Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark
John already wrote an earth shattering review for this film but I’ve decided to put my two cents in due to an interesting text message exchange.
Mark – “The creatures from Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark are jerks.”
John – “They sure as sh** are. But, in this economy you just do what you have to do to feed your tribe of diminutive monster fairies.”
The reason to watch this film is for the diminutive monster fairies. They are creative looking little buggers who have a neat mythology. The reason the creatures are so cool is because Guillermo Del Toro (Hellboy 1 & 2) produced and wrote this film. Del Toro’s creature effects and attention to production design are reliably stellar and the angry monsters look beautiful.
The biggest problem is this film should have been part of a spooky double-header. The premise is stretched so thin the film lags to the finish line instead of sprinting. Afraid of the Dark could have been a lean mean thrill machine instead it feels like a decent flick with too much fat. However, this remake of a TV movie tries to expand a cool story and create a neat world of monsters and mythologies. In a world of remakes you need to appreciate the people who create new creatures.
If you haven’t watched Devil or Insidious you should check them out. They are inexpensive experiments in horror. Both films succeed and look beautiful.
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Trailer Talk: Red Tails
By Sweet Sugar
Man, I really hope this movie doesn’t suck.
The website and trailers say the movie was “inspired” by true events, which is scary to veterans who hold the Tuskegee Airmen in incredibly high self-esteem. I hope it doesn’t do to the Tuskegee Airmen what Michael Bay did to the Navy and the Doolittle Raid in Pearl Harbor.
The Tuskegee Airmen are some of the greatest men ever to set foot on this earth, and there’s no need to fictionalize any part of their story for the sake of an action movie. This story deserves a production on the level of Saving Private Ryan or Band of Brothers.
However, I agree that a big studio movie is long overdue. There was the Golden Globe-nominated PBS video “The Tuskegee Airmen”in 1995 starring Lawrence Fishburne that did an admirable job trying to correctly capture the historical context and obstacles they overcame.
The Red Tails trailer did give me chills, the aerial action sequences look great thanks to LucasFilm, and the casting looks solid. We could have gone without Cuba Gooding Jr. I think the studio snuck Cuba in there to try and atone for the stinker Men of Honor (2000) with Robert De Niro, which nobody watched. And the scenes with the racist Army general look painfully formulaic.
Overall, hopefully it will get people to learn more about American history. I can’t wait to see the RottenTomatoes.com results.
If you watch the movie and want to learn more about African American contributions in WWII, check out the massive logistical effort known as the Red Ball Express.
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John’s Horror Corner: Witchcraft (1988), and only witchcraft could compel me to watch this movie again.
MY CALL: Only witchcraft could compel me to watch this movie again. This isn’t bad 80s horror. It’s just plain bad. [D] WHAT TO WATCH INSTEAD: Witch movies have a terrible tendency to suck. But there are a few gems out there. For children there’s the Roald Dahl adaptation The Witches (1990) or Hocus Pocus (1993), the young crowd should appreciate The Craft (1996), and the more mature will enjoy The Witches of Eastwick (1987). If you want something fun, decent and campy with that 80s feel, then you want The Kiss (1988) or Warlock (1989) and Warlock: Armageddon (1993).
After enduring this “classic” I was overcome with the urge to flee, as if such future movie experiences were avoidable as a result of previous insufferable misjudgments. This film was wowingly poor. Not unimpressive, nor mediocre, but just POOR. While I have a special place in my heart for most circa-1980’s horror series part ones, this little piece of Hell scarred me with boredom. So, here’s why you should take this to heart and NOT EVER WATCH THIS…
When you think of a 1980’s horror films what pops in your head first? Gore? Cheap scares provoked by sudden scene changes and loud sound effects? Gratuitous nudity? You’ll find none of these things here. Not only did this movie suffer a complete lack of even remotely eerie scenes, the producers didn’t even have the common decency to force some fledgling actress bare her scantily clad body. No kids are doing drugs or having premarital sex either—so, by common law of horror, no one deserves to die in this movie! (And almost no one does.)
The greatest gore effect involves two robed figures hovering over what could only be described as roadkill in a birdbath. The figures chant some incomprehensible syllables while kneading mashed organs in their hands and then <<GASP>> putting it in their mouths. This scene made me tremble no more than when I eat a poorly prepared meatloaf. The other effects, if we’re elevating them to such a descriptor, were limited to sketchy visions through a mirror that were probably meant to feel like a spooky oracle.
