What movie are you viewing at the moment?

[frakacylon]

A very watchable copy of Batman v. Superman (well bar the douches that on occasional walk in front of the camera)

I like it so far, doesnt disappoint.

[Oh hi Mark!]

Watched a week before Christmas.

Rare Exports - This is my first Finnish movie. I learned about this movie through a post from another forum, on what's the best Christmas movie. Somebody mentioned this, and I later saw it on a list of the best movies with Christmas as a theme. I'm satisfied that I've watched most of them already, along with some on the queue. This movie was listed. Featuring nobody I know, but with the genres action, fantasy, and horror classifying the film, I got really interested. Those three make up genre films, along with science fiction. Since this year has proved to be a banner year for me getting into more genre films, I figure this will be right up my alley.

It's not spoken in one language. Immediately there is English and Finnish being spoken. These adult American or British people searching for something on a snowy mountain, essentially grave robbing. Then there's the Finnish kids witnessing a speech by one man. The older of the two kids said how Santa Claus is a bluff. Way to ruin a childhood, but that kid ended up researching Christmas. However, it's the pagan interpretations of Santa and all that. The opening scene took place 21 days before Christmas.

1 day to Christmas now. Pietari is the boy that was hitting the books on Santa, and he's seen wearing briefs. Uhhhh, and there's snow all around, what was he thinking? His dad is a hunter, and they go on a planned hunting trip for big deer. Unfortunately it was by the facility on top of the big mountain from the beginning. All the deer were slaughtered, carcasses left in front of the gate. Ruining the hunters' revenue with the dead deer, they go to the facility. To note immediately, the music is really epic, and does play into the fantasy genre. Pietari noticed a huge footprint underneath one of the deer carcasses. Nobody was at the research camp, and a giant crater was shown. Hmmm? Pietari back home suited up and looked like a dime store superhero! It was different. He showed his friend that Santa Claus wasn't the "Coca Cola" one people are accustomed to. He said this Santa Claus kills naughty kids! This actually resembles a bit of the movie, Santa's Slay, only Santa there isn't a beast, literally speaking.

After something of a heart to heart between Pietari and his father, the researcher and his men are shown. He said the cargo's not ready, he wanted to cancel everything. But it was too late...

0 days to Christmas. Pietari's shotgun is bigger than him! Seriously, as if the fact he's carrying a gun isn't enough of a surprise. He also has a dog doll, Vuppe. A body was discovered in the trap Pietari's dad set, although his dad doesn't want to involve his son in any of this. Pietari's dad and his fellow bearded companion got a body that according to the passport in the wallet, was a 59 year old American, who looked dead. Nosy Pietari went to a cop, and his father followed, angry at his disobedience. He was grounded after all. Grounding, I didn't think that exists today. The cop said radiators were stolen last night, Juuso, Pietari's friend, his mom's hair dryer was stolen too. There are these straw dolls that are left at, the scene of the crime, so to speak. One was in the pit by Pietari's house where the dead body was at, another in Juuso's bed.

Things turned into more horror territory with the tease over this mysterious old man's body. It was actually really tense, I was really intrigued at what would happen. They brought in Juuso's dad as an interpreter, speaking some English to this mysterious old guy. Pietari came to the realization of who the guy is, and admitted to his dad of being a naughty boy. He and Juuso at the beginning of the movie made a hole in the fence. It became clear what that research team found...

And even when it's revealed who it was, it turns out Pietari was wrong. Oh man! It just increased the excitement level. At a military base, there's a giant hangar that says "24," looking like the advent calendar bit that Pietari stapled shut. The mystery of the radiators and hair dryer is also revealed, ohhh, people die, later Pietari shoots his damn shotgun, talking like a brave hero. He engineered a major plan. SPOILER: it involved the kids in the sacks being carried off by helicopter, along with Pietari.

There was a great ending that focused on Pietari, and convinced me that the whole story was basically a boy becoming a man. In that respect, it makes up for the lingering bummer I have for not showing the big guy, if you know what I mean. It ultimately doesn't matter, especially how the film's climax was epic in its own right. Between the lush snowy landscape at night, when it wasn't CG, and the stuff back at the base, the climax was very much a satisfactory experience to me. There is CG in the film, most of it is at night, so it kind of blends into the real footage. Right at the ending images, I think some of those were CG and were daytime and sunset looking settings, but the total amount of it wasn't major. It didn't hurt the film in any way, but it is noticeable.

The scene in the end with the triumphant looking stance of Pietari really put the nail on the head over his story being the major part of the movie. Things were tied to Christmas, before, and especially after that scene. I thought it was pretty funny how the final setting looked to be the warehouse from Raiders of the Lost Ark. The movie title turns out to have meaning behind it.

I was questioning why this got an R rating, even though there is a pick-axe death. No blood dripping out though. But then I saw cocks...and I get it now. Wow.

Kill of the film? Well, awake or sleeping, I'll count it as a kill, plus it's visually stunning.



The title of the movie appeared before the credits, with the subtitle "From the land of the original Santa Claus." I did some quick searching on Wikipedia, and judging by the movie, it fits into the imagery shown in it, as well as the books Pietari was reading. Joulupukki, "Christmas goat" or "Yule Goat" in Finnish. Its own tale, according to Wikipedia, "conflated" with Santa Claus. I remember from Santa's Slay too, the origin story of Santa Claus being Scandinavian.

This movie is really fast. It's 83 minutes, but the credits are over 6 minutes long. It shows how much work was put into the film, because it looks pretty epic, there are major moments, the sound design just sucks you into that wintry wonderland of dark fairy tales, and the CG probably took a lot of work. It's a short movie, and does not overstay its welcome. The setup was long in hindsight, but it didn't feel like it to me. No dragging that I felt, and not really knowing what the movie entailed, helped. I was very curious about what would be in the film. In the end, I was very impressed. €1,948,000 was the estimated budget, which is surprising because the film does not come across as a low budget flick. It looks like it was inspired by Hollywood, and the big epic fantasy movies from the previous decade, as this came out in 2010. Lord of the Rings, Chronicles of Narnia, it seemed like those were inspirations for this film, trying to reach for similar heights of grandeur. Looking at the budget and runtime, basically, if they had more money, the film would've been longer. Already though, a good amount of stuff is packed into this, making it grander than most movies that run that long, and even some that are longer.

Of course, there are some logic things to question. The helicopter with the bags, and what's inside them. How come they weren't moving? They were very still, as if just regular stuff was in the bags. The stunt by Pietari to jump from helicopter to a tower, the fact the helicopter is strong enough to carry all that seemingly dead weight. These are forgivable little flaws, and don't affect my overall opinion of the movie.

Compared to all the Christmas movies I've seen so far, this one really stands out for the wintry landscapes, going beyond that holiday, and just into the bitter cold of Scandinavia. It's amazing, I'd like to go there. Anyways, some bits justified the R rating, but if you trim them out, you got a PG-13 film. The concept of Pietari's heroic tale is not R material at all, and the music is familiar to PG/PG-13 epic fantasy films. Still, cocks ruined everything.

Seriously, such a great movie! I wonder if Hollywood will try to remake this, because this movie's pure epic blockbuster fodder for Hollywood. It'll be splashy, probably be directed by Michael Bay, and it will thus be soulless. This film comes off as a product of much effort and heart, not money and some effort.

Die Hard - Aww yeah! Finally being able to comment again on a film I know oh so well and have enjoyed for years. I've been having the Run DMC Christmas song in my head for a while now, specifically the beat to that. Rated number 1 on WatchMojo's top 10 alternative Christmas movies, let's see if I still agree with that after all the stuff I've watched this month.

Such a legendary movie in the action genre, and how does it start? Fisting with your toes? That sounds disgusting. I know, make fists with your toes while on a rug, but John McClane said "fist with your toes." If it's a woman doing it, I'm all in, but come on. It's a nice opening scene, it shows John to be this regular guy, he's scared of things like any other person. In this case it's flying. The guy who suggested the toe fisting had been doing it for 9 years. John's a cop, he's been one for 11 years, so he knows how to use a gun. That'll never happen in today's airplanes, carrying a gun while on board. I don't think so, right?

Ooooh, one of the biggest dickweeds in cinema history, Harry, this Ben Affleck looking guy. He clearly represents the 80s yuppie character, and him trying to hit on Holly Gennero, John's wife, by name only at the time.

California! Yes, where a woman jumps onto a guy and sucks face with him. Argyle is cool! He was "fast" as John said. He knew the real reason why John didn't go to California with Holly. Men are stubborn pretty much. Argyle probably knows women, even though you never meet his girlfriend. Anyways, the big Nakatomi tower is actually the 20th Century Fox tower in Los Angeles, I saw some recent pictures of it, still there. Surprisingly restored after what this movie did to it...

Ha, the Run DMC song, "Christmas in Hollis." Fucking California. Yes, where a man kisses another on the cheek, and is very happy with it. Technically, that's San Francisco, and it would be French kissing. Freaking Harry with the coke, John being the cop spotted it under his nose. That guy's smile and laugh, he seriously needed a backhand. And each finger has to have a ring on it. Boom, goofy motherfucker. Actually, Harry Ellis looks like James Roday too. He wanted to show off the Rolex Holly got, freaking douche, showoff, asshole. I'm smiling while I type those words, he really is a guy I love to hate.

I'm surprised John didn't say "fucking California" with the couple going into the bathroom wanting a fuck. The argument he and Holly had was interesting for a few reasons. I noticed this before, but Bruce Willis has a scar near his right shoulder. I always thought it was makeup, to show that he's been on the pavement doing his job before this Christmas trip. One other thing, that argument really painted how men are when arguing with women. They make it about them, bringing up something that's not entirely related to the topic at hand, and they're the victims. The last name crap, Holly using her maiden one. Something I picked up for the first time during that argument, Holly indicated they had this discussion in July. Christmas in July! Hehehe.

The bad guys came in all slick and organized, getting their shit down. It was funny how the lead, Hans Gruber, came out last, just to show he is the man. The black guy was pretty charismatic in his entrance, talking about basketball, and kicking a dead body off the chair.

Fisting with your toes on a rug, does work, according to John. I'm just fine with my socks. Freaking Argyle hanging out with the big teddy bear John got. It was interesting now to pick up on the German. These are German speaking terrorists, and I'm trying to remember the 6 years of German I took between middle and high school. While Alan Rickman has a very unique, deep, nice voice, I don't think his German is particularly great. It's good, but I always thought it was a bit off. I think it's me not being able to pair up his voice with German, because it fits more along the United Kingdom. French too maybe, German, I'm less sure of that. But he tries, don't get me wrong.

I didn't really pick up on the sleaze factor to the film. Within 3 minutes there are two sexy women, one was topless. When the "terrorists" barged in, one of the women was pulled off a desk, as she was topless and having a shag with a guy. The same couple wanting hanky panky in the bathroom. It's a huge bathroom actually, it's bigger than my bedroom. Actually it might've been Ellis' office, because Holly did say she wants his private bathroom. The second woman was seen from across the Nakatomi building, as John looked out the window.

I'm spoiling my opinion on the film, but ah well. As awesome as the film is, it's not without little flaws. For example, when John looked out the window and saw that lightly dressed woman, it shows that the apartment building the woman's in, is just a couple feet across. The exteriors of the tower show that it's standing tall on its own, not really neighboring other buildings. I know the interior was shot in sets.

Pausing on the movie magic spoiling, Hans shows his charisma, his way with words when speaking English is better than the German he puts up. How he read about Takagi's life and career, dude did his research, and you just listen. And you believe him, if he says he has two John Phillips suits, then dammit, he has them! Takagi was threatened to give the code to the big safe housing over $600 million, and he said it wouldn't make a difference. It changes all the time or whatever, and you can see the guy sweating. It was a tense scene, and Hans didn't waste time. He counted to three, no good answer, blasts the guy in the head! Nice. The black guy won a bet he had with Karl.

Bruce Willis has a tendency to talk to himself in movies, I thought that was quirky. I figured it just happened in the Die Hard movies, but no. I guess here it makes sense because he doesn't talk to anyone, and especially in the stuff before Sgt. Powell is introduced. Karl by the way is dressed terribly. A big gray sweater over gray pants, small black boots. He looks like a clay toy. So he deserved to die based on his appearance. Which by the way, that may be unrealistic, because it's one set of stairs, not more than a dozen steps. Metal, but still. Ohhh, nitpicking...

I'm not doing that with John being barefoot. Man, his feet become a mess by the end of the movie, how did he do it?! HA! How Hans read the message John wrote on the dead guy's sweater. "Ho. Ho. Ho." It was hilarious, he really emphasized that one word. John McClane is a pervert, I finally noticed how he looked at a poster of a nude woman at a hallway. Playboy Playmate, I have to find out who she is. I know some other Playmates were in the movie. I'll look at the trivia, I think one was a stewardess, the other was the girl that went topless in the office.

Maybe dating, or exposing the movie, the walkie talkies. Movie logic dictates these things were the wave of the future. More powerful than the smartphones we have, and costs less. He was able to use a walkie talkie to contact the cops, apparently it was able to get the secured police signal. No shit, does it sound like I'm ordering a fucking pizza? That was a funny line by John, freaking cops, tech support people, they give you the damn run around.

Al Powell is introduced, buying twinkies, supposedly for his pregnant wife. Supposedly, look at him. Reginald VelJohnson, I sure know him, having seen a couple Family Matters episodes, as he was Carl Winslow.

Dammit, John ended up back in the hallway with the nude lady poster, and he put his hand over it! Dude, there are more important things than grabbing photographed breasts. I know he wasn't that pervy in this scene, but still. It's awesome to pick up on these small things, it's the benefit of watching a movie multiple times.

I saw a top 10 video about movie logics that don't make sense. One lighter, one little fire, lighting up a ventilator shaft? John did that, and yeah, it doesn't make sense. But you know, let it go. Hehe, John asked who's driving the police car, Stevie Wonder? No, he's not blind, but he's black.

Damn idiot said if you want to shoot someone, don't hesitate. Like John really needed that advice. "Welcome to the party, pal." What party? The one in Argyle's limo? That limo is surprisingly huge, and apparently loud music and being on the phone, is loud enough to not hear a car in reverse, speeding past one from behind. I mean, if he was playing Manowar, turn it up to 11, it would make sense.

John called himself the monkey in the wrench, the fly in the ointment, the pain in the ass. Story of his life, it's actually what he said in Die Hard 2, the story line. It was also funny how Hans in his conversation with John, via the magical walkie talkies, name dropped Rambo, and some other names. Rambo, very 80s! The legendary one liner by John was heard here, and it was really cheeky how John made that "Oh snap" face. The "You got burned" face. You know, that face. "Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker!"

Enough explosives to orbit Arnold Schwarzenegger. So this movie had a Sly and Arnie reference in one movie, and it's funny how Bruce Willis rose up in competition against those two action movie titans. Perhaps very prescient placement of those references. John gave the "Roy" name, and I finally grabbed it was because he said he was partial to Roy Rogers, revealed in that walkie talkie conversation.

Paul Gleason! He appeared here as the captain, very stubborn, but entertaining. Holly came in her office, occupied by Gruber, with a set of demands. Damn, some balls on that woman, and she probably thanked her lucky stars that she put down that photo in her office, showing her, the kids, and John. Also fortunate she used her Gennero name. I also loved that idiot question and answer. HAHA, a funnier line by Gleason's character, the guy that fell off the building was a stock broker according to him. Yuppies killed themselves?

Argyle was able to get the police signal. Is it that open or something? Jeez, magical radios too along with walkie talkies. I should've pointed out this guy, I mean, the skullet is legendary. Al Leong! Perennial henchmen in various 80s and 90s movies, stuff directed by icons like John Carpenter and Andy Sidaris. Even John McTiernan, appearing in this particular film, but definitely not German. Al Leong had a memorable scene, eating a Crunch bar! I love Crunch.

Oh yeah, I remember how this film had a lot of "Schnell" and "Los." Schnell schnell schnell! It was funny. Weiter weiter! The SWAT team idea was a bad one, and the explosions came! Very nice. What also was nice, John McClane using an axe to open and hold the elevator door. Now I can say how it reminds me of Silent Night, Deadly Night! Every time I did a review for December, I had to mention that movie.

"Geronimo motherfucker." The explosion after that line was amazing, still holds up. It took me long enough, I have to mention William Atherton's Richard Thornburg character. Dick, another twat! Him and Ellis compete for biggest dickhead award. I think Dick stands out because he's so slimy, a total leech, pretty much representing the field reporter perfectly, and really, paparazzi of today. Just give him a camera instead of a microphone, he'd be a TMZ guy.

Dwayne T. Robinson, Gleason's character, nice name. He and John McClane had a heated exchange, the latter said Robinson was buttfucked on live TV. Burn. Facial. Suck it! I need to use that line more often, it's from The Brothers Solomon. Goddamn Ellis, look at his smile, look at that twat face. His teeth aren't even white, so he basically has a coochie face, and the coochie has a yeast infection! Look at his facial hair too, vagina hair, donkey punch, do something to that face. Oh my goodness! Almost hair pulling quality with this guy, but it's actually entertaining to have these reactions to this butthole.

He tries to do his million dollar breakfast negotiation tactics with Hans, and basically lying and grandstanding his way through this, along with a freaking Coca Cola. Really? Product placement? Where's the Santa Claus on the can? I noticed how Ellis' hair looked...down with his fearful expression. He suddenly looked like a 12 year old child, hurt.

I type that, and Robinson said he was going to "nail his ass," referring to McClane. Uhhh, no.

HAHAHA! "Helsinki, Sweden." That stupid anchorman, what a douche, if he had more screen time, he'd compete with Dick and Ellis for biggest dickhead. Robert Davi and Grand L. Bush appear as Special Agent Johnson...and Johnson of the FBI. Davi had one of the lines of the film, after Dwayne said that he's in charge. "Not anymore." Damn skippy.

I think Rickman's American accent was better than his German. I sound like a snob with the German, he probably knows more about the language than I do. It's just, his voice, German? It doesn't mix perfectly with my ears. It's a movie though, I'm letting it go. Oooh, John McClane's feet look gross. Gruber was really smart with his Bill Clay name.

There was a really good kill by John that showed the crispness of the blu-ray video, but also how slick the blood is in here. Fuck CG blood. The legs of this guy, the blood just popping out and maybe could've been a 3D gimmick if the film went that route. Also the blood on the floor shortly after that kill, and later with McClane's feet, it's all brilliant.

Only John would drive a person that mad, in reference to Karl. Remember Holly, he's the pain in the ass. He's a hemorrhoid. "Ho. Ho. Ho." How about "F. B. I." Hans said it the same way, it was great. Hans is so smart, it's amazing, he really is one of the smartest movie villains ever. But nobody's perfect. The face by Hans in that safe opening scene was awesome.



Briefly too, you see the guy smiling, one of the rare times it happens in the film.

The conversations between John and Al represent 80s movie bromances. Even though the movie redefined the action movie, it still grabbed from the 80s action movie well. The bromances, almost homoerotic, with Arnie and his men in Predator, Sly and Carl Weathers, Rambo and Col. Trautman. John and Al, sounds like a sitcom. It's really nice though, especially the part where John wells up in his message for Holly, that he wants Al to give her. Some proper acting by Willis, and I heard for the first time, the echo effect coming from John's voice. It makes sense, he was alone in that whole floor, in a bathroom, I thought it was really nice.

Fucking Dick ruined everything for Holly and John. Wait until the second movie. Jeez. Dicks tend to ruin the lives of men and women.

I thought Al Leong died, I was surprised to see him still alive during the part where the hostages are forced up the roof. Where's his Crunch bar? John and Karl have a nice fight, the latter actually did a little kung fu with the double kick thing.

Oh my, Hans in his agitated state turned on Holly? When she called him a common thief, he responded in frustration, and you can see the woman's white bra, and she was sweating too. heaving, oh my goodness! I didn't notice that before! I love it.



Oh, Al Leong didn't last long after my little comment, haha! Another funny little line I never caught, when Davi's Johnson said that it was like Saigon. He was in the helicopter, with a big fucking gun, enjoying the ride. Grand L. Bush's Jackson said that he was in junior high, asshole. Really? 1988, let's say 1976 in regards to Saigon. 12 years? Man, Johnson's young. He should've said college or high school. Even if going to 1970, it's still odd to say that line.

More awesome explosions that still hold up, better than what Michael Bay would do. After that, some black on black crime. That was funny, damn Argyle looking so triumphant. He's as thin as a Twizzler for crying out loud.

How did John get that gun taped to his back? By himself...very well placed? It's just a movie...it's just a movie. It was ingenious nevertheless. I heard that Rickman did fall a couple feet, so his facial expressions here are genuine. A fear of heights, and my kill of the film.



I hope that wasn't a hostage. The sound of impact was really powerful to me. That had to hurt. The bromance with a hug, so lovely. And then...

SPOILER: Karl coming back alive was stupid. But it was necessary so Al could face his fear and pull out his gun. Earlier he shared that heavy story about accidentally killing an underage kid, explaining why he relegated himself to the desk. So this moment is necessary, it's a fist raising kind of event, but Karl died by a chain lynching. Pretty much, after getting the shit beaten out of him by John, and he just pops up conveniently for this scene? In the end, if that moment from VelJohnson's character wasn't so satisfying, this resurrection part would be butchered by me even more.

Trivia time. The scene where Gruber and McClane meet, the former using the fake name and American accent, was inserted into the script. The filmmakers felt Rickman was great at mimicking American accents. I definitely agree. Plus they wanted the two main characters to meet before the climax, and they were looking for a way to have it happen. A brilliant way was thought up. It was also unrehearsed to create a greater feeling of spontaneity between the two actors. It does feel like a loose conversation, I dig it.

The Nakatomi tower is in fact the headquarters of 20th Century Fox, the company charged itself rent for the use of the then unfinished building. Odd, charging itself rent?

Special, extra loud blanks were made for use in the film to add to the "hyper-realism" that John McTiernan the director wanted. Yes I forgot to add how loud these bullets were, making it sound like a serious barrage of ammunition. It was really good. Unfortunately for Willis, some of these blanks were used for the scene where he kills a terrorist by shooting from the bottom of the table. The gun being close to Willis' ear during the scene caused permanent hearing loss to Willis. This would explain the face John made during that. An almost wincing face, could be interpreted that he was in pain. That's how I grasped it. But, it was worth it, because Willis was paid $5 million to be John McClane. That was unheard of, for 1988, unbelievable. Fox President Rupert Murdoch OK'd it. Jeez.

This was Alan Rickman's feature film debut, I understand that he was a theater actor prior to this movie, so he had skills going into it.

Only a couple of the actors who played the German terrorists were actually German, and only a couple more could speak broken German. I had a feeling it was broken, especially the stuff from Gruber. Again, I am no expert in German, but I can imagine that my high school German teacher would've pointed out the inconsistencies in the language being spoken in this film. The actors were cast for their menacing appearances rather than their nationality. 9 of the 12 actors were over 6 feet tall. Yeah, they looked like hard motherfuckers, moreso than the henchmen in Die Hard 2. Al Leong by the way, does not count, he's clearly the odd one of the bunch.

The scene where McClane falls down a shaft was a mistake by the stuntman, who was supposed to grab the first vent, as it was originally planned. He slipped and continued to fall, but the shot was used anyway. It was edited together with one where McClane grabs the next vent down as he falls. That was brilliant, because it showed John McClane not being a graceful human being. Remember, he's flawed, he's not macho, he's practically an everyman, so doing that stunt and botching, worked for his character.

HAHA! Hart Bochner, who played Ellis, said "Hans...Bubby!" In the negotiation scene, it was ad-libbed. Alan Rickman's quizzical reaction was real!

In the "Making of" Featurette for Die Hard 3, Reginald VelJohnson said that after his appearances in the first two Die Hard films, friends and people on the street frequently teased and joked about the guy's obsession of Twinkies. Some people even bought Twinkies just to throw them at his car, while he was inside, and saying things like "Oh we knew you wanted some of those." Dick moves, but that's people for you. I bet it was in New York City, since they shot Die Hard 3 over there.

McTiernan found it necessary to smash cut away from Hans Gruber's face whenever he fired a gun, because Rickman had a bad habit of flinching from the noise and flash of these prop guns. The trivia bit said that if you look at Rickman's face when he shoots Takagi, you can see him wincing. I went back, slow motion, he pulled his head back a teeny tiny bit. That's it. By the way, damn it looks great in slow motion, the blood spatter was brilliant. SPOILER: when he shot Ellis, I knew they cut away from the gun shot, probably because they couldn't capture it with Rickman's habit. Either way, it was still a great scene, and the cutting was effective because they go to John hearing the gunshot from the walkie talkie.

Bruce Willis personally recommended Bonnie Bedelia for the Holly role. Good man!

On Rickman's first day of shooting he filmed the scene where he runs into McClane. He made a jump off the ledge about three feet high, and injured his knee, damaging some cartilage in it. He was told by his doctor not to put any weight on the leg and he had to use crutches for a week. For the rest of the scene where Gruber was standing and talking to McClane, Rickman is standing on one leg for the entire time and has a leg brace on under his pants. No spring chicken. What a story, Mark!

The German that the terrorists speak is sometimes grammatically incorrect. In the German version of the film, the terrorists are just from "Europe." It was fixed for the special edition VHS and later home video releases. The only instances of incorrect use of German are Rickman's lines. AHA! I knew it! See, I did have a reason to kind of take a dig at Rickman's accent. There was a few times where the words he said in German, didn't fit. Bless him though, he still was awesome in the film.

In the Spring of 1987, producer Joel Silver and director John McTiernan attended a performance of the play "Dangerous Liaisons," in which Rickman played the evil Vicomte de Valmont. Immediately, the two realized they had found Hans Gruber. Smart people, at least for that moment, because there's nobody that would've made Hans Gruber the way he was as Alan Rickman did.

When McClane runs through the glass shards in his "bare" feet after Hans has his men shoot out the glass partitions in the computer room, Willis was in fact wearing "rubber" shoes designed to look like his own bare feet. What exposes them is how unnaturally large they appear. I never really bothered looking that closely, because I prefer women's feet.

Much of the script was improvised due to the constant screenplay tweaks that were being made during filming. Yet it still came off really well.

Willis was also shooting Moonlighting at the same time, which explains why nearly all of McClane's scenes take place at night. Willis would shoot TV during the day, then come to the Fox lot in the night to work. That's hard work, too bad Bruce Willis forgot that.

In the making-of featurette, McTiernan revealed that a vast majority of the exterior shots of the building showing explosions were real, full-scale explosions set off in and around the actual building. Whoa. Hmmm, impressive.

McTiernan suggested Ludwig van Beethoven's "Ode To Joy (9th Symphony, 4th Movement) as the musical theme of the terrorists. Gruber does hum it while in an elevator with Takagi. Film composer Michael Kamen thought at first it was sacrilege to use Beethoven in an action movie, telling McTiernan: "I will make mincemeat out of Wagner or Strauss for you, but why Beethoven?" McTiernan replied that the Beethoven piece had been the theme of the violence in A Clockwork Orange. Kamen, a Kubrick fan, agreed. The song was used brilliantly anyways, so no issues.

The German version of the movie changed the names and backgrounds of the German-born terrorists, to English ones, mostly British equivalents. Hans Gruber became "Jack Gruber. Karl became "Charlie," Heinrich turned into "Henry." You get the picture. The new background depicted them as radical Irish activists having gone freelance and for profit rather than ideals. Ha, that sounds a bit too complex. This led to some odd plot holes in this movie and the continuity problems to Die Hard 3, as Gruber is referenced as being German. German terrorism, especially by the Rote Armee Fraktion (the Red Army Faction, take out the final word, you have the military force from Dragon Ball), was still considered a sensitive issue by the German government in the 1980s. This would explain the edits. Jack Gruber vs. John McClane. Jack vs. John, epic showdown that altered origins.

The funny thing about the cast of characters, Bruce Willis was born in Germany, his mother's German, father was American. Rickman of course being English, and Alexander Godunov, who was Karl, was Russian. That makes Willis the most German guy than most of the villains. Fascinating.

As the opening credits mention, this was based on a book by Roderick Thorp entitled "Nothing Lasts Forever." This was a sequel to "The Detective" which had a 1968 film adaptation starring Frank Sinatra. Because of a clause in Sinatra's contract for The Detective which gave him the right to reprise his role in a sequel, he was actually the first person offered the McClane role, even though he was 73 at the time. Coincidentally, Willis made his movie debut in The First Deadly Sin walking out a bar as Sinatra walks in. Odd that they even considered Sinatra, probably a formality, just to get a "no" from him, and have it on record.

When the police dispatcher tells Powell to investigate the Nakatomi Building, she said it was a "Code 2." This refers to an urgent indication where sirens are not to be used. I wouldn't know that, because it looked like just a simple look around, but yeah his lights were off.

The scene which McClane embraces Holly, when Hans Gruber gets the action movie ending, had to be re-shot 4 times because Willis kept making Bedelia crack up with laughter. The first take, he made her unintentionally laugh when he says "Didn't want to do this" and said "Ye!" in a funny voice. In the second take, Willis made her laugh again when he did a monkey impression. Third take, he broke into song singing "Paris in Spring" by Mary Ellis, which made the whole crew laugh. And Willis doesn't have that kind of fun anymore, it's a shame.

The McClane character had not been fully realized until almost halfway through production when McTiernan and Willis decided that he was a man that did not like himself, but was doing the best he could in a situation. Seems about right.

When the bomb in the elevator shaft blows out the side of the building, the effect was accomplished by first collecting virtually every camera flashbulb of a particularly powerful type in the Los Angeles area and wiring them on the outside of the actual building to simulate the flash, and then by superimposing a shot of an actual explosive blowing a whole in the wall of an all-black miniature of the building at the appropriate location. And that's why practical effects always beat CG.

Dwayne T. Robinson said that McClane "could be a fucking bartender for all we know." Willis was actually a bartender before acting! Clint Eastwood originally owned the rights to the novel this film's based on, and planned to star in the film around the early 1980s. That would've been interesting.

Bruce Willis' dialogue in the scene where he pulls glass out of his feet was ad-libbing. When Terry Gilliam learned that, he cast Willis in Twelve Monkeys. However, when comparing the original script to Willis' lines, it shows he didn't really deviate much from the script. Willis' exhaustion from his Moonlighting schedule, forced co-writer Steven E. de Douza to beef up the roles of other characters, giving them personalities like Powell, Ellis, Argyle, Rick Thornburg, and more screen time. Brilliant, that's what actually puts this movie in a higher territory than almost all other action films. It's rich, filled to the brim with memorable side characters. While taking a shower, I counted how many stand out and memorable characters there were in this film. 14. From Harvey the douche anchorman to John McClane, that's a wide spectrum, consider that Harvey's stuff is pretty small, but he had that Sweden botch.

The fireball in the elevator shaft was shot with real pyrotechnics using a miniature shaft. The camera speed had to vary over the length of the shot because otherwise the fireball would appear to change speed as it moved up the forced-perspective model. The effects people weren't sure at what exactly rate to vary the speed, so they rigged a manual variable-speed control and did a couple takes changing the speed at different rates and picked the one that looked best. In other words, hard work, not CG.

I wondered what guns they used for this film and action ones in general. I learn here that they were real firearms modified to function with blanks. Modern small arms ammunition is intended to have minimum muzzle flash, but McTiernan wanted vivid, "exaggerated realism" in those flashes. Weapons specialist Michael Papac hand fabricated some blanks that were so powerful that the standard modifications for firearms weren't workable. Papac had to specially modify the firearms involved. Special effects coordinator Al Di Saro said that these blanks were deafening. I usually play stuff all the way up, the media player, the PC's volume, but I'm wearing earphones. So if I watched it from the TV, yes it would be deafening. They were really loud, I know that for sure, it tempts me to watch this on a bigger screen. I'm too cheap to get a home theater system. Actually, I don't have enough space for that, I said already how that bathroom's bigger than my room. Anyways, the blanks caused some cast members, notably Alan Rickman, to flinch. Furthermore, normally most sound effects come from a studio library. Sound designer Richard Shorr didn't want to use these clips as modern sound equipment would show their age, as some of them came from the 50s. The sound crew took the appropriate firearms to a firing range in Texas, and recorded them being fired with live ammunition. Wow, I wonder if action films used these sound clips. I have a feeling Die Hard 2 at least did, because their firearms had similarly loud sounds to them.

There were references to the Pearl Harbor attack on December 7, 1941. The first one was Takagi, in response to John saying he didn't know Japanese people celebrated Christmas. Takagi said they're flexible, Pearl Harbor didn't work out so they got you with tape decks. Yep, and later PlayStation. While not dominating the world, at least one of their products is conquering a world. Sony conquering the video game world. Anyways, the other reference was "Akagi" as the password from one of board of directors for the safe. 7 locks, 6 could be cracked, the 7th lock was an electromagnetic thing, and obviously that was seen to in the movie. "Akagi" means Red Castle in English, the name of the Japanese aircraft carriers which carried out the strike on Pearl Harbor. Interestingly enough, James Shigeta, who played Takagi, played Vice Admiral Chiuichi Nagumo, one of the architects of the Pearl Harbor attack in the film, "The Battle of Midway."

In the original script in the original novel, the action took place over three days, but McTiernan was inspired to have it take place over a single night by Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream. That's good, I couldn't imagine this being more than a night. It shows a sense of urgency and fast response action. Die Hard 2 and 3 did the same kind of thing, and those made sense. Die Hard 4 was several days, and Die Hard 5, and it's oddly coincidental that those are the weaker ones in the franchise.

Apparently the FBI agents and the anchor Harvey Johnson were named as an in-joke to Reginald VelJohnson. What was the joke? Him being dumb? I mean the FBI agents were pretty stupid with their electricity shut off plan, and Harvey did that Helsinki botch.

The LAPD officer who gives medical attention to Powell was Anthony Peck, who also plays Detective Ricky Walsh in Die Hard 3. I wonder if the casting people for the third movie knew that.

The office interiors were designed to resemble Fallingwater, a house designed by architect Frank Lloyd Wright. The first release poster for the film did not feature Bruce Willis' likeness, just the building. The producers originally thought it might deter non-Willis fans from seeing the movie. Posters were later altered after the early box office success. Pre-release promo posters did show Willis.

The film's ending had not been finalized by the time filming had begun. One result is that the truck depicted transporting the terrorists to the building (Pacific Courier) is too small to house the ambulance that was later revealed to be inside. Other scenes also lacked context: the building's computer room was built before anyone knew what it would be used for. The one with the monitors, John used one and put a C4 explosive in it. That caused the big boom.

The addresses and phone numbers depicted on the LAPD dispatch's computer for the Nakatomi plaza management are the actual numbers for management of Fox Plaza, where the film was shot.

Bruce Willis took the role of John McClane after it had been turned down by Robert De Niro. Willis had just been turned down to play the Charles Grodin role opposite De Niro in Midnight Run. Coincidentally, both films opened the same weekend. What competition, but Die Hard's better. Midnight Run's a classic though, and really he wouldn't fit in that movie. As a wisecracking and annoying support? Wisecracking lead, for sure.

McTiernan did not want the villains to be terrorists, considering them too mean. He chose to avoid the terrorists' politics in favor of making thieves in pursuit of monetary gain, believing it would make the film more suitable for summer entertainment. Smart man, it wasn't necessary, and it was funny when Hans demanded for various revolutionaries who are in prison, to be released. Kind of a knock on that terrorist idea. If anything, it makes their plan more ingenious, all that for money, wow.

Arnold Schwarzenegger was originally considered for the role of McClane. That would've been interesting, but he wouldn't fit here, the premise is McClane's a regular lughead put in extraordinary situations.

The character of Hans Gruber is rumored to be based on Roderick Thorp's father, known to be a tyrant amongst friends and family. I wouldn't think he would be as sophisticated as the actual character.

The gun that Karl uses in the film is a Steyr AUG, an Austrian made assault rifle that is standard long arm for armies like Austria, Australia, and Ireland. Well, Austria's Germany's little brother, they got that right.

McTiernan turned the script down several times. He felt it was a nasty piece of work. When he was finally persuaded to take on the assignment, he was able to lighten some of the film's darker edges. Cool, but I'm curious what those darker edges were. McTiernan was probably approached because of Predator, so he knows action movies.

Sam Neill turned down the role of Hans Gruber. Interesting.

Ah yeah! The Playboy ties. Alright, the centerfold that McClane sees in the hallway, using as a point of reference while navigating his way from the elevator shaft to the air vent is that of Playboy Playmate Pamela Stein. I was hoping it was Hope Marie Carlton. Another Playboy Playmate, Kym Malin, was the girl who banged in the office, the topless woman. The third was Terri Lynn Doss, the blonde bird who jumped and hugged her boyfriend.

Here's my own trivia, or rather, something I questioned every time I watched the movie, but now bothered to research. When Gruber told Karl to "shoot the glass," he first said "Schiess dem Fenster." That's not right. It should've been "schießen die Fenster." "Schiess" according to Google translate is "shooting." I figured it to be the form of the word that goes after the he/she/it pronouns. So I thought it should be "Karl schiess die Fenster." It's "schiesst." All this contributes to the trivia of incorrect German, I always thought that specific bit sounded wrong.

Another trivia bit by yours truly, I watched this movie again, days after already seeing it. So Thursday a couple days after a Sunday. Yeah, I wanted to, the movie's awesome enough and I needed something to watch while eating. So I finally noticed the guy who called for the grid to be shut down, so the building's electricity would be cut out. His name's Walt, played by Rick Ducommun. Rick played Art in The Burbs! Interestingly enough, I went back recently to some bits from that great movie. I really love the "Ray, this is Walter" scene. The femur bone, and that leads to the trivia bit. Walt, Walter, get it? 6 degrees of separation, The Burbs and Die Hard, wow!

Back to regular trivia.

Hans Gruber was also the name of an adversary in Our Man Flint with James Coburn. I bet that guy's not as slick and villainous as this Gruber.

The Hungarian title is "Give your life expensive," the title of the sequel is "Your life is more expensive," and the third part is "The life is always expensive." Die Rich, Die Richer, and Always Die Rich.

On the blu-ray commentary, production designer Jackson De Govia notes the company name on the truck, Pacific Courier. It was a joke, since it means "Messenger of Peace." Govia used a similar name and graphic on the truck that gets blown up at the start of Die Hard 3.

Due to the tourist interest in the Fox Plaza building, people are now forbidden from taking photos directly outside the building. Going back to the picture I said that was recent, it was taken from someone parked many feet away from the building.

18 minutes of the movie passes before the first gunshot is heard. That's great because I always thought the movie took its sweet time, and was the better for it. The pre-action stuff was funny, the setting was sunset, and when John gets his ride from Argyle, there's shots from outside the limo, and you can see the day. Very nice, orange hue I think. It just looked beautiful. Of course the dialogue's great too.

