This film typically gets brought up when there is discussion of the worst movies ever made. The granddaddy of them all is Plan 9 From Outer Space, but Battlefield Earth always gets an honorable (or dishonorable?) mention. It was only a matter of time before I saw this movie, and I found myself with the need for something awful and a 3 for $10 Blockbuster coupon.
To be honest, I was disappointed. Battlefield Earth isn’t nearly as bad as people say it is, although it certainly does suck. At times it really seems like the story was fetched right from the pre-writing phase and turned into a movie. While most of the criticism for the film’s lack of achievement is merited, it seems like most people declaring it one of the all-time worst are really just taking potshots at John Travolta and his merry band of Scientologists using the film to promote their “religion.”
But let’s be clear- Battlefield Earth has nothing to do with Scientology. There may be some parallels and allusions to Scientologist beliefs, but Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard wrote this story purely for fun. Sure, his bias against psychiatry shines through, but Scientologists do not believe that this film is what our future will become.
The most annoying thing about this film is that virtually every single shot is on some kind of angle. This little bit of artistic expression gets old and annoying really fast and by the end of the film (if you make it that far) you still are not comfortable with it. The script also suffers greatly. All the terminology, like breath-gas, shows just how big a hack L. Ron Hubbard was as a writer- this is a cheap, pulp novel story suffering from too much overconfidence and indulgence. Some updating would have helped, but even though it was published in 1980, it seems Hubbard decided to stick with the fantastical junk science of the 1930s.
Essentially, Battlefield Earth is just a poorly-constructed piece of science fiction that isn’t very original and would have otherwise been ignored had it not been for Hubbard’s connection to Scientology. However, there are sparks of creativity, but any potential that may exist in this film is buried so far down it would cost tens of millions of dollars for a studio to try and rewrite, salvage and turn it into something fit for theaters. It’s kind of like those cheesy, lame Sci-Fi Channel original movies, except someone actually thought this would succeed in the theaters.
It’s bad for sure, but not bad enough to be immortalized.
I absolutely love M. Night Shyamalan’s work as a director and a writer. His films have all been intriguing and well made, so I was dismayed when I heard so much negative press about this film. The critical consensus was that Lady in the Water was a dud and an ‘exercise in arrogance and self-indulgence’ on Shyamalan’s part. I went into this film with mixed feelings, hoping that one of the more brilliant filmmakers of our time hadn’t truly blown it.
Fortunately, he hasn’t. I can see why people may not have been impressed with Lady in the Water, as it is a departure from Shyamalan’s twist ending thrill fests. Yet I see no reason for the critics and moviegoers to slam the director in the way they did. It seems to me that most critics responded with viciousness to Shyamalan’s depiction of a film critic character as a cold, unfeeling jerk who thinks he knows everything. It was tongue-in-cheek and I got a good laugh out of it, because it is in fact largely true. Film critics, for the most part, do not live in this plane of reality. Something about film school and “proper training” ups the ego on some of these folks, and it is apparent that many of them couldn’t take a joke.
As for the movie, it isn’t as good as any of Shyamalan’s previous major releases (though I have yet to watch Unbreakable). That much is true. But it’s not bad, and I shudder to declare it Shyamalan’s worst film. I look at it as his weakest film, because I still enjoyed it. It’s based off of a bedtime story Shyamalan wrote for his children, but this version is more detailed and more frightening than the bedtime version.
As it is based off a bedtime story, intended for children, Shyamalan takes a unique approach by moving the players and events of the story in the same manner of innocence, naïveté and simplicity that story book characters always possess. This means that the viewer has to figure out that they should be approaching Lady in the Water with a sort of childlike view, hearkening back to the fairy tales and Disney movies that filled our younger days. It’s challenging, because people are used to these kinds of stories being animated kid stuff. The live action adult actors and PG-13 setting makes you want to assume it’s supposed to be a standard-issue thriller. However, if you are able to put yourself into the proper and intended mindset, you will get this film.