I suppose I could address the plot. Scene One: some people are killed. All the rest of the scenes, those people were somehow reincarnated into a mother and son (though lovers in scene one) who are obsessed with the son’s new child. Why? Well, clearly that child is a reincarnation of their unborn child when they were burnt at the stake. Oh, and this is the “child of the devil” as well. Far from compelling stuff.
So we have a lame plot festooned with poor attempts at effects, a total absence of scares, some unexplained motives, no nudity (for those of you who care), and an unsatisfying ending. Though, to the ending’s credit, it was no more disappointing than the rest of the movie.
I truly yearn for the day that we get a horror-for-the-sake-of-horror witchcraft movie that doesn’t suck. Season of the Witch (2011) was a semi-action, genre-crossover disappointment. The Blair Witch Project (1999) really wasn’t a witch movie. I really like Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 (2000)—but it was a “haunting movie,” really no different from a typical “house movie” (aka haunted house movie; see Haunter). The closest thing to what I’m looking for has been The Skeleton Key (2005)… but that relied on one big incantation to drive the plot. I liked it, but it didn’t feel like a witchcraft movie. I’m also not counting séance-based movies like Lo (2009).
Come on, Hollywood. This is something that has not been overdone (not well anyway). Is it really so hard to throw together a good witch story without giving it a charming Harry Potter British spin or Disney make-over? Or do I just have to sit back and watch as the Witchcraft series pelts out a dozen T’n’A-driven sequels? Really, folks! I checked online. There is a “part 13” for God’s sake! Witchcraft 13: Blood of the Chosen (2008). I am proud that I have not seen any of these 12 sequels!
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Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is a sly espionage film told with style, mood and anxiety. Tinker is a game of chess made up of world-class chess players.
This film should be a lesson on how to make an intelligent thriller. The lighting is fantastic, the script is intriguing and Gary Oldman is a gangster with glasses. I love that one of the world’s best spies needs glasses. He can see everything but needs help doing it.
The film focuses on Gary Oldman hunting down a traitor who is giving information to the Russians. The problem is finding out which master spy has flipped sides. That is like Muhammad Ali trying to find a traitor by boxing Rocky Marciano, Larry Holmes, Mike Tyson and Joe Frazier. Ali is the best but it is going to hurt.
These spies are not going to box but there will be a lot of mental and verbal sparring. They will look for chinks in the armor and the smallest of clues. I loved every second of it. I can’t wait to see it again now that I’ve absorbed the initial experience.
Have fun watching Oldman hunt.
Tinker Tailor also has three of my favorite actors playing key roles. Benedict Cumberbatch (Sherlock, War Horse), Mark Strong (Kick-Ass) and Tom Hardy (Warrior).
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The Adventures of Tintin
I knew nothing about Tintin before this movie came out. All I knew that Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson were making a movie together. They were going to forgo live action to use performance capture in order to accomplish exciting set pieces not possible with actors.
My girlfriend and I watched Tintin last night and we had a fun time. We left the theater smiling and couldn’t believe the animation we had just witnessed. I’ve never seen better animation in a performance capture film.
The problem is that nobody is watching this film in the US. It has only made $65 million at the domestic box office while it has made $269 million overseas. I would love a sequel because this is a film that features some of the best chase scenes since Indiana Jones. There is a seven minutes tracking shot that follows Tintin as he and Captain Haddock (Andy Serkis) chase a flying piece of a treasure map. My jaw dropped as I watched the inventive scene that Spielberg and Jackson dreamed up.
The movie focuses on intrepid journalist Tintin and his faithful dog Snowy as they chase down clues to find a pirate treasure. Tintin is aided by an incredibly drunk Captain named Haddock and the two Thompsons (Nick Frost, Simon Pegg). The villain is the ultra angry Rackham (Daniel Craig). Along the way they crash planes, escape ships, speed on motorcycles and punch many people.
Tintin also features one of the funniest scenes of the year between the Thompson twins and a wily wallet thief. I dare you not to laugh at the bumbling cops and confused criminal.
Watch this movie while you can. It is a total treat to behold in 3D. Enjoy, smile and smile more.