Hart Bochner, who plays Ellis, is the son of actor Lloyd Bochner, who co-starred with Frank Sinatra in The Detective. It's based on Thorp's novel of the same name, and as said, Die Hard's novel basis is the sequel to that.

In Spain, the title was translated into "Crystal Jungle." In Poland it became "The Glass Trap," which sounds and fits very well in that country. The original title is hard to translate correctly, as it would sound like: "It is hard to kill him" or "He dies slowly." The same titles are used for the sequels even though they do not relate well to the sequels. Those titles sound stale and funny.

The bridge shown in Takagi's office is a work of Frank Lloyd Wright for the Bay Area in 1949. In here, it was some planned bridge for Indonesia. Gruber read about that project in Forbes.

Each of the first 3 Die Hard films has a connection and/or reference to at least 1 of the 3 countries of Northern Europe: Norway, Sweden, and Finland. Here, freaking Harvey with the Helsinki botch. It was used by some Hasseldorf guy who authored a book called "Hostage Terrorist and Terrorist Hostage" or whatever. The author was a guest on the news show that Dick Thornburg works in. Helsinki Syndrome was just a twist on "Stockholm Syndrome." Stockholm's the capital of Sweden, Helsinki the capital of Finland.

The Fox Plaza was designed by William L. Pereira, one of his last projects before his death in 1985. That building looks fantastic.

Michael Madsen was considered for the role of John McClane. He might've fit, but a bit too "cool" for the project. If that makes sense, just look at him in Resevoir Dogs, so cool, and it was odd he was some scientist in Species, because he's cool. Bruce Willis isn't cool, he was badass.

Before reporter Dick Thornburg hears Powell's call for backup over the radio, he was discussing dinner reservations with a woman, saying "of course I can get a table, Wolfgang is a close personal friend of mine." Obviously Wolfgang Puck, who did have a restaurant called "Spago," which opened in 1982. Freaking Dick man.

Bruce Willis and Demi Moore tied the knot at the Golden Nugget hotel in Las Vegas during this shoot, the latter having recently broke her engagement to Emilio Estevez. Little Richard presided over the ceremony and Ally Sheedy was a bridesmaid.

Bruce Willis is left-handed, therefore McClane is portrayed as being left-handed. I never noticed that actually! The Beretta 92F used in the film was modified to better accommodate Willis being a southpaw.

The entire Nakatomi building was supposed to be managed by a supercomputer and the scenes where McClane is trapped in an office and Gruber orders the windows to be shot are supposed to be the computer room. The large dark object is the computer, modeled after an ETA-10 supercomputer. It is a model and a bit larger than the actual computer which was thought to look too small. The fiberglass model was later used by ETA as part of marketing for their supercomputers. In other words, old computer. Old old old! Did you see the size of those monitors? It's huge.

Don Johnson and Richard Dean Anderson were considered for the McClane role. I know the former only from Dead Bang. Yeah, it might've work, especially the wisecracking. Charles Bronson was considered for the role too. WHAT?! He was contracted to Cannon Films though. He'd be too old for the role, as badass as he was.

Though Heinrich is supposedly German, the cigarettes McClane picked up out of his pocket are French-made Gauloises. Fittingly, there used to be army-issue and are known for their strong, harsh taste.

When Powell circles the Nakatomi parking lot, McClane looked on and made that Stevie Wonder reference. The song that was playing in Argyle's limo, was "Skeletons" by Stevie Wonder. I didn't know the song specifically, but that's funny!

Four of the actors who were considered to be McClane later appeared in the Expendables films, Willis was in the first two. Arnie, Sylvester Stallone, Mel Gibson, and Harrison Ford. Willis getting this should be considered "There's a new sheriff in town." Willis missed the boat on working with Ford and Gibson, him and his money demands, but the third film was underwhelming, probably good that he wasn't in that. Plus it was the lowest grossing of the three.

The music being played at the corporate gathering at the beginning of the film, was the first movement of Johann Sebastian Bach's Third Brandenberg Concerto. It played before Ode To Joy took over the rest of the film.

The Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian translation of the title is "Umri Muski," "Die Like A True Man." "Die Manly" basically. The pirated VHS translation back in 1988 was "Skupo Prodaj Svorju Kozu." "Sell Your Skin At High Price." That sounds kind of badass, and sounds like a horror movie title.

In the Nakatomi building's vault is, among other pieces of art, the Edgard Degas' painting "Ecole de dance" (1873). It's shown when the bad guys finally break the last lock. It's in the Corcoran Museum of Arts in Washington D.C.

Rick Ducommon, Walt in this movie, and Art in The Burbs, also played the man that has his pool set on fire and gets shot by Milo in The Last Boy Scout, also starring Bruce Willis. I have that movie on the queue, I've seen it a couple times. Spoiler opinion, it's a great movie, but how great, I will be able to describe eventually. Now I can't wait to spot Ducommun in that film.

After seeing the movie Heart Like a Wheel, Willis loved Bonnie Bedelia's performance in that film, personally recommending her for this one. I never watched that movie before, maybe someday.

This was the first of three films between Robert Davi and Grand L. Bush. The other two being Licence to Kill and Maniac Cop 3, which I did see a few months ago. That movie in hindsight is like Jason Goes to Hell. Ooooh. It was okay, but like that Jason film, it tried to put supernatural stuff in a formula that didn't need it at all. That film by the way had Jackie Earle Haley.

The Christmas carol "Silent Night" was composed in Salzburg, Austria by Franz Gruber, a school teacher and church organist. He wrote the melody for a guitar arrangement at the request of the 6 stanza poem's author Fr. Joseph Mohr, a Roman Catholic priest and assistant pastor at St. Nicholas Church, who wrote it in 1816. Mohr and Gruber first sang the song "Stille Nacht" at midnight mass on Christmas Eve 1818, while Mohr played his guitar. The name is similar to Hans Gruber, and of course this is a Christmastime movie. Interesting, and "Silent Night" doesn't even play in the movie.

Bruce Willis worked with some of the actors who were considered for the McClane role. Obviously Arnie and Sly were mentioned. Also, Richard Gere in The Jackal, Michael Madsen in Sin City, and Don Johnson in an episode of Miami Vice. I bet he bragged to all the guys about being in this film, he can lay claim too that it's the best action movie ever. It's one of, maybe the best, it's that good in my opinion.

I didn't know this, not watching Licence to Kill, but Davi was the main villain. Interesting, but the Dalton Bond films haven't been talked about a lot, so I had no idea he was in that big franchise. Grand L. Bush was an American agent in that film.

Nick Nolte was the first one to turn down the lead. He'd be too old for that anyways.

Richard Gere was considered, since I mentioned The Jackal tie-in, Tom Berenger, Al Pacino also turned down the roles. Jesus! All the big names of Hollywood.

This film is in the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die" piece, edited by Steven Schneider. Yes, it's a movie people who haven't must see.

When asked how he's doing while pulling glass out of his bleeding feet, McClane responded to Powell with "All things being equal, I'd rather be in Philadelphia." A famous quote of W.C. Fields misconstrued to be on his gravestone. I heard that line before, well, maybe the opposite. Something like "It beats Philadelphia," said by Dale Cooper of Twin Peaks. It's funny too when you see their Philadelphia headquarters, it looks so damn bland, it's not a glamorous look at the FBI's facilities.

Roger Ebert was one of the few critics to give this a negative review. Oh my goodness, of course! It wouldn't be nice to speak ill of the dead, but goddamn man, this guy. The main reason he gave the negative review was because he hated the Dwayne Robinson character played by Paul Gleason. He said the character was unnecessary, useless, dumb, and he prevented the movie from working. Oh come on! He's not dumb, he is useless, but that's the point! Unnecessary, duh, aren't they all in the end? Look at it, their only good use was when the movie's story ended. They're basically damage control and the cleanup crew. It was all John McClane dammit. Even Johnson and Johnson proved useless, but damn were they fun! This is why I can't read movie reviews by critics, they shit on everything. Plus they praise big dramas and such, and those tend to be boring, or not as good as a genre film, or even a big A-grade action film.

IMDB says the news anchor shares the same name and introduction as one of the characters from Bye Bye Birdie. That's all it said, I had to look at the IMDB page for it, never seeing that movie. Uncredited character called Harvey Johnson, and since that's the "news anchor" in this film, yeah. Introduction, I guess how he was caught with his pants down, so to speak, arguing with Dick Thornburg, and they went live while he was glaring at the guy.

Hans' personal weapon is a German Heckler & Koch P7. Its strange shape is a result of its unique safety features. In weapons terminology, it's called a "squeeze-cocking" mechanism. Sounds like a sex thing. The black strip sticking out under the trigger is the safety. Hans has to squeeze the safety strip with his shooting hand. This unlocks the firing pin and cocks the hammer. He can't release it after the first shot to do follow-up ones. It has to be held down to repeatedly fire the gun. If he accidentally dropped it, the safety would snap back on, making it a very safe gun to use. In addition, a red pin in the back of the slide sticks out when the safety is squeezed to the "off' position, so Hans knows it will fire.

In the first scene where the helicopter gunships appear, the lighted building letters in the background reads: "Agfa-Gevaert," which is a Belgian corporation. I guess I.T. stuff.

Apparently the teddy bear John McClane has also appeared at the end of The Hunt For Red October. I have not seen that movie, but when I do, I'll be on the lookout for that. Another McTiernan movie, another bad accent, Connery going for Russian, so I've heard.

Beginning of SPOILER trivia.

So I was right about Rickman's fall. He was falling from a 21 foot high model. He was holding onto a stuntman and falling onto an airbag. To get the right reaction, the stuntman dropped Rickman on the count of two, not three. So the face he made, was genuine!

The original script called for terrorists to hijack the building, and for a superhero cop to stop them. McTiernan modified the script to change the bad guys into robbers pretending to be terrorists so that the audience could enjoy their intention of stealing lots of money. He felt having terrorists as villains would make the movie less enjoyable and give it a political edge, which he wanted to avoid. I agree, and this movie didn't call for that kind of thing. True Lies is an example where the terrorist angle there made sense. McTiernan also changed John McClane into an everyday, flawed man that rises to the occasion in dire circumstances. He felt the audience would identify more with him. Absolutely! It's strange that such a concept didn't really get utilized to the fullest before Die Hard.

The book this film is based on, "Nothing Lasts Forever," had details changed. Originally, a much older Leland (changed to McClane) was visiting his daughter, Steffie Leland Gennaro, who worked for the Klaxxon oil company. Takagi was originally a VP of sales named "Rivers." Harry Ellis, Al Powell, and Dwayne Robinson were essentially the same, but the FBI wasn't involved. No Johnson and Johnson. Hans Gruber was originally Anton "Little Tony" Gruber, while Hans was the name of Karl's brother. The purpose of the terrorist takeover was to allow the West German radical group to uncover an illegal arms shipment Klaxxon was making to the Chilean dictatorship. Finally, in the end scene, which was Christmas morning at 10AM, Anton is shot by Leland and falls out the window, also catching a finger on Gennaro's watch, but in this case he pulls her out the window to her death! What a story Mark! Yeah that makes for interesting literature, and a film to break out in the fall, but Summer? The movie is all the better for its changes.

Hans Gruber's fall was filmed at 300 frames per second. That might explain why that scene looked striking. It looked different than everything else in the film, kind of like Hans had a bigger...physical presence. It's hard to describe. But at 300fps, wouldn't that mean it was really fast at first, then slowed down? It was a slow motion scene after all. I wonder how this particular moment looks in 4K.

The music cue when Powell shoots Karl at the end of the film was actually an unused track from James Horner's score for Aliens, another Fox film! Specifically, the music was originally intended for a scene near the end of the film, in which Sigourney Weaver's Ripley battles with the alien queen on board the Sulaco. Instead, an earlier music cue was reused, leaving the cue available for this film. A second music cue, scored by John Scott for the film Man on Fire, was also used. The music can be heard when McClane and Holly meet Powell at the end of the film. Interesting stuff. The music that appeared in the Karl death scene was also used for the final battle of Kirk and Kahn in Star Trek II.

On-screen body count: 21. Damn! Jason Voorhees would be impressed. These include, in order, both Nakatomi security guards, Takagi, Tony, Heinrich, Marco, James and Alexander were blown up at the same time, Ellis, Franco, Fritz, Uli, the Johnsons and the 4 other guys on the chopper, Eddie, Hans, and Karl.

Powell shoots Karl a total of 5 times during the final scene. Yeah he unloaded on the guy, it was cool.

End of SPOILER trivia.

Classic moment in cinematic history...



While in the GIF making mood, I saw Bonny Bedelia's credited name saying "Gennaro." I thought seeing that on the "futuristic" touch screen from earlier in the movie that I was wrong. I was just seeing things, so I went back and...



What the hell? So is it Gennero or Gennaro? Her office door says "Gennero." The credits say "Gennaro." Oh man. It's just a movie...it's just a movie. Oh come on, forget that, it's a continuity error. I had to edit my spelling already because I thought it was always "Genero." Jeez man, it's ridiculous. For all the nitpicks I have with the film, this is actually the biggest one. The error was mentioned on IMDB, of course.

Nitpicks will almost always happen with movies, even the best of them. That being said, goodness, this movie is just fantastic. It never gets old for me. 27 years later, it still holds up strongly and stands firm as one of the best action movies ever. If I did a top 50, maybe even a top 20 of all time favorite movies, Die Hard would be on it. Most of the nitpicks and logic gaps are done in jest, the film survives these little things. The amazing explosions, the slick and polished presentation, the stunts, even though it's clear some doubles got really busy, the dialogue, the memorable asshole characters, the people in general, the actors in general. Even though Bruce Willis was the master of this domain, the main man, the unlikely, reluctant hero, he's not the only reason the movie rocks. Alan Rickman was brilliant, one of the best villains ever, so darn smart and good looking, well dressed. Bonnie Bedelia was a hot damsel in distress, without conforming to many of the traditions that encapsulate said movie cliche. She knows her way through an argument. Even a henchman stands out, Karl, Theo, they were memorable characters. The former had a revenge angle placed in the middle of the movie, rather deep for such a minor character. The latter as charismatic and a nice techie guy. Argyle spent most of his time in the roomiest limo ever, and even he stood out, from the moment he talks to John, it's all memorable. Reginald VelJohnson was absolutely lovable in the film, I'd eat twinkies with the guy. There's really no badly written character. Paul Gleason, William Atherton, the Ellis guy, dicks on film, but it takes talent to be that good of a douche. Robert Davi and the amazingly named Grand L. Bush, whose birthday is actually on Christmas Eve! Those guys were great in their tiny roles here. To think Bush went on to play Balrog from the hilariously bad Street Fighter movie. Who else? Hmmm, the Playboy Playmates, the pregnant girl, uhhh, "schnell schnell" guys, I'm just running out of ideas. I didn't realize until recently, such a deep pool of memorable, interesting characters, in a film filled with excitement and entertainment. The action was badass, and it set the tone for the decade that followed. Say goodbye to the 80s: macho, beefy men, sweat that can fill the Red Sea, and slightly dumb villains. Say hello to some better villains, more sophisticated action, more unlikely heroes, the muscles were decreasing, the minds may have increased. At the center is this film turning the tide and leading the way, and holding the big flag is a guy that would go on to lose all his hair and become a grouchy, bored performer. But here, he was fucking awesome.

Santa McClane delivered a fantastic movie.

Die Hard 2 - A tremendous action movie double feature. Since this is also a Christmastime movie, I might as well watch this too, and not hold it off for a separate day. I mean, I'm not waiting, the movie doesn't wait with how it immediately started after the title is shown, within the first 15 seconds! It even starts hot and heavy. Well, cold, with the cop impounding John's car. Immediately a bit of an asshole shown. Renny Harlin directs this movie, now I can note that after seeing one of his first movies in Nightmare on Elm Street 4. It's interesting to think back to that film and this one. I knew by the end of part 4, that Renny was an action movie guy. Despite the film being horror, it really has a serious action movie polish to it, it showed what he was destined to do. The movie's not a classic, and certainly doesn't touch the first Nightmare movie, but it does stand out for the action movie things it carries. Interestingly enough, I'm watching this, Harlin's a Finnish guy. Earlier I enjoyed Rare Exports, a Finnish production. It was a Finnish day apparently.

William Sadler was naked and doing some martial arts. Tai Chi? I kinda wished his dick was shown, he was so fit and good looking, I can't help it. The big thing with the film is that it is very similar to the first movie, to a fault in some degree. I mean, Sadler exits his hotel room and walks along with his men, and it's very much like the entrance of Hans and his men. And these guys were soldiers, so it kind of makes Hans and his men even better when they act all military very well.

The 90s? Faxes, airplane telephones...microwaves? Tasers? This film was released in 1990, and bless Holly Gennero, that's not the 90s. Here's the 90s in my opinion: grunge, the world wide web, Pamela Anderson. There's other stuff, but I think those three are strong enough. Grunge: the musical landscape. The world wide web: society. Pamela Anderson: celebrity. Three biggest things about America.

Buckwheat! Ha, one of the codenames of the henchmen, who shot the guy that lived in the little church. He set himself up for death with that "A little part of me has died in this church" line. I think the fall taken by the guy was done by a stunt double. Damn blu-ray rip exposes some stuff. Sadler's line for that reporter, not named Dick, was nice. A word? How about two? "Fuck" and "you." Classic.

Interesting, something I didn't notice before. In the airport baggage scene where John fights the two guys, there's a golf club bag that says "Tiger Shark." I was thinking Tiger Woods, but yeah.

The film being about 10 minutes shorter than the first, illustrates the overall pacing of the film. It felt like they rushed a bit, because it felt almost immediate that the movie heads to action territory. There's about 20 or so minutes before John strikes in the first movie. Here, less than 15 minute, it felt like. And not just one guy, but two. Plus during the first movie, he was trying to be stealth. Here, just walks in that baggage room.

"Do you know who I am?" Yes, you are a dick. William Atherton's introduction to this movie was funny! Following the incident from the first movie, he filed a restraining order against Holly. It's technically being violated, but nobody raises a stink about it except Dick. It was funny how the stewardess was all "Would you like some champagne?" In response to Holly saying how he knocked two teeth out of Dick.

One difference that can be said for William Sadler's character is that he's more liable to tease his men, while Hans doesn't have time for that. Joining the fray in this movie was Dennis Franz, as the chief of airport police. He had some memorable roles in Dressed to Kill and Body Double, classic Brian De Palma flicks. I think his character here was very similar to his cop one in Dressed to Kill. Basically, an asshole. McClane had an awesome line for the guy, asking what sets off the metal detectors. Led in the ass, or shit in your brain?

For the first time I know the actor who played the General Esperanza character. Franco Nero! Wow, having seen the guy in a few movies last year, it's now obvious that he was in this.

Recently deceased Fred Thompson is in the movie as the head of the Washington D.C. airport. He's got the deep, Republican sounding voice, it fits for this character. It also fits for his Chief of Staff character from In the Line of Fire, a sweet Clint Eastwood flick. I don't remember if I spotted this before, but John Leguizamo is actually in this film, very briefly, one of the Colonel's men. You see him on a walkie talkie saying everything's set to Sadler's character.



Sadler's introductory line to his message to Dulles Tower was very similar to Hans Gruber's Alexander The Great line. One of his demands was for a fully fueled plane, while Hans had a demand for a helicopter. The comparisons just keep coming up. Holding planes hostage, holding a corporate tower hostage. It's amazing how the movies got bigger and bigger as far as the problem, yet the first film still stands tall. Probably because it's so simple compared to those other plots. I mean, the first movie, so easy, cracking a safe, raising some Hell. Here, some technology wanky stuff to take over airplanes. Die Hard with a Vengeance was simpler with a revenge plot and gold stealing one running parallel. The fourth one got complicated again, cyber terrorism stuff. The fifth movie? Fuck it. I actually don't remember, and I can't be arsed to research.

Uh no lady, Col. Stuart said "Fuck" and "you," not "Fuck off." She said those were the same two words as what Stuart said. But John was right when he said he's done this before. Yeah, I saw it a couple minutes ago! The elevator maneuvering.

I always thought Marv looked like Billy Bob Thornton. The little janitor guy in this movie.

Another little appearance, Robert Patrick, the T-1000. I spotted him before, this isn't new, but still nice.



To the similarities with the first two movies, there's also repeating. John even made a comment about how it's the same old stuff with the ventilating shafts and such. He goes through one again in this. I laughed this time at the obvious dummy getting hit by all that wood and metal in the terminal shootout scene. It already had a pile of SWAT team bodies, which can be compared to the SWAT team from the first movie getting bombed. Speaking of the terminal scene, that had the little black guy that appeared briefly in Fright Night! Hehehe. He was a cop who Charley got to check out his vampire neighbor's house. Good times.

Stuart cares about his men so much that he'd crash a plane in response to their deaths. From that terminal scene. The airplane target, I noticed how clever, for lack of a better term, that they showed the passengers in that plane. So that you care about what was about to happen. A kid being sat down, an old lady. It's cliche actually, one would expect a handicapped person in this flight. After the fact, a baby doll, burned. Awww. Bruce Willis' attempt at his runway lights wasn't as successful as Nicolas Cage's green flare thing in The Rock. The explosion on this was really damn good.

Switching aftershave and stronger mouth wash would help Dick, according to Holly. Burn. Facial. Suck it! Twice in a day, I like it.



Another familiar face to this film, John Amos as the leader of the platoon sent to Dulles. I know him most as Lisa's (Nia Long) dad from Fresh Prince of Bel Air. Good times.

Esperanza conveniently can fly a plane, the magical walkie talkies from the first movie return here, and one just so happen to have the codes punched so one could listen in on Stuart and his men talking. What else? Grenades that take too long to explode, McClane saying he should quit smoking, and then some scenes later, he's smoking a cigarette. There's a bunch of nitpicks to this film, they're similar to the first movie. Also lines. Dwayne Robinson saying he wants to nail McClane's ass, and Amos' Major Grant wanting to "jerk that cocksucker off," referring to Col. Stuart. Speaking of magic communication, the airplane phone that can basically be connected all the way to live network TV? I can buy it today, but 1990? In a way, the film feeds some great moments to distract from the small little issues. For example, the explosion to Col. Stuart's plane, some McClane lines, Marvin sounding like a goof. Also, the asshole line by Major Grant. "I'm just your kind of asshole." Uhhh, eww, no. Wait a second, John McClane's white. And Grant isn't.

SPOILER: the kill to the "chickenshit" by Grant was great! It does now remind me of a horror movie kill, the blood and the neck's opening. Renny Harlin using some things he picked up from Dream Master, methinks. While I'm still under the spoiler umbrella, I think now it was pretty obvious that Grant and his men were heels all along. The magazines being marked by red and blue tape, where the former are blanks. Both Stuart and Grant's men having the exact same colors. I get the reasoning behind it, but they should've been more subtle with that. Such as one team changing their magazines, but bring the camera up, so as not to show the colored tape. Then after the dust settled in that church scene, go down and reveal the tape. First time watch, I didn't expect the turn, nor noticed the tape, reliable McClane made it clear for younger me. Older and barely wiser, it's just clear to me now.

Classic moment in cinematic history...



"Not the kind of ride I'm looking for." Dammit McClane finally brought back his pervert self. It was in response to the Coleman report lady saying if he could get her this story, she'd have his baby. I'm available...

Some nice continuity with McClane having a fear of flying, just like in the first movie. Helicopters count too, and it reminds me how in the fourth movie, he mentioned taking helicopter flying lessons. So he conquered that fear. Dammit with Grant, he might as well be a homosexual, another gay line when he said "I'll do him." This was before the final confrontation. I can't believe I didn't note these lines before. It's pretty clear that he loves white men, jerking off Stuart, doing John McClane. Esperanza even said "This time do it right." What the hell? Pervert! Then the whole "I kinda like you" line. I mean, John's line, "I've got enough friends" sums it all up. He doesn't swing for that team.

SPOILER: Grant's kill was nice, it now makes me think of it as a horror movie kill, if they showed the gory part, body to propeller.

Col. Stuart finally proved his fighting abilities, though now I got the sneaking suspicion that a stuntman doubled for Sadler in that. His hair was seemingly darker in that scene.

Starting with this movie, McClane's "motherfucker" line was used as a final quip before the big movie kill. With such an amazing line, it's kind of surprising now to think that it was used as a sweet comeback in the first movie.

Another small thing to bring up, the ending. The old woman who sat next to Holly in the plane, she was walking without shoes. Her feet should've been hurt, the fact she walked a couple steps was rather strange. Anyways, jeez, that was minuscule, right? I had to bring up something. There were no opening credits to the film, how about that? The ending was the only scene where Bruce Willis and Bonnie Bedelia share the screen, it doesn't take IMDB for me to point that out. Back to something smaller, Reginald VelJohnson's name was over Franco Nero's in the one by one cast list. Also in the general credits with the descending text, Nero billed under VelJohnson. That's weird because Al Powell only had two scenes in the movie, the faxing scenes that deal with McClane's first victim here.

The ending did in fact use the same song as the one from the first movie. "Let It Snow" by Dean Martin. Nice.

Trivia time. According to John Leguizamo in his autobiography, his role was intended to be much larger until the filmmakers realized how short he was. He part was cut down to one line, which was dubbed by someone else. He got his way years later in Executive Decision, another Joel Silver produced picture, and often described as "Die Hard on a Plane." I need to watch that film actually.

Renny Harlin made sure that the scene where Major Grant says to McClane that he is the "wrong guy in the wrong place at the wrong time," with McClaine saying "Story of my life," ended up in the movie's trailer, because it perfectly summed up McClane's character.

HAHA, I didn't notice this, but Franco Nero's character is from "Val Verde," the same fictitious Latin-American country used in Commando! More ties between Arnie and Bruce before Expendables.

The scene where McClane climbs the ladder from the service tunnels up onto the runway and then nearly gets over by Esperanza's plane was filmed from 8 different locations. Say what? Granada Hills, California (McClane in the tunnel and climbing up the ladder). Los Angeles (close-ups of Esperanza inside the plane's cockpit). Mojave Desert (head-on view of plane in the sky on approach). Alpena, Michigan (exterior shot of the grating door on the runway). San Francisco, California (rear shot of the plane on approach with runway lights in the background). Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan (plane after it just landed rushing towards the screen). Lake Tahoe, California (plane rushing towards McClane in the foreground). Denver, Colorado (plane rushing towards McClane as seen from behind the landing gear). Jesus Christ, good editing, and thank goodness it took place at night, this composite scene would look less appealing as a result.

Black and Decker paid to have its cordless drill featured in a scene with Bruce Willis. When the scene was cut, the company sued 20th Century Fox in the first ever product placement lawsuit for a film. The $150,000 claim was settled out of court. HAHA.

The scenes with Willis running through tunnels under the airport were filmed at a water treatment facility near Los Angeles. The facility has miles of underground tunnels, and was also used in Die Hard 4, doubling as the Woodlawn Social Security Administration building. Interesting stuff.

In the original Die Hard, McClane only had a few scripted one-liners. However, Willis ad-libbed so many one liners and audiences liked them so much that in this sequel and the third movie, more gags were added and Willis was told he could ad-lib as many more as he saw fit. Yeah I noticed how the film went for more one-liners here than in the first movie, which was fresh. Here, they still sound great, but it's noticeable how intended they were.

Major Grant's commando team is referred to as "Blue Light." This was the name of a real life US military anti-terrorist team formed within the US Special Forces in the 70s. It was eventually replaced by the Delta Force who recruited personnel from the entire army rather than just Green Berets. I eat Green Berets for breakfast.

John McTiernan had planned to direct the film, but could not because of his commitment to The Hunt for Red October. Aw man.

The movie was based on the novel "58 Minutes" by Walter Wager. I saw the movie again today, and picked up on the "58 minutes" line by Col. Stuart. It was the estimated time of arrival for General Esperanza when he made a call to Dulles Tower. I actually counted by the clock how long until Esperanza landed. A little over 45 minutes, so, not too bad!

Minnesota was originally picked for location filming, but there was no snow, so they went to Michigan. Good thinking.

Robert Patrick, along with Jai Courtney, both share the distinction of appearing in the Die Hard series and the Terminator one. Ugh, and Courtney ruined both franchises. Patrick's role here was really small, but of course his T2 turn was iconic.

Denver was unseasonably snowless during the shooting of the snowstorm scenes, and a fair amount of snow had to be created artificially. Haha, today it'd be CG. Although the movie was filmed using a fictitious airport and/or other airports which stood in for Dulles International, the movie posters along with the VHS and DVD covers for the movie show a picture of the actual Dulles Airport. The film was shipped to theaters as "wet prints" - an industry term meaning that it was barely completed before its release date. Most of the interior airport scenes were filmed in the Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport.

In the "Making of" featurette for Die Hard 3, William Sadler said for this movie, his favorite part of his character was when Col. Stuart crashes the airplane. Probably because he gave that Southern accent, which works, as I remember his role in The Green Mile, Southern guy there.

HAHA! Renny Harlin came up with the scene where Stuart did martial arts exercises naked, claiming it was an effective, but unusual way to introduce a character. Definitely right.

The Russian title for the first 3 Die Hard movies is "A Hard Nut to Crack." HA! So true, in more ways than one. The confrontation between McClane and Stuart on the airplane's wing took several nights to shoot. Huge fans were used to blow in the fake snow in the background because of lack of real snow.

All the airplane landing equipment used by the mercenaries in the church is close to the real equipment used in actual air traffic control towers, but simplified for the film's dramatic and action effects. Nice, but then when you think about all that stuff, it does get complicated. It was so simple in the first Die Hard movie, just some smelly German guys, Eddie the white guy, Theo, and Al Leong, robbing a safe, holding yuppies and employees hostage.

The first time Holly is seen on the plane, the woman sitting next to her is reading a magazine advertising the VHS release of Lethal Weapon. Both the first two Die Hard movies and the Lethal Weapon series were produced by Joel Silver. I still never saw the first 3 Lethal Weapon films.

The subplot involving Esperanza being turned over to the US Government is a reference to the real-life Panamanian general, Manuel Noriega, who was overthrown for brutality and drug trafficking in Panama in the 1980s.

Carmine Lorenzo (Dennis Franz) asked McClane if he thinks he is "playing John Wayne." In the original Die Hard, Hans Gruber also compares McClane to John Wayne. I figure there'd be Dirty Harry comparisons, a bit of a loose cannon when push comes to shove.

Some of the shots of the airport (interior and exterior) were filmed at the old Stapleton Airport in Denver. Also, external shots of the church were filmed in Highland Lake, north of Denver.

Dennis Franz and Robert Costanzo, who played Carmine and Vito Lorenzo, respectively, would work together in 1993, the first season of NYPD Blue, when Costanzo played mobster Alphonse Giardella, Franz being Detective Sipowicz. Franz popped up in a couple Brian De Palma films, it was nice to spot him there. He claimed he based his director character from Body Double on De Palma himself, which is funny. The director character was pretty hard pressing. He was filming some horror movie that looks more like a music video for a pop song.

The trailer for this film actually had "Ode to Joy," but it is not heard in the movie itself.

Bruce Willis, William Sadler, Fred Thompson, all appeared in the first season of Roseanne. I didn't know that, George Clooney even had a guest starring role!

It was supposed to be filmed at Moses Lake, Washington, but like Minnesota, no snow. But yet they went for Denver and had to make fake snow. At least they went for snow, it's funny how many alternative Christmas movies don't bother. Even though not all of them take place in typical wintry weather areas, it still is a bit shocking to not see snow in a lot of these.

The scenes filmed in Denver had to have snow machines brought from a local ski resort with truck loads of ice every night, during the day it would all melt. Stapleton International, where some external and internal shots were filmed, shut down at night because of noise abatement laws. Again, it was so simple with Die Hard. Just one tower, sets, exteriors, helicopter and cop cars, not much else. Just a load of 80s action fun. But this went for it, and succeeded.

The Polish title for "Die Hard" in the first 3 movies is "The Glass Trap," as a reference to the first movie located in a glass skyscraper.

There is a war reference in each of the first 3 Die Hard films. This film references Iwo Jima and Pearl Harbor by good ol' Marvin, and the Commando team reminisced about Grenada. I remember a line by Major Grant, "5 minutes of fire fight, 5 weeks of surfing." Of course the first film mentioned Saigon and Pearl Harbor.

Renny Harlin edited this film and The Adventures of Ford Fairlane at the same time, because of the short post-production period for both films. They were then released one month apart. I have some Renny Harlin films on the queue, and Ford Fairlane is included, especially since Robert Englund is in it.

The 747 plane that Esperanza, Stuart, and the other guys use to try to escape in bears the livery colors of Evergreen International Air Cargo Lines, but with the company name whited out. Copyright I guess. The aircraft that Esperanza arrives on is a Fairchild C-123K Provider. This is a twin engine propeller airplane modified to appear with four jet engines for the film. The pods for the J-85 jet booster engines are still visible under the wings between the mock-up jet engines. I just thought it looked like a cargo plane.

The Spanish title for Die Hard in all the movies is "The Glass Jungle." A jungle oddly filled with Germans and Al Leong...

After the film's initial release in theaters, it played on TBS Superstation, which was heavily dubbed for content by voice actors. The dubs were noted for sounding nothing like the actors who played their respective roles. Most noteworthy, McClane's famous line "Yipee-ki-yay motherfucker" was dubbed into "Yipee-ki-yay Mr. Falcon." There's no Mr. Falcon in the film. HAHAHA! That really did make me laugh. On that note, I did watch Die Hard 2 a lot when it circulated on TV in 2009-2010. I believe on Starz, I even had it DVRed. As a result, I saw this more times than the other Die Hard films, including the first. I just know it so well, but a long time had passed before this viewing. Not too fresh, everything was familiar, just picked up on a few things, like the homoeroticism supplied by John Amos' Grant.

As said earlier about the countries of Northern Europe being referenced, connections. Here, Renny Harlin being from Finland, "Finlandia" by Jean Sibelius is featured twice during the film.

Esperanza speaks Spanish, as you see in the first scene with him. However, Nero is Italian, but he tried.

The TV show that played in the airplane was "The Simpsons," episode 4 of the first season. "There's No Disgrace Like Home," which I've seen before. Where they are all getting shock therapy and some gags ensue. Good stuff.

Don Harvey, the actor who played second command to Stuart, I'm assuming the guy who called the cameraman a "pinko bitch." He was a bar patron in Striking Distance, another Bruce Willis film.

Beginning of SPOILER trivia.

Several scenes were filmed but cut from the final release of the film: an extended version of the scene when McClane enters the terminal, featuring shots of a children's choir singing Christmas carols (the audio of the choir singing still remains in the final cut, heard in the background, a scene of two of the terrorists killing off two painters and stealing their truck as well as their uniforms (Robert Patrick being one of those guys, and it led to the ambush scene). An extended version of the scene where McClane first meets up with Marvin the janitor, and an extended scene of Marvin showing McClane the best way to access the tunnels to get to the runways, which includes a scene where McClane has to walk carefully across a narrow beam over a hot boiler. All these cut scenes can be viewed in the Deleted Scenes section of the Special Features disc. That last bit sounds really interesting, and is a tiny callback to Nightmare on Elm Street, as the series always has boiler room stuff.

Oh yeah, the trivia brought up a good point about the Simpsons episode. Since that involved shock therapy, it matches well with Holly shocking Dick Thornburg in the bathroom.

This has the highest body count of any Die Hard movie. I believe that, given the final explosion killing what had to be at least a dozen guys, John mowing through some men in the grenade scene where he's sent flying on an ejected chair. There's the big ambush scene, and much more, so I believe that. Given the first movie being 21 bodies, that means this could match up with Jason X, if not exceed it. I didn't bother counting this film's bodies in particular.

As I think about the final thoughts for the movie, I have to say, the kills are really good! I keep thinking back to Dream Master, Renny Harlin doing a horror movie, and conforming to horror movie kills, but it seemed like he put a spin on them. There's the special effects heavy kills, and the Freddy one is a bit of a precursor of the huge explosions this film had. I don't know, that came to mind. The martial arts kill was definitely action movie territory. Some of the kills here are graphic, I think moreso than the first movie. What that particular film had was a really strong presence of blood, almost crystal in color quality, which might sound weird to say. This one though stands out in its own right. I never really took a moment to realize how great the deaths in these Die Hard movies were, particularly the first three movies. Certainly the first and this movie are different in how deaths are presented. I kind of favored this one, at least it's on the level of the first film. They're different, that's for sure. So kill of the film would have to be something that is pretty graphic, and has a serious horror touch to it. Hence, the ice pick kill...



While most of the film is similar. It's the same John McClane fun, but there are many parts where it's too samey. I had that feeling when watching the films on different days, the double feature today nails it harder for me. Such is the case of sequels, and the positive is the film was samey to a brilliant format, and succeeded. Because Die Hard 2 is so similar to the first movie, I don't see how anyone can put this over the first movie, arguing that it's better. It's not, how can it be? It's like having pizza two straight days, the first of those two occasions is the best. It's fresher, I just had this meal. Another comparison, the first taste of food in the day. Say I'm having a bag of potato chips, Pringles. The very first Pringle tastes the best, because it's the start and quick manifestation of something beautiful. As you go halfway through a can, you either keep going and fill up like a fat man, or you stop, probably eat later. Digesting these two movies like going through a whole can of Pringles. Great, filled up, but I felt better at the start of the snacking.

But both films are Pringles chips, they're awesome. This film shows what Renny Harlin is best at, as I have at least one movie on the queue from him that I will dig into. Currently in post-production is a movie he did with Jackie Chan and Johnny Knoxville called "Skiptrace." That should be very interesting. Anyways, on this film, despite it being too similar to the first movie, it just means the same highlights are present. Characters from top to bottom being memorable and well formed. Dennis Franz's Carmine, the cop who gave John the parking ticket, who is related to Carmine. Holly once again standing out, even though she's in a plane 99% of the time. William Atherton's Dick is once again an asshole, and with more screen time, he got more highlights here. A total slimeball, even when he wasn't speaking. Fred Thompson's Trudeau was alright, the black guy Barnes was a nice bit player. Marv's pretty funny, Colonel Stuart is a fairly underrated villain. He's smart, has a hidden ruthlessness...like Hans Gruber. Dammit, but he fights though, Hans needs a gun along with his brains, while Stuart has some fighting skills to stand out. John Amos was nice, I never really thought of him as an asshole actually. Hard headed Major Grant, but asshole? Fruity on the other hand! Jerking that cocksucker off, wow. It was funny to spot John Leguizamo and Robert Patrick. Reginald VelJohnson had a decent, glorified cameo. Probably too busy with Family Matters to do any more shoot days. Franco Nero was pretty cool. All those guys mentioned, that just leaves one more person, Bruce Willis. Despite him basically being a shell of his former self now, back then he was the bomb. Leading into the 90s, he became the big action hero of that era, while Sly and Arnie were seemingly taking steps back. Willis had up and down periods in the 90s, but I think success wise, he was in some blockbuster hits, and then there's the fact he was in one of the best movies ever made. Ahem, Pulp Fiction. Anyways, cutting out the pervert quality from the first movie, McClane came off as a better human being. Hehehe, well, to be serious, he wasn't blindly arguing with Holly, he kept the shoes on, and he moved to Los Angeles to stay with Holly. So, he was a better human being. I think he has less competition in this movie with characters, so he stood out more among other characters. Of course, he's always a major highlight of the first 4 Die Hard movies, just that, less competition, bright light in a smaller room.

