10 Horror Eyes for March!

So many movies, so many close-up shots of creepy and distressed eyes! That's a good thing though, because we love to share them.

Sweaty, Fat, Bug Eyes (Human Centipede 2)

"Let Me Out!" Eyes (Stormhouse)

Good Girl Gone Bad Eyes (The Fades)

"OMG, Bella's Like, a Vampire and Stuff!" Eyes (Twilight: BD)

Ghostium Pisspantsiosa! Eyes (The Woman in Black)

"Don't Mess With My Mother!" Eyes (Underworld: Awakening)

Rapey Incest Eyes (Bloody Moon)

Live and Die on This Day Eyes (The Grey)

The Eyes of Haterade (He Knows You're Alone)

It's a Trap! Eyes (The Skin I Live In)

Rumpelstiltskin (1995)

FEBRUARY 29, 2012

GENRE: MONSTER

SOURCE: DVD (ONLINE RENTAL)

Since today doesn’t really exist, I decided to watch a movie that shouldn’t. Rumpelstiltskin is from Mark Jones, the writer/director of Leprechaun, and like that movie it tries to balance horror and humor in a wholly ridiculous concept. But it’s not quite as “successful”; there is some fun to be had, but it’s very lackluster in the horror/action department, and ol’ Rumpy doesn’t have the same appeal as Warwick Davis’ creation. The most interesting thing about it is that it actually got a minor theatrical release… I sure do miss the 90s sometimes.

Oddly enough it’s kind of a Terminator ripoff, with the little demon in the Arnold role as he chases a woman because he wants to kill her baby, who he thinks belongs to him after the mother makes a wish, or something. Missed a few of the plot points I think; the quality of the DVD was sub-budget pack, so some of the audio was hard to make out and I had no interest in trying to decipher it. Anyway, it’s basically a long chase as she makes her way out of her Encino neighborhood (which I recognized instantly!) and out into the same damn hills/cliffs that we’ve seen in a million other horror/action movies. Along the way she is joined by some loud mouthed asshole from the radio, sort of a cross between Andrew Dice Clay and Jerry Springer I guess. I’ll give you a dollar if you’re surprised that he softens over the course of the movie and eventually helps save the day. And by help I mean he actually saves the day; the heroine is curiously absent for most of the climax, which I’d suggest was a bit misogynist but it would be giving the filmmakers too much credit. It was probably written the other way but maybe the girl didn’t know how to drive a tractor and they didn’t have her stunt double that night.

Like Terminator, there’s also a police station massacre, which is a decent enough set piece. In fact there are a few decent scenes throughout; I particularly liked the goofy chase scene in which Rumpelstiltskin drives an 18 wheeler after the asshole guy, who is in a tiny little dune buggy. The visual is hilarious, and it’s got some pretty decent stunts and crashes for a low budget film, and unlike the mom I believed that this guy could die, so it all works (less successful: Rumpelstiltskin’s A-Team reference, which doesn’t even make sense in context). The problem is that there’s no real plot – the entire last hour of the movie is just a long chase scene where you know the outcome. There are no other real protagonists of note, and the few other people we see are obvious goners from the start, like the biker dude that gives Rumpelstiltskin some shit. You can pretty much watch the movie on fast forward – most of the dialogue boils down to “He’s here!” or “Run/Go!” and such. A prologue tells us everything we need to know about the title character, and there is no lamer weakness in a movie than a monster who can be undone by straw or someone knowing his name.

As for Rumpelstiltskin himself, eh. Actor Max Grodénchik is no Warwick Davis – he doesn’t seem as into it as the latter was in the Leprechaun films. The makeup is decent, but time hasn’t been kind as now he just looks like a biker variant of a troll from the bank in the Harry Potter movies. Most of his one-liners are just nonsense, and many seem like they were thrown in to look good in a trailer. At one point they just cut to him saying “This ain’t no fairy tale…” even though nobody is in earshot nor was anyone discussing fairy tales. “This ain’t no hockey game…” would make as much sense. Plus, not for nothing, but he’s not really in the wrong here – his deal is that he gets a baby in exchange for a wish, and people keep trying to fuck him over. So I can’t help but feel a little sorry for the bastard, especially when there’s like 3 scenes of the hunchbacked and crippled thing trying to outrun something faster/stronger than him.

The main problem is that Jones can’t seem to decide whether to take this serious or just have fun with it. It’s got a fair number of downer plot points: the heroine’s husband is gunned down in the first 10 minutes, her best friend is killed a bit later, the monster wants to kill a baby, etc. But, you know, it’s a little hunchback demon in a leather jacket making A-Team references. Not saying the movie can’t be scary and funny, but it seems Leprechaun was a more successful blend of the two. And with most stuff happening off-screen, it starts to feel like a porno where all the sex scenes have been cut out – sure, there’s some semblance of a plot, but it doesn’t really offer anything that you came to see. Probably why there are six Leprechaun movies and only one Rumpelstiltskin.

