The Emoji Movie!

The Emoji Movie (2017)

Runtime: 86 long, long minutes

Honestly, everyone involved with this should be ashamed of themselves

The first film I've ever DVR'ed; I swear this is true. I realize how preposterous it will sound when I say that until Tuesday I've never had a DVR in my entire life, but that is exactly the case. Who knows how often it will even be used, but of course I have seen others use one so I was interested to try it out. This “wonderful” motion picture was on the FXX Channel yesterday so that was programmed, and it played without a hitch. Of course, some would say I would have been better off had it not recorded...

Going in I expected this to be like the poop emoji, and that indeed it was. To be honest, it just seemed like a bad idea from the very concept... life in the smartphone of a dopey 14 year old boy and emoji being living things which can only express one emotion in their entire lives & Gene Meh (unfortunately voiced by T.J. Miller) is “broken” as he has multiple emotions. He has to go on the run to fix himself and while I am one of the few on the planet that doesn't love The Lego Movie, that did a similar concept better than this lame, vapid, dopey film where I only chuckled a few time and I usually groaned or rolled my eyes at this “entertainment”.

I get that smartphones have become popular for little kids in recent years-I have four little nephews, after all. However, I don't even know if the children will enjoy this crap. At least now I fully understand why many people have a strong dislike of James Corden between his character here and whatever the heck he was doing in Cats. As many have noted already, it is not in good taste to see a motion picture for the young ones heavily plug certain phone apps to the point that instructions are given on how to play Candy Crush & Just Dance... which of course is a console-only game.

I can only hope that none of my nephews have ever seen this dreck; at least I know there is plenty of worthwhile family entertainment just in these modern times... among other options, the majority of what Disney and Pixar have released in recent times. Don't be a fool like me and even give a shot to The Emoji Movie for ironic laughs; at least personally, there has to be literally thousands of films that range from stone cold classics to simply interesting that are far more worthy of my time rather than an infamous animated flick that people hated simply for its very conceptualization... and turned out to be something that needed to be far better just to be meh.

The biggest laugh I got: the movie having a “dungeon” where never-used emojis are stuck in. One of them was... an eggplant. Now, I know it is poppycock that a 14 year old boy won't use that emoji often in messages to a significant other or a potential significant other!

Freebie And The Bean

Freebie and the Bean (1974)

Runtime: 113 minutes

Directed by: Richard Rush

Starring: James Caan, Alan Arkin, and a bunch of 70's character actors

From: Warner Bros.

A movie with dated elements, but still the way that I'll tip my cap to the late Richard Rush.

I've been meaning to visit or revisit something from the director once I heard last month that he had passed away. I only saw Freebie and the Bean once before today, and that was many moons ago. By 2021 standards, the movie has plenty of material that will offend more sensitive types (after all, even the title is problematic, considering that Alan Arkin is playing a Mexican character...). Despite that and how loud the movie is-which more often than not would be tiring to me-I still enjoy the bats--- insanity of this motion picture.

The threadbare plot has James Caan and Arkin has undercover cops in San Francisco who have a love/hate relationship where it seems as if the latter usually wins out. They have to guard a mob boss during Super Bowl weekend; the big game is in the area. From that germ of an idea came a LOT of chaos in San Fran; the duo were like agents of chaos in that they made everyone else act loud, crazy, and cause plenty of wanton destruction all across the area. There are many car crashes, brawls, s--- getting destroyed, etc. A sequence in the middle lasts about 10 minutes long and is astounding in the amount of monetary damage that must have happened from just a would-be assassin attempting to elude capture. Some definitely won't like the amount of innocent bystanders that are collateral damage, or the number of offensive slurs that both title characters use. Heck, plenty won't like Bean's behavior as he believes his wife is cheating on him and eventually confronts her.

Despite myself, the movie is still rather entertaining due to all the chaos, all the dialogue that is funny without being too gross, and the absurd situations our “hero” duo find themselves in. Big assets include the cast (and not just Caan & Arkin. This also has plenty of familiar 70's character actors), the jaunty score, how well the action is staged and yes, the gigantic cojones it took to make such an outrageous movie. While not a movie I'll revisit often (it'd be too exhausting for me) it was a good idea to finally be able to sing its praises on Letterboxd. After all, of all the classics that came out in '74, allegedly KUBRICK said this was his favorite from the year.

