The most technically amazing was Charlie Sheen. But I've really enjoyed collaborating with them all. Van Damme was very hard-working. And I must say that Robert Patrick, Rob Lowe, Ice T, Snoop Dogg, [and] Tom Sizemore were all really fun to work with. I especially enjoyed watching Dennis Hopper, Teri Hatcher and Thomas Jane work. They were mesmerizing. Recently I've had the pleasure, after a few attempts, of working with Michael Pare', and he was a great gift as was his co-star Clare Kramer who is one of the very best actors I've ever had a chance to work with. She's incredible.

How long have you been in production for BULLETFACE?

Two years. It was shot in 2007 and was in heavy post until mid 2008. Then I went off to shoot ROAD TO HELL and TALES OF AN ANCIENT EMPIRE before finishing the film. I just wasn't satisfied with some of the dramatic underpinning that the story hangs on until I met producer Joe Baile in August 2009. He helped me find the solution to the problem I was having. He and Howie Askins co-directed additional sequences in September 2009, and we did the final edit and post-sound work in December. Adam Benson and Ikuo Saito, two amazing digital effects artists, added a number of enhancing effects shots in early January, and we finished everything up on Jan 30.

What was the budget for BULLETFACE?

About $120,000, more or less. It was done more like an indy art film although its probably one of my most mainstream and straightforward films. But definitely the most sexually graphic film I've ever done. Shot in five and a half days.

Every movie has a crazy production story (something strange happening behind the scenes). What is the craziest production story you have for BULLETFACE?

Well, the most frustrating was the HD camera had a bad pixel in its sensor so we had to fix over 100,000 frames. That pushed us to the brink of insanity.

We have heard that you are really pushing the boundaries with BULLETFACE. Can you give us some insight into that?

Just in the depiction of the brutality and sexual aggression towards women in some not well-supervised prisons and how that changes a woman. In this case, Victoria Maurette as the character "Dara". There are explicit sexual and bi-sexual scenes, so that was a departure for me. Most of the scenes are filtered through sexual desires, conflicts and sexual histories.

You have worked with Randall Fontana, the writer of BULLETFACE in the past, would you consider BULLETFACE a departure from both of your normal styles? If so how?

Yes, in terms of the sexual component -the amount of raw nudity and aggressive sex. That's a big change as well as the straightforward coherent storytelling. I really wanted to tell a contemporary noir story in a very creative and the most lurid way possible--to capture the jackhammer storytelling and characterizations of pulp novels and magazines. Sensationalistic and where every beat is almost melodramatically striking.

It was good to have contact with a director whose work I have been following for so long. Ever since the first hearing whispers of BULLETFACE online, I have been clicking reload looking for more information. The story sounds intriguing and from what I have been able to ascertain, promises to be something different.

Look for BULLETFACE coming to DVD this February.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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THE INFORMANT! - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-06T22:46:00.001-08:00

THE INFORMANT! – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

It is great to know that Steven Soderbergh is willing to come correct after his actorless spirit-killer, THE GIRLFRIEND EXPERIENCE. Unfortunately, he is still signing on to directing projects with weak plots. This time around he is dragging the waters of the “based on real events” realm of moviemaking. There is even an artistic license disclaimer at the beginning stating that the characters are composites, and the dialogue has been touched. THE INFORMANT! is carried solely by the quality of acting in the film, especially that of Matt Damon.

Damon plays Mark Whitacre, a corporate whistle-blower who is in way over his head. Damon’s performance is captivating. He has put on the extra pounds around the middle, grown a fireman’s moustache, and mastered some twitches that come off as intelligent yet imbalanced. Damon’s performance is initially zany, but the off-kilter pacing of the film and general lack of plot make the Whitacre character less and less amusing as the film wears on.

The general plot of THE INFORMANT! concerns the FBI investigation of corporate extortion and international price-fixing crimes involving ADM, a corn-processing company. Mark Whitacre (Matt Damon) is the vice president who reveals to his bosses that he’s received a corporate extortion demand for ten million dollars. His bosses (against Whitacre’s better judgement) bring the FBI into the mix. Whitacre’s home phone lines are tapped, and at the prompting of his wife Ginger (Melanie Lynskey), Whitacre tells Agent Shepard (Scott Bakula) about ADM’s price fixing schemes.

The rest of the film features a lot of unnecessary globe-trotting to sit-down meetings where Whitacre wears a wire and also compiles hundreds of secret recordings documenting corporate malfeasance. The travels that are presented onscreen, from Zurich to Mexico City to Tokyo to Paris, are all unremarkable because they merely feature hotel meetings and waiting areas in airports.

When Whitacre finally manages to accumulate enough damning evidence against ADM, he envisions himself helming the company now that he has managed to clean up the crime. He even adopts the G-manspeak when telling others of his exploits. But Whitacre’s delusion is apparent to everyone but himself. There is no question that Whitacre is a dazzlingly intelligent man; he is just so full of eccentric narcissism that a lot of what he says and does falls short of rationality.