What say you?

P.S. The end credits have the best disclaimer in the history of movies. It’s almost worth watching the flick to see it; I hope someday I can put something as wonderfully odd in one of my title sequences.

50 Years of 007 - Thunderball

50 Years of 007 takes Cody under the sea for 1965's Thunderball.  

Thunderball has caused a lot of troubles and headaches over the years. Not the film, but the basic story and the rights to it. Ian Fleming had never been averse to his James Bond novels becoming a film or television series, and actively pursued getting such a project going himself in 1959. Over the course of meetings between Fleming and collaborators Ivar Bryce, Ernest Cureo, Kevin McClory, and Jack Whittingham, the story for Thunderball took shape. Outlines and treatments were written, Whittingham wrote a screenplay... but when it seemed that the project wasn't going anywhere, Fleming took the ideas and turned them into his ninth Bond novel. When Thunderball was published in 1961, McClory and Whittingham were very displeased to find that Fleming had taken sole writing credit, with no mention of their substantial contributions. A court case ensued and McClory and Whittingham won the right to have "based on a screen treatment by" credits added to any future publications of Thunderball.

McClory also received part of the film rights to the story, so when Bond film producers Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman decided to make Thunderball the fourth film in their series (after having considered following Goldfinger with On Her Majesty's Secret Service), they made a deal with McClory. Under the deal, McClory would receive the Producer credit, with Broccoli and Saltzman taking Executive Producer credits, and McClory would retain the right to remake Thunderball after ten years. The remake rights would cause more trouble down the road, but in 1965 all was copacetic and Thunderball was a go project.

The first director approached was Goldfinger director Guy Hamilton, but he needed to take a rest after that film. An offer was made to Dr. No/From Russia with Love director Terence Young and he agreed to return to the series that he helped shape.

The films had been getting bigger and bigger with each installment, with the budgets rising each time. Goldfinger had been massive, Thunderball went even further and tripled the budget to $9 million. To capture the widening scope of the films, the picture also went wider - Thunderball was the first in the series to be shot in 2.35:1. As such, the gun barrel opening that was used for the previous three films, which featured stuntman Bob Simmons standing in as James Bond, had to be reshot for the new aspect ratio. Finally the gun barrel features the actor playing Bond in the film, as Sean Connery performed the gun barrel "walk and shoot" himself.

The gun barrel segues into the pre-title sequence, which begins in a church, on a coffin draped with a funeral cloth that bears the initials of the deceased: JB. They were oddly amused with implications of James Bond's death in the early films, with this and the garroting of the man wearing a Bond mask at the beginning of From Russia with Love, and they went on to "kill Bond off" again at the beginning of the next film.

Viewers are only left to wonder about the initials for a few seconds, as the camera pans up to see James Bond and an ally observing the funeral from a balcony in the church. The deceased is Colonel Jacques Bouvar, a man who murdered two of Bond's colleagues. Bond has been hunting him down and is disappointed to find that Bouvar apparently died in his sleep. Watching Bouvar's grieving widow, Bond notices something off about her and follows her home. Bond confronts the woman with a punch to the face - she is revealed to be a man, Bouvar himself in disguise. Yes, this is one of the many Bond moments that directly inspired Austin Powers scenes.

Bond and Bouvar have an intense scuffle, with Bond taking his fair share of hits, including whacks to the ribs with a fireplace poker, but of course Bond is the victor. As Bouvar's guards pursue him, Bond runs to the roof and makes his escape - with a jet pack. I've seen people call the jet pack ridiculous and mock its design, but this was a case of the films using an experimental gadget that existed in reality. It was actually called the "Bell Rocket Belt" and, powered by hydrogen peroxide, could boost the operator over a 9 meter tall obstacle or across short distances. Quite short distances; it only worked for 20 seconds at a time. It was designed for the US Army, who decided they didn't have much use for it.

The jet pack gets Bond to his waiting Aston Martin DB5 and the title sequence begins. Dr. No title designer Maurice Binder made his return on this one and here sets the style that he would use for every Bond film for the next twenty-four years. The primary feature of this sequence are the silhouettes of nude women swimming around the screen through explosions of bubbles and at one point there are very clearly bare breasts on the screen.