With great kills, explosions, some sweet lines, funny lines, whether intentional or unintentional, gay lines, so many lines. Lines of bullets, planes, explosions, and Bruce Willis moments and other lines. I felt kind of blown out from all the action movie awesomeness, but my day was not over. I should add that I ate pizza and boneless wings during this movie. It was sweet, such a great movie to have while pigging out. High quality action, high quality movie.

I'll end this review with a parking ticket ripping line.



Staying On Top - I needed a break after all this action movie awesomeness, and of Christmas stuff. Going to the old queue, this was chosen and I put it away for a rainy day. It was raining earlier that day, and I just felt like taking a break. Well, physically, I was exhausting myself with this. Hmm, probably not a good idea...

Angela Davies, Holly Sampson, Ava Lake/Mia Zotolli. Oh, it was a good idea! There is actually another reason to watching this, so I could multi-task and fill up my reviews of the Die Hard movies. Those are heavy bastards, I wanted to get as much as I wanted out of them in terms of comments. And really, it's a softcore movie, plots are either really simple, or laughably complicated. This film is really simple, so just because I was multi-tasking heavily, I know the score.

Angela Davies is Cindy, aha, got her name dammit. She and Holly Sampson's character work at an advertising firm. Even though I never watched the show, I guess it's like Mad Men? Sampson and Davies don't get along in the firm, and it leads to the former leaving, starting up her own agency, along with her friend, Ava Lake. Davies caused this by being pretty antagonizing and conniving. She represents the corporate whore, sleeping with clients to get her way into some money and projects. Meanwhile Sampson, just bangs for lust, no monetary gain. It's seen with her banging a photographer, who ends up banging women he takes photos of, even Cindy. Everyone's banging everyone, and the funniest thing is that you don't actually see proof of work. "Projects" and "photos," "business" and "creative." These are quoted because there's no substance. It's style, it's talk, no walk. The only "walk" in the film is actually fucking. Even when characters look at pieces of paper, they're just that. You have to buy into the dialogue that everyone here is actually working and doing some business. Yeah right, I don't believe that, but the ladies are screwing, I don't mind. Since the film is called "Staying On Top," the person doing that is Cindy, but as the movie goes on, she's challenged. And she runs into a barrier with nailing down some big account, despite banging one of the guys in the company targeted as a client. Also, while she's trying to stay on top, she's capped by her superior, this guy with glasses who never actually engages in the fucking. It makes me wonder why Cindy never made advances to the guy, as that is never seen at all.

The photographer is a slimeball, banging women behind Sampson's back. But he stands out. His dick I mean. The first sex scene he had was with Sampson, and I spotted his dick. It was even more noticeable in his scene with Cindy, it looked erect...



Later Sampson and this photographer have a fight. The guy's lucky in the film, he banged her, Angela Davies, and Leila Hashemzadeh (say that 3 times fast). Sampson threatened to call the cops, and said it was ringing. Obviously referring to the other line, the cops successfully called. This was the guy's response to "It's ringing." "You're ringing." Really?! Weak comeback and pretty ridiculous.

The dialogue overall is just that, ridiculous, especially with the sexual innuendos and implicitly dirty talk. Nobody masters this like Davies' Cindy character. Because she's the most promiscuous of the bunch, she has scenes where she leads conversations into sex talk. For example, saying she has "just what you need" for the guy she's trying to have as a client. Then the guy asks how she feels about "drive-thru," offering a ride. "Ready to drive that hard bargain?" That's what Cindy asked, and bam, sex scene. The craziest part is this guy suddenly became a prude after it, all business. Seemingly the sex worked, but he was more interested in a pitch by Sampson's character, which made Cindy feel challenged. As a result, she makes it so she's kept off meetings with this guy, and the frustration with working under the same roof as this cougar, made her quit.

The one thing I always noticed with Holly Sampson, at least in these softcore movies, her mouth. It always looked like she smiled in every scene. Even when she's supposed to be mad. She would sound mad when necessary, but she looks to have a little smile. I can't imagine her making a proper angry face. It's cute really, and actually, it fits for these movies. If she did it in a mainstream movie, it would look ridiculous. Also with this specific movie, it's the first I've seen of her and the bigger boobs. Previous softcore titles had her before breast surgery. I love them.

I also love the sex scenes. The music is there, but you can hear the ladies' sexy moans of pleasure. To make this review longer, because, that's my specialty, I'll list and comment on all the sex scenes.

1. Holly Sampson's Katherine and the photographer. It takes place in a pool, where you see some of the guy's junk. More importantly, a skinny and naked Sampson riding dong in a pool. And she's wet, not by the photographer.

2. Angela Davies' Nicholas banging the guy in a limo. It's not as roomy as Argyle's limo from Die Hard, but it got the job done. The best feature on Angela's body, her ass. So riding parts are awesome. They always are anyways in my opinion, when a woman rides, cowgirl positions are the best. It seems everyone goes for doggystyle. That's great too, I prefer cowgirl, seeing the butt. I guess a variation would be frog? I don't know, when the girl squats and goes up and down, the ass looks even better. It doesn't happen in softcore, at least as much as I can recall.

3. Leila. Her butterfly tattoo looked incomplete and ropey, but I'll forgive her. She bangs the photographer in the shower of his and Katherine's house. The setup was just pictures with her in a bikini, then go topless, trying to get her to pose a certain way on the bench of the shower. She wants him to show him hands on, and yeah. Hands on, dick in. You don't see his junk, aw man. Great boobs and butt, I hoped she was a pornstar. I was wrong. I was hoping the blowjob was real, because the guy's dick not appearing here surprised me, I hoped it would be seen erect or something, getting blown.

4. Cindy and the photographer. The guy did have a nice line when he called Cindy, "Sin." She is a sinning woman, imagine if she was Christian Grey rather than that guy, Jamie Dornan. A lesbian tryst with Dakota Johnson, that'd be hotter. Also, better for Johnson, because Angela Davies is a better actor than her and Dornan. Yeah, I'm serious. Like Monique Parent, she seems to actually try in these softcore roles. Those two just so happen to be my favorites in the genre. They're actually more likable than Shannon Tweed, who often phones it in. But she's hot in her own right. Oh yeah, the sex scene! Well, the erection might indicate actual riding, and the positioning of Angela's body is conducive to that. Also, I got the sense that some of the cuts were done to hide the hardcore parts, and the thing with his cock coming up here, was an editing mistake. I bet it happens in other soft titles, but this one stood out among the ones I've seen so far. Angela's butt looked amazing here, pert tits. Davies' full name in this film is "Cindy La Conte." I see what you did there. Oh and to note, this camera guy eats pussy, and his technique seemingly is to munch on the inner thigh. So it looks like he's eating one lip at a time.

5. Holly Sampson masturbating in the shower. She's rubbing it out, and the camera catches the rubbing, so I take it as real. Fingering and above that, wouldn't be done here. Short, great, she's wet again, I'm noticing something with her scenes...

6. Sasha Peralto's character by this point gets more screen time as she becomes Cindy's assistant in a way. Sexually luring the other guy of this company that Cindy wants to do business with. Seeing her tattoos raises the question about how she got the job as sort of a clerk for the advertising firm. Well, not like they do full body inspections, but still. Very professional. Anyways, her character is Ty, she goes to this guy's big house, everyone here has a big house. They eat some pastries, and the old "one thing leads to another," and they're in a tub, banging. So more wet stuff, it's all great. What a nice, brown body, a bit voluptuous. She's the loudest during sex in this movie, and it proves to be a great thing. The guy is better looking than the photographer and the other men in this film. Method acting I guess with the facial expressions of pleasure, by him and Peralto.

7. By this point, Cindy's against the ropes because of her boss, as she had been lying about Katherine's departure. He wants that particular blonde back. Also by this point, Katherine's friend, Melissa, played by Ava Lake, comes by. Despite never seeing proof of her intelligence in this field, she and Katherine decide to start up their own agency and try to take the client that Cindy wants. Before actually doing that, how about a massage? There are three massage scenes, all featuring the masseuse, played by Holly Hollywood. Part of Cindy's assignment for Ty is to infiltrate Katharine and get the scoop on her current endeavors. So she's in this, gets a massage, then Holly. The one with Melissa has the sex scene, and shows a good deal of asshole! It seemed like in the early 2000s, softcore showed more than usual. Assholes and pussy lips, awesome! So Ava Lake's butthole is shown during the massage section. The loving portion was really good, that woman was stacked. Great butt and big boobs. On the former, Holly said her butt was tight. I know she meant one thing, but when Ava said it's always tight, I thought the other thing. Her butthole, oh my! Holly's butthole could be seen too, Ava's hard nipples, goddamn. Holly showed experience in girl/girl scenes, how she sucked Ava's nipple slowly grinding up, and pulling back, rubbing snatch. Ava did a little rub before Holly did, it seemed. Tribbing, brilliant! Note that all these sex scenes are awesome, but this one's a cut above the rest for me. Plus the cumming was more realistic. The thing about these guy/girl scenes in all softcore films, the guys cumming. Creampie? Notice how they go right when the girl goes, typically. And then that's it, you see the vagina sometimes and it's clean as a whistle. Where's the white stuff? I know I know, it's not porn, but have a bit of realism dammit. And did Plan B and those other drugs exist back in the 90s and early 2000s? Do we have to assume all the ladies are on the pill? Holly Sampson's character said she was, and Angela's character only bangs condomed dick, always having one to supply for the male. In hindsight, those character traits make their scenes realistic, while the others except the lesbian one? Holly Hollywood did porn, yes! I had to get that out. Anyways, fantastic scene.

8. Ty banging the same guy again, which is rare in these softcore titles. Usually it's everyone banging everyone, and monogamy is a big joke. Fair play to them, more romantic given their relationship flourishing by this point. And it's by a pool, not in the tub. I think people typically don't like the softcore blowjobs, as it's just a girl bobbing her head up and down. I don't mind it all, fantasy man. Peralto did fine in that respect here. More compliments for the guy, he has a nice butt. It got hot and heavy, and Peralto said he was so great. I think that's unscripted. I thought he was great.

Getting back to the movie...

Katherine's mom died. Yeah, that was mentioned out of nowhere, near the end of the film when Ava's Melissa just said it. There was a point to it, saying she'd be proud of her daughter, but still.



Ty's true allegiance is shown in the film, and there was a part where Cindy convinced the photographer to sabotage Katharine's presentation, stored in a CD. In exchange for sex. Nah, but that would've been great. For a damn camera, the twat. Anyways, there's a bit of a twist to that, and the movie wraps up as anybody would expect.

This film has a 7.2/10 average rating on IMDB. HAHAHA! That's hilarious, and that's according to 391 people. I'm number 392. I thought it was really good. The sex scenes were all so damn good, and I have found that the softcore movies from the late 90s to mid 2000s are some of the best in the whole genre. In terms of sex scenes, but also the acting wasn't dreadful in those. If I could nail down years, 1997-2006. That's about right, Surrender Cinema and Indigo Entertainment titles, some Jim Wynorski and Fred Olen Ray, other stuff, were just really high quality in that period. This film is certainly part of that golden age that I define. The dialogue is sill y, Angela and her boss in the movie were the only ones who were serious. Of the whole cast, Angela is still active, one movie currently in post production, and she moved onto legit films. That says something about her acting. I saw an interview with her a couple months ago where she talked about the craft, and being in the New York circuit of acting. So, basically, she's legit. Regardless, it was all about fucking, greed, competition, envy, lies. All those aspects were touched on very well, obviously the banging was the best part.

So glad I survived this film. So much hotness, I could've easily finished by accident. Seriously good film.

Invasion U.S.A. - Only a year after doing Friday the 13th Part IV, Joseph Zito directs this film. A product of the amazingly wacky Cannon Films, as well as their partnership with Chuck Norris, this incidental Christmas movie, that takes place primarily in Florida, fulfills what the title indicates. There's an invasion on the United States of America, but what does that entail specifically?

How about starting from the beginning, with a sudden massacre of Latino immigrants on a boat. I saw this movie a couple months ago, and clearly my memory was foggy on many parts, I forgot about this slightly shocking opening. There's dialogue before it, but it still starts with a massacre. Leading the boat of guys who killed those immigrants, is Richard Lynch, the main bad guy here. I thought it was vintage Cannon when the first victim got a head shot, and it looked funny! Even at their most serious attempts, Cannon films can come off as silly.

Chuck Norris actually co-wrote the screenplay, so no question he's going to be the man here. So what does Norris' Matt do for a living? Alligator wrangling, so manly! You see how he took care of this alligator that didn't really put up a fight. Oooh, the 80s, lots of sweat, but add mud on the men, so fucking hot.

Back to Cannon and their zany deaths, Richard Lynch contributed to that in the form of throwing a coke addict out the window, shooting the guy he was dealing with in the fucking dick and balls! Before that, he smacked the girl's head down on the desk, while she was sniffing coke! And if all this wasn't funny enough, the motel desk guy turns out to be this short black guy, and he jacks the fucking coke! What the hell is this movie? That was so ridiculous, Lynch left it there, he has his own goals in mind, but dude, leaving coke there. Cocaine, the drug of the 80s! Oh my, so much 80s in the movie, and not even at the 20 minute mark! Well not 80s, but random, an armadillo appeared in this scene where some guy sneaks into Matt Hunter's house. His purpose was to enlist his help, Richard Lynch's Rostov returning to the country. Matt of course turned it down, they always do. Look at Commando, which came out the same year. Rambo 3, those guys turned down initial offers, but they were persuaded when their loved ones were kidnapped. What this movie did differently, rather than a kidnapping? Actually, before I answer that, Rambo 3, technically it was a prisoner of war deal, not a kidnapping. Okay, loved one taken away. So to answer the question, screw kidnapping, screw imprisonment. How about straight up death?

To clarify, that was an attempt on Matt Hunter's life, as Rostov had a dream about his last encounter with Hunter. He was about to lay waste to a mansion gathering with a bazooka, but Hunter just appeared out of nowhere, telling Rostov, "Time to die." He didn't kill him though, just a kick, and the guy wakes up. Knowing of Hunter being a threat, he wants action taken on him before the big plan's carried out.

So before that, you see Hunter doing another manly thing, using a chainsaw on some wood. Ooooh, more sweaty Norris, so damn 80s. The armadillo dammit, I guess it's a pet, I totally forgot about that creature. This is only the second time I watched this film. Anyways, the assassination attempt is taken out, Matt's Native American looking friend, John Eagle, gets killed while buying Hunter some time. Rather than just sniper stuff, it's full on 80s action and war stuff. Explosions, destroying a house, and it didn't look like a set. Cannon would happily blow up anything, screw CG. Ah the 80s, and these guys were great for the practical stuff. At least in this period, before their decline in trying to go big budget. Anyways, Hunter does a slow motion jump out the back window, and survives without a scratch on him. That's Chuck Norris for you. He ditched the armadillo though.

Ah man, I thought the neighborhood scene was the first bit of Christmas in this film, but during a scene where Rostov talks to one of his associates about invading the country, "Jingle Bells" is heard playing on the radio. Rostov said it had been over 200 years since a foreign force invaded the United States. I guess so, it's been us crossing into foreign territory to fight. Freaking Americans deserve to be invaded, Rostov thinks. Yeah, especially when they're trying to have sex on the beach. The associate comes into the beach and shoots this couple. This scene isn't supposed to stand out. You can guess on paper that it's just this guy killing two random young adults. Well, there's more to that when it comes to Cannon. Have the couple trying to make love, without nudity, while their portable TV is on. Then after 2 or so minutes, have the associate come in, and just freaking watch! Pervert, then walk slowly to the couple, and just kill them. Then, watch TV. What the hell?! And then the plot actually kicks back in when the invaders come in by sea. I have to question this, Coast Guards didn't sense this? They didn't do a damn thing apparently, these guys just come on big boats, and enter the show. Then, a whole line of trucks parked next to each other, how was that arranged? Ahhh, it's just a movie. No, it's just an 80s movie. So freaking 80s, it's ridiculous.

Matt Hunter takes the case, and lets the goober guy take the check for his dinner. Ha! There's a photographer who appears when trouble's looming and trouble already passed. This raven haired white girl, she becomes this supporting character. Nice looking woman.

Here's the neighborhood scene! It stands out because this suddenly came out of nowhere, that it's Christmastime. So again, this is an incidental alternative Christmas movie. Even going by "Jingle Bells" there's nothing indicating it's that time of the year. This neighborhood scene established it, with the lights and decorations, and the music playing. Similar to Die Hard 2 with the passengers of the British flight, you see innocent people. A girl putting the star on a tree, teens kissing in a car, a family called for dinner. All this nice stuff, and Rostov sees it in disgust, blows up the houses with his bazooka! These are real houses too, that whole neighborhood was actually scheduled to be demolished. Cannon took the opportunity to use this neighborhood, decorate the houses to make them look like they're occupied, and blow them away! So Cannon films, love 'em or hate 'em, they blew up a fucking street. That's badass. Great scene.

The aforementioned brunette ends up witnessing these two invaders dressed as cops, shooting at people with rifles. Not all of them, Rostov apparently wants witnesses. To make sure people care about the damage being done, there were scenes showing survivors' reactions. A mother and her daughter who hung the Christmas star, the former crying in fear, scrambling with other survivors.

This whore saw Hunter driving his pickup truck, so American and 80s I guess, and said "Fuck you." WHOA! Someone said "Fuck you" to Norris and didn't get killed. Good guy Norris doesn't hit women. Well, he doesn't kill the guys that kicked his truck. Very cool, calm, collected. Chuck Norris is so strong, he makes a bottle break by squeezing it. Well, he used some guy's hand, squeezing on it. Still, broke the bottle by squeezing it.

Nudity! A tabletop dancer at a bar, which Hunter goes in eventually. It's a Latino bar seemingly, all these Cubans I guess. A blonde Cuban girl gets thrown on the bed after she accidentally grabbed and hurt the guy's injured hand. Norris came with a knife, stabbing the hand! Then this big guy came, Hunter threatened him not to come back in the room. He came back in the room with this short, but beefy ass motherfucker. Hunter said the guy was beginning to irritate him, one kick sends the roid freak flying back. Norris isn't really a man of many tones, he basically has one tone in dialogue. A serious one. But he's so badass that you let it slide. Especially when he told the guy with the stabbed hand, that if he survives the grenade he was forced to hold, pin removed, he had to tell Rostov, "Time to die." I certainly remember that line, "Time to die." He could've said that to the car that got the grenade he threw. HAHA, vintage 80s explosions. More of that goodness.

Damn mall scene featuring more establishing stuff for these people. A kid just throwing gum onto a Nissan truck that's on display. The thing is, these establishing scenes last too long, but not in a way that bothers me. Rather, it bewilders me. Why? And I ask that again with the guy who was persistent in delivering the bag that one of the invaders left on the floor. Obviously it's rigged, but the guy doesn't know that, and was so adamant on returning the bag to the owner, that he chased after the guy, running and everything. Dude, give it up! He didn't, he actually had to be killed for that to happen! Wow, but then pure action happens, the mall decorated with lots of Christmas stuff is turned into a wasteland thanks to Norris and the invaders. This is the first time you see Norris with the signature weapon of choice for the movie. Two Uzis! One on each hand.

Melissa Prophet as McGuire, the photographer, just pops up outside the mall, and gets in the car Hunter jacks. So simple in involving this woman to the plot. There's a nice car chase that ends with some bad guys, simply crashing into a line of cars, and big 80s explosion! BOOM, BAM, wow. In a way, the Go Go Boys are precursors to Michael Bay, but they're better than that guy. Anyways, the guy that got the grenade in hand, did deliver Hunter's message, and thus got his genitals shot off! The unfortunate thing in these genital killing scenes, you don't see blood staining the guys' jeans. Zito should've told Golan and Globus about that, he should know about blood spatter, he directed a Jason Voorhees movie.

Does Hunter have any ID? Yes, two fucking Uzis! You like talking? Jabbering in Korean or Chinese. I didn't think so, peow peow peow peow peow peow. Ahhh, the movie works in making me think to my childhood. Really, children can watch this, boys in particular, will think it's so badass. The odd thing is those guys Hunter killed are dressed like the National Guard, or Army. I just say "National Guard" because one of the cops in the mall said they were coming.

Another establishing scene, it's shorter, but it's in a church, almost completely filled. It must be because of all the mayhem, got to come together and put faith in God, and sing hymns. Meanwhile, this guy sets up a bomb on the church steps. The scene briefly alternates with one involving Nikko the associate and Rostov. The later spoke, and I didn't catch it before. Is he German? He said "Schnell." He said "Finish this quickly." Mikhail Rostov does not sound like a German name, it sounds Russian, Eastern European. German? Well, maybe since Golan and Globus are Israeli Jews, perhaps they secretly hate German people. Operation Thunderbolt, though based on a true story, was still a film about German terrorists. Rostov's apparently a German terrorist, so yeah. It could be Swiss, Swedish, I am not too sure. I just go to German. Mikhail is a Swedish name I think.

Bomb didn't work? Just because like an invisible force, really, Hunter gets that bomb, it's already shown to be disarmed by a separated wire. The guy was never seen getting the bomb, just appearing on a roof, many feet away from the church, dropping the bomb by some invaders, put together the ends of this separated wire, and yet another explosion! It doesn't really make sense, but it's still great.

McGuire is a cow, Hunter saved her freaking life! How does she repay him? Trying to hit him, which was an epic failure, ranting about his methods. They are a bit rough, but she was held on by Nikko, and the guy had to kill him without doing her in. So he did dammit. It's stupid, and the cow then tries to throw a trash can lid at Hunter. She fails at that too. Way to be unlikable within a couple seconds, what a bitch.

Dirty Harry inspired scene with the kids in a school bus singing "Row row row your boat." I remember that scene from Dirty Harry, it was pretty creepy actually. This one, not so much, but I guess tense with a bomb planted on that school bus. But Hunter was able to take care of that, because he's that damn good. You actually see Hunter laugh, in a scene where he watches some ropey-as-shit black and white alien invasion movie. It was funny, I want to watch it.

What the hell? After Hunter gets taken away by the cops and SWAT team, because the goober guy didn't debrief the cops on Matt's mission, McGuire popped back up, and was friendly with Matt. Rare time in the movie, Hunter smiled. Really? Well, she's still a cow. That scene was a highlight, not because of that, but for Hunter's message on national TV when asked what he wants to say. Addressing Rostov, he said Nikko was easier, he's next, when he closes his eyes and opens them, Hunter will be there. It will be time to die. Rostov flips shit and breaks a TV in the process. Nice.

Even nicer was this sudden explosion of smoke seen as invaders made their entrance to a garage. You can see this effect from the perspective of a cop sitting by a desk, far away from the entrance. When the explosion happens, the guy's body whips back, looking like a real man did that stunt. It was shocking a bit, I had to replay it to make sure I wasn't seeing things. Pretty damn good man. Bazookas again, this time it's used by Hunter. Blow up a helicopter, just because, shooting the guy who got on it wasn't enough.

"It's a trap!" Said in Spanish and I think German. Yeah, I guess it was, because I was going to question how Hunter escaped police custody. Anyways, towards the end, it was funny how Hunter blew two holes to a room, and still used the door, rather than go through one of those! The final sequences also include an epic shootout between invaders and soldiers, it was just shoot shoot shoot, no personalities or any identifiable characters. But guns, explosions, 80s! It ends with a final confrontation between Rostov and Hunter, and it's what you'd expect. I love how the credits come right after the final death. Screw showing the Americans being all happy, everyone hugging and high-fiving. End with Chuck Norris doing what he does best, with a bazooka no less!

While I still need to watch more Chuck Norris/Cannon films, it's safe to say that this represents two things. It represents the Chuck Norris film, and the Cannon movie. They were a match made in Heaven really, it's seemingly where Cannon got really ambitious in their explosion happy over the top nature. After this film was The Delta Force, and that film was filled with explosions. I think this film in some ways is better than Delta Force. Even though Robert Forster was great as a brownface terrorist, and the motorcycle Norris uses is badass, the major flaw with the film is that it's too long. This film is 107 minutes, Delta Force is 129 minutes long, going by the video I saw. Delta Force is no Die Hard, those films can go over 2 hours and not overstay its welcome or have a notable dragging period. It should've aimed for this film's runtime. This film trims out the fat that was in Delta Force. That film's still great, but this film didn't mess around. Chuck Norris and only him, no Lee Marvin or any other guys. Norris vs. Richard Lynch, a whole bunch of Latinos, invaders all around, nothing but explosions.

It's a dumb film, it's pure 80s excess with all the explosions, but also with small, zany and quirky bits that also show the comical side of Cannon films, along with the action side. This film defines Cannon. Even though Menahem Golan directed Delta Force, I'd say this film by Joseph Zito told the Cannon story of moviemaking, in a shorter time, and a notably better way. The first time I watched it, I thought it was pretty solid, but now? I think it's even better, it's a great film! I was a bit surprised how much I took to it after digesting the first two Die Hard movies, along with Rare Exports and its usage of explosions. It proves that I can always go for some sweet action movies, they're genre films, especially when going down the ladder from big blockbuster Hollywood to something like Invasion U.S.A. The film doesn't reinvent the wheel. It doesn't want to, rather, it wants to blow it up with a bazooka! Blow up a neighborhood? No problem. Blow up a house? No problem. Terrorize a mall? No problemo. So many guns and explosions that it could supply the US military? No problem. This film had no problem blowing shit up. I loved seeing it, I'd take this over a splashy Michael Bay film. Screw that guy. Chuck Norris kicked ass. Technically, blew up ass, but that sounds disgusting actually.

I felt like showing a bunch of the over the top, explosive moments in this film in GIF form. As a highlight reel. Here goes nothing...



The thing with these films is that I know I won't get Chuck Norris doing martial arts. He only does it in these 80s films if he just dominates, and the guy is unable to retaliate. It's seen in Delta Force, and is seen here. Some kicks, one roundhouse, but not much. I'm fine with that, he traded in martial arts for guns and explosives. I have to look into his 70s, and maybe his early 80s films to get kung fu Norris. This Chuck Norris is fun, so is the whole movie. Logic be damned, and I could spend a long time nitpicking the film and pointing out even more logic gaps. But screw that, if the film's entertaining, I let most of it go. This film's entertaining. Some Christmas stuff, which I think was incidental, maybe planned to add more sympathy for the people at the mall and the neighborhood. Christmastime action! I love it. Let it snow. "It" meaning explosions, guns, Chuck Norris. Cover my face with it...

A Cadaver Christmas - I'd rather get my face covered with Chuck Norris than zombies. Zombies are icky. Segue into this film, which seemed to take a page out of Grindhouse's book, the film has scratches on it, trying to bring a rustier aesthetic to it. A gritty one I guess. A guy covered in blood walks into a bar. Really, no joke. He gets the attention of the bartender and a patron, and tells his story.

This guy's a janitor at a college, he does some voiceover narration for this. There's blood all over a hallway, and the infected humans here are called "cadavers." Not zombies, clearly they are. A cop walks into a bar, not joking, and he thinks the janitor has something to do with these infected humans. Outside, some action ensues, what one would expect with low budget filmmaking, nothing stiff. Head shots with shovels, some gun stuff, no reinventing the wheel. They all ride together under the cop's force, and already in the car, which isn't a cop one, is some other guy. They go to the college, the cadavers are gone, and it's revealed that Sam the cop, isn't one currently. It's weird that this kind of heavy story came, and the movie's barely 18 minutes in. It's silly too, he apparently had a partner that is 2 feet tall, accidentally shooting his dog. Was it a police hound? How would that get a cop off the force? Maybe he quit from the trauma, I'm not sure.

When the janitor tried to call the cops, it goes to some security woman, who has a direct line to the sheriff's office. So she's a middle woman. The bartender is self aware I guess. When the group split up, the bartender said he's too fat for this shit. Right, he's too fat for this movie, and he doesn't look badass. But he's in the movie, him and his bowling shirt! The janitor cleans up most of the blood from his face, puts on a bandana like Rambo putting on a headband, got his mop as a weapon, and was ready to battle. Meanwhile, the guy the cop initially brought in...ah Hell. SPOILER: he fucked a corpse, but thought it looked like a woman, and they did cut editing to show this nice looking blonde getting it. Her boobs are too far away and out of focus, but her feet can be seen, good enough for me!

The little guy said "zombies," but the janitor said the difference between those and "cadavers" is that zombies are not real. Yeah, they look like zombies to me. Light makeup, so I guess they can be called "cadaver." In recalling his story that takes place the morning of the cadaver apocalypse, the recalled some stuff unrelated to cadavers, just ranting on how people are messing up the floors he cleans. He finally mentioned something suspicious about a professor. They try to go there and bump into the security guard, nice looking brunette. Oh, bowling shirt bartender got bit.

Entering this professor's room, there's a journal on the guy's experiments. He does his work on cadavers, more voiceover narration, this time from the professor. He made a special serum, testing it on the cadavers. It's pretty much a ripoff of Re-Animator. He set a date for a specific test, Christmas Eve. When he cut into a guy, blood came back, revealing that his reagent worked, but not in the way he hoped, suffering in the name of science. So while this is a ripoff of Re-Animator, it follows more traditional zombie things, the infection, the cannibalism. The bartender of course turned, but the security girl? I didn't see her bit at all, that was so random. Then the janitor proved to be a bit of an asshole by bringing down the guy who had the odd sex scene earlier, as bait, feast for the cadavers.

Odd, the janitor said the college is "maglocked," meaning magnetically locked. You can't leave unless by a fire. It's odd because the guy was doing his janitor duty at night, the cadavers came after him, and he escaped and ended up in a bar. So he basically was able to escape this maglocked facility. Am I missing something? That's a plot hole. More splitting up, this time the cop went alone, not liking the janitor enough to join this fight. With the drunk guy and the janitor, the former's annoyance starts to take over. He's definitely written to be annoying, and it works.

Things finally picked up when the cadavers come out in droves. The janitor is better at killing zombies than yelling that these people are "cadavers" and not "zombies." Whatever man, just kill them all! The fun part to the kills are the weapons used. Broomsticks, plungers, Christmas trees, mops, snow shovel, and of course some guns. The Kill effects were pretty good actually! Better than the Bikini Bloodbath moves and most of Caesar And Otto's Deadly Xmas. The only ropey stuff to it was the CG blood coming from gunshots. The cop returned, and things take important turns as far as the remaining characters are concerned.

I'm not sure if this was the video file, or the movie itself adopting sound glitches to match the scratchy video, but there were two times the sound would glitch and mute for a moment. One around the beginning, the other towards the end. On the latter, it seemed planned because it came up when the drunkard was about to curse, sounding like he was going to say "motherfucker." But there's other cursing here, so I don't know. That scene was too long where the drunkard spoke as the janitor, moving the unconscious guy's lips in the process.

There's a George Romero zombie flick trademark of eating from the torn apart guts, shown in the film. I thought it looked really good here, choke on it! I would've popped if someone said the line. The Janitor mentioned the differences between zombies and cadavers, accepting the former, and going into more detail than previously. The explanation makes sense, basically the condition of the brain determines the kind of zombie, with a rotting thing like the corpses.

Kill of the film, there's a great deal to choose from, but I went with the one that made me raise my eyebrows. Impressive, plus the one liner.



The ending had potential to be a dramatic, albeit cliche one. In hindsight, what happened instead was pretty funny. The logic in it is pretty ridiculous, so that's why I kind of think the serious ending might've been better. It might not have gotten a strong reaction out of me compared to this. Actually, I didn't get a big reaction to it, just an "Uhhh, okay" thing.

SPOILER: alcohol cures this zombie disease. The drunkard was bit towards the end of the film, and he never turned because of the "special blend" alcohol he made. There's no further explanation to the alcohol, no science to back it up. It's kind of funny actually, and would've been a fine ending, but then it got slightly better with the imprisonment of the janitor and the guy. After all, who to pin the big massacre on? Also, nice callback to the bar scene, I almost forgot about the three cadavers cuffed there. Not all of them are dead...

The credits feature some female anchor doing news reporting, the stuff about the massacre at the college is mentioned. Note how this apocalypse was only confined to the college. There are interviews with friends and acquaintances of the two prisoners. Also during the credits, the janitor's name is finally mentioned. So it wasn't me not paying attention enough, he was actually credited, Dan Hale the actor, as "The Janitor." Dan Hale as it turns out, was a co-writer of the film. I was a bit thrown off by his name as an actor, "Dan Hale." While the writing credit mentions "Daniel Rairdin-Hale." He also produced the film, and maybe the longer name was to throw people off? So that nobody would question why this skinny white guy, who does look like a young janitor, would turn up and kick ass. Only someone who writes that role to be strong, for themselves, acting as the person, would do such a thing. Theoretically. Reading about his other credits, I'm not surprised. His character comes off badass. There's an attempt at it, and I'd say in some cases it works. However, his voice doesn't really fit the persona of a badass. Then again, it makes him unique. His voice sounds a bit like a teenager, almost nasally. Just the voice alone would make one think he's a victim. Ah well, while he didn't direct the film, he certainly influenced it. Joe Zerull was a worker bee for this film. Director, cinematographer, editor. It's a small crew too, some double, multi duties. Hale also helped with the makeup. A "Kathryn Hale" is credited as makeup artist and associate producer. I guess she's Dan's wife. She also has a cadaver role in the film. Hanlon Smith-Dorsey (Tom the drunkard) and Joe Zerull also co-wrote the film. Dorsey and Jessica Denney (security guard) were production assistants. Dorsey was a grip.

So yeah, small crew, and surprisingly the film is pretty well produced. It probably helped that they filmed in so few locations. Bar, college, street, a jail. The college amounts to 90% of the film though, so, saving the money. The makeup was alright, it's a bit on the Nightmare City side in terms of sometimes the zombies look like they had no makeup at all. It's notably better, but just that it's closer to that than say Dawn of the Dead. The kill effects were great, except for the gun and the CG blood that went along with it. Forgivable because it's low budget, but still a bother to me.

The problems are that the film does drag. The flashback of the professor for example seemingly lasted 20 minutes. The dialogue isn't entertaining enough to hold me over when the kills are not happening. Thus, when things actually kick in, it becomes a very serviceable film. While I did see four huge action films before this, and a softcore flick that really got me up, the fact still remains that this is a tiny bit of a slog. It also doesn't help that most of the characters are annoying. I can let the janitor slide, and I wished the girl had more screen time. Everyone else, not too entertaining, with Tom being the most annoying at times.

Well, back to the state of the day, this film had to follow a Chuck Norris one. Yeah, not easy, so I guess what I watched before influenced my opinion on the film. I was notably calm and emotionless upon entering the film, and exited not too different. Still, there are some good parts, the kills and all that, but it's a bit too uneven for me. Or, the wrong side of uneven, I wanted at least 60% kills and 40% dialogue. I don't feel like I got that. As far as non kill scenes, the ending stuff and credits were fine, and the twisted sex scene was very interesting. That's about it though. The gag with the security guard answering the phone and not connecting to 911 directly? Yeah, that was a gag, ehhh. Zombies vs. Cadavers? Ehh, too much arguing on that. Tom? Talked too much at times. Really, things do drag, suggested gags aren't all great, but the kills make up for things.

It's a low budget zombie killing movie, you get what you...download for. Hehe. Overall, it's just okay.

Watched on Christmas night

Santa's Slay - Now the third year in the row where I watch this film during the holiday season, it's one that got better after the first viewing. Will the third time follow suit? Given how I got into Christmas slasher films this month, it's interesting to tackle this, as me watching it predates those other films. Before I even got into horror films, I watched this. During the time where I only watched horror/comedies, and this is definitely a comedy slasher flick. For one, former pro wrestler Bill Goldberg is Santa Claus. That alone is comedy. Even though the guy is a big bad motherfucker, it was funny to see him have a ball and say his lines. This viewing is special because it's the first time I'm watching the blu-ray version, which is 10 minutes longer! 85 minutes in total, awesome. I didn't know until the credits played following the first scene, Brett Ratner produced this! Wow, thank goodness he didn't direct I guess.

The film looks low budget, so it was amazing that this Canadian production was able to get cameos by Fran Descher and James Caan! The first scene has them as a husband and wife with self-entitled adult children, along with a girl that is married to the son. They're all bad people, James Caan can't satisfy his wife, and hoped the turkey wasn't dry. Fran said it can be moist, it takes foreplay. It's funny he said he wants to eat the turkey, not fuck it. Well, what makes a woman wet? Eating her out, for one. So, dude. Anyways, it doesn't take long for Santa Goldberg to come down a chimney, killing people in unique ways. A Christmas star to the back, fainting in fear and getting the neck stabbed as a result, drowning in eggnog after the hair is set on fire, uhhh, choking on a turkey leg. It's an awesome start.

Then after the cute credits that show Santa in book illustration style how he really is, there's this old woman that has a potty mouth. The film takes place in Hell Township, yep. In a deli where you meet the two young protagonists of the film, she told the Jewish owner, don't say "Happy holidays." None of that "politically correct bullshit." YES! That's what I'm talking about, even though she's an old bat. She got what she deserved by Santa. Just to make it clear, Goldberg is Santa Claus, he's not some guy dressed as Santa. This is a nice follow up from Rare Exports, as it gives a different look at Santa.

So after the grandma gets a car crash, but no 80s explosion, there's the two leads exiting the deli after getting snow globes from their boss. I noticed a goof, when you see the two about to leave, it looks like it's day. It's supposed to be night because they're closing shop. When they are outside, it is night. Low budget filmmaking, no dollar amount is shown, but that's a ropey enough thing to qualify it as such.

Finding differences between the blu-ray and regular version, one comes up where the guy is watching some commercial about horny Asian housewives...playing football? I don't remember that! Pretty damn funny. Nick, the male lead, has a grandfather who can be compared to Doc Brown, inventing stuff that are pretty useless and unnecessary, but he has one lucky breakthrough. Back to the blu-ray/regular comparisons, this one had an added scene where the grandfather shows off his MP3 player. As in, a chest strapped to your back, with giant headphones, and inside the chest is a record player. I just call it an MP3 player. Haha! Even more laughs when I finally caught the "put your eye out" by grandpa. That had to be a reference to A Christmas Story.

Grandpa's big invention that is important is a bunker. It becomes clear why it's important later in the film. Anyways, time for some kills! One damn little candy cane, killing this mugger. Awesome! And an extended bit in this blu-ray version, as a girl asked about the bell ringing, angel getting its wings. Even though I never watched It's A Wonderful Life, yet, I get the reference. The grandpa has a tendency to do the Ed fart thing from Shaun of the Dead. You know, the silent but deadly blows, and then an "I'm sorry." Classic!

