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The Underwater City (1962)
Disappointingly Bland.
They could have done so much more with this concept, it's really obvious though that they couldn't be bothered to make you know an actual movie out of the basic plot elements and instead went with this part docu-drama style 77 minute time-waster for 8 year old boys in the early 60s.
Despite how boring this film was even with its short run-time I feel it would have benefitted hugely from being 20-25 minutes longer and you know having an actual human storyline and characters we actually cared about!
The worst scene is when "cowboy" goes out and gets drunk on whiskey he finds in a nearby shipwreck {that he was actually searching for in the first place} and then doesn't get eaten or even attacked by the Giant Octopus they spend about 5 minutes showing you at the other end of the ship!
Space Precinct (1994)
Despite the complaints about the Alien Effects....
I thought the Aliens were well realised in this show.
Unfortunately that is literally the only thing I can praise having watched the first three episodes.
Our lead character is a block of wood.
Our secondary lead is a total cliche.
The lead character's son is awful and just seeing that he's in every single episode makes me loathe to even attempt to get through the other 22.
The Acting is abysmal from mains and guest stars alike.
The writing is like something out of the 1950s....and not the good stuff from the 50s either.
The budget clearly went on the alien masks and makeup rather than on getting decent writers, directors, actors and technical people to make a worthwhile tv series.
You know what annoys me most.....We got this rubbish in 1994 and had to wait another 11 years for the return of Doctor Who! Classic Who was never given a budget anywhere near what this rubbish got but did so much more with so much less!
Le pupille (2022)
More Proof that The Academy Awards are a Joke!
How on Earth did this absolute rubbish get nominated for an Oscar!?!
I'm speechless!
Yet somehow I've got to find another 450 letters for this review.
....Err?
There's really nothing here to even talk about, some jaunty light hearted music around a frankly vicious little scenario.
It's not even a story, there's no plot, no characterisation and specifically no moral; as stated at the end of the 35 minutes this short film lasts without credits.
It's one of those art for art's sakes productions that I don't actually see any "art" in.
Technically it's well made but that's the antithesis of "art" - Art isn't about technicality, it's about feeling; And this "film" has no feeling!
Ticket to Paradise (2022)
Clooney and Roberts are too old for these roles
George Clooney and Julia Roberts at 61 and 55 years old are according to this film meant to be no older than 45.
They married straight from college, their daughter was born within the year and she's now just out of college...I'll be generous and say they were almost 22 when they left college and their daughter was also born in the summer meaning that with her being 21-22 now they would have to be 44-45.
Obviously neither are capable of passing for 45 anymore and haven't been for years.
-
Other than that major issue this is a by the numbers rom-com of the gentle persuasion.
A 6/10 or if you want to be generous a 7.
Obi-Wan Kenobi: Part III (2022)
This episode has the highest rating of the three so far? HOW!?!
Sorry but there's clearly false voting going on here.....An objectively atrocious episode that has NO respect for the canon and lore of either A New Hope or Revenge of the Sith has an 8.0 on IMDB?
NO!
JUST NO!
This episode is absolute TRASH with no redeeming value whatsoever!
Uncharted (2022)
Absolute Trash
From the first scene to the last there's literally nothing good about this film..... And no I'm not a fan of the Uncharted games, I've never played any of them or even owned a Playstation! I do however have a soft spot for Adventure Movies and would love there to be more good ones out there, I'm not asking for Raiders of the Lost Ark, I'm not even asking for Romancing the Stone but surely you can at least hit the level of a National Treasure 1 when you have an IP as popular and detailed as Uncharted is to work with.
But no, instead you half-arse it, relying entirely on the IP and Tom Holland to get backsides in cinema seats!
-
Seriously, if you haven't already wasted your money on this abomination then do yourself a favour and just rewatch "Sahara" instead!
The Adam Project (2022)
Pretty much a clone of Timecop only nowhere near as good
This film was advertised as a Back to the Future homage but it's much closer to Jean Claude Van Damme's 1994 movie Timecop in plot, story and character.
Ryan Reynolds is yet again playing exactly the same character he always plays whilst Mark Ruffalo is stuck with a rather thankless role as a hidebound scientist {seriously.... The refusal to hear what Ryan is trying to tell him gets old fast and should have been cut down by a good minute.}.
Jennifer Garner's barely in it and after one of the best scenes in the film completely disappears never to be mentioned again.
Zoe Saldana is playing yet another Mary-Sue trope {can we please stop this Hollywood - Strong Female Characters can exist without being PERFECT!} but luckily she also isn't in the movie for very long so doesn't hurt it too badly.
