My Teacher is a Robot

Title:  Class of 1999

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away:  Though not in a very prominent role, Malcolm McDowell is in this movie.   Stacy Keach is also in here with a crazy little white rat tail.

Introduction:  I bought this on VHS for an undisclosed amount, as it is one of those rare movies.

Location:  This movie starts in a sort of prison, and they go to other various places throughout the city, but it is primarily set in a school.    I’d say that about 78% of this movie, if not more, is filmed within the school.

Plot:  It’s 1999 (Oh no!) and for some reason everyone is carrying guns and trying to kill each other.    It’s like Mad Max only in a school.   So, obviously, the teachers are robots that have advanced programming and begin to take on a mind of their own, by killing the students.    I kid you not, in one scene the teacherbot breaks up a fight and takes the two kids involved and spanks them.    And I thought Catholic school was hard.

                This boils down to the basic fight of man vs. machine and let me tell you, these kids go through a lot to try and stop their teachers.    Had they just called me, I would’ve told them to just get a giant magnet and make those teacherbots sing country.

Acting:  The main kid reminds me of Corey Feldman.   I think that pretty much explains it all.

Production:  This movie is set in 1999 (the future), though it was actually filmed in 1989.   It looks like 1989 in every aspect of it.

Sex/Nudity:  No, thankfully.   Too many robots killing humans.

Special Effects:  The robots have this vision thing that reminds me of the Terminator, but the models themselves look like they were left over from the T2 set.   So let’s just agree that this movie was made because T2 had some extra props lying around and they didn’t want them to go to waste.

Overall Verdict:  If this movie wanted to be taken seriously at all, it wouldn’t have had the spanking scene.   Granted, that unintentionally funny scene made it all the more shocking when the teacherbot would later snap a kid’s neck.    Ultimately, plot aside, you have to love this movie simply because it is set in a future that has already happened.    I like seeing movies from the 1980’s that tell you “This is what the future is going to look like”, but then we’ve already lived through it so the answer is obviously no.    These types of things simply did not happen in 1999.   However, people were panicked in 1999 about the impending doom of Y2K.    Remember that?   Perhaps that could be the sequel to this that never got made until now.   Class of 1999 Part 2:  The Revenge of Y2K.   I like it.   Someone make it.

When Owls Say More than “Who”

Title: Legend of the Guardians

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away: This is, up until now, the only Zach Snyder movie I had not seen.   There are some pretty noteworthy voices in here as well, but try not to think about them that way and just get lost in the moment.

Introduction:  I got this movie on DVD, for free, from my local library.

Location:  This is animated, so it’s not really relevant here.

Plot:  Some owls fall out of their nest and are about to be eaten, but then they are saved by bigger owls that sort of bring them into a life of slavery.    Our two main owls go on a quest to find the Guardians and along the way, they become heroes themselves.

                This is based on a book, which I haven’t read, so it probably get a lot of its story ideas from there.

Acting:  The owls sound right on and let me say that usually in voice over movies there is a character or two who really stands out where you just can’t buy into him being anyone other than who he is in real life, but this isn’t the case here.    Everyone uses their voices appropriately because I never stop seeing the owls as who they are supposed to be instead of going, “He sounds like that guy from The Matrix”.

Production:  This was a seemingly big budget movie that was in theaters and all, yes.

Sex/Nudity:  No, haha.   This is still somewhat of a kids’ movie.

Special Effects:  The owls in this look real enough to eat.

Overall Verdict:  Gina said she felt that this was too dark to be a kids’ movie, but I reminded her that she is a big fan of Harry Potter.   I really did enjoy this movie but maybe it’s just because I like owls.    Added bonus:  There are songs in here (or at least one played more than once) by Owl City.    Makes sense, right?

She’s the Titular Character

Title:  Hanna

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away:  I’m not entirely sure whether I’ve reviewed this movie before or not.   I tried to watch it once before and only made it halfway through, so I might have given it an inaccurate write-off review.   I am here to correct that now by giving it a proper write-off review.