The grandfather revealed the history of Santa, the true one. A Norse tale, basically, Santa is the son of Satan. Christmas was actually derived from a "Christ Mass" where the people prayed to be spared and stuff. As shown earlier, and confirmed in the book, Santa rides a giant bison, no reindeer for this man.

This blonde girl is too nice, and cute giving the old man a wolverine. Her dad's a hunter, apparently wolverines are edible? And she gives Nick a gun, which is more than meets the eye. Yeah, hopefully one gets the reference. It's consistent with what Nick always wanted.

Nothing is more sinful than a pastor, who gets down and dirty. Similar to Silent Night by Anchor Bay, there's this pastor who heads to a strip bar. Too bad Santa goes there. For some reason the bouncer didn't want Santa to come in, and gets a wreath choking death! Then there's this other bouncer who took issue with Santa kissing a stripper, when they were underneath a mistletoe! Come on, but ah well, more deaths! Santa had to disinfect a stripper pole, for obvious reasons. That scene did have a lot of tits, taking the film into a lovably sleazy territory! It was a hot scene, and I'm not referring to the burning coal...

Nick looks like Frankie Muniz, I just realized that. It's weird that this girl mentioned a "mature relationship," as if she wants to have one with the guy. Why? He is a bit of a knob. The story of Santa Claus went into that old animation style seen in Christmas specials back then. It was cute, and it explained an angel sent down by God to challenge Santa. A challenge where they slid a rock and it had to be as close to the hole as possible, without falling in. If Santa lost, the day of slayings would be a day of glee, as in Christmas, for 1000 years. The angel won, 1000 years later, the bet is over. Nick had a conversation in a Santa tracking website, with someone called "GONAD." HAHA, and he said how his parents didn't have that "conversation."

Christmas Day, Santa rides! A statue head being beheaded, swearing kids opening their presents to get their heads exploded! Hilarious, dead kids, very classy. There's an extended bit where the pastor listed the names of the strippers that died in that fire. "Dixie Rect." HAHA! Angry Jew didn't like Santa coming by when the shop's closed, and he got speared. Vintage Goldberg, that was his finisher during his wrestling career. Then he got a very Jewish death!

Tiny Lister! Yep, Deebo from Friday, appearing in this as a gas station worker. Rap music played, and him recommending the "Smokin Gum." Because black people love weed, share that love, right? So funny to see Tiny in this. He said there was too much violence in the Hood, so he moved up North. One of the three Hebes that bumped into Santa after the Deli guy's death is named "Schlomo Lipschitz." HAHA.

Added little scene. Caulk and Bush! Who this police guy prefers working with, which makes the presence of this police captain, Caulk, even funnier! And Caulk's dressed like Santa. Jolly Old St. Caulk. He didn't believe Nick, but he did when his balls got tased by Killer Claus! Maybe a Silent Night Deadly Night shoutout with one of the cops being impaled on these little stick markers. Not antlers.

Mary, apparently forgiving Nick after his little immature spat the night before, drives the guy home, and here comes Santa. Nick subdued him with a shotgun, yeah, Goldberg as a wrestler doesn't sell, so you think he'd sell a shotgun blast in a movie? Yeah, exactly. Pretty funny though. He appeared again, fucking over some carolers as he invaded Nick's house. The door to the bunker by the way looks so fake, I just realized that. It has to be the blu-ray quality, because regular DVD quality made it look better, the blurrier in comparison quality worked.

Santa hates children! Ohh, that scene with him appearing before grandpa and the teens was funny for a few reasons. The line about him hating children, SPOILER: grandpa's death because it looked like some editing magic to make it look like the bison coming and the grandpa standing there, were in the same shot. Also the reaction by Nick. His "Noooo" sounded flat, but funny oddly enough.

The chase scene was longer than I recall from the original version, and thus it looked cooler, more memorable. I don't remember the CG plates that random shooters were hitting. Anyways, the effects for the most part looked alright actually. The CG plates were ridiculous, but to make Santa flying on a bison, not too shabby.

When the teens make it to a high school, she asked if she's the only one to make the first moves in this relationship. Why does she even like the guy? It was in reference to him not grabbing her boobs in order to push her through the hole in the window they made. What a wimp, I would've been all over that shit, because it's important...

I should mention the thing about Santa's Christmas time, is that it follows Greenwich time. So Hell Township might've been GMT-5:00, Eastern Standard Time, which I'm in. He mentioned 7PM, it'd be midnight in Greenwich time, that's when Santa's day of slaying ends, it explains why he appeared last night and killed people on their Christmas Eve.

Goldberg took off the coat, showing his muscles, I bet they gave him a belly attachment, because the guy's a musclehead motherfucker. Anyways, he shot a fireball out his mouth, cheap, but funny. He then looked at the book, "A Christmas Carol," and said how the holiday scares the "Dickens" out of people. I get the reference. One of the funniest parts in the film, a very small one, Santa threw that book all the way across the room and it hit Nick right on the head! Awesome.

There was a lovely moment between Nick and Mary that could've been more romantic, but Santa ruined it with a zamboni! And Mary actually had a really nice scream! A funny face along with that, so this woman has some scream queen chops!

SPOILER: The grandfather returns, appearing as the Archangel that beat Santa in that animated story. I might've been surprised watching this the first time, but when you see the animated part, you'll notice how grandpa looks very much like the animated thing. The hair says it all. Anyways a rematch, making it look more like a curling thing. Ah Canada. A nice little tactic by Santa to send the angel to the hellhole that he made. Literally, Santa made a hellhole, a gateway to Hell. This leads to a silly confrontation where Nick used the practical gift that his grandfather gave him early in the movie. The nutcracker, and it was so ridiculous. The nut inside the nutcracker, deflecting Santa's fireball, and knocking him off his feet. Goldberg's selling of that was hilarious! And short, he left the school by zamboni. The Archangel story is that he sacrificed his immortality to marry and stay with Nick's grandmother. 7PM did pass, but Santa proved to be rather smart, basically saying the time in the North and South pole, is discretionary. Meaning, Christmas ends when Santa says it ends. Nice!

Ahhh, the climax, which looked like the ending, and hmmm. In the first and second time watching the film, I'd say "Thank goodness that wasn't the ending." I think that because it was such a copout. Pretty cheap to have Mary's dad determine the ending. However, being that I watched Cannon movies and Andy Sidaris stuff, I can appreciate now the explosion. I did in fact laugh at it. It featured some Native American who talked through a voice box. He gave Mary's dad this huge bazooka, and he said it cost him a lung. Oh, not his vocal chords? Something I didn't notice in the previous two viewings, this cop with a tache. He just comes in like some macho guy holding a buzzsaw ready to extract the dead guy dressed as Santa. That was random, but funny! The Santa by the way was impaled on a flag pole, which had the American flag on it. Weird given how this is a Canadian production, and I'm pretty sure it was shot in Canada.

SPOILER: Santa didn't die. Instead, he goes to the airport, as Mary's dad blew up the sleigh and the bison. Pronouncing his name as "Shatan," and not "Satan," he gets a ticket to the North Pole, literally. The movie has a bunch of sexual innuendos and stuff like that, and one here with the airport girl asking if Santa's one sack ever left his sight. Oh come on, did you see the size of his sack? It's massive!

Something the original version didn't have, a reel that is carried by this Santa song. It's just clips from the movie, with no audio. You don't hear the characters speak, and instead see their faces. It was weird, I figured it to be a blooper reel.

Some bloopers did come with the stripper not being a good beermaid, letting a bottle slip. Goldberg picked it up and broke it over his head. Hehe, then him not being able to kick the deli's door down. Him breaking the table when he did his forward roll in the beginning of the movie, telling someone off camera that "You're killing me." Flubbing his explanation about the time zones. Pretending that he has the big sack, farting, blue screen fun with a stagehand in the background. The bison going off course and a handler struggling to control it. The bison running away! Not even cued. Mary punching the bison, and hitting her hand. Snowmobile mishaps which showed that Mary became a dummy strapped to a stuntman. Pretty funny stuff actually, and I think is the biggest extension to this movie's 10 minute longer runtime.

The credits are funny in that you see Naughty/Nice labels. Obviously Goldberg's naughty, given his character. It was funny when going into the crew, the drivers were all listed as naughty! Most of second unit, naughty.

Vintage Goldberg in the post-credits!



That wraps up the film so nicely. Ahh! What a Christmas treat. I still love the film, in fact I appreciate it a bit more compared to last year. It's just stupid Christmas fun. Not strictly a slasher given Santa slaying with objects that are not knives, razors, or anything like that. But still has the other slasher tropes. Compared to Silent Night Deadly Night, this film is more obviously self aware. Even though there's no winks to the camera, it's easy to tell the people knew what they were making, and probably giggled after every take. It's that kind of fun movie that just so happens to be about Christmas. I think the only flaw with the movie is the fact it's a Christmas one. Santa, heavy Christmas themes all around, the flaw is that you can't really watch this any time of the year. The same could be said for all these Christmas movies I guess. Really, it's nothing, this film is fun for what it is. It's not trying to be like Black Christmas, and I think why I got on to it before I actually turned into a horror fan, is just because it's so damn stupid. It's a horror movie in the sense that Santa is a serial killer, but without a doubt, it's a comedy. So the goal is to make one laugh. I laughed, a lot, this film's a riot and proves to be a great yearly tradition for me. Robert Culp, looking him up, was in Big Bad Mama 2. I knew the name was familiar, he was the journalist that ended up in a relationship with Angela Dickinson's character. One of the worst sex scenes ever given that they were both doubled and the camera work on it is almost as bad as The Room. Unfortunately he passed away, but nice performance in this film. I wish there was a sequel to this! It would've been a fun little franchise if nobody tampered with the formula, unlike the Silent Night, Deadly Night franchise, who did so with mixed results. I guess the ship's sailed given this film coming out 10 years ago. Ah well.

I guess if trying to nail down a serious flaw to the movie, the acting is weak. Douglas Smith as Nick has wooden delivery, and definitely Emilie de Ravin had more emotion, but also was hokey. I don't mind, in fact they complement each other, thus the pairing was nice, even though he is a knob and she's too faithful to him. Really, this flaw is just a nitpick. In the end, it doesn't matter because this is such a fun movie. Goldberg was the star of it, but Robert Culp's Grandpa character was pretty fun as well. The cameos were awesome! James Caan and Tiny Lister had memorable scenes. The opening scene alone pretty much is a great summary of what the movie is. But it doesn't go downhill, it's a satisfying sleigh ride of yuletide slaughtering!

I had more Christmas movies to watch but I just got lazy. I didn't want to type more about movies until I finished the thoughts on the ones from last month. In hindsight, it was not much work, proofreading, GIFs, extra comments. It's just that I wanked too much, most of my recent sleep deprivation days were of that. I wanted to see if I can cover a whole day with movies, now knowing I can go the 24 hour distance. As a result of the procrastinating, there's a bunch of Christmas movies I still have to go through. I wanted to knock out Santa's Slay, making sure it had to be watched on Christmas. I'll just put the Christmas movies into the queue, and go back to random picks.

Watched on my birthday (January 4). I wanted to go a full day of movies, but that didn't prove successful. I'll explain later. These movies were handpicked by me, no queue selection via a randomizer.

Note, because it's been so long since I initially typed out this post, I'm going to blaze through comments for most of these films. I just want to get this over with, as I've made it so that I didn't watch any movies until I finished the reviews. Some reviews will be beefier than others, simply because I typed a lot of notes and comments while watching some of the films. The ones towards the end, I barely typed anything but GIF notes, so you will notice them being thinner.

Sex Tapes - 3 couples, small plot involving these people fucking each other in a controlled environment, filming the scenes and putting them on discs. The gimmick is they sleep with each other, as long as their actual partner sees it, all of it takes place in this big house. Angela Davies, pornstars Chanel Preston and Charmane Star. Nice, the guys, yeah, fuck 'em. Tapes stolen. Security guard was the only other character in the movie. So, who stole them? Given the introduction of that character, who do you think did it?

The sex scenes aren't bad, compared to Staying on Top though, they aren't that, big. A bang, something exciting, they just come and go, and the movie doesn't make the small cast, bigger than they actually are. You see these 6 people and that's it, then a 7th person who doesn't get in on the action. So scenes come off a bit repetitive, and had to encompass all possible combinations. So each girl ends up banging each guy, at least once. It's around 80 minutes long, and most of it is just sex scenes. The dialogue is rather bland, and it's just tits and ass. Angela Davies stands out for actually being a competent actor, Charmane Star's not bad. Chanel Preston, there's a fakeness to her in the dialogue, but there's no point in judging harshly, because, well, she's a pornstar. Her acting is definitely in line with a serious porn film, as does Star, but she stands out a bit more. Davies would be too classy for porn. She aged really well too, I think this was her last softcore flick, and this came out in 2012. Great body, she has it, she flaunts it. Just a few more wrinkles, that's it. All the girls had great bodies, with Preston in particular having a pretty fit one. The guys are just jackasses, like anyone would give a shit about them.

Performance wise, Davies does take command, as her lines are better on paper, and better delivered than the rest of the whole cast. Meanwhile the guys are just there, they're at best not memorable, at worst annoying. The ending was rather anti-climatic and easy to guess, given the random 7th person. It ends just on the guy, there's not even some grand follow up to the reveal. There he is, then the credits roll. Definitely a low budget film, but as my video file shows, it looks very high quality. HD and all that, but just because it looks good, doesn't mean the content is. It's a good wank, nothing more.

I watched this first because I had something to do at 1:10AM. That particular thing didn't last long, but I wanted to get to it. I didn't want a movie I could afford to pause and thus risk ruining the flow. So I went with this film, and suffered no downside to the pause. If anything, it made the film longer, which would be considered a service, giving more time to this little movie.

This was just an appetizer, it's time for the real fun...

Hard Ticket To Hawaii - It's not paradise all the time! Ah yeah, one of the two crown jewels in the Andy Sidaris 12 film set, this film sees all the trappings the director was known for. Malibu Express was a first step and kind of a black sheep given that it is a bit different to the 11 other movies. This movie builds upon Malibu Express as well as introduce things that the 10 other movies used, to death. But in a good way.

The plot is basically government agents coming together to fight the threat of a bunch of diamond thieves. It sounds simple, but the film takes that into something that is very wacky. It stars Dona Speir, the franchise player that was in 7 of these films! Hope Marie Carlton as her partner for a few of those 7, Harold Diamond, and Ron Moss. Dona Speir plays...Dona, her cover up with witness protection girl Taryn (Carlton) is that they're cargo pilots. They were tasked with escorting this couple to an island, as well as this crate containing a snake. The twist? It's not the snake they were supposed to carry, it's one contaminated by the toxins in CANCER INFECTED RATS! Oh my fucking God! That was hilarious, and it makes no sense. Harold Diamond is Jade, Ron Moss is Rowdy Abilene. Now being that this is the second film in Sidaris' series of his fully controlled movies, I have to mention the connection to the first movie. Cody Abilene, played by the fantastic Darby Hinton, was in Malibu Express, and he's revealed to be Rowdy's cousin. Rowdy and Jade are agents, with the latter being a martial arts expert. Having experienced Diamond in Rambo 3, prior to all this, I know full well that he's actually pretty damn good.

This is my fourth time watching the film, and to my surprise there was some new things I didn't pick up. The biggest is all the references to James Bond. It's clear that these Sidaris films are heavily influenced by Bond films, but I didn't recall the references. Now about trappings, introduced here is the model vehicles, which I might as well call them toys. A toy helicopter in this was used by a Bond inspired villain, Mr. Chang (huh?), this snobby British guy who only appears in that early scene, a scene past the halfway point, and one of the last scenes, sending diamonds over to a skater guy and this chubby Hawaiian man. Taryn and Dona just happened to be there as they were heading to their home base following their transportation of the couple. The diamonds pretty much came to them and the dumb henchman were not fast enough for the rendezvous. It's ridiculous! But yeah, they got the diamonds, by throwing a nightstick and a fucking ninja star at the guys! A ninja star! Wow, and that's only the beginning.

Another thing introduced here, topless jacuzzi thinking sessions! Yeah, because they need to see what's in the box, and Dona said she does her thinking in the hot tub. It makes a lot of sense! Rowdy and Jade are called upon to help, the former is the boyfriend of Dona, while the latter is digging on Edy, played by the beautiful Cynthia Brimhall. Ah hell, might as well go into it, these 12 films made a habit out of using Playboy Playmates and turning them into badasses. Penthouse Pets came in later, I think the first from that camp was Julie Strain. So with these ladies as badasses, that makes the men idiots. To be fair, the early movies had the guys standing on their own, but later, they were just idiots. Jade for example can kick ass, Rowdy can handle a bazooka. OHHH, he sure can handle it.

Rodrigo Obregon!!! Another stalwart of these Sidaris films, making his debut here as the suave Seth Romero. The thing I find hard to take is that he answers to Mr. Chang. As I said earlier, this guy only appears in 3 scenes, and Seth's all over once he's introduced in Edy's restaurant. One thing this movie was so awesome at, characters. Not just the beautiful lead women and men, but the supporters and the bit players. At Edy's is this guy who is best described as Quagmire! From Family Guy, his name is Ashley, but how he talks, one scene where he said Taryn can sit on his face, it's so clear he's Quagmire. It makes me wonder if Seth MacFarlane saw this movie and got inspiration from this character. All that was missing was "giggity."

There's this guy that always plays a henchmen in the Sidaris films that has this real bored expression. I always thought he looked bored and wondered why he bothered acting, at least in these films. He's a henchman seen with this muscular, scary woman who try to break into Dona and Taryn's house. They wear socks over their heads, and this guy's face never changes. One facial expression throughout, monotone voice, it becomes funny after a while. That particular scene was hilarious when Seth, getting rather hands on in his work, has a gun out wanting to get in on the action. Instead he's scared of the snake that made its way to the secret agents' house. To make matters worse, Dona, all angry of the home invasion, fires her gun and hits Seth in the face! It causes a serious cut to his cheek, it was pretty hilarious. Meanwhile the snake escapes into the sewage. To note, the girls had taken in the snake. It got out.

Andy Sidaris sometimes makes cameos in his movies, and does so here as a sports broadcaster. Not a hard role for him given his background. One of his colleagues is this blonde pretty boy douche that's Taryn's boyfriend. They hook up in the middle of the movie and a silly montage of them comes up, that features Carlton being topless. Yay!

This now leads me to one of the best scenes in movie history. Jade and Rowdy make it to Molokai, and take a drive on their jeep. Along the way they pass by one of Seth/Chang's henchmen, the skater guy. Oh man, okay. I might as well show this in GIF form, I want to, and it's fucking hilarious. First, here's how the skater guy's introduced to the scene.



This is how Skater, apparently that was his name, tries to attack the two agents.



Yeah, a blow up doll is with him. Note, Rowdy is an Abilene, who are notorious for being bad shots. This was introduced in Malibu Express with Cody Abilene, proving this to be a family thing. Here's how Rowdy Abilene retaliates, creating cinema history.



That...was fucking awesome! How can anyone not be entertained by something like that? That's just the halfway point of the movie!

To think that wasn't the end, the couple mentioned earlier, that Taryn and Dona transport, got an unwelcome appearance by the snake that was contaminated by the toxins from CANCER INFECTED RATS! Amazing.

Vintage leg up throughout the movies, seemingly a trend of the 80s. Rowdy's leg is up in the scene where Jade comes out of the hospital following the Skater attack. Seth takes home the trophy because he has a leg up multiple times in one scene. The kidnapping of Edy, jumping ahead into the film. Classic.

I was going to save this for last, but there's a random nude girl that comes up by the 50 minute mark, I might as well get to it. The nudity in the film. Legendary, obviously with Playboy Playmates, they can't be shy to supply the plot. By this point Speir and Carlton bared their breasts multiple times, it gets tiring to count the exact number. Brimhall supplied the plot as well. In the random department is busty brunette bird Patty Duffek, as an employee of Edy's talking to this suspicious girl who works at the counter of the restaurant. She talked to her about breasts, saying a good pair is a great asset. Then...I won't spoil it. Just...I was fooled. I'm sure everyone who has seen the movie would attest to that. A great twist, but I can go into it without spoiling. So, what? Why? There was almost no point to it, it could've been done...more normally, but it's just one example of how wacky and wild this film is, and what makes it a classic.

Edy got kidnapped, as I mentioned earlier. Later, to get to a phone, Taryn asks sumo wrestlers to use the phone. That's right, so random, and they showed the sumo guys pounding into each other, it was almost homoerotic. And she asked them in Spanish, bad Spanish for fuck's sake. It was ridiculous and funny.

Going back to the snake and the couple, that did have a serious horror element that actually was an underlying tone to some scenes in the movie. Namely the music that played in its sudden appearance. Then when the beautiful female agents discover the bodies, the makeup...dirt on the bodies did give off a horror feel. But then it got really funny with this...selfie.



So Taryn's boyfriend is called Jimmy John Jackson. Wow, so he's a serial killer? This random scene at Edy's comes up where he interviews two black football players who had a bit too much frilly alcoholic beverages, and one blurted this out in a live interview.



Motherfucker's crazy! That scene didn't serve the plot at all, but it was so funny that it doesn't matter! It also didn't matter that Sidaris' shorts were too short. Then as it turned out, the satellite feed was cut out during that interview, so as a substitute, Jimmy John Jackson had to interview a woman golfer. He was sad when he got that news! Her name's Muffy Freemont. Who is so dumb she went home and studied early for a pap test, according to Triple J. HAHAHA, what?!

So I didn't mention how Taryn and Dona's house had posters of Andy's previous 3 movies: Stacey, Seven, and Malibu Express. On the latter, they explained that Cody Abilene became an actor, hence that particular movie poster being there. Haha, okay. So during this preparation scene where the 4 agents get their guns ready, Dona and Rowdy have a little time to themselves. This was when Rowdy really stood out. I didn't really take much note of Ron Moss in the previous viewings of the film. This time I did, and will admit that he's a big reason the movie's entertaining, and he wasn't some weak link in the pairing with Harold Diamond. He and Dona get naked in a steamy love scene, but the setup to that featured him saying that he wants to “suck the polish off your toes.” JEEZ! Foot guy, and who knew that it would be fitting for this day considering the movie I saw later. During the preparation scene, there was a phone conversation between Dona and Dixon, the guy who ran the cargo warehouse and who informed of the CANCER INFECTED RATS and their toxins contaminating the snake. Aliens reference? She said she was never mistaken for a man, but asked if Dixon was. Yeah, Aliens reference! Wow. This came out in 1987, Aliens in 1986. Yep, seems about right.

There's also a line that obviously calls back a James Bond film, “Live and let die.” During the love scene between Rowdy and Dona, Jade showed Taryn how he has his vodka. A lemon wedge over his mouth, while he chugs the drink! That's really stupid, but so manly and 80s, you have to let it go.

It does take hindsight to realize that Ron Moss did contribute to the absolute best moments in movie history, let alone this film. There's the blowup doll murder scene, and then there's this. A guy that looks like Skater, let's call him Frisbee, regularly throws it with this random woman. In comes Rowdy during the planned agent invasion to save Edy. It leads to an amazing scene.



I realized that Dona's little airbike gimmick was shot against a blue screen. Whatever you call it, a glider thing. Still funny.

The gun battle and explosions were all classic 80s awesomeness. The film uses a bunch of slow motion stuff to hilarious effect, making some kills linger on too long, but in a way that's just funny. Then you have Harold Diamond fighting, as he choreographed the martial arts scenes. As in, the scenes he was in. They actually looked really nice. I forgot to mention that Diamond always wore his pants too high, it's pretty funny!



I forgot to mention that somewhere in the middle of the film, during the time Edy's kidnapped, the muscular woman does this random ritualistic dance where she's in a bra and panties, and is all oiled up. It was hot, but totally random! There was no purpose to it.

During the rescue of Edy, even freaking Harold Diamond has a leg up, and he didn't really need to. It's just comical. The rescue mission ends with a magnificent explosion that can only be supplied by Andy Sidaris.



That would've made an awesome ending to the movie, but there's still more! Back to the horror movie realm, when it's realized that they forgot Seth. Rowdy just busts out of the van they were all in with a motorcycle and rides out in one direction. Where? I'm not sure, but he ends up being where Dona goes. Seth's home invasion scene, had to have been inspired by Halloween. What happens is just the bastard not being able to die, but also his knife is closer to what Michael Myers would've used. Also a bit of Friday the 13th with a huge entrance towards the end. It reminds me of the boy from the lake, coming out from below. Yeah. Before all that, one is getting teased big time over Seth and his temporary immortality. The scene ends with an explosion...



The logic is off because the bazooka would've made a larger explosion, but it obviously exposes how rigged that gun was. On the other hand, Dona Speir was drenched in sweat by the end of that scene. Amazing!

Rowdy and his one liners, again this viewing made me realize how the guy stood out. He even went into vintage 80s action movie hero territory with the lines.



So that also could've made an awesome ending, but wait, there's more! Fucking Chang, the guy who really had no business being in the movie, but because he fulfills the Bond stereotype these films love, he has to be there. There's no question that Seth Romero, was the star villain, Rodrigo Obregon showed he was a major franchise player as a bad guy in these Sidaris films. If I'm not mistaken, he's been in all the Sidaris movies starting with this film. Thus the most out of every other actor, while in the female department, Dona Speir reigns supreme. There's a reason they got used so much, and on Obregon, it's because he's so damn good at being so damn bad. There are some good guy roles he played, most notably as a...woman named “Large Marge.” That's right. Obregon's a team player, that's the basic description of him, he makes the movie just as much as the other leads do. So, in that respect, man, fuck Mr. Chang.

I mean this villain apparently has a Chinese father and British mother. That's what Rowdy says, but the guy looks 100% British! Bitch please. His presence in the film was really to say this hilarious line. Had he not said it, I would have had him completely off the film.



If gun size equates to penis size...



Oh, second reason to have Mr. Chang here, funny scene...



A theme in the movies with Hope Marie Carlton, Taryn's sticky fingers. Yeah, there were two little boxes of diamonds. Only one was accounted for by the authorities. Any wonder why she ended up as a Witness Protection client? She probably stole from some gangster, and to avoid jail time, she ratted out the guy. Anyways, such as the case from Malibu Express, these movies end with everyone together, sometimes on a boat, sipping some alcohol, almost recapping the movie, and being all happy. It's like a bow tie to this odd and wild gift that could only be provided by Andy Sidaris.


There was even a fantastic end credits sequence with music, and movies don't tend to have standout end credits in general. The song “Hard Ticket” plays, while earlier the amazing piece “Hard Ticket To Hawaii” blessed my ears. It was when Taryn and Dona transport the couple to an island. “It's a haaard ticket, to Hawaii! It's not paradise all the time!”

This movie is paradise though. It's the paradise that consists of lots of nudity, lots of action, badass women, most of the times stupid men, inventive and hilarious explosions, despite going into the 90s, these movies represent 80s excess. Malibu Express is a tremendous movie and stands on its own, but this film encapsulates and perfects the Andy Sidaris formula of B-movie making. Essentially the 10 films that follow emulate and take from this movie, thus this stands out as the gold standard and archetype for the Sidaris film. Arguably, for B action films in general. What those films don't have, and this film does, is a surprising amount of polish. This movie is pretty polished in its presentation, despite the sleaze and excessive action. It just looks good, whereas other B action films have a more rustic quality, sometimes to its detriment. Meanwhile this has a coat of paint that will never get old, as long as people want to just sit back and watch a silly action film. This movie delivers that, tits, and ass, how can anybody shoot that down? Amazing movie.

CANCER INFECTED RATS!

Re-Animator - Even though I saw this movie once before, it has been a while, and some things therefore can still come off really shocking. The first scene exemplifies that. Herbert West, played by the brilliant Jeffrey Combs, being confronted at what looks like a German hospital, as the people were speaking the language, not West. Turns out to be Swiss. One's introduced immediately to the brilliant effects as the guy West was trying to bring back from the dead, goes crazy and his eyes explode with blood spewing out! It's unbelievable, and makes for a startling open. Carried over by Combs' overacting, how he delivers the line that he brought back Dr. Hans Gruber (hahaha, this was before Die Hard) from the dead, sets the tone for the entire movie. It's a tease, there's a hell of a lot more to come.

Note, like the first watch, I go by the extended version, also known as the "Integral Cut." From what I understand, this version makes certain things like a particular hypnosis angle, more sensible. The unrated version clocks it at 85 minutes, this is 20 minutes longer. So, a considerable amount must've been compromised, and I'll likely look at it.

Miskatonic Medical School in Arkham, Massachussetts, Dan Cain (Bruce Abbott) is introduced as this guy failing to CPR this fat woman back to life. No restraints, they showed this big woman topless, and belly out. Oh my goodness, but yeah, persistent and caring, a bit too much for a doctor, according to this older woman, played by Carolyn Gordon. The wife of director Stuart Gordon, and this was his first movie! Herbert West comes in as a transfer to Miskatonic by Dean Halsey, who has a daughter, Megan, played by the wonderful Barbara Crampton! One's also introduced to one of the doctors, Carl Hill. Immediately he and West differ on their theories about the brain and death.

666 Darkmore. That's where Cain lives, seen first as he's boinking Megan! You see some nipples from Crampton, and buttcrack. Yes! Anyways, they have their relationship stuff, Cain needing to make rent, and suddenly wanting to marry Megan, that jazz. West comes in looking for a place to stay, and he takes a liking to Cain's basement. He doesn't take a liking to Carl Hill, they argued after that wicked brain harvesting scene. The pulling of the scalp back, it looked nasty!

I assume medical school students are slightly older than college students, otherwise it's weird given that the main characters hover around 30, Crampton in her late 20s at the time. Anyways, I think this Integral Cut probably gave more character development to Carl Hill, because that's the hypnosis angle I referred to. He stands out as being rather conniving. In a scene where he drinks with Halsey, Megan being there briefly, there's a camera shot that is a bit blurry and a shadow cast behind him. The lighting makes it known what kind of character he is. I didn't notice this before, but it's brilliant, as if the dialogue where he sounds really manipulative of Halsey, mentioning how Megan's basically in danger by being with Cain and West being at his house, wasn't enough. Just look at the guy, he's a bad motherfucker.

Herbert West's breakthrough is witnessed by Cain after he and Megan basically invaded West's room, and see their dead cat. Megan was suspicious of West since he introduced himself. The passage of time wasn't really explicit, because Megan talked like West had been living in the house for weeks, but it was really just a few scenes apart that West comes in the house for the first time. One has to assume that weeks passed. A little nitpick, that should've been a bit clearer to the viewer. Regardless, Herbert's intentions are a bit purer than what Megan thinks, but it does go into the theme of playing God. The film gets a comedy tag to it, and the humor is there. It's not too easy for me to spot though, pretty dry humor. It's all from West. He has some zingers, one liners that are pretty funny. Later during the human re-animation trials, he called Megan a bitch. That delivery was just funny! Back to the cat re-animation, that was funny as well! Herbert West wrestling with a cat, and how Cain kills it by throwing it against the wall. Very entertaining. That's when West gets Cain on his side, but not Megan.

The human re-animation trials were absolutely wild! The first of two being the big one, this random, buff guy freshly dead, brought back and going wild like a roided up pro wrestler. It got really crazy, and was so damn entertaining, just can't take your eyes off the scene. Then someone dies (SPOILER: Dean Halsey) during this rampage, I guess they can be considered zombies. Then West ended it in an amazing way, but with a deadpan delivery of his one line. Blood. Blood everywhere. Gore, brilliant makeup and effects, everything this movie's about, in one wild scene, and it shows how the movie really works in these pockets of outbursts. It clearly builds to a huge climax. SPOILER: it's also revealed that West is also a reagent user, but as a way to beat sleep and to keep his mind sharp. It's a pretty powerful scene because it looks like a junkie needing his fix, and Cain as an enabler by helping.

Hill tried comforting Megan and it's shown more how the guy uses hypnosis. How he delivers his words, no blinking, staring right into a person's eyes. It's really good, and not some watch spinning stuff. If anything, it's a science untapped. But the thing about this scene and the earlier one with Halsey, it really makes Hill out to be a lech. He has the hots for Megan basically. Hill's ability is more clear as hypnosis when he confronts Herbert West and gets his notes from the guy. That scene's really interesting because it looks like West knows he's been a bit brainwashed, as he shed a tear during this. Hill's just a greedy fucker, he wants the reagent to himself, be famous, West can be the successful assistant, Cain has to go. Clearly West's usage of the reagent proved helpful as I think he snapped out of hypnosis by his own to take control of the situation. In a bloody brilliant way...

But then more playing of God, and it leads to even more science gone horribly wrong. In a way that made me laugh! It was really good. SPOILER: Hill's head separated by the shovel decapitation, and his body being re-animated long with him, and knocking out West. That was awesome. Megan and Dan discover Halsey and it turns out he was lobotomized. That's weird because, that doesn't really do anything. Halsey's still a zombie. Oh no, I guess it's actually a mind control thing, as Hill was able to basically have Halsey as a slave. Anyways, the funny stuff is seeing that body function without its head, and sometimes bumping into things. Can you blame it? No eyes!

So there's a hospital scene with the black security guard. He's introduced early in the film, so this isn't new. Him and his Boudoir magazine...break time.

Oh, the most famous scene in the film, where to start with that. Spoilers I guess, because it's just too good to ignore. SPOIER: pretty much solidifying that Hill's a pervert over Megan, he has her kidnapped, by her own father, stripped completely naked...by her own father, on a slab. Epic bush! Pert nipples, soft breasts, oh my goodness.

Fairness to Crampton's nudity, there is some cock in the film. Little guy under a big bush during the epic climax.

The climax was absolutely wild. Once West enters and does some verbal jarring with Hill, the villain says “So do I,” and that's when shit gets real. The final 20 or so minutes steals the film and shows how simple, yet amazing the structure of the movie is. Basically build up the characters and stories, tease the viewers with small outbursts in between. The viewer is lovably teased and wanting more, it is delivered in the last 20 or so minutes. It's so simple, it's amazing how a lot of movies don't follow that. The fact this was a low budget film is something hard to grasp, when the effects are just incredible. Big props to the re-animated beings, I guess you can call them zombies, but those people did a great job. During all this mayhem, there's West wanting to try his theory on overdose, leading to even more monstrous stuff. Now the ending for West seemed definitive to me, but there are two sequels to the film, which I haven't seen. I will, I'm a bit hesitant though because...come on, this movie is absolutely brilliant. It really stands tall in the 80s horror pantheon, and to think there were sequels, is kind of strange. Anyways, Cain and Megan's end, is rather sad, though there's a glimmer of hope, given the stuff in the film prior, that glimmer of hope is pretty nonexistent to me. Either way, a great way to close the film.

Credit to Richard Band for the music, especially the main theme, which derives from the Psycho main theme. Credit to all the effects people behind this, to the camera men and crew that were able to make this film possible, given Gordon had only done theater productions before this. To the man himself for such an amazing first movie effort. Also of course the actors, as I learned that they rehearsed the whole movie 3 weeks before producing. It really goes to show, no wasted motion at all in the performances, everyone brings their A-game, no flubs, no ropey stuff, bad delivery. In that respect, it's amazing this is considered a B-film. Sybil Danning said in an interview that the only difference between an A-movie and a B-movie is the budget. This film proves that, because this kicks so many A-horror movie asses. If one has to consider a flaw, it would be that it's low budget, thus is stuck being a cult film. It's in a way, too good to be a cult film. It's a funny, powerfully entertaining film, not just in the horror genre. I can watch this more and more and appreciate all the things at play here. While I haven't seen all of Stuart Gordon's films, I doubt any could top this. It's a masterpiece. Trying to thing, it's really this film and The Thing that go neck and neck for best Sci-fi/Horror film I've seen. And it's interesting how both films have similar high quality effects, ensemble cast, kickass music, similar structure and great pace, goodness. A double bill with these two would be incredible. Jeffrey Combs is amazing, and without question the MVP of the movie. He embodies everything the movie is, the heart and soul and all that jazz. Anyways, yeah, Re-Animator, classic.

Braindead - Note, this is Dr. Sapirstein's fanedit of the film, piecing together things to make it the uncut version of the film. The US got an unrated version that was pretty short, and I wanted the full thing. Unfortunately this serves as the only way to see the uncut version that's in English. This should've been official, but ah well, thank goodness it exists. A movie I've wanted to see for a long time, planned on watching it on Halloween, but with no time in that particular day, I had to save this for a rainy day. Rather than wait for it to be chosen at random, I went ahead and put it on my birthday queue.

The fanedit shows which was officially remastered and presented, and which wasn't, as the color and quality shifts. The more aged stuff, still looks really good, so it's of very little consequence to the overall presentation of the film.

The film starts hot and heavy with the comedy and gore when this Indiana Jones wannabe or whatever and his African sidekick escape from an indigenous tribe, along with a monkey they probably pilfered. The monkey turns out to be rather special, as it does "the bite," which is what the African sidekick and the guys in the jeep name the scars this white guy got from the monkey. So how to treat it? Why, cut the infected parts off! With a rusty hatchet looking thing, and it looks really damn good. Unfortunately the guy had a head wound, so...yeah.

Oh the Aussie accents! A big laugh all around. There's this Latina looking cashier that works at a convenience store who wants some love, getting attracted to this delivery guy. Some really old bat, her grandmother plays fortune teller and basically sees her future in terms of love. A tarot card with a certain sign is shown, and then this skinny Aussie walks into the convenience store, drops some stuff into the counter, and it makes the sign of that tarot card. Love at first sight. The Latina suffers from broken English, bless her.

The Aussie has this old bat of a mother who is a clean freak, but looks to be controlling of her son. Plus she doesn't like that her son got a date with the woman. Lovely little scene with the two lovebirds at a zoo, dude talks about a traumatic experience with his father drowning. Then comes the monkey from the start of the film. Rat monkey sumatra. Ugly motherfucker, with what seems to be stop motion animation bringing this thing to life. It makes a disgusting impression with how it rips a monkey arm off and eats it! Then biting on the Aussie's mother, who was spying on her son. The old woman kicked ass actually, mashing that fucker's head in, ew.

Lionel, that's the Aussie's name. So the film shows that it's a splatter one, gross out stuff, and it sure was convincing. Lionel's mother shows the effects of this rat monkey biting, and how she deteriorated. It was really nasty, especially with the lunch scene where her gooey blood was squirted out and landed in the custard. The Mathisons, part of the WLWL, that mum was proud to be a new member of, were eating. The male of the couple loved custard, and didn't look down and see the blood, ew! Then the bat's ear fell into her custard, and she eats that! Yuck. It only goes deeper into a gross rabbit hole. Pretty much taking the zombie transformation thing from movies like Romero's Dead films, the mum goes from being an alive bitch, to an undead bitch. Its first kill was really good, more splatter in the form of blood from the nurse's head being mushed off its body!