The finale is probably the weakest part of the movie although the coda runs it close.
All in all; a decent time-waster but nothing more.
5/10.
Outland (1981)
Needs a Remake
There's a really great film hidden in here but unfortunately a combination of terrible decisions by the villains and outdated even for 1981 acting and effects leaves us with a rather underwhelming film.
Imagine a remake helmed by either Chris Nolan or Denis Villeneuve with Daniel Craig as The Marshall, Frances McDormand as Dr Lazarus, Chiwetel Ejiofor as Sergeant Montone, Andy Serkis as the Governor, Brie Larson as The Marshall's wife, Tom Hardy as Spota, Benicio Del Toro as Yario and Daniel Kaluuya as Officer Ballard.
Connery wasn't at his best here but he didn't really have much to work with and a remake for me would need to be at least 20-30 minutes longer than this 110 minute film to fit in needed characterisation and story to what is a quite basic action film really but with a great premise that deserves so much more than what it got.
6/10 - It does its job but it could have been a classic if done right.
Encanto (2021)
Standard Disney fare except for one big problem.
I'll never understand how the progressive Hollywood Elite can go on and on about marginalised people then make a movie about an abused child having to apologise to her abusers for the "magic" to be fixed and everything to become perfect again!
Do they not understand that their characters, plots and storylines actually tell the exact opposite of what they want them to say?
SHOW DON'T TELL HOLLYWOOD!
Why have you forgotten this mantra - You're saying one thing but you're showing the exact opposite!
And worse - You're showing this to CHILDREN! You can wrap it up in a bow at the end but they still saw everything in the film and that's what will stay with them NOT the false and forced everything's perfect now ending!
Sin Takes a Holiday (1930)
Disgusting ending ruins the entire movie
You know, prior to the ending I may have given this movie a 4,5 or even a 6 out of 10 in recognition of the 90 years that have passed since it was made.
The acting from Constance Bennett is actually pretty phenomenal, Basil Rathbone is good too and the rest of the cast are ok.
The story seems to be one of an introverted and unsure of herself girl finding freedom and love with a man who actually sees her for who she really is.
But unfortunately that is all thrown away at the end of the film as the man she mooned after at the start of the film only for him to treat her with contempt and use her in the most awful way suddenly notices her because she has good clothes and make-up and what does she do.... Let's him have his way with her!
AWFUL!
JUST AWFUL!
The Exorcist (1973)
The Opening Scene is completely Superfluous!
One of the most overrated films of All-Time! The Exorcist begins with an utterly superfluous sequence in Iraq that has nothing to do with the rest of the film whatsoever, then spends the best part of an hour meandering about with equally superfluous scenes that do nothing to advance the admittedly meagre plot.
From time to time we get a glimpse of our possessed child doing something that could be considered shocking for a child to do, which of course includes copious verbal vulgarities.
Finally the film gets to the actual point only to then end abruptly with no real closure.
The Exorcist is not frightening in any way and having checked out the trivia page here on IMDB I was not at all surprised to find that it was in fact the hospital scenes that caused much of the "fainting" and "walking out of cinemas" that is constantly brought up as supposedly being because the film was so "scary".
The Exorcist is a film that was meant to shock the highly conservative US public back in the early 1970s and it does this through copious use of profanity, bloody medical procedures and the obligatory fake vomit BUT "Scares"? There are NONE!
It's also noted in the trivia that neither Jaws nor Silence of the Lambs are considered "Horror" movies on IMDB yet both those films are far far superior in evoking a sense of fear and empathy for their protagonists to this pretentious pile of crap! Not to mention all the other ways those films are far superior to this vastly overrated film.
Mildred Pierce (1945)
Repugnant!
I just watched this movie and I'm sorry but Crawford's performance was nothing special and the plot and dialogue were absolutely abysmal!
I did like Eve Arden's performance as Ida but that's literally the only thing I did like about Mildred Pierce.
Mildred Pierce is in no way "Working Class" - Her first husband owned and ran his own business for goodness sake and left her because after he lost his business and the money was running out she was still spoiling their daughter with expensive gifts! {As for his supposedly cheating on her, I assume this is from the book as in the movie his relationship with Mrs Biederhoff seems purely platonic!}.
The Daughter isn't just spoiled, she's outright EVIL!
Her house which her husband moves out of is large and spacious, she even has an expensive Piano, hardly the kind a working class family would be able to afford, which she doesn't even need to sell as a working class mother would surely have to do given the circumstances!
