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Reviews
Kalifornia (1993)
the role a young pitt was born to play, a villain
All stars play one once in their lives, and get noticed for it mostly in a good light. Pitt does his role justice as the trailer trash hick you don't mind as a buddy for protection but your partner has different opinions on. His scenes with Duchnovys partner when they are alone are very eerie, and the two play off each other well to create a tense feel. The movie rolls quite slow and softly but kicks into a nice overdrive when we find out whats been happening behind closed doors. I believe it would be hard to recreate a role like this when he is the bad guy as his status in too lovey dovey currently and continues taking on safe roles. Duchovny on the other hand would love any role if given, I think I saw him in this type of character in playing god some years back. He even seems he was still on scully?/moulder? duty throughout this flick with his tape recorder investigating (no I never watched xfiles). Juilette does her thing, really type-casted during this era, funny to look back at her being brad pitts love interest. Nothing too graphic, which does dimmer the film overall especially given the name KALIfornia
Striking Poses (1998)
Snakes and Twisters, one two many twists shakes us off the road
despite only catching the film halfway through, the time when shannons already been conned, I was luckily able to catch up quickly and thankfully did because this turned out to be a better than average TV movie. Shannon doesn't bring her A game but does enough to keep us interested, I recall years ago reading a couple of bad reviews for two of her movies at the time and I think this might have been one of them which might have put me off a little before viewing this? Regardless because I think I might decide to watch another one of her films if they turn up on TV in the near future. Although the film doesn't cross the creepy line and we don't get to see any goodies of any such nature, shannon does look remarkably good. Wasn't a fan of her in 90210 (in kelly/jennies camp) or charmed (never seen it) but loved scare tactics. like the summary states, there was one too many twists leading to the climax and it did seemed force feed as you don't really see whats happening to who and remember who was crossed etc etc.
The Usual Suspects (1995)
The clues fit like a puzzle the more times you watch it
Well thats what I thought and hoped, but the matter of fact that after watching it at least 5 times (a couple were interrupted viewings) since it was released I'm still pretty much in the dark. At least if you were to watch it now you'd appreciate the supporting cast of more familiar faces of benecio and pollack, at the time byrne and baldwin would have been the recognizables and spacey the newcomer. I was thinking their was more action in this, but to watch it now seems it more an episode of gillmore girls than a lost episode. It was released around the same time as Heat which i'm a huge fan of and probably a big factor to why I didn't rate this to well because for the timing issue I always think of heat when I hear usual suspects. Benecio is very very funny especially reading the card in the line up. The twist is what the film is primarily remembered for which is pretty sad, due to the very good acting and chemistry. But regardless the movie still ended up as a classic in many eyes (and launched spacey, del toro & singer)...sadly not mine, I'll give it another shot one day
On Hostile Ground (2000)
two points, 1. sink holes are not scary and 2. you have to be a genealogist to understand most of the film
A familiar looking cast, one two of them, I think corbet was in my big fat Greek wedding and northern exposure? I haven't seen either and Brittany Daniel not to get confused with little black book, 8 mile brittany murphy. Now I have seen her in 90210 and broken lizards club dread. Anyway what I'm trying to say is it has a couple of minor stars that careers should have taken a dive after this landsfill grounded. The dialogue gets too detailed for a such a dumb big goofy disaster movie. I still don't know how or what the actual disaster was? Perhaps I misread the lines, and this is suppose to be a thinking mans disaster pic? We start to care about corbett towards the end, and think just maybe one cast member could be sacrificed...The stuff they fill holes with reminds me of evolution for some reason? Its situated in New orleans during mardi gra but the boys will be sad pressed to find what they're looking for. I watched it on TV so only saved $ just lost time.
Ghoulies (1984)
cast a spell to rid yourself of any knowledge you saw or wanted to see this film
The rating of even a 1 out of 10 seems to high for this film. Perhaps the 1 would have been more justified at the time when the film was released, watching it for the first time nowadays however just brought a hole in my pocket for renting it and to yours as well if you do too. Its not because of the special effects (the ghoulies themselves were pretty good for the time) but because both the acting and story are so pathetically drawn its hard to find much positives such a blunder. It marketed itself as a funny horror but I didn't find myself laughing once throughout. The ghoulies take their sweet time to show themselves (many viewers wouldn't have had the staying power and would have given up), and the first death comes 3/4 through the film. The final show down was laughable in a sense that it was so lame (lightening). While the comedian for the film (a kiefer sutherland lookalike, the lead was a eric roberts lookalike) were down right annoying. You'd hardly recognised SVU's Mariska Hargitay with big hair the only cast known to me. The one bright spark was the clown which might frighten some viewers, and i think was used from this film for scary movie 2?. I guess I'm just not a fan of 80s b grade horror/comedy dark magic?
Ghoulies II (1987)
Twice as good as the first, a rating of 2 out of 10
One thing they did right in this sequel was base the movie around the actual ghoulies themselves to a certain degree rather then keep them out of most of the first. And unlike the first, we actual feel for a couple of the characters (dwarth & uncle). An added bonus is early killings. However the ghoulies are still situated in one place, the first being a house this being an amusement park, the third I think is college? I would have liked to see them take over a town or city. They tried to make the series a horror comedy, but I believe to do that you need to have teens/young adults rather then adults who were the victims in the first, while the third must be college kids which I hope means the got it right third time around. This worked better having a younger cast, "tunes" dude should get a couple of chuckles. Another lame showdown ending(perhaps the villain in this was recreated by kevin smith in dogma?). This is Watchable, but only just.