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Holy Rollers (2010)
MY CALL: If you like Jesse Eisenberg, you’ll like this. It’s really that simple. And for everyone who’s been yearning for an Hasidic Blow, this is the film you’ve been waiting for! IF YOU LIKE THIS, WATCH: Most good movies allow us to watch characters develop. In Holy Rollers, we see Eisenberg transform. Other character-transformative films include Almost Famous, Donnie Brasco and The Devil’s Double. The parallels between these movies and Holy Roller are strong.
Set in 1998, our story (inspired by true events) follows a twenty year old Hasidic Jew (Sammy) who is every bit as quirky as the actor playing the role (Jesse Eisenberg; Roger Dodger, Zombieland, The Social Network)—but, then, Eisenberg is always twitchy, isn’t he? Feeling the normal Hasidic coming-of-age pressures as he is about to be married, he is morally taunted by his rebellious, fast-talking, unorthodox neighbor Yosef (Justin Bartha; National Treasure 1 & 2, The Hangover, The Hangover 2) who watches reality shows, talks about fake titties, and smokes. Just FYI, these do not follow the typical Hasidic canon.
Living in a financially struggling household and helping with the family business, Sammy worries about providing for his future arranged wife. So, he naively accepts an offer from Yosef to import “medicine” from Amsterdam. Upon their return, Sammy discovers that they had been moving drugs (ecstasy) and feels conflicted about it. From this point, we see Sammy slowly transform, shedding his morals one by one, into a drug dealer’s right hand man.
Sammy and his humble father wrestle about the importance of money versus happiness as he lies to him about his whereabouts. The father’s character, while little more than ancillary, brings a strong sincerity to the film; a moral compass that keeps the audience from becoming slowly corrupted without noticing the change—much as Sammy is, scene by scene, throughout the story. Sammy slips smoothly into the clothes of another personality completely unaware until he turns and sees his former self in his wake, like a hollow cast chrysalis.
As Yosef, Bartha, whom we’re accustomed to seeing in more charming roles innocently sporting an “aw shucks” smile, performs brilliantly as Sammy’s loose cannon field trainer. Jackie (Sammy and Yosef’s dealer-employer) is a noteworthy character as well. And his girlfriend, Rachel, is much like Almost Famous’ Kate Hudson.
A few jabs were taken at the Jewish community by way of some well-placed lines…
Referring to a drug dealer, Eisenberg asks “Do you trust him?” Bartha replies with “Of course. He’s Jewish.”
Bartha, insinuating that no one would suspect the Jewish people of moving drugs, advises Eisenberg to “Relax, mind your business, and act Jewish.”
Drug Dealer: “I’ve never heard Jews complain so much about making money. Jesus Christ!”
Bartha, rationalizing his profession, explains “You know, Jews have been smuggling for thousands of years.”
See this movie. It’s got solid actors and well-written characters.
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Google Reader and Organizing Your Blog Reading List
Time Saving TIP: If you have Gmail and you aren’t following your favorite blogs on Google Reader you should check it out. It is, in my opinion, the most simple and convenient way to check in with all of my favorite blogs everyday. If you have Gmail there is a link to your reader at the very top left of your screen. Once you are in your reader you just add the urls of your favorite blogs and then it pulls all new posts into the reader. Now you’ll never have to visit 20+ sites every day just to stay in the loop.
You can stay updated on everything Movies, Films and Flix.
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Warrior (2011) [a second opinion]
MY CALL: MMA fighters are tough, but those who face life’s most trying dealt hands are tougher. Between the exquisitely written characters, engaging fights and solid guy-cry, I can’t remember feeling so affected…and it felt amazing. I don’t give out many A’s without caveats, but this gets an A+! IF YOU LIKE THIS, WATCH: While considerably less intense, Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale brought The Fighter to gritty life. As did The Wrestler. Then get back to the root of it all with Rocky, Rocky IV and Rocky Balboa! CAST: Joel Edgerton (Animal Kingdom, The Thing 2011), Tom Hardy (Inception, Bane of The Dark Knight Rises, Charles Bronson of Bronson), Nick Nolte (Tropic Thunder, Hulk, Cape Fear). SIDEBAR: This is a second opinion. The Hof reviewed this movie when it was in theaters. Here’s his review.