Introduction:  Once again, I got this movie on DVD from the library for free.

Location:  They go to a bunch of places with a bunch of climates, so yeah, I’d say that they had a budget.

Plot:  Hanna is a young girl who grows up in isolation because, as it clearly explained to us in the beginning of the movie, if she is revealed she will be hunted until either her or her hunter is dead.   Her hunter is played by Cate Blanchett.    Of course Hanna goes out into the world and gets hunted.    So it becomes this cat and mouse game where you know one of them will not be alive by the end and, well, you can guess which one lives and which one dies.   Movies aren’t named after losers.   Well, except for “The Losers”, but that’s different. 

Acting:  Aside from the woman who once portrayed Bob Dylan, we also have Eric Bana and, yes, that girl from “The Lovely Bones”.   For what it is, the acting is convincing.    There are seemingly a handful of pale blonde actresses that could have been the lead.   What about that one from Arrested Development, Archer and Love & Other Drugs?   Or Gwen Stacy in Spider-Man 3?   Or was that the same actress?  I don’t know, pale blondes are a dime a dozen in Hollywood.

Production:  It was a big budget motion picture, yes.

Sex/Nudity:   Not really, no.  Too much action, but not that kind of action.

Special Effects:  They are good for what they are, but more on that below.

Overall Verdict:  It’s funny that this movie stars the same young actress who was in “The Lovely Bones”.   Why, you ask?   Simply because this movie was to me what I felt after watching “The Lovely Bones”.    This movie had a fairly simple, typical plot that you could see coming from miles away if you’ve ever seen movies before this.    However, the big claim to this movie (as with “The Lovely Bones”) must be the visuals of it.   It is pleasing to the eyes, even if not the mind.   For that, yes, it is good, but why can’t we have a visual spectacle and a movie with a plot that makes you think?   I guess Hollywood just thinks audience are too dumb or suffer from a.d.d. to the point where they cannot have both.   I find that to be false, but my opinion doesn’t seem to matter when it comes to big budget movies like this one.

“Sometimes I Think About Finding a New Alien Species… and Then f#$% it” - jay

Title:  Splice

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away:  This movie has Adrien Brody, who I’m coming to like less with each movie I see him stumble through, and Sarah Polley in it.

Introduction:  I got this movie from the library on DVD for free.

Location:  It mostly takes place in a science research lab and an old barn, but there are a few other settings and a presumably large budget.

Plot:  A married research scientist team accidentally creates a sort of human sort of gargoyle type creature and then it turns into a giant mess as you’d expect but these people were kind of too dumb to do anything about beforehand.

Acting:  The acting is what you’d expect it to be, which is neither really that great nor awful.

Production:  It was in theaters and it shows.

Sex/Nudity:  Yes.  The main couple has a sex scene early on, and later in the movie Adrien Brody’s character has pretty graphic sex with this alien hybrid thing.  It’s just all sorts of wrong and whoever came up with it should be charged criminally.

Special Effects:  See above.

Overall Verdict:   While my overall distaste for this movie stands, here is my biggest gripe with it.   The main character played by Sarah Polley is kind of the one to kind of hide and keep this weird creature at first, right?  At first, Adrien Brody’s character is resistant to it and he seems like he wants to kill it.   But when you get to the end of the movie, who is left alive?   Sarah Polley and no one else.   Her boss, her husband, her brother-in-law and even her precious pet she seemed to think was a child are all dead because of her.    So it really does bother me that this all seems to be her doing and not only does she not really suffer any repercussions from this (Given everyone else died, I’d say she got off light) but she also ends up being impregnated by this alien gargoyle thing and is given a large sum of cash to have the baby and keep her mouth shut.   So I guess if someone you know ever ends up in a similar situation, be sure to report them right away and if necessary kill them even because under these circumstances it is obviously either them or you.   Adrien Brody kept his mouth shut, and sure he got some dirty alien sex, but then he also got killed, so you know, make your choices wisely scientists. 

