Fantasia

Fantasia (1940)

Runtime: 125 minutes

Directed by: Many Dudes

Starring: Besides the cartoon stuff, there’s narrator Deems Taylor, composer Leopold Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra

From: Disney

Here’s a movie that I’ve seen available as a rental at Blockbuster for awhile and just earlier this week I decided to pick this up. I had seen the movie once before, but it was when it came out on VHS back 20 years ago, so it was that long since I had seen it. I didn’t remember too much about the film but as a kid I think I enjoyed it; some of it was over my head, though. I don’t plan on seeing Fantasia 2000, though; I’ve heard some negative things about that.

This, though, has become a classic after being a disappointment at the box office when it was released. It was ahead of its time, I guess. I’m sure it helped that when it was shown again in the late 60’s, people saw it while drugged out of their minds and enjoyed the abstract visuals and accompanying music.

Me, seeing it as an adult, it’s a great piece of work. Sure, narrator Deems Taylor delivers some stuffy narration, but otherwise it is a tremendous piece of art. You get 8 different segments accompanied by various classical pieces of music from the likes of Bach, Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky, and Beethoven. Like I said, the wordless animation manages to work in telling a story and it fits like a glove with the classical music. There’s not too much else to say about it, as it’s really a movie best seen rather than described by me. It’s especially nice on Blu-Ray. Sure, if you watch it that way the aspect ratio is 1.33/1, meaning that there are black bars to the right and left of the picture, but there is an option where those get replaced by images that fit with what’s on the screen at the time; that’s what I did and it’s nice.

By the way, speaking of movies I’ll never see, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. I don’t plan on ever watching that live-action flick from last year, as it looks just plain bad. I’ll stick with the great 10 minute segment you see here, thank you very much. Also, I thought it was odd that one thing from the movie’s been edited out since the 60’s, which is a character in the Pastoral Symphony segment that was deemed to be offensive to African-Americans. You can find the original segment on YouTube with only a little digging. I’ve seen it that way and yeah, it’s politically incorrect, but I don’t know if it’s bad enough that it needs to be banished forever.

Then again, despite making a huge ride out of it at Disney Parks, who knows if the U.S. will ever get a proper release of Song of the South (which can also be found on YouTube with little effort, and of course I’ve seen it in the past few years that way; one of these days I’ll do a review of that too). I thought it was odd that got removed when there’s a brief segment called “Chinese Dance” (it’s part of the Nutcracker Suite) involving mushrooms dancing around, and well, they looked stereotypically Chinese, with the slanted eyes and all. Curious. Heck, those mushrooms were even on the cover of the Blu-Ray!

But anyhow, it is a unique experience you should watch if you’ve never viewed it before. I'll be back Friday night with a new review.

Sanctum

Sanctum (2011)

30% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 136 reviews)

Runtime: 109 minutes

Directed by: Alister Grierson

Starring: Richard Roxburgh, Ioan Gruffudd, Rhys Wakefield, Alice Parkinson

From: Universal

Oh man. What a miss this was. And it shouldn’t have been this aggravating to watch. The main reason why I went to see this was that I was bored last night and I wanted to go to the AMC Theatres at Downtown Disney in order to enjoy their giant ETX screen and their Coca-Coca Freestyle machine, where you get 106 different flavors, remember. This was the only movie that fit the bill. I certainly won’t go to the ETX now that they’re showing the Justin Bieber concert movie… although I wonder if I would have enjoyed that more than this movie!

You’ve probably seen the ads, but in any case, this movie is about some cave explorers who are in Papua New Guinea to do some exploring. Complications happen (in this case, a cyclone arrives out of nowhere and flooding happens), resulting in the characters having to try and find another way out.

I can’t say I’ve seen too many cave films before. I doubt there ARE too many of them out there, as it must not be easy to try and film. The Descent does a great job of that. Besides the monster stuff there are many tense moments with the characters trying to get out of their situation. There’s also The Cave, which I haven’t seen but I hear it is very similar to The Descent, only it’s not as good. I’ll have to watch that one of these days for comparison reasons. I think I’d enjoy that rather than this movie, to be perfectly honest.

It isn’t the 3D stuff that was the devil in the details. Using James Cameron’s fancy cameras, it looked pretty nice. Rather, it was the script that sunk things. It is based (rather loosely) on a true story. It’s hard to believe given all the stereotypes and stock situations you see here. It’s hackneyed and cliché-ridden. There’s the gruff father who’s a master at exploring caves (Roxburgh), the whiny bratty son who has daddy issues (Wakefield), a rich thrillseeker who is funding this operation (Gruffudd), and so on and so forth. Then there’s the situations they are put in. Totally out of the screenwriting playbook. It was so disappointing. There could have been some creative and interesting situations that they could have been put in if you’re making most of it up. Instead, it’s standard situations with some stupid plot twists.

