Shark Week: Based on a True Story

Do you remember Quint's speech in Jaws? Of course you do. It's his harrowing tale of survival from the USS Indianapolis. He tells Brody and Hooper about it while they're aboard the Orca:

Japanese submarine slammed two torpedoes into her side, Chief. We was comin' back from the island of Tinian to Leyte. We'd just delivered the bomb. The Hiroshima bomb. Eleven hundred men went into the water. Vessel went down in 12 minutes.

Didn't see the first shark for about a half-hour. Tiger. 13-footer. You know how you know that in the water, Chief? You can tell by lookin' from the dorsal to the tail. What we didn't know, was that our bomb mission was so secret, no distress signal had been sent. They didn't even list us overdue for a week. Very first light, Chief, sharks come cruisin' by, so we formed ourselves into tight groups. It was sorta like you see in the calendars, you know the infantry squares in the old calendars like the Battle of Waterloo and the idea was the shark come to the nearest man, that man he starts poundin' and hollerin' and sometimes that shark he go away... but sometimes he wouldn't go away.

Sometimes that shark looks right at ya. Right into your eyes. And the thing about a shark is he's got lifeless eyes. Black eyes. Like a doll's eyes. When he comes at ya, he doesn't even seem to be livin'... 'til he bites ya, and those black eyes roll over white and then... ah then you hear that terrible high-pitched screamin'. The ocean turns red, and despite all your poundin' and your hollerin' those sharks come in and... they rip you to pieces.

You know by the end of that first dawn, lost a hundred men. I don't know how many sharks there were, maybe a thousand. I do know how many men, they averaged six an hour. Thursday mornin', Chief, I bumped into a friend of mine, Herbie Robinson from Cleveland. Baseball player. Boson's mate. I thought he was asleep. I reached over to wake him up. He bobbed up, down in the water, he was like a kinda top. Upended. Well, he'd been bitten in half below the waist.

At noon on the fifth day, a Lockheed Ventura swung in low and he spotted us, a young pilot, lot younger than Mr. Hooper here, anyway he spotted us and a few hours later a big ol' fat PBY come down and started to pick us up. You know that was the time I was most frightened. Waitin' for my turn. I'll never put on a lifejacket again. So, eleven hundred men went into the water. 316 men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945.

Anyway, we delivered the bomb.

I always thought it was a story that deserved a movie of it's own, never realizing that in 1991 there was a made for TV movie called Mission of the Shark: The Saga of the USS Indianapolis.

So, if you've seen Jaws, or read the speech above, you know the story of the Indianapolis. After delivering the bomb, it was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine and sank. The men that made it off the ship floated in the water for a number of days, some were killed by sharks, more succumbed to their injuries for the attack or drowned from the sheer exhaustion of staying above water for so long.

The movie stars Stacy Keach and his distracting upper lip scar as well as David Caruso and....some people I've never heard of. Keach plays the somewhat tragic Captain Charles McVay. What makes Chuck's story so tragic is that of all the captains whose ships were attacked and sunk during the war, it was Chuck that got court martialed for a 'failure to zigzag'. No. Seriously. You can't make that shit up. He got court martialed for sailing in a straight line. And, while it was not long before the verdict was overturned, he succumbed to his guilt and killed himself in 1968.

Mission of the Shark was entertaining enough for a TV movie and doesn't feel dated at all. It helps that the story takes place in 1945 and there aren't a ton of special effects. Some stock footage stands out at times, but if that's the worst of it, it's not too bad. We'll go with 6 please for the love of god grow a mustache and cover up that distracting scars out of 10.

Film Ignorance: Batman Begins

I'm not sure if you've noticed or not, but it seems like the interweb is abuzz with excitement over a recently released movie. Bloggers, movie fans, comic book aficionados and, according to at least one 7dp commenter, even grandmothers are in a tizzy over the release of The Dark Knight, aka the new Batman movie.

Conversely, here at $7 Popcorn Industries, Inc, LLC...there's been nary a word. In fact, the only mention of it here prior to today was to comment upon how indifferent I was about it! And do you know why? I'm not a big Batman fan, that's why. The Tim Burton Batman and it's sequels did very little for me. I liked the first one enough, but found the sequels to be, simply put, shitty. As a result, I never watched Batman Begins, and it's hard to get excited about a sequel to a movie you never saw.

Well, never saw until now. That's right. After 3 years, I finally watched Christopher Nolan's franchise reboot, Batman Begins. Like I said, I'm not a huge caped crusader fan. I find the concept of a man in a mask, fighting crime kind of silly. I mean, who does that?

Bruce Wayne does that. So, the question is, who does Bruce Wayne think he is?

This review was written as a part of Movies et al's Film Ignorance series. To read the rest of my review, please visit Movies et al!

back to normal...I guess...whatever normal is around here

For a movie with a silly plot, cheesy acting and horrible effects, Machine Girl was fucking tits, yo. That's right, I said it was tits.

The plot is a rather ridiculous revenge story with ninjas, yakuza and a spoiled rich kid. The spoiled brat throws Ami's brother, Yu, off of a building. While the police want to write it off as suicide, Ami believes that there was more to it. On her quest to find answers, she finds fights in some of the most unlikely places.

Really, the movie is cheesy as all hell. And there are a lot of times where you'll wonder about physics and then stop yourself. At least I did. It's fun as all hell though.