Composer John Barry had some trouble coming up with a title song, as he couldn't think of any sensible way to work the word Thunderball into the lyrics. He wrote a song called "Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang", Bond's nickname in Italy, and versions were recorded with Shirley Bassey and Dionne Warwick singing it. The Warwick version can be heard in full on one of the DVD/Blu-ray audio commentary tracks. When Broccoli and Saltzman decided that the song should have the title in it, Barry and songwriter Don Black worked together to come up with "Thunderball". The resulting song is really good and well sung by Tom Jones. "He strikes like Thunderball!"

Following the title sequence, we're introduced to the villains of the piece. Through a hidden doorway in the Paris building that houses the charity organization The International Brotherhood for the Assistance of Stateless Persons is a large conference room, which is hosting a meeting of SPECTRE agents. Thunderball was the first novel to feature SPECTRE, here of course they've been built up over two of the three preceding films.

At the head of the meeting is the mysterious mastermind Blofeld, his face still obscured from the audience's view. Blofeld's body is that of Anthony Dawson, as it was in From Russia with Love, but there is disagreement over who provided the voice this time, with the choices being Eric Pohlmann, who was the voice of Blofeld in FRWL, or Joseph Wiseman, who had played Dr. No. The voice does sound similar to Wiseman's...

Among the SPECTRE agents is the film's main villain, the eyepatch-sporting Emilio Largo, and a couple things are made clear over the course of the meeting - Blofeld does not tolerate insubordination, and Largo is cold as ice. With a flip of a switch, Blofeld electrocutes an agent who had been shortchanging the organization. As his fellow operative fries, Largo just glances over with a blank expression, barely interested. Largo is at the meeting to discuss "the NATO project", the most ambitious plan that SPECTRE has ever put together, from which they expect to get $280 million.

Adolfo Celi is great as Largo, a man who's a bit more presentable to society than his villainous predecessors but has a hidden cruelty beneath his successful jetsetter lifestyle. Celi was dubbed by Robert Rietty, and it's an expert job because there are seamless transitions between Celi's actual voice and Rietty's dub.

Thunderball is kind of a strange story, even stranger is that this was considered as having the potential of being the first James Bond movie. It's odd because Bond spends most of the first quarter of the film hanging out in a health clinic. M sends him there in the novel because he's getting out of shape, drinks and smokes too much, and has bad eating habits. In the film, he's apparently there to recover from the rib injury Bouvar dealt him.

It's while at the clinic that Bond, by pure coincidence, first gets wrapped up in SPECTRE's schemes. He notices a tattoo on the arm of fellow patient Count Lippe, a tattoo that represents a branch of the Chinese Tongs. Ultimately it's an irrelevant tattoo since Lippe is working for SPECTRE now, but it's enough to get Bond snooping around the clinic to find out more information about Lippe, who doesn't appreciate his curiosity.

Bond looks around in Lippe's room and finds that it's connected to the room of another patient, a man with his face wrapped in bandages. As Bond exits Lippe's room, he steals a grape from a bowl of fruit, a popular moment that was paid homage in the 2002 Bond film Die Another Day.

The man with the bandaged face, Mister Angelo, has been given plastic surgery to look exactly like bomber pilot Major François Derval. In the novel, SPECTRE just hired the actual pilot to do the intended job for them. Here, Derval is killed and replaced by his doppelganger, who has spent the last two years studying everything about him.

While Lippe takes Derval's body to the health clinic and puts it in Angelo's place, Angelo manages to take Derval's place on the test flight of a jet bomber equipped with two atomic bombs. He gasses the crew and crash lands the plane in the Carribean at the Bahamas, where Largo and a small army of henchmen are waiting to unload the bombs. Angelo is killed for demanding more money for his service, whereas the pilot in the novel was killed just because he had outlived his usefulness.

The next day is check out time for Bond at the health clinic. His stay wasn't just filled with health food, exercise, and spying, he also made it worthwhile by seducing one of the therapists there, Patricia Fearing (played by Molly Peters). As he leaves, Patricia asks him what he does for a living. He tells her that he's a "sort of licensed troubleshooter."

Also checking out is Count Lippe, who follows Bond with the intention of taking him out of the equation once and for all. Bond is preparing to ward Lippe off with some of his Aston Martin's gadgets when Lippe is taken out by another troubleshooter with deadly gadgets - SPECTRE assassin Fiona Volpe blasts Lippe's vehicle with a rocket fired from her motorcycle. This is another coincidence, Volpe has no idea what's going on with Bond and unknowingly interrupts the assassination attempt just by doing her job. Like the pilot in the novel, Lippe had outlived his usefulness. Volpe wasn't in the novel and Lippe's assassin wasn't identified. She did exist in the 1959 treatments, with the name Fatima Blush, and she's a welcome addition to the film. As played by Italian redhead Luciana Paluzzi, Volpe is one of the most memorable things about Thunderball.