And, the characters that get trapped down there don’t act intelligently. Rather, they act dumb and do dumb things, only because the script told them to do so. I can’t blame the actors for it. But what *really* grinded my gears was all the arguing that they did. It happened constantly to create drama, which I didn’t think was needed in the situation. Look at The Descent, for example. There were many tense moments in that, even before the monsters appeared and did their damage. There was suspense that was done well and it didn’t involve people arguing and griping with each other about what to do, or them making the dim-witted decision just to advance the story. There is a tension-filled movie done right. This, though, was a disappointment and I don’t think I can say much more than that.

Although, I do have to mention that a guy named George (Dan Wyllie) who was the one person I didn’t hate. He was just wacky. He wore a Ramones T-shirt early on, said some colorful phrases, and mentioned that he got “The Clap in Mexico”. Tremendous.

I'll be back Monday night with a new review.

Blood and Bone

Blood and Bone (2009)

Runtime: 93 minutes

Directed by: Ben Ramsey

Starring: Michael Jai White, Julian Sands, Eamonn Walker, Dante Basco (yes, Rufio from Hook)

From: Remarkable Films

Now, here is an action movie released on DVD in the DTV market that is well worth seeing if you enjoy the genre.

I’ve heard about this film for awhile from a certain thread on a messageboard that is filled with hardcore action film fanatics. I even bought it last year from the Blockbuster by me that was closing down. Yet, it was just Friday night that I sat down and watched this.

The story isn’t high art. Isaiah Bone (White, who should be a bigger star in the genre, for damn sure; he more than proved himself in a serious role like this and also a funny role like Black Dynamite) gets out of prison and goes to LA. He finds a room for rent and stays there. He comes across an underground fighting league, and he hooks up with a promoter (Basco) and for a cut of the profit, he goes through various fighters. However, he also comes across people who are out to take him down, along with a few peeps who are related to the buddy he had in prison who got shiv’ed and died. It’s not much more complex than that.

Yet, it’s great entertainment. The story is entertaining enough and you don’t get bored by it. There are such quirks as a big scene involving the 80’s “classic” Dance Hall Days. There’s racist characters who explain their racism in a rather colorful way. The villain does some rather evil stuff in order to make you want to root for the hero. But, you’ll enjoy the plentiful fights and action scenes. From the beginning with Bone fighting off some thugs (including Kimbo Slice!) in a memorable way to the ending, the action stuff is fun, is easy to watch (no shaky-cam awful crap), and it looks good too.

Various MMA personalities appear (including Gina Carano, Bob Sapp, and Maurice Smith, along with karate dude and former pro wrestler Ernest “The Cat” Miller) in small but still unobjectionable roles. There’s such quirks as Miller being an out in the open homosexual, to the point that he wears a wig with curlers during his fights. It’s stuff like this that just makes the movie fun. Sure, it’s violent and there’s no lacking in very strong language, but if you enjoy your movies that way, you should particularly enjoy this little gem. Don’t let it going straight to DVD turn you off.

I’ll be back on Friday night with a new review.

Locked Down

Locked Down (2010)

Runtime: 99 minutes

Directed by: Daniel Zirilli

Starring: Tony Schiena, Vinnie Jones, Rashad Evans, Bai Ling, Kimbo Slice

From: Lionsgate

I’ve mentioned before there’s been some quality action movies that happened to go to direct to video instead of getting a theatrical release. I’ve reviewed some of them before, such as Ninja and Universal Soldier: Regeneration. For the next few weeks I’ll review a few more of those films for any of you wanting to check something out in the action genre and what’s been on the big screen hasn’t whet your appetite as of late.

This movie is NOT one of those.

This is one of those movies from Tapout, the clothing line. They “present” it so I’m sure that’s why you have some recent DTV films out there which “star” some popular MMA guys but their roles likely are glorified cameos. Those movies don’t really get talked about in the community, which I consider to be a red flag. But, I took the plunge anyhow and picked this out at random at Blockbuster to see how it was. The MMA guys here are Kimbo Slice, Joe Doerksen, Cheick Kongo, Forrest Griffin, and Rashad Evans. Only Evans has a role that’s longer than a scene or two. He’s fine. Kimbo is amusing as he’s pretty much playing himself. The other guys… not so much.

Another movie from recent years that has gotten love in the action community is Undisputed II, a sequel loosely related to a movie devoted to boxing in prison. I haven’t seen II yet, but it’s MMA fighting done in prison. Well, I haven’t seen that but I understand this movie has a lot in common with that… only UII is much better. In short, a cop gets set up by someone and ends up in prison, where a mob dude (Jones) runs an MMA fighting thing in the basement of the clink; no kidding, and everyone is in on it and is fine with the whole deal.

