12 posts tagged “five thumbs”
Three cute Asian women kicking ass? What's not to like?
So the story, as if there needs to be more than cute Asian women kicking ass is that two of them are sisters who are high tech assassins. One does the killing in dramatic and exciting martial arts ways and the other monitors everything by hacking into the computer systems and monitoring everything. The third woman is the cop who is trying to arrest them. Would you be surprised if it the assassins have hearts of gold and all three of them end up working together? Well if not, the be prepared to be surprised because even though the assassins do have hearts of gold only one of them teams up with the cop. No cliches here!
The action is pretty good. There is some good kung fu action especially by the older sister and the cop. When the younger sister has to take over it is obvious that the actress isn't as athletic as the other two and there is some wire-fu that doesn't work within the world of the movie. There's also a pretty entertaining car chase where one sister has to use satellite imagery to guide the car while also taking out some bad guys attacking her house.
five thumbs up
Love the kick ass chicks
ok, I just like kicking
pretty girls help too
This movie is blatant false advertising. This film is not about elves at all. It is about an elf. Singular. There is only one elf in this movie. On the other hand, however, it does have Dan Haggerty. That's right. Grizzly Adams vs. and evil Elf.
So there's this very 80s girl (although the film came out in 1990 it is super ultra 80s in look and style) who lives with her mean mom and kindly grandfather. She hates Christmas and so her and her friends do some sort of anti-Christmas ritual in the woods releasing an evil elf that looks like and for half the film is referred to as a troll. She works in a store and Grizzly Adams used to work there but was fired for some reason. The store Santa gets killed (by the elf) and they let Grizzly take over. The girls have a party with some boys in the store after hours and the elf kills some people. Then Grizzly Adams dons his detective hat and figures out what this elf thing is about.
This is the point when it turns really weird. See, it turns out that the Nazis were researching elves to use as some sort of ruthless killing machine/ultimate soldier. So it isn't just Grizzly Adams vs. an evil elf, but rather Grizzly Adams vs a Nazi elf! Now how much would you pay??? What if I told you that the elf was a guy in a rubber mask and that the rubber mask had its mouth permanently held open? Now what if I told you that there was also incest? Finally what if I told you that at one point they steal George Romero's line about "When there's no more room in Hell, the dead will walk the Earth" and replace "the dead" with elves? Seriously.
five thumbs up
only one elf here
but there is never enough
for Grizzly Adams
I can, that's who! The crux of this movie is that people are freaked out by killer kids and can't kill them. If I was attacked by a group of killer children I would certainly kick their asses. In fact, I happen to know for a fact that I could could take 28 five year olds in a fight.
However, the adults in this film aren't so lucky if only because there are way more than 28 kids and nearly all of them are over 5 years old.
The movie starts off with a montage of newsreel clips showing real atrocities that have been committed against around the world. From WWII to African genocide there are some reminders of how horrible people can be. I suppose that the film is trying to make a statement about how children are treated in war and to show that in the real world there are those who have no problem killing children. However, it is really too long and the first time I sat through it I turned it off.
I'm glad I did give it a second chance because the film is pretty darn good. It has a British husband and pregnant wife touring a Spanish-speaking country (I couldn't figure out if it was Spain or Mexico or some other South American country) who are going to go to a rustic island a couple miles off the coast. Once there the film goes straight into Children of the Corn territory -- even though this film was made years before that one and was released near the time when the short story was written. They get to the island and can't find any adults. Of course they soon find that the kids have killed every one. Then they have to try to get away.
Some have criticized the fact that they never explain why the kids went evil and there is a scene where an evil kid stares into the eyes of a normal kid and the normal kid turns evil. I, however, didn't find this to be a problem because it really doesn't matter. Without some sort of opportunity to cure the kids or prevent other kids from turning evil there is no reason why we need to know the reason. This film is really Night of the Living Dead with kids instead of zombies complete with some Gustav Vigeland-style kid fighting and an ending with some similarities to Night.
The film isn't perfect. The woman not only doesn't know Spanish (everyone but the husband and wife speak Spanish) but perhaps because she is pregnant is totally helpless. There is a part where a kid has a gun pointed at her head and is smiling and so the husband has to kill the kid and the wife just freaks out about it. That combined with the actress's horrible overacting was a major strike against the film.
However, the smiles on the kid's faces as they kill people and the scenes of them merrily playing (and the knowledge that the director just said, "Go out there and play, kids") which are then juxtaposed with them playing with the dead bodies is pretty chilling. There's also a great scene where the kids come up over a hill and you see that the adult is just screwed is also really excellent. The film isn't really scary and there aren't any real scenes to make you jump but it did slowly draw me in and the end of it is great and draws more parallels with the zombie movie genre which always makes me happy.
five thumbs up
I can kill a child
but not that I really would
unless they were bad.
Like a lot of people I have a huge tv-crush on Jenna Fischer's character Pam from The Office. She's dreamy. Like a few people I love Troma films. Now imagine my delight when I find a Troma film starring, written by, and directed by Jenna Fischer. The only thing that could make it better was if she had made a zombie film...