Quirky and weird characters all around. Already mentioning the grandmother, Lionel's mum, and here with some pharmacist selling tranquilizer. This helps in putting down the zombies, albeit temporary. "Dark forces" was mentioned earlier, and it's further explained when Lionel meets Paquita's grandmother, he's been marked. She gave Lionel this object that's a crucifix with a crescent moon over it. The same signal in the tarot card and the one made at the store. There was also a previous scene where the granny reads tarot cards that show what will happen in this story. The last one says "death." Well obviously!

More insane splatter with the embalming room scene. Yeah, a funeral for Lionel's mum, it goes sour as she rose up from her coffin. Peter Jackson makes a cameo as the embalming guy. He looked like a total dweeb, haha! Fast forward to this cemetery scene that features this gang of punkers and the lead gets his dick grabbed on by Lionel's mom, who was 6 feet underground. So that was all really nasty and cool, but then all of a sudden, the fucking priest came out and does some kung-fu! It came out of nowhere, and it was really shocking and awesome! The punkers became zombies, and the priest fends them all off, including this amazing maiming part. It doesn't end well, but it shows that Lionel feels it necessary to have all these infected people, including his mum, in hiding and in his house. Back to the quirky and weird characters, there's Lionel's uncle that has the hots for his nephew's girl, who by this point had been alienated by Lionel. There was what sounded like fucking going on with the zombies Lionel was caring for. It wasn't fucking, I think, but it looks like it made a baby. Oh the baby! And some child abuse ensues in public at a park. Before that, I guess a rugby guy came and pretty much picks up Paquita on the rebound. The uncle wants Lionel's mum fortune, along with her house. The house by the way, I keep thinking looks like the one from Fright Night.

This movie just moves at hyperspeed. One minute zombies are literally sucking face, the next is baby abuse, the next comes this party hosted by Lionel's uncle, using the house as party central. It's like a Looney Tunes cartoon, the whole film has this animated sense. As if the zombie effects and stop motion animation wasn't enough.

From there the last 30 or so minutes of the film is just bonkers. It's completely crazy, so much stuff to mention, but it all binds together as this gigantic scene. The zombies basically run rampant, and it starts with the feeling that they were all poisoned. The bottle that Lionel gets says “toxic” on it, so he figured those would put these monsters, including his rotted to shit mother, down. It didn't, and it turned out that it wasn't poison, rather an animal stimulant, and that it wasn't for human consumption. Uh oh!

Now, this large portion of the film, by this point I was going in and out, lying in bed did not help at all. It's my fault and has nothing to do with the film, I just got really tired, and I was in the middle of trying to stay up for 48 hours. I figured the 24 hour birthday run would be easy and add to my numbers. It wasn't at all. I did catch all the action, though I missed the explanation for the big zombie uprising. I watched the entire sequence again, and not only got my answers, but was even more entertained and shocked at the stuff that went on. Being awake, the eyes fully opened taking in basically an overdose of splatter. One that is most appreciated.

So the initial pile of zombies Lionel tries to kill, rise up and shit got real intense. Basically everyone in this at first random party, became zombies! Paquita, the uncle, and some brunette with glasses were exceptions, and some others. As it turned out, those numbers dwindled and it was down to Paquita and the uncle. The film kind of splits into three alternating sections where it's Paquita fending off the zombies, either by herself or with some help. There's the uncle alone, somehow always getting his nuts hurt during all this, and then there's Lionel himself. The sections merged in an epic fashion, but every single moment is just hard to forget!There's really no comparison to it. As far as specific content. I can think of movies with a grand final 20+ minutes, like Re-Animator, The Exorcist, Killer Joe. This film is not like those however, it's just insane. The goriest film ever made? The best splatter film of all time? This is coming from a man who went on to make the Lord of the Rings movies, the Hobbit movies, he remade King Kong. He pretty much became a blockbuster, big budget, effects heavy Hollywood franchise player, but before all these, he made down and dirty movies like Bad Taste and Braindead that were awe-inspiring.

So anyways, given the zombies that came back to life thanks to Lionel's big mistake, these turn out to be the most monstrous, and most powerful. This indicates patient zero to be rather...yeah. Before I get to that, I mean, shit, details? Skin being bitten off, pulled off from a person's head! The entire area of a man, from waist to neck, completely ripped off! Intestines ripped off just by one hand, a zombie that became a jack o lantern! Limbs separated, entire halves ripped away slowly, punching through the back of a woman's head and the mouth! Feasting on human flesh, pitchfork, amateur dental procedures on a zombie, impalement, a zombie basically ripping himself apart just to get to Lionel! Using shears for decapitation, and half-head soccer! Zombie legs that don't need a top half to do damage! The fucking entrails even coming to life, wanting to kill Lionel, a family secret revealed, the motherfucking baby from earlier! Toupe's coming off, garden gnome for a zombie head! A broomstick bring zombies together and a failed kiss! Nutshots aplenty, patient zero doing some damage before it shows its full appearance.

Everything stops though when Lionel comes through a lawnmower! Holy shit, then it's right back to the gore! The blood is so vibrant, the limbs, cartilage, entrails, remains all looking amazing. Oh and zombies trying to have sex! Patient zero's first victim during this entire sequence coming to life and looking gross and freaky! Paquita kicking its ass, a face ripped apart. And then, the grand finale, patient zero. SPOILER: Lionel's mom.

Look at the tits on that monster! Shit, it leads to an epic finale on the roof as Lionel faces his greatest challenge, his fears, his family past. There's...uhhh, reverse birth and...birth?! I don't know, it's absolutely wicked and serves as a fantastic end to the climax. Then things calm, love is in the burning air, and the film ends.

My God, this film's a fucking tour de force of blood, guts, and comedy! So over the top, the phrase isn't even fitting for the film. It's beyond the top, it's at a level all its own. It pulls no punches, it exists to gross one out while delivering fantastic comedy and overall entertainment. Given how much I adored The Frighteners, it's honestly hard to choose between this and that classic film as far as the best of Peter Jackson before Lord of the Rings. Given how deep and long the Lord of the Rings movies are, especially the special editions, there's no question I can watch this, Bad Taste, and The Frighteners a whole lot more than those movies. It's a matter of time, and really, on this film, it delivers so much that it feels like a 3 hour epic. Rather, it's a little over half that time, and blazes through in a way that no other movie truly does. It's really unique in all its downright nastiness. Given what it set out to do, this film is a masterpiece. I wish I saw this in October of last year. But then again, I'm glad I saw it this year, because I can say, at least for now, this is my top first time watch of 2016. Granted, at the time of this post, it's my only first time watch, but it's going to be hard to top this mammoth of a film. It truly is B-movies personified, horror/comedy perfected, potential fully realized before the big trilogy that came thanks to Jackson. Also to note, Fran Walsh was one of the writers of this film, along with Peter Jackson.

Oh yeah, the film's called Dead Alive in the United States. I don't know why, you can change the name, you can't change this opinion, Braindead's amazing!

Space Jam - So I fed myself softcore, Andy Sidaris, classic horror, splatter insanity, it was time to feast on an old delight from my childhood. It had been maybe 2 years since I saw this film. As far as I can remember, Space Jam was actually one of the few movies I saw that didn't have Jackie Chan. Granted, I didn't see a ton of films as a kid, it's just notable that it can be easily divided into three sections. Jackie Chan, Pokemon, and other movies. Regardless, it will be interesting to try and judge the movie, whether the setbacks can be looked over this time.

I'm aware of the setbacks, the major one being Michael Jordan not being a good actor. It's not his world, I know all that, but it's about entertainment. There can be bad acting that's entertaining. Let's see, starting from the beginning, it is weird that young Michael already mapped out his life. Play for North Carolina, then the NBA, then baseball. Surely that wasn't so mapped out, and I think it's just something for the kids to understand. Narration or text to give out that info? Kids couldn't be arsed. I'm sure I wouldn't be. Also easy that the guy just feels he can fly and simply run and try for a dunk. But dude, the cameras do Jordan justice, because he is fucking tall! It was interesting to see him tower over people around him, and he's not even the tallest in this film. 6'6" though is something not to look past.

It was hilarious to see the opening credit sequence, where Jordan has top billing, then Bugs Bunny! HAHA! The big draw to a kid, probably 5 or 6, to this movie, was the Looney Tunes. Who is this Michael Jordan? Exactly, all about the cartoons, but it was interesting how it did turn me into a Jordan fan. To the point where I did try to watch basketball. Somehow not immediately, as in not seeing him in the Bulls. I did follow to the closest attempt at basketball possible, to his final NBA season. He played for the Washington Wizards. Looney Tunes was a big part of my childhood, Cartoon Network supplying the goods. Bugs, Daffy, Foghorn, Elmer Fudd, Roadrunner, Wile E. Coyote, Porky Pig, I can go on and on. They're all awesome.

So the plot is some alien that runs an amusement park planet, voiced by Danny Devito, wants his little lackies to kidnap the Tunes, as they could help in drawing more people to his amusement park. They invade the Looney Tunes' world, oddly enough it's just underground, with a gate that's the Warner Bros logo. Product placement. Annyways, the Tunes are not too intimidated by these little aliens, and suggest a game for the ownership of the Tunes. A game they know the aliens can't win. Basketball, but they don't play the game regularly for crying out loud.

I mentioned about Braindead coming at hyperspeed and being like the Looney Tunes. Conveniently there's this film to watch and note. That opinion stays, there's stuff moving really quickly, and the film overall is 87 minutes. There's a scene where it's basketball practice by Bugs, then all of a sudden it's Daffy on a fashion runway, changing outfits and ending up looking like Dennis Rodman. There was Bugs doing his General Patton, spit shining, a whole lot of stuff. If one's seen Looney Tunes/Merry Melodies shorts, then it's nothing surprising. Just interesting to notice it as an adult, it's not like I watch it regularly nowadays.

Okay so that video on basketball, the first one, was hilarious! They were all white and none of them made a shot! That was basketball back then I guess, when it was all played by white people, and I guess they stunk. Or hell, that could've been acting and all staged. On the other hand, it looks like a real old instructional. The second one had more of the same, but dude made it from half the court. His poise during that was ridiculous, but a 3 pointer is a 3 pointer. HAHA, Charles Barkley. Patrick Ewing too, I think they were in NBA Hangtime for N64. At least Ewing, it's been a while since I played that. Yeah the aliens can steal talent, to transform into the Sylvester-dubbed, "Monstars." Challenged, the Tunes feel the need to kidnap the greatest basketball player of all time.

Fucking Bill Murray, one of the few proper actors in the film, interesting that this was the first time I saw him. Not Ghostbusters. He's one of Jordan's golf buddies, along with Larry Bird. Dude was really short compared to Bird and Jordan, it was pretty funny to see that.

Oh God, adult innuendos in this film that I haven't caught before. Daffy's introduction in the film has him asking what a duck has to do to get "wet" around here. Sylvester the cat saying that the Tunes have "balls." Balls. Motherfucking Tweety, I never caught this, and it had to be because I didn't watch the film up close. When Tweety got flicked by one of the Monstars, he was crying, but then he had a sly face, proving that the tears were fake, just to convince Jordan to take on the Tunes' offer to be in their team. HAHAHAHA! The Shrink asking Patrick Ewing if there were other areas besides basketball where he felt like he hasn't performed well. Dude said "no." Sex? Charles Barkley was praying and said he'd never go out with Madonna again. Yeah, her and that clown's pocket of a vagina.

Oh Lola Bunny, sexualized and written to be this sexy, heartthrob...but she's a bunny. Ahead of its time, furry porn being admired nowadays, I guess this film can have a second life as fap material. Not for me though, but pretty funny to note this. And she just happened to be talented in basketball. It could be a feminine empowerment thing, because she was the only talented Tune at the time.

Fortune teller mentioned the plot of the film by this point to the afflicted NBA players. When she said "inside you," I thought it was another innuendo. Oh wait a minute, ass moving and Richard Simmons? Yeah before Jordan did a little exhibition of his basketball talent, the Tunes were exercising to Richard Simmons. That was weird.

I haven't mentioned Michael's personal assistant, this Stanley guy. Big old boy I've seen in Jurassic Park and some other stuff, Seinfeld, as I understand. That guy's hilarious! It took him being all happy to see Michael after all the digging he did on the golf hole Michael was sucked in, for me to type this comment down. His car's a smoking death trap by the way. He's a dork, according to Daffy. HAHAHA! After the granny got gangbanged by the Monstars, Daffy said she was "wide open." Come on! Sexual innuendo! "Dogpile" is the more appropriate term, but blame Daffy for me using "gangbang." That does bring me to the basketball game. Substituting a lot, isn't there a rule against that or something? Surely too it felt like more than 12 guys in the Tunes' team. Is it any worse than Daffy wanting to play in knight's armor and other shit? Exactly.

While I'm at it, the water Bugs gives to the Tunes. Performance enhancing drugs! This is highly illegal! It's called "Michael's Secret Stuff." That sounds gross. Jizz? Oh no, the film made me go there, if they didn't use "wide open" and stuff, I wouldn't bother. It was a placebo though, you would think the other Tunes would know that. They're cartoons, they are kind of like shapeshifters, among other things. Even stronger is the logic gap when Bugs told Michael towards the end of the game that he can basically do whatever he wants, including breaking the limits of his body. Because it's Looney Tune land, as Daffy said. So when it comes to the Secret Stuff, these toons should've known it was ropey.

Fucking Hell, I didn't notice this, just thinking it was Yosemite and Elmer in suits and with their guns. Pulp Fiction!



Something about the deal Jordan made with the head alien. Uhm, aliens know Michael Jordan? I mean, Looney Tunes on TV, fair enough, but they didn't show if NBA basketball is on, and even if it was, Jordan was retired. He was fumbling around getting his ass kissed every moment during his baseball stint. So judging by that, Jordan's technically not a draw to these aliens. I never thought of this until now. Also, when the guy says Jordan would be signing autographs all day long. Would these aliens want his autograph though?

The aliens gangbanged Stanley, they flattened the motherfucker. Actually before that, Jordan said the special stuff was inside the Looney Tunes all along. Cum.

No Danny Devito, it's not Dan Aykroyd, it's Bill Fucking Murray. The guy made it to the game thanks to the "producers" and a teamster driving him. It's so simple, 4th wall break or something?

Spoilers? It's essentially an animated movie with Jordan, Bill Murray, other people. So everything works out in the end. That being said, what was up with the Monstars realizing at the end that their boss was bigger than what they were? You'd think they'd realize that immediately. So NBA players are dumb? Part of their talent must be their intelligence, and you see the section where the players are dumb and hard of functioning. I mean, Ewing can't get his dick hard. I didn't even question the logic of the basketball game, all the biting, and punching, physical assault. Highly inappropriate. And what's up with Jordan's grand entrance, it was over a baseball game. Thank goodness that wasn't the end, because you know, baseball wasn't Jordan's sport.

Jordan talked to the NBA players and basically said their game was little to begin with. From what I understand, Jordan's a trash talker, and he has the ego to back it up. It's just interesting to catch that a bit here. I think the gym in this scene was the same one that got toonified. It looks very similar. Hmmm.

The film ends properly enough, where Jordan always belonged, and Bill Murray being sad. Him and his bum knee, sucks man. Speaking of sucking, number 45? What was up with that? They couldn't change it just for the movie? It's the number he had as a baseball player, I'm referring to Jordan. I know the guy got the number 23 back. Oh hey, I turn 23, Jordan's number is that, wow. Anyways, yeah, damn 45.

The truth is that most of my comments for this film was in jest, but people could raise these concerns and criticize the film for it. I won't disagree that Jordan's not a good actor, but it kind of wasn't the point. He was playing himself, and I would surmise that himself came off pretty well here. He wasn't playing a character after all, so I let it go. As a kid, easy to let go, as an adult, goodness, nostalgia glasses? Maybe, but just, it's all about entertainment, and Jordan was entertaining! Emoting? Fuck that, at least when it comes to this film. So yeah, the film's quality hasn't been lost on me as an adult, it's the case of being a 90s kid, but that's something that can't be taken away. I'll always praise the film.

Before I get to the final love session. Some things to note. The animation style mixed with the real humans here, was really nice. There was some old CG such as the inflating of Stanley towards the end, but overall the film stands out still for how it melded together the real and the cartoon. As the credits play, you can note how many people contributed to all this being possible. One's treated to the soundtrack of this movie, as all these names and titles descend. The soundtrack was really the only music album I heard until 2005 I think. 2005, I got something for my birthday, or just a random day, 50 Cent's "The Massacre." Yeah, I used to listen to rap a lot. I suppose this film's to blame because there's some hip hop tracks along with R&B, such as R. Kelly's "I Believe I Can Fly."

All these words and I haven't even mentioned the main theme song. "Come On And Slam." I think because I've heard that song remixed with whatever so many times, that it wasn't something that I had to note immediately. It's almost as if it's a part of my everyday life, so it's not a pressing matter to note it. Still, it's awesome. Whether on its own, mixed with a Pokemon track, John Cena's theme song, Power Rangers theme, it doesn't matter. It's legendary and it could be considered the greatest gift this film supplied, given how viral the song is. But the whole film is a childhood gift that's still very potent to me.

Segue into the conclusion. I can't dislike the film, I can never turn my back on it. Like Beverly Hills Ninja and Mortal Kombat, the film will never age for me. I get older, this film stays the same. It's a lot of fun, good family friendly laughs. Nostalgia ridden for me, but something the kids can enjoy, and should be indoctrinated with. Quickly, before this fucking sequel comes. Space Jam 2, yuck. It was great to revisit this and just smile. A nostalgia fix, treated like a novelty, is never a bad thing. This film's not a bad thing, it's a great thing. Very looney. Yeah. Ripping off the post credits scene...



Shotgun - Well, not entirely. The movie marathon continues, traveling into the wonderful world of PM Entertainment. Their first film actually. Or one of their first, just that this came out the same year as a bunch of other films they produced, quick 10 day productions and multiple movies made at the same time. PM Entertainment, to sum them up, was a production company run by Richard Pepin and Joseph Merhi, foreigners, I'm not sure of their nationalities. Their movies are characterized by over the top action, low budget filmmaking with all their films being shot on video, and the random stuff that gets thrown in that takes one out of the plot.

For example, there's a porno district here shown, and look what a theater's advertising...



Truth be told, I fell asleep while I watched this film for the first time. I went back and finished it, and I thought it was alright. Second time with commentary featuring star Stuart Chapin, it was hilarious! Now third time, no commentary, and after experiencing some very entertaining PM Entertainment films, let's see how this goes. I'm sure it's a mistake people have made, the gimp looking guy that stepped out of the bathroom. I thought it was Rocker. Now Rocker is this guy who works for Fletch Rivington, some drug and crime stuff in Mexico. I thought he was the gimp, but it was Fletch. I should've realized based on the fact Fletch is British, and obviously the accent can be heard while he talks. Their gimmick is that Rocker gets a whore, takes them to a specific motel, then leaves the room while Fletch is in a bathroom. Fletch, as the gimp, beats on the women. This is shown for this blonde, and the funny thing is that she thought it was an act, that needed extra charging. Yeah, wow, whore, but then it got serious. Despite cops being on this job, there was a bit of a pact for the whores and pimps not to deal with this Rocker guy.

Just on the people involved here. Addison Randall wrote and directed this, he did a bunch of movies with PM Entertainment. It stars Stuart Chapin as Ian Jones, the most unlikely action hero. Moreso than John McClane given what he looks like. A tall, lanky, ghost skinned, long haired, bearded man. Chapin wore his own clothes, and the guy looks like grunge before grunge blew up. This was released in 1989, so, yeah, before grunge. You look at the guy and think he could be a janitor, a cafeteria worker, maybe even a low rent teacher. But a badass cop? It's just really unlikely, but that's the fun part. His partner's Max Billings, played by Riff Hutton, who was described as a bit of a golden boy for PM Entertainment. I'm going by a really in depth interview with Stuart Chapin. Joseph Merhi didn't particularly liked Jones, and Chapin being cast was based on him looking like Randall. There's a mystery about the guy who played Fletch Rivington, as there is no credit given to him. David Mariott played Rocker, but no credit for Fletch. It is strange, and I think it's because he was part of SAG, and didn't want his name associated with this hamburger film. As Chapin put it in this in depth interview with a podcast, most of the cast was SAG and were pretty secretive and hesitant. Chapin wasn't SAG.

PM Entertainment just loves porn, there's an adult shop that becomes a recurring location for the movie. The funny thing is that there are movie posters, proper ones. I saw a Chuck Norris one, I think 2001: A Space Odyssey. If I'm not mistaken, this location was turned inside out, the backroom that had the porn, was put up front here, and lack of proper set decoration didn't tend to the legit movie posters. The crazy thing about Joey, the guy who works at the shop, is that he has "kiddie porn" lying on his counter. It's just there, and yeah, it's covered by a black videotape case, but it's "kiddie porn." Unbelievable, Max and Ian hold that kiddie porn over Joey for information on the "basher." We got a basher!

Duly with his epic beard! More epic than Jones. They get the name of a hooker who suffered from the basher. You see the marks being expertly placed on the woman. Wow, Fletch is an artist. Seriously, look at how well placed the scars are. Anyways, goodness, there's a scene where some black guy as a DJ, can't make out what he says, but he plays for these goober people who can't dance for shit. As I've learned from an interview with Stuart Chapin, these people are part of a church. It makes a lot of sense, look at how badly they were at dancing. At a later scene, it's the same damn group of people dancing, wearing the same clothes, in the same position. Talk about continuity! They never changed their clothes I guess, all the dancing surely would've made them sweat.

Now things tail off from here for me. There's a big development in the plot, which is an exaggeration by me. It's just that Ian's sister, a hooker, was killed by Fletch, too much beating apparently. The funny thing is the actress playing Ian's sister, does not go nude, she refused to on set, and during shooting of that scene, her children were with her! Son of a bitch. So she dies, and it's hilarious when Ian loses his shit, Max's big response to all this is that he needs a drink. That's it, he said it twice too! Wow, what a buddy.

As I said, things tailed off from here because during this viewing, I fell asleep. I made it close to the halfway point. I was just too tired and so my 24 hour movie attempt was a failure. Still, I wanted to get the most important movies out of the way. I did, and didn't finish this as a result. So, the following comments are from a repeat viewing done more recently.

For some reason I didn't mention the theme song that plays in the opening credits. Shotgun. Shotgun! *Guitar strum* Jones! I will get to the explanation of the movie's title, it's pretty obvious, but to think it's not justified from the beginning.

Something I also didn't mention was how Rocker actually appeared briefly as the father of some troublemaking teen in Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare! Probably the biggest movie the actor was ever in, bless him. The movie was released in 1989, a year after Die Hard, which makes me think the Fletch character being British, was inspired by the movie, Rickman being cast in that huge film. Now about my misconception about Fletch being Rocker in that gimp outfit, it becomes evident sometimes that both guys look similar. In their first scene together, I notice this. Fletch apparently is a lawyer, in his legit side of business, something I also didn't mention. It was pretty ridiculous that a lawyer, runs a...criminal organization? Was it even a criminal organization?

Also when the protagonists are introduced, it's after many shots of the, let's say, red light district of Los Angeles. Porn. Porn everywhere! Max and Ian seemingly came out of a porn theater, swamped by prostitutes wanting them. Max, fucking Hell, he actually was open in saying that he and Rhonda, the first victim of Fletch, as shown in the film, bang, and his wife knows! As if the wife allows Max to have some times with a whore, and Ian kind of said that he and Max's wife could have a good time, and Max would allow it. I think, it's just ridiculous. Also, that they didn't even bust Rhonda, or the prostitutes clearly trying to solicit the guys. I'm realizing how this movie can get me into many tangents. Fuck, I didn't even mention Ian's hat during these early scenes. A fedora, close to Indiana Jones. I swear the guy dressed grunge before there was grunge, and this is the year of the 25th anniversary of Nirvana's Nevermind and shit, when the genre exploded. Also when Max complains about Rhonda being attacked, he did flub a line, and yet they kept it in the film. It just shows how PM Entertainment were all about finishing their films, very quick turnaround and such. I think they had over 100 films, and they lasted from 1989 to 2002! There seriously needs to be a documentary on this company.

Fletch's introduction in his gimp outfit actually goes into a theme in the movie with these guitar strums and screams that bring focus to a scene, as if to bring everyone to the scene, it's so important. Touches sometimes of guitar work act as background and score music. Basically, it's rock n' roll! It's the 80s, glam, proper metal, hard rock, the almighty guitar was ruling the world.



So the porn store guy Joey actually did talk about the guy Max and Ian are looking for, Rocker. He bought the gimp stuff, which is surprising to me because I didn't know porno video shops, sell sex related accessories...gimp shit.

The word of the film really is “basher.” The cops don't just say it, the hookers even. We got a basher! When Rocker told Fletch that he couldn't score shortly after the Rhonda incident, the gimp looked like he was about to cry. This guy in the suit, it's either crying, or sweat, as evident in the Rhonda scene.

Anyways, here's Duly.



And here's the victim with the well placed bruises. Fletch is an artist at woman beating.



Now here's a GIF of the dancing. I swear you can't make out what the DJ said. It's almost like he didn't speak English.



I should mention this is the first movie I've watched on my new ultrawide monitor. Major vertical bars on full screen, but the big benefit is how side by side windows look tremendous and full. Like two monitors together. I think the multitasking experience, typing comments and watching the movie, is better on this monitor. Yeah, I think so.

Back to the movie, after Ian gets the news about his sister being killed, a little montage happens, with a heavy amount of 80s saxophone! Classic.

Recently I shared this scene with someone on Youtube. When Ian and Max drowned their sorrow in alcohol following his sister's death, it shows the amazing acting in display. Stuart Chapin and his epic monologue about his movie sister. It's so dramatic, and it ends beautifully when he asked the bartender for another drink. The scene hits a climax with the two hooded guys with...shotguns! This isn't the main justification of the movie, don't worry. It was hilarious to see the bartender's death again, dude totally milked it. It was as if he didn't want to be done with the movie.



That bar scene was classic, the guy I shared it with loved it. Well, I'm just saying he did, who knows if I'm telling the truth.

When some Internal Affairs prick scolded Ian and Max, the former said the bar scene would've made this guy drop “Hershey squirts.” That's hilarious! It continues when he and Max are with the lieutenant of the police. Jones said “She was just a hooker.” The guy said, “She was your sister!” It's as if that was a botch, and the actor playing the lieutenant was correcting Chapin. Otherwise, that just didn't make sense. He was trying to diminish the value of this case he and Max were in danger of being pulled out of, which he obviously didn't want. Laughably confusing stuff, basically.

So with the church group and the DJ, again, it's the same scene. It might've been the same shoot day as Ian and Max's first scene, as they're wearing the same clothing as that one, including Jones and his Indiana Jones hat! It's ridiculous. Then at a second floor bar in this building where the bad dancing took place, was this bartender. He's actually Riff Hutton's father. Max said “pops,” almost as if telling you that's his father. I didn't know about the fact until listening to the interview with Chapin. So that scene concluded with Rocker being caught, and who had to go out with a blaze of glory, by throwing this random whitey over a rail! Dude totally milked that scene.

While I'm at it, I should go all the way back to the beginning. A common feature of PM Entertainment films is a helicopter, and someone falling off it. This was the case early on, I need to point it out. The interview with Chapin mentioned how the guy doing the stunt, had a habit of flipping off the camera during these kind of stunts. I didn't notice it, the guy must've been slick with it.

So there's Rocker being bailed out by Fletch the lawyer, and after that, Max and Ian are positioned with their backs against each other. It was weird. I don't know why, homoerotic or what? The next scene has the two at Max's house, and the wife clearly wanted Jones' dick! She said she didn't mind “putting out” for Ian. What?!

A rather infamous scene, or at least standout...and let me say each scene does stand out, is this drunk stuff with Max and Ian. The acting here was absolutely dreadful! Max kind of talked like a witch, Ian sounded like a guy acting like he was drunk. Chapin said in the interview that he basically hated that scene, he's aware how bad his performance was in that particular scene. Self-aware overall. It still was funny.

Jones confronted Fletch and kneed him in the balls, that looked ropey. Just a little push of the leg, seemingly, and the guy goes down! It's ridiculous. Apparently that one incident made Fletch complained to the mayor, and it trickled down to the lieutenant and him scolding Ian and Max, the latter wasn't in that testicle scene. “Police brutality,” “psycho cops,” come on! Then in the end, the lieutenant said off the record, he would've done a lot worse to Fletch, “that son of a bitch.” That doesn't make the guy cool in any way.

Next scene had Ian in a very familiar setting where he's lying under a blanket, outside, in front of a dumpster, looking like a hobo. He looked like a hobo before. He and Max and some other guys busted some other dudes, which turned out to be a setup by Simmons, the prick Internal Affairs guy. That can't be legal! He brought up the assaulting the police officer shit, and that's what gets Jones suspended for 6 months. It's absolutely ridiculous. But at least it made for a hilarious beatdown of the prick by Jones.

So for his 6 month suspension, Jones gets work as a bounty hunter. The owner, who is a woman, nice looking, actually gave him work right away. One would think there'd be hesitation with giving this obviously ill-tempered cop, a job. Ah well, logic aside, this finally leads to the shotgun! Ian “Shotgun” Jones! I guess the shotgun's not regulation, and the dude just carries it. No explanation, he just appears with the gun on his first job.

Max got promoted, and something to note is that Riff Hutton a lot of times in the movie, had an unusually raised voice, it makes his acting performance worse because he sounded too dramatic! Just bad too, it's the Samurai Cop syndrome, low budget movie like this, there must not have been body mics, boom mic and needing to project as loudly as possible. Max was celebrating with his wife over the promotion, as it turned out he and Ian hadn't been hanging out for a while.

“Congratulation.” This was what Jones said to Max as he mysteriously appeared in the police station in a fucking suit! Briefcase too. I don't have an explanation for that, could be a script typo, thanks Addison Randall. At the conclusion of this scene, which had the stupid Simmons guy, Ian said “Sergeant Max Billings” had a nice ring to it. Max said it back, and agreed, which is funny because it was as if he didn't have the promotion in the first place. It was just his imagination. Ridiculous, my word of the day for this movie.

The beauty of the movie is just how each scene begs some attempt at analysis. One after another almost. Next up was Ian busting this guy who did some criminal shit involving cars. The guy was the singer of the theme song. Jastereo Coviare, who appeared in a bunch of PM Entertainment movies, one of their boys. His scene was hilarious because he had to sell getting rock salt blasted into his ass! Literally! That actually could be considered some of the best acting in the film, I mean it had to hurt.

There's this character you never meet called “Ernie,” who makes an impression based on him sounding like a goof impersonating Michael Jackson, when he told Ian, “telephone!” I never noticed this character's voice before, but it was funny. The phone call was from Max, Rocker jumped bail.

Uh oh, but wait, can't go after him, police interfering in his bounty hunting assignment? Can that happen? It's...ridiculous but ah well. Jones and Max a chat about all this, while the former is wearing what looks like a Christmas sweater. In Los Angeles, wow. Anyways, he got angry and had this line to say. The delivery was an attempt at 80s macho.



On that scene, what's up with the bounty hunter work? Does it actually pay more than Ian's detective salary? That's what he said, and uhhhh, there was a deal on the table for Jones to back off and he'd be instantly reinstated. This is useless because he was set to get his badge back after 6 months. Then Jones got a phone call from Rocker, and he surmised that a contract was put on Jones' head. Oh okay, and there was Joey getting killed. Not because of the kiddy porn I guess.

Best acting performance in the film? I think it's obvious to know why Max's wife screamed. She saw something terrible, and no, it wasn't this movie.

So a big foot chase happens between Rocker and Jones, and it's funny because there was an obvious stuntman for Rocker. David Mariott, who played Rocker, didn't properly warm up. No stretching and such. Chapin said this in an interview, and as a result, Mariott blew out his knee or ankle. Cue a stuntman, and Chapin actually did his running and the actually impressive car stunt that follows a random lady's go at action movie brilliance. Her car was stolen by Rocker. He mentioned too that he wasn't allowed to hop the fence. Randall or one of the producers didn't allow it, saying it's not in Jones' character to do that? You see in the chase that he could've hopped the fence to this parking lot and be right up in Rocker's business, instantly catching him. But nope, I guess it's too edgy for Jones to do that.



Another standout scene to analyze, Jones coming to Sam, this guy that looks like Freddy Mercury! This is obvious, before the common Jones made about “faggots, pimps, and bad tempered desert hermits.” A response to Sam's question about people complaining that Ian makes too much noise. Yeah...

The scene's standout quality includes this montage using the theme song's instrumental, the equivalent of Commando and First Blood Part 2, where the protagonist suits up and looks all ready for war. Also, sweat, Arnie, Stallone, so sweaty. So with this film, it has grunge man Chapin, sweating, with his fucking hairy chest. Then there's Sam, sweating and you notice how the guy actually has a better physique than Ian! The suiting up is mostly welding, and then you get some shots of this big ass gun turret. As it turned out, it's attached to this big ass pick up truck! OHHH YEAH! Fucking 80s! It actually looked awesome, and it's hilarious how this character of Sam gets in on what becomes the film's climax, yet Max is missing in action. When they mount up and drive, you see a dog chase after the truck, it was cute. Hi doggie!

The climax is absolutely awesome, and 80s! Even down to the entrance of the truck, and how the doors almost collapsed on Chapin, this was legitimate! Then the burning man that caused the burning car, and it was supposed to do a complete 180 or 360, something epic. But the velocity of that car was way too slow to get that stunt done, so it turns out being rather ropey, yet funny. Either way, guns, explosions, fire, guys flying from the explosions, literally! It was crazy! I loved it, and I think Sam got shot. It then gets quiet with the confrontation with Rocker, who confesses to everything, including everything his boss is involved in.

Porno, drugs, guns. Yeah, barely see drugs in this movie, in the beginning, but then that's it. Porno, the kiddie porn? Yes, as it turned out, Joey worked for him, that's how he got the kiddie porn. Wow. Final confrontation with Fletch, who appeared to look like a vacationing pimp in Mexico, which is where this gun and drug, and apparently porno running fortress was located. It ends hilariously enough, with I think a botched line.



“Yes you can't?” You mean, “can.” It was basically him agreeing with Fletch. Either way, classic scene.

Boom mic!



Wow, and then this ends the film!



Yes, Riff Hutton must've been blind to get that finger incorrectly positioned. So that's it. I did pretty much give away the whole film without even a spoiler alert. Woops, but really, there is a predictability with these films. Obviously the good guys win in the end. But PM Entertainment are masters at being unpredictable, so while the plot is simple, the stuff they throw distracts one from that. Porn, bashers, Freddy Mercury, hairy grunge chest, literally an unlikely 80s action movie hero, kiddie porn, bad dancing, a shotgun, unlikable I.A.D. Slime, some tits, hookers, implicit promotion of 80s porn, which kind of sums up the film. It's as if it was made by pornographers who wanted to go into legit action movie territory, but are stuck with their past so much, they filmed shots of the porno district, porn is actually a theme in the movie, “kiddie porn,” and Fletch as the gimp is just trashy S&M porn I guess. It's this kind of fuzzy, hazy, and sometimes slimy aesthetic, that makes this film rather enjoyable! It's definitely in the “so bad, it's good” territory, and I didn't get tired at all watching this. Proving that my past viewings without commentary, was just me being tired. This being my first proper viewing without commentary, I ended up picking out more from the film, and laughing a great deal! It's not the best bad movie, but it's definitely worth a watch for fans of that genre. PM Entertainment didn't stop there, a hell of a lot of gold in their filmography. This was just the start of a beautiful run. Shotgun isn't completely indicative of their films, this had a heavy amount of sleaze, whereas later films had that trimmed down, though still there. Especially with the films they distributed and/or had kind of a background role to it. The movie about strippers, Sunset Strip. Or maybe that is PM Entertainment, it's just that the credited company is “Contact Films” or whatever. Also this women in prison movie with Gail Harris, Banished Behind Bars. Anyways, the late 80s and early 90s was the seedier PM Entertainment. Mid 90s, there was actually a bit more polish, but still some wacky shit going on. No matter what the period, the big theme with these movies is action! Whether it's Stuart Chapin, Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs, Wings Hauser, Traci Lords, Jeff Fahey, C. Thomas Howell, even Anna Nicole Smith, the theme is always action! PM Entertainment somehow lasted 13 years with this formula, which had to be a winning one, with VHS being their main selling point I bet. They probably couldn't handle DVD or the formula was just obsolete by 2002. I know they actually got a TNT show that ran for a few years in the mid to late 90s, called “LA Heat,” which I guess was just a TV version of the Chance movies: LA Heat, LA Vice, and Chance. Though they didn't have Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs, Chance himself, as a lead character.

Anyways, Shotgun, terribly produced and acted movie, but with hilariously bonker scenes, laughable dialogue and action, with a climax that did have some real fun stuff, characters that you will never forget, lines you will never forget, it's quite the 85 minute experience. It doesn't overstay its welcome, and with a bunch of movies I've seen from this company, I can say this perfectly sums up what PM Entertainment was all about. It's hard though to go with this as the best or Angels of the City, a movie that is...indescribable. I think this was more on their action stuff, so I can go with this. As a tease for a future review maybe? Angels of the City is more of a...drama, but it is just, goodness, unbelievable. Back to this movie, it's a rocker, it's a basher, it's a lot of things. One thing it's not, and I can say this for sure now, it's not boring.

Pulp Fiction - Space Jam's little scene with Yosemite Sam and Elmer Fudd didn't make me watch this, it was always on the birthday queue. After failing to stay up after Shotgun, I went to the hotter stuff immediately. Hitting my all-time favorite movies. Up until 2015, the undisputed all-time favorite was this movie. But things changed, and really, it's hard to say what's my all-time favorite. Because if I say one of the two bad films I'm going to type about is my all-time favorite, it might sound outrageous. It's all about entertainment factor. Still, just go with the holy trinity already. I spoiled what I think about this movie...

Where to begin? Fresh off typing about Shotgun, it is something where each scene can be analyzed, and each one stands out, for reasons completely different from that film. There are movies I've seen lots of times to the point where I remember everything. Lines, scene moments, everything. Pulp Fiction is one of those movies, and it doesn't matter how long it's been since my last viewing. Typically there's a time where I watched a film a bunch of times. For Pulp Fiction it was probably around 2009, I had it DVR'd, and I believe it was on AMC. The TV version actually trimmed away a scene with Vincent (John Travolta) and Jules (Samuel L. Jackson), and in exchange added this later bit with the former and Mia Wallace. Other than that and of course the censoring of the many “fucks” and such in this movie, it's pretty much the full experience I got. When I downloaded it around 2011, I got to enjoy that trimmed scene, but found that the scene the original version cut out, could've been really helpful. More on that later, I suppose it was a deleted scene, as TV versions would throw in said scenes. One example is Beverly Hills Ninja, Chris Farley's Haru fucking up an antique shop.