It's in the fighting that the movie really shines. It's all very over the top, but a lot of fun. It's kind of goofy, and very bloody. Just enough to be really entertaining.


The poor story does weigh it down a bit. And while you can tell that it's intentionally poor, it's still annoying. It really is a bit of cheesy fun to watch once or twice. I can't imagine there being too much reason to re-watch it. On top of that, there just aren't enough features on the disc to really warrant buying it. But it's definately one to grab on Netflix. Machine Girl gets 6 hugs with a drill bra out of 10.

Let it be said though that I liked Land of the Dead, I don't care what the rest of the interweb says.

Have you ever noticed that zombie movies all take place in a universe WITHOUT zombie movies? It's as though zombies are a completely foreign concept to anyone who stumbles across one. It never clicks in anyone's mind that 'Hey! I've seen shit like this before on the TV!'

Wait, that's not entirely true. If it's a zombie movie with a bit of comedy, then you can acknowledge that zombies are in movies.

Of course this has nothing to do with anything else. Just one of those things that sticks in my head after watching Diary of the Dead, aka George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead. That's important, it's a Romero zombie movie.

This time, rather than taking on racial stereotypes or consumerism or militarism or corporate greed, we're attacking...YouTube. And blogs. And this 24 hour information overload society. Ok. Fine. I agree that this whole 'everyone's opinion matters and should be shoved online' thing might be a bad idea. I'll also readily admit that I'm a part of the problem. I have a Myspace, a LiveJournal, this blog, a Facebook, I use Twitter, I post pictures from my camera phone to another blog. I make my vacation photos available online via Picasa. And you know what else? I'll be the first to admit that nothing I do online matters to anyone else. More people come here from the Google looking for the pictures I've posted than for anything I have to say. I'd get a lot more attention if I were posting pictures of Scarlett Johansson naked.

Where was I going with that?

Ok, right, Diary of the Dead is about a handful of kids and an old drunk professor trying to survive in a world over run by zombies. Chronologically speaking, in the Romero zomb-iverse (I just made that up, you like it? Feel free to use it yourself), this takes place at about the same time as Night of the Living Dead. It's right at the beginning of the outbreak. Luckily though, these kids are all student film makers, so they have the most important thing to have in a zombie attack, a camera! As soon as the zombies see that, they get all self-conscious and start primping and worrying about the extra ten pounds that the camera puts on, so they have to rip out there guts to shed the weight, but then their guts are all over the ground and they start tripping over them and falling down. Then they start chasing each other, and then they're chasing the people and then the people are chasing the zombies and suddenly it turns into a Benny Hill skit.

I made that last part up. It may as well have though. At least that would have been unexpected. Instead, you have a fairly by-the-numbers zombie movie. And if anyone else had made it, this would be an entirely different article. But this is a Romero zombie movie. It's held to a different standard. Romero isn't just a director of zombie movies, he's a brand name. Romero is Pepsi to Sam's Choice Cola, he's Kraft Macaroni and Cheese to Kroger Brand Mac N' Cheese. It's a different standard. And when held to that standard, Diary withers.


The characters are shallow and underdeveloped. No one has a back story. Tony is the angry young man because he's from Brooklyn. Eliot is the technology nerd, you can tell because of his glasses. Everyone is just a poorly developed stereotype. At one point, our Scooby Gang gets stopped. By 3 angry black men. With guns. It wouldn't have been so annoying, and mildly racist, if the scene had been necessary. But, in looking back, if the whole time the were with them had been cut out, the movie would hardly have been effected. The only minorities in the movie are thrilled that they're in power now that everyone else who had the power before left! They didn't earn it. They weren't the ones who kept cool and gathered supplies and came to be respected for their foresight and ability to handle pressure. No, they stumbled into it.

This is the kind of social commentary that Romero gives us in 2008? And, what is he even trying to say about YouTube and the 'information age'? The heroes are the cameramen. This isn't exactly a vilification. The director takes time out to upload some footage to MySpace, and while he gets yelled at briefly for taking the time to do it, he's not shunned or cast out for it either.

And am I the only one that's already sick of this whole 'video taping it ourselves', 'this is the recovered footage' style of film making that's cropped up? The Blair Witch Project was original and Cloverfield was well done...but now, after 3 movies, I'm done. How much variety can you get out of the concept? How many different reasons can you have for some group of kids to have a camera ready to go when all hell breaks loose?

From any other director, this would have been a fun movie. There'd be no afterthought to it. You'd watch it, think, that wasn't bad and move on with life. But, like I said, it's held to a different standard because of the director. So, Diary of the Dead gets 6 eyeballs exploding after having a defibrulator discharged against the zombie's heads out of 10.

It was missing something...like suspense...

Did I ever tell you about my trip to Alaska? I don't think I did. It was last February, in the middle of the FILMuary marathon. I visited a small town called Chevak and the city of Fairbanks (and even ate at the northern most Denny's in the world (the sign said so)). Of course, none of this compares to Alaska's northernmost city, Barrow.

Aside from being at the top of the world, Barrow is also the setting for 30 Days of Night. The city at the top of the world is at the top of the list for vampire travel agents. You see, it's night time...for 30 days. Kinda. Really it's just a very small amount of light every day, but that isn't as intriguing. No. 30 days of complete darkness, now THAT'S a story element.