Night of Terror

Night of Terror (1933)

Runtime: The version I saw was only 63 minutes long

Directed by: Benjamin Stoloff

Starring: Bela Lugosi, Wallace Ford, Sally Blane, Bryant Washburn, Tully Marshall

From: Columbia

As of late I've mentioned a few times my issues with my Internet/phone/cable. Well, I've been gaslit by what's happened during this period of time but today I have a new provider which installed some fiber optic cables and now everything is not only working again, the speeds are notably improved from before... and the performance in the past was good when it worked. Realistically, there should be no more problems with that anytime soon so it should be a LONG while before I carp and moan about such things in a Letterboxd review.

The installation was done this morning; this was seen on Prime in the early afternoon, although it's easy to find elsewhere as it's in the public domain. I've known of this for years and mainly chose it due to its brief length at barely more than an hour. It is a Pre-Code horror movie involving a mansion filled with various characters... this includes a young lady who is engaged to a scientist-who is going to be buried alive to prove that he created a serum that causes someone to breath without oxygen!-but she is constantly bothered by a tool of a newspaper reporter who always forces himself on her, “mystical” characters, one of whom goes into trance-and in the third act does a seance-& another played by Bela Lugosi, and (unfortunately) a Black servant who is a total buffoon. Oh, and there's an ugly-looking maniac prowling around in the area.

There are actually other characters which also come across as one-note. All that said, it is an entertaining yarn which has enough macabre laughs/spooky moments for me to say that this was “fine”. Plus, it was nice to see some other faces I recognized (Wallace Ford, Tully Marshall). In addition, the ending scene has one of the characters breaking the fourth wall and talking right to the audience, for reasons I won't spoil but it was a menacing message. I actually saw that clip before and it was funny out of context. In context... it's still funny.

Carlito's Way

Escape to Paradise.

I still had to use physical media last night (tomorrow I am FINALLY going to have Internet and cable again; if this long nightmare continues for me and something goes wrong there... expect an all-timer rant from me) so thankfully in my collection was a steelbook of this movie. I don't usually purchase those but I found it for cheap somewhere so I couldn't turn that down. It's another De Palma movie where Pacino plays a Hispanic character and even if it's not as great-or over the top-as Scarface the film is still very good.

Carlito Brigante is a Puerto Rican drug dealer who is released from prison due to a technicality by his sleazy lawyer and he actually wants to reform and be involved in legit businesses (a nice twist); in fact he has an end goal in mind-he just needs to earn enough movie the right way but not only does his past haunt him, but some people in the present are really hampering him. Not even reuniting with his girl Penelope Ann Miller can help him. There were quality performances all around... from Latin actors Luis Guzman and John Leguizamo to Miller and Pacino. But, it was Sean Penn as Jewish lawyer David Kleinfeld who gave me the most entertainment.

I am not sure about Penn IRL (among other things, there are rumors concerning some things he may have done to Madonna when they were together) but this character was an amazing scumbag. The Art Garfunkel hair, some of his clothing, him being a cokehead-there were plenty of laughs and as I say often, those chuckles were needed. The story was engrossing (as talk about a conflicted lead), 1970's NYC was brought to life rather well and it has a wonderful soundtrack between the salsa music and the disco tunes. While it would have been better if it wasn't shown in the beginning, the ending is rather haunting.

It was a delight to finally talk about Carlito's Way on Letterboxd.

In The Earth

My first Ben Wheatley movie... no, really.

Of course I've known of Wheatley for years now yet haven't checked out anything from him until last night at an AMC in Orlando. To be honest, there was some question concerning if I would find his typical movie to be “pretentious claptrap” or something else that wouldn't appeal to me even if it would be favorable to the average Letterboxd user. When I saw Godzilla vs. Kong theatrically, the trailer for this played beforehand and it looked interesting as something which looked like folk horror set in the woods.

This was shot quickly last year during the pandemic, so it is set in a more severe pandemic as a researcher is led into a forest by a lady. There aren't too many other characters and I'll leave it at that; it's not a spoiler to say that things go wrong as the duo experience bizarre elements out in an isolated location. Now, it has some unforgettable scenes that feature very trippy imagery, an electronic score (how that factors into the story made me guffaw when it probably wasn't supposed to) and a small cast full of unfamiliar faces which all were at least fine. What a doggone shame then that this wasn't too enjoyable to me overall, with some stretches that just felt L-O-N-G and that did sour my opinion.