This story follows an emotionally scarred family trio. Brendan Conlon (Joel Edgerton) is a high school physics teacher who returns to his former profession (MMA fighter) for extra money to keep his home afloat from foreclosure. When this financially desperate decision results in his suspension without pay, he has no choice but to engage in mixed martial arts full time. Meanwhile Brendan’s brother Tommy (Tom Hardy) returns home from serving with the Marines, arriving at the doorstep of his father (Nick Nolte as Paddy Conlon) and eventually seeking him out as a trainer for a grand prix MMA tournament which will recognize the toughest middleweight fighter in the world…the tournament is called Sparta!
This already has all the trappings of a good sports fighting movie. However, we soon learn that Tommy has not a warm ounce in his heart for his alcoholic father, who trains Tommy desperately hoping to find some vestige of reciprocal love in his unflaggingly resentful son. Paddy also yearns to reconnect with Brendan, who shuns his destroyed father despite the fact that one of his little girls has never met her grandfather. As if this wasn’t enough, the enmity Tommy feels for his older brother is yet more vicious than that reserved for his father.
By composition this is an anti-fight-movie, but somehow it strikes me as the greatest fight movie since Rocky! The standard formula of a boxing movie relies on several key elements, all such rules of which are broken in Warrior. 1) Extensive training scenes demonstrate the fighter’s hardship and devotion—training scenes in this film are minimal and seem more informative about mixed martial arts than demonstrative of the hardship or devotion. 2) The fighter turns to his family for support to overcome the training and insecurity of the upcoming fight—the only family under the lens here is a sundered father and sons who all turn to the fights to escape their family’s general paucity of love and forgiveness. 3) The fighter has a resistant loved one and his relationship is tested—Brendan’s wife, while clearly not a fan of the idea, makes no concerted effort or threat to keep her husband out of the ring. 4) The actual fights are few in number and serve as highlight montages, building up to post-victory catharsis—these fights are extensive, numerous, and view reel-to-reel as if complete, with most catharsis delivered “during” the fights! 5) The fighter faces an unlikeable (or at least very arrogant in the case of Rocky’s Apollo Creed) or even evil antagonist—the antagonist in this film is the Conlon brothers’ unwillingness to forgive. The single major element that the classics have in common with Warrior is that Brendan is the ultimate underdog and, like Rocky Balboa, fights from the heart. You never think he should be able to defeat his opponents, but you believe it when he does it!
While this movie is not so much about who wins the fight, it is still very much about victory. Nick Nolte plays the damaged, AA-devout, alcoholic Paddy to perfection. He drove his family apart and crumbles whenever he is reminded of the monster he once was and is horrified by the thought of becoming that monster again. He serves as the bone on which his children sharpen their fangs. Amid this loveless viciousness, this film manages to pull the audience from feeling irreparably beaten, to excited and motivated, and ultimately inspired—perhaps awestruck. The fights were thrilling, shocking and technically stunning. On the softer side, my throat tightened up more times than I care to admit and culminated in some serious guy-crying in the same five minutes that I was screaming at the screen during the final fight as if I had money riding on it. I can’t remember feeling so affected…and it felt amazing.
This movie isn’t for MMA fans, it’s for everyone. As long as everyone is old enough, make a family movie night out of it.
Don’t miss this one. Don’t you dare!
John: out!
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Bad Movie Tuesday: Apollo 18: Review #2
John already wrote a wonderful review for this film. However, days after watching this flick I can’t let some of the questions go. I understood Tree of Life, Inception and Donnie Darko but Apollo has left me baffled. Apollo 18 is a question farm. I’ve never watched a film that raised so many questions.
I don’t get this movie and that is why I love it. It is like a never-ending wormhole of questions. Alice’s Rabbit Hole makes more sense than this film. In a day and age when movies have to be cohesive and coherent this movie breaks the trend and commits to confusing.
You have to admire a film that answers ZERO questions. Why should you admire this? Today’s horror movies answer all the questions we don’t need answers for. For instance, The new Halloween and Nightmare on Elm Street gave Michael Myers and Freddy a back story. The Texas Chainsaw remake answered how fast Leatherface can run the 40-yard dash (4.34 seconds). To top it all off The Thing prequel showed how the alien got to earth.
What do all of these answers have in common? I didn’t want to know any of them. The scariest thing is the unknown. Apollo 18 is not scary it just leaves you scratching your head. The more you see of it the less you know.
What do you know? This movie features footage that NASA discovered in space. They don’t even discuss how or where they found it.