While a Fischer Zombie film is yet to materialize this film is pretty entertaining not only because it is a Troma film and not only because you get to see another side of Fischer (and the bonus footage allow you to see that she seems almost as cool as Pan) but because it is a mocumentary that makes fun of self-serving people who set up lame charities.
Fischer stars as Jenna and Fischer's husband James Gunn stars as the husband James. They are fairly well off (we never learn exactly what either of them do for a living or where their money comes from) and decide to create a charity to help someone. Told in the typical documentary style we learn through a series of interviews, archival footage (which includes Fischer and Gunn's actual wedding video), and filming of scenes as they are allegedly happening, we learn that the main characters have decided to create a charity to help the homeless -- by giving them lollipops.
The film is basically a series of sketches as they try to get funding and we hear Fischer getting rejected and called horrible things by people on the phone, they hit up their famous friends, put on a presentation for a potential investor, try to create the artwork for the lollipop wrappers, deal with the stress it puts on their marriage, and, near the end, give the suckers to homeless people as a local tv reporter does a story on them. Some of the scenes are more funny than others but there is a lot of fun stuff here.
This was made before Fischer got the gig on The Office but oddly the documentary style is quite reminiscent of The Office and although her character is different there are quite a few scenes where we see Fischer cultivating that look of listening that she often has to have while listening to someone on the Office.
five thumbs up
lollipops are good
but probably not the best
way to help homeless
Another movie I saw as a kid. Remember back when Disney made movies with adults in them that weren't wacky comedies? Never Cry Wolf, Tron, the Black Hole. I know it isn't Cinderella 3 or some crap but they were pretty good movies.
Never Cry Wolf is based on a true story -- although allegedly the book it was based on wasn't 100% true. Regardless, the story is that the caribou herds are diminishing and Tyler, our main character, is sent up to the arctic to try and find out if it is because wolves are killing them.
He's totally unprepared. He's no "Survivorman." He almost dies but is saved by an Inuit. It gets warmer and he starts to study the wolves. He finds out that they eat mice and only kill young and diseased caribou.
It is a nice quite film. However, it is a bit preachy. The old Inuit man is shown as being almost mystical and in tune with the earth in a pretty stereotypical way. The wolves he studies end up getting shot even though wikipedia says it doesn't happen in the book. There is some mention that the land he has been on is going to be developed into some sort of resort which also didn't supposedly happen. Yawn. Despite that, it is a pretty good film.
five thumbs up.
Mickey ain't in this.
Don't make 'em like this no more
To live he eats mice
Because the original book came out in 1902 they wisely decided to start the film in what was then the present day. The film starts with a group of astronauts landing on the moon and putting up a flag. they walk around and what should they find? An old British flag and a letter talking about Queen Victoria. It seems that someone had beaten them to the moon by several decades!
We cut back to Earth where scientists and reporters attempt to track down the people mentioned in the letter. Unfortunately, one is dead and another has been missing since the time of when the letter was written. Finally, they find the lone survivor. It turns out that he has been writing the space agency for years telling them not to go to the moon. Everyone thought he was crazy but now they learn that they should have listened to him because he had been to the moon. At this point, as the man begins to tell the story of his journey, we flash back to the turn of the century where we see the story of the "First Men in the Moon" as it happened. It turns out that not only is the moon inhabited but it is also hollow. Once we see the reason why man shouldn't return to the moon the film goes back to the astronauts then on the moon. The film concludes with a brief rundown of what happened to the inhabitants of the moon.
Overall it is a fun, if a bit low key, film that is a nice example of scifi movies before Star Wars and the Alien films.
five thumbs up
The men in the moon
are not green and are not small
but there's lots of cheese.
The story is told in a way that there are numerous flashbacks and hallucinations which I guess are supposed to make the viewer intrigued about what exactly is going on but it is such a lame story it is pretty obvious what is going on.
Basically a man wakes up and finds the world deserted. He wanders around and eventually finds a couple people outside of a church. One wants him to go in, the other doesn't. One of the series of flashbacks is of what is supposed to be an angel or something. What it really looks like, however, is a guy in a plastic suit with a plastic mask that doesn't even have a moving mouth. The angle eventually shows up at the church. Another of the series of flashbacks is of the main character and his wife. There is lots of sad music and we see scenes of the wife in various stages of pregnancy. Gee, sad music and a pregnant wife, I wonder what happened to her...? A final series of flashbacks is of the main character sad and apparently contemplating shooting himself. Gee, I wonder why? Gee, I wonder what is this whole deserted world and whether or not to go into the church is all about...?
If you have read that and can't figure out the end, well I'm not going to tell you. You will have to sit through this horrible movie for yourself to find out.
five thumbs down.
stupid gold angel
don't bother talking to him.
his mouth doesn't move.
There's not really much point in reviewing this movie. Simpsons fans like myself are going to enjoy it. Not much can change that. And unlike the horrendous South Park movie they didn't put a bunch of stupid songs in it. Also, unlike the Stewie Griffin Family Guy movie this isn't just three episodes back to back that they can conveniently cut up later. No, this is actually a real 87 minute long movie.