Jean Claude Van Past, Jean Claude Van Future

Title:  Timecop

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away:  This has Jean Claude Van Damme in it, as well as Mia Sara (who is probably best known as Ferris Bueller’s girlfriend), but beyond that I’m not really sure.  It’s also based upon a Dark Horse Comic Book Series, one of the first movies to be made that aren’t about Marvel or DC.

Introduction:  I bought this movie on VHS at Good Will, though I had originally seen it back in 1994 when it first came out.

Location:  This is the most complex question of all of these for this movie.   It’s not so much as to where this movie takes place, but when.   JCVD plays a cop named Max who lives in 1994.   Then he goes into the future, which is 2004.    Then he ends up going back to 1994, which at that point becomes the past because he sees a younger version of himself.    Somewhere in between his first trip to the future and his first trip back to the past, the present seems to disappear.   If you think about it too much, your head will literally explode.

Plot:  An evil politician is using time travel to secure his spot as President and basically owning the entire U.S. government.   Max (played by JCVD) is the only one who knows what’s going on because every time he goes back in time to stop this then comes back to the future something has changed in the memories of his friends and co-workers.    Basically, this is a movie about time travel where Max decides it’s wrong for a crooked politician to change the fates and lives of others for his own benefit, but yet Max can go back and change the past all he wants to if it means his overly annoying wife doesn’t have to die.

Acting:  It’s a JCVD movie, so you do the math.

Production:  This was in theaters because I believe I actually saw it in theaters when it first came out.

Sex/Nudity:  There is one pretty graphic sex scene early on involving the two main stars (JCVD and Mia Sara), but after that it remains nudity-free.

Special Effects:  There’s a scene where one guy loses his arm and a good chunk out of the side of his body.   That, coupled with the way it looks when the past and future President converge together show that this movie has pretty good special effects considering it’s from 1994.

Overall Verdict:   When you get around the whole time travel problem with this movie (such as what I like to think of as “Too Many JCVDs”), then it can become a fun sci-fi sort of action movie.  I really do enjoy it, even if at times it makes my head hurt over-thinking it.

Every Bad Horror Movie Cliché Possible

Title:  The Roommate [2011]

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away:  This movie has some actors in it from various television shows, but it lacks that one big sort of actor that makes it a movie where I can write something here.  I mean, who is the big attraction?  Billy Zane?  Or do I just say this is the movie with that one girl from Friday Night Lights in it?

Introduction:   I got this movie from the library for free.  If you actually paid for the DVD release please move to somewhere far enough away so that you can’t hear me laughing at you.

Location:  It takes place at college, but goes to many places nearby, so sadly it had a decent budget.

Plot:  This girl moves in with this other girl- for college- and the one girl is creepy and becomes obsessive and blah blah blah… This plot has been done so many times in so many different ways that all seemed the same I don’t even know what I was expecting going into this.   I guess maybe I was looking for some unexpected twist or humor, but yeah, this was just bad.   Same movie, different year.

Acting:   The acting wasn’t that bad, but to be a “major motion picture” it was pretty awful.

Production:   It looked like it was in theaters and it was.

Sex/Nudity:  Yeah, that’s really what will save this movie.

Special Effects:  Were hardly there.   Ugh.   The death scenes could have at least been cool.

Overall Verdict:  This movie, looking back at it now, can be summed up by one single name.   If you look at this movie on iMBD or Wikipedia, you’ll notice one of the character names standing out.   Yes, there is a girl in this movie with the character name Tracy Morgan.   Yes, like the hilarious actor.   MST3K has a rule about how you’re not supposed to put a better movie inside of your crappy movie, well I think you shouldn’t name your crappy characters after actors that would hopefully never make something this bad.   The kitten gets put in the dryer (Though you don’t really see anything happen to it) and that bugged me more than any of the human characters getting it.   All of the characters in here should have been killed off except for the kitten.   If you somehow end up watching this movie, don’t blame me.  I warned you.

Faster than a Speeding Mullet

Title:  The Flash

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away:  This is the movie pilot of the television series you’ve probably never seen.

Introduction:  I bought this VHS at Good Will for one dollar.  Well worth it.