Reporting in at MI6 headquarters, Bond is informed by Miss Moneypenny that there's a big meeting going on, all 00s have been called in. In MI6's own large conference room, the scope of SPECTRE's scheme is revealed through an audio recording of Blofeld laying out facts and demands. SPECTRE is in possession of two atomic bombs, if they aren't paid 100 million pounds sterling ($280 million) within seven days, a major city in England or the U.S. will be destroyed. MI6, CIA, NATO, all allied intelligence units are now working on finding the bombs, an operation codenamed Thunderball.

Included in the Thunderball file folder is a picture of a man who Bond recognizes as the corpse of "Mister Angelo" that he saw at the health clinic, but the photo identifies the man as François Derval. Pictured with Derval is his sister Dominique. Bond requests that M send him to Dominique's location for his individual assignment. With that, Bond is off to Nassau, where the rest of the film takes place.

Bond makes contact with Dominique - her friends call her Domino - and begins to charm and woo her under the guise of an interested fellow vacationer. Domino is played by Claudine Auger, who was dubbed by Nikki van der Zyl, the voice of many Dr. No characters.

Domino is at Nassau with her guardian, who has a large yacht called the Disco Volante and a nice piece of property called Palmyra. Her "guardian" is Largo, she became his mistress after meeting him with her brother in Capri, but her attraction to him has since worn off. The "brother in Capri" backstory fixes a huge coincidence from the Fleming novel, the biggest in a story brimming with them - in the novel, Largo had no idea that Domino and the pilot were related and this lack of background research is his downfall. In the film, he obviously knows that he's had Domino's brother killed, it just doesn't matter to him.

Bond's mission now is to figure out if Largo has the bombs and if so, where he's keeping them. Much of the film is spent on Bond's investigation in and around Nassau, which in addition to his pursuit of Domino includes diving around Largo's yacht, sneaking around Palmyra, and looking for the sunken plane from a helicopter. When Q drops by to deliver some gadgets that will help out, Bond greets him with an "Oh, no." The gadgets aren't very flashy this time around - a geiger counter watch, an underwater camera with infrared film, a flare gun, a pocket size rebreather, and a homing beacon in pill form that Bond is meant to swallow. Q requests that Bond take special care of the camera, though he knows that everything he gives him "is treated with equal contempt."

Aiding Bond in his search are a couple local contacts, CIA agent Felix Leiter (who, as in Dr. No, is first seen as an observant suave dude in sunglasses), and a female assistant named Paula.
Leiter was again recast and is this time portrayed by Rik van Nutter. van Nutter only starred in a handful of films after this, though he did have a chance at being in more Bond films. The producers were happy with him as Leiter and intended to bring him back, they just couldn't find a way to work the character into the next couple movies.

Paula is played by Martine Beswick, who has previously appeared as one of the gypsy girls in From Russia with Love. The character doesn't do much other than drive a boat while wearing a bikini and read magazines in the hotel room, her most important act in the film is to end up dead.

Bond's interactions with Largo and Volpe are the highlights of the film. He first encounters Largo in a casino, over a game of baccarat. It's a very entertaining interaction, as Bond taunts and tests Largo by slipping the word "spectre" into their conversation as many times as possible.

Largo reacts to this, and Bond's obvious interest in Domino, by sending a henchman named Quist to kill him in his hotel room the next day. Quist sneaks in and hides in the shower. The plan is foiled when Bond returns to the room, as he checks an audio recording device that's hidden in a hollowed-out book and hears that footsteps moved through the empty room right before he entered. The hotel room scenes in these early films were great - Bond having the hidden audio recorder here, checking for bugs in From Russia with Love, putting hairs across closet doors and powder on briefcase latches in Dr. No so he'd know if they'd been opened. Very simple and smart showings of security and thoroughness.

Largo has two swimming pools at his Palmyra property, one of which he keeps pet sharks in. Quist is fed to these sharks for his failure, and as you might expect, Bond also has a close call in the shark pool later in the film. There have been a lot of potentially dangerous members of the animal kingdom on display in Bond movies over the years, and this is just the first of several installments to feature sharks.

Another of my favorite Bond-Largo moments occurs when Bond takes the villain up on an invitation made in the casino and stops by Palmyra. They do some skeet shooting, a favorite pastime of Largo's. Largo blasts a clay pigeon out of the sky, then calls one for Bond. Facing Largo, Bond comments that this "seems terribly difficult", then casually turns and shoots his clay pigeon. "No it isn't, is it?"