She's a middle-class woman who happens to have fallen on hard times! Although those hard times are severely ameliorated by how easily she is able to not only hold on to her house and belongings {incl. that piano} but also to get a new business for zero outlay! Not to mention that the older daughter is clearly used to a style of living far beyond that of any teenager in a working class family and many lower-middle class families too!
Veda's personality is pure EVIL! She marries a young upper class man who's family are rich in order to divorce him almost immediately and con him out of 10,000 dollars in 1945 {God knows what that would be today!} by lying about being pregnant!
P.S. Why is the ex-husband driving approximately 90-100 miles from San Bernardino to Malibu with an extremely sick child!?! Are there no hospitals in San Bernardino OR anywhere on the journey across LOS ANGELES!?!
Dancer and the Dame (2015)
Blatant K-9 Clone made for kids who's religous parents won't let them watch K-9
So, this film basically copies wholesale entire scenes from the 1989 James Belushi masterpiece but with the edge completely removed and replaced with "good clean family fun".
The story isn't exactly the same, the criminal enterprise is counterfeit money rather than drugs and the characters are very different to the original - Again all this does is takes the edge away.
Eva LaRue is terrible unfortunately and David A R White's role is significantly smaller than it should have been.
But Billy Gardell does well in the Lead role and the two canine actors are as delightful as you'd want them to be.
Overall this is an enjoyable homage but hardly a great film and frankly I'd prefer my children if I ever have any to watch the original as I did BEFORE watching this as I wouldn't want to spoil the original for them with all the blatant scenes copied from it.
5/10 - Not great but not particularly bad either.
*batteries not included (1987)
Nasty, Spiteful, Mean-Minded Claptrap!
I was under the impression I'd seen and enjoyed this movie as a child over 30 years ago but that can't be as straight off there's no way I'd have sat through the first 30 minutes without giving up as this is absolutely not a movie made for children!
For those first 30 minutes it's basically an overdone TV drama that feels like the first 5-10 minutes of an A-Team episode before the A-Team arrive but is much much more horrific.
In fact there seems to be more than a few horror elements in this supposed family comedy!
Then we get to the pathetic slapstick half-hour before once again reverting to viciously over the top drama.
And finally the denouement descends into total cheese mode as the villain has an out of nowhere change of heart and our heroes go wandering around the city.
Dora and the Lost City of Gold (2019)
Hollywood doesn't understand children
At 8 years old I was watching Raiders of the Lost Ark and Temple of Doom, Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, The Vikings, Zulu and Clash of the Titans.
This is one of those movies that seems to have been aimed straight at an 8 year old audience yet doesn't understand that that audience is perfectly able to tell a good movie from a bad one.
Seeing the trailer I was expecting a much better movie, one that took the cartoon and worked with it but unfortunately the trailer lied. The jokes that worked in the trailer didn't work in the movie past the first 5-10 minutes, After that they just seemed to forget that the audience for Dora the Explorer is quite a bit older now and want more than the odd blatantly throwin in reference.
And again - Even were that audience not older now 8 year olds still want more from a movie than they expect from a daytime TV Cartoon!
These are different media and different rules apply!
Was Dora and the Lost City of God better than say Masters of the Universe? NO! No it wasn't, because despite that particular movie hugely disappointing many fans of He-Man back in 1987 {I was 10 then} it didn't try to PANDER to kids! Frankly I personally still enjoy re-watching Masters of the Universe even today - More than I enjoy re-watching the cartoon it was very loosely based on.
I took my nieces to the cinema to watch Sonic {a good movie that doesn't PANDER to kids} which they loved - I'm glad I didn't waste money taking them to see this because they'd have been bored very quickly!
Overlord (2018)
If you liked Dog Soldiers, Severance etc. then this is for you!
This is a great new entry into a sub-genre of Horror that I personally really enjoy - Along with the two movies in the title of this review I'd also like to add....Wilderness, Reign of Fire, Alien Vs Predator, Deathwatch and Predators to the list of movies that standout as Classics of this genre - I would place Overlord alongside these movies but obviously below the absolute top tier such as Aliens, Predator and The Descent.
What Men Want (2019)
Well that was "SAFE"!
Was expecting far more meat to this considering all the criticisms the Mel Gibson movie has got over the past 20 years. I was worried that this could be a complete diatribe against "Men" and that is thankfully NOT what we got at least...However, instead they just played it safe and where they could have given some real meat to this idea they wimped out.
Yes; we still get the juvenile sex jokes and we still get the obligatory gay best friend and we still get the "moral" that you have to think of other people's feelings and not just your own.
But that last point is really where I hoped for more - Our lead is still the typical "Comedy Lead" that you'd expect in this story, She's not a person you'd sympathise with in any way, We already got that with Mel Gibson and that was a major complaint that has been aimed at What Women Want so why not make the lead a more sympathetic character this time round?
