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I think I too prefer Short Circuit 2.

It’s got much worse ratings, but for me it’s the funnier, snappier film of the two.

Once again, shame about the Brownface.

On the other hand, when Ben does his calculation for providing the number of toys needed, I at once feel young and very, very old. Because I remember the date given being far in the future. And now it’s miserably far in the past.

One of my dearest friends sent me a copy of two movies I quote wayyy too often Taken
and Street Fighter

I realize these films are not cinematic masterpieces... but I don't care, much like the Return of the Jedi, it makes me smile or just enjoy the ride.

Which if your movie is dumb, tell me up front... don't pretend to be a deep look at the underpinnings of what it means to be human, when all you want to do is blow up stuff and have over-the-top car chases.

Taken is definitely a landmark movie, sadly marred not just by Liam Neeson getting stuck in that casting rut, but some woeful sequels.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Taken is definitely a landmark movie, sadly marred not just by Liam Neeson getting stuck in that casting rut, but some woeful sequels.

Taken 2 wasn't horrific... Taken 3... I'm sorry--"Tak3n" was pretty horrific.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Taken is definitely a landmark movie, sadly marred not just by Liam Neeson getting stuck in that casting rut, but some woeful sequels.

My thoughts exactly.

I don't see an ounce of redeeming quality in Street Fighter.



I watched a film! A Night at the Roxbury (1998), but I don't have much positive to say. I laughed once though, pretty hard.

Street Fighter is just daft fun, like the game.

 Sigur wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Taken is definitely a landmark movie, sadly marred not just by Liam Neeson getting stuck in that casting rut, but some woeful sequels.

My thoughts exactly.

I don't see an ounce of redeeming quality in Street Fighter.



I watched a film! A Night at the Roxbury (1998), but I don't have much positive to say. I laughed once though, pretty hard.

Raul Julia is the redeeming quality in Street Fighter. The man was literally dying and did the movie for his kids and chewed scenery and did so gloriously.

William

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Taken is definitely a landmark movie, sadly marred not just by Liam Neeson getting stuck in that casting rut, but some woeful sequels.

Did they ever finally, finally get around to making the no-brainer sequel where the daughter is abducted by aliens, Taken in Space?

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Taken is definitely a landmark movie, sadly marred not just by Liam Neeson getting stuck in that casting rut, but some woeful sequels.

Did they ever finally, finally get around to making the no-brainer sequel where the daughter is abducted by aliens, Taken in Space?

No, but they did do one focusing on sanitation Taken Out the Trash

The Return (2024)

The story of Odysseus, washing ashore on Ithaca, years after the Trojan War and the treacherous journey home. He hides his identity as he is wracked with the guilt of what he did during the war, as well as having survivors remorse, being the only Ithacan to return from Troy. He finds his home in a poor state with nefarious suitors for his wifes hand running rampant across the lands.

Pretty wild acting showcase with Ralph Fiennes as Odysseus and Juliette Binoche as Penelope. They had previously teamed up in the 1992 classic “The English Patient” which was a critical and commercial success way back in 1992. I was 11 back then so it never interested me, but I may give it a shot after this.



Probably not everyone’s cup of tea, but a solid movie in my book.

The English Patient is excellent, but it’s not happy.

Gardensnake wrote:

 Sigur wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Taken is definitely a landmark movie, sadly marred not just by Liam Neeson getting stuck in that casting rut, but some woeful sequels.

My thoughts exactly.

I don't see an ounce of redeeming quality in Street Fighter.



I watched a film! A Night at the Roxbury (1998), but I don't have much positive to say. I laughed once though, pretty hard.

Raul Julia is the redeeming quality in Street Fighter. The man was literally dying and did the movie for his kids and chewed scenery and did so gloriously.

William

He was in other films and tv productions too. If I want to see him in somehting bad I'll watch Overdrawn at the Memory Bank. Mid-90s films was the ONE time Mortal Kombat did anything better than Street Fighter. Weird time, that.




Here's an excellent article about Netflix and why stuff they make it what it's like:
https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-49/essays/casual-viewing/

I want to see The Return very badly, but the closest theatre that had it was pretty much a days drive away.

