Title: Doom (2005)
Rating: 3 out of 5
Tagline: “No one gets out alive.”
My Tagline: “Well ok, a couple people get out alive but that’s all!”
Favorite Quote: “Semper Fi mother fucker.” & “I’m not supposed to die.”
Plot Synopsis: At a research facility on Mars something has gone ape-shit and started killing all of the local scientists. A group of space marines are called in to neutralize the threat as well as retrieve the research data. I wish I could say all hell breaks loose but I spent most of the movie asking, “When is the shit going to hit the fan?” With a lack of anything even remotely resembling Doom a lame plot folds out in front of us involving the same old crap we’ve seen a billion times including less then ethical scientific research and super-human abilities. (yawn) Most of the movie is silly dialogue, tired action sequences, and people VERY intensely asking simple questions while you keep holding out hope that the monsters will eventually show up. Spoiler Alert: They don’t.
I have never read the books (why the hell would you want to write/read a book about Doom?) so I have no idea if the movie in anyway reflects them and I don’t care either. I defy you to find any media about the movie that says something like “Based on the hit book!” No, it’s based on the game according to the marketing department and so I will approach my review of the adaptation from that perspective.
Review: It’s nice to see them make (and of course ruin) a movie about a game I don’t care about for a change. Not that I dislike Doom. I just don’t care about whether or not its movie is any good and I don’t feel there’s anything more to it then just mindless carnage. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. With that said I can’t help but wonder what hardcore fans felt as they watched the Rock bully some chick scientist, anxiously waiting for the shit to hit the fan and the real movie to start. As far as being a faithful adaptation I did like the part where it turns out Sarge wasn’t really the main hero and it became more about Reaper because in the original game the hero’s back-story was that part of the reason he was stuck in the mess was because he refused to fire on unarmed civilians. I found it interesting they upheld that little bit. Other than that though this couldn’t be much farther away from a Doom adaptation. It’s supposed to be about monsters and selfish survival. Instead there are all these characters with mission goals, relationships, personal attachments and motives. And while there are a couple of beasts the majority of the monsters are basically just zombies. There’s all this garbage about 24th chromosomes and Martian civilizations and people arguing with each other about who knows what. Fuck that, I wanna see some monsters damnit! You’re never going to turn this into some kind of brilliant character drama so why bother wasting our time with that nonsense? I’ll never understand why Hollywood always wants to take games that have things like character, plot, subtext, and halfway decent writing and then just turn them into mindless action flicks while at the same time take mindless action games like Doom and try to artificially infuse them with character and emotion. I’m sorry but Doom isn’t about character conflict or morality. It’s about kicking ass and making it to the next level! You had the perfect formula, the perfect thing to adapt into one of your stupid action movies and you fucked it up. Shame on you Hollywood!
The Action and the Acting
The adaptation aspect aside…
It is actually pretty funny watching the actors struggle to do something with their extremely simple lines that they often have to repeat. I wasn’t expecting Oscar worthy or anything but wow that’s some bad acting. It actually distracted from the flow of things when in your mind you say, “What the hell are they doing?” And I don’t know if it was a tense set or the director was giving them strange orders or what but some of the actors seemed to have developed facial ticks. Then as far as the action goes there is a segment deep into the latter half of the movie that is done in a first-person perspective that I must admit I did like a lot. Other than that though the action is mostly just a bunch of retarded and unoriginal melee that, like most of the movie, leaves you sobbing for something that you might actually recognize from the game. So as far as being an enjoyable bad movie it certainly has the elements and there were moments that made me laugh out loud. I imagine those out there who do not share my frustration with Hollywood’s bastardization of video games will enjoy this movie even more than I did. While I may not care about Doom itself it seems to have opened some old wounds. As I said it has all the makings of a great bad movie and no doubt there are those out there for whom this film will resonate with as one of their favorites. I can definitely understand and appreciate that.
Stupid Shit
You could probably fill a book on the stupid crap that was in this movie but here are some of the major things that bothered me.
You do realize that if you’re being electrocuted you can’t really use your muscles so that whole Destroyer melee scene just wouldn’t work.
I have to believe it takes more than a quick nap to rewrite your entire DNA structure. And really, humans are born with a library of DNA in each of their cells that has every possible DNA code. Which means you wouldn’t need to (and probably couldn’t) create a synthetic chromosome. You would just have to activate the existing lines of code already inside the cells.
Part of Sarge’s mission was to recover the company’s property right? Couldn’t the company scientists be considered company property and so his desire to slaughter them is flawed?
Near the end there Sarge said he had one more shot left right? But the Bio Force Gun is supposed to draw energy from living tissue in the immediate area. Hence, “Bio Force” Gun.
In the bathroom scene couldn’t that guy load his gun with another clip and then try to retrieve his dropped one?