THE INFORMANT! is a sophisticated “talkie.” There are no guns, explosions, or fists to the head. There are some pretty shots, but what is communicated in the film could have been done in a radio show or a dramatic podcast for that matter. This is a film completely concerned with the words that are being spoken and not the action happening onscreen. All of the codes to be unraveled in THE INFORMANT! are verbal.

The film presents a shell-game for the viewer to suss out; sadly the answer is rather unremarkable. When the last ten minutes of the film give the answer to the whole story, it becomes a lesson in unfair scriptwriting. Soderbergh and screenplay writer Scott Z. Burns have chosen to present half-truths and obscured facts in order to bloat and float the plot. They further bog the story down with extraneous jargon and business rhetoric in order to maximize their 100-plus minutes of runtime.

What makes this film feel like more than simply a quirky, wordy documentary are the comedic AMERICAN PSYCHOesque musings of Whitacre in voice-over. Whether he is considering the syllable count of the word “pen” in German or the potential maximizing of time by flossing his teeth and conditioning his hair simultaneously in the shower, it is all amusingly left-field and captivating. Another tangent that Whitacre indulges in has to do with expensive clothing and high-end automobiles. Most unsettling is Whitacre’s sinister thoughtlife that has to do with suddenly dropping dead. Elements of this and Whitacre’s constant fidgeting create a tension that suggests that the THE INFORMANT! is headed toward a violent conclusion.

THE INFORMANT! is basically an exercise in finding the truth about Whitacre and his employers. There is a parade of familiar faces on the way to such truth. The dumpy comedian Patton Oswalt plays Agent Herbst of the FBI’s “economic crimes division.” Clancy Brown of STARSHIP TROOPERS and SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION also plays a corporate heavy lawyer named Aubrey Daniels. The performances of all are strong.

The red herrings that pile up become elements of comedy, and the ground of logic in the plot is continually shifting. Idiosyncratic behavior rules this film, and it isn’t just Damon’s character. The film looks at corporate incompetence and crime through a peculiar lens that playfully skewers the FBI, corporate culture, the American public and anyone who has ever fallen for a Nigerian ponzi scheme.

THE INFORMANT! nurtures the build-up towards full-disclosure of who this Whitacre character is and what he is all about. But when full-disclosure is finally reached, it is far from satisfying. By the time Whitacre feels that he can unveil “the master puppeteer” behind all of the wrongdoings in the story, the film has already worn out its welcome. The interest level in the characters has waned, and the plot is obviously extending itself, abusing the audience by holding basic facts from them. THE INFORMANT! achieves feature-length by padding itself with counterproductive or trite details. It would have worked better as a bizarre, hour-long documentary on the History Channel.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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THE MESSENGER - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-05T22:32:00.000-08:00

THE MESSENGER – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

The similarities between Kathryn Bigelow’s HURT LOCKER and Oren Moverman’s THE MESSENGER are perplexing. Jeremy Renner and Ben Foster (the leading roles in both films) look pretty much the same at a distance. They are both named William. Both are tow-headed young men who like heavy metal and hard drinking. Lastly, the muted emotional notes presented by both protagonists trying to keep a lid on their own personal holocausts seem pulled from the same template. The stories work in tandem so well that viewing them both would work on double-feature night. Lamentably, the preachiness of THE MESSENGER comes across as a color-by-numbers, cliché presentation of emotional suffering rather than something substantial.

THE MESSENGER starts with a wounded Sergeant named Will Montgomery (Ben Foster) looking into the lights over his hospital bed. There is a scar under his eye, and the camera makes sure that we see his war injury. It is no mistake that these hospital lights are reminiscent of ceiling fans or that the clanging guitar notes in the background are reminiscent of Jim Morrison’s THE END, all elements of Coppola’s APOCALYPSE NOW.

The comparison of the war in Iraq to Vietnam is made multiple times in THE MESSENGER. However, as Captain Tony Stone (Woody Harrelson) mentions, at least there was sex in Vietnam. As he point out, these soldiers in Iraq have no brothel to go to and “all of the religious bullshit, the crusades and jihad and nobody getting laid! I mean that right there is half the reason why everybody’s so angry!”

The Captain Stone way of looking at life provides a serious spine to this film. Sexual dysfunction of soldiers is a running theme. Captain Stone’s driving force seems to be sexual. He spends his time at the bar as a recovering alcoholic, drinking hot water and tea with lemon while ogling the barmaid.

Will’s problem is a little more complex. He has a strange sexual hook-up with his soon-to-be-married ex-girlfriend Kelly (Jenna Malone) but isn’t ready to commit to anything. Kelly’s tryst with Will has to do with checking the pulse of their old relationship. The scenes that Kelly and Will share together are so painfully incompetent on a social level it is a wonder that they ever functioned as a couple.

A similar level of painful incompetence is also presented with Will’s new military assignment as part of a “casualty notification team.” This new, thankless position requires that he notify civilian families about their loved ones who have died in action. Will is placed directly under the tutelage of Stone who is all about the cold-blooded, by-the-book method. Stone’s heartless delivery of news from the battlefield and the reactions he gets from those he notifies are truly heart-wrenching. Stone proceeds to try to mold Will into another son of hell like himself, but Will, though battle-scarred and cynical, still has a heart.

