Spaceballs

Spaceballs (1987)

Runtime: 96 minutes

Directed by: Mel Brooks

Starring: Bill Pullman, Daphne Zuniga, John Candy, Rick Moranis, Mel Brooks

From: MGM

Looking through my pile of Blu-Rays I decided to pick out a film I have seen many times before, including on Blu-Ray during the time I have had this blog. Now it is the time for me to talk about what has to be one of my favorite films; I've seen this too many times to count, whether on VHS tape, on television, on DVD, on Blu-Ray, and even a few years ago, on the big screen when a joint in Orlando briefly showed old movies on the big screen during the weekend. The crowds when I went were rather scarse, so no wonder they stopped doing it. A shame, I say. At least I got to see this in front of a small crowd and we all laughed together at the whole barrage of jokes and humor. Sure, not all of it works but a lot of it does, and there are so many memorable lines (the majority of which I have memorized) that's why I am able to watch this without getting tired of the film.

I am sure that everyone knows the plot of the film, a spoof of Star Wars where the bad guys are looking to steal the air of Planet Druidia and the princess of the planet is also kidnapped by them, so Lone Starr and his sidekick Barf (a mawg, half man and half dog, he's his own best friend) have to do battle to try and rescue her. If you are a fan of the Star Wars series you should especially enjoy this.

I realize that there's a strong love/hate thing with this film, where people either have a fiery hot passionate love for this or they hate it with much fury and anger. Interesting, really. I can't explain why it's so polarizing but I am glad this is something I treasure and haven't grown tired of. Note that I have never seen Spaceballs: The Animated Series, from a few years ago. I presume that most don't know it even exists, and from what I have heard it is atrocious and a big shame given that Brooks was involved with it. If only they would have made Spaceballs 2: The Search For More Money.

I'll be back Monday afternoon where I'll talk about a few things.

Deathrow Gameshow

Deathrow Gameshow (1987)

Runtime: 82 minutes

Directed by: Mark Pirro

Starring: John McCafferty, Robyn Blythe, Darwyn Carson, Beano

From: Pirromount Productions

Here is something incredibly obscure I found out earlier in the month from a messageboard post. Someone had gotten the film from Netflix via disc and it came with another unrelated film. That person said that this was definitely low-budget but is good if you love tasteless humor. All of this is true. I then looked for any clips of it on YouTube and there was one in incredibly bad video quality but I still saw something that literally made me laugh out loud. More on that later.

On a whim I decided to check out the online version of Epix, which is a series of premium cable channels that some providers offer, but not the one I have. They have some interesting things on there, and they have a Drive-In channel which shows the type of films you'd expect on a channel with the name and I would LOVE to have that. Anyhow, they had this film so I decided to watch it. I'll have to talk about this in a few days in a post where I don't review a film, but their online streaming service (which I signed up for a free 14 day trial) is God-awful and pitiful compared to Netflix and Hulu. Several times for no reason when I tried to watch this, the stream would stop for no reason and I'd have to go back and load it up again... it was incredibly aggravating and I highly doubt I'll try to watch anything else during my free trial.

As for a description of this, let me “borrow” from IMDb: “Chuck Toedan's the host of a gameshow featuring death row convicts competeing in life-or-death contests in hopes of cheating the executioner or, at the very least, winning some nice prizes for their next of kin. Not surprisingly, Chuck has made more than a few enemies, from outraged viewers trying to ban his show, to families of losing contestants looking for revenge. A hitman hired by one such family has shown up at Chuck's office, and he'll need to enlist the help of his most outspoken critic to keep from ending up like most of his contestants.”

As I said already, the movie is filled with bad taste, as you can guess from the plot description. It's real low-budget, so there isn't much gore to speak of at all. To give you a taste of the type of humor involved, the TV station is named KSIK, his female enemy (and obvious Gloria Steinem parody) is named Gloria Sternvirgin, and the hostess of the show is named Shanna Shallow.

But, this scene (the one on YouTube) is darkly hilarious. An old man is hooked up to an electric chair and there are sensors on his “wang dang doodle.” If he gets excited while watching the hostess do a dance known as THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN BONERS. She's in lingerie and dances seductively around him, and she ends up taking off her bra. There are several girls who go topless. This does not arouse the guy, so he wins. But, the male host (who really does look like a gameshow host) puts his hand on his shoulder while talking to him, and that immediately produces a boner and he gets electrocuted! Yep, that's a shining example of what to expect here.

Overall, while I say that the first half of the movie is better than the second (some really dumb things are done in the latter half which brings things down), overall it is still worth a look, especially if you enjoy that sort of humor. I understand Code Red is putting it out on DVD in about 2 months time. And really, I think that most TV these days is complete garbage, especially “reality” television, and with the bottom-feeder crap on, is it so hard of a stretch to believe that there really would be a program on which deals with death row contestants competing to get pardoned? I say it's not as far-fetched as it was 25 years ago. And this may have the potential to be a brutally on-point gory satire if remade by someone.

I'll be back Saturday afternoon.

Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale

Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (2010)

Runtime: 84 minutes

Directed by: Jalmari Helander

Starring: Onni Tommila, Jorma Tommila, Tommi Korpela, Per Christian Ellefsen

From: Cinet

Here is something I've had in my collection for awhile but have never watched... until now. What a better time to do it than on Christmas Eve, given that this Finnish tale is a rather bizarre tale where on Christmas Eve, a boy and his reindeer-herding father deal with the ramifications of a group of English-speaking men searching and finding the corpse of Santa Claus, who is actually evil! See what I mean about this being bizarre? And I don't think I need to say that the corpse doesn't stay a corpse for long...

I pretty much already told you what the plot was. It takes place in Finland and I don't want to give too much away but it is centered around a young kid and his rough and tumble dad; he's a single parent too, so you can figure out what the dynamic is then. The kid hangs out with an older boy who is also the son of a reindeer-herder. The characters act like what you'd expect and none of them you hate, even the gruff and sometimes rude parental figures. I don't want to reveal much more as a lot of fun is finding out what's next, as there are various surprises along the way and I'll leave it at that. It wasn't what I was expecting going in, which is both good and bad for various reasons. There is rather dark humor throughout, too.

Besides the strange story and the performances, there is also the pretty scenery. It is set in a rural village in Finland and it's a very pretty area, with plenty of snow-covered trees, snow-covered mountains, and well, snow-covered just about everything. It sets the mood and almost makes you feel cold, literally.

If you want to see a one of a kind movie about Jolly Old Saint Nick that is unlike anything you've come across before, then check this out. I wouldn't say it's great as I've heard from some places, as some parts I can carp about, but it's still good and I can see why it's already become a cult hit.

I'll be back Thursday night. I hope everyone has a nice holiday season.

Home Alone/Home Alone 2

Yep, today for the holiday season I decided to talk about these two films from my childhood, which I both saw on the big screen with my parents way back when. The first one I was pretty familiar with as I had seen parts or all of it a number of times throughout the years (including as an adult) but the second one I hadn't seen in full in many years. I figured it was time to watch both and talk about them here.

Technically, how I saw the first yesterday was that I watched the movie while listening to a podcast from a site where some people did a commentary track for the movie and while they spent a lot of time clowning on the movie and how there's so many coincidences and the villains take a superhuman amount of punishment... that said, they still say they love this piece of nostalgia from their childhood despite how it's easy to laugh at things as an adult.

Home Alone 2... yeah, it's pretty ridiculous how it's such a carbon copy of the first. Plus, talk about contrivances, I thought the first was silly but the sequel and how Kevin ended up in New York, preposterous. You could really tear apart this movie, even more so than the first one. Plus, I don't think it needed to be 2 hours even; it should have been around the same as the first one.

Now, Tim Curry as the hotel concierge was great as hey, it's Tim Curry, and his underling Rob Schneider was actually tolerable considering it's Rob Schneider. There were some real sappy moments but they were fine if you're into such things. The traps for The Wet Bandits... it tops the first for sure and it makes things even more cartoony in the amount of punishment they can take and they still can get up instead of getting maimed or even killed. Plus, Uncle Frank singing Cool Jerk in the shower, that was the first time I heard that tune, and Cool Jerk is pretty awesome.

Now, it was nice to see the second after all these years, but overall the first one is the best. At least the both are watchable as an adult, as least if you saw it as a kid first. The other sequels I've never even seen, but I've heard real bad things about the third and fourth and believe it or not just a few weeks ago a fifth one made its debut on ABC Family (with Malcolm McDowell and Ed Asner!) and I have a feeling that one is no good. 

I'll be back Monday night for an appropriate Christmas Eve review, even if it may be on the twisted side.

Revenge of the Nerds

Revenge of the Nerds (1984)

Runtime: 90 minutes

Directed by: Jeff Kanew

Starring: Robert Carradine, Anthony Edwards, Timothy Busfield, Ted McGinley, Donald Gibb

From: 20^th Century Fox

I apologize for this being up later than planned but today was real long and I did not get to much sleep last night, and I do not feel 100% either. In short, early this morning-soon before I was going to go to bed-I found out that I was going to become an uncle to twins, rather than it happening after this month as planned. Needless to say it was hard to get sleep with that revelation. But yes, everyone is fine now.

I decided to go and review this, which I hadn't before; that's a surprise as this is one I've seen all or parts of many times before and I've always enjoyed, from the first time I saw it at probably too young an age to now as an adult. I am sure everyone knows the story of how this is about a pair of nerds meeting up with a bunch of outcasts (including someone who is Japanese and another guy who is flamboyantly gay; hey, it was the 80's...)-including some people you periodically see throughout but they're never given any lines and those nerds are just random dudes, such as that guy that looks like Harpo Marx-and they end up feuding with a frat filled with jock preps known as the Alpha Betas at the fictional Adams College.

Turns out, I still really enjoy the film. Sure, it's funny often, there's plenty of female nudity and there are many memorable lines and moments. But what I dig about this is that all the characters are enjoyable, from the good guys to even the shitheel villains. Everyone is fine, from the people I mentioned to small roles from the likes of Bernie Casey and John Goodman as a stereotypical football coach.