Location:  This takes place throughout an entire city, which for a television show is not that uncommon.

Plot:  This is the movie pilot of what would eventually become a failed series for whatever reasons.  It begins with a criminal scientist being hit by lightning and gaining special powers, mainly the ability of speed.   A lot of development is made on the side of the bad guys- a group of thug bikers who want to overthrow the government or some such typical nonsense- as well as some of the supporting characters.   At times it feels like The Flash himself got a stronger role in the animated Justice League series, but, you know, who am I to complain for a live action version of The Flash?

                I will say that this movie drags out for quite some time in terms of finally getting to see The Flash costume on the box.   At first, he has a suit without the mask and that’s used quite a bit.  It seems to take forever to finally see him in his official Flash suit, but more on the suit later.

Acting:  The acting isn’t bad, but it isn’t great.   I attribute that largely to the fact that I have no idea who any of these actors are and if they are still working it’s probably on soap operas.

Production:  For what it was, it looked pretty good.

Sex/Nudity:  Since this was a television show in the 1990’s, the obvious answer is no.

Special Effects:  The really big special effect in this all is actually the way that the Flash runs.  I mean, how do you have someone still visible to your audience watching at home when in reality he is moving so fast that he can’t be seen by the naked eye?   They pull this ghost technique off in a rather good way, but it still looks kind of odd.   I don’t know, for the time I guess it was the best that they could do.   While watching this, I wondered aloud how this would look if it was made today.   Then I quickly shot down the question, realizing that not only would he simply look like Clark Kent running fast in Smallville.   Heck, they even had a Flash-like character on the show.

Overall Verdict:  This should very easily be one of those cheesy, cult comic book movies made before the first Spider-Man (or X-Men) when people didn’t necessarily know what they were doing and the special effects weren’t quite good enough to get there anyway.   I just wish he would have been in the Flash costume more.  I am aware that this turned into a series, so there was plenty of time for that later on, but still.  Plus he kind of looks like a red version of The Tick without his mask.

Dude… A Monkey!

Title:  Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away:  If you haven’t heard of this movie, you might just be missing out on one of the greatest action movies of 2011.

Introduction:  I got this from the library on DVD for free.  I came quite close to seeing it in theaters.

Location:  All around the jungle… haha, j/k.  You know they had a budget for locations wherever they wanted.

Plot:  When I first read that there was going to be a new Planet of the Apes movie, my immediate thought was, “Great, another remake.   An attempt to revive a great franchise with mediocre movies and merchandising”.   You know, basically the same way I feel whenever I read about any new movie coming out.    Then I found out that this would be a prequel of sorts to the original Planet of the Apes.   Hmm.   I actually found that to be quite intriguing.   Think about it:  In the original, we have a human who finds himself on, well, a planet full of apes that act human.   But no one ever really said how that happened.   Sure, there are probably some books or more likely comic books out there that explained the origin once before, but to see it in a big Hollywood movie made me quite excited.

Acting:  James Franco is the man and John Lithgow still has it.   What more do you need to know?

Production:  It looks and feels like a modern movie, which is good, but in terms of transferring to the other movies in the series you get what I like to call the Star Wars Prequels Problem.

Sex/Nudity:  Actually, no, which considering the apes is probably a good idea.

Special Effects:  They were what you would expect from a movie released in 2011.   The funny thing is that about 99% of the time I bought into the idea of the apes being real.   In the back of my mind, I knew that they were not because even some of the things they were doing were obvious, but I mean, yeah, it was a nice touch of looking real but not going too far as to make you realize they weren’t real.    I very much bought into the whole movie, and the special effects sucking me in helped that out a lot.

Overall Verdict:  I’ll be the first to admit (and complain about it) that most movies lately tend to not be living up to their hype.  I’ve read about things on paper that seemed funny or just a great story… I mean, how do you mess up a movie with James Franco and Kenny Powers?  I don’t know, but it wasn’t funny.   How do you mess up a movie about frickin’ Thor?  Really?  THOR!!   Anyway, I digress.   Nothing can kill The Blob (except for cold) and Hollywood can continue to crank out perpetually disappointing movies, but every once in a while one will slip through that leaves me wanting more.   This is one of those movies.   Now if you’ll excuse me, this review has thrown me into a coughing fit.