So you’re willing to uphold a piece of the main character’s back-story but you just completely drop the fact the reason why things went crazy is that the researchers were trying to create a teleporter and they accidentally opened a door into a realm (some would say hell) where terrible monsters lived and now they are able to pass into our dimension? You really thought all the crap about Martians and Arks and chromosomes was really better huh? Well they aren’t.
7.31.2008
7.29.2008
Zombie Strippers Review
Title: Zombie Strippers (2008)
Rating: 4 out of 5
Tagline: “Live Dead Nudes”
My Tagline: “Stiff, Nude, Girls!”
Favorite Quote: “Iraq is making us enough money to make God cream in his fucking jeans!”
Plot Synopsis: In the not too distant future a zombie virus makes its way into the inner workings of an illegal strip club run by Robert Englund. The strippers who become infected with this virus are not only brought back from the dead but become “super-strippers” garnering them much praise and cash. The downside is that zombies inevitably do what zombies do and that’s eat living flesh. Those they partially devour become infected leaving the crew of the Rhino strip club with a nasty zombie problem to deal with. Refusing to face the obvious problems that arise from allowing your girls to eat your costumers Robert Englund decides to allow the feast to continue as he is making slightly more money then he was. You could make the argument that he will eventually run out of costumers and therefore will make no money but hey, we wouldn’t have a movie if people thought things through.
I was destined to like this movie. It has two of my favorite things. Zombies and strippers.
Review: I always feel weird about doing bad movie reviews for comedies. I guess I just want to help people become more aware of this movie. Since it is a comedy the best consideration I can give it would be whether or not I think it’s funny. And I do. Probably the best laughs can be derived from the characters but the movie is full of humor ranging from social and political satire to movie references, general absurdity, and more subtle things like the blonde bimbo reading Nietzsche. Overall I’d say it is an enjoyable experience that I would recommend to other horror/comedy fans. If however you want a movie that was meant to be good but ended up bad then this isn’t the film for you. It’s supposed to be funny.
Take it off!
For some of my hornier readers out there I will go ahead and answer some of the questions that are no doubt burning in your mind. And yes, there is a considerable amount of stripping and nudity in this film. Unfortunately, it is done by people who look like real strippers and not Hollywood actresses playing strippers so the action is more vomit-inducing than boner producing. I haven’t been this grossed out by a woman working the pole since Lindsey Lohan greased up the runway with her gin-sweat and vagibrand cigarettes in “I Know Who Killed Me.” Most of the action involves the one and only Jenna Jameson who is apparently, and for reasons far beyond my comprehension, just about the most popular pornstar in the world right now. I’d say she looks more like something a cryptozoologist wrestled to the ground in the Amazon and attempted to bring back to the states for gawking only to have it break it’s bindings and assimilate into the California population where her inbred deformities where mistaken for plastic surgery. So rather than have a title like Zombie Strippers which naturally makes us anticipate stripping just to mercifully disappoint us, as one might expect, the film subjects us to what feels like hours of bare breasted torture. To add insult to injury us lonely zombie geeks are not only forced to sit through fugly stripping but there are plenty of very attractive women in the movie who you would actually want to see naked but alas, we never do. It’s high school all over again. The pretty girls are too prudish and annoying leaving us with Bigfoot spawn and emo chicks with pierced nipples. Girls, girls everywhere but nary a poon to pound. My advice would be that when one of the ladies (and I use the term loosely) takes the stage reach for your favorite porno mag, pry the pages apart, and look at something that will make you happy. Unless you’re one of those people who gets off on feeling sick.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Tagline: “Live Dead Nudes”
My Tagline: “Stiff, Nude, Girls!”
Favorite Quote: “Iraq is making us enough money to make God cream in his fucking jeans!”
Plot Synopsis: In the not too distant future a zombie virus makes its way into the inner workings of an illegal strip club run by Robert Englund. The strippers who become infected with this virus are not only brought back from the dead but become “super-strippers” garnering them much praise and cash. The downside is that zombies inevitably do what zombies do and that’s eat living flesh. Those they partially devour become infected leaving the crew of the Rhino strip club with a nasty zombie problem to deal with. Refusing to face the obvious problems that arise from allowing your girls to eat your costumers Robert Englund decides to allow the feast to continue as he is making slightly more money then he was. You could make the argument that he will eventually run out of costumers and therefore will make no money but hey, we wouldn’t have a movie if people thought things through.
I was destined to like this movie. It has two of my favorite things. Zombies and strippers.
Review: I always feel weird about doing bad movie reviews for comedies. I guess I just want to help people become more aware of this movie. Since it is a comedy the best consideration I can give it would be whether or not I think it’s funny. And I do. Probably the best laughs can be derived from the characters but the movie is full of humor ranging from social and political satire to movie references, general absurdity, and more subtle things like the blonde bimbo reading Nietzsche. Overall I’d say it is an enjoyable experience that I would recommend to other horror/comedy fans. If however you want a movie that was meant to be good but ended up bad then this isn’t the film for you. It’s supposed to be funny.