So, the vampires decided that this year, they would attack Barrow. Why now? After all these years? I don't know. I guess that they just never got around to it. They're real busy, you know. What with their BlackBerries and iPhones and PDAs and all that other stuff that vampires have. I guess it's tough to get up that way. Especially when you can only travel at night!

Aside from it's setting, it's a pretty generic vampire attack movie. The vampires terrorize the town and it's up to our sheriff to save the day (and his marriage) with the help of a plucky assortment of locals.

The movie, however, fails to ever build any suspense. The vampires lay siege to the town for 30 days, but you really don't get a sense of time. The whole thing feels like it takes a night or two. You never get a real sense of the hell that would be hiding for a month. I think THAT would have been a much more interesting story.

It was entertaining enough, it was just lacking suspense. And that's a pretty vital ingredient for a horror movie. It's like making a cake without flour. Yeah, it might turn out ok, but it just doesn't feel right...

6 people walking down the street so that the vampires can lure you out of hiding out of 10.

Face the thing that should not be

Let's talk octopi. What do we know about them? Well, they have eight legs, they squirt ink when scared, they are thrown onto the ice at Red Wings hockey games, and (if I recall correctly from my meat eating days) are kind of bland and chewy, kind of like the EasyMac that I'm having for lunch today.

None of these topics, however, are addressed in Octopus 2: River of Fear. Why would they be? None of them make for an entertaining movie. What does make for an entertaining movie is a combination of every cop cliche you can think of and then a healthy dose of massive cephalopod. It's like a recipe for an entertaining movie. Take 1 part buddy mystery, 1 part giant monster, and a pinch of love interest and you have yourself a movie.

The truth of the matter is that Octopus 2 reminded me a LOT of Shark Attack 3. In a good way. The big difference being that Shark Attack 3 was a bit wittier and made some attempt to explain the presence of the prehistoric beast. Octopus 2 makes no effort to explain anything. The presence of Chthulu is simply a given. He exists. That all there is to it. There is little effort put into explaining the why of the situation. Hell, there's not much effort put into much of the problem. In fact, at one point, our heroic police officer, and his contractually obligated love interest, the mayor's aide, resort to using perhaps the most mind boggling device to locate the octopus' garden...an electronic calendar with a couple of film cannisters attached to it. What's amazing about this is that is it so clearly a calender.

This is not the movie you're going to want to watch for the writing...or the effects...or the actors. No. In fact, I'm not sure WHY you would want to watch this, I'm only sure that you do. One of my friends told me that this is one of the 'five worst movies' she'd ever seen. I disagreed, arguing that she should probably watch more movies with me. However, it cannot be argued that this is a good movie. No, not by any means. What it is, is a movie with a giant monster attacking New York for no reason. And, to be honest, I'm okay with that. 6 massive tentacles ripping through the hull of your facility...however that works...out of 10.

Shark Week: Super smart shark edition

Shark Week continues with a look at genetic engineering in sharks in Deep Blue Sea. The 1999...it's unfair to call it a crapfest, but it's the first thing that comes to mind.

I say it's unfair because, it wasn't that bad. If it were a SciFi Channel movie, Deep Blue Sea would be the cream of the crop. But, alas, it was not. This was a...major motion picture, so to speak, in that it got a theatrical release and an ad campaign that I can somewhat remember 8 years later. Hell, it even had a website! Look! Now THAT is some killer site design!

Deep Blue Sea begins the way ALL shark movies begin, an attack on some attractive young people. You see, sharks abhor ugly people, they taste kind of weird, so they only go for the good looking ones. It's true! I think I saw it on Wikipedia!

So, pretty people are being attacked, but before the shark can eat any of them, here comes Thomas Jane playing Carter and looking like Christopher Lambert to save the day. No, really. Thomas Jane could have been a stand in for Lambert in Highlander looking like that.

It's a genetically engineered shark that has escaped from the Aquatica test facility. You see, they're trying to create a cure for Alzheimer's, because the doctor lady's dad died or something, and she's just doing everything she can to...I don't know. But, she's trying to cure Alzheimer's by any means necessary, dammit.

Then there's Samuel L. Jackson, playing...himself, I guess? It's Sam Jackson as a rich guy, it's his money that is funding the research. Also, it should be noted that he survived an avalanche. This is really important, they bring it up all the fucking time. It's really irrelevant, but, hey...whatever, it's their movie.

So, in an effort to save their funding, they want to take one really good go at making this...serum? I don't remember, brain activating protein...stuff. So, they conduct their test on the shark. And it WORKS! Yay! Congratulations all around! These guys fucking rule! And it's all parties and cupcakes until someone's arm gets eaten.


Oh shit! They have to get him some help. Easy enough, get a helicopter in here and take him to shore, right? Sure. But it's storming outside, and the winch is broken, so our armless scientist falls into the water...and do you know what's in the water? I think you do...3 really smart sharks. They grab hold of him and are, apparently, strong enough (and smart enough) to drag the helicopter into the building.

Look, I've seen Jaws 2 and I'm capable of believing that a shark can rip the shit out of a helicopter...but laying siege to a research facility? I dunno. I mean, I know I couldn't plan out an attack like that, but I'm to believe a shark could? Well...if you say so.

