"There can be only one!", 2 December 2017
Connor MacLeod (Christopher Lambert) is an immortal Scottish swordsman who must do battle with others of his kind in modern day America. The battle will leave only one immortal left alive. Because as we're told repeatedly, "There can be only one!"
I doubt I've actually watched all of Highlander since I saw it in the theater back in 1986. Overall, it's a pretty fun experience with plenty of fights, mystical mumbo-jumbo, and a wonderfully over-the-top performance form scene chewing Sean Connery. I love the scene where Lambert calls Connery a "Spanish peacock". Good stuff. But the highlight for me has to be Clancy Brown as the evil Krugan. He's amazing. The voice, the menacing size, and the pure delight in his eyes during his fight scenes really make Highlander special. It's a really enjoyable performance.
I also enjoy all the mixed-up accents in Highlander. Clancy Brown is from a supposed ancient race of fighters, yet sounds like he's from modern day America. Lambert, despite his French accent, is a Scotsman. And the decidedly Scottish Connery is Spainish in the film. How bizarre.
Other than reeking of the worst of the 80s, my biggest complaint with the movie is with the sound. The looping and dubbing are horrible. It gets very distracting every once in a while. I think every line Lambert utters was dropped in in post. Ugh.
7/10
"He paid in fluke. Fluke is a fish, Matt.", 1 December 2017
Blinded as a child when a vat of radioactive goo hits his face, Matt Murdock discovers his other senses have been uber-heightened. As he grows, he trains as a fighter and learns to use his newly found powers to fight for good. That "good" includes bringing down Kingpin – the city's biggest crime lord and the man ultimately responsible for the death of his love, Elektra.
This was a first time viewing for me. It may not be fair, but watching the 2003 Daredevil film in 2017, it's impossible not to compare it with the Netflix series. Let's see – they both, obviously, feature the blind titular hero. They both feature a ruthless criminal named Kingpin. They both feature a love interest / fighter named Electra. And they both feature a lot of fight scenes. But beyond these superficial similarities, the movie and the series couldn't be more different. Ben Affleck looks horribly stiff – especially in his fight scenes. His movements are unnatural. Michael Clark Duncan might have been a wonderful actor, but like Affleck, he's also stiff - too stiff to be an effective Kingpin. I don't think the weight he gained for the role did him any favors. As bad as Affleck looks in the fight scenes, Jennifer Garner as Elektra is even worse. She looks like someone in an aerobic kickboxing class, not someone who could actually hurt you in a fight. Finally, while both films feature a ton of fighting, the stuff in the movie is child's play in comparison with the brutality displayed in the series. The fight scenes from Netflix's Daredevil are miles better and way more convincing.
If all that weren't bad enough, the 2003 movie also features an over- the-top Colin Farrell as Bullseye (and I don't mean over-the-top in a good way like I often do), a duller than dirt screenplay (boring), and a lot of bad CGI (the movie looks horrible). To put it bluntly, the movie stinks. I'm being terribly generous by giving it a 3/10.
3/10
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2+5: Missione Hydra
Confusing but fun, 30 November 2017
I haven't done this in a while, but for Star Pilot, I'm going to use the plot summary from IMDb: "Aliens from the constellation Hydra crash-land on the island of Sardinia. A prominent scientist, his daughter, several young technicians, and a pair of Oriental spies are taken hostage by the beings so they can use them to repair their spaceship's broken engine. With that done, they take off towards their home planet, taking the earthlings with them. However, the humans attempt to mutiny against their captors, inadvertently sending their tiny spaceship hurtling into the infinite beyond."
I used the IMDb plot summary because, even after watching Star Pilot, I'm not entirely sure what it was all about. The movie made very little sense to me. But even though I may have been confused during most of the movie, parts of it were still a lot of fun in a campy / cheesy sort of way. Instead of the usual write-up I do, here are a few random thoughts I have regarding Star Pilot:
1. While the cast wasn't much to write home about, it's always cool seeing Kirk Morris and Gordon Mitchell outside a Sword and Sandal film. I just wish Mitchell had been in the film for more than 20 seconds. Other than getting his name in the credits, I'm not really sure why the filmmakers even bothered.
2. There's a decent size chunk of the film "borrowed" from Doomsday Machine. The differences in film quality, acting, and everything else is a little jarring. It's shocking just how good the stuff from Doomsday Machine looks in comparison. The clips include a scene with Casey Kasem – minus Kasem's very recognizable voice.
3. Why bother with the Chinese secret agents? It adds absolutely nothing to the plot. It seems like such an unnecessary plot detail that amounts to nothing in the end.
4. I suppose that if I had to pick a highlight, it would be actress Leontine May's ever-shrinking wardrobe. She begins the film fairly modestly dressed, but by the end, she's wearing a full body fishnet with a few strategically placed feathers.
In some ways, the 5/10 I've given Star Pilot may not be fair. The copy I watched seemed to be horribly cut-up. IMDb lists a runtime of 89 minutes. The version I watched was only 81 minutes. I'm not sure how much difference the extra 8 minutes would make, but I'd certainly be up for giving it another go with a complete copy.
5/10
"You should know, I'm a black belt.", 29 November 2017
Rising Sun is basically a buddy-cop movie paring the unlikely duo of Sean Connery and Wesley Snipes. In the movie, both are cops who have a working relationship with the local Asian-American community. So, when a murder occurs during a party at the Nakamoto Company's American headquarters, they are called in to help with the investigation.