You want to make a point about there being a glass ceiling for women it makes no sense to me to have our lead woman be such a nasty piece of work that no-one would want her to make partner even if she was a man!?!
Heck they do at least have the guts to call her on that but unfortunately they pull back and have her not take it in and it is left as a single scene playing no part in the rest of the film.
The "Coda" to this film {after the 3rd act} tries to wrap it all up in a bun giving us the standard happy endings BUT we don't see the path to these endings and it doesn't ring true.
Overall this is a decent watch which should illicit a general feeling of relaxation throughout but it has very few outright laughs and is nothing more than comfort food.
Cats (2019)
If you didn't like the Musical this film is NOT FOR YOU!
A Magnificent Masterpiece of Cinema! The bad reviews and IMDB rating are because of people who despise the idea behind this Musical in the first place! One of the most popular musicals of All-Time Cats does unfortunately have a marmite effect and plenty of haters! I cannot recommend this film enough! It is SUPERB!
Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker (2019)
First Time I've Ever Been Bored By a Star Wars Movie.
Seriously...no matter how bad things have got previously in this franchise I have never been bored while watching a Star Wars movie before....Solo, Farce Awakens, Revenge of the Sith, Attack of the Clones - All AWFUL Movies but they all kept me interested on first watch! Not this one...I couldn't wait for it to end! Frankly the only half decent movie in this trilogy was Last Jedi and then only if you treat it as its own thing like say the Ewok movies of the 80s. The only actually good Disney Star Wars movie is Rogue One.
Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)
Worst MI so far!
Now the MI movies have never been my cup of tea, the first one only barely gets a 6/10 from me, the 2nd one got a 4/10 for being enjoyable even though it was a bad movie and the 3rd I gave a 2/10 {I can't now remember a single thing about it and I only watched it for the second time about 6 months ago if that!}....I thought that had to be the nadir for the MI franchise, I'd actually skipped the rest for the past decade having given up on them but now, thanks to Netflix I have finally seen MI-4....And I'm absolutely STUNNED at the ineptitude on display in this movie!
1) The Russian Agent acts more like a detective in a cop movie than the agent he is supposed to be.
2) There is no explanation given of how exactly the villain even knew they were in the Kremlin at that time to piggyback on them and frame them!
3) The carcrash scene and 500 bullets being fired into the water is just asinine....How exactly were the Russians following them in the first place? Again there's no elfin' explanation given of how they know Cruise in the secretary's limo! OR Why they just start shooting! {Until the agent arrived to tell them to stop I thought they were the villain's goons!} And let's not go into just how dead Cruise and Renner would have been without plot armour!
4) The climbing scene up the Burj Khalifa is just straight up FANTASY! Cruise seems to be able to change direction in MID-AIR! And what is it with the constant raising of the stakes!?! His glove fails, He can't finish the cutting of the glass and ACTUALLY FALLS! Then he gets back up to the glass that still isn't cut, without his cutting tool, smashes the glass with his foot and somehow propels himself inside without any of the velocity necessary to do so!
5) Getting back down we again raise the stakes when his line somehow isn't long enough and he has to do another ridiculous flight through the window ONLY FOR THINGS TO EVEN MORE STUPID as He doesn't quite make it, Renner grabs on to him and the woman grabs on to Renner and a Rug and we have Cruise and HALF OF RENNER too hanging out of this window 100 stories up BOTH being held by Renner's trouser leg by a 100 pound woman who is somehow anchored by a rug!!!
6) The plan has to go wrong at the last minute OF COURSE but why is he chasing after the villain when he's already stated to let that guy go for now!?!
7) The Chase through the sandstorm is yet more Hollywood idiocy!
8) That's right, leave the computer guy holding the gun on the world class ASSASSIN!!!
9) The female MI Agent {Carter} is implausibly bad at the seduction of the Indian billionaire yet somehow he accepts her manhandling him over and over again, twisting his arm so he's on his knees at least once! If he's meant to be a masochist who likes women to be the ones with the power TELL US THAT BEFOREHAND! Or at least AFTERWARDS!
10) I don't know what to say about the multi-storey carpark fight other than Aaaarrrggh WHAT THE PUCK!?!
Straight up this is one of the worst ACTION movies I have EVER seen....Possibly THE worst! I've seen worse comedies and I've seen horror movies I've really loathed but I didn't think it was possible for a pure Action Movie to be THIS bad! I really hope MI-5 is a decent film, come on, at least a 7/10 PLEASE!
Dragon Kingdom (2018)
Well it is at least better than Knights of the Damned....