The sharks lay siege to the facility, they're trying to get to the researchers. Which leads to such random and...well, bizarre deaths. What do I mean, well, look:

This is Sam Jackson getting killed. Supposedly. His character I mean. Out of nowhere this shark eats him, mid speech (a lot like Hero in Feast actually). That is's kind of random is fine...but, well, look at the CGI on this...
I just love the...um...pose that he's in. The sort of 'I dunno' shoulder shrug as the shark's mouth envelopes him. That and that it looks like shit.

Like I said, this would have been a great SciFi Original, but it's not. What it is is a fairly entertaining b-movie with a nonsensical plot, flimsy, underdeveloped characters and an ending that seems to be out of character for everyone involved. We're supposed to believe that someone who was willing to risk everyone else to save her research is now going to sacrifice herself?

It's worth a watch, though not worth buying. It's good Saturday afternoon fare. And let's be honest, when it comes to questionable science, it's no Event Horizon. 6 and 1/2 scientists falling into the mouths of super smart sharks out of 10.

Edit: Oh, and LL Cool J plays a cook who, despite being extraneous and poorly developed, manages to, in the end (and beyond any sort of plausibility), save the day.

Donnie Don and the Groovy Group

What would you do if a puppet suddenly showed up on your doorstep? In a box? Wrapped in plain brown paper? With your NAME on it? With no return address? Personally, if a large packet shows up on my doorstep with no known sender and no one around to even drop it off, I'd call the FBI and let THEM deal with it. Because, according to the FBI, it could be a bomb. And dammit, I'm NOT opening a bomb in this apartment. Not after what happened last time. And you know what? If the FBI opens this strange package and there's no bomb and instead there's a goddamn PUPPET? They can fucking KEEP it. Because you know what, I want nothing to do with it.

The thing about puppets is that, ultimately, someone somewhere is controlling it. And there's only one reasonable thing that I could do with it. Bury it. Under the dirt. Under concrete. Under a house. Under a pilot and co pilot. Underneath a fucking plane. And then, just to be safe. I'd do it in Chernobyl. Fuck that puppet dude. Do you know what happens if you don't dispose of it properly? It kills your family. That's what happens! And do you want that on your conscience? No. I didn't fucking think so. You love your family. And the last thing you want is some goddamn evil puppet mutilating them.

Naturally, it's because Jaime Ashen DOESN'T do these things that his wife ends up dead and he's the prime suspect in her murder. He's being investigated by constant shaver and terrible cop Donnie Don Wahlberg. I'm not kidding about the constant shaving thing either, every scene he's in he is shaving. With an electric razor. I have no idea why. Just, always shaving. Yet, somehow, he never manages to get rid of the caterpillar under his nose. It's crazy.

Following his wife's death, Jaime heads home. First though, he returns to his apartment (aka the scene of the crime) and takes the puppet. He's greeted, in a very friendly way, by his new stepmother, whom he's never met, and his, apparently, paraplegic father. He had a stroke a year ago and is now confined to a wheel chair. Jaime doesn't care about any of this, though. He's trying to remember a local nursery rhyme.

Beware the stare of Mary Shaw; she had no children, only dolls. And if you see her, do not scream, or she'll rip your tongue out at the seam.

All we had was Goofy Granma, and I don't even remember what her deal was anymore. Just that she was weird to some of the kids at my school. This Mary Shaw though, sounds like a rough old broad. Apparently, when she died she was buried with all 101 of her puppets. And, in fact, was made to LOOK like one for her funeral.

And, of course, she didn't die of old age. No, that's never how it happens. You see, some kid mocked her during a performance and then the kid went missing. The kid's family suspected Mary Shaw and killed her. And now, she's taking her revenge.

"Missing? That's a funny last name."

It wouldn't be much of a movie if it wasn't Jaime's family, so lets go ahead and assume that it is. It's Jaime's dad that tells him the story of what happened. About Mary going after the family from beyond the grave and how he sent Jaime away to try to protect him. He wasn't such a bad father, he was only trying to help!

Meanwhile, Donnie Don is tearing apart a cemetery in order to exhume Mary Shaw and the puppets (without a warrant or court order) to no avail. He naturally suspects Jaime did something and, conveniently, arrives at Jaime's dad's house to arrest him. Jaime, however, gets a phone call asking him to come to the theater where his innocence can be proven. Donnie Don is done with the nonsense and says that Jaime has to go to jail. Jaime points over Donnie Don's shoulder and says "what the heck is that" and escapes, once again eluding capture. Donnie Don gives chase and they end up at the theater for the final showdown with Mary Shaw and her creepy wall of puppets.

The movie doesn't get too into Shaw's origin which helps and hurts the movie in some ways. While the mystery is kind of fun, it would have been nice to see a bit more of how she got to her end. And, while the story has a nice twist, it's somewhat obvious. Not entirely. It's obvious like saying that there's a car on the freeway. Of course there is. Duh. But it doesn't specify what KIND of car. So, while it's SOMEWHAT obvious, it's not entirely. Is that vague and confusing enough? Let me know, I can make it worse for you. I'm good at that.

Dead Silence was an average movie. It was a neat premise and had a good look to it, but the characters were underdeveloped. Why Was Donnie Don's Dt Lipton shaving all the goddamn time? Why was he such an ineffective cop? Why was he SO doubting of Jaime's "ghost story" yet still willing to dig up the graveyard without a warrant? Why does there HAVE to be a twist at the end? Why wasn't Jaime more concerned about a random puppet showing up on his doorstep? 6 and a half tongues ripped out at their seams out of 10.