So I guess I shouldn’t be surprised to see how many people are incapable of thinking like a kid again, now that the current generation of computer animated “kids” films incorporates adult humor so the parents don’t have to think like a kid again to enjoy it. It’s really kind of sad. The story is about a water nymph who is on a mission to meet someone, but whom exactly she does not know. Once meeting this person their life will change and they accomplish great things, leading to future restoration of the long-severed ties between human and water nymphs. The nymph in question happens upon a troubled apartment superintendent. He and eventually many of the folk living in the apartment complex end up being players in the puzzle to allow the nymph to accomplish her task and return home.
Shyamalan took heat from critics because he plays the important character the nymph is supposed to meet. I thought he was fine in the part, because while the character is important in the grand scheme of things beyond the end of the film, he doesn’t really do much during the course of the film. Shyamalan wouldn’t have been a fit for any of the other supporting cast and it makes sense for him to play a struggling writer trying to make sense of his place in the world. Critics just need to lighten up.
The visuals are decent, though there is some not-so-good-looking CGI involved. The biggest problem is that the action is all confined to one set piece- the apartment complex. We’re trapped there, and never get the sense that there is a world outside of this one, but that is also part of the storybook nature of it all. When all is said and done, my appreciation for Shyamalan is still strong. With Lady in the Water he dares to be different. While many critics and moviegoers couldn’t appreciate his craft, I could.
One of the classic dysfunctional family vacation comedies, The Great Outdoors pits the hapless but well-intended John Candy against his one-upmanship minded brother-in-law, Dan Aykroyd. The movie is full of cheesy 80s clichés and silliness, but it’s darn fun to watch. Most of the clichés are easily forgotten, as they don’t occur during the film's most memorable scenes.
And boy are those scenes memorable! Chasing a bat out of the cabin, Akroyd’s freaky daughters, rambunctious sub-titled raccoons, Candy’s story about the monstrous bald-headed bear, and the final 15 minutes or so including a showdown with said bear. Yeah, the filmmakers try slipping in a little sentimental mumbo-jumbo and a quaint message about family togetherness, but all that is easily overlooked by the sheer hilarity of The Great Outdoors’ high points.
As an added bonus, film lovers will catch a glimpse of a young Annette Benning in her first major motion picture appearance.
After years of success together, Disney and Pixar had a little squabble over whether they needed each other. Pixar was a computer animation powerhouse that possessed some of the best CGI technology, and Disney tried to prove they didn’t need Pixar by creating their own CGI technology. It sure seems like somewhere along the line to prove that they had the technology to equal Pixar, Disney forget to make sure their story was any good.
Chicken Little takes a classic fable about misconceptions and miscommunication and distorts it into a flashy piece of eye candy filled with sight gags, self-aware post-90s sensibilities, and pop culture references for the adults. Lest I forget, it’s dripping with smarmy psychobabble focused on parent-child relationships. Instead of one great big misunderstanding that is the original fable (which is covered in the first 5 minutes), it turns out the sky really is falling...and it’s because of aliens!
Honestly, I was fairly insulted by this film. While there is enough humor and silliness to keep the kids at bay for an hour twenty, the real message of the film is aimed at parents. Are we that hopeless as a society that we need to trick parents into seeing a public service announcement by disguising it as a kid’s movie? And ever since Shrek came along, “kids” movies seem to be required to contain humor for mom and dad to pick up on, and that’s annoying. Either make an adult-oriented animated film or be true to your core audience- the kids.
While there were parts that I laughed at (despite being inappropriate and unnecessary for a “kids” movie) and the computer animation was rather good, the story still sucks. I couldn’t decide which pun was more fitting for Chicken Little- I was torn between “This egg is a dud” and “This bird’s flown the coop” because they are both so apt.
