Review – The Terminal Man

The Terminal Bore is more like it. Though it’s been many years since I read the book, I remember it as being a lot more interesting than this odd, sixties-vision-of-the-future flick about the evils of mind control. George Seagal plays a man suffering from a form of epilepsy that makes him wig out and try to kill people every time he suffers a seizure. Well-meaning doctors implant electrodes into his brain with the intent of staving off his attacks with pleasant stimulation. But as such things often do, the scheme goes awry; our anti-hero’s brain becomes addicted to the shocks, triggering the device so frequently that the over-stimulation begins to cause the very problem it was supposed to prevent. The premise isn’t bad, but once it’s established the movie just doesn’t seem to go much of anywhere else. Mildly amusing

Review – In Dreams

Take the fashion photography out of The Eyes of Laura Mars, add a hearty dose of child murder in its place, and this is what you get: a woman (Annette Benning) can see inside the mind of the psychopath (Robert Downy Jr.) who kills her daughter. Aside from a few visually interesting sequences, this movie offers little that hasn’t been done better elsewhere. See if desperate

Review – The Mummy (1959)

The old guy walks yet again, this time courtesy of the magic of Hammer Films. Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee once again square off in a rehash of monster movie territory first explored by Universal decades earlier. Along for the ride come bad elements like racism and sexism as well as stuff like the archaeological themes that make good mummy movies so much fun. Despite the heavy makeup and the lack of dialogue (except for the obligatory origin-of-the-mummy sequence), Lee actually manages to wring a fair amount of emotion from his slow-moving role. So if you have a taste for British horror movies from this particular era, you should find this example thoroughly enjoyable. Mildly amusing

Review – Detroit Rock City

When KISS bass player Gene Simmons makes a movie about fans of the group trying to get to a concert back in the band’s heyday, this is the predictable result. If you’ve got a little 70s-era lower class white guy in your past, some of the antics here may bring back a memory or two. Otherwise the audience likely to enjoy this movie is likely to be limited to teenage slackers doing the empty-headed rebellion thing. KISS fans, in other words. Mildly amusing

Review – The First Power

The first time I saw this movie was many years ago when it was originally released in theaters. The theater my friends and I chose for this magical experience was one of those spots where the audience members felt free to add commentary if and when appropriate. I have an especially vivid memory of the umpteenth time protagonist Lou Diamond Phillips takes a shot to the crotch, because the guy sitting right behind us loudly opined, “His shit ain’t gonna work tomorrow!” Honestly, it was the high point of the show. Audience participation aside, this is yet another tiresome tale of a psycho-killer who resurrects himself post-execution and continues his killing spree by hopping from body to body. See if desperate (or at least in the right company)

Review – Mr. Death

Continuing his habit of making documentaries about some of the lesser-known corners of our society, Errol Morris turns his camera’s lens on Fred Leuchter, designer of execution paraphernalia and Holocaust denier. Fred’s an odd little man who claims he drinks 40 cups of coffee a day and smokes six packs of cigarettes. No doubt all the caffeine and nicotine help keep him going while he’s working on the electric chairs, lethal injection machines, and gallows used by several states. Unfortunately for Fred, business bottomed out when he got caught up with the movement of people who insist the Nazis never gassed any Jewish people. He even traveled all the way to Poland to chip concrete from the gas chamber walls in  order to prove his point, engaging in such bad forensic science that the results of his crime were completely inconclusive. As usual, Morris paints a fascinating picture, though I kinda wish he hadn’t decided to include some old Edison footage of an elephant being electrocuted. Mildly amusing

Review – Firestarter

If Carrie made a good movie, maybe we can get another one out of an early Stephen King novel about a girl with destructive, psychic powers. Or maybe not. The plot follows King’s story of a pre-teen who can set fires with her mind. Naturally the sinister government agency known as The Shop takes an interest in her, but when they try to separate her from her father all hell breaks loose. The film is notable primarily for the starring role played by a very young Drew Barrymore. George C. Scott also does a solid job as an icky hit man. Other than that, however, it offers little beyond some elaborate pyrotechnics. Mildly amusing