Before I get to the TV/movie differences, shit, I want to touch on everything the movie offers. Everything is memorable, classic, the only flaws to draw up are goofs that you can read on IMDB. I know one for sure stands out, one continuity error that is pretty obvious.

Starting from the beginning, there's the restaurant scene, which completely gives a crash course of Quentin Tarantino movies. Dialogue heavy, the conversation is rather loose and has no exposition at all. The next scene took it to a higher level, but this was a bit of a teaser. One's carried by the suave British sounding accent of Tim Roth, who is referred to as “Pumpkin” by Amanda Plummet's character, called “Honey Bunny.” It's all about robbery, a story about a bank job being successfully done by a telephone. Why restaurants are basically a hot bed for robbery given banks and liquor stores by this time are played out. In between that there's the botch by Pumpkin in calling out the waitress for coffee. In a way the pairing of these two prove that opposites do attract. Pumpkin is cool, hair slicked back and looking like a rugged sexy man, while Honey Bunny's hair is wild, and when she screams, she sounds like a hyena. She looks like a hyena. Or rather, a duck, and that's funny considering she said Pumpkin sounded like one.

Two things this scene does that links to later, that are small. One, a certain someone with a really bad habit of going to the bathroom and shit happening during that, actually does appear walking in the background, from the perspective of Pumpkin. The other thing is what Honey Bunny says when the stick up happens, it is not exactly what was said later in the movie, which was a repeat to link up the two stories at that point. The usage of “motherfucking” and “motherfucker” are not the same, they're supposed to be though. Well alright, more than one continuity error. Does it hurt the movie? Absolutely not.

The conversation between Jules and Vincent in the car is probably one of the best dialogue scenes in Tarantino's filmography. It totally represents what the man was and still is all about in that department. What sounds like random talk, is actually really engaging, and in an odd way, does link up later to the film. Vincent talking about Amsterdam and Europe, these are referenced later, and it's all sensible. Something I didn't think about until now, when Jules said he's fucking going to Amsterdam, the possibility is rather high given what he does in the end of the film.

The music overall in the film is just seemingly random tracks thrown in, but somehow gel for the scenes they accompany, and altogether make for a really memorable and classic soundtrack. First there's Misirlou playing by Dick Dale, which does happen in that Space Jam scene I mentioned. Credits role, sounds pretty nice, kind of a driving thing to really follow up the cliffhanger the first scene leads. Then the fast pace shifts to something groovy via a radio station switch, and one's treated to Jungle Boogy. This accompanies Jules and Vincent in the car, and it fits in this groovy, chill scene. On the random stuff linking to a later scene, there's the name of a quarter pounder with cheese in Paris. It's hilarious to see Vincent's face when he said that. Mayonnaise on french fries sounds disgusting.

Did they really need shotguns for that kind of deal? It would've been funny, kind of a similarity to the movie Shotgun. This whole day really had ties among the movies, it's pretty crazy. No shotguns. Jules had to describe to Vincent what a TV pilot is, the claim to fame for Uma Thurman's Mia Wallace, who Vincent has to take care of. Know what I mean? Exactly. Then there's that grim sounding story about Tony Rocky Horror falling off a building and into a glass house, supposedly over rubbing Marsellus Wallace's wife's feet. Oh the feet. This leads into a serious debate about foot massages and whether that treads badly in regards to a relationship. This scene was actually cut from the TV version. Interestingly enough it was rather nicely cut, because you had the shot of Jules and Vincent standing, you see them from behind, waiting for the elevator and chatting. Then cut to Marvin (Phil LaMarr) opening the door for the two well dressed men. It really looked like an elevator straight to an apartment, very seamless, but I didn't know it came at the expense of a very nice, and heated scene. Foot massages, ballparks, sticking your tongue in the holiest of holy.

There's each scene is better than the last, at least when it comes to the individual chapters. Even the scenes that precede the proper chapters have that quality. So before the chapter, “Vincent Vega & Marsellus Wallace's Wife,” things end at an overall high point for the whole film. Vincent hangs back looking cool while Jules performs a tour de force of sounding like a scary, threatening badass. This, even before he raised his voice. The scene before it had Jules say for them to “get into character.” Vincent was chill from the beginning, but for Jules, he really did get into character, in the sense that he simply cursed more and raised his voice when it was time. Fucking Brad, I actually thought all along his name was “Bret.” I had to Google to make sure. Him and his big brain. With the mention of the Big Kahuna Burger, there comes the Tarantino trademark of, well, not using trademarked items, no big corporate product placement. You only hear about McDonalads, you don't see one. Screw that, hearing about them is enough. But seeing a Big Kahuna Burger? Why not? Sounds interesting, it must've been a tasty burger. Red Apple Cigarettes? Hmm, that sounds more appealing than cigarettes by “Camel.” I think Sprite could be considered the biggest corporate product placement ever in a Tarantino film. A product from the Coca Cola Company, even though it's in a cup by Big Kahuna Burger, no Sprite can or bottle to show that it is just that. Take Brad's word for it, tasty beverage.

Trivia that I had to read about, not noticing it, the combination to the briefcase. It's 6-6-6, very clear to show that, but I just never picked up on it. Also the contents of the briefcase, it's never revealed, but there's theories and speculation. Something I wouldn't mind getting the definitive answer, but actually like that it's never been answered. It's whatever the viewer makes of it, movie magic.

Flock of Seagulls and his bad haircut got killed, which does lead me to question something I never did before. The gunshot is loud, you hear it, you see the guy react, dying. But, where's the bullet? I don't see it fly out the gun, not even a flash, and you see the it at the conclusion of the scene. But here and when Brad says “What” too many times, there is no muzzle flash. I guess it begs mentioning that this was an independent film, with a budget of $8 million dollars. Not really high, but not really low, I guess being 100% on muzzle flashes in every gunshot couldn't be met by the budget.

Besides, the scene's just so classic, it's one of Jackson's best feats of acting ever, everything just worked. The location was confined and it gave an almost claustrophobic feel, which helped in making Jules' voice the center of attention, it dominates the air the room surrounds, Brad gets stones thrown at him throughout, even before getting a grand execution. Verbal stones, whether it be the “what” business, describing what Marsellus Wallace looks like, and the epic bible quoting, which actually wasn't verbatim from Ezekiel 25:17. In fact during the final scene, it's said again, but not even in the exact same way as this particular instance. Rather interesting, but it's still some cold blooded shit to say to a motherfucker before popping a cap in his ass. This last viewing made me laugh at something I didn't do so before. “Does he look like a bitch?” I don't know why I didn't laugh at it before, but damn it was funny this time! There's just so much to say about this scene, the film in general, that nothing is enough to give it justice. I'm trying. I'm trying Ringo. I'm trying real hard to be the shepherd. Wait a minute...

The first chapter begins proper, “Vincent Vega & Marsellus Wallace's Wife.” Bruce Willis! Ah yes, first image you see after the title card appears, he's in a bar, red lighting, which it just dawned on me. Red, the Devil's color. Red Apples, cigarettes, cancer sticks if you will. The theory about the briefcase containing Wallace's soul, coming out of a deal he made with the Devil. Wallace, played by Ving Rhames, saying how pride only hurts, it never helps. It's what the Devil would say to a sinner to justify his entry in Hell. But the Devil is evil, so here comes this fixed boxing match plan. In the 5th, Butch's ass has to go down. Willis put enough of his ass down for John Amos, Jesus, and then Tom Gleason wanting to “nail his ass.” Oh God. Callbacks galore. Anyways, the thing that supports the theory about Wallace's soul and the briefcase, is the cut on the back of his head. A bandage over it, covering up the scar where his soul was extracted. Sounds amazing, even though the truth is that Rhames has a scar on the back of his neck that Tarantino wanted to cover up. Who knew that it would add a heavy dosage of characterization. A Band-Aid.

That scene too, you don't see Wallace's face. I'm very sure this was my first Ving Rhames film, so certainly I didn't know what the actor looked like. So it was rather nice to have that air of mystery. If I'm not mistaken he wasn't really a big star before this film, so probably others didn't know what the guy looked like, hence the fact they kept on Willis' face, and even have a far away shot where he hugs Vincent Vega, these are all useful. One has to sit and watch Willis' mug during this, but still, it does sell what Wallace is saying. I think so, Willis' face is rather stoic, perhaps a defeated dignity, having to take this money and do this job. Things don't go according to plan.

Then there's Jules and Vincent looking like dorks, which is hilarious. Now the talk about Mia Wallace, Jules suddenly laughing when Vince said he never met her, it makes me wonder why he didn't laugh before given all the questioning he did after they arrived at the apartment. Also, Jules met Mia? Is she funny looking? Well, goodness with her hair and the eyes looking like Cleopatra or something. But he laughed, and sometimes it makes me laugh.

Now I heard about a theory regarding Vincent and Butch, why the former was really rude with the latter. He called him punchy and stuff in the bar. Leave it to Marsellus Wallace to defuse that situation before it got hot. After that scene is the drug dealing stuff with Eric Stolz's Lance. In it, Vincent ranted about his car being keyed. I never thought about this, just heard it from a podcast that commented on the film. Butch keyed Vincent's car? It sounds feasible, if there was some reason for it. Who knows? Butch and Vincent go way back? That scene with them though looks like they never met, otherwise they'd go on a first name basis, then Vincent would throw insulting words at him. Then again, do they have to know each other? Go to the other side, Butch probably knew as much about Vincent in terms f the car he drives, so he keyed it out of frustration, knowing he had to face Wallace, and then the scene that opens the first chapter plays for the audience. Yeah, that makes sense, especially since Butch would show how he acts out in anger and frustration later in the film.

Seriously, each scene can be picked apart and commented on big time. Which leads to the drug deal scene, it started with Rosanna Arquette's Jody talking about her piercings. I didn't spot until I think this viewing, her friend Trudy's accent. Irish? She didn't speak much so I just chalked it up to American. Listening more, sounds Irish to me. Anyways, stud in Jody's tongue. Why? Sex thing, and I didn't know until a few years later what “fellatio” means. I knew the slang term, blowjob! But not putting 2 and 2 together, I just didn't know what she meant by “fellatio.”

Eric Stoltz as Lance looks like a ginger Jesus! Also, ginger Kurt Cobain? I don't know, it's pretty crazy. I look at him, and wow, he was the original Marty McFly. Of course he was younger and looked the part, not as much as Michael J. Fox, but still. To go from that to Jesus! Dude knows how to talk to his clients. He was like an understanding, agreeing buddy with Vincent as he ranted about his car. Meanwhile, Vincent had a huge fucking wad of cash! Shit man, making me feel really inadequate. Proper description of Jody by Vince, the one with all the shit on her face. Metal shit, but he laughed at the mention of the other woman. Hahaha! She's not bad looking though, but yeah, Arquette all day. So back to the inadequate thing, now trying to make one jealous? The heroin scene, the term I heard for this was “glamorizing.” I would say that's accurate, how Vince took that dope was rather, smooth and cool. The music and atmosphere made it look like some chill thing that's alright to do. But it's heroin! Then his face as he drove his car, he looked so chill, at a state where everyone wishes they'd be. At least me, look at him, so calm, cool, collected, not a care in the world. Nothing in life that could get him down.

But then he goes into Mia's house and his walking kind of ruins the illusion for me. Also him talking a bit, yeah, too high for me. Too “under the influence.” Then again, Mia's no angel, sniffing coke before she went downstairs, barefoot! Vintage Tarantino. I'm having a hard time remembering Reservoir Dogs, whether there's a foot scene. That movie is a total sausage fest though, so I think this film signaled the beginning of Tarantino showing off his foot fetish. Not the last time with Uma Thurman, that's for sure. “Son of a Preacher Man” played at the beginning of this scene, which was really nice, again going to the soundtrack being really diverse, but everything gels. It suits the mood of Vincent, at peace and stoned.

The TV version of this scene, had an extended bit where Mia had a camera on Vincent. I'm not referring to the security camera, that happened before this. I mean a handheld, she filmed Vincent and interviewed him a bit. The final version of the film just had Uma Thurman walk, the music stops, and she just says “Let's go.” Note it was from the bottom, you see just her feet. This deleted scene was important because it did explain why Mia called Vincent an “Elvis man” when they arrive at the Jack Rabbit Slim's. The interview was an either/or deal. He's an Elvis man, he prefers the Partridge Family, and I think some other stuff. This scene already showed the awkwardness their date entailed. Maybe it was too early, hence it was deleted. I can understand that, because their dining scene really stands out more than this. Before that, Mia in Vincent's car said “Don't be a...” and she air draws a rectangle. I recall this being in the Flinstones, maybe that's where Tarantino got it from. A square is a rectangle, she clearly meant “square.”

The Buddy Holly waiter at that 50s style restaurant, was Steve Buscemi. I never ever noticed that, given how he looks in the film, I was easily fooled. You don't see his teeth, which would indicate it's him. His voice in this film never gave him away though, and now I just think he simply had a deeper tone in his voice. Listen closely, yeah, it's Steve Buscemi.


Something I never picked up until this viewing, Uma Thurman shaking until her second coke bump. Quick withdrawal or the nerves of a a young, inexperienced actress? It could be the former as it would add onto the awkwardness of the scene. In a wax museum with a pulse, according to Vincent. It's quite the description. They chatted about stuff, the pilot, Fox Force 5, sounds like a Charlie's Angels wannabe. Even when Vincent gave Mia some rolled up tobacco, it didn't really make the woman less shaky. She was the chatty one though, then again one can chat up as a way to hide their insecurities. The shaking Mia really did add to the scene, it offered up a whole new topic to explore, because otherwise it's the conversation itself and Vincent's little moments.

The second coke bump takes place in the bathroom, powdering her nose while a bunch of other skeeves do their makeup. After that, the woman's nerves tighten up, the shaking stops, and she gets a bit more lively. Yeah! That's so right, this would explain her suddenly volunteering her and Vincent for the dance competition. Would she have made that call without the coke bump, with her shaky status? Interesting. The truth about the Tony Rocky Horror incident is revealed, and then the dance scene comes up. Apparently it was ripped from the Fellini movie 8 ½. I'm sure it fit, but here it was so, well, awkward! It didn't mix with the Chuck Berry song “You Never Can Tell.” It's not a complete ripoff, I mean Mia was doing the Monkey, and at the same time, I have no clue what Vincent was doing. John Travolta claimed that Tarantino let him ad-lib the dancing. I like the think the two finger slide in front of his eyes was an ad-lib, especially how it rings to mind disco. Yeah, Saturday Night Fever, the dance scene might've been carefully constructed so that Travolta wouldn't upstage Thurman and just bring everyone to silence, assuming he kept up his dancing skills. Maybe that's why the restaurant is a 50s gimmick, and not 70s, don't give Travolta the motivation to bust a disco move. Theories and stuff aside, my goodness it's classic! I'm sure the 8 ½ dancing didn't have the woman barefoot, thank you Tarantino.

Now another theory that I heard, never thought about, was the trophy. Did Vincent and Mia actually win it? The theory is that they stole it. More on that later. Uncomfortable silence? No, drinks and music, referring to the scene after this. “Girl You'll Be A Woman” now pleasures the ears, provided by Urge Overkill. Vincent went to the bathroom, uh oh! This was actually the first instance of it, but still. Mia looked less pale in this scene than in the Jack Rabbit Slim's one. I think, hmmm. Anyways, jeez, heroin can be white and cocaine like? Another thing, fucking cow! Mia went into Vincent's grass and ate off it, without really knowing what she was getting into. Doesn't the “cow” description fit? I think so, especially since it doesn't spoil what happens. Then again, who hasn't watched this film?

Regardless, one of the few things that date the film comes up after when Vincent uses a cellphone that is so 90s. High end too, as it's not the size of a brick. Lance was eating cereal and watching some old sitcom when he gets a lovely, distressed, hysterical phone call from Vincent with Mia by his side. It leads to a car crash, and a very tense scene. There's no music, the TV is turned off when Vince makes his entrance. Going back to the scene, there's a real palpable atmosphere to it, and there's just no music. When the characters scream, it's rather, powerful. It just stands out, even when Lance rummages through this messy room to find his black medical book, that stands out. Jody's screams, the arguing between her and Lance, the latter and Vincent. This is all before the climax, the adrenaline shot. It was absolutely amazing, it still is absolutely amazing. Chalk another classic scene in this film.



The tense stuff over, time to calm down, until you look at Mia's face! Jesus, she looked like...well, exactly what one would after going through what she did. In that respect, brilliant makeup! By the way, that Fox Force 5 joke still makes me do a little chuckle. Like Vincent's reaction, it hasn't really changed, it's not laugh out loud funny, and the timing of it really helps cement its comedic value. It's thus the perfect joke to say after the shit they both went through. It ties the bow nicely on a fucking fantastic chapter! To think there's more to come...

Ah! I type that and then there's the creepy looking cartoon show that kid Butch is watching. The human mouths placed in for these animated characters, it looks disturbing.

This scene's the prologue into the next chapter. It's carried by the awesome Christopher Walken as he pretty much gives an epic monologue. It's in the form of sharing the story of the gold watch to Butch, which traces back to his great grandfather. That watch, it doesn't work, right? Given how long it's been in existence, and where it ended up. Oh man, but the whole history is really rich, it gets more epic each generation. The great grandfather was simple, the grandfather gone through Japanese, World War 2 stuff, sad ending, and then the father! Oh my, it does get a big laugh. “His ass!” War veterans, heroes, martyrs, and then there's Butch, a lowly boxer...

“The Gold Watch,” shorter chapter title than the previous one, which doesn't indicate how crazy this chapter was. Willis wakes up, it could be interpreted that he dreamed of what the viewer just saw, the story of the gold watch shared. He heads to the ring for his match against Floyd Wilson. I wonder how it exactly turned out, you only get the post-match escape, and the result. Uh oh, which leads to Vincent answering the call, so to speak. Just him, where oh where is Jules?

Hiding in a bowl of rice ready to pop a cap in Butch's ass. HAHAHA! It's badass and funny at the same time. Butch wouldn't dare go to Indochina. Mia's feeling great by the way.

What isn't so great is the background during the taxi driving scene. That was intentional though, it's totally lifted off a black and white film noir. That had to be the case, otherwise, it's just ropey. Even when I didn't know the reasoning behind the background, my eyes are more drawn to Esmerelda, the Columbian taxi driver, curious about murder, and Butch changing out of his boxing gear. I heard the actress who played Esmerelda, also played a taxi driver who basically was a cleaner for gangsters in a little Latino production. This would explain Tarantino essentially transplanting her to this film. It definitely works, oh my goodness is she hot, and has an amazing voice. And I just realized how lucky Butch is, because there's this woman, and then his significant other, Fabienne!

Fabienne was beautiful, and seemingly young. But also, strange, why with the pot belly? She said pot bellies are sexy, which is strange because they are not at all. I equate pot bellies to beer ones. She mentioned male ones being either oafish or like a gorilla. I assume for the latter it's muscled up roiders with an inflated stomach. During this pot belly sermon by the woman, I noticed Bruce Willis' right shoulder. Going back to Die Hard, it's official to me that said scar on that area, is real. Interesting, and given the characters Willis played, at least in Die Hard and this one, it does show that the guy's been in a scuffle or two.

Of course, observations like that don't matter when the scene gets very sexual. Fabienne probably earned her stripes as one of the best movie females in history, by asking Butch for oral pleasure! Ah man, instant wife material. Not just her love of oral pleasure, but some other stuff. French accent, sexy; nice sized boobs, of course she doesn't expose them in the film, but a good enough indication that they're nicely sized; lovely eyes and cute face, if there's one flaw to her, it's that she's a bit soft in the head. Butch believes that, after the fade to black, he basically calls her a retard. I mean she has to be of that mental condition, to suggest pot bellies are sexy. How she and Butch talk to each other, it's strongly indicated that she is very submissive. Compare her to Mia Wallace, one is a subordinate, the other is closer to a right hand (wo)man.

Anyways, flash of Bruce Willis' after his shower. The night ended with Fabienne brushing her teeth, and in the morning when Butch wakes up from a bad dream, she's brushing her teeth. I know it can't be that she was doing that all night, but eh, she is a “retard.” Maybe that's just a tick of hers.

Alright, seriously, moving on is the watch business. Willis' meltdown felt familiar, domestic violence and all that, minus the actual hitting. I've experienced it, overhearing at least, arguments between my mother and whoever she was with at whatever time. These happen at night, so in the morning, I come downstairs from my bedroom, discovering broken items, namely glass and pottery stuff. So seeing Butch lash out was pretty captivating. Then of course the reason for that adds on to the theory that Fabienne is actually mentally slow. Comparisons continue as I believe Butch had the short tempered issue like Jake LaMotta from Raging Bull. Both are boxers, both end up with women significantly younger than them, and shit breaks as they lash out, only LaMotta was depicted as physically harming his woman. Who knows? Maybe Butch hurt Fabienne in previous events, it wouldn't be surprising.

So when Butch goes to get his watch, there's the famous, or just notable, continuous shot as he walked from the street he parked, through a yard, over a fence, across another street, into his apartment. I could never hear this, but I heard that a radio broadcast can be overheard as Butch walks through the big yard, that says that the Jackrabbit Slim's dancing contest trophy was stolen. I went back to the scene with subtitles on, all that I caught was “Visit the Jackrabbit Slim's nearest you,” which can be interpreted as a heads up for a missing item, some cautionary thing. So the stolen trophy business, I'm just going to take as a theory. The movie already has a bunch of theories, what's one more going to do?

Anyways, Bruce Willis proves to be someone who talks to himself, like John McClane, his Butch character talks to himself. It's shown as he drove off after the Fabienne incident, and then after a powerful scene in the apartment. This movie is must-see, at the same thing, something that a lot of people should've seen. So, the scene I'm referring to, shouldn't be a spoiler, but I won't go into detail about it. I can't remember my reaction to it the first time, whether it was shocking or not, but it was definitely moving. Once again, another memorable, classic scene in this movie. One observation, Butch is a cheap ass, get Pop Tarts dammit, generic toaster pastries? Really? That's how you're going to beat 'em Butch. They keep underestimating you. I suppose that's proven in the next few scenes...

A theory I made up, maybe someone else came up with it, I didn't bother double checking. When Butch drove away and tried to sing some song playing on the radio, he bumps into hard motherfucker, Marsellus Wallace. He was crossing the street, and had two cups of coffee and a box of donuts. My theory is that he had those, not just for him, but for SPOILER Vincent Vega. I never thought about it until this recent viewing. Makes sense, and going by their first scene together, Wallace and Vincent are cool, they're at the hugging level, and the former called the latter his bro (N-word). Yeah, it makes sense to me. Wallace buying himself and his bro some coffee and donuts. A boss can be friendly with his employee after all.

There's a good deal of comedy in the foot chase scene, given how the two main players couldn't run for obvious reasons. Before that was a gunshot hitting this woman, and then screams of “My eye!” I assume it was the woman that was shot because after she got it near her side, she put her hand over an eye. So, wrong selling? She should've been selling the injury near her side, not an imaginary shot to the eye. I don't know, as amazing as the movie is, it still is an indie film, such a mistake, if I'm right on calling it that, is to be expected.

An interesting bit of trivia is Duane Whitaker, who played Maynard in this film, appeared in Vice Academy 2 as “Long John.” It's been a while since I saw that movie, so I can't remember his character, but I thought it was interesting to note that. Him in this movie, runs a pawn shop, which is unassuming, as was he. Just hanging out, music playing on the radio, nobody in the shop. Wallace and Butch bring the ruckus, and then all of a sudden, Maynard pulls out a shotgun. Alright, he was just trying to bring order, the two were disrupting his zen mode, his place of business. He acted accordingly I guess, but then he whacks Butch unconscious, calls on his buddy Zed and what follows is a scene that is still really weird. Even though I never saw the movie, I guess the scene was inspired by Deliverance. No calls for pig squeals though. The fucking Gimp, oh my goodness, I just wonder if the guy is what he is because he loves it or he was forced into it. If it's the former, why?! I'll never understand that level of fetishism and kink.

Oh man, poor Marsellus Wallace, but it did lead to Butch rising up. He was underestimated, them white boys thought Butch would just stay bound and gagged, but nah, this is Butch. Fucking guy killed another man with his bare hands! Don't sleep on this guy, in a way he's probably more badass than Samuel L. Jackson's Jules. Jules has words and a gun, Butch has his hands, which attract weapons that he himself doesn't own. It was evident earlier in the film, and is proven again when he gets a Hatori Hanzo sword. Nah, it's not a Hanzo blade, at least not officially, I think I read once that Quentin Tarantino's movies are all part of a shared universe. Sounds nice, though that means there's a bunch of characters that look like Jules. I can't forget Butch's luck, it does aid in his badassery I guess, but then go back to the boxing match. During that, or before, Fabienne was getting Butch's stuff from his apartment, which includes the watch. So one can assume that he didn't have the watch on him during fight night. So the fact he did what he did, it wasn't luck. Thus, Butch has a fierce animal inside him, there is true badassery, and lucky just so happens to help at times, but not every time. Now put Butch in a room with Jules. No weapons, Butch would win. With weapons, who knows?

I got off track, Butch owned and then gave an opening for the victimized Marsellus Wallace, to redeem himself from his...traumatic experience. In that, he started belting out quotes that continue to go down in history as amazing and classic. Getting medieval on one's ass! Whoa now, one learns that you don't fuck with Marsellus Wallace, and at the end of this chapter, you don't fuck with Butch. After an interesting exchange between the two victims, Butch goes back to Fabienne, with a new ride, and they go off into the sunset. A figure of speech of course. Once again, another fantastic chapter, the music that closes out is an interpretation of the Twilight Zone theme, which perfectly summed up that chapter, as it took a really bizarre and dark turn.

Last chapter, The Bonnie Situation. I'll just jump into something, I thought the guy hidden in the bathroom was Jerry Seinfeld. I don't know, I always thought during the credits, that guy's name was mentioned, but of course that's not the case. He isn't in this movie, but the guy looked like him anyways, so, yeah. Seinfeld got what he deserved. Marvin, as it turns out, was an inside man, which I never really thought about until this viewing. I just thought he was spared as some sort of witness deal, Jules and Vincent would take him to Marsellus, where he'd put the fear of God in him, as if Jules' bible interpretation wasn't fearsome enough. It does make more sense that he was just a plant, it would explain how Jules got the info, sharing with Vincent that there might've been 3 or 4 guys in that apartment. Not counting Marvin, there were 3. And I never noticed Vincent asking Jules during that trunk shot scene, about “our guy.” Asking if he's included in that amount Jules mentioned, which he said he wasn't sure.

I'm too tempted, I have to pause and bring up some connections. Lately I've been watching Fresh Prince of Bel-Air episodes. As I've learned recently, some Pulp Fiction connections. Phil LaMarr as Marvin, also was Phillip Banks' butt kissing assistant in an episode where their house is robbed. In the 6th season, there's an episode where Will and some of the Banks clan go to the gym and work out. Nicky prepares for boxing training and he said “Imma get medieval on you.” He did, on the punching bag. So yeah, just felt like mentioning that.

Back to the movie, there's a notable continuity error. Bullet holes on the wall of the apartment, they were already there before the gunshots were fired at Jules and Vincent. I didn't really note it to be a continuity error, and accepted that the holes were there just because, and when Jules analyzes them, he's referring to some others that were on the wall. But no, they were all there before the gunshots, it's a continuity error. That sure wasn't divine intervention.

Following that is another famous scene in the shock department. I should note that the first time I watched Pulp Fiction, it was on TV, so some things were edited to make it to TV. AMC handled it, and they can allow some stuff to fly, and this was before The Walking Dead. So what happened, was cut to where the graphic nature, is not completely felt. So, when I saw it uncensored, the impact was stronger, and little things made it more, nasty. Namely, what's on Jules' hair after the deed was done. Marvin should've shared his opinion on the divine intervention debate.

This leads to Quentin Tarantino's acting performance in the movie, as Jimmy. Tarantino often puts himself in his movies, but in roles that never are leads. His acting is not great, I know that, but I let his appearances slide, if anything, given the feeling that he's a frugal guy, casting himself in some key support roles, is just a matter of one less mouth to feed, if you catch my drift. But then there's the observation that probably books himself some roles, make movies in some way, to exercise freedom in racist remarks, particularly with blacks. The “n-word” in it's -er ending is said a bunch of times by Jimmy in this film. There's Django Unchained, where that word is second nature. Perhaps Jackie Brown can be mentioned, but maybe more on it being a fascination. Inglorious Basterds, where there is a rant on black people during the restaurant scene that features Hans Landa and Shoshana. I don't want to say Tarantino is racist, especially with how he does write powerful black characters and such, and the fact his muse is a black man in Samuel L. Jackson. Perhaps he just considers himself black. Not explicitly of course, not like Rachel Dolezal . But you know, like one of the brothas. Not sure if that's a functioning explanation, but there you go.

Getting back on track, one is treated to more back and forth between Jules and Vincent, particularly in the bathroom, goddamn Maxi pad business, and in the car, which was after the arrival of Harvey Keitel's Winston character. Marsellus Wallace was on the motherfucker, can't have Bonnie come to her house, and spot a dead body, she'd divorce husband Jimmy. Fucking divorce. Dude should've ended the marriage over the shitty coffee she apparently gets. Anyways, Winston was such a cool guy, smooth operator, doesn't speak a lot, very patient and to the point. A man like that knows how to take command. He commands respect too, wow. Vincent got Winston to respond with a fierceness that was subtle, yet still powerful. He took control of the Bonnie Situation, and it was awesome. He deserved the gourmet coffee more than Jules and Vincent, that's for sure. He was a true fixer, he had a solution for everything. Bloody car, no problem, clean that shit up. Losing bed spreads and sheets to that car, no problem, here's some money to buy a new set. He's efficient, speedy in it all too, and it's not just him driving really fast and magically not getting a cop on his speeding tail. Really, Winston qualifies as yet another badass in the movie. This is just filled with badasses. Butch, Jules, Marsellus, Winston, overflowing. Vincent could be argued, but definitely the 4 guys mentioned, badasses in their own ways.

I guess Bonnie won't question the clothes that disappeared from the house, which end up on Jules and Vincent. Come on now, and the whole “dorks” thing is not right, because as Jules said, they are Jimmy's clothes. He looked like a dork to begin with, and the guy playing him, Tarantino, is a dork in real life. At least in my opinion, a movie dork. So, dude. Pot calling the kettle black. “Black” again, there it is. Anyways, looking back, was Winston necessary? Jules and Vincent couldn't come up the plan Winston spelled out to them? Clean the car, cover the seats, dispose of the trash? I guess they were just too much in a panicky situation, unsure of themselves, so in comes Winston, who is sure of himself, to bring sanity to it all. That makes sense. He's an angel for hire. A gangster's angel.

I liked the volleyball player remark by Raquel more than the dork stuff. Hahaha! That actually made me laugh, it's pretty dead on too, given their short shorts, they could've fit well in a casual volleyball game at a beach. That Raquel by the way, I'd give her one. I wonder what Monster Joe looks like. Well, now that I mention him, Winston was necessary, Vincent and Jules probably didn't know of Monster Joe, who helped in getting rid of the incriminating car. Winston parts ways with the two hitmen, capping off an incredible performance by Harvey Keitel. Just, cool, totally damn cool, Jules agrees as he and Vincent have breakfast at a restaurant.

Now coming to this scene, going all the way back to the first one of the movie, I never knew until a podcast review I first heard last year brought it up, that Vincent actually appears in that scene. He's seen walking when the camera's on Honey Bunny, and as the later scene explains, he was going to take a shit. This goes into the bad luck, the troubles that happen when Vincent goes to the bathroom. Whether to talk to himself or take a dump, something bad always happens. A robbery, thus the first scene and this chapter, are connected. This happens after an engaging and somewhat funny conversation over pigs, Jules not eating them because they're filthy animals. Dang! A little too high brow? That's weird to say given his profession and that he's perfectly capable of killing people. Yet the pig thing is rather snobby. Interesting dichotomy I believe, and it makes for a great scene, no need to complain any further.

One could guess Jules learned from Winston, he clearly respected and admired him. Jules learned how to be cool and take control of a situation that could've easily not be in control by him. The robbery, and the gun pointed at his head by Tim Roth's Pumpkin, and then Amanda Plummer's Honey Bunny. Then again, he did say that it wasn't the first time a gun was pointed at him. So I guess when a gun's pointed at him, it's no big deal, but the prospect of a friend's wife discovering a dead body and telling the cops about it, was too much to bare. Obviously that's not the whole issue, the fact he and Vincent were in a tainted, incriminating car, it had to get off the road. Adding to the reasoning behind Jule's calmness is his ability to read people. That's what I believe, and he clearly read Pumpkin as this weak willed individual putting up a facade of toughness. He pretty much calls Pumpkin weak as he interpreted the Ezekiel 25:17 verse, and how they factor into it. Who is the weak, the shepherd, the tyranny of evil men. All this and I forgot to mention the Bad Motherfucker wallet that belongs to Jules, in the movie, but apparently belongs to Quentin Tarantino, in real life. Dork! Anyways, also Vincent being out of the bathroom, and factoring into the standoff that nears the end of the movie.

Jackson pulls off more classic lines in a monologue that really stands out in the film. The non-linear plot of the movie serves as a statement, in a way. The statement that the MVP of this movie, is Jules, Samuel L. Jackson. It's proof that it can take one movie, one performance to turn someone from just an actor, to something else entirely. John Travolta and Bruce Willis redeemed themselves through this movie, but saying that, they hit their peaks, they were big stars. Jackson wasn't, and this performance proved that age isn't a factor, early in life, later in life, one can find success, become a somebody. The film overall can be seen as a tale of making stars, redeeming stars, all while making something that has stepped into timeless territory. Right when it gained eligibility, this movie was added to the Library of Congress, which says a lot about how impactful the movie is. The quality to back that up, for sure.

Anyways yeah, movie ends awesomely with Jackson owning it all. After all that typing for this movie, I wonder if it still holds up as my favorite movie of all time. Then again, when I think of the two other movies competing with it, things change. Never mind the competition, this is one of the best movies I've ever seen, and it will continue to be that. Even after a 2015 filled with movies, a lot of first time watches, earning new favorites in the process, this still stands tall as one of the best. It's flawed in the sense of continuity errors and some other minor goofs, what movie isn't? So “flawless” may be a stretch, “perfect” too. Subjectively, I guess you can say it's flawless, perfect. It's a masterpiece, that I can and will say. While I haven't seen The Hateful 8 at the time of this post, I'm very sure I'll still hold this as the best Quentin Tarantino movie. While I haven't seen all their movies, I will say, at least for now, this is definitely John Travolta's best performance, Ving Rhames' best outing, and Samuel L. Jackson's best as well. As great as he is, pretty much all his movie characters after Pulp Fiction, are variants of Jules. Or rather, all his characters, starting with Jules, are variants of Samuel L. Jackson himself. The guy is Jules basically, it's not acting.

What else can be said? Every scene sticks in my mind, so much memorable dialogue, it's like a disease, a duration that never gets old, it never overstays its welcome, it's the perfect length of time for this movie. Telling a couple tales and sewing them together beautifully. The movie is peerless, while the genre is technically crime, I think of it more as that kind of movie. Some dark comedy, there's more than that. More than some drama. It's certainly a Quentin Tarantino movie, and this turned me into a huge fan, as this was the first Tarantino movie I saw. It's proof that sometimes, or most times, Hollywood can't make a movie like this. A landmark of independent movie making for sure. Also with 100% certainty, just a fucking awesome film.

This is where I become lazy, the next three reviews are typed out with the mindset of just wanting to finish this long post and get back to watching movies. A self-imposed thing for me, not to watch movies until I finish reviews. Well I never specifically said all reviews had to be long winded and overly detailed, and my patience and focus is dries up as I'm close to the end. Even though the next three movies are very impactful to me, I am more concerned with finishing this. It's a burden I've been able to drop and put back on whenever, but never eliminating it entirely. I'm going to do that. So here goes...

Project A - Next stop, Jackie Chan! In a film he wrote and directed, and one I've seen a lot on Spike TV. It looked exclusive, because up until a blu-ray release, I've noticed the only downloadable version of this film was an older dub, or Chinese with subtitles. The Spike TV version had Jackie Chan dubbing his own character, and I'm not sure if it was shorter, because it turns out the US release of the film was 97 minutes long. Other versions, 105 minutes. I haven't spotted differences because it's been a long time, that Spike TV broadcast was in 2008 I think. Remembering though, the dialogue isn't that much different. There's some minor changes I noticed, and only because they were really funny. Obviously the dubbing featured different voices, and no Jackie Chan doing his own dubbing. The video I got for this also had Chinese language and subtitles, which I'll watch someday.

As for the cast, classic 80s all star lineup in a Chan movie. Chan as the star, but his buddies Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao, all three being of the best in that decade. As I watch the big bar scene, I already noticed some differences. It's just extended scenes, and I'm very sure the shorter version didn't really compromise anything. This original version had a song by the sailors, which wasn't in the US version. I can't remember if the US version did this, but this kept in the voices during the fight scenes, not dubbing over them, along with the sound effects it seems. Awesome, and I love those distinct martial arts sound effects from the past, pre-90s.

Fei, not "Fats," his introduction through a gambling scene is here, not in the US version, cheating at some dominoes game. In the US version they called him “Fats,” which is hilarious. There are probably other extended scenes, but as I recall only the bar stuff and this gambling thing are the ones that stretch the movie away from the US version's duration. I should mention the bar scene also had one of the sailors in a running gag involving spaghetti.

That out of the way, the plot is Jackie Chan as “Dragon,” he's part of the Hong Kong navy, the movie's set in the early 20th century. The Navy has a rivalry with the cops, and after explosions ruin their fleet, the Navy is shut down by the British government. The Naval officers all had to convert to cops, with Yuen Biao training and leading a task force that Jackie becomes a part of. The training section was really funny, as the former Navy guys try to prank Biao's character, who is the nephew of the jackass chief of police. Biao would strike back too, specifically in a scene where they train in grenade handling.

Solidarity is shown when they start doing police work, which comes in the form of busting some guy involved in gun running. Fei is introduced then, as he's in the country club where the task force goes to investigate, and interrogate the similarly fat suspect. The bar scene had a spectacular fight, props in the form of chairs, Jackie and Yuen going at it. This time they join forces, along with others, and a big club brawl ensued, with the stairs playing a factor as props, along with chairs and tables, and such. The fat suspect is cornered and gets a fucking wicked kick by Jackie that sends him flying. The operation didn't end well, Dragon pretty much quit and tries to solve this gun running conspiracy himself. He bumps into Fei, and they kind of team up.