First, I'm not going to go into detail on the racial / racist aspects of the film that you can read about in other posts. I'll just limit my comments to this – making the baddies in this movie Japanese does not automatically make it a racist film. I've read a number of comments that seem to indicate that if you make a group (whether it's Asian, African-American, Jewish, or whatever) the bad guys, then you're a racist. If you believe in this argument, then I suppose the only safe group that can play the bad guys are white dudes. Just like good guys, bad guys should and do come from every imaginable race or ethnic group. I suppose the filmmakers could have done a better job of presenting more Asians in a positive light, but the movie was already bloated enough without cowing to PC drivel.
Anyway, as for Rising Sun, overall I'm going to call it about average. The film has a few nice action sequences, enjoyable performances from Connery and Snipes, and a plot with enough twists and turns (even though the real killer's identity is as obvious as the hand in front of your face) to keep me reasonably interested throughout. I guess my favorite bits were (1) the way Tia Carerra uncovered the altered video (interesting) and (2) watching Snipes use his marital arts skills near the end of the film (awesome). Also, similar to his Bond film, You Only Live Twice, I got a real kick out of Connery's alleged expertise in all things Japanese. That may be the most racist part of the film, but Connery is so hysterical I can't help but be entertained (Note: I'm laughing at Connery – not Japanese customs or people).
As for what didn't work for me, like the last film I wrote about, Rising Sun is horribly bloated. At over two hours in length, it overstays its welcome by about 30 minutes. There are so many things that could have been cut without really affecting the final film. Why is Steve Busciei even in the movie? Cut his scenes and save a few minutes there. Why do we need more than one scene explaining how to bow? Cut out the others and you've saved several more minutes. Why is so much time spent with Connery and Snipes jibber-jabbering about nothing? Cut some of that out and save even more minutes. There are dozens of other examples I could cite where, with judicious editing, the movie could have been trimmed to a lean 90 minutes.
In the end, this is another of those cases where the good and the bad pretty much balance out. I'm left with rating Rising Sun a 5/10.
5/10
"Puddin'!", 28 November 2017
In the aftermath of the events played out in Batman v Superman, some in the government are concerned about handling the next meta-human crises the world might face. Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) puts together a team of super criminals, each with their own unique power/talents to deal with such a threat. The newly formed Suicide Squad is called in to action almost immediately when one of Waller's recruits turns and threatens to destroy the world.
When I first caught wind of Suicide Squad, I was excited. My excitement started to wane as I read more and more about the movie. By the time it hit theaters and I read the initial reviews, I decided to wait to watch it. I finally sat down with it last night. And while it's not as bad as some would have you believe (I mean a 1/10 is an absolutely ridiculous rating for this movie), overall, it's a bloated mess of a film. The end result is a mostly unentertaining and quite often boring film. A lot of the problems with Suicide Squad could have been remedied with some judicious editing, a more streamlined cast, and baddies with better defined purpose.
Editing – There are many useless moments in the film that seem to exist only to extend the film's ridiculously long runtime. For example (and I could cite dozens), right out of the gate, Waller is involved in two separate meetings to discuss the possibility of forming the Suicide Squad. Why not one? Why did we need to see her make her case twice? Totally unnecessary.
Cast – The cast is far too large. Some of the characters are unnecessary to the film. Why include them? The Suicide Squad could have easily consisted of Deadshot, Harley Quinn, and El Diablo. Characters like Captain Boomerang, Katana, Slipknot (why bother with him in the first place), Killer Croc and even Joker (yes, even Joker), could have been eliminated without changing a whole lot of the film. All these characters only serve to take up screen time, confuse the issue, and extend the film's runtime. I'm thankful they weren't all given the same detailed backstories like Deadshot and Harley – otherwise, this would have been a 3+ hour movie.
Baddies – The baddies, Enchantress and her brother, are so poorly defined that I still have no idea what they were up to. I know they were trying to destroy the world, but why? What was their endgame? Maybe it's explained, but if it is, it's not explained very well. How about a baddie with a real plan? If you really want Joker in the movie, make him the baddie. The conflict Harley would have been forced to go through would have made for a better movie than this.
Those are my three main points, but there are more I could get into if I wanted, like: bad CGI, some ridiculous dialogue, the gooey minions that reminded me of a Power Ranger's villain (and were about as threatening), and a soundtrack that, though it includes some great songs, got annoying real quick. All of these negatives overshadow any fun that might have been in the script and the solid performances from Viola Davis, Margo Robbie, Joel Kinnaman, and Jay Hernandez. In the end, I consider Suicide Squad a wasted opportunity for DC to bring in some new fans. The original idea and the trailers promised so much more than was actually delivered. I'm rating this one a very disappointing, but generous, 4/10.
4/10
Entertaining and enlightening, 26 November 2017
I was one of those fortunate enough to see The Princess Bride in the theaters back in 1987. My wife and I recently shared the film with our oldest son (I'm happy to say he enjoyed it) and I stumbled on this little "making of" short. It's obvious that the people in the movie look back on it fondly. Their stories are told with a great deal of love and humor. I think my favorite bits have to be the casts' recollections of working with Andre the Giant. I especially like the story of Andre putting his huge hand on Robin Wright's head to help keep her warm. He seemed like such a sweet man. It's just one of the many interesting bits I picked up watching this short.
As for a rating, I'll use the scale I always use with documentaries and shorts. Was it entertaining? Does it do what it intended to do? The answer to both is "yes". Even though I was left wanting more, the 20+ minute runtime is filled with so many good memories and stories, it's impossible to watch this short as a fan of the film and not be entertained and enlightened. Very nicely done.
8/10