Review – Mission to Mars

Close Encounters was a good movie. 2001 was a good movie. So if we mash them together, that should make a really great movie, right? Wrong. Of course the stupid, new-agey plot didn’t help matters at all. The so-called Face on Mars is real? It was put there by aliens that were also responsible for starting life on Earth? That’s dumb even by Disney standards. As if all that plus a hearty dose of spouse death wasn’t bad enough, the final icing on the cake is an excessive reliance on the battle of the endless string of mishaps versus the techno-babbling macho men. Touchstone must have spent a fortune on this clinker, because the cast list at the end dragged on so long that I actually started looking for my own name in it (hey, everyone else in the United States was in there, so why not me?). See if desperate

Review – Mission: Impossible 2

Just about the only serious fun I’ve been able to derive from either of the MI movies has been seeing how they’ve re-worked the theme music from the old TV show. In the first one, Art of Noise did a techno-reheat. This time around it gets a guitar-intensive workout. Though that aspect of the production was fun, there isn’t much more to put this outing on a to-see list. John Woo is in the director’s chair, so you can bet that there’s going to be a lot of top-dollar, tightly-edited action sequences. And in that respect the movie does not disappoint. But much of the celluloid that passes through the projector between the explosions and the shootings has been exposed to a parade of dull, predictable plot twists, situations oddly familiar from the first time around, and some of the worst dialogue ever written by anyone this side of Ed Wood. Furthermore, as good as Woo is at action, he should probably be physically prevented from ever attempting to handle romance. But hey, that’s what the fast forward button on the remote is for. See if desperate

Review – At First Sight

Sadly, Val Kilmer appears to have reached and exceeded the limits of his acting ability. He’s supposed to be playing a blind man who regains his sight thanks to the miracles of modern medicine. But he plays the character as if he was not only visually impaired but also mentally differently abled. Once he regains his sight and begins to struggle with his newfound sense, his IQ also seems to jump by at least 50 points. Mira Sorvino, as Kilmer’s girlfriend, does her best to keep up. But ultimately this movie never rises above the level of run-of-the-mill disability drama. Mildly amusing

Review – Patton

I loved this film when I was a kid, and I still love it now, though for different reasons. When I was a kid, I mostly just loved all the World War Two action stuff (I was quite a war buff in my younger years). Now I enjoy marveling at George C. Scott’s masterful portrayal of the duality of Patton: military genius and psychotic prima donna. They actually manage to turn the bastard into a tragic hero in the loftiest Greco-Shakespearian tradition. And then there’s the story about how Scott turned down the Oscar for the role, proving just what an amazing acting job he really did. For anyone who thinks he or she might even vaguely be able to sit through a multi-hour war movie, this one’s a must-see. Worth seeing

Review – War of the Worlds (1953)

Return with us now to the days of yesteryear, when scientists were all rugged, good-looking men who worked for the military and even women with master’s degrees existed only to fetch coffee and whip up some fried eggs as needed. This George Pal version of H.G. Wells’ science fiction classic features special effects that were ahead of their time and still hold up fairly well all these years later. I wish I could say the same for the dialogue, much of which would probably be right at home in an Ed Wood movie. Further, I don’t know that Wells would have thought much of the ultra-Christian preachiness, especially at the end. Otherwise, this is a good example of Pal’s unique contributions to the history of sci fi cinema. Mildly amusing

Review – Destroy All Monsters

Well, if we have to destroy all of them at least we’ve got the whole crowd in the same place. Our story begins with Godzilla, Rodan, Mothra and a peck of other rubber suits only die-hard fans of Japanese city-smashers have ever heard of all walled up together on an island somewhere. Enter the evil women from an asteroid who stick transmitters in the monsters’ heads and mind-control them into attacking the world’s major cities. I guess you can kinda tell the caliber of the city based on the monster that smashes it: New York gets Godzilla himself, Moscow rates Rodan, but Paris just gets a big, warty thing. Eventually our intrepid, macho astronaut defenders figure out a way to beat the transmitters, and the monsters turn on their brain-washers. Enter Ghidara to take them all on in the final Texas Death Cage tag-team free-for-all. As Godzilla movies from the 70s go, this is actually one of the better ones. Mildly amusing

Review – Midnight Express

Here’s the grim and brutal story of an American youth who got caught trying to smuggle hash out of Turkey in the early 70s. So come prepared for a couple of hours’ worth of sheer brutality as our protagonist is tortured to the brink of madness by cruel guards, evil inmates, increased sentences, and other miscellaneous trappings of the third world prison experience. Needless to say, this film didn’t exactly do wonders for Turkey’s tourism industry. Mildly amusing