One of Stone’s most serious rules is to not have any physical interaction with the N.O.K. (next of kin). This specific rule becomes a point of contention between the two. Will is prone to offering an understanding hand on the shoulder. The situation is made even more complex when he finds himself attracted to a widow he notifies.

Foster’s performance of Will is so reserved and guarded that it is hard to make a connection with this character or know where he stands on just about any issue. However, at least Foster attempts to humanize Will. Renner’s William James from THE HURT LOCKER never lowers his guard as much as Foster’s Will does.

Will’s treatment of Kelly and his berating of a military mechanic are obvious symptoms of some seriously stunted social skills. When assigned to the casualty notification team, Will cites himself as never having received grief counseling or being in a position to give it. Will has demons, the kind of demons that need a well-scripted expulsion. With the portrayal of Will as cloaked as it is, the catharsis really needs to be visible. Unfortunately for the viewer, the exorcism presented is in the form of a cliché band-aid.

Captain Stone has problems of his own. His teetotaling stance on life is sidelined for long, drunken carousing sessions with Will during which Stone and Will proceed to draw closer and closer in a distant, manly fashion, each subtly bringing their own personal dysfunctions to the table for dissection. Unfortunately, a lot of the dissection feels forced.

When Will and Stone tear a guilt-ridden verbal strip out of a highway patrolman for pulling them over, it feels rehearsed. Their drunken game of total warfare role-play in a parking lot also feels strangely false. The glimpse into their world of pain feels stilted. There is also emptiness at this film’s core. Emptiness and distance are presented through the lives of Will, Stone, and how they interact with each other and the people around them.

The scenes that really feel sincere, like the scene in which Dale Martin (Steve Buscemi) is informed that his son was taken out by snipers or the scene in which Will smashes holes in the wall as he wrestles with his feelings for Kelly, are overshadowed by scenes that feel contrived. An example of this would be the heartless, cynical conversation Stone has with a one-night stand of his in which they both flippantly tell each other to “have a nice life.”

THE MESSENGER isn’t quite “must-see viewing.” It is flawed but not completely disfigured. If there is one reason that should be cited for seeing it, that reason would have to be the performance of Woody Harrelson. This movie is essentially his show. When he is not onscreen you are waiting for him to return. It isn’t really possible to second-guess what the next thing coming out of his mouth will be or how he will react to virtually anything. Harrelson’s Stone isn’t even particularly likeable, but you can’t take your eyes off of him. His complexity as a character is staggering, and he upstages everyone else in every scene he is in. It is no surprise that Woody Harrelson is up for an Academy Award for his work in this film. Ever since NATURAL BORN KILLERS, he has been perfecting his “dangerous hillbilly” routine. Every twitch, every part of his swagger, and the way he grimaces when portraying anger are all charged with lethal amounts of unpredictable testosterone. Harrelson’s Captain Stone is a cocky, blunt man with unrealized dreams. His presentation of a man totally out of touch with his emotions is rather remarkable. Harrelson does a pitch-perfect job of displaying some superhuman bluster while slowly revealing the weak joints in Stone’s armor.

THE MESSENGER ends on a hopeful note, and this is what really sets it apart from THE HURT LOCKER. Will and Stone both manage to present and wrestle their demons within the parameters of the story. Unfortunately, the story is too simple. The idea of the adventures of a casualty notification team can only go so far. Within its simplicity also lies a disjointed presentation of human interactions. This should come as no surprise because director Oren Moverman also wrote the horribly disjointed and overwrought I’M NOT THERE. THE MESSENGER comes across as a well-acted, didactic note on the ramifications of the war in Iraq. Unfortunately, its lofty intentions are bogged down with an overwritten lack of sincerity.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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CRAZY HEART - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-02-02T21:24:00.000-08:00

CRAZY HEART – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

-By THE MAD HATTER

Amongst the many great songs in CRAZY HEART is one whose chorus says "Funny, I fall and it feels like flyin' for a little while."

I keep coming back to this lyric since the two sensations can indeed feel so close. In both cases the weight of the world gets lifted, and anything seems possible. However in life, one obviously shouldn't confuse the two since the end results couldn't possibly be more different.

CRAZY HEART is the story of Bad Blake (Jeff Bridges). Blake was once a big country star, but at 57 he's fallen on hard times. How hard? When the film opens we see Blake arriving to play the night's gig . . . in a bowling alley. To say Blake is down on his luck would be putting it mildly. The man is driving from gig to gig alone in his 1980 Suburban. He has no family, is staying in seedy motels, playing for food money, and essentially bleeds whiskey. Bad Blake has become the embodiment of every sad country song you've ever heard.

At one tour stop in Santa Fe, he is introduced to Jean Craddock (Maggie Gyllenhaal). She's a budding writer and asks Blake for an interview. When Blake agrees, her charm ends up disarming him, and he finds himself opening up far more than usual. As the interviews continue, the two develop a relationship, and soon enough Blake is finding reasons to double back to Santa Fe. Jean is enticed by the sudden life spark she can see in Blake but wary since he isn't exactly walking the line, and she's a single mom who has witnessed such behavior before.