The story is basically that Springfield gets so polluted that the government puts a big dome over it. Then the Simpsons have to save the day. There are some great jokes but it could have used more for my tastes. Unfortunately, there's no couch gag in the beginning which was disappointing. While there are appearances from every character the Simpsons and Ned Flanders get the most screen time which is a bit of a let down. It would have been nice for them to take 10 minutes or so to give some of the minor characters some screen time before getting into the story. As it is, they get to the storyline right away (at the expense of said couch gag). In this summer full of epic length movies like Pirates 3 and Spider-Man 3, it is kind of odd to suggest that this movie could have been longer.
five thumbs up
You see Bart's man bits
and so it earns its rating
be quiet Flanders.
The movie is allegedly based on Sheridan Le Fanu's Carmilla. I'd never heard of Carmilla, but apparently it is the story of a vampire and it appeared before Bram Stoker's Dracula. From what wikipedia says there are some similarities between Vampires vs Zombies and the company that made this movie has released a special "unrated" edition under the name Carmilla (it supposedly has more hot girl on girl action or something...).
Basically, there is a girl and her father who are trying to go to a cabin in the woods somewhere or something. They are stopped in the middle of nowhere by a woman who has her daughter, Carmilla, with her and another woman she claims is also her daughter but is bound and gagged. The woman claims she is sick and tied up for her own good. The woman begs the dad to take Carmilla with them so that she can take the sick daughter to a doctor. Reluctantly, the father and his daughter agree.
So they take off only to stop at a gas station. While the father is getting gas and the daughter is just handing out, Carmilla takes the gas station attendant to the bathroom and bites him. Carmilla is a vampire!!! Oh noes!!! But the father and daughter don't catch on so they can Carmilla take off.
Then we meet a Kenny Rogers impersonator who goes by the name "The General." He stops at a gas station that looks exactly like that other one but is apparently a different gas station since the guy who works there seems fine. Just then the woman with the tied up girl pulls up. The General claims that the tied up girl is Carmilla and that Carmilla killed his daughter! So although the woman has untied the girl, the girl doesn't say anything or protest until the General has put him in his car and taken off. Only after they are on the road does the girl tell the General that she isn't Carmilla. Heaven forbid that she try to get away or claim her innocence before she gets into the car.
At this point, the General calls the father and daughter and tells them that he has caught Carmilla and is going to meet them so that they can kill Carmilla. However, the father tells the General that they have the real Carmilla and then the General learns that the girl he has is also a vampire! On noes!!!!
So here we have the father who knows that the woman they have with them is the Carmilla that is like an evil vampire or something (although it all takes place in the daytime and there isn't any evidence that the daylight has any effect on the vampires). Although he knows who she is, he lets Carmilla go off alone with his daughter. That's real good logic there... Of course it does allow Carmilla and the daughter to get naked and Carmilla to give her a vampire bite on the daughter's inner thigh.
I usually don't give this much plot but I feel like I have to in this case because the movie is so stupid that it is really hard to follow. Because cut in between all of this are some random zombies walking across the road that the General and the dad like to run into, flashes of the daughter being seduced by some brunette women (Carmilla is blond), flashes of the daughter in an insane asylum, people getting bit by the gas station attendant, what the woman with the gagged girl does after the General takes off, the fate of the General's daughter, and some other stuff. The zombies are pretty special because when you become a zombie apparently not only does your face get covered in tar black stuff, but you get some work gloves because all of the zombies have gloves. It has nothing to do with how cheap the production was or anything...
The only possible rational of why the zombies even exist in this film is some stuff on the radio about a sickness going around that is making people sick, and murderous. Only when you first hear that on the radio, it is made to sound as if vampirism is the sickness and not zombism. Only it seems that the zombie stuff is the disease and all the vampire stuff just seems to be happening at the same time as the zombie stuff.
Then once the General and the father and daughter get together the whole thing goes off the rails as they seem to forget that Carmilla is a vampire and are more interested in other things and the flashes to the daughter in the insane asylum get more and more common. I know, as if the movie could go any more off the rails, it does. Then it ends on what is supposed to be some sort of twist but it is really just stupid especially if you are looking forward to seeing a movie all about vampires fighting zombies.
The movie is almost so bad it is good but really, it is very very infuriating and so much of it makes you go, "what the hell???"
five thumbs down
This is a train wreck
Everyone knows vampires suck
It needs more zombies
There's this "gelfling" which is really just an elf and he has to go find a shard of the Dark Crystal and put it back into the crystal to make it whole. So there isn't anything special about the story. But all the muppets are wonderfully strange and fascinating. They ride around on these creatures that have long legs like a giraffe but the body of a rabbit. The bad guys are some sort of evil birds. There's this great big model of the three sunned solar system and lots of other weird stuff.
There's so much in this movie that it actually seems kind of rushed. Sure it was for kids and it is probably a sign of good story telling that they can make this world seem to rich. However, I would have liked a bit more time on the way to ending the quest. They are supposed to be making a sequel that is going to come out next year, so I suppose I'll get my wish.
five thumbs up
Skekses are evil
and they are also ugly
nice stereotype...