I Get No Doggone Respect

Title:  Rover Dangerfield

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away:  Rodney Dangerfield is a cartoon dog.

Introduction:  I got this at Good Will for a dollar, but it was the sale color so the VHS was also 30% off.

Location:  This shouldn’t matter since it’s animated.  Doesn’t cost extra to send them to the moon (Though they don’t actually go to the moon)

Plot:  A somewhat generic tale of the city dog being moved to the country (against his will).   When he finally makes it back to the city—SPOILER ALERT—he decides he’d rather stay in the country.   Rodney Dangerfield is what makes this movie special.

Acting:  It’s a cartoon, so you can’t really judge it too harshly. 

Production:  It looks like a Warner Bros. cartoon from the 1990s.   It kind of has a Foghorn Leghorn feel to it because they’re on a farm.

Sex/Nudity:  While the two lead dogs eventually have puppies, there is no actual nudity or anything because this is still a cartoon for kids in many ways.

Special Effects:  There aren’t really any because it’s animated.

Overall Verdict:  While there are some songs in this movie, it still remains one of my all-time favorites simply because Rover sings a song about how he’ll pee on any tree but a Christmas tree.  No, I am not making that up.   It’s a great movie to introduce your children to Rodney Dangerfield and prepare them for one day watching him in other movies when they get older.  It’s just all around good family fun.

Colin Farrell in Twilight

Title:  Fright Night 2011

Actors/Director/Anything Worth Mentioning Right Away:  Colin Farrell leads a pretty good cast including McLovin’, Charlie Bartlett, the United States of Tara and one of the Doctors.   By all means, on paper, this should be a good movie.

Introduction:  I got this movie on DVD from the library for free.

Location:  It takes place mainly within two neighboring houses, but goes other places.   Yeah, it’s a pretty big budget horror movie remake.

Plot:  This is your standard cliché plot, but hey, it has been done before any way.   A kid thinks his new neighbor is a vampire, his friends start disappearing but no one believes him… I know this is a remake and all, but the idea has also been far stretched enough to such movies as Disturbia.   So we’re not really looking for a great plot here (We pretty much know how it’s going to go down coming into it), we’re mainly looking on everything else.

Acting:  The acting isn’t that bad.  It’s perhaps one of the most redeeming parts of this stinker.   Though when I read online that Colin Farrell took this part because he needed the work, I threw up in my mouth a little bit.

Production:  It’s a modern day horror movie, so yeah, it’s got that big budget look.

Sex/Nudity:  I don’t remember any, but I am kind of blocking certain moments of this movie out of my mind permanently.

Special Effects:  This is where you expect the movie to really deliver.   Why remake a classic if you’re not going to do something that couldn’t be done- visually- at the time of the original?  Granted, this movie does have up to date graphics like most other modern horror movies… But that’s just the problem.   It comes off looking like nearly every other vampire movie mass produced since Twilight and, well, that’s a lot of movies.

Overall Verdict:  I know the director of this movie also directed Lars and the Real Girl, which I really love as a movie, but if you told me it was directed by someone who had something to do with the Twilight movies or the like I would certainly believe you.  It has that kind of look to it.   It’s like somebody out there- some corporate suit guy, not an artist or filmmaker- said, “Hey, this has vampires in it… Let’s remake it since vampires are hot now and cash in on it being mistaken for a Twilight spinoff”.    I forgive the plot instantly because it is a remake, but there is still a sense of horror, terror and suspense that can be conveyed to make this movie awesome.   This can be done through the acting, lighting, music or just the overall feel of the movie… how it sucks you in and makes you believe and want to be scared.   Unfortunately, this movie really fails on all of those accounts.   Yes, this could have been a great remake considering the talent involved, but it comes up looking like just another remake that didn’t need to be remade.