In amongst all of this, Blake is having trouble dealing with the success of Tommy Sweet (Colin Farrell), a hotshot star of new country who he mentored to fame. Sweet has all the fame and fortune that Blake doesn't but not near the talent. Blake isn't quite seething with jealousy, but it's a bitter pill to swallow when your protégé is playing amphitheatres and you're playing bars.

Bridges gives a great performance in a good film. As Bad Blake, he embraces the grizzle of a life lived hard. From his posture to his voice, he embodies a man who has accepted a particular lot in life and really doesn't have the drive to make his own luck. It's amazing to watch him talk to fans and admirers since he smiles politely and speaks with warmth but always seems like he wants to cry from shame. Bridges takes the roughest elements of Kris Kristofferson and Merle Haggard and rolls them into one character. It is indeed an award-worthy performance.

The movie on the whole, however, is spotty. By the final act, the movie feels like a Frankenstein of a few other movies. Indeed, CRAZY HEART has elements of WALK THE LINE, HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH, and THE WRESTLER. The music scene is full of people like Blake, people who played songs we all know by heart but who are now playing a nightly gig at the Holiday Inn. CRAZY HEART is unfortunately not their story. In fact Blake's performing and songwriting get packed up and set aside for a good long while, and the story instead focuses on his relationship with Jean and her son.

This is especially sad since the music is one of the very best things about this movie. It's filled with original country songs created by Ryan Bingham and T-Bone Burnett, all of which have the appropriate amount of built-in sadness even when they are up-tempo. Each one sums up Bad Blake in ways he can't seem to say himself. If you listen closely enough, within the lyrics and chord changes you'll hear the story to every single line on Blake's face. It’s music you will want to download the moment the credits roll.

It saddens me that the waters of this story have been so muddied since all the elements of a truly great film are there. Much like the character of Jean, this film leads with its heart instead of its head, and that's where it goes wrong. It wants us to fall for the weary legend like a groupie on the side of the stage, but it’s one thing to fall for the star and a whole other thing entirely to fall for a tribute band covering the star. CRAZY HEART comes close, and features one of the best performances of the year, but when it's all over, the film doesn't fly. It falls.

-MAD HATTER

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MOON - A SPOILER-FREE, BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-01-31T20:41:00.001-08:00

MOON - A SPOILER-FREE, BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

MOON dropped last year and was an exclusive fanboy favorite for those “in the know” and those lucky enough to catch a screening. For those that weren’t so lucky, it is now on DVD for the consumption of the masses. This movie is a hard lesson on cynicism at the corporate level with a realistic, painfully human core. The story will grip you, but the slower pace of the film might alienate a lot of the film’s potential audience.

However the thoughtful, time-consuming pace of MOON actually helps cement its foot into the classic 60s and 70s sci-fi mold. Long, quiet moments in classic science fiction movies like SILENT RUNNING, 2001 A SPACE ODYSSEY, and television’s SPACE 1999 have always hinted at the spirit-breaking loneliness that people at remote space stations might experience.

MOON’s sets have that sterile white, traditional futuristic feel. The film is definitely lower-budget, but don’t let that distract you. MOON uses its claustrophobic sets to its advantage and tricks them out. Fuzzy dice even hang in the cockpit of one of the moon rovers. And Sam Rockwell’s portrayal of a miner on the moon named Sam Bell is nothing short of astonishing.

Those that are familiar with his work might think Rockwell would be out of his range with this role as a completely spiritually lost man on the moon. The two roles that he has done that stick out the most are his starring roles in CHOKE and as Chuck Barris in CONFESSIONS OF A DANGEROUS MIND. He does sleazy quirkiness convincingly, so well, in fact, that when he really starts to act in MOON, one can’t help but notice his evolution as an actor. He takes on a heavy, heavy load in this film and gets to present his character in varying levels of stress, managing to deliver a performance with different, complicated facets that all spring from the core of this Sam Bell character he is playing.

This film is set in a future in which all of the energy issues are solved by a product known as Helium-3, an energy source that is harvested on the moon. Sam Bell has signed on for a three-year shift on the dark side of the moon. His job is to monitor the harvesting process and send small courier ships back to Earth with the Helium-3 payload.

It is apparent immediately that there is something wrong with Sam. He eats his breakfast beans served in clear plastic packets and drinks his coffee, but he has stomach problems. Physically he looks sickly and off. Psychologically he is getting a bit frayed around the edges and is starting to hallucinate and talk to himself.

Still Sam continues to maintain the ominous, moon-dust spitting Helium-3 harvesters named Matthew, Mark and Luke. He only has two weeks left of this gig, and then he can get back to his wife and daughter on Earth. The information that Sam receives from his wife and from Lunar Industries’ corporate desk are all recordings. Sam is the only human on the moon at a base known as the “Sarang.” Adding to the stress is the lack of live contact with Earth. The live link has been on the fritz for as long as Sam has been on the moon.