At least Venom looked fucking sweet

Did I ever mention that I really liked Spiderman 2? Or, that I thought that Spiderman the first was pretty sweet? No? Oh, sorry.

I really liked Spiderman 2 and I thought that Spiderman the first was pretty fucking sweet. Now you know. I don't want there to be any secrets between us.

To be honest though, I didn't really care about Spiderman 3. I was kind of excited, but not like Hot Fuzz excited. Or 300 excited. No, this was more on the level of X3 excited. Luckily, it was a bit more entertaining. Not that that's a challenge, X3 was REALLY bad.

Spiderman 3 isn't REALLY bad, much like Parker with the symbiote, it's just confused. There are all these stories that it thinks it NEEDS to tell, and just doesn't really pay off.

The Sandman, kind of extraneous, really. I mean, it's neat and he's done fairly well, but I don't really think that his little subplot was needed. Same with Gwen Stacy. Don't get me wrong, Bryce Dallas Howard was great in the role and was hot as hell, but again, unneeded.

And the amnesia shit with Harry. "I hate you Spiderman, but I forgot so lets be buds until I remember and threaten your girlfriend if she doesn't break up with you but maybe I'll feel bad later and help you out in the end."

The fact of the matter is that all anyone (and by "anyone" I mean "me") wanted to see was the symbiote suit and Venom. I mean, all anyone has wanted for 3 fucking movies now was for Venom to show up. And while he looked sweet as hell, and Topher Grace was actually pretty good as Eddie Brock, though, for me, his voice was 100% wrong for Venom. I guess I just wanted/thought/expected that he would have a deeper/growlier/hissier voice. But, I have no control over such things.

What I do have are ideas, baby. Ideas for movies. You know how in every interview Tobey/Kirsten/Raimi are all like "Oh I don't know if we'll do a fourth. I won't unless everyone else does"? I say, fuck that. Get a new director, get Topher and make a couple Venom movies. Get Carnage and lets do it. It's the perfect opportunity to create a bridge and in a couple years bring in a new actor to play Spidey. You can bring him in in Venom 3. See? Pretty sweet.

Spiderman 3 gets 6 and a half omelettes dropped off your frying pan while you're in the kitchen doing the twist with you best friend's girlfriend out of 10.

I wonder if it's a misdomeanor or felony when you break the laws of physics...

Oh, Event Horizon! I really wanted to like you. I wanted to like you a LOT. I mean, you were a movie about space and black holes and space time distortion and other fun theoretical physics. And I do love theoretical physics.

General relativity aside, there were other things that seemed interesting about the movie. The whole interdimensional travel to hell and back. The mystery of what happened. The horrific consequences of defying the laws of physics. Things like that. It had a kind of claustrophobic, Alien style vibe at times. Though, really, what modern horror movie in space doesn't have some sort of Alien vibe?

The Event Horizon is a ship that went missing seven years ago. Now, the crew of the Lewis & Clark, joined by scientist Dr. Weir, are sent to investigate a signal that has been identified as coming from the Event Horizon, now in orbit around Neptune. Prior to leaving, Dr Weir appears to be plagued by dreams of his formerly suicidal girlfriend. I say formerly because I think it hard to call someone suicidal once they've succeeded. At that point, really, they're just dead.

When they get to the ship, no one is alive. They only find one body. However, the crew of the Lewis & Clark start to have visions. And one of the crew members is sucked into the gravity well that the Event Horizon uses as an engine. See, the engine creates a portal to another dimension and no one knows what's on the other side. Except the dude who got sucked in. And he wants to kill himself over what he saw!

The ship seems to bring everyone's worst fears to life and drive them crazy. Yeah, it's like that. Whatever came back from the other dimension with the ship wants to go back, and it wants to take everyone with it.

This was a movie that, had it had a competent director, could have been great. Well, it could have at least been really good. And, nothing against Paul WS Anderson (who's work I have really enjoyed on other occasions), but the flaws in this movie were predominantly from a directing stand point. Yes, I understand that the studio made him cut 30 minutes from the film. And I understand that that alone can wreck a movie, but he still got to choose which 30 minutes.

The biggest problem was that the movie kept building and building and then either wouldn't pay off or would pay off with the world's most predictable jump scare. Think about it this way, ever been to a cheap haunted house? Maybe something put on by a church or high school? It's kind of like that. You want to be scared because it's a haunted house, and you want to be scared because you know that their hearts are in it, but really, it's not that scary and you almost feel bad. Afterwards you lie a little and tell them that "Oh, you almost really had me back there!" just to make the kids feel better.

And it's in this way that a movie that could have been something special gets turned into a basic haunted house in space. And that's boring to me.

It wasn't a complete waste of time though. The effects looked really good. The acting was good. And I'm always interested in the ways movies try to get around general relativity to travel through space, and cutting a hole through space-time is as good as any. So, it's not that the movie didn't have anything going for it. And it's not that I wasn't entertained. I was just annoyed. 6 trips to a dimension of pure chaos where your crew will kill each other in some sort of weird outer space blood orgy out of 10.

Giant Monster Theater!

In lieu of a review of Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorrah: Giant Monsters All Out Attack, I've decided to go for something different. Basically, I'm going to expand on my Gamera 2 post...

Here we go: 7 Dollar Popcorn Presents: Giant Monster Theater!
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You know what guys? I'm sick of always being the bad guy. Fuck that shit!