Review – Armageddon

Here we have a Sun-Classic-esque treatment of that most serious of subjects: the end of the world. This documentary (for want of a better term) features a lengthy parade of prophets (including de rigeur considerations of Nostradamus and Edgar Cayce), hysterical Iberian children, “pyramidologists,” survivalists and religious fanatics. I’ve watched this film a couple of times, once when it came out many years ago and then again recently (in the year 2000) after much of the apocalyptic gloom and doom has been conclusively refuted (at least in terms of most of the time frames proposed). Amazingly enough, a lot of the ridiculous ranting loses most if not all of its amusement value after its been conclusively proven wrong. What was once entertaining in a bad-ghost-story sort of way is now just annoying in a making-fun-of-the-mentally-ill sort of way. Or maybe I was just in a bad mood when I re-watched it. At least it wasn’t as bad as the Bruce Willis mega-movie with the same name. Mildly amusing

Review – The Patriot

I guess maybe it’s comforting to know that Americans still have a war we feel we can be proud of. Revisionist history has done in the nobility of just about every armed conflict in our history except World War Two (which has taken some lumps but remains more or less on its feet) and the Revolution. This, of course, is a Mel Gibson epic about the older of the two “popular” wars. If you go in expecting Braveheart relocated to the Colonies, then you’re going to get just about exactly what you pay for. Some of the battle effects are kinda graphic (especially the scene in which a cannon ball takes off a guy’s head). But other than that, this is mostly just a whole bunch of “Hello my name is Inigo Montoya you killed my entire family prepare to die.” If the outlaw Josey Wales had a funny accent and fought for the good guys, this movie would already have been made around 30 years ago. Mildly amusing

Review – Pass the Ammo

Though this movie was a great deal more timely when it first came out (right around the time of the infamous Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart scandals), it still endures as a comedy masterpiece. Aside from Tim Curry’s flamboyant performance as Rev. Ray the crooked televangelist, the cast is good without being great. The production values could only charitably be described as cheap. But the script is an amazing piece of work, as clever as it is sarcastic and irreverent. Though it probably isn’t one of the greatest films ever made, it is an excellent choice for anyone in search of a silly, cynical bit of brain candy. If nothing else, it’s worth seeing just for one of the most memorable lines in movie history (though decency forbids me to say more than that). Buy the tape

Review – The Ten Commandments

Among my guilty pleasures, this is one of the guiltiest. Cecil B. DeMille takes so long to tell the story of Moses, the exodus from Egypt and the title subject that it’s almost faster just to read the Bible. Further, the casting is a big mistake. Though I concede I’m not much of a judge of men, I just can’t imagine many Egyptian princesses actually preferring rock-headed Charlton Heston to smooth, stylish Yul Brynner. And the script? Don’t even get me started on the dialogue! And yet I’ve seen this so many times I know much of it by heart. Perhaps it’s a childhood comfort association, because this used to show a lot around Christmas and Easter. Maybe it’s an appreciation of the finest in sanctimonious camp and spectacle. Or maybe it’s just that when I’m using the TV as background noise it’s nice to have something on that’s familiar enough for me to ignore most of it. Whatever the case, I can’t go all the way to “buy the tape” here, but I do confess that it’s part of my personal collection. Worth seeing

Review – Mercy

What an odd title for a film that apparently has none. The bad acting, ludicrous script and ham-handed exploitation of unsavory sexual themes are as relentless as they are tedious. Yet again Hollywood (or at least the low-rent, straight-to-cable corner of Tinseltown) trots out the tired old male fantasies about what women do with each other “while the guys are at work.” Adding S&M wrinkles and a basic murder-thriller plot structure does little to warm up these cold leftovers. And Julian Sands in a dress? Please. See if desperate

Review – Tarzan

Yet another familiar tale Disney-fied. It’s got all the classic studio stock elements: dead parents, lots of law-of-the-jungle violence, cheesy romance, plenty of musical numbers, expensive animation, the works. And though it features all the usual dysfunctional relationships Disney has become famous for, it nonetheless turns out to be a fun movie to watch. Or maybe I was just in a good mood when I saw it. Mildly amusing