Even with the laughable plot, the movie isn’t worth watching. The fight scenes are only alright, some of the acting is rather poor (and not just from some of the MMA guys), and I’m sure Undisputed II is a lot better than this film.

I will at least list some notable things so that you don’t ever have to watch this:

* The fighting stuff is alright, I suppose, but it does look overly choreographed. Kimbo Slice, though, does a powerbomb in one bout, as if he's a WWE wrestler! The opponent no-sold what should have been a finishing move; that pissed me off.

* There's random female nudity throughout, which I didn't complain about.

* You do get to see Bai Ling in her bra and thong panties in one scene; I didn't complain either! However, I don't really buy her in the role she had, which was that of a prison guard! I kid you not. She also managed to get into a fight in the jail with the lawyer that represented our hero.

* Did you know that Wushu is a JAPANESE martial art? That's what the movie tells you, anyway. I hate to break the news to the filmmakers, but Wushu is a popular CHINESE martial art. And, the statement comes from the stereotypical "wise old sage" who used to run a martial arts school before getting sent to prison! Talk about insulting.

So yeah, hopefully I’ve explained adequately enough why this is something you shouldn’t rent or buy.

I'll be back Saturday afternoon with a new review.

Enthiran

Enthiran (2010)

Runtime: 174 minutes (no, not a misprint)

Directed by: S. Shankar

Starring: Rajinikanth, Aishwarya Rai, Danny Denzongpa, Santhanam

From: Sun Pictures

Alright, here’s a review of something that’s rather strange but yet it’s timely, and not just because I’ve talked of some foreign flicks as of late. Last week I first heard about this movie on a website where a pair of videos were posted. I didn’t watch them… which was a mistake. Suddenly, on Thursday the 27th the second video that was posted went viral and was talked about on various sites, due to the fact that you saw action scenes that were SO wacky and over the top and yet because of that, it was great beyond words. I looked around and found out what the movie was called. It apparently was released in a few places in the US a few months ago, but I had not heard anything about it. I looked around some more, and magically, someone uploaded the entire film to YouTube, and with English subtitles! How nice of that person. Of course, that got taken down but as I’m typing this late Sunday night, someone uploaded the movie in 12 parts on YouTube, in better quality and subtitles for the songs too. You just have to know what they’re singing. Here’s Part 1, to put it out there blatantly.

So, I watched it that way, and what an experience. Now, even though it’s from India, it’s not a “Bollywood” movie. Rather, it’s called “Kollywood”, or Tamil to be more specific. I don’t really know how it’s different, as you still get random extravagant musical numbers like you do in Bollywood flicks. Also, at random points the cast will speak a few words in English before returning to their native language. This happens often, and I have ZERO idea as to why.

Besides those things, though, the movie is rather straightforward. A scientist (Rajinikanth) creates a robot in his image. He has a hot girlfriend (Rai). The robot does many amazing things… in fact, to a preposterous degree, but it works in this universe. So, the scientist wants the robot to become a weapon of the state, but there’s reservations. It becomes injected with emotions, and that causes problems, as you might expect. The robot starts to fall for Rai too; at least that is understandable. As you can see, I find her to rank high on the attractiveness scale. Now there’s another person who has tried a few times to break into the Western world, but when those films are The Last Legion (trust me, I’ve seen it and it’s not all that great) and The Pink Panther sequel… I’m sure she doesn’t mind still being a huge star in her homeland.

Anyhow, there’s also problems with rivals who wish to have the technology themselves. To give it away (hey, the videos went viral, after all, so you’ve probably already seen it), the robot gets trashed and thrown away, only to end up in the wrong hands, and that’s how you end up with many copies of it.

Much of the movie isn’t action-related at all. Besides the musical stuff there’s also drama, romance and comedy. But, what action you do see is in those two videos I linked to, and what insane action it is. You see many preposterous things… and yet most of it was just so damn COOL! Most of it I had never seen before (or even thought of) and while it’s videogame-like, it doesn’t look bad at all. It’s not like they have ILM magic working for them so you can’t expect stuff comparable to the most recent and biggest Hollywood blockbusters. It works for the movie.

The other stuff is also fine. The story really wasn’t all that original if you look at it closely; who cares, though, if you’re entertained by it? There was enough for me not to be bored, even with it being almost 3 hours long. The songs… they’re wacky, so for that reason alone you shouldn’t be bored by that particular aspect either.

So, whether you want to watch it that way or wait for DVD or what have you, if it sounds interesting for your tastes, go for it.

I'll be back Thursday night with a new review.