Tough titties, Ghidorah! You think I'm going to be the bad guy?

Sure! It's been a while. Be the bad guy!

Fine! I'll get rid of my pupils and be the bad guy.

Why do you want to get rid of your pupils?

Because that way I look like a zombie! It's creepier!

Yeah it is. You look so weird!

Ok then. If I'm the bad guy, what does that make your three?

We're the good guys. We'll be like Guardian Spirits or some shit.

You can't be a good guy! You don't know how!

Oh come on, how hard can it be? Mothra can show me how!

Yeah, that's no biggie. Baragon will help out too.

Just do what I do!

Wait! I'm not ready!

Oh, you fuck shit!

I can do that!

Chomp!

I hate you guys. remind me why I stay friends with you.

We have the hook up for hookers and blow.

Shit! That's right.

Besides, we have history!

History? we have a history of you guys attacking me when you get all hopped up on PCP! That's what we have you fucktards!

You know, you really need to learn how to relax.

Yeah, take a vacation, go on a cruise or something. Those ships have EVERYTHING!

You know what, fuck you guys. I'm going to go home and go back to being the good guy. You three suck.

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Oh man! Those wacky monsters!

Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorrah: Giant Monsters All Out Attack really wasn't very impressive. Very different from the modern Godzilla movies. Very middle of the road. 6 oxygen destroyers out of 10.

7 Dollar Popcorn Presents the 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Spectacular: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem Day 15: Final Girl Film Club: The Exorcist

It's February 19th! And that marks a couple of occasions! 1) It's post number 206 (not as exciting as 200, I know) B) It's day 19 of 7 Dollar Popcorn Presents the 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Extravaganza: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem and c] it's time for another entry into The Final Girl Film Club. So, lets kick this off right...

Having eaten my arctic blackberries with Eskimos, and avoided any extracurricular polar bear activities, it's time for 7 Dollar Popcorn Presents the 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Spectacular Extravaganza: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem Day 15 Final Girl Film Club Edition of The Exorcist. More than that, not just The Exorcist, but the restored version. Aka, The Version You've Never Seen. Which, to be honest would describe ANY version as I have never actually seen The Exorcist. Shocking. I know. I mean, here is a movie largely to be considered a "classic" and I've never seen it. What next? Do I own up to never watching Halloween or Citizen Kane? Do I mention that I have never watch a Friday the 13th movie in it's entirety? Do I talk of never seeing Titanic or Dirty Harry?

Hell, it's all true.

The Exorcist starts in Northern Iraq where an archaeologist finds a demon looking thing in the sand. We then transition to Washington where a movie is being shot. There's also a priest there. And a kid.

Lets be honest here. There's a good chance you've seen this. And even if you haven't seen it, you know what it's about. It's about...someone needs to get me some fucking coffee!

Coffee? No. The movie dammit. Right, so there's this kid, and she gets sick. The doctors think it's something like ADD, only they don't call it ADD, it's "nerves" or some such thing. So, they keep running tests and trying to figure it...dammit, coffee....um...right, the doctors can't figure it out. Eventually mom things it's time to turn to the church. Naturally. She's not religious, so religion MUST be the answer. No, coffee is the answer. Goddammit, stop that.

Sorry guys, I can't help myself, it's like something else is taking over my body. And this "something" demands coffee. I don't know what to do! Someone call Father Karras...and a barrista!

The story has a couple of strings to it. You have the priest/archaeologist in Iraq. Father Karras' loss of faith, and the actual possession of Regan. And, it takes some time, but eventually all of these stories converge and the three people actually meet each other in Regan's bedroom. Thus begins the exorcism, the ritual, the ceremony, I need a thesaurus...and coffee...goddamn. I should have just slept instead of trying to stay up all night to make my flight.

Ok. You know the story, the last question is what did I think of it? Well, it was enjoyable. I can see why so many people dig it. Personally, it didn't do a whole hell of a lot for me. It didn't scare me. Maybe if I had seen it ten or fifteen years ago it would have. It's like Jaws. Jaws is a great movie, and it scared the heck out of my friend when he first saw it when he was 12 or 13. I saw Jaws as an adult. I love Jaws, but I don't think it's scary. On the other hand, Jurassic Park, which I saw at 13, has taught me to always fear velociraptors. So, a lot of it has to do with WHEN you see a movie.

The movie itself serves as a great example of how film making has changed in the past thirty years, though. Now, it would be rare to see a movie build this long. I mean, you would have to have Regan possessed and puking by about 20 minutes in. That it takes an hour to bring everyone together without being boring is a testament to the film making.

I liked it. I guess. I mean, I didn't NOT like it, so I must have liked it. I've seen it, I don't think I need to see it again. I'm good. 6 and a half kids spider walking down the stairs with a tray balanced on their knees and coffee on the tray out of 10.

7 Dollar Popcorn Presents The 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Extravaganza: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem Day 16: The Science of Sleep

Le réalité et toi, vous ne vous entendez pas, n'est-ce pas? Pas à 7 dollars le maîs éclaté présente l'extravagance de FILMuary de maîs éclaté 7 en provenance de la zone dollar : 28 jours de mutilation de film.

Sorry. I seem to be speaking in tongues...if the translation is bad, it's not my fault. Hmm...mutilation de film. I like that. So, the mutilation today is The Science of Sleep.