This does fit into the “heightened horror” category; the term itself I don't fully understand its name but to be frank, most of the ones I've seen I thought were overrated. That does include Hereditary, It Follows and The Babadook. This is not as highly rated as those-unfortunately it's one of those films which has a few gruesome over the top gory moments... that has been tiresome to me for years now. I do get why some would love this, while others would hate the movie to death. Myself, I am more ambivalent about the end product. This being made during the pandemic where (presumably) it was made safe & various people got work... that is nice and all; if only I would have liked it better, and there wouldn't have been a few minutes of strobing light-which was noted in a warning at the beginning-I don't have epilepsy so my complaint about that is that it hurts my eyes; for some reason it seems like a bad idea to create an effect that causes many people to not look at your movie...

This hasn't made me swear off Ben Wheatley for good; one day I hope to see something from him that is more up my alley-and I am not referring to the upcoming sequel to The Meg.

 

Carry On Cowboy

As I haven't seen any entry from this franchise in awhile & this is one of the Carry On movies I have on disc that hasn't been watched yet... the absurdity of a British Western filmed in Jolly Old England was the reason why it was selected.

Sid James played The Rumpo Kid, a villain in black who takes over Stodge City with the aid of his ruffian friends. Like in Blazing Saddles, the mayor asked Washington for assistance, although it's otherwise an entirely different scenario. The mayor genuinely needs helps after the sheriff is killed and because of a misunderstanding, a sanitation worker played by Jim Dale called MARSHAL P. KNUTT is hired as a U.S. Marshal to drive the bad guys out of the city. Even if you are not familiar with the series or how it's known for its silly ribald humor, the names alone should tell you what sort of motion picture it is.

In every review I've done for the franchise, the type of comedy this is has been noted; it is more of the same here, although it still tickles me pink. While not a classic like Blazing Saddles, Carry On Cowboy is still an amusing picture which does poke fun at various cliches and even spoofs such films as High Noon. Knutt is unknowingly assisted by the sheriff's daughter... Annie Oakley! It was unexpected to see a real life figure being used. As in other Westerns even by this time, there was “redface” action going on by having whites play a Native American tribe. The “drunken Indian” stereotype also used here hasn't exactly aged well due to the real life issues with alcoholism that plague Native Americans... yet I can chuckle that old fey man Charles Hawtrey played the leader of that tribe, BIG HEAP. With the way things have gone as of late, I needed some laughs, which this helpfully provided.

 

Mortal Kombat (The New One)

 I apologize for being gone for days; now is the time to catch up: 

Great... for a videogame movie.

Not to start off another review of mine with an update on my long miserable saga concerning my Internet/phone/cable situation, but due to reasons (monetary being one of them) I now have a new cable provider. It will be a fiber optics hookup-it's wired all through the neighborhood-and that sounds great... except that sometime in the next few days, they have to install that cable in my abode... Cripes almighty that will be a lengthy process and preparations have to be made to ensure they have space to install it in my room. The appointment for that hasn't even been confirmed yet but unless it's tomorrow, I hope to see something somewhere tonight and post a new review sometime tomorrow. No guarantees there... but this has been far more of a nightmare than I could have predicted.

Last night I literally had nothing better to do, so I used my AMC A-List service and saw this film. Neither of the films made in the 90's have ever been seen by me-as the first is from Paul Writes S***** Anderson and Annihilation has such a toxic reputation-but in the 90's I at least put a few quarters into the original arcade machines and at home I have played some of the games on console. I am not a superfan of the franchise by any means so take that into account with my review.

Whenever playing the games, the story or any sort of story mode was never of any concern; one on one battles where hopefully I can land a fatality was more my focus. It is to be expected that bringing this wacky over the top characters with special powers into “the real world” will be pretty goofy, and this was just that. My opinion: Mortal Kombat 2021 is nonsense but at least entertaining nonsense. A new character (Cole Young; why not introduce someone that will be playable in the next game?) is an MMA fighter who discovers that competing in an epic tournament is his destiny. Of course, there's no actual tournament in this origin story movie, but maybe next time...

The plot at times is for the birds and it probably won't hold up well if I were to really scrutinize it. I've seen complaints concerning the pacing and editing-both are valid criticisms. Hardcore fans will likely think different but for me who has only played some of the games, the movie was fine for what it was. It is nonsense where several iconic catchphrases are shoehorned in kind of awkwardly, one character definitely qualifies as “odious comic relief”, and it blatantly sequel-bates at the conclusion. All that said, there was plenty of action, brawls, some gunfire, and several moments that were befitting of a franchise that caused a HUGE stink in the 90's with its graphic gore.

The circumstances I've been in as of late where I haven't been able to watch much of anything perhaps has impacted my rating; in any event, I did not feel disappointed with this silly motion picture.