SPOILER ALERT
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
The end of the film features a space pod loaded with moon rock spiders colliding into an orbiting shuttle. How could they possibly have found the footage? the poster says they never went back to the moon but they must have landed to get the footage. Also, if the shuttle broke to pieces wouldn’t the film have been exposed and ruined.? I know NASA have their secrets but KODAK space film isn’t one of them….or is it?
Something strange happened when NASA got a hold of the space footage. They decided to edit it into a horror film. Is all NASA footage like this? Do the video editors have a sense of humor? I know NASA needs funding so after Paranormal Activity maybe they dusted off the footage and released it as a movie. I’m hoping they have a Apollo 19 film involving moon rock spiders the size of godzilla.
What I love most about this film are the moon rock spiders. The rock spiders steal American flags and dig themselves in unlucky astronauts bodies. Eventually, a spider gets into one the suits and buries itself into the man’s ribs.
Sidenote: He is lucky he didn’t get the Orlando Jones treatment in Evolution. If a moon rock spider got into my nether regions I’d need more than ice cream to make it better.
The guy who gets a rock in his rib starts acting all funky. Is he turning evil? Is the poison affecting him weird? Do the moon spiders have a toxin that makes you act like a jerk? If the rock spider is so smart why doesn’t it go further into his guts and kill him? fellow writer John tried to answer the toxin quagmire and ended up threatening an ecology and evolutionary lecture. This movie has a way of flustering people. Hal the super computer from 2001 would short-circuit explaining this movie.
The moon rock spiders kill all communications, slash a hole in the pod insulation and harass the poor astronauts. The reason is never explained. My girlfriend had the closest theory when one of the astronauts takes a rock she said “give me back those rocks.”
So, the simplest deduction is that they are angry about the rock theft. It is like how you can’t take petrified wood from state parks…except the wood doesn’t become an angry spider.
Watch this film. Is it real? Is it fake? Why are moon rocks so angry? Will there be a Apollo 19? Are questions farms real? Why is it impossible to stop asking Apollo questions? Must close computer……
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The Expendables: Extended Director’s Cut
If you have not watched The Expendables here is a brief synopsis:
“A bunch of badass good guys kill South American bad guys with very big guns, knives and biceps.”
The budget for The Expendables was $80 million. Other films like Sherlock 2, Transformers and X-Men: First Class had budgets of around $200 million. Thus, Stallone wasn’t able to entirely capture the vision he wanted due to time and money constraints. The theatrical cut made a lot of money but he had to edit a lot out in order to appease the studios and his investors.
The extended cut is the film that Stallone intended. He added in ten more minutes that flesh out the characters and their back stories. The director’s cut has been out for a while and I really wanted to see it. However, I own the original Blu-ray so I didn’t want to buy the new version. Luckily, I was able to rent it on my PS3.
I dug the majority of the added scenes. Dolph Lundgren gets the best treatment of the bunch. The new cut has him talking about being a Viking. There is a scene where he wants to hang a pirate and says “it is a Viking tradition.” Also, when Dolph gets shot there is a great bit of dialogue between he and Stallone that made the rental worth it. Here it is:
Dolph: “I want a viking funeral.”
Stallone: “What? Like we put you in a boat and light you on fire?”
Dolph: “That’s right.”
Stallone “You are not a viking.”
Dolph: “So what, who cares?”
Later Stallone is telling Statham about the viking funeral and how he wants his ashes spread in the ocean. Statham quips “That will poison about 1,000 miles……actually, more like a million miles.”
Dolph + Viking Funeral = Money well spent.
Jet Li talks more about how he needs money. I love the scenes where he tries to get more cash. He talks about his kids..yet he doesn’t have kids. He says he is little and has to do more work..thus, more cash. I loved that he is a shady little guy that must have a gambling problem.
Randy Couture talks more about his cauliflower ear. Terry Crews talks about his kids and Stallone and Statham get to bicker longer. I’m happy Stallone didn’t add any more of Rourke’s heavy breathing monologue.
The biggest problem is the love story between Jason Statham and Charisma Carpenter. It all stems from her dating the biggest turd in recent film history .The guy is a poorly realized meathead that is there so Jason can beat him up.
The Nu-metal in the film hurts the soul as well. It seems like he couldn’t afford Metallica so he got a Metallica cover band who also writes original music.
If you liked The Expendables you will like this. It provides no new revelations but you do get to hear Dolph talking about Vikings.
Movies, Films & Flix 