Maintaining a level of sterile sanity in this film is the voice of Kevin Spacey for “Gerty.” Gerty watches over Sam like some sort of strange mechanical angel while monitoring the Helium-3 harvesting. Unlike 2001’s HAL, Gerty is genuinely concerned for Sam‘s welfare. Flashing various emoticons across its screen in order to convey its frame of mind, this robot negotiates the position of complex caregiver and small-talk companion. Gerty also knows about the inhumane corporate practices Lunar Industries employs to keep the moon base operable. Sam just needs to ask the right questions. Gerty, while definitely on Sam’s side, cites limited knowledge on what goes on outside of the base.

The movie turns when Sam wrecks his moon rover and wakes up in the infirmary under Gerty’s care. The wreck takes its toll on him, but the undefined sickness that Sam has been experiencing produces symptoms far worse than those caused by the slight rover accident. There are numerous scenes in which Sam spits blood, and for some reason his teeth are falling out. During this time we also see Sam in what seems to be top physical condition. Sam is both broken and fresh. As we learn more and more about Sam’s predicament, he does too.

MOON manages to show how much the corporation’s greed and focus on the bottom line play into the way it treats its employees. When Sam realizes exactly how expendable he really is, the revelation is akin to a nightmare that he can’t wake up from. Gerty manages to keep a level head in all of this, consoling Sam and ultimately explaining to him who he is and how he really fits into Lunar Industries’ moon-mining plan.

Paranoia mounts as Sam tries to find a way to contact Earth. When he learns that his signals are being deliberately jammed, he doubles his efforts. What Sam finds out directly before making his Earth contact and how he solves his numerous problems all make for some brilliant, heartbreaking storytelling. Sam has found himself in the center of a personal hell that his employers at Lunar Industries deliberately dropped him into. There is also a repair crew that is on their way, but these guys look more like a scruffy hit-squad than mechanics.

MOON is mostly about lost connections. It is also about the human urge to make such connections while being stymied by greedy men playing God. This film has captured the Zeitgeist of today, angst concerning the amorality of powerful corporations. The value of human life and how it could be completely discounted is also explored to a horrific, cynical conclusion. There is a shred of hope however, and the shred of hope saves this film from becoming the biggest bummer you will ever experience. The third act lags almost a half-hour too long, but MOON manages to leave its viewers with several dark and wonderful concepts to process.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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BLACKING UP - A BADASS DOCUMENTARY REVIEW

2010-01-27T22:18:00.000-08:00

BLACKING UP – A BADASS DOCUMENTARY REVIEW

BLACKING UP- HIP-HOP’S REMIX OF RACE AND IDENTITY is a hard hitting, hour-long documentary that asks the questions about America and more specifically, hip-hop that need to be asked. What is up with these white kids who think that they are black? Do they really think that they are black? Are rappers like Vanilla Ice and Eminem following the steps of Al Jolson, and deeper still, what the hell was Al Jolson doing anyway?

Robert A. Clift, the narrator/director of this ambitious documentary, successfully takes a serious chunk out of this subject matter and serves it up coherently. The topic is charged with deep emotion and conflict. Clift manages to present multiple aspects of the argument with an historical background, and he doesn’t shy away from the questions immediately at hand.

The documentary starts with a freestyle rap battle in Bloomington Indiana in front of the Alpha Phi Omega house at Indiana University. A young, white rapper named Automattic takes a series of racially inflammatory raps to the face regarding the notion that he shouldn’t be rapping because he is white. Directly after the assault, he nervously looks into the camera and says, “It ain’t nothing man. I forgot I was white.” Automattic then proceeds to deliver his rebuttal, charged with a slightly above average series of profanity-laced, crypto-homophobic rhymes. Clift’s voiceover then asks the question, “is this is the face of new racial understanding in white America, transcending racial stereotypes, or is it reinforcing an ugly history mimicking a degraded idea of what it means to be black?”

This is a question that really can’t be answered in a documentary no matter how long it is. The truth of homage vs. mockery with these white kids rapping boils down to individuals and their individual experiences. Comedian Paul Mooney sums up the idea of white people acting like they are black (or “blacking up”) as something that will go away if he “has a rope and a posse and starts hanging niggers again, and we’ll find out who’s white and who’s black.”

There is truth to Mooney’s stance, but there is also truth to the fact that some of these white rappers do indeed love and respect the music and the culture. Shouldn’t they be allowed such freedom of expression? BLACKING UP interrogates the racial boxes in which we find ourselves deposited.

It looks into how hip-hop has influenced dance routines at a typical white high school dance squad in southern Indiana. The responses of the girls in this troupe to interview questions are interesting and speak to the mainstreaming of hip-hop culture within white society. Their routines are accepted and not considered as something racially specific or even a part of some sort of negritude. The boundaries of hip-hop have broadened to a point where aspects of it are unremarkable within mainstream white society. However, Clift juxtaposes this with the high school experience of Andrea Van Winkle, another Indianan, in which she was referred to as a “nigger-lover” because of her baggy clothes and braided hair.