The rating for this film is more subjective than most, because this film is a piece of nostalgia for me. Granted, I was only 1 when it came out, I remember watching it when I was young and in my Sesame Street days. Follow That Bird takes me back to when Sesame Street was still good. There’s not a ridiculous amount of silly colored monsters, nor do we rap the ABC’s. Nope, this goes back to the days of Gordon and Maria and Telly and Guy Smiley (when Elmo hadn’t yet hit the big time).
Big Bird has no bird family and is sent by a social worker to live with some Dodo birds in Illinois in an attempt to give him a family of his own kind. Once there, Big Bird realizes his home is Sesame Street and his family is everyone he left behind. So, he sets off on a trek back to Sesame Street. He ends up getting lost and his friends try to come to his rescue.
It’s a very good movie for young children and has a good message without all the crude humor or jokes designed to go over kids’ heads so parents can put up with watching it. Follow That Bird goes back to the days when kids' movies were for kids and it excels at what it does. It entertains and provides a valuable lesson about friends and family.
While there are a few subtle goofs and inconsistencies, Follow That Bird is a priceless kids' classic that I plan on showing to my kids someday. While not fitting my criteria for greatness, it’s certainly the next best thing.
“So I asked her, ‘Do you love me?’ and she said, ‘No, but that’s a great ski mask!’” This is just one of the many examples of silliness that I could pull from this movie. While countless prudes believe that this film is among the lowest of the low when it comes to forms of comedy, Dumb and Dumber is anything but. It’s one part farce, one-part buddy road trip comedy, and even part mystery.
Harry and Lloyd, two bumbling idiots stumble upon a briefcase full of money and are trying to return it to the owner. Unbeknownst to them, they are now the subject of a manhunt by both the Feds and the mob. What ensues is sheer hilarity, as they trek across the country meeting many colorful characters along the way.
There’s all kinds of humor, from the crude to the witty, along with references to and spoofs of other films. More than just a cult classic, Dumb and Dumber is borderline historic. If you were alive in the 90s, you’ve heard of Dumb and Dumber. It’s impossible to escape it. Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels turn out to be a well balanced duo waiting to fill you to the brim with laughs.
Unless you’re a prude, there’s no reason not to see it.
This film used to be on the ‘weekend afternoon movie’ rotation and was highly recommended by my boss, a Vietnam veteran. The movie is about a ragtag group of pilots who were recruited to help run secret military operations in Laos and Cambodia during the Vietnam War.
Mel Gibson and Robert Downey Jr. star as two of these pilots. There’s decent money to be made in running these operations, but they question whether it’s worth it at times to stick their necks out like they do. Ultimately they happen to discover that a US military officer is working with the enemy to secure a substantial amount of heroin trafficking.
Downey and Gibson end up cracking the case while putting themselves in mortal danger a lot. It’s based on true events, but paints an even nastier image of the Vietnam War, as it makes our military looks corrupt. And a big problem with the film is that it doesn’t quite feel like a Vietnam War movie.
It looks like Vietnam and it sounds like Vietnam, but it doesn’t feel like Vietnam. Perhaps because no one is walking around in retro military apparel, and maybe they characters hair and clothing styles look too current, but something is amiss, and that sucked me out of the film experience a good bit.
It’s an interesting movie, but it’s not fully engrossing nor fully engaging.
To put it bluntly, this is the first officially unnecessary Rocky sequel. After capturing our hearts with his grit and determination in the ring in two films, Rocky has become an icon. He defends his title several times and is a marketing giant. He’s pulling in all kinds of money and it just may be going to his head. His brother-in-law Paulie grows incredibly jealous and calls him on his fame and fortune while in a drunken stupor.
Meanwhile, a determined young fighter, Clubber Lang (played by Mr. T), has his sights set on Balboa. He practices and trains and works his way up the ranks and is bold enough to demand a match against Rocky.
The problem with Rocky III is that things are just too simplified. In a way, it’s a reversal of the original. Now Rocky is living the high life and being challenged by a young upstart. Clubber Lang is very much like an early Rocky. To prevent audiences from rooting for Lang, however, the filmmakers depict him as selfish and egomaniacal, thinking that he is the greatest and Balboa is just a chump. After being called out many times, Balboa wants to know why he shouldn’t take on the loud mouth.