Watched The Mechanic: Resurrection. A sequel to the other Mechanic film which was a re-boot of the old Charles Bronson flick. This one was just a low-rent Bond wannabe with jet-setting, daft shoot-outs/action scenes, and too many highly paid stars to be this mid and forgettable. It had Jessica Alba, Jason Statham, and Tommy Lee Jones, all collecting pay checks.

There was a rather interesting pool related hit, but overall pretty forgettable flick. The other two Mechanic films are much better.

 Easy E wrote:
I want to see The Return very badly, but the closest theatre that had it was pretty much a days drive away.

It was an I-tunes rental, if that helps. Bit on the pricier side because it was such a new release, but I really wanted to see it so I pulled the trigger.

Borderlands

Having never played any of the games, I thought I could just enjoy this as a big, dumb action movie... Turns out I could not.
Some of the action scenes aren't bad, just a little over CGI-ed, but overall it's a terrible movie and not even in a "so bad it's good" way.

Just watched my second favorite DiCaprio film Inception

The special effects still hold up, and the hallway fight scene is still spectacular.

My favorite bit is still the Hans Zimmer score. It's amazing how some soundtracks feel absolutely perfect for the film, and you couldn't imagine the film with a different score.

Because I’ve seen all of Phase IV, but haven’t really rewatched all of Phase IV, I’m doing just that, bit by bit.

I’ve done Multiverse of Madness, and now on Shang Chi.

Both of those have reminded me what some of the their phase mates seemed to have forgotten. The key to making a decent MCU Movie? Is to focus on making a good genre movie, that just happens to involve superheroes and super villains.

Shang Chi is predominantly a solidly entertaining Martial Arts Movie, for instance. Whereas Wakanda Forever* is just a superhero movie.

*I do recognise that must’ve been a sodding hard movie to make. Not just due to pandemic and its restrictions, but losing your massively charismatic, scene stealing Lead.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Street Fighter is just daft fun, like the game.

This. So. Much. This.

My brother and I quote this one to each other all the time. One of our favorites is "Quick, change the channel!"

Street Fighter did well by not taking itself too seriously. Personally I think it was a more fun movie than Mortal Kombat. Mortal Kombat was too busy trying to be serious and edgy, just like the games. I don't hate it, but Street Fighter is the superior movie, at least to me. I know I'm in the minority with this opinion.

And yes, Raul Julia was by far the best thing about Street Fighter. The guy just absolutely crushed it, and his whole "For me, it was Tuesday" speech is probably one of the best short speeches in all of cinema, at least to me. A fitting swan song for a great actor.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Because I’ve seen all of Phase IV, but haven’t really rewatched all of Phase IV, I’m doing just that, bit by bit.

Confusing way to start the post. Before I got to the rest I thought you were talking about the ant movie.

 Geifer wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Because I’ve seen all of Phase IV, but haven’t really rewatched all of Phase IV, I’m doing just that, bit by bit.

Confusing way to start the post. Before I got to the rest I thought you were talking about the ant movie.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phase_IV_(1974_film)

I had to go look that up. I don't think I've ever seen that one. I still have nightmares from that old MacGyver episode that dealt with ants in South America, so I might have to skip this one.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:

 Geifer wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Because I’ve seen all of Phase IV, but haven’t really rewatched all of Phase IV, I’m doing just that, bit by bit.

Confusing way to start the post. Before I got to the rest I thought you were talking about the ant movie.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phase_IV_(1974_film)

I had to go look that up. I don't think I've ever seen that one. I still have nightmares from that old MacGyver episode that dealt with ants in South America, so I might have to skip this one.

Actually I believe MDG was referring to Phase IV of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, especially as he then goes on to talk about several films that are from Phase IV. The marvel films are broken up into "Phases" that make up story arcs. For example Phase 1 was six films starting with Iron Man (2008) and ending with Avengers (2012).

Yeah, MDG was talking about the MCU.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:

 Geifer wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Because I’ve seen all of Phase IV, but haven’t really rewatched all of Phase IV, I’m doing just that, bit by bit.