Bond first meets Volpe after swimming ashore from avoiding henchman and grenades during a dive near Largo's yacht. He walks up to a secluded road and hitches a ride with the first passing car... which just happens to be driven by Fiona Volpe. She recognizes him, he notices her SPECTRE ring, but they don't let on that they know they're enemies. They banter while Volpe drives along the dark country road at up to 100 miles per hour. This causes Bond to reiterate something he told the chauffeur in Dr. No - he's a "nervous passenger."

Bond and Volpe do end up having sex, when he sneaks into her hotel room to look around and finds her relaxing in the bath. There are no martini orders in this film, nor does Bond speak the line "Bond, James Bond," but Volpe does, during their time in bed together. "Do you like wild things, Mister Bond, James Bond?" As they're about the leave the room later, Bond is captured by henchmen. Unlike the women in Goldfinger, Bond has not been able to charm Volpe over to his side. She mocks the idea that he thought he might, almost directly quoting critics who reacted negatively to the turning of Pussy Galore. "James Bond, who only has to make love to a woman and she starts to hear heavenly choirs singing. She repents and immediately returns to the side of right and virtue... But not this one."

The girl who makes love to Bond and is on the side of right and virtue is Domino. After discovering the sunken plane and completing his seduction of Domino, Bond informs her of Largo's villainy and the murder of her brother. She does her best to aid our hero, and for her troubles Largo ties her to a bed and tortures her with a cigar and ice cubes.

As SPECTRE's deadline gets nearer and Largo moves forward on their plan to destroy Miami, everything culminates in an epic underwater battle, Largo and his henchmen against Bond and American soldiers, all in SCUBA gear. The underwater sequences are the standout feature of the movie and also an element that draws a deciding line on how much someone will enjoy the film.

Underwater unit director Ricou Browning (who had played the Creature from the Black Lagoon in the '50s) did fine work and composer John Barry scored the sequences with some great music. I appreciate the effort that went into filming the underwater action, but I am one who does not find it particularly enthralling. The sequences just go on too long for me. For example, the sinking of the plane and unloading of the bombs is around 5 minutes long. The climactic battle goes on for 11 minutes. Editor Peter Hunt says he had cut the battle down to 4 minutes at one point, but was convinced to include a lot more.

The underwater sequences aren't the only times during Thunderball that I lose interest. Beyond the bright spots that I've pointed out, I also don't find Bond's time in Nassau all that interesting. I don't think Thunderball is a bad entry in the series, it just doesn't completely gel for me. The story is decent and the screenplay by Richard Maibuam and John Hopkins is full of good lines, but the health club start is questionable and there's something off-putting about the overall structure. I notice something new in Thunderball every time I watch it because my attention wanders during viewings, so I miss things.

Back on the positive side, the characters are good and the actors handle the material well. Sean Connery is still doing strong work as Bond, I've read that he felt he gave his best Bond performance here.

Thunderball also had the best box office performance of any Bond, passing Goldfinger's record and, when adjusted for inflation, earning almost 1 billion dollars.

The film doesn't end with the usual "James Bond will return" note in the credits. Apparently it did when it was first released in theatres - "James Bond will return in On Her Majesty's Secret Service". But when the necessary locations for OHMSS couldn't be secured, the note was cut from the credits and a different story was chosen for the next film...

Lady's choice: Gentleman's choice

In our third installment of our bi-weekly Tuesday movie-watching series called Lady's Choice, I finally got to make my first pick of the movie to watch.

But it almost didn't happen.

My wife had had a hard day, and I could tell when dinner time was approaching that she hadn't remembered about movie night. I thought it seemed almost mean to bring it up. We should just engage in a couple hours of clearing shows off the DVR and then go to bed.

But I couldn't help myself, and found myself sheepishly mentioning it.

I did clarify that it was okay if we didn't watch the movie I'd chosen, but I kind of feel like the purpose of a series like this is to push through come hell or high water. The very idea of the series is that once a month -- only 12 times a year -- each of us has to accept a movie chosen by the other person to watch, regardless of what it's about or whether they're in the mood for it. (The alternating 12 times, it's your choice so you should theoretically be psyched for it.) Trusting the other person's judgment is implicit, and veto power should be reserved only for extreme circumstances.

So that logic prompted me to bring it up. If she wanted to use her veto power, I wouldn't have held it against her.

But she didn't, so we started a nearly two-hour movie at 8:15 -- which in itself seemed ambitious with people who are tired and possibly cranky. You might say we were already running on empty when we started Running on Empty.