Evidently, Rocky’s world is crushed when his trainer tells him that all his title defenses were against much weaker opponents. Mickey was protecting Rocky from tough bouts because Rocky isn’t the stallion everyone thinks he is. A good fighter, yes, but not capable of standing toe to toe with some of the toughest fighters on the circuit.
Rocky decides to be block-headed and fight Lang anyway. Before the fight, Lang assaults Mickey, who suffers a heart attack and dies in the locker room. Balboa, having insufficient amounts of training montages by this point isn’t focused and loses his title to Lang.
Rocky becomes depressed and reverts to his bummish ways of old until Apollo Creed tells him to snap out of it. Creed takes him to the slums of LA to train ‘old school’ style, but Rocky’s afraid of fighting Lang again. Cue an emotionally charged speech from Adrian and some new montage music (“Eye of the Tiger”) and Rocky is good to go. He’s mean, lean and ready to fight.
He wins of course, allowing Rocky to redeem himself (from what, exactly, we’re not too certain) and Rocky has now become elevated from inspiration to hero status. The biggest problem is that Rocky III indulges in all the over-the-top attitudes that were flirted with briefly in Rocky II, turning Rocky into some kind of all-powerful demigod. Sylvester Stallone effectively converts Rocky from a film series into a movie franchise. The success of this film all but guaranteed another installment, because while Rocky may still be fighting for pride, from here on out, Stallone was in it for the money.
This sends us a mixed message that doesn’t mesh with the ideals of the original film. Plain and simple, Rocky III kills most of the virtue of the original.
This is a unique ensemble film that shows just how dangerous and interconnected the world of terrorism, politics and oil can be. Several well known actors appear throughout that film and there are a good number of impressive performances by people I had not seen before.
On the whole, it’s a challenging watch. You have to take mental notes in order to follow the story from start to finish. If you aren’t alert enough, you’ll become confused when the individual stories begin to overlap and converge.
Gripping and tense, Syriana may come off as too political for some, but that’s not the point of the film. It’s just using a fictional story to highlight the complex relationships that come along with dependence on oil.
It does begin to feel a little long-winded by the final reel, but if you stick with it, you’ll be left with plenty to ponder about.
Quite possibly the most charming film I’ve seen since Big Fish, and that’s saying something. Let me warn you though, this film is incredibly vulgar, filled with cursing and references to all kinds of stuff kids don’t need to see. While the plot reads like a standard family road trip comedy, Little Miss Sunshine is brutally honest in its portrayal as to how screwed up people can be.
A family puts all their effort into making sure little Olive gets to the Little Miss Sunshine pageant, because it is her biggest dream to do so. Then comes the quirkiness. Olive’s parents are strapped for money and fight a good bit. Her mom is neurotic and over-worked, while her dad is a failure at trying to sell his motivational self-help series. Her brother is a Nietzsche reading artsy-fartsy type who has taken a vow of silence until he achieves his goal of becoming a jet pilot. Grandpa just got kicked out of the old folks home for snorting heroin and manages to fill in those silent moments with a barrage of obscenities. Finally, there’s Uncle Frank- a gay Proust scholar who recently botched a suicide attempt after learning that his ex-boyfriend is now dating the guy that beat him out for a prestigious grant.
After discovering that Olive has gotten a chance to compete in the Little Miss Sunshine pageant the family loads up into a rickety VW Bus and heads off on a journey you’ll never forget. No matter how hard you may try.
Some liken it to National Lampoon’s Vacation, except that Sunshine is darker and presents plenty more obstacles in the family’s way before they can get where they’re going both literally (the pageant) and as a family. It seems to me that the graveness of some of the things they encounter provides the balance that many family road trip films lack. Sure, there are plenty of clichéd, been-there-done-that scenarios, but Little Miss Sunshine doesn’t give in to the sappiness of those clichés. Instead, they bludgeon them to death with the right mix of dead-pan humor, bleakness and obscenity to elevate those clichés to a new level of comedy.