Take it off!
For some of my hornier readers out there I will go ahead and answer some of the questions that are no doubt burning in your mind. And yes, there is a considerable amount of stripping and nudity in this film. Unfortunately, it is done by people who look like real strippers and not Hollywood actresses playing strippers so the action is more vomit-inducing than boner producing. I haven’t been this grossed out by a woman working the pole since Lindsey Lohan greased up the runway with her gin-sweat and vagibrand cigarettes in “I Know Who Killed Me.” Most of the action involves the one and only Jenna Jameson who is apparently, and for reasons far beyond my comprehension, just about the most popular pornstar in the world right now. I’d say she looks more like something a cryptozoologist wrestled to the ground in the Amazon and attempted to bring back to the states for gawking only to have it break it’s bindings and assimilate into the California population where her inbred deformities where mistaken for plastic surgery. So rather than have a title like Zombie Strippers which naturally makes us anticipate stripping just to mercifully disappoint us, as one might expect, the film subjects us to what feels like hours of bare breasted torture. To add insult to injury us lonely zombie geeks are not only forced to sit through fugly stripping but there are plenty of very attractive women in the movie who you would actually want to see naked but alas, we never do. It’s high school all over again. The pretty girls are too prudish and annoying leaving us with Bigfoot spawn and emo chicks with pierced nipples. Girls, girls everywhere but nary a poon to pound. My advice would be that when one of the ladies (and I use the term loosely) takes the stage reach for your favorite porno mag, pry the pages apart, and look at something that will make you happy. Unless you’re one of those people who gets off on feeling sick.
7.26.2008
Snakes on a Plane Review
Title: Snakes on a Plane (2006)
Rating: 4 out of 5
Tagline: “Sit Back. Relax. Enjoy the fright!”
My Tagline: “Dude, it’s SNAKES on a PLANE. Dat shit is off da hook y’all!”
Favorite Quote: “Get off my Dick! Get off my Dick!”
Plot Synopsis: The movie’s title is Snakes on a Plane. Three guesses what it’s about.
Review: It was probably impossible for this movie to live up to the build in excitement leading to its release but now that the dreams have been shattered and the illusions cast aside we can finally step back and examine this movie fairly. This was a rather rare case where a film was universally recognized as, and anticipated because, of pure awfulness. Rather than then the “good film gone bad” formula we are familiar with this film was almost tailor-made for the bad movie fan. I have heard rumors that some involved, like the director, actually believed in the project and operated under the insane idea that the film was a quality picture and it was only later after the buzz swirling around the movie was related to how bad it must be did they say it was always meant to be a bad movie. The idea that any right-minded human being could ever conceive of this movie as an actual cinematic triumph with moving character and story is so ridicules that I refuse to accept the possibility. But whether it was always meant to be this way or whether it started out noble only to fall from grace there’s no getting around the fact that this film is wonderfully terrible. Everything about it is bad. There are no saving graces or “well at least such-and-such was good” moments. Whether it’s the terrible CGI, the brilliantly bad dialogue, the dwelling shots, the either totally lame or too-good-for this-movie acting, the ridicules character dynamics, or just the overall feeling of complete nonsense that this film embodies, everything about it is dreadful. And it’s a lot of fun.
The Best of the Worst
As with many great cinematic masterpieces the best part, and the real heart of the film, is the characters. Not only are each of them infinitely lame, shallow, and undeveloped but watching how they relate to each other from minute to minute is an interesting character study. Some characters only seem to exist when they are needed while the sudden focus on another will have you saying “where the hell is all this coming from?” On a dime people will turn on each other just to be hugging one another the next minute. Characters will simply drop quirks like OCD when it’s more convenient to the story for them to be physically affectionate with total strangers. Brief lines relating to a character’s past and their relationship to others trapped on the plane will abruptly appear as some kind of half-assed attempt to bring emotion and conflict to the screen. These awkward and undeveloped moments will pass by so quickly you will be unsure if they really happened because the idea of someone trying to cram something legitimate amongst all this crap is simply mindboggling. As with just about any horror film at least one discussion took place on set where the topic of the day was cool death scenes and fun moments. This collaborative spirit has lead to some of cinema’s greatest death scenes and with this film’s almost unique killing machine at work (snakes) some doors where opened leading to fun possibilities, nearly all of which were explored. Now I tend to favor those movies that were made with the greatest of intentions and were always meant to emerge as masterpieces but somewhere along the way ended up on the B-reels but I can’t deny that a movie like this is fun too. Given how great it is and the large amount of even mainstream excitement leading up to it I would say that this movie is a must-see for any bad movie or horror movie fan.