Comedy comes in the form of their banter, they're not the best of friends, arguing a lot and threatening each other. As it turns out, the gun running is for pirates, sweaty, low down pirates. Yet there are associates to these pirates, as evident in the country club. They are the bad guys up until the final section of the movie, where the good guys sail and head to the island where the pirate gang head by this hard bastard reside. They chase Dragon in a fantastic bike scene, with some classic funny gags. It ends with a great fight scene with Dragon and Fei teaming up to own some idiots.



The guns by the way are police rifles, so there's the chief of police's personal connection to the case. The big stunt of the film is Jackie's insane clocktower scene, where he falls several feet from a clock hand to the ground, only cushioned by two onings. I heard he did it three times, in the movie proper, it's shown twice, but I didn't know until this viewing, that the third, more brutal try, was in credits! Jackie's perfection at its most insane, he didn't like one attempt, so he did it two more times. I'm curious which one he liked the best, I'm assuming the second one, which isn't cut, as Yuen's character and the girl Jackie's character was hitting on (the Navy general's daughter) run towards him after his landing.

When pirates are discovered as the people behind this gun running stuff, and also an inside job with a government official is uncovered, the Navy is reformed and get busy. Laughs come as Jackie goes in disguise as one of the country club dudes involved in the criminal enterprise, going to the head pirate and to that island. He and his crew kidnapped the Rear Admiral and some other whities. Yuen Biao's character also helps out, Fei steps in for his own greedy reasons.

It all leads to a fantastic finale, with the three main protagonists fighting the head pirate, who is no pushover at all. They had bombs going off in the pirate headquarters, so naturally the final fight ends in a bang, a great one at that.

As someone who has watched Jackie Chan movies since the age of 5 or 6, I've seen a boatload (well timed, right?) of his work. Project A came later in life, but still made an awesome impression at me. I hadn't seen many pre-90s Chan up to that point, I think only Armour of God before this. So I grew up on 90s Chan movies, where the guy still did a lot of crazy stuff, fight scenes that were amazing, but most of those didn't take place in Hong Kong/China. Thinking back to this and Police Story, there's so many stunts and brutal fight scenes that they make me wince a couple times. Project A encapsulated 80s Jackie Chan, who went for it, established himself after primordial late 70s films, throwing himself at many walls. The stunt work is the most notable difference when it comes to comparing the 80s and 90s. Not to say he toned down in the 90s, but it was like he tried to make a name for himself in the 80s, and after that decade, it was simply preserving that name. Hollywood, honestly, didn't help much in that, but ah well. Stick to this film, it's a fantastic blend of action and comedy, only the master of that fusion can pull off. I'm referring to Jackie Chan of course. As a Tony Zhou eloquently put, Chan made it so that action is comedy, and this movie is a golden example of it. It's one of his best for sure, probably the best 80s Chan film. It definitely has one of his best stunts, and all the fight scenes are fucking entertaining. Picking the best of that lot is challenging. Damn, I don't know. I think it comes down to the big Navy vs. Police bar fight scene, and the country club fight scene. I guess the former wins because the comedy there is strong, whereas the latter is all serious. So the former thus represents Jackie Chan fights better, but whatever the case, all the fight scenes are great. I could've gone with this or Legend of Drunken Master for my birthday movie watching, I needed to have a Chan movie. Mentioning that film and the comments on this, should indicate some of my all time favorite Jackie Chan movies, this being one of them. Classic Hong Kong martial arts film.

The Room - And now for a double bill, top of the line, two of the worst films ever made, but also the ones that made me back off naming Pulp Fiction as my all-time favorite movie. Starting with this little gem, I pay tribute to the film everyday pretty much, down to my username, and the lines I rip and use in some online conversations. This film is that important, it was one of the first steps into this wacky world of so bad, it's good movies, the B-movies, cult, camp, trash, all that jazz.

How did it all start? Well, from efukt. Yeah, at the end of one of their videos, which I saw in 2013, “Breaking Points,” a compilation of girls', well, breaking points being reached. At the end of it was a clip of The Room, the “Oh hi Mark” scene. I thought it was really funny, but I didn't know where that scene came from. Around 2014 I think, I saw a top 10 of the worst movies of all time by WatchMojo, and The Room ranked high there, but it wasn't number 1. I can't remember what drove me to watch the movie, but during the final days of 2014, I downloaded the movie. December 30 to be exact. Now I'm not completely sure, I want to say this was a 2015 first time watch, but I probably saw it the day of the download, December 30, 2014. Given how close it was to 2015, I just consider it a 2015 first time watch. That first time, I know for sure, was a great one. This was the fourth time I saw it, and each viewing was better than the last! It's strange, usually a funny movie's comedic value is best experienced at first watch, just because subsequent viewings, you know the gags, jokes, and lines that induce laughter. Part of the fun in comedy is not knowing what will be pulled. But then the best comedies are those that you can watch multiple times and still find yourself laughing. This movie stands out in that the increase in laughter on each viewing is notable and steady. The movie isn't even supposed to be a comedy, contrary to what Tommy Wiseau may have you believe.

Going back to that efukt video, I thought Tommy Wiseau was German. I thought the accent sounded like a German one, which shows that even though I took 6 years of German and know about the shoddy use of it in Die Hard, I'm no expert at all. I could make the mistake of assuming someone is German, as I did for Tommy Wiseau. As theorized by many, and expertly presented in a Reddit post from a few years ago, Tommy is from Poland. That was the theory, it was recently confirmed ahead of the premiere of the documentary, Room Full of Spoons. At first it was set to be a documentary on The Room, the making of it, the people involved, the head honcho himself, but it later developed into not just a piece on the movie and the cult success. It has become an exposé on Tommy Wiseau, Rick Harper pretty much torpedoed his friendship with Tommy in order to make the documentary. He admits that and him maybe going too far, such stuff makes me eager to see the documentary, which is currently only showing in film festivals. It's set to feature in a Philadelphia one on April 8 and 9, and I'm not too far from the city. I don't know if I'll see it then, I'd love to. On that note, I have not seen The Room in a theater with an audience, as it seems to be the best way to watch the film, given the audience participation and such. I watched the movie before The Rocky Horror Picture Show, which this is compared to a lot in terms of theater antics and cult appeal. People dress up as the characters, they throw spoons at the screen, they repeat a lot of the dialogue, and a whole lot more. If there's one reason for me to go to a theater, it's to watch The Room, definitely.

As it stands, I've sat and watched it at home, alone, but it doesn't change the fact I laughed from beginning to end, especially in this viewing.

Where to start? I can go on and on about the movie, but I do want to speed this up, if that's even possible. Alright, the plot is basically Tommy Wiseau plays Johnny, who is with a woman, his future wife, Lisa. Their relationship seems strong as the film starts with him giving her roses, and a sexy red dress. She loves it, and they proceed to have a sex scene. But, delaying that is Denny, a manchild who is supposedly a teen, 18 maybe, but the actor was actually 26 at the time. Phillip Haldiman played Denny, he was older than Juliette Danielle (Lisa), Greg Sestero (Mark), Robyn Paris (Michelle), everyone except Carolynn Minnott (Lisa's mother, Claudette), and Tommy Wiseau. Thus his presence in the movie is just plain weird and creepy even. As if him saying “I just like to watch you guys” wasn't creepy enough. He pretty much wanted to be in a threesome with Tommy, who is a father figure to him, and Lisa, who is...a mother figure...oh fuck. In case one doesn't know, Tommy Wiseau was also the writer, producer, executive producer, and director of this movie. His stench is all over this, even starting with the credits as his name appears under one title, rather than bunching all the titles in one shot. So, “Writer: Tommy Wiseau,” then, “Producer: Tommy Wiseau,” you get the idea.

With this viewing, I laughed after pretty much every end of a sentence or series of sentences by a character. So Denny would talk, and I'd laugh, then Johnny would talk, I'd laugh, Lisa...well you got me there. Lisa was not funny at all, she's a horrible human being, but only through Tommy's chauvinistic writing. His ideals regarding women are pretty hollow and lacking, but hilarious at the same time. Women, according to him, are easily at awe about getting roses, order pizza on instinct, stay at home, have a sex scene, basically setting back women a couple decades. Note how I say “sex scene,” as that's what they are. Love scenes? Bullshit, characters having sex? No, they're having a sex scene, it's different. In fact it's more like a Room Sex Scene, it deserves its own trademark. I'm surprised the copyright minded Tommy Wiseau hasn't trademarked that, “Room Sex Scene.” Well he'd probably rather say “Room Love Scene.” Yeah, that's love. Doing it the way Tommy does, where he clearly isn't aiming his dick at her vagina (I would specify what, but don't want to spoil too much), so much love!

Oh man, see the movie gets sidetracked, so do I. The plot, yeah, Mark, Johnny's best friend, has an affair with Lisa. Johnny's future wife (not “fiance”) cheats on him, which sets off what Johnny believes, is his world crumbling apart. The plot sounds simple on paper, but between overly long sex scenes, bizarre dialogue that sounds like they all come from one person (which is true), hilariously cheesy music, story elements raised and dropped instantly, an obvious dubbing throughout the movie, camera work that lacks in diversity given that Tommy taped a 35mm film camera next to a Panasonic HD camera, green screening a fake rooftop set, oh my goodness, again, I can go on and on.

Doing a review of this movie, it feels weird to just go by each scene, each plot element, and have it all be cohesive, one step at a time. So I'm just going all over the place. I'll continue on the first couple minutes of the film, as after the first of four fucking sex scenes, Tommy's character gets out of bed, naked, and walks bare ass to the bathroom! I should mention that I own Greg Sestero's book, his memoirs about the making of The Room, his friendship with Tommy, and his own story of trying to make it in Hollywood. It's called “The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room, the Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made.” I actually haven't read the book, I just own it for the sake of wanting a physical copy, plus the pictures in the halfway point are great. Pictures of Tommy, Greg, audiences at screenings of the movie, cast and crew, etc. I have listened to the audiobook, recently finishing my 12th overall listen. Yes, I've listened to it 12 times, which I think is a lot. It's amazing! Greg Sestero does the reading, and brings his wicked Tommy Wiseau impression! Now Tommy would say he only supports Greg's book “40%” (it used to be 50%), claiming that it's mostly lies. They aren't, watching interviews with the guy, it's clear he's overly defensive, and flubs the truth in order to make himself look good. In getting the book written (along with Tom Bissell), Greg interviewed cast and crew members of The Room, including Tommy Wiseau himself. He also used as a reference, The Room's original script, as well as hours of behind the scenes footage. Also of course, he went off his memory. Viewings of The Room can confirm that Tommy would do the things he did according to the book, to outright deny all of it is basically being like Tommy, which is something nobody can, or should be. At least entirely.

The good parts in the movie, not counting the unintentional laughter, is simply it being made. The fact it was is a testament to human endurance, and the power of stubbornness, while also not backing down to anybody's suggested changes. As odd as the auteur's vision is, it's his vision and he stuck to it. Greg realized that and didn't offer suggestions right before the movie even went into pre-production.

The bad parts are plenty, it's whether they are funny enough to the viewer that determines if they are passable. Would a feminist like this movie? Probably not, Lisa is a bitch, Claudette's an older bitch and a manhater, Michelle has almost no character other than being happy all the time and eager to give a blowjob after some food play (chocolate). Women are poorly represented in the film, thus showing Tommy Wiseau doesn't have a good understanding of the opposite sex, though the movie indicates that he had a working relationship that went sour, and the book goes into that. The men aren't redeeming, Mark has no tale, no personality, Denny is creepy and according to Tommy Wiseau, “retarded.” Peter (Kyle Vogt) is the worst psychologist ever, which is funny considering Wiseau is a legit Psychology major from Laney College. Mike (Scott Holmes) is basically like Michelle, sex in his mind, but has more goober qualities. Though he has the best blowjob receiving face ever in film. Chris-R, though intimidating, is a shitty drug dealer, not asking for money upfront, instead giving a deadline to a retarded Denny. That just leaves Johnny, written to be perfect, and a pure victim. He has a great job at the bank, he has a future wife half his age, lots of best friends, a great physique, he always gets some even though in the middle of the film he said “My Lisa's great when I can get it.” HAHA! He got it a bunch of times in the damn movie! Johnny's just perfect, a very nice guy, but then you analyze the character and realize his perfection's only so if trying to look through Tommy's eyes. He's shamefully loyal, he should've dumped Lisa and save himself further humiliation and heartache, fuck that line of “Love is blind.” That is fairytale nonsense, then again Tommy Wiseau loves Disney movies, the book implies he's a huge Aladdin fan for example, and as a kid, he peaked into a theater in his homeland and watched 101 Dalmations. Though he claimed he did not hit Lisa, he did shove her twice in the infamous “You are tearing me apart Lisa” scene. What about that? Lisa did lie that he hit her, but obviously Johnny is capable of doing it. He didn't get his promotion at the bank, one can say the manager is being a tightwad, or smart, because why have a guy like Johnny, have a high ranking job at a bank. A face like that warrants a comforting amount of trust? Exactly.

The movie throws out so many subplots that, well, you can write a book about it. The hitting, the marriage, a pregnancy, breast cancer, missing underwear, Denny's love of Lisa and then some girl Elizabeth, tuxedos worn in the middle of the film, an obsession with football, Claudette's house situation, Denny's drug addiction (WHAT KIND OF DRUGS?!), Mark and his self-described issue of women. Which by the way, he has one of the more potent lines in the film, indicative of Tommy's philosophy on women, saying that sometimes women are smart, flat out stupid, or pure evil. If those three had equal value, that means 66% of women, according to Tommy Wiseau, are not good. The movie has a homoerotic thing to it, so these women hating things aren't just made up by this viewer.

Most of the film takes place in the small and cheap looking apartment set, the living area of Johnny Lisa, and the world renowned rooftop. The film was mostly shot at the parking lot and small studio place of a camera equipment store in Los Angeles, Birns and Sawyer. The book indicates that Tommy had a fascination with that store, thinking it was a major Hollywood studio after seeing a picture of John Wayne hanging in front of the place. The rooftop in particular was a cheap set shot against a green screen wall. Why? Tommy in the book claimed it was no different than big studios. Right, and note the rooftop was shot in a parking lot, not indoors. So weather reasons are bullshit. On that note, the composite shots are from second unit work Tommy head up in San Francisco, as he and a guerrilla film crew trio got shots of the San Francisco skyline from the roof, yes, roof, of a building that Tommy himself owned. This leads into the producing business. Tommy financed the movie all by himself, the figure thrown around is $6 million, which is hard to believe. My guess is that $1 million was spent on the equipment, as Tommy bought all the equipment, which is insane. Another $1 million accounted for overall filming, and as the book mentioned, there were many wasteful uses of money during filming of scenes. The re-shot Chris-R drug scene (originally shot in an alley set) cost about $80,000, and for such a short scene, it took 2 weeks to film! So yeah. Another million went to Greg himself. Even though he hasn't revealed the salary Tommy offered for him to play Mark, with descriptors like “life changing,” I just assumed it was that amount of money. This includes the car Tommy purchased for Greg, an SUV, so they could transport the camera equipment during the San Francisco adventure. By the way, the movie is supposedly set in that city. The final $3 million had to go to marketing for years during the film's dark period from its bomb of a theater run ($1800 gross revenue) to its eventual cult success. Tommy paid theaters to screen the movie, he rented a billboard in Los Angeles for 5 years, paying $5000 a month! The question becomes how did this man make that kind of money? I don't know, the book only says so much, Greg doesn't even know the specifics. You basically have to buy that he's a successful retail and real estate man. A podcast in 2014 interviewed someone who worked for Tommy Wiseau for 11 years, shedding a little more light on the man's business side. Owning a couple stores in San Francisco, selling bootlegged Levi's and other clothing items. You can see Tommy's fashion taste in his wardrobe in the film, which is what he wears in real life, minus the 2 belt gimmick, which he rocks to this day! As far as the clothes he sells, you can see an example in Greg's outfit during a montage where he and Tommy throw a football around, compete in a foot race against each other, and jog, all while one suffers through atrocious dubbing that actually loops itself in the beginning! Mark's outfit there also included a dorky visor that disappears after just one shot, in real life because it was a windy day and Tommy said “Screw it” basically.

Footballs are huge in this film, as Tommy seemingly is a football nut, but he hadn't been until a random day where Greg brought a football and they just played. So one can really thank Greg for Tommy's football craze, and the fandom that goes along with it, people tossing the ball around during screenings, outside the theaters in anticipation for the movie, even with Tommy himself, who tours the movie to this day and does Q&As. The thing about footballs in this film is that they are thrown 3 feet apart! So it's like kids who never played the game, tossing it around, pretty much like Tommy Wiseau, who can have the mindset of a child.

See? I don't think I can talk about the movie proper, do a scene by scene breakdown, because it's just crazy, I'm more compelled to explain the stuff behind the scenes as a way to justify how they made it to the camera. At the same time, I can't explain breast cancer and drugs, only offering up that Tommy just wanted to squeeze in as many serious issues as possible, despite them being dropped by the next scene! Seriously, the breast cancer thing is not mentioned again after the first scene it's let out. Same with the drugs. Surprisingly the only arc to the movie is the love triangle, which that itself is crooked. Mark and Lisa's sex scenes are less laughable and just cringe inducing like Johnny's sex scenes. Greg was assured that he could wear pants during the scenes, so unfortunately you don't get to see his ass. But if you like Lisa's tits, they're in the sex scenes. I wank at sex scenes, that's why I watch a lot of softcore films, but I have never gotten a stiffy watching the sex scenes in this movie. I might've tried jerking it at first watch, but that's it, subsequent viewings, I don't even bother. The music in those scenes are hilarious. The first song is “You are my rose. You are my rose. You are my rose!” Repeated ad nauseam, and then the second sex scene is “I will stand in the way of a bullet.” Gag. Next sex scene, which I now have to finally say, is recycled footage from the first sex scene between Johnny and Lisa! Do a side by side and you'll notice identical shots. The song in that is “Baby you are the one for me” or something along those lines. Generic R&B stuff, but fits so well in the sex scenes. Oddly enough, Michelle and Mike's sex scene, doesn't have a song, just the score music made exclusively for this film. Ahhh, it sticks to your head as soon as the opening credits roll. One of Lisa and Mark's sex scenes are on a staircase. Why? No good reason, don't say their passion took hold, that's ridiculous. Well, par for the course with this movie.

See, it sounds like I'm trashing the movie, pointing out the flaws and crazy stuff, but that doesn't mean I dislike the film. I love it! It's absolutely amazing, text doesn't help a lot, only just telling you what the movie has, and leaving it up to you on whether or not it's funny. At the same time, I don't want to go too deep into the dialogue, I could spend the whole review belting out quotes from the movie. 4 times watching it, and I already have a crap ton of lines committed to memory, it's amazing.

With the San Francisco second unit, there came establishing shots to show that they're in San Francisco, but they're mostly bland and pointless, but funny at the same time. In particular an establishing shot separates two identical fight scenes towards the end of the movie, that's just hilarious! Originally these were supposed to be establishing shots and composite ones for the green screen, but Tommy abruptly suggested scenes, hence the montage mentioned earlier, the coffee shop scene that has one of the best lines in the film (no easy task), and another infamous scene, the flower shop one. A conversation between Johnny and the flower owner that runs as fast as an Olympic tier runner! Screw punctuation! The two best lines in that legendary conversation is “Oh hi Johnny I didn't know it was you,” and “Hi doggie.” HAHA! The former is insane because how can she not recognize Johnny? She later said he's her favorite customer! The “Hi doggie” was ad-libbed, though Tommy claims it was all planned. Tommy claims that 37 takes wasn't done in order to finally get the “Oh hi Mark” scene entrance done. He's right, it wasn't 37 takes, according to the book, it was 32 takes! The book showed that Tommy had a really tough time saying and remembering lines from his own damn script! Production lasted around 3 months, going by my estimate, such a film if done really efficiently, would've been less than 30 days. Enter the Peter situation, Kyle Vogt was assured the movie would only take 2 weeks to shoot, or at least his scenes. Well, they didn't, and Tommy forced all crew and cast members to come to the set, and stay, even though the latter wouldn't have scenes to shoot that day. Kyle had other commitments, and, yeah, it leads to a hilarious new development towards the end. “When is the baby due?”

Going back to “You're tearing me apart, Lisa!”, that is Tommy's homage to Rebel Without A Clause. The book mentions how he's a huge fan of James Deen and Marlon Brando, of A Streetcar Named Desire and thus Tennessee Williams. The Room trailer said the movie has the “passion of Tennessee Williams.” Tommy's intentions for the film were serious, he wanted to make the best movie ever, and he believes he did. He paid for the 2 week theater run, so he could submit it to the Academy Awards, he brags in interviews that the movie is in “the database.” This movie is high drama, Tommy's attempt at it, but he switched his tune to labeling it a “black comedy” because people couldn't stop laughing at it. Dude is not self-aware, and even though in recent years people have analyzed the film more astutely, the underlying reason behind that is for the laughs. I theorized the movie is a statement of hatred towards women, but I did that for comedy, I made myself laugh. People have gone deeper into it, which is admirable, but the bottom line is comedy. So while Tommy says that people have “accepted” it more over the years, it doesn't change the fact that the movie is laughably bad. It can still claim to be the “Citizen Kane of bad movies,” as no movie after it can lay claim, and it's arguable no movie before it can. There are some stiff competition, all with similar mentalities, filmmakers wanting to make a serious film, they're most likely foreign, so their understanding of American values and sensibilities are warped. Earnest, honest efforts lead into laughably bad movies. Since The Room, there's also been movies made to be intentionally bad, which is not ideal for entertainment. It's why I haven't seen the Sharknado movies.

What else to say? Tommy claims he had to replace the crew 3 times, the book notes there were 2 crew replacements, at least going the director of photography replacements. 2 in total. Juliette Danielle was originally cast as Michelle, which probably would've worked, given that Robyn Paris was more good looking than Danielle, and I'm not being cruel, it's just my opinion. Apparently the original Lisa was a Latina with discolored teeth, which is odd considering Tommy wanted a supermodel looking woman for Lisa, someone as beautiful as “Angeleeca Jolie.” The book mentions that Juliette pretty much got the role because she exhibited the manipulative personality of Lisa when she stepped up to the plate to audition for the role, then her willingness to make out with Tommy during rehearsal, which is too graphic. Overall, she had the fortitude, and probably desperation, to survive Tommy's casting and direction. So in that respect, she deserves a round of applause, nobody goes through the shitter more than her in the movie. Even today with audience members making fun of her appearance, including her weight, which was believed to have changed throughout filming. That's not the case, just bad costuming, inexperienced costume designer, and Tommy not being a good overseer on that stuff. She goes through some neck tendon popping in a scene with Michelle that is filled to the brim with continuity errors, and of course she had to expose her breasts multiple times and have Tommy be on top of her all the damn time! So, she deserves a lot of credit, the book shows other women auditioning for Lisa and fleeing because of the harsh auditioning process by Tommy, and/or them finding out that they'd have to lock lips with Tommy. Greg said in the book that Danielle was paid a “pittance.” She deserved more, that's for sure. Also it seems like she's the least public about her work in the movie, maybe ashamed of it, which is understandable. But all the actors involve share in the shame. Greg pretty much buckled down to money in order to take the part, and go along with Tommy's idea to oust the original Mark. The other actors needed tape and experience, so they answered the casting calls put up by line producer Greg Sestero (that's right, he was also the line producer), not realizing the movie's a turkey. The original director of photography, Raphael Smadja was embarrassed to be a part of the movie, but it seems like he did it as a repaying of a favor to Birns & Sawyer. No coincidence he raised Hell about the lack of an actual line producer (can't have Greg doing two big jobs at once, it's stupid) 5 weeks into production, as he was tasked to keep Tommy from returning the camera equipment he bought, a 30 day window. The second director of photography, Graham Futerfas, didn't know what he was getting into, and when he did, he felt embarrassed too. Crew members working below their usual pay as well. The production was an odd combination of low budget filmmaking and gregarious spending on Tommy's part.

Dammit, I'm barely reviewing the movie. I mean, there's a lot to say in detail, the summary is really short though. You just have to see it to believe it. If only I took some film study class in school, especially one that involved this film, I would gladly write a big essay about it. I probably just typed up a rough draft in this review. There's just so much to say about it, and it's all thanks to Greg's book, and interviews with members of the cast and crew. Greg's book mostly, it's absolutely fantastic, the audiobook especially, highly recommended. Without those resources, I can spend a lot of time typing about the film, but I'm dodging spoilers, I won't even touch the ending, or the lead-up to it, the latter featuring the most hilariously disturbing scene I've ever watched. As a first time watch, the movie is just unpredictable, you don't know what will be said or done, with subplots raised and dropped, you don't even know what will stick along with the main, crooked plotline. The movie is randomness at its finest, from a man that wanted to be part of the Hollywood elite, but broke every kind of filmmaking rule in his quest to do that. A case study of the dangers of being a complete auteur, as well as the sympathetic nature it entails.

Thus, anything with Tommy's name attached to it is must-see, even though nothing he's done since touch this movie in any way, it's still a worthwhile event to experience. Whether it be his sitcom which probably has even worse production flaws given that he's doing it all himself (Sandy Schklair, the script supervisor of The Room pretty much tweaked the script to be as coherent...or readable as possible) and doesn't have experienced people behind the cameras and equipment. His brief roles in stuff like the Tommy Wi-Show or The House That Drips Blood on Alex, or even his more recent appearance in Samurai Cop 2 (which I haven't seen yet), the guy commands an audience.

Make no mistake, the acting is dreadful. Wooden delivery, weak reaches for emotion, stupid dialogue, weak facial expressions, over the top physical acting at times, lacking physical acting otherwise. All the scenes make no sense, there's 4th wall breaking, bad editing on account of the editor pretty much not cutting anything per Tommy's orders, a generic as shit soundtrack, a very weak and arguably offensive representation of women, a strange lionizing of the main character, soulless sex scenes, overly long sex scenes (11 minutes in total it seems, the first 30 minutes is dominated by 3 fucking sex scenes), useless characters, horrible sets, weak green screen effects, dreadful sound production. On that note, the sound guy Zsolt Magyar was a total rookie in the department, the book says he was pretty much reading the manual in between takes. This would explain the poor sound work, and why there's a bunch of dubbing. At the same time, necessary dubbing, as Tommy Wiseau has a very weak grasp of the English language, to a point where one can question if English is even his second language, clearly it isn't his first.

There's also pointless conversation about stuff like the computer business being too competitive, Claudette's fucking house, her relationship with men. Pointless scenes all around, like the coffee shop one having at least 30 seconds of extras ordering! The sole alley scene is probably the most pointless scene in the whole damn movie, and if it wasn't for the big shave in the tuxedo football scene, that would definitely be the most pointless scene. While that word is still in my mind, pointless establishing shots!

Stupid. Stupid getting drunk scene, mixing of scotch and vodka, which is something people said, it was never explicitly stated in the movie that those were the drinks being mixed, I probably assumed at once point it was apple juice and vodka. Anyways, at first I didn't like Mike, thinking he was a stupid goober, but now I think is laugh out loud funny. Almost every character has a line that is really funny. Lisa is just not funny, not that she needed to be, and Chris-R was just too badass to be funny, though his drug dealing payment system is dumb. On that note, Dan Janjigian, who played Chris-R, pulled out the best performance in the movie, despite not being an actor (he was a motivational speaker and competed in the 2002 Winter Olympics as part of the Armenian Bobsledding Team). Despite her asinine character, Carolynn Minnott delivered a coherent performance. Greg, who is very self-aware of his work in the movie, mailed in his performance. He admits that, even saying that he didn't bother to lick the envelope. Kudos to him, he's probably the most open guy of the cast and crew in terms of the movie, dammit he wrote the book that answered a lot of questions. So in that respect, Greg Sestero's the MVP of The Room as far as the story behind it. Dan Janjigian's the MVP in terms of acting, despite only being in one scene, and kind of pussified given how he loses the gun, still badass, blame poor writing. Tommy Wiseau's the MVP...yeah that's it. He already is on paper given that he was the writer, producer, executive producer (the other listed names are lies, Chloe Lietzke was an elderly woman who helped Tommy in his English speaking, she was not involved at all in production. Drew Caffrey was someone Tommy knew and admired when he first moved to San Francisco, he was dead years before the movie was even conceived), director, and star. Despite the good people involved, the hidden heroes that made the movie possible, it all traces back to Tommy Wiseau. For better or worse, without him, there would be no Citizen Kane of bad movies, there probably would not have been a renewed interest in “So bad it's good” movies, thus there probably wouldn't be a cult following for the next movie on the review list. Without this movie, I would not have even gotten into bad-good movies, let alone B-movies. I was building up to it a bit in the form of exploitation films, the Ilsa movies, some Jess Franco, and the Danish hardcore sex comedies of the 70s, but The Room showed me to a wider world, to a door that I could now see and open. Even I didn't see B-movies until May of 2015, 4 months after my first viewing of this film, it still offered up the possibility, an open portal. For that, I'm thankful, add on to the opinion that this is one of the funniest movies I've ever seen, if not the funniest. Uncontrollable laughter is savored from beginning to end, and it will continue to be like that until I'm dead. So, this movie is timeless in its own right. Even without the comedy, I can't deny that it's a very bizarre and fascinating movie. Even by one viewing, it's unforgettable. I love that.

Samurai Cop - And so it ends with this film. The birthday movie watching I mean. Like The Room, there's a background story to my discovery of the movie.

A few days after watching The Room for the first time, I stumbled upon The Room subreddit, and one of the newest posts at the time was a trailer for Samurai Cop 2. Tommy Wiseau of course being in it. A teaser trailer to be specific, the movie was still in production at the time. It was made possible through a Kickstarter campaign, at least for special effects and other stuff. Also, through the unveiling of star Matt Hannon (legally changed his name to Mathew Karedas) being alive. Yeah, he was thought to be dead for 2 years, because another Matt Hannon had passed away, who had done some movie stuff as a crew member of some kind. Someone even traveled to the grave site of that Matt Hannon to confirm it, and Karedas didn't bother correcting everyone, which is funny.

So knowing of a sequel being made, I researched the original. I didn't see any clips though, I just looked up on IMDB, that was it. May comes and the B-movie urge was in the air seemingly, I had watched the Evil Dead movies for the first time, consequently opening up horror movies to my film consumption. I suddenly felt like giving Samurai Cop a spin and it changed everything. After the first viewing, I made it a mission to watch more B-movies, bad-good stuff, trash, things you can't take seriously. Thus, Samurai Cop was a catalyst in making my 2015 the best movie watching year for me. I felt like my world of movie watching doubled in size, maybe even tripled, leading to me leaning towards those kind of movies a lot more than Hollywood stuff and entry level and beyond independent movies. My digestion of the movie was just like The Room, in that it was instant, the appeal registered big time. However, I think this movie made a slightly stronger first impression than The Room, because with that movie, there was just confusion along with laughter. This one was just laughter. It was easier for me to digest this given that I love action movies. Even though it's a ripoff of Lethal Weapon, I never saw the original movie. I've seen Lethal Weapon 4, so that's something. Not long after I watched Hard Ticket To Hawaii, but it took a few viewings for me to digest it as a gut-busting movie. This was just immediate. I was laughing at the dialogue, and 30 minutes into the film, when Karedas' Joe Marshall gives a stirring monologue about gangsters pushing drugs into the streets, I lost it. Specifically when he brought up the children! That still makes me laugh! It's like a horrible anti-drug PSA, but so damn funny.

The fascination with the movie continued as I discovered a UK podcast that interviewed some people from the movie, first Mark Frazer, then Mathew Karedas just a month after his daughter (not him) posted the Youtube video where he confirmed him still living, and months after, the lovely Melissa Moore. Some other interviews popped up, but the podcast interview with Karedas, originally a 2 part one, made me more fascinated with the movie, and with the man behind the Samurai Cop, Joe Marshall. A very interesting life, that includes a stint as Sylvester Stallone's bodyguard, and some criminal activity.

The cult status of the movie was pretty much solidified when that Kickstarter for the movie came up around 2 months after Karedas came back alive, a very quickly greenlit project. The man to thank for Samurai Cop's preservation and for the sequel and all that, is Gregory Hatanaka, who runs Cinema Epoch, a company that distributes a couple films, some John Woo ones, and even a classic 80s sword and sorcery film by the name of Hundra. They also do productions, Hatanaka having made a couple films, one I saw was Blue Dream, which was decent and bathed in its weirdness. It featured pornstar Kayden Kross, who is also in Samurai Cop 2. Samurai Cop was directed by Amir Shervan, and Iranian born filmmaker that decided to make American action movies. He only managed to make 5 from the late 80s to early 90s, Samurai Cop was his second last movie. The films were stashed at some studio, the myth was that they were hidden in a castle. No, just a studio, abandoned probably. Hatanaka was filming a movie at the studio, one of his actresses found the film reels, and Hatanaka sought to restore them all and distribute them. So far they released just Killing American Style and Samurai Cop. There is still Hollywood Cop, Young Rebels, and Gypsy.

Probably Shervan's golden boy was Robert Z'Dar, big scary guy that played a heavy or even the main bad guy in these Shervan movies. At least 3 of them, I don't know if he was in all 5.

As evident with The Room, a foreigner comes to the United States, wants to make a movie, doesn't have a great grasp of American sensibilities and values, writes the script as well, you get a flop in every conceivable way, but also a riot. Another bright example is Troll 2, made by an Italian director.

So Mathew Karedas' dream was to be an actor, he migrates to Los Angeles from his home in Oregon, he gets by as a security guard for establishments and even people, including Arnold Schwarzenegger. Wanting to focus more on acting, he leaves security work for a while and ends up getting in a film called “American Revenge.” I have no idea about the plot or anything, all I know is he was a coked up drug dealer in it. The bad guy. His second only film ends up being Samurai Cop, he gets the heads up about Amir Shervan casting, he turns up and is pretty much hired on the spot. It makes sense, given the guy was a powerlifting hunk in his 20s, and bore a resemblance to Sylvester Stallone. Certainly not today, one aged naturally, the other turned to HGH.

Similar to cast members of The Room, the cast of Samurai Cop, at least the ones that are alive and out there, are self-aware, they know what kind of movie they were in. So hearing Mat talk about the filming so openly and honestly was lovely. What's there to talk about?

Well, it's a movie about a cop from San Diego, who somehow already owns a nice house by the beach in Los Angeles. The cop is Joe Marshall, he got his samurai training from the “masters in Japan.” He got a tip about the dreaded Katana gang, led by the indomitable Fujiyama, who sounds a lot more American than Japanese. Shervan apparently got the guy for Fujiyama by just strolling through a mall and picking him up for some reason. Maybe he was the only Japanese person there, even though again, he speaks really clear English.

Aiding Joe in his hunt for the Katana gang is LAPD detective Frank Washington, played by Mark Frazer. Offering some help and her tits is Melissa Moore's Peggy, and Jimmy Williams as “Johnson,” at least according to the name tag on police uniform. Jimmy Williams is also seemingly another Shervan stalwart, as I saw him in Killing American Style as well. You may be asking yourself what “Katana” means. According to the Samurai Cop, it means “Japanese sword.” Yeah man!

What truly separates this movie from The Room is the budget. Despite The Room exhibiting low budget filmmaking sensibilities, this movie just takes the cake. It's the engine that powers its laughably horrible quality. Even without the interviews with the cast, it's obvious to tell that the movie is low budget, guerrilla filmmaking was the name of the game. The Room's second unite was just the director of photography at that time, Todd Barron, sound guy Zsolt, camera assistant Joe Pacella. I'm assuming it was similar for Samurai Cop, Amir Shervan with Peter Palian the Director of Photography, a sound guy, and maybe a camera assistant. Thinking back, I don't believe there were any multi-camera setups, instead it's one guy working the camera, thus scenes can have a couple cuts or hardly any. The restaurant scene where Joe goes into his epic monologue, is something to note because the camera guy got the shot of the bad guys at their dining table, Joe and Frank are there as an establishing shot, but most of it is just the Katana gang and Fujiyama's girl, played by Janis Farley. The shots of Frank and Joe's faces turned out to take place in Amir's office! This would explain why the camera cuts back and forth, because it's two different locations, not the same one, thus proving how it limiting the single camera format was. Credit to it though, it was a lot less statuary than The Room.

Furthermore on the guerrilla filmmaking is the fact they got a whole bunch of locations, but no permits for all of them. Some tricky stuff, but also examples of Amir's connections, especially the houses and backyard areas he was able to film. The blu-ray has commentary tracks, one with Frazer, another with Karedas, and another with the UK podcast I was referring to, all of them are laughs by the way, the former two of course are informative as far as the production of the film is concerned. On that note, I didn't catch the hospital was basically a composition of three different facilities. They pieced it together...decently actually. Maybe I just wasn't paying attention enough, which is acceptable given that the hospital scenes were absolute highlights of the movie. The nurse who's a total size queen, Mark Frazer's 4th wall breaking facial expressions, classic one-liner “Bingo,” and then the stuff with Robert Z'Dar and the unnamed character played by...Cameron. Redhead vixen, her credited name is just “Cameron.” She apparently appeared on Star Trek: The Next Generation with the credited name of “Cameron Oppenheimer.” I don't know, she got naked randomly in the middle of the film, so, whatever her name is, fucking hot! Full frontal and everything, more than the tall and lovely Melissa Moore. Anyways, their hospital scene was funny as Z'Dar hid in a waste disposal cart, and sliced off a guy's head (the one who caught on fire after an undercranked chase scene), with the blood being rather syrup like and sticky. Wow, talk about cheap. Fujiyama wanted that caught guy's head on his piano! Even though one never sees the head on the piano, he probably got what he wanted anyways.

The end of the hospital scene shows something that is prevalent in the whole film, the dubbing of grunts and small human sound effects, even lines. You'll notice them all sounding similar, and that's because they come from one man. Amir Shervan! That's right, he dubbed grunts and such, he even looped a line or two of Mat's. This is strange since Mat and Mark did do some post-production looping. Maybe Shervan felt he had to loop Mat's “No” in the end, but didn't have him on call, or have the money to pay him for a day's looping session. I don't know, it's strange. Also strange is the Walt Disney looking old guy that watches footage with Joe Marshall at an editing bay, the guy was dubbed over by Mark Frazer! So if he sounds like a guy putting on an older man's voice, well, that's because it was a guy putting on an older man's voice.

Fight scenes are choreographed only minutes before they are filmed, so it accounts for the fights being lacking and rather stilted, but hilarious all the time. The skill level is also something to discuss. Karedas only had combat training that a bodyguard would have, using nerve holds and quickly incapacitating someone. The fight scenes are a very broad martial arts fighting, and street fighting common in American action films. There's also, surprise surprise, sword fighting. Unfortunately nobody really knew how to use samurai swords, the most experienced guy on set was Gerald Okamura, who has a blackbelt in some form of martial arts. I don't know what exactly, but just watch his stuff in the movie, he was the only one that knew what he was doing. To be fair, the fight scene in the second floor of that restaurant (Carlos & Charlie's, a real restaurant) was actually well done. As it turned out, the guy Joe Marshall chased at the end of the scene, was the guy who choreographed that. That is funny considering the guy's chase end with him falling, the staging being way too obvious.