Sure, some things in this movie wouldn't fly in 2012 (the good guys being voyeurs and installing cameras to spy on a sorority for double-crossing them, the lead guy going in disguise and pretending to be the bad guy so that he could have sex with the bad guy's girl... that's not in the best taste) but that's OK and you shouldn't get too mad about it, I say. I mean, you can't stay mad when you see such 80's things as that finale rap/song thing, dancing while stoned to Thriller, the fashion, and the new wave-esque 80's ditties you hear throughout. Like I said, I still really enjoy this film. The sequels... talk about "diminishing returns" but maybe one of these days I'll talk about those.

I'll be back Saturday night, unless I keep on feeling crappy.

An Evening With Miami Connection

Back in September, I watched a YouTube upload (long since taken down) of the late 80's movie known as Miami Connection, a film that was rediscovered by happenstance a few years ago and it got a slow release from Drafthouse Films. I did my review and since then it's actually gotten a backlash from a segment of the Internet audience (including some people I know) for it being “overrated” as a bad movie experience; sure, there are funnier and shittier bad movies out there that a segment of the movie audience would go bananas for in the same way they did with this if those films got the same treatment that MC did. It doesn't mean that MC is a bad time; indeed, it's still a blast to watch for the reasons I mentioned in the review. It's pretty terrible but it is a blast to watch. Anyhow...

They put it out in limited release this fall and finally this past weekend it came to the appropriate place of Orlando, as it was mainly set and filmed in that city, despite the title. It was at the local indie/arthouse joint, The Enzian. I've been there a good number of times before and I knew this is where any screenings would happen. 

The film did so well this past weekend that there are two more midnight screenings the last weekend of the year. Many (but not all) of the seats were filled at my screening. I got there early to sit at their patio bar to have some drinks then I lined up to get in. There as special guests was Angelo Janetti (i.e. the guy who in the film looks like Oates from Hall & Oates; he now has a goatee) and Maurice Smith (i.e. OH MY GOD! i.e. The Black Guy)... and Grandmaster Y.K. Kim himself. He runs Martial Arts World in Orlando. A number of his students were there to see the film. Before it started, the three said some things and Kim can still do the splits at his old age. His English skills are not that much better than they were 25 years ago, but oh well.

The screening went pretty well. There was a lot of cheering and of course plenty of laughter too. Even Kim admitted beforehand that the movie isn't great on a technical level. I am glad I got to see it on the big screen with a crowd as that's the best way to see it. I still like this motion picture despite the surprising backlash it's gotten.

I'll be back Thursday night.

All I Wanna Do

AllI Wanna Do (a.k.a. Strike!, a.k.a. The Hairy Bird; 1998)

Runtime: 97 minutes

Directed by: Sarah Kernochan

Starring: Gaby Hoffman, Kirsten Dunst, Lynn Redgrave, Rachael Leigh Cook

From: Alliance

Yep, it's been too long since I've seen a Rachael film so I figured I should finally watch something I recorded off of an Encore channel last month but put off until tonight.

The plot of this: this is set in the early 60's in a random Northeastern town and revolves around an all-girls school. Odette (Hoffman; there's a name from the past) gets sent there by her parents, basically because they caught her about to have sexual intercourse with her boyfriend. She has to room with the mischief-makers of the school, including Dunst, Monica Keena, and Heather Matarazzo. They end up crossing paths with the leader of the school (Redgrave) and one of the hall monitor types (Cook) who try to control those rowdy dames. When the bad girls find out that their school is likely to merge with an all-boys school, they decide to enact a plan to try and sabotage the annual get-togther where the two school's residents hang out with each other for a day, including a dance and a choir performance.

Overall, this comedy with dramatic moments (for example, Matarazzo's character deals with bullemia) is rather entertaining. I wasn't sure what to expect but I managed to enjoy it. It may sound like a “chick flick” but I say that anyone can enjoy it. There are plenty of funny moments and also some nice ones too. Depending on which girls in the cast you enjoy for hondog reasons, you may or may not feel like a pervert while watching this. Thankfully for me, the ladies I dig the most were around the age of 18 so I did not feel so bad.

Speaking of perverts, the guys from the all-boys school (including the much-beloved Hayden Christensen) acted about how you'd expect; they put together a pot of money and the guy who randomly got to pair with the girl that had the “biggest nay-nays” (i.e. boobs) got the pot. Also, one guy slow-dances with a girl at the dance and out of nowhere... well, he came in his pants! Of course I laugh at such humor. Also, apparently if a guy takes Midol along with drinking Coca-Cola, this makes him feel good. I never knew. This is all part of their plan to sabotage things; the main part is getting the guys drunk and they acted how you would expect.

Oh, and of course I liked looking at Ms. Cook. At one point she had her hair done with Jacqueline Kennedy and I approved of that look. The movie has some interesting lingo, too. For example, the phrase "hairy bird" is used a few times, along with the quite memorable "up your ziggie with a wah-wah brush." I happened to enjoy this movie and if it would have gotten a bigger theatrical release back in the day, then it probably would have gotten the attention I feel it deserves.

I'll be back Tuesday night with a special recap of what I did Saturday night revolving around a movie I talked about a few months ago.