Running on Empty is a film I loved when I was about the age of the character River Phoenix plays in the movie. I don't think I related to his character, per se -- my family lived in the same house my entire childhood, and my parents were never on the run from the FBI. But there's no doubt that the emotions his character experiences, as he approaches adulthood and wrestles with whether he can permanently sever ties with his wanted parents in order to forge his own life, were something that struck me, and were key to my appreciation of Sidney Lumet's film. Phoenix was nominated for best supporting actor for his work, and Christine Lahti, Judd Hirsch and Martha Plimpton also give really good performances. (One scene with Lahti and her own father, whom she never sees, just kills me.)

I knew the film would have extra interest for my wife because a) she loves Lumet's work, and b) we currently watch Plimpton on the Fox show Raising Hope (where she's great). It turns out there was one additional layer of interest I hadn't anticipated, in that Lahti's character's father is played by a guy named Steven Hill, who had a recurring part on Law & Order, which my wife used to watch. Hey, when springing a movie from 1988 on somebody without any idea whether it has aged well, it helps to be able to explain/defend your choice.

So did it age well, and did she like it?

Yes on both accounts. I don't know about aging "well" -- I must admit I was distracted several times by Lahti's 80s mom jeans, with the tall waistlines -- but the important part was that the drama felt as solid to me as ever. I was a bit puzzled by the arc of my wife's reaction to the movie, however. When we paused after about a half-hour, she volunteered that it was indeed quite good. By the end, though, I had to milk that same admission out of her -- she wasn't proactively forthcoming about it like I expected her to be. Expected her to be because I think of the film's final scene as a powerhouse that gets me every time. (And this time was no exception.)

Oh well, I'd say it was probably a good start for my half of the themed movie night. Especially considering the difficult circumstances of our viewing.

And at the very least, I scratched the itch of having wanted to revisit this movie myself for several years now.

I mean, as much as I want my choice to work for her, I'm at least guaranteed of knowing it'll work for me.

Horror Hottie of the Month- February

It was a tough one this month, deciding which mistress of horror has captured our attention the most, but we think we made a good choice.

If you haven't seen the British TV show The Fades, you missed out on some pretty good stuff. It's basically about dead spirits that are stuck in a limbo between this world and the next, and how they're pissed off about it. A group of "Angelics" are the only humans that know the Fades exist, and that they are getting stronger and want to pretty much end all human life.

It's a good mix of horror and comedy, the latter part which centers around two bumbling best friends trying to make sense of not only being teenagers, but with all of the supernatural hi jinks. It goes without saying, of course, that the show has it's share of hot chicks, and this month, we honor them.

First up is Natalie Dormer. This crooked mouthed little minx played a smoking hot Anne Boleyn on The Tudors and is about to become a household name playing Margaery Tyrell in the new season of Game of Thrones. In The Fades, she plays Sarah; A sexy, dead Angelic who is slowly turning into a Fade... part of which she does naked and greased up with some sort of slime all over her. Sexy, sexy slime. This girl is crazy hot and isn't afraid to do cool genre TV shows, so we are big fans.

Next we have Lily Loveless, the chick from Skins series 3 & 4.For you Non-Brits out there, Skins is a teen drama show which shows teenagers smoking, drinking, having sex and acting like dumb teenagers. Lily played a girl who liked girls in Skins, so we of course respected her way before The Fades ever came about. As far as The Fades goes, Lily plays the role of snotty bitch older sister, and aside from her needing to do something with her bangs on the show, she's as hot as she was in Skins. Plus, as evidenced by the above picture, she might be an alcoholic and prone to bad decisions. That's only one more reason to love her, isn't it?

Jenn Murray's come a long way since playing Dorothy Mills, because Dorothy Mills was creepy looking, and she isn't at all. Even though Jenn plays a Fade named Natalie on The Fades, she's way cuter than she was before. She's still pretty creepy though. But cute. We digress.

Finally we have Sophie Wu; the cool girl on the show with the boyish haircut. She's way hotter with longer hair, but we'll take her none the less. As the hot, edgy girlfriend of our geeky, not edgy main character, she gives geeks of the world hope that some hot, edgy hot chick with and edge will want them, despite them being a total mess. That's what makes her special.

In closing, check out The Fades because it's a really good show, and enjoy the chicks, because they always make things a bit better, don't they?

Subspecies II: Bloodstone (1993)

FEBRUARY 28, 2012

GENRE: VAMPIRE

SOURCE: STREAMING (NETFLIX INSTANT)

I have already forgotten everything that happened in Subspecies, so it was a bit disorienting when Subspecies II: Bloodstone picked up right where it left off, because I couldn’t quite recall who anyone was or who was on who’s side. It didn’t help that the heroine was replaced in between movies, which will allow me to make one comparison between these movies and the Hatchet series. Just the one though!