Someone who watches the movie will be able to spot the glaring issue at the very first scene, the Katana gang only have two Asians! Okamura and Fujiyama, and the former at least can pull off evil Japanese man talk. Okamura actually speaks clear English too, as evident in the Andy Sidaris movies he was in. It's hilarious as the other Katana gang members are mostly white, and then later Yamashita contacted some black men from New York as a hit squad. So, credit to them, a good deal of diversity, and in the car chase there was a black man, and I think a Latino. That Latino drove the ugly van that crashed, set on fire, and out came a different guy. A stunt man probably used to being set on fire, and the funny thing is that Mark and Mat had to put the guy out legitimately! All they had was a fire extinguisher (that magically grew in size from one shot to the next) and a big blanket! It was hilarious, dangerous though. Sure the guy was a professional, fire retardant gel, but damn. That burned guy ends up with his head chopped off, poor motherfucker.

This movie is less random than The Room, only in that there's more of a plot going on, which isn't saying much. It's not that subplots are raised and then dropped, but there are random things. Awkward as well, specifically the nudity and sex scenes. They are super awkward, especially the last one because clearly Janis Farley did not want to do it. Melissa Moore, a pro at those kind of scenes was totally game, as was Cameron. Those scenes however are awkward because of the bed. As is evident, there apparently was a “No breast touch” rule, as Mat and Z'Dar didn't get hands on with their partners. I almost forgot a shorter sex scene between Okamura, who was wearing only briefs, and some random brunette. Oh Lord, they kissed, and that's it, thank goodness. Damn though, middle aged, short Asian in just tightie-whities. Wow. As Karedas mentioned, in his first sex scene, with Melissa Moore, Amir apparently was close to the bed, saying “And kiss and touch,” adding to the awkwardness. If you look at the Janis Farley scene, there is a brief moment where she looked down, seemingly to where Amir was, for further direction. It was during their kissing. That scene had Mat go down south and then go back up almost instantly. HAHAHA! I wonder why, might've smelled!

Just like The Room and Troll 2, this movie is one where moments that barely have anything to do with the plot, or nothing at all, stick out big time. As mentioned earlier, the nurse scene, which was one of the first clips on Youtube of Samurai Cop, thus it served as an introduction to the film for many viewers. At the end of it, Mark Frazer came up and basically implied he had a big dick. Why? Because he's black. And in a scene where two guys (one of them apparently was Janis Farley's boyfriend at the time) invaded Frank's house, the boyfriend of Farley said he will relieve him of his “black gift.” That's right, he said “black gift” and that wasn't the only stereotyping of black people. Frank and Joe would have exchanges about the former being black. After the hilarious Roman candle explosions in the parking lot fight scene following the restaurant confrontation, Frank said the police captain will burn his ass. Joe said, “Yeah, charcoal black.” Frank said “It is black.” Joe, “Right on.” And they fived each other! HAHA! And Mark Frazer was totally down with it, showing the chemistry of him and Mat, and they basically became friends on set. That's something to praise legitimately, both guys worked well together, their chemistry would be more praised if they were just in a better movie, but ah well!

Having mentioned the captain, he represents the stereotypical angry police captain, as he cursed a whole lot, which might've been ad-lib. So many “motherfuckers” you would've thought he was a rapper. He was one of the best performers actually, Dale Cummings was the actor, he passed away unfortunately. I haven't seen him in other films, but the guy was a veteran actor, probably had the most experience out of everyone else. On that note, Z'Dar was probably the only guy who took his role really seriously, as is evident with his no-nonsense character, and only handful of unintentionally funny moments by the guy. A round of applause for him, he also passed away, last year. Very sad, but the guy before Samurai Cop did have a nice role as a prisoner in Tango & Cash, and he was in a couple PM Entertainment films. Also, most famous role, Matt Cordell, the Maniac Cop! Great trilogy overall, even though the third movie's a bit of a mess. His most notable body feature is his big jaw, which is covered considerably on account of his beard. Unfortunately he's horrible at sex scenes, and he was about as good as Mat Karedas in their sword fight confrontation.

As mentioned earlier with undercranking, there were other instances of that. Most notably in the final sword fight between Joe and Yamashita. There probably were other film quality issues at play, but Cinema Epoch cleaned them up big time, because not a lot of that stuck out. There are coloring inconsistencies, which might've been a case of poor lighting, of course the sound was badly done, hence the need for looping. Also, filming must've been bad because there were reshoots. This led to the biggest feature of the movie.

I can't believe it took this long to get to it, but here it is. After initial production, Mat had his hair cut, as a way to get more noticed in Hollywood as the beefy long haired guy thing was so 80s, this movie was shot in June 1990 and lasted a few months. Reshoots came up in December, Mat came to Amir's office with his new haircut, shocking Amir. It was justified for Mat to get his long hair cut because he was under the impression that production finished. It wasn't, despite the couple month period in between production and the reshoots. Enraged, Amir nabbed Mat and took him to a wig store in Hollywood! He snatched the nearest wig off the rack I guess, a woman's one. Mat thought the reshoots would just be faraway shots, where you wouldn't be able to tell he had a wig on. But NAH! Closeups, fight scenes, monologues, key actions and bits of dialogue, the wig is there, risking serious distraction. The pattern is almost like one shot had Mat's natural hair, the next shot is him wearing a wig! So at least half the damn movie is him wearing a freaking wig! It's absolutely hilarious, and there's even a moment where the wig comes off...



You know, in that shot, he looked like Mel Gibson, Mad Max era.

I should mention as soon as the credits finish, the first scene is a meeting of the Katana gang, and this sets the tone for the whole movie...



I have no idea what the budget of the film was, but I'm guessing it was dirt cheap. Anything in terms of effects, explosions, smoke, are done on the cheap. Roman candles, gunshots were handled by rock chucking. At least in one scene, the one with an arcade machine, apparently it was Amir's office or home, there is a shot of a small TV's screen being destroyed by gunshots. Karedas said on the commentary track that they just through rocks at the TV. Oh, forgot, paintball guns! Tose also substituted gunshots, most notably in the Roman candle display, Z'Dar had a lot of toys to play with that day. Also the famous part about that shootout was Joe Marshall using a sword on someone, and it being hilarious! I won't spoil it.

Something to note too, Frank Washington is kind of a dick, as he doesn't give fair fights. For example, someone down, he just kicks them in the face. Then again, Joe Marshall's a manwhore. He bangs Peggy, he hits on some girl at the police station, he tries to get down with a nurse, and he “falls in love” with Janis Farley's character. His “Yakama, Yamaha” line was insensitive towards Japanese people, which is contradictory to the background story that he got his training from the masters in Japan.

Also like The Room, the script is broken English, and both head honchos didn't like to stray from the script, ad-libs weren't encouraged so to speak. This is most notable in the monologue at the restaurant, as Joe said “Now I'm telling these son of a bitches.” HAHA! Classic. If I recall, one rare ad-lib was Mark Frazer's undercover cop pun. Oh yeah, also Mat had to ad-lib the chicken talk during the scene where he takes Farley's character to his house for some fun on the lady's birthday.

More I type, the more I remember things, another infamous thing from the movie is the lion head that steals the scene where Joe pays Farley's character a visit, it preceded the club fight, the one that took place on the second floor of the restaurant.



HAHA! I hope to see that lion's head in the sequel.

Some memorable music, specifically the opening and ending credits tracks, the former sounding like it came from a video game.

I'm just going all over the place, back to the car chase, the incessant use of the word “Shoot” by Joe was intentional, Amir apparently was hidden in the car, telling Mat to keep saying that word, as if Mark Frazer, the guy doing the shooting, needed that. Also there's Peggy on the helicopter, and some how being able to talk to Joe, who is on the ground, without the need of a communication device, a walkie talkie. Oh it's funny.

That's right, forgot to mention that as far as takes, complete opposite of The Room, hardly any retakes. Film costs money, obvious low budget film, Amir even ran out of money, which would explain why production needed reshoots. The man had his connections, unlike The Room, there's a buttload of locations! Mat in would praise the guy for being able to get all those locations, despite the legality of some of them coming to question.

I'm continuing on the spitballing, the restaurant scene also had some random Latino giving some info that Frank and Joe wanted, but then went completely off tangent, talking about his cousin, his overly long name, and...stuff. He talked like a stereotypical gay man. This was the only time the film tried to be funny, and it's actually one of the weaker scenes in the movie, imagine that. The dialogue by Mat and Mark saved it, they sounded more upbeat in that, which brings up the fact that Amir wanted them to speak a certain way, that came off as monotone, especially for Mat's character. Also, with poor sound and boom mic handling, everyone had to raise their voices, thus exposing acting flaws a lot. Just adds on to the comedy!

Watching a lot of the people that die in the film is also a laugh, a lot of them milk their time on screen, most notably two big black men in two different scenes, one in the middle of the movie, the Roman candle and paintball business, and the final shootout that concluded with the epic Katana blade fight. Oh yeah with Joe being a whore, Peggy is one too, sleeping with all the guys in the police station. Before the Okamura bust as he was trying to make love to a woman, Peggy replied to Mark's comment that the captain would cut his dick off. She said “Let's use it before you lose it.” So she likes the black gift! Then she said she and Johnson should fuck, the dude told her to shut up! He turned her down, but it's revealed later that he has a wife. Still, wow! Look at her! Tall, long blonde hair, great tits, a decent butt, come on now.

That Okamura fight scene not only had the wig mishap, but a glaring example of the continuity flaws the film has in spades. Namely, the locations, as it's clear the fight scene took place in multiple locations, a great deal of house scenes took place in multiple locations. I think the few exceptions are the cop characters' houses. On that note, Johnson's house is funny because it has a bunch of awards on a wall, apparently the owner of the house was a martial arts master. Those awards are for his martial arts competitions, and Johnson doesn't get into any fighting whatsoever, thus that's a big lie. Oh, wait, Joe's house is by a beach, but for some reason there is a pool location, definitely not the same location. You get the idea, also along those lines, a scene would be shot in different times of a day, different times of a year! This coincided with the production and then the reshoots, as the former took place in the Summer, the latter took place in early Winter, spilling into 1991 (as evident in the editing bay scene's calendar. Thus one can tell by the trees, the leaves, that the movie's a mess of continuity issues. All the more reason it's endearing and hilarious.

Ah well, going back to the Okamura scene, he did speak clear English, but I still think his Japanese is stronger than Fujiyama's. Moving on, Mat kind of took the piss during the scene, making those three fingered gestures, the metal/rock horns, only with the thumb also out. Speaking of thumbs, in the Yamashita fight scene, he punched him with his thumb tucked between two fingers. That's impractical and just plain silly! Par for the course then!

Freaking black gift scene was also a laugh because you're supposed to believe that Frank was naked, he got out of the shower, there's his towel, but, yeah. Naked? Hmm. Still weird how Farley's boyfriend basically held a knife to his dick with one hand, and the other...yeah! Haha!

Back to Z'Dar, dude really did take his part in the movie seriously, the scenes where he and his guys invade Johnson and Peggy's homes have him really being a no-nonsense motherfucker. The former is serious, but makes me laugh in the end, while the Peggy one is just serious, and even a bit cringe inducing on paper. Very well done actually.

Ladies will love Joe's swimsuit.



As far as cars, there's the old Caprice that was beat to shit, Frank's ride apparently. Joe drives some Honda car, which was/is Mat's actual car. He still owns it! So that's another thing I hope is in the sequel. Robert Z'Dar had his own car(s). I don't know if he had more than one, as his character rode in two. One of them was...a Suzuki Samurai! I am not kidding!



Also I just had to make a gif of this. After the captain scolds Joe and Frank, and the latter kisses him on the head, he does this, which had to be a case of not knowing that the camera was still rolling.



He said he felt like he had a big club stuck up his ass, and it hurts, and he's trying to figure out how to remove it! HAHA! One of the henchmen in the final shootout had a Metallica shirt on, but he had it worn inside out. Hilarious, I bet Amir made that happen. He also had a blonde mullet, wannabe James Hetfield I guess. Oh yeah, that shootout also had one of the henchmen that appears a bunch of times in the film, take a hard landing on the back of his head, selling his death, whiplash. Oh haha! Whiplash, Metallica song. Wow. Timely comment then.

I think the final fight scene between Karedas and Z'Dar sum up the whole film. The undercranking, the seasonal changes, the wig, the hilarious facial expressions that look like a cross between constipation and taking something huge anally, the sloppy fighting, the hilarious end. Yeah, everything Samurai Cop is in a nutshell.

Like The Room, it must be stressed that this movie is a mess in terms of production. The camera work is cheap, everything is cheap in the movie really. The explosions, the action, the sword play. Dialogue that is laughably bad, characters that are poorly written, scenes that are poorly written, broken English hindering dialogue a great deal. Random sex scenes void of comfortable performances, the movie's the lowest level of grindhouse movies. Those kind of movies sell violence, sex, and a real badass attitude with a very gritty and dirty appeal. Plus they're cheap. This film looks like a B-movie, but with a budget that has to be Z-level. It's like he poorly conceived son of Grindhouse, it's no coincidence it was filmed in 1990-1991, released in 1991, after the grindhouse erra of the 60s-80s.

But these flaws are what makes the film enjoyable! Compared to The Room, the first impression is stronger. Replay value is very high, as I do find myself laughing more at certain parts in subsequent viewings. As far as which is better, it'd be hard to choose, as both have advantages over the other. So it's preference, two different genres anyway, drama vs. action. Given that I grew up on Jackie Chan movies, and some action films, this film is theoretically more endearing to me. It is very endearing, but I can't say if it beats The Room in that, nor can I say that movie beats Samurai Cop in that department. Both Amir Shervan and Tommy Wiseau, by all accounts are lovable tyrants. That term, I thank Mark Frazer for, as that's how he described Amir Shervan. Both guys had their vision on what their films should be, and they didn't let anyone get in their way. With Shervan though, it could be that he didn't have a lot of people that would interfere in the first place. As Karedas mentioned, initial production had more of a crew, there was a script supervisor, makeup, more stagehands I guess. But as production wore on, the personnel disappeared, Amir running out of money. The reshoots were pretty much Shervan, Peter Palian, a sound guy and I guess a boom mic operator, and I think just Mat, Mark, and Robert! I know for sure that Melissa Moore wasn't part of the reshoots, as you can see that her scenes with Mat were during his long hair period.

It's truly astounding how the reshoots took up at least half the film, it makes me wonder how Amir relayed that the film was done after principal photography. Whatever the case, Shervan does deserve respect like Tommy Wiseau, they went for it, stuck to their guns, good or bad, they brought their creations to the world. That's what artists do, and Shervan managed to do it 5 times, wheres Tommy only made one movie and a sitcom. Different worlds and budgets, but still. The movie deserves the revival it got, the cult following it gained, it's fucking entertaining, it's a huge riot. It will never get old for me, like The Room, like Pulp Fiction, like some other movies. Even though they're different, at least those three films are extremely high up on my list, no other films go over them. Like a holy trinity. I think even Tarantino loves Samurai Cop, Karedas said Quentin and Robert Rodriguez had the movie in their own top 5 lists.

Anyways, Samurai Cop, so horrible, it's a masterpiece.

I am surprised that those last three reviews did end up being long. I was just in the zone, and when that happens, I just type and type and type. So they weren't fast jobs, but I'm fine with that, I took my time, enjoyed the typing while it lasted, and stopped and took breaks or slept when it got too boring and tedious. Ah well, I'm content with it all. Moving on...

Watched on Groundhog Day

Groundhog Day – Obviously. I've seen the film a couple times, but it's definitely the first time I watched it on February 2. Unfortunately Punxsutawney Phil didn't see his shadow, meaning there will be an “early spring.” Oh boy, and this coming after an epic snowstorm. I guess for this Winter, it's a 1 hit wonder kind of deal. As a Pennsylvania native, I didn't really know about Phil and the silly tradition with that groundhog. West Pennsylvania, I'm in the East, apparently there are serious differences. Anyways, this movie, directed by the late Harold Ramis, starring the one of a kind Bill Murray, with a nice looking lady in Andie McDowell, and funny supporting character Chris Elliot, is a rather unique, fun movie.

Lovingly, decades later, a certain action movie called “Edge of Tomorrow” has been referred to as a sci-fi action version of Groundhog Day, which speaks of how unique this film is. It's a comedy, there is some romance, the story sets it apart, Bill Murray sets it apart. Him and dry humor in this romcom...ish movie, it's interesting at least for me.

Bill Murray's local weatherman character Phil heads out to Punxsutawney to report on the groundhog and his shadow gimmick. Ah man, alright there's this guy Ned who jumps on Phil after he leaves the bed and breakfast inn. I keep thinking the guy who played Ned, is Rick Moranis. That's not right, he totally looks like Moranis though, but it's Stephen Tobolowsky. “Sure as heckfire.” HAHA, that did make me think, he had to be inspired by Ned Flanders, there's a Flanders thing to him. Total goober.

I always wondered about Andie McDowell's teeth in the film. Yeah, they're quite...not white. Yeah, ohhh! I never noticed this before, when Phil did his countdown following the groundhog of the same name seeing his shadow, he flipped the bird. The whole 5-4-3-2-1 with the fingers, I never noticed that before! I had to go back to make sure. That's funny.

Phil predicted a snowstorm that would blow over and not impact the Pittsburgh area, where Punxsutawney is. It didn't, so it makes me wonder if that causes the time loop. A magic snowstowm, it dug into the core of the Earth and made its rotation around the sun, twisted. Where at a certain time, it suddenly rotates in reverse a full day's worth, thus the repeat. I never really theorized how this happened. It could be the damn groundhog, he's secretly a sorcerer! Why Phil isn't affected, it has to be because he is a weatherman. Yeah, this goes back to the magic snowstorm. Since he went against that a blizzard would hit that southwest area of Pennsylvania, he had to suffer this. He went against Mother Nature, and so she got Father Time to essentially fuck with him.

Theories aside, I would surmise the film was done where they'd do multiple takes, and obviously takes would be done differently to represent the different events and situations in this one day. Bill Murray and Ramis had a falling out that lasted until the latter's passing, which makes me wonder if the filming of this caused it. I would think it was exhausting. By the time Phil and Rita chat in the diner, there's two repeats of the day, specifically showing the morning. The radio broadcast, the same dialogue, the filming of the groundhog segment, and dude realizes already about him living the day over and over quickly. As in on the first repeat, and he did a test on that day, the broken pencil. Restart, the pencil is fixed. On the third repeat, there's the diner scene and other new stuff. Phil went to a doctor, played by Harold Ramis, and then a psychologist who didn't know jack shit about Phil's problems, only specializing in couples. Then there's a funny scene with two drunk hicks, one of them played by Rick Ducommun! It's interesting how this big post has a lot of the same names. Everything's connected. Murray too, having watched Space Jam last month. Phil has a wild night out, realizing he won't suffer repercussions due to this time loop. He can do whatever he wants, so he goes “fuck the police” and has a wild ride in a car with the 2 drunk imbeciles.

It just gets funnier! There's the classic scene in repeat 4 where Phil punches Ned!



I wish I could be Phil in that diner scene, him eating all those pastries, fattening food! I don't think I could handle it though, I would need gallons of water or something, chocolate milk is my arch enemy in past all you can eat events. Rita in that scene shared a Walter Scott quote, I guess it's about someone who suffers a downfall from avarice or gluttony. Anyways, repeat 4 ends with Phil getting some info from this lovely looking woman. Repeat 5, he uses that info to bag her! Brilliant! This ends according to plan, though it reveals that Phil has Rita on his mind. She's a nice looking woman, but that Nancy was nicer looking.

After this, the repeat count is just not easy to guess. Phil's able to jack money off the back of a truck, as he mouthed off the steps and actions of the waitress at the diner, and the two old guys tasked with the money. So, yeah, I'm done counting. Next up, he ends up dressing like the Man with No Name, while with a girl dressed as a sexy maid. They were going to see a movie, but it's not shown what the film is. Was it A Fistful of Dollars? There's also him wanting to be called “Bronco.” I just think of the 1980 Clint Eastwood film, “Bronco Billy.”

One night stands over, he tries to bag Rita. Not for a one night stand though. He does the trick with Rita, but it takes a lot of repeats to get this woman nice and ready to be his partner. Something I didn't pick up before, I think Phil sabotaged the van. I guess so that Rita wouldn't go far in the town, and he'd be in Phil's range, without stalking, stuck in the Pennsylvania Hotel. I don't know, there's just the image of him having some separated part from the van in his hand.

Alright, so things advanced with this romance to the point where Phil uses French poetry to really impress Rita. Dude, is this woman that picky about her ideal man? He has to know French poetry to basically make her wet. Definitely though there's Phil's charm and sarcasm, traits of Bill Murray. Making a snowman, throwing snowballs and young people, dancing out in the night, it's the perfect day, according to Rita. It becomes too perfect, and coordinated, meaning Phil's a stalker! At least that's what Rita thinks, I believe. More botches and things went downhill for Phil. To the point where he's reduced to nailing Jeopardy questions. Fuck the Punxsutawney Phil tradition, fuck the alarm clock even...



Fuck Punxustawney Phil! Phil kidnapped Phil! Wait a minute! Chris Elliot's Larry basically implied Phil would boink the groundhog, calling him a “pervert.” HAHA! I don't even remember that line, wow. The little bastard actually bit Bill Murray twice during filming, and he had to get anti-rabies shots. This possibly perverted suicide plan ends like an action movie scene!



It is really dark, and it didn't end there, Phil basically wanting to kill himself. But he can't because of the time loop. The last one was ridiculous, obvious stunt double, which is kind of funny. Phil then shows he's a god. He gave a nice explanation about God, that he's been around long enough to know everyone and everything. Makes sense. Oh as it turns out, when Larry comes over to take Phil and Rita to the van to drive out of the town, it does make me think again that Phil sabotaged the van earlier in the film. He was able to convince Rita about his special situation, gosh, what a nice woman. 6AM is the restart time, I should've noted that earlier, the alarm always goes off at that time. Just that this late night scene where Phil and Rita are getting cozy together is when the former mentions 6AM as the restart time. Rita looked at the positive of living the same day over and over, which does inspire Phil to basically be a generous man. Given the God talk, Phil kind of becomes Bruce Almighty. On that note, he buys his way into piano lessons and it leads to a little girl being thrown out by the teacher. Well now.

HAHA! Phil killed Ned with kindness. Maybe it's gayness though, given how he hugged and talked to the guy. I didn't realize it was that. Things took a really sad turn with the old homeless man. I keep remembering that and thinking it was cancer that did him in. It wasn't, but none less sad. There's the kid falling off a tree, fucking brat never thanked Phil. But them GILFs man! At least they thanked Phil for his nice deed with their car.

Fast forward to this big party, and freaking Phil gave the newlywed couple, tickets to Wrestlemania! This was 1993, Wrestlemania IX was the show, and that took place in Las Vegas, and it was...not a good show. I felt bad for the couple, fucking Hulk Hogan ruined the show, also Giant Gonzales. Then there's the bachelor auction thing, Phil is sold at a high price to Rita, but Larry's not so lucky, but the old ladies are nice looking though!

Even though I saw the film multiple times, the ending just came. It happened. It's not bad at all, just that I was a bit distracted this time and was thrown off guard how things solved itself. Love solves everything I guess. Again, this was all on Phil, beyond just his wrong prediction, it was all about bringing this guy to the best possible version of himself. Not godlike, not vain, not depressed, but, hmm, at Rita's level really. Here is as this humble, kind, a bit too idealistic, but just a fine lady. The casting of McDowell might be based on the fact he's no model like leading lady, rather a brunette version of Meg Ryan from the 80s. Actually, like Sigourney Weaver, and it's interesting that came to mind because of Ghostbusters, Murray and Ramis being 2 of the legendary foursome. Yeah, makes sense to me. So the film's about correcting this man, it's common in romcoms, bring the flawed man to a more likable, corrected level, if that makes sense. Bill Murray though is always likable, and as a result, this romcom...ish movie really stands out, even before bringing the story's uniqueness up.

Such a great film, its magic hasn't been lost out on me. It's really funny, there are touches of sadness, it ends on a positive note, there's a warmness to the film. I can see why it's on IMDB's top 250, still. I've noticed it being there for years. It's just a brilliantly written, brilliantly acted movie. It looks really down to Earth, the location of Punxsotawney helps paint that. I want to visit there, get fascinated in road trips passing by small Pennsylvania towns. One time me and one of my sisters just walked around Cambridge Springs, which is near Erie, and I liked it. Not a metropolis, but it's interestingly a place where you don't walk around for long and you spot a place to visit that is useful and satisfying. A gas station here, a little diner there, that center city, definitely less crowded...and less ethnically diverse than my center city.

I looked at IMDB trivia to find out about the reasons behind the falling out between Harold Ramis and Bill Murray. One bit said how Murray went through a divorce during filming and was obsessing over the movie. He would ring Ramis constantly, often in the early hours of the morning. Ramis eventually sent the guy he wrote this film with, Danny Rubin, to sit with Murray and iron out his anxieties. It was said to be one of the reasons Murray stopped speaking to Ramis. Sounds like a director not wanting to tend to his star of the film, but probably because a limit was reached. It can happen.

Anyways, a small town gets a big on-camera treatment, but not in a Twin Peaks way. Rather, interesting, maybe magic hidden inside, but without murder and strange occurrences and characters. No Laura Palmer. Back to the subject at hand, yeah, classic movie of the 90s, classic Bill Murray movie. Without it, there probably wouldn't be an Edge of Tomorrow, which is a great film by the way. Unfortunately it marks the end of the Harold Ramis/Bill Murray collaborations, but what a swansong!

Watched on March 22

Limitless – I won't spend too much time on this review. It was a first time watch, and it didn't come off my queue. Someone I talked to a couple times so far this year suggested a movie watching date. Done through Skype, we'd watch a movie together, making sure our playthroughs are synced. There were some holdups, but we managed to watch all of it together. Thus this review probably couldn't be a full one as I had equal share of entertainment through the movie watching with someone along with the movie itself. A great experience, I hope we do more.

But I did manage to see the movie and get it. Not like our conversation during the film was distracting, it was like we were sitting together at a couch watching the film anyways. Quickly, the plot involves Bradley Cooper's character being a washed out bum that looks like a grunge rocker. His life turns around big time thanks to his ex-wife's brother hooking up with a wonder drug that taps into all of the human brain, the movie claims we only access 20% of it. The movie does a bit too much glamorizing on the highs, which are major, but also with punishing lows that are fantastic to watch. The camera work and coloring effect was awesome, when Cooper's on a high, everything is bright, multi-colored, positive vibes all around. When Cooper comes down and goes through withdrawal, it's blue and gray, it's dreary. Mixing these two color palettes was really ingenious, creating a nice flow to the story.

Robert De Niro has a great supporting role as some big corporate head that Cooper works with after suddenly becoming a successful business god. Despite Cooper's enhanced capabilities, De Niro's character really shows to not be a slow turtle, in fact the ending was a brilliant power play exchange between the two characters, showing that you don't need to be on the drug to kick a little ass intellectually. There's some narration in the film, which wasn't overbearing, done by Cooper. There's some sexy stuff, one pair of boobs, Cooper being able to get some action. The conflict of the film is Cooper's addiction to the drug, him being accused of a couple murders, being targeted by this trenchcoat wearing geezer that actually kicks ass, and then some drug dealing with a damn Russian guy. That was a bit bothersome, they played up the Russian cliché, the guy in question not being a fresh character, which is sad considering the movie is a fresh take on the thriller/mystery genre. It is a unique movie, but sometimes non-unique things permeate.

The most startling thing about the movie, that impressed me big time, was the violence! I was surprised because the movie's PG-13, the nudity alone shocked me. Still, the violence was damn good! Well timed, the movie is mostly a thriller/mystery, but it sure knew when to get brutal. Specifically the big scuffle in the end between Cooper and the Russian guy and his henchmen, that was awesome. Very tense, we both loved that scene. On that note, we shared a lot in common as far as opinions over the movie, what it did right, what it did wrong. No arguments over things, which was great. The movie wrapped up really well, though I expected more of a bad ending for Cooper. It'll make sense if one hasn't watched It and takes the plunge.

Anyways, even if I watched this movie by myself, I probably would've sped up the review as part of this really long post. I think I tped a good deal though. Summarizing it, the film features great performances, especially by wise old cutthroat De Niro and suave, slick, and cool Bradley Cooper. Trenchcoat geezer (to specify, a hitman for a certain character) was a surprisingly memorable character. He didn't talk, for one, so he proved actions speak louder than words. Fantastic use of color palettes, a very entertaining modern movie. I lean towards older films, especially 70s-90s stuff, but this movie really proved there is some good stuff rocking the 2010s, especially one that is original. I haven't seen the TV show of the same name. Maybe I will, especially since Cooper appears in it. This movie signaled Cooper's turn away from the raucous comedies, Wedding Crashers and The Hangover movies to be specific. He went into very serious films and this one proved to be another knockout. I did enjoy Silver Linings Playbook, American Hustle and American Sniper, so I know how good Cooper is in the serious film department, probably even better than his funny stuff. Mentioning that, as I said, he started out looking like a grunge rocker, then looked like his Phil character from The Hangover, and in the end, looking like his douchebag character from Wedding Crashers. Just some observations. The movie went by really quick too, at 105 minutes, the time just zipped by, which in general is a good indication for the film's quality. This film's quality is high, great stuff.

Finally done! I put a couple things over finishing these movie reviews. I did break my rule about not watching movies until I finished the reviews, only because I wanted to watch Limitless with the guy. It was worth it, especially how that particular movie's review came out, a really quick one for me, which I really wanted and needed. So this long post is 3 months in the making, and given that, I need to chill and just watch movies. Granted, it's not like this was an everyday burden, but the urge of wanting to watch movies again since seeing Limitless got so big that I wanted to knock this out as soon as possible. I let watching cams, beating sleep, and then getting more sleep at more segmented time periods, watching Fresh Prince, making GIFs, and of course work, take over priorities like these reviews. Ah well, at least I'm done. The queue ballooned big time as I kept adding to it. Without watching, it grew so huge, the number at the time of this post, 646. That's a lot of movies. I'll manage.

One last thing, I breezed through spell check, I just want to get this posted, proofreading be damned.

[frakacylon]

Wow mate

Bruce - The scar on his right shoulder is from surgery due to complications from a broken arm when he was 17. The one on his arse is from when Stallone booted him off the expendables....heh.

You should watch the lethal weapons, Mel Gibson plays a nutjob really well (go figure).
I watched Conspiracy Theory a few days ago on amazon, it showed Mels' acting of someone that aint quite right well and also features Pat Stewart in a rarish bad guy role (the only other one i can think off of the top of my head was a 'toy soldiers' knock off which sees Pat riding through the sewers on a ATV wearing a Manchester United top booo)

Il finish reading your mighty post the morn mate, after some much needed sleep. Hopefully I can once again resist the urge to quote you...

[FalunGonged]

London has fallen is.......
2/10

[Sir Honkers]

Batman: Assault On Arkham. What can I say, I like deep and meaningful films.

[palo5]

Joulupukki, "Christmas goat" or "Yule Goat" in Finnish.

Christmas goat?

Maybe I misunderstood, but Joulupukki is "Santa Claus" in Finnish. Finnish tradition says Santa comes from Finland. He's said to live on Korvatunturi, a mountain in eastern Lapland

[MaxJoker]

Finding This



A meandering cheapo retread banal Sci Fi (Without the Sci Fi) movie for kids.



Kids without heads.



Thus unable to grasp just how bleeding pointless this by the numbers nonsense actually is.



The lucky devils



I figured out (Despite barely paying attention) the shock twist (Plus what passed for a plot) as soon as a certain well known actor baddie rolled into the forest.
Intend to fast forward through the rest.
Not least as apart from that certain well known actor baddie.
Everybody else on screen is embarrassingly awful.

[Ghaleon]

Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice – Review

Quite a few years ago there was a video making its rounds of the internet that spoofed the then popular “I’m a Mac & I’m a P.C.” with “I’m a Marvel & I’m a D.C.” referring to the two major comic book companies and their respective film franchises. It is still out there if you look for it.

In them, one of the respective characters from each company talks about their upcoming slate of films and of course, Marvel was on top with the box office hits like Iron Man and Thor. While D.C. at the time was banking on 1998’s Superman Lives and fans of comic book movies all know how that turned out.

Flash forward to 2013 and Marvel was still raking it in at the box office and expanding their universe, while DC had just released Man of Steel to very polarizing reviews. Either you loved it or loathed it. In either case it was to be the first step in a second attempt to forge a cinematic universe that could rival Marvel’s.

The next step is in theaters now in the form of a comic book fan’s dream; Batman fighting Superman. But unlike Man of Steel, it’s been savaged by movie critics receiving as of this writing a 29% score on Rotten Tomatoes, but the audience has ignored that and it has done some awesome box office in its opening weekend. With these two things in mind, I was a bit wary going in to see it for myself.

But it’s not as bad of a movie the critics make it out to be.

The story starts off following the origins of Batman. Young Bruce Wayne watches his parents gunned down outside a movie theater and as their caskets are being taken to the family crypt he runs off and crashes through some rotted boards into a cave full of bats that swirl around, lifting him out of the hole he had fallen into.

We move ahead to where an adult Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck) is racing through the streets of Metropolis to evacuate the Wayne Enterprises building there. And he is doing this right in the midst of the battle between General Zod and Superman that took place during Man of Steel. And this does tie the two films, loosely, together.

However, he is a bit too late as he watches Superman’s laser vision slice through the upper half of the building sending it crashing into the street. It also raises a dust cloud that surges down the street that some might find eerily reminiscent of what happened to the towers of the World Trade Center after they collapsed on 9/11.

He does make it through the cloud and aids in the rescue of a security guard whose legs are pinned under a steel beam and a little girl who is nearly killed by some unstable debris. As he comforts her because her mother was in the part of the building that fell, he watches in anger as Superman and Zod continue to do battle with no consequence to the mayhem and death below..

We move ahead 18 months and find Lois Lane (Amy Adams) visiting a terrorist training camp to get an interview with its leader when they discover her photographer is a CIA plant. And he’s offed. But the man who does that also offs the terrorist leader’s group with some special bullets that no one can identify when Lois digs one out of her journal a bit later in the film. Superman (Henry Cavill) flies in to the rescue but is blamed for killing the terrorists as the ones who actually did it have fled.

Meanwhile, Batman is tracking down leads in Gotham that are leading him to a kingpin of the underworld who may have contacts that can lead him to some kryptonite he then wants to use to battle Superman. And in order to do that, he needs to get into Lex Luthor’s facility and grab some computer files. As by happenstance, he gets in invitation to a party being thrown by Lex (Jesse Eisenberg). Also at this party are Clark Kent and a mysterious woman (Gal Gadot) who grabs the files Bruce has downloaded and speeds away.

Lex of course has his own agenda for the kryptonite; to use it as a “deterrent” against alien beings like Superman, but is denied by Senator Finch (Holly Hunter) who is holding hearings into things Superman has done. But he convinces an aide to let him have access to a Kryptonian ship that crashed into Metropolis and the body of the late General Zod.

Lex also befriends the security guard who lost his legs after having them pinned under that steel beam earlier in the movie and gets a new wheelchair. He is encouraged to speak to Senator Finch and tell what happened to him. A special hearing is set up at which Superman will testify, but just after his arrival in the hearing room at the US Capitol building, a bomb in said wheelchair blows up and kills many, but leaves Superman unscathed and questioning whether or not he is doing any good.

But while Superman is in self-imposed exile, Batman has broken into the LexCorp labs and stolen the kryptonite and has weaponized it in the form of tear gas shots and a spear with a blade of it. And he summons Superman to do battle via the Batsignal. Lex has gotten into the heart of the scout ship and uses it along with General Zod’s body & some of his own blood to create a powerful monster, which you know who it is if you’ve seen the previews.

So how does the fight turn out? Well, if you’ve read enough of my reviews, I don’t give out any spoilers so you’ll have to head for the theater and see for yourself.

And where do I stand on this movie. Well, I liked it, but it could have been better.

The film runs for 151 minutes which I think is at least 30 minutes too long. We all know, or at the very least should know, how Bruce Wayne’s parents were killed and how he came to adopt the bat motif as his vigilante alter ego.

Also the battle with the monster of Lex Luthor’s creation felt like it was shoehorned in and really didn’t need to be part of this film. Maybe in a later one it might work. But not here I’m sad to say.

On the positive side, Ben Affleck does the role of Bruce/Batman well, despite a great deal of negativity when his casting was announced. He is what I would’ve pictured as an older and tired Batman. One who grows weary of fighting petty criminals only to have more crop up.

Jesse Eisenberg also does a good job at “Alexander Luthor, Jr.” walking a fine line between egomaniacal genius/high tech CEO and an over the top lunatic who relishes in total destruction.

I will also add that on the positive side that this movie does lay the foundation for building a universe similar to Marvel’s. With the introduction of characters like Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot doing the job very well and seeming to have a little fun battling the Lex created monster); The Flash, Aquaman and Cyborg also make cameo appearances in those aforementioned stolen computer files.

However, if DC wants this universe to have any chance of success, they need to tighten up the writing and make the stories relate to one another. Also, inject a little humor into the future films. They don’t need to be dark. And have one overall nemesis, like Thanos is in the Marvel films.

One last note, when this film hits on Blu-ray, it is rumored that there will be an “ultimate” edition that features an R-rated cut that is even 30 minutes longer. It will be interesting what additional footage does to the story.

My Grade – B

Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice – Warner Bros./DC Entertainment
Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action throughout, and some sensuality.
Running Time – 151 Minutes

[CARLTON BROWN]

Black Mass 2016.

I was looking forward to this Johnny Depp, period gangster movie, but ended up hating it. A dreary, sleazy film with unpleasant characters you will find hard to like in any way. The dialogue relies on the use of the word fuck in almost every other line and this becomes a real bore after 20 minutes. I'm sorry to say that I can't find anything good to say about this movie and consider it a total waste of time and money.

2/10

[Oh hi Mark!]

Originally Posted by palo5

Christmas goat?

Maybe I misunderstood, but Joulupukki is "Santa Claus" in Finnish. Finnish tradition says Santa comes from Finland. He's said to live on Korvatunturi, a mountain in eastern Lapland

Wiki was my friend on that.

Joulupukki is a Finnish Christmas figure. The name "Joulupukki" literally means "Christmas goat" or "Yule Goat" in Finnish; the word pukki comes from the Teutonic root bock, which is a cognate of the English "buck", "Puck", and means "billy-goat". An old Scandinavian custom, the figure eventually became more or less conflated with Santa Claus.