Questions and Observations
Now I love video games more than any human being who has ever or will ever live but even I didn’t get the whole discussion and arguing about the merits of flight simulation. And I hope you realize that those autopilots are advanced enough that they can land themselves. No one even needed to be at the controls and even if they did Mythbusters proved that even laymen can be guided to safely land a commercial jet.
It’s always nice to see that Kenan can still find work but does anyone know what happened to Kel?
Believe it or not a Kevlar vest wouldn’t protect you from a snake bite if its fangs were long enough so if that was a poisonous snake our surfer hero would be dead. Though I guess the anti-venom was just a few feet away…
So do you think Kim was convicted or what? I’m going to say that Surfer-witness was sniped while surfing with Sam Jackson a fraction of a second after the shot we saw cut away.
Gee, if all it takes to screw up a plane’s internal systems like that is a few light snakes squirming around I don’t ever what to fly.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Tagline: “Sit Back. Relax. Enjoy the fright!”
My Tagline: “Dude, it’s SNAKES on a PLANE. Dat shit is off da hook y’all!”
Favorite Quote: “Get off my Dick! Get off my Dick!”
Plot Synopsis: The movie’s title is Snakes on a Plane. Three guesses what it’s about.
Review: It was probably impossible for this movie to live up to the build in excitement leading to its release but now that the dreams have been shattered and the illusions cast aside we can finally step back and examine this movie fairly. This was a rather rare case where a film was universally recognized as, and anticipated because, of pure awfulness. Rather than then the “good film gone bad” formula we are familiar with this film was almost tailor-made for the bad movie fan. I have heard rumors that some involved, like the director, actually believed in the project and operated under the insane idea that the film was a quality picture and it was only later after the buzz swirling around the movie was related to how bad it must be did they say it was always meant to be a bad movie. The idea that any right-minded human being could ever conceive of this movie as an actual cinematic triumph with moving character and story is so ridicules that I refuse to accept the possibility. But whether it was always meant to be this way or whether it started out noble only to fall from grace there’s no getting around the fact that this film is wonderfully terrible. Everything about it is bad. There are no saving graces or “well at least such-and-such was good” moments. Whether it’s the terrible CGI, the brilliantly bad dialogue, the dwelling shots, the either totally lame or too-good-for this-movie acting, the ridicules character dynamics, or just the overall feeling of complete nonsense that this film embodies, everything about it is dreadful. And it’s a lot of fun.
The Best of the Worst
As with many great cinematic masterpieces the best part, and the real heart of the film, is the characters. Not only are each of them infinitely lame, shallow, and undeveloped but watching how they relate to each other from minute to minute is an interesting character study. Some characters only seem to exist when they are needed while the sudden focus on another will have you saying “where the hell is all this coming from?” On a dime people will turn on each other just to be hugging one another the next minute. Characters will simply drop quirks like OCD when it’s more convenient to the story for them to be physically affectionate with total strangers. Brief lines relating to a character’s past and their relationship to others trapped on the plane will abruptly appear as some kind of half-assed attempt to bring emotion and conflict to the screen. These awkward and undeveloped moments will pass by so quickly you will be unsure if they really happened because the idea of someone trying to cram something legitimate amongst all this crap is simply mindboggling. As with just about any horror film at least one discussion took place on set where the topic of the day was cool death scenes and fun moments. This collaborative spirit has lead to some of cinema’s greatest death scenes and with this film’s almost unique killing machine at work (snakes) some doors where opened leading to fun possibilities, nearly all of which were explored. Now I tend to favor those movies that were made with the greatest of intentions and were always meant to emerge as masterpieces but somewhere along the way ended up on the B-reels but I can’t deny that a movie like this is fun too. Given how great it is and the large amount of even mainstream excitement leading up to it I would say that this movie is a must-see for any bad movie or horror movie fan.
Questions and Observations
Now I love video games more than any human being who has ever or will ever live but even I didn’t get the whole discussion and arguing about the merits of flight simulation. And I hope you realize that those autopilots are advanced enough that they can land themselves. No one even needed to be at the controls and even if they did Mythbusters proved that even laymen can be guided to safely land a commercial jet.
It’s always nice to see that Kenan can still find work but does anyone know what happened to Kel?
Believe it or not a Kevlar vest wouldn’t protect you from a snake bite if its fangs were long enough so if that was a poisonous snake our surfer hero would be dead. Though I guess the anti-venom was just a few feet away…
So do you think Kim was convicted or what? I’m going to say that Surfer-witness was sniped while surfing with Sam Jackson a fraction of a second after the shot we saw cut away.
Gee, if all it takes to screw up a plane’s internal systems like that is a few light snakes squirming around I don’t ever what to fly.
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