Potential questions regarding this subject matter are literally endless. Clift pushes hard for the truth. He even zeroes in on all-white rap parody bands like the offensively silly CRACKD OWT and the over-blinged TOO WHITE CREW in attempts to determine the line between minstrel show mockery and imitation as the highest form of flattery.

In regards to minstrelsy, a good portion of the documentary is dedicated to Al Jolson (the white actor who has been immortalized singing, “Mammy” in blackface). Modern white fans of Jolson’s work are interviewed and scrutinized. Are they closet-racists? Or are they people who actually appreciate the music sans its heavy racial overtones? Blackface performance is queried and examined. It is even posited that Jolson loved the black culture and didn’t find his proper voice until he was painted up to look like a black man. But like most of the subjects tackled, Jolson isn’t easily dismissed or completely defined. There are opinions in regards to the subject matter though, and Clift has secured some respectable voices to present their different takes on this social conundrum.

Clift lands screentime with the poet Amiri Baraka, the rapper Chuck D (PUBLIC ENEMY), Russell Simmons (co-founder of Def Jam Records), and Greg Tate (a gifted staff-writer for THE VILLAGE VOICE). In order to completely drive this controversial subject matter home, he even presents a rather ebullient Robert Van Winkle (aka Vanilla Ice) who speaks about his career and what it all meant.

BLACKING UP is more of a musing and meditation than a definitive, absolute answer to a complex question. Should white people “pay your dues” as Paul Mooney suggests? Or should they be free to sample and adopt whatever culture they see because as the dreadlocked white girls from the dancehall flavored rap group EMPIRE ISIS argue, they have the right to self-definition.

A striking note of the complex bassline of BLACKING UP is the use of the word “wigger” which means “white nigger.” The reactions of many people are recorded, and it is fascinating to see how such a word has penetrated our language and the power that it wields.

BLACKING UP is a powerful documentary that will force you to think. It doesn’t present an answer because in truth, there is no absolute answer. This is America, a smorgasbord of cultures interacting with each other daily. This film takes a significant part of the modern American experience and asks it some hard questions. It is some truly bold, must-see viewing.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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TRIANGLE - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-01-25T21:48:00.001-08:00

TRIANGLE - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

Herb West over at MyMavra.com told me quite some time ago to watch TRIANGLE. The film played at the 2009 FRIGHTFEST in London and got a lot of respect. I, however, felt no inspiration to see it whatsoever. Who names a movie after a three-sided shape you learn to draw before kindergarten? So I sat on it. When I got my hands on the screener, I sat some more. I did a little legwork and found out that it is a British horror film set somewhere in the ocean. The last time I’d seen one of those it was the horrible DONKEY PUNCH. Needless to say, the film had accumulated a patina of dust by the time Herb gave me the forceful prod to “just get it over with,” and I have come away from it more than impressed.

The most interesting thing about TRIANGLE is that it is damn near impossible to write a spoiler-free review. The film is one big spider web, and each filament leads to a serious spoiler. I can reference things that happen in the film, but they are so close to the main spoilable idea that I have had to really collect myself before presenting this review. That I can barely even talk about this movie without spoiling it is really a tribute to writer/director Christopher Smith.

TRIANGLE doesn’t quite have the traditional third act unveiling of what is going on plot wise. It is more like Tarantino’s Frankenstein patchwork plot style and places massive hints before your face immediately. They aren’t enough to pull it together though; the major pieces that will snap the tumblers in place come later.

The body count in this film rises to ridiculous proportions. When the amount of murder that is underway is exposed, it is mind-boggling. However, this isn’t quite a horror film. Human beings are indeed dispatched in vicious, painful ways, but questions regarding the storyline overshadow the spattered blood. Intrigued?

TRIANGLE seems to false-start with Jess (Melissa George) consoling her autistic son Tommy (Josh McIvor) after he has had a bad dream. This film is no “then I woke up from my dream” trash though. TRIANGLE is a ride through the TWILIGHT ZONE that defies you to watch it once. As more characters are introduced and potential interpersonal issues are displayed, this film demands all of your attention.

The story of TRIANGLE really starts with a group of people getting onto a sailboat named the Triangle and owned by Greg (Michael Dorman). Downey (Henry Nixon) and his wife, Sally (Rachael Carpani) have brought a friend, Heather (Emma Lung), along with matchmaking hopes for Greg. Greg is much more interested in his other guest Jess (Melissa George) who seems to be distracted. And Heather actually takes more of an interest in the other single male on board named Victor (Liam Hemsworth). These five sail off into the sunlight.

Marketing for TRIANGLE is such that it comes as no surprise when the ship is wrecked by a strange-behaving storm. A freightliner named the Aeolus and its sketchy crew comes to the rescue, and this is where the editing, direction, and scripting all work on the audience, forcing it to the edge of its collective seat.

When Downey and Sally inexplicably know key information in advance, it feels like an editing error or a hole in the plot. But actually, it is some great editing close to MEMENTO status. TRIANGLE presents the characters’ perspectives, revealing them piece by piece. It hooks your eyeballs and pulls you along.