There are plenty of laughs in this film. The complete and utter lack of rationality in some of the choices that are made are so absurd that you can’t help but laugh. Then there are the inappropriate laughs, which you know shouldn’t be funny but are anyway. That’s the real secret to this film’s formula of success. Portraying situations that would be treated as a somber moment in other family trip films, effectively killing the humor for a moment of sap, but then throwing compounding amounts of absurdity on top of it to break the norm.
Raunchy, obscene good fun abounds in this film but the cursing is a bit too casual, which held Little Miss Sunshine back in my ratings scale. If the vulgarity had been toned down just a smidge, I might have supported this film for Best Picture at the Oscars. While it is certainly an excellent movie and one of the best of the year, I hesitate to declare it THE best of the year.
Definitely watch this film. It’ll warm your heart and warp your mind.
Based on the true story of five missionaries killed in the rain forests of Ecuador, End of the Spear is a unique experience. It tells two tales at once. First it tells of the ongoing struggle for survival of the Waodani tribe in Ecuador amidst an on-going tradition of spearing enemy tribes in an endless cycle of retribution. Secondly, it tells the tale of missionary efforts by five American families to these mysterious natives.
Part way through the film, the five men make contact with the Waodani but are killed because of suspicion and one tribesman’s false report of aggression from the missionaries. The wives and children of these missionaries then decide to move into the jungle to live with the Waodani, in an effort to understand what happened to their loved ones and to spread the message of God.
End of the Spear was made with a Christian audience in mind, but the religious aspects are played up no more than what really took place. One of the missionaries’ children helped with the creation of the film and ensured as much truth from real life as possible. For this fact alone, the film should be commended. The events of the film make it very susceptible to either overplaying or underplaying the missionary work, but it is handled with care.
As a part-time religious scholar myself (not a profession, just in my spare time), I enjoyed seeing the careful blend and assimilation of Christian ideas and teachings into the existing beliefs of the Waodani. Instead of forcing the natives to drop their beliefs (which many think happens in missionary efforts), they help assimilate new Christian principles into their existing beliefs. This is one of the beauties of Christianity that people tend to overlook or ignore.
Given that the film was geared towards religious-minded folks, I have no qualms mentioning it here. I thought the film performed solidly and powerfully, despite a few moments of weakness in the script or in a few artistic and directorial decisions.
As a fan of Johnny Cash’s music, I looked forward to seeing this film but was leery as to how whitewashed it might be about The Man in Black’s early career. Cash fell into severe drug addictions and was quite a rough-and-tumble fellow. Fortunately, this biopic captures it all pretty well.
Growing up in the 90s made it clear to me that the rock n roll lifestyle was a dangerous one. The deaths of high profile musicians from bands like Sublime, Blind Mellon and most importantly Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain hammered home the fact that musicians can lead very troubled lives. Given that nostalgia paints a cheery picture of a simpler time where bad things just didn’t happen as often are largely false, and Walk The Line asserts these facts by showing the human side of Johnny Cash and his weakness for narcotics.
The film only focuses on Cash’s early career, when he breaks into the music scene, meets future wife June Carter and gets hooked on pills. The relationship between Cash and Carter develops at a rocky pace and Carter, initially turned off by Cash’s attitude and feelings, becomes his saving grace.
While the film really captures Cash’s life well, it’s also not the happiest film ever made. Bleak and depressing at times, the movie also seems to drag on in places and even seems to cover perhaps too much, leaving some parts feeling rushed and others overexposed. Nevertheless, Walk the Line is a solid film and a touching human drama.