Badge 373

Badge 373 (1973)

Runtime: 116 minutes

Directed by: Howard W. Koch

Starring: Robert Duvall, Verna Bloom, Henry Darrow, Felipe Luciano

From: Paramount

Here’s a curio. It is a movie never released on DVD yet one time it was on TCM (it was during a month where they paid tribute to Hispanics and even though the movie’s portray of Puerto Ricans is not flattering, to say the least, it still had many of its top actors during the time period) and a few days ago on a TMC channel they showed the flick, so I caught it that way. It is one of those movies based on the exploits of Eddie Egan, who is now most famous for being the inspiration for “Popeye” Doyle of The French Connection fame. Now, I got to be honest here. The one time I saw that movie, I wasn’t blown away by it and in fact I wondered why it was so beloved. Sure, the famed car chase was cool and all. The rest of it, though, did nothing for me, and I remember not really liking the two lead cops, which is definitely a problem.

Then again, it can be tough to like the lead here, known as Eddie Ryan. Played by Duvall, he’s a gruff cop who clearly has his prejudices. He uses a certain Hispanic slur (it’s a four letter word starting with S) about 10 times and it can be difficult to like that sort of protagonist. At least here he can be outrageously funny. For example, a suspect calls him a maricon and Ryan responds, “I bet you’ve taken it up the chocolate-covered speedway a few times, haven’t you?” and says to a prostitute, “Listen, you coked-up whore bitch!” That sort of dialogue makes me laugh, as politically incorrect as it is.

However, the movie overall is average at best. It’s overlong and despite a fun first ten minutes where Ryan goes in disguise as a club patron (with giant fake mustache) in order to be part of a bust, the rest of the movie can be downright dull at times and the story (involving guns and Puerto Rican independence) isn’t anything special. There’s some unintentional laughs but that’s about it. However, the music is early 70’s grooviness, and I at least enjoyed that. It was done by J.J. Jackson, the guy famous for the oldies staple But It’s Alright (covered in the 80’s by Huey Lewis);

It’s a shame, as Duvall delivers the expected good performance. I just wish that aside from some nice dramatic moments scattered throughout, that there’d be more of this movie than there was. It doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be on DVD, though.

I’ll be back Monday night with a foreign flick, and while I’ve only seen clips of it as of this time, I already know it’ll be quite the review.

Shout At The Devil

Shout At The Devil (1976)

Runtime: 128 minutes (US Version), or 150 minutes (British Version)

Directed by: Peter Hunt (please don’t snicker)

Starring: Lee Marvin, Roger Moore, Barbara Parkins, Ian Holm

From: Tonav/AIP

Here is something that I saw early this month but I wanted to save the review for a later date, as I don’t have that much to say about it and plus, I was going to talk about something else but things happened and now I’ll be discussing this.

This is a British movie from 1976 that got released in the States by low-budget masters American International Pictures, although it was edited down by 20 some odd minutes and plus I saw this on THIS-TV, a commercial channel. Not the most ideal thing, but given how rare the movie is, I still watched it that way.

The movie is set in Zanzibar in 1913. Marvin plays a guy named Flynn O’Flynn! He’s a wild guy who likes to drink (not that far from real life, to be honest here) and his daughter (Parkins) is hooked up with proper aristocratic Sebastian (Moore) and they get wrapped up in a scheme involving revenge, ivory poaching, and so on and so forth with the Germans, who controlled the area at the time.

The movie sounds cool on people. It stars some quality actors and is directed by Hunt, who is best known for doing a great job of editing the first few Bond movies (and directing one of them, too); the plot also sounded interesting. Not to mention, it reminds me of the Motley Crue song of the same name.

It may just be me, but while a lot of stuff did go on, much of it wasn’t that interesting to me. Sorry to say; that’s just how I felt. Maybe if I saw it in its proper format (and saw its original British cut, although given that I thought the cut version dragged on and was overlong…) I’d think differently. Based off of what I saw, though, it’s a misfire, although a noble one and it isn’t what I’d call “awful”. I was just hoping it’d be better, an underappreciated gem.

One good thing I can say about the movie is that it has a great fistfight, and it’s on YouTube. It starts at 2:45 in the video. It’s of Marvin and Moore engaging in a long fistfight. I mean, think of the big fight in They Live in terms of length. It’s a raucous affair and I’m glad you can at least see that if you don’t want to try and watch the entire movie.

Also tremendous is the rumor that during filming of the movie Moore and Marvin got into a *legit* fight-who knows over what but given Lee’s known troublemaking ways during the filming of movies and his love of drink…-and apparently Roger whooped his ass and knocked him unconscious! Both guys are definitely tough (they were both members of the military, after all) so I wish I could have been a fly on the wall for that.

Anyway, you may enjoy it more than I did. If you do want to see it, it is likely on once in a blue moon on channels like THIS and MGMHD.

I’ll be back Friday night, and it won’t be a foreign film, but it will be something obscure and rather interesting.