Synopsis: In a wild distopian future, Keanu Reeves stars as a man trapped in a world in which The Matrix films have become self aware - determined to crawl so far up their own ass that they transform into an Ouroboros, hell bent on destroying an already ruined franchise of movies.
Review: If you find yourself scrolling through HBO and think "Hey wow, this movie just came out!" And don't realize it likely means the film isn't as good as it looked like it'd be, then congratulations, you've fallen into what I'm dubbing The Batman-Matrix trap!
Two unnecessary reboots to movies that have already been overdone.
Two actors who aren't great but who are both for unknown reasons, unquestionably charmismatic (I won't ever not watch a Reeves or Pattinson movie and not feel good about it).
Two movies filled with folks who should be doing better but who fuck it, deserve a pay check (Looking at you Dano/Harris)
I'm not certain The Batman and The Matrix Resurrections aren't the same movie and it's just a glitch in the simulation we all live in that's made them appear seperate.
In Short: Todo List:
1. Watch the first 30 minutes of this movie
2. Ponder movie makers choice to not use therapy scene where Keanu and Neil Patrick Harris basically circle jerk around the idea of a reboot to the Matrix trilogy as a trailer
3. Realize that would have set expectations too high
4. Cancel HBO Max subscription and burn all records that you ever had it
Trivia: Keanu's role in this movie has finally alleviated his debt to The Deep Ones and will have his soul returned to him by next Tuesday
Biggest Positive: Neil Patrick Harris' glasses
Biggest Negative: I regret not finding out that the band "Bass Against" exists until their song played over the credits, as I could have spent my time more valuably watching a video of their singer pissing on a fan on repeat instead of watching this film
Cast: Alex Vega, Anthony Stewart Head, Paris Hilton, Paul Sorvino
Synopsis: In a dark future where organ transplants have become both a necessity and a fashion accessory, a corrupt government legalizes the repossession of organs by those people who can't make their payments to the ever twisted GeneCo. the proclaimed 'Savior of Humanity'. The grizzly fate of harvesting people's organs is left to one man - The Repo Man. Who has his own unforgiving tale to tell... and for some bizarre reason everyone in the future sings all the time about every single thing ever.
Review: WTF?
Biggest Positive: As far as original ideas for films go they don't come much better than this, both the plot and the concept are fairly original at least in cinema these days...
Biggest Negative: After not too long it does get a little bit grating hearing people sing about everything. I mean, everything. The weather. Breakfast. (I know, I know, it's an opera what did I expect? I'm just saying - maybe I'm not an opera-guy)
Trivia: This film was nominated for five hundred Oscars including 'Best Operatic Piece Starring Paris Hilton Based In A Neon-Dark Future'
Synopsis: An alien named Klaatu arrives on Earth spreading good will and cheer to all it's citizens until he realizes we're a bunch of assholes who deserve to die (Roughly two seconds after landing). Jennifer Connolly acts overly concerned about everything as per usual.
Review: All I'm going to say is that I shouldn't have listened to a single review I read about this film. All I heard about it was that firstly, it was too preachy and went on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on about how much we're polluting and being evil to the world around us and it got glib and secondly, that the flying bug things were inconsistent - one minute rampaging through whole buildings and the next taking a tense amount of time to shatter glass. That second point seemed moot to me even reading reviews since this is sci-fi and if there wasn't gaping holes and inconsistencies it wouldn't be authentic but I assumed that either the reviewer was broken or that it was really bad in this film.
However these are lies! The film is in no way too preachy. It's message that "If the Earth dies, we die. If we die, the Earth lives." is, in my opinion, a basic fact. Whether we're going to choke the planet and most of the life on it to death in our lifetime or the next or the one after that is debatable but it's obvious we can't keep pumping shit into the air and water left and right without it damaging the Earth and we already see the effects of deforestation and pollution in the world today so frankly anyone who thought a film that had maybe three pieces of dialogue referring to how much of a bunch of scum-sucking fuck-cunts we all are for not giving a flying fuck about the world around us is "too preachy" can fuck off and die. What I translate these reviewers as saying is "I got uncomfortable with someone pointing out that we really do suck and probably should die to save the rest of the animals".
And the second point is less relevant. The reviewers who said this were being doubly broken because throughout the film when the stupid flying bug