I love a good horror movie, but this wasn’t one. I was hesitant to rent it because all I had heard while it was in theaters was how terrifyingly real the graphic violence was. The fact that I could only rent an ‘unrated’ version made me more leery. With horror films, ‘unrated’ could mean even more bloody and chunky. But in the end, it was all fluff.
While the concept of luring American tourists to isolated cities where people will pay large sums of money to kill them is pretty unique, the characters being lured to their death got no sympathy from me. It’s a pair of American college boys and a guy they picked up along the way traveling through Europe with one thing on their minds- SEX. They’re told of a Slovakian town where the women are fast, loose and go crazy for foreigners. Naturally, these bumpkins head off into parts unknown.
In a horror movie, it helps to have characters you can sympathize with. Instead, I actually felt that the main characters deserved what they got. I’m not prudish or anything, but if you go wandering around in strange places looking for sex, you deserve to get chopped up. Now, there were some innocent victims, but that doesn’t matter. The ‘heroes’ of the show are sex-obsessed idiots.
The movie also paints a bleak picture of Slovakia- making it seem like Central European countries are all 30 years behind us in technology and have rampant crime problems. This depiction is completely false. Director Eli Roth claims he did this on purpose to show audiences the ignorance that Americans have of Central and Eastern Europe.
Newsflash: if you’re trying to educate your audience as to what stereotypes are wrong, don’t flood your movie with them.
The gore is also completely wrong here, which is a major no-no where I’m concerned. I demand authentic looking gore. This film gets at least a D in its false depiction of chainsaw trauma and bloodletting. It left me wondering why audiences were raving about this film.
Trusts the critics on this one- Hostel isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed.
This film typically gets brought up when there is discussion of the worst movies ever made. The granddaddy of them all is Plan 9 From Outer Space, but Battlefield Earth always gets an honorable (or dishonorable?) mention. It was only a matter of time before I saw this movie, and I found myself with the need for something awful and a 3 for $10 Blockbuster coupon.
WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!
One of the classic dysfunctional family vacation comedies, The Great Outdoors pits the hapless but well-intended John Candy against his one-upmanship minded brother-in-law, Dan Aykroyd. The movie is full of cheesy 80s clichés and silliness, but it’s darn fun to watch. Most of the clichés are easily forgotten, as they don’t occur during the film's most memorable scenes.
After years of success together, Disney and Pixar had a little squabble over whether they needed each other. Pixar was a computer animation powerhouse that possessed some of the best CGI technology, and Disney tried to prove they didn’t need Pixar by creating their own CGI technology. It sure seems like somewhere along the line to prove that they had the technology to equal Pixar, Disney forget to make sure their story was any good.
WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!
“So I asked her, ‘Do you love me?’ and she said, ‘No, but that’s a great ski mask!’” This is just one of the many examples of silliness that I could pull from this movie. While countless prudes believe that this film is among the lowest of the low when it comes to forms of comedy, Dumb and Dumber is anything but. It’s one part farce, one-part buddy road trip comedy, and even part mystery.
This film used to be on the ‘weekend afternoon movie’ rotation and was highly recommended by my boss, a Vietnam veteran. The movie is about a ragtag group of pilots who were recruited to help run secret military operations in Laos and Cambodia during the Vietnam War. 
WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!
This is a unique ensemble film that shows just how dangerous and interconnected the world of terrorism, politics and oil can be. Several well known actors appear throughout that film and there are a good number of impressive performances by people I had not seen before.
Quite possibly the most charming film I’ve seen since Big Fish, and that’s saying something. Let me warn you though, this film is incredibly vulgar, filled with cursing and references to all kinds of stuff kids don’t need to see. While the plot reads like a standard family road trip comedy, Little Miss Sunshine is brutally honest in its portrayal as to how screwed up people can be.
WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!
As a fan of Johnny Cash’s music, I looked forward to seeing this film but was leery as to how whitewashed it might be about The Man in Black’s early career. Cash fell into severe drug addictions and was quite a rough-and-tumble fellow. Fortunately, this biopic captures it all pretty well.
WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!