With nods to THE SHINING, THE PRESTIGE, and an antagonist sporting a sackcloth mask reminiscent of last year’s abysmal THE STRANGERS or even more subtly, LOS CRONOCRIMENES, the creep factor redlines and maintains itself until the very end of the film.

The solution presented at the end of the film hits the “so crazy it just might work” bullseye bluntly. TRIANGLE is an amusing step onto the storytelling landscape that Christopher Nolan has been training us to comprehend for years now. This film is something fresh for a genre that is awash with socially inept basement killers and sadistic sub-humans with journeyman butchering skills. I should have gotten to this thing a lot sooner.

*TRIANGLE will be on DVD Feb 2*

-Mediasaurus Rex

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THE BOOK OF ELI - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-01-20T12:34:00.000-08:00

THE BOOK OF ELI - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW
By: THE MAD HATTER

Looking around the blogosphere, I'm about to stand squarely in the minority and try to convince you all that BOOK OF ELI is a good movie. Maybe I think it's good because I expected it to suck. Or maybe it's because I like how it gives its action a moment or two of thoughtfulness. It's both, actually, and more that makes me one of the few who will try to convince you that this latest Denzel ass-kicker is worth your time and money.

Eli (Denzel Washington) used to be a K-Mart greeter. Yes, really. That was before the apocalypse. Nowadays he wanders what's left of America, "heading west," he says, with a scary looking knife, some expensive-ass earbuds, and a large book in his bag. He is seldom shaken from his quest; in fact he has been known to kill people trying to keep him from staying on the path. He does, however, decide to stop in a human settlement when his iPod needs recharging. Yes, really.

The camp is run by Carnegie (Gary Oldman), a gangster who holds sway over all the townspeople's comings and goings since he controls the water. Carnegie is obsessed with finding a book. Which book? We're not quite sure. When Eli gets into a skirmish with fifteen of his thugs and comes out on top, Carnegie immediately wants Eli working for him. Too bad Eli has no interest in being under Carnegie's employ. Carnegie decides he might get further using his kept woman, Claudia (Jennifer Beals), or rather using her daughter, Solara (Mila Kunis).

This is a great move since Solara disarms Eli just enough to find out more about the large books he's hiding, one of which is a bible—exactly the book that Carnegie has been looking for. Carnegie makes his move to forcibly take it, but Eli seems to have a particular gift for protecting it, so much so that he often seems unkillable. Yes, really.

Before I go on, I should say that the movie takes a turn in its final act. Your enjoyment of the film depends entirely on whether or not you want to take that turn with it. I went with the trick even though I don't think it completely adds up. The plot device didn't bother me nearly as much as Denzel's pearly white teeth did. It’s post-apocalyptic America. You mean to tell me he's still happening upon Crest White Strips?

Surprisingly, THE BOOK OF ELI is pretty good . . . not great but pretty good. Going past the action which is fun without being excessive, the movie is particularly interested in telling us a story. It's a story that wants us to think about the role religion plays in our world's events. After all, religion has been the cause of some of the worst atrocities committed by human beings, and at the same time, religion has been a guiding light when humanity has had seemingly nothing left. Both sides of this paradox get their due in this movie, and they have their moment without being corny or preachy. Not an easy trick for an action film to turn!

Another detail that I liked about the movie is its brief nod towards how disposable and materialistic our society has become. During a quiet moment, Solara asks Eli about "the world before," and all Eli can answer with is how much mankind owned that they truly did not need. Conversely, he points out, we were wasteful. We would constantly throw away items that people now kill for. I can't help but gravitate towards this subtle warning. I mean if the bomb were to drop somewhere right now, what would be more valuable: the computer I'm writing this blog on or the tube of Chapstick sitting on the desk with it? BOOK OF ELI gives this sort of question its due—not the sort of philosophy you'd expect to get in a shoot-em-up.

These details are what I think make the film worthwhile. It strikes a delicate balance between style and statement, and it really didn't have to. It very easily could have played to its built-in audience of Denzel/action fans, taken its box office, and called it a day. But this sort of movie working a few substantial ideas into the script and trying to give its audience something to take away is rare and indeed, something special.

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SMOKIN' ACES 2: ASSASSIN'S BALL - A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

2010-01-14T12:02:00.000-08:00

SMOKIN ACES ASSASSIN’S BALL – A BADASS MOVIE REVIEW

The original SMOKIN’ ACES is one of those crass movies that sneaks up on you and forces you to like it. The characters are all well-developed, and Joe Carnahan’s frenetic direction really makes that film work. But when it ends, there is no room for a sequel. Most of the characters have been killed or are considering a new line of work. So the only direction in which to build another story out of the SMOKIN’ ACES foundation would be to go prequel. But that doesn’t work either.

SMOKIN’ ACES 2: ASSASSIN’S BALL (SA2AB) is a horribly clunky, straight-to-DVD prequel that fails in its attempt to coast off of the first film. Directed by PJ Pesce, the asshat who directed LOST BOYS 2: THE TRIBE and FROM DUSK TILL DAWN 3: THE HANGMAN’S DAUGHTER, one should expect SA2AB to be nothing but a crippled film at best.