Anyway, I THINK it’s a little better. Not GOOD, but I was actually kind of interested in the shenanigans this time around, and even got a bit bummed when a character was killed. The makeup and FX are improved, and it’s not as terribly overlit as the original either. When the vampires go outside, it’s dark out, not late afternoon, and when a vamp starts to emerge from a crypt and sees the sun rising, it makes visual sense that she cannot proceed. It’s the little things, like not having a goddamn vampire walk around in direct sunlight, that can really help a silly little vampire movie.

It’s still awkwardly structured though, carrying over a major problem of the original. This time, new heroine Rebecca (sister of the main girl, who is now a vampire) comes to Romania to find her sister, which is the sort of plot you’ve seen in a million movies. But those movies don’t usually break up this plot to show the sister doing her thing, as this one does, which severely limits the suspense that these plots can provide when done correctly. I should be in the same position as Rebecca, wondering what happened to her, if she’s hurt or worse, if I’ll ever see her again, etc. Instead, I know perfectly well what she’s up to, putting the audience far ahead of the heroine we should be identifying with. Once they finally meet up (a bit past the halfway point) it gets a little better, because we’re finally just as informed as Rebecca.

It’s also shocking low on violence; these vampires seemingly don’t need to feed as often as most of their movie brethren. The villain Radu spends most of the movie just talking to his mother (a Mummy), letting Anders Hove give his best bad Marlon Brando impression pretty much every 5 minutes or so. Most of the scares are shadow based – people run and then we see a shadow of Radu or the Mummy in the background. As with the original, it’s painfully short on action – it’s almost like they forgot that by shooting in Romania they had extra money to put toward things like FX and violence.

Then again, maybe they were saving it for part 3, which was shot back to back with this one. OR, another theory – this is just the stretched out version of the first half of one script, with Subspecies III forming the 2nd half. As you might expect given what I’ve said so far, it’s a bit of a snoozer, and part of that is due to the fact that scenes drag on forever (such as Michelle boarding a train in the first reel). I won’t know for sure until I watch part 3 (hopefully with the ability to remember this one), but I’d be willing to bet that a good editor could make a pretty fun/exciting 1:45 or so minute movie from these two (this one is 86 minutes with credits; it could probably be around 50, 55 tops).

It’s just amusing to watch these now; I avoided most of them as a kid because they were too cheap and dull compared to the good stuff I regularly digested (the big franchises, big budget Hollywood stuff like The Blob or The Fly, etc), but now they’re pretty classy and respectable compared to the shit Full Moon churns out now. Most of their modern films are shot in cheap, overused Los Angeles locales and sport FX that would be embarrassing in these 20 year old films. I’ll take Romania and a bad miniature composite over the Linda Vista and PS1 level CGI any day of the week!

What say you?

New rules for watching comedies

I watched Bridesmaids for the second time on Saturday night.

It wouldn't have ordinarily been a movie that jumped to the top of my re-watch list. I ranked it only 40th out of the 121 movies I saw in 2011. But my wife hadn't seen it, and desperately wanted to remedy that before more of the movie's surprises were ruined for her. (She knew pretty much everything that happened at the bridal shop, for example.)

I liked it quite a bit -- I don't consider 40th to be a particularly low ranking last year -- so I was happy to watch it again.

And as it turned out, if I'd watched it this way the first time -- at home, with my wife -- it might have ended up closer to 20th.

See, I was laughing my fool head off this time around. It wasn't that I hadn't found it funny the first time around, because I did. But I don't recall going into fits of laughter as I did this time. What makes that all the more unusual is that a movie is supposed to be its funniest the first time you see it. Even with a movie that's hilarious, there are diminishing returns on repeat viewings because nothing that happens is a surprise to you.

I attribute my reaction to one of the following two things:

1) Comedies are best when watched with someone else.
2) Comedies are best when watched at home.

Until recently, I'd considered the first to be the primary factor. My go-to example had been the Judd Apatow comedies The 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up, both of which I saw in the theater. I saw The 40 Year Old Virgin with my wife (then girlfriend) and one other couple, and I saw Knocked Up by myself. I suspect that The 40 Year Old Virgin is just a funnier movie in general, but since these movies are both from the same director and are both well-liked, they seemed like good apples to compare to each other. When the fits of hysterical laughter from Virgin didn't travel over to Knocked Up, I concluded that the difference in company was to blame. (I shouldn't rule out that we saw Virgin at night in a packed theater, and I caught Knocked Up after work in a theater that was less than half full.)

I may never know how much of a difference it would have made if my wife had seen Knocked Up with me. But I can say that I watched Bridesmaids under very similar circumstances -- on a weekday afternoon, by myself.