Confusing way to start the post. Before I got to the rest I thought you were talking about the ant movie.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phase_IV_(1974_film)

I had to go look that up. I don't think I've ever seen that one. I still have nightmares from that old MacGyver episode that dealt with ants in South America, so I might have to skip this one.

It's been a good while since I saw it, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say you don't miss much by skipping it. I don't think the movie had much of a point.

For a safer ecological "horror" movie from the 70s I'll recommend Night of the Lepus. Anyone would be hard pressed to get nightmares from that.

Dr. McCoy vs. Giant Bunnies.

I still cant believe that Night of the Lepus was based on a HG wells tale.

With inspiration from this thread, and a timely Prime recommendation, I’m watching Street Fighter.

As covered it’s an unpretentious slice of self aware nonsense, and nobody is taking it particularly seriously.

But you know, it also feels like a decent GI Joe movie.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, in pursuit of movies which are bad yet I unironically enjoy?

Van Helsing

Falls short of being the sum of its parts, but there is a lot still to be enjoyed. Not least the redhead vampire.

The villains are all chewing the scenery with gusto, and despite being what, 20+ years old? The CGI and effects remain pretty convincing.

A pleasure, and not a guilty one for me.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And now time for genuine crap.

Snakes on a Plane.

Probably the first “meme” movie. Apparently internet hype lead to five days of reshoots, which didn’t pay off at the box office.

Numerous issues with this, including it typically being really quite nippy in the hold of a plane, so the Sneks shouldn’t have been active. And I’m not at all persuaded Crack (yes, Crack) would make Sneks aggressive.

It also ruined by idiocy like “people suddenly forgetting how to walk up some stairs”, and a generally unlikable case of characters.

And hey, if your inside man or men or whatevs can get a bunch of unsecured, highly venomous Sneks aboard a plane? Just get him to plan a bomb instead, put us all out of our misery.

There isn’t a bargain bin deep enough to bury this absolute turd of a movie.

Oh, I see your mistake. You questioned the premise of Snakes on a Plane. Don't do that. It's not going to end well. You're there to enjoy watching melon-fething snakes on a melon-fething plane do their melon-fething thing.

In other news I watched Repo - The Genetic Opera the other night. Fun movie. Fun musical. A bit much on the gothy side for my taste, though I suspect that's part of what makes it good.

If there were more metal musicals, I'd watch more musicals.

Westworld

This is the one that convinces me that I'll never know what actually makes a good film.
As movies go it's incredibly bare bones, but it not only works it works really well.

And despite being quite old and much copied at this point, it still holds up today.

Pirates of the Caribbean, Curse of the Black Pearl

One of those movies I loved when it first came out, but due to media overexposure, some very ropey sequels and every scrawny little no-mark desperately trying to convince everyone they’re just like Jack, a movie I’d gone right off.

But it’s been a few years, and my ire has more than cooled enough for me to enjoy it once again.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Pirates of the Caribbean, Curse of the Black Pearl

One of those movies I loved when it first came out, but due to media overexposure, some very ropey sequels and every scrawny little no-mark desperately trying to convince everyone they’re just like Jack, a movie I’d gone right off.

But it’s been a few years, and my ire has more than cooled enough for me to enjoy it once again.

The first three really form a rock solid trilogy. After that it all falls apart- but that's an impressive feat for something inspired by a Disney ride.

I feel like the first 3 work but I do dislike how in 2 and 3 Jack Sparrow becomes basically less and less viable as a drunken charismatic leader and becomes more just a drunk fooling around on set.


Also I maintain that they should have done a spin-off for Barbossa purely with him as a pirate doing pirate stuff without Sparrow

I watched all five movies last week. The first three are great. The fourth one has a few rare, good moments but is already a marked step down. The fifth one is basically an insult.

I really like Barbossa (more than Cap'n Jack, even), but I'm not sure he'd benefit from a solo movie. He's good as the serious counterpart to Jack, with his own little quirks to spice things up. But I'm not sure that we'd get much good out of him without that direct contrast. I'm going to say the last two Pirates movies already showcase enough what decoupling working combinations from the early movies leads to. I don't think we need more of that.