The plot is a boiler-plate, illegitimate mockery of the original SMOKIN’ ACES (SA1) right down to its last scene. FBI agents have been called to protect someone, and a bunch of psychotic assassins are closing in on that target. Everyone dies, and those that don’t are scarred either physically or mentally. Even such a cookie-cutter plot should work for a prequel/sequel, but SA2AB trips over itself constantly.

The story is about a wheelchair-bound, middle-management FBI agent named Walter Weed (Tom Beringer far from his PLATOON days). Apparently a three million dollar contract has been taken out on his life. For a solid half-hour, he is hustled away deep into the bowels of a nightclub and then into its posh panic room. Snipers are put in place, and an agent occupies a hotel room across the street with a great view of this blatantly obvious Universal Studios backlot setting. There is so much bluster from Agent Baker (Clayne Crawford) and Malcolm Little (Christopher Michael Holley) about how impenetrable the place is that it is completely predictable that someone is going to walk in heavily armed and crack through the layers of cement and metal before the film ends.

Unfortunately, there is so little character investment in Walter Weed, Agent Baker, or the other half-dozen FBI yahoos that no one should care. These other FBI agents are identified by over-dramatic screen freezes with their names emblazoned in print, but it is a useless stylistic gesture, and these characters really don’t matter.

SA2AB leans drunkenly on the movie it supposedly came before. Buddy Israel (Jeremy Piven) from the first film is referenced just before McTeague (Vinnie Jones) performs some seriously blunt acupuncture on his victim’s head. McTeague is a waste of a character and a waste of an actor who could actually convey menace back when he was Bullet Tooth Tony in SNATCH. In SA2AB he is just a bloated, scarfaced hitman. He has nothing to do really, and it is his fault for signing on to this disaster.

There is another new assassin in SA2AB who comes in sniffing around for the chance to make a quick three million. It is unfortunate that Ariella Martinez (Martha Higareda), the queen of literally poisonous kisses, only kisses two people to death before she takes a sloppy bullet to the back. There was a sliver of potential with her character, but for a film running as short on time and brainpower as this one, it is a true feat that she made it to the third act.

The most heinous reference in SA2AB to SA1 is the introduction of the Tremor family sans the non compos mentis brothers who absolutely ruled SA1. Kaitlin ‘AK-47’ Tremor (Autumn Reeser) is introduced as the nymphomaniac sister who shrieks like Amanda Plummer did in PULP FICTION. There is a running incest joke as her brother Lester (Maury Sterling) paws and gropes at his sister, but relief is on the way because both of these weirdos get their aces smoked.

It takes zero brain effort to realize that if these Tremor folk aren’t around in SA1 that they will all most definitely get killed in SA2AB. And they are so irritating that it doesn’t happen soon enough. The nihilistic sophistication of the Tremor brothers in the original SMOKIN’ ACES has been swapped for loose cannons that are just completely crackers. This new (old) batch of Tremors have nothing going for them but incest and a dislike for one another. The original Tremor brothers were unified in their ignorance; they actually seemed to be brothers, not a bunch of second-rate actors in a straight-to-DVD debacle.

The only assassin that makes an appearance in both films is Lazlo Soot (Tommy Flanagan). Lazlo is a master of disguise but really doesn’t do much for the outcome of the film. He gets a couple of sneaky bullets off but is ultimately underused as a character. He is the only true link to SA1, and he is basically a throw-away character.

It will take a completely unseasoned movie watcher only seconds to guess who is pulling the assassins’ strings, but it takes the film a solid 70 minutes or so to confirm the guess. SA2AB runs at a lean 88 minutes, but seriously, I would rather clean the bathroom than watch this trash. There is a moment when exploding midget clowns are being employed by the Tremor family as a way to penetrate the fortress, but that is the only non-pedestrian step this film takes. Blood sprays heavily when throats are slashed, and Baby Boy Tremor (C. Ernst Harth) manages to execute a headshot that is worth a rewind. Other than that, this film is a loosely stitched together, ugly bastard child of a film that was in no need of a prequel or sequel for that matter.

Apparently, Joe Carnahan (the writer and director of the original) is subtly attached to this film. He presents it and apparently has something to do with the story. There was so much promise in Carnahan when he caught everyone’s attention with NARC. It is unfortunate that he is associated with this SA2AB wreck just before his career seriously implodes with his upcoming, stupid-looking A-TEAM. Pity, because when Carnahan is up and running, he is a force to be reckoned with.

SMOKIN’ ACES 2: ASSASSIN’S BALL is a complete atrocity of a film. It follows its cro-magnon skeleton plotline all the way through to its cynical end. It had the potential to really be something better than the disjointed abomination it became. Unfortunately, a blank cheque in regards to body-count, profanity, and splatter doesn’t make a decent film. This movie is a waste of talent, money, and your time.

-Mediasaurus Rex

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