The mandate to see funny and popular movies in the theater is a strong one if you're a movie buff. But the problem is, my wife and I have rarely gone to the theater together since my son was born -- maybe only a half-dozen times. She's my primary movie-watching partner, but she's not my only one. I do still go to the movies with friends from time to time, but that has gone way down in recent years.

I think I've determined that if I'm going to see a popular comedy in the theater, I need to go with a friend. If I go by myself, I'm just setting myself up to fail.

The last time I remember really laughing out loud in the theater by myself was when I saw Tangled, the day before Thanksgiving in 2010. There was this one line that hit my funny bone so hard, I hadn't fully calmed down for about a minute afterward. But the reasons I loved Tangled had little to do with it being funny. So this is not a pure example.

It's hard to determine what should be the minimum threshold for how funny I thought something was in order to qualify for this discussion, but going backward through my list, the previous movie I thought was really funny that I watched by myself was Woody Allen's Whatever Works, all the way back in January of 2010. But I watched that one at home, not in the theater.

So that makes a good transition point to the other half of the discussion: the venue where you see the movie.

The funniest four movies I saw in 2011 -- Tucker and Dale vs. Evil, Hall Pass, A Good Old-Fashioned Orgy and Paul -- were all movies I saw in a home setting, with at least one other person. The first three I saw with my wife, though one of them was in a cabin where we were staying, which just felt like a home. The last was with two other friends at one of their homes.

Is it really possible that comedies are best when watched at home?

I'm starting to think that one of the keys of watching a good comedy is feeling comfortable. When you're at home, you usually sit in a comfortable chair, and you have whatever food or drink you may want at your disposal. And if you're watching with friends -- as I think we've determined you should be -- then you are in a good mood because it's all part of a fun social experience. What's more, you can laugh freely and as hard as you want without being self-conscious about how strangers are perceiving you.

Of course, there could be other factors involved -- namely, that comedies represent a greater risk to us, so we don't want to spend the money to see them in the theater. I can tell you that of the movies listed above, none of them were movies I thought would be good, so there was never any question of whether I might see them in the theater. The fact that they ended up being good is probably part of why I enjoyed them so much, since we are always happy when a movie pleasantly surprises us. But the point is, maybe we see more comedies at home in the first place, because paying theater prices for something that ends up being unfunny is more of a disappointing experience than paying theater prices for a blockbuster that doesn't deliver. With that blockbuster, at least we were probably impressed on some level by a special effects spectacle, one that was all the more grand because we saw it on a big screen. Comedies don't have the lure of spectacle to fall back on.

Whatever the true factors may be why we laugh or don't laugh at the movies, I've reached a point where I'm going to set myself some new ground rules.

1) If I feel compelled to see a comedy in the theater, I should find someone to see it with. This will be nice, because it'll get me back into seeing movies as a social experience with friends. If I feel self-conscious about this for whatever reason -- though I don't know why I should -- I can always explain to that friend that I've got a new policy for watching comedies. As if I should need an excuse for getting together with friends at all.

2) If I can stand to wait, I should watch the comedy at home with my wife. The conditions to laugh will be much better. After all, our senses of humor are so similar that we tend to build off each other, so that the movie gathers steam and becomes funnier and funnier as we watch. Not to mention that we can then quote the funny lines to each other later on, something we would be less inclined to do if we saw the same movie separately, even if we found the same lines funny.

So the next time you hear me talking about taking advantage of an early release from work to sneak off to the theater and watch the next Will Ferrell comedy, remind me of this post, will you?

DVD Releases for February 28th

February draws to a close with a mix of DVD titles that might just appeal to everyone. Then again, they might not.

Rabies is an interesting flick that puts a different spin on the slasher genre... and it's from Israel. We saw it and liked it, and still cant believe that Israel gave us a bloody horror flick. The other must see of the week is Todd and the Book of Pure Evil; it's a fun little Canadian TV show that kinda crosses Degrassi High with, say, Evil Dead? Kinda? However you describe it, it's goofy fun.

I Melt With You is the wild card of the group. With Rob Lowe, Thomas Jane, and Jeremy Piven, not to mention the hotness of Carla Gugino, Arielle Kebbel and porn whore extraordinaire Sasha Grey, it could end up being a good little thriller.

Beneath the Darkness was a lame duck, unless you like the tension level of your average Lifetime movie. 

As for the rest of the weeks offerings, well, they give us pause; WWE's Trish Stratus as a bounty hunter in Bounty Hunters); the trailer alone for From the Inside might be one of the worst things I've ever seen; and Wolftown looks... not horrible. Out of this last group, we stick with the wolves... we did after all love The Breed.

Click the pics for more info on the flicks.

What will you rent, buy, or avoid?