...But that's faint praise indeed!
There was no sequel advertised at the end of this one so whether the 3rd film in this trilogy ever sees the light of day is not looking good.
First the good -
. The Dragon was actually decently rendered in this one for an ultra low budget film.
. The acting from all {bar Jon Paul Gates who's still stupefyingly awful} was significantly better than in the previous movie.
. The monsters were pretty decent bar the blue man group orc rip offs - The Lizard King's Make-up was very good indeed.
. The fight choreography though still generally bad was in places almost decent.
Now the bad -
. The writing is still sub-par even by Asylum standards!
. Jon Paul Gates villainous Prince is as I've mentioned above really very bad indeed!
. The second Katori warrior woman has not only changed actresses but seemingly changed characters - She's now called "Freya" and I don't see that name anywhere in the first film's credits!
. The comic relief spearman is completely wasted - I'm sure he's meant to be a big part of the 3rd movie if that ever gets made but here and in the first movie he's basically pointless padding!
. The film still suffers from slow pacing.
My final thoughts -
I've seen a lot of bad fantasy movies from the 60s, 70s, 80s right up to Asylum's more recent efforts and this is by no means the worst...That award goes to "Knights of the Damned" and I'm sure most of the people who watched that refused to watch this which is a pity as it's actually much better and if you like low budget fantasy such as Hawk the Slayer, Deathstalker and DragonWars it comes off quite well comparatively.
I've also noticed that most of the other reviews here not only don't mentions Knights of the Damned but seem to have not noticed that this is a sequel at all - Lucky them. I suggest they do NOT go back and take in the previous movie unless they're looking for a candidate for worst movie ever made!
Hardcore Henry (2015)
Quite simply unwatchable!
OK to the people out there saying that you should know what to expect from a first person shooter I SAW DOOM OK! I've played and watched other people play first person shooter video games!
Video Games don't utilise Shaky-Cam like this! This was ridiculous! This was so bad that watching this movie on Netflix I had to switch it off after just 30 minutes because my eyes were hurting and I was getting both a headache and dizzy!
When a person looks around at other people there is no jerkiness in real life!
The shaky-came was EVERYWHERE! I can understand if the camera being on the body of the actor/stuntman when he's running/fighting shakes a bit BUT when he's just looking around at people who are talking to him like at the very start of the movie you've gone too far!
This movie was quite simply unwatchable and has the dubious distinction of being placed ahead of Jaws 4: The Revenge at #5 on my list of all time worst movies!
Stir Crazy (1980)
A truly lightweight 1970s Comedy
A truly lightweight 1970s comedy that just happened to be released in 1980.
Stir Crazy raises numerous smiles and provokes not a few cringes but laughs are few and far between in this meh prison caper.
Many characters appeared and disappeared and reappeared just to service the paper-thin plot with no attempt to show how or why anything was really happening or indeed how the lawyer's female friend knew things she couldn't possibly have known having not been privy to those conversations.
The love story is totally phoned-in and completely unbelievable whilst being pretty much unnecessary to the actual plot.
Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder are given nothing to work with here and Wilder in particular resorts to manic at every opportunity with Pryor seemingly forced to follow suit.
Again things just happen with no build-up seemingly just to get us to the end of the film!
Stir Crazy is an unremarkable "comedy" that plays it safe from start to finish but forgets to actually provide a competent plot.
3/10 - Not worth watching except if you're bored and feel like an inane "comedy" with lots of smiles but few actual laughs.
Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
Are Marvel trying to make us HATE Tony Stark/Iron Man?
I've wished for many villains to be killed off in TV shows but never have I ever wanted a supposed "Hero" dead as much as I want Iron Man gone from the Marvel Universe! He's completely and utterly ruining it by hogging the spotlight and reducing other characters to his minions! At one point in this film I just thought "Good, Finally" then Dr Strange had to go and mess that up by going back on his own absolute statement of intent earlier in the film in order to save Tony Stark! Hulk was neutered and confined to Tony's Hulk-Buster Armour! Spiderboy is a shadow of the Amazing Spider Man and also stuck in Iron Man's Armour! Peter Quill is just plain TOXIC! We're back to Guardians 1 Starlord here unfortunately!
Now I could go on and on BUT there's one other HUGE problem with this film and that's that there's absolutely no way Marvel are going to stick with this situation! We know there's going to be sequels to Black Panther and Spider Man so this film is one big wipeout! It will be reversed in the next Avengers Movie for certain!
6/10 for now, I will review that grade when I've seen what they do with the series from here - and yes this is a series, it can't be rated as a one-off movie!