Stéphane is from Mexico City. His mom is French and he moved to Paris after the death of his father. He narrates his dreams as though it were a cable access television show, and sometimes seems to dream so vividly that the actions correspond to actual events, like his dreams are bleeding into his life.

He meets a girl, his neighbor, Stéphanie and lies about being a neighbor. Stéphanie is a composer. She kinda digs Stéphane. Stéphane really falls for Stéphanie. He really makes some intersting choices in his attempts to woo Stéphanie. Some of them are just amazingly...bad.

Largely it's due to this state he lives in of being half dreaming all of the time. It's hard to be sure if he is awake or dreaming at any given time. Through his dreams his insecurities about Stéphanie tend to get the best of him.

And, while, it's an exaggeration, it's a great example of the way doubt can eat away at someone. I mean, here's this guy who is crazy about a girl who is, it seems, pretty crazy about him. Stéphanie's has a great line..."Everything will turn out the way you want, if you stop doubting that I love you. " That sums up the movie and the relationship. Because Stéphane can't get out of his head and stop worrying about every little detail with Stéphanie, it consistently eats away at any hope for a relationship with her.

This makes for 2 Michel Gondry movies in one week. This, of course, means that I have to make some sort of a comparison. While Eternal Sunshine was a pretty awesome story and presentation of someone traveling through their own memories, Science of Sleep is a sometimes sloppy, but still sweet, story of a young man unable to escape from his dreams. The biggest difference is in the story itself. Sunshine was a pretty coherent story. Things happened for a reason, and those reasons were explained. Sleep, however, opts out of really explaining what's going on and just sort of running with this stream of consciousness story of the unconscious. 6 and a half mechanical mares galloping along a cellophane river out of 10.

7 Dollar Popcorn Presents The 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Extravaganza: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem Day 5: The Amityville Horror

You know, I seem to write longer posts if I write up the movie WHILE I watch it.

Welcome to Day 5 of 7 Dollar Popcorn Presents The 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Extravaganza: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem. Today's movie is the 2005 remake of The Amityville Horror starring Ryan Reynolds and Melissa George.

The movie starts off in 1974 with Ronnie DeFeo going through the house and killing his family. About a year later, George and Kathy Lutz buy the same house. It's cheap, and the deal of a lifetime, so what if a bunch of people were brutally murdered there a year ago? How do you pass up such a deal? You don't! You suck it up and buy the house. Besides, "Houses don't kill people. People kill people. "

The Lutzes move in and start making the house their home. But crazy crap starts happening. The dog getting locked in the boathouse. And the little kid getting into the boathouse. And George starts getting real pissy, especially about the boathouse. So, George and Lisa decide to go out for the night and hire a babysitter.

Well, the babysitter used to work for the DeFeo's and she tells the kids what went down. And she shows them the closet where the little girl, Jodie, was killed. After some discussion, the babysitter agrees to go into the closet in exchange for a KISS poster. Once she's in, the door locks itself and Jodie appears. And Jodie, very happily, puts the babysitter's finger into her bullet hole...

And thats just kinda gross.From here, George just keeps getting pissier and pissier. His relationship with every one if the family becomes more and more strained. Basically, if he's near the house, he's a massive prick. If he's away, he's alright. When he's home, he kills the dog with an ax. That sort of thing. Kathy goes and tries to get a priest to come and bless the house, but he freaks and leaves.

Finally, George just loses it on the 28th day in the house. He goes nuts and attacks everyone. He chases them around the house with a shotgun. Then one of the kids hits him with a pipe. But that's not going to stop him, oh no. Finally, Kathy gets the gun, but rather than killing him, knocks him out and ties him up. They escape on the boat and as soon as they're away from the house George is a col cat again. The End.

Now, I never saw the original Amittyville Horror. So, I can't tell you how true they were to it. As a horror movie today, on it's own, it was alright. Not great, but certainly better than a lot of the crap they've been churning out lately. My biggest problem though was Ryan Reynolds. He did a fine job, but every time I see him I think Van Wilder, I think 2 Guys a Girl and a Pizza Place. And I just can't take him seriously. There were a few good jump scares, but the mood of the movie was never exactly scary. So what do you give a movie lke this? What's fair? How about 6 and a half indians mutilated by a priest out of 10.

7 Dollar Popcorn Presents The 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Extravaganza: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem Day 4: Arachnid

Four down, twenty four to go. Hello! Welcome to 7 Dollar Popcorn Presents The 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Extravaganza: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem Day 4!! Today's movie is Arachnid!

I decided to check this movie out after reading the review of it over at Final Girl. Because, really, how can you not enjoy a movie about alien-mutated spiders in the jungles of the south Pacific? Especially after enjoying Raptor Island so much?

The answer? You can't. You can't not enjoy a movie like this. Or, I can't. Or I can. I'm not sure. There's too many double negatives at this point. It's making my head hurt.

Arachnid stars Beth from The Descent and some dude named Chris Potter that my friend swears he recognizes from so show, but can't remember what show. It also has a doctor that is pissed at everyone for no apparent reason. His assistant, who thinks awfully highly of herself and the doctor. A couple of apparent mercenaries and natives who appear to be destined to be spider food. And a spider expert.

From here, I'm going to try to keep it short, especially since Stacie does a much better job of reviewing this flick than I ever could. So, I'm just going to do the short version:

Dude gets sick. Doctor, mercenaries and pilot crash on the beach. Spider dude keeps wandering off. Pilot takes off her shirt. Ticks get inside one dude. Dude dies. Spiders capture and eat spider dude. Pilot finds her dead brother. Big fight with big spider. Movie ends. Yeah, that kind of sums it up.

Arachnid is a Saturday afternoon movie in every way. If you try to think about this movie too much, you start noticing, not just the wholes in the plot, but how oddly everyone interacts with each other. I mean, these people just don't seem to like or even care about each other in anyway. This certainly wasn't a great movie, but it had it's fun parts, and despite being SUPER tired when I watched it, it didn't put me to sleep, so that something. And to top it off, as the movie kept going, and Mercer kept getting dirtier and dirtier, she kept looking better and better (and she wasn't bad to start with). Arachnid gets 6 baby spiders feeding on the insides of a scientist out of 10.

7 Dollar Popcorn Presents The 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Extravaganza: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem Day 3: Raptor Island.

Our third movie in 7 Dollar Popcorn's 7 Dollar Popcorn Presents The 7 Dollar Popcorn FILMuary Extravaganza: 28 Days of Movie Mayhem is another Sci Fi Original, Raptor Island.

A movie about raptors...on an island. Pretty straight forward.

It starts of with a plane. A plane that looks like it's a model on a string and I love this already. There's a storm, and the engine blows. And it explodes.

Fast forward 40 years. Lorenzo Lamas in part of an elite military group (naturally) trying to retrieve a missing soldier. Apparently, this soldier was on a UN ship. You can tell it's a UN ship because it says UN in bold red letters on the hull. Just like all UN ships, right?

The ship was attacked by a group of evil Russians, who appear to have taken a hostage. They head for a nearby island where Lamas and the gang give chase. It's not any old island though, this is Raptor Island, baby! You know what that means? That's right, dinosaur attacks! Evil Russians go back to destroy Lamas' boat? Raptor attack! This means that everyone running through the woods though is blissfully unaware of the danger, the only ones who know about the raptors are dead! That's reality! You don't have to be afraid of the raptor you see...well, here...let's talk about velociraptors...

"Try to imagine yourself in the Cretaceous Period. You get your first look at this "six foot turkey" as you enter a clearing. He moves like a bird, lightly, bobbing his head. And you keep still because you think that maybe his visual acuity is based on movement like T-Rex, he'll lose you if you don't move. But no, not Velociraptor. You stare at him, and he just stares right back. And that's when the attack comes. Not from the front, but from the side, from the other two 'raptors you didn't even know were there. Because Velociraptor's a pack hunter, you see, he uses coordinated attack patterns and he is out in force today. And he slashes at you with this... a six-inch retractable claw, like a razor, on the the middle toe. He doesn't bother to bite your jugular like a lion, say... no no. He slashes at you here... or here... or maybe across the belly, spilling your intestines. The point is... you are alive when they start to eat you. So you know... try to show a little respect."

Thanks for the assist Dr Grant. You and your science can go back to Jurassic Park now, I don't think either of you will be required here again. These raptors are kind of slow. And dumb. Besides, who needs science when you have automatic weapons...and a grenade launcher.

After a gunfight in the woods that kills almost all of the evil Russians and frees the hostage (who was apparently some sort of CIA spook), Lamas and the gang encounter a pack of raptors. And get into a gun fight with them. Naturally, the raptors don't have guns, so the troops do manage to kill one. The one who killed their team member no less. Sweet, sweet raptor killin revenge. However, their boat is destroyed, so they can't leave the island for at 20 hours.

20 hours to track down the leader of the evil Russians, and 20 hours to survive the raptors. And 20 hours to survive the volcano. Did I mention the volcano? Right. There's a volcano. Let's run this down. They are on an island with an evil Russian, a plane that apparently spilled nuclear materials into the ground(remember WAY back at the beginning?), mutating the animals, hence the raptors, and a fucking volcano, and no way off the island! Holy run on sentence, Batman, what the heck are Lamas and the gang going to do??

They're going to go hide in a cave like any one of us would! I know what you're thinking, a cave? A fucking cave? Lorenzo Lamas can't hide in a cave! Damn right, he left to go find fresh water, leaving the gang to fend for themselves in this empty old cave. It is empty, right? Did anyone bother to make sure the cave was empty? Nope, and just their luck, it's the cave where all the raptors live! Out at the watering hole, Lamas learns something new...there's more than raptors on Raptor Island...there's a T fucking Rex too! And he likes to eat raptors.

At this point the movie is half over. The story is pretty much done, but the movie is only halfway. It's all running and shooting at dinosaurs from here. The hope is to create a diversion by blowing up the raptor cave/volcano so that they can make it to the beach for, what they hope will be, the copter pick up.

Everything about this movie is terrible. The effects? Awful. We're talking bad cgi, and model planes on strings. Ed Wood would be proud. The acting? Lorenzo Lamas, remember? You've seen what a great actor he is. The script? Yeah...no. The story? What story? I should hate this movie, but dammit, it's so much fun. Think about it, less than 5 minutes in and we already had our first slow motion death. At this point, you know this is going to be good. I'll admit that I can be awfully hard on a lot of movies. I'm not afraid to say that a movie is terrible. Just because it's bad doesn't mean it can't be fun. And fun is what matters, right? Right! Lets go with 6 muddy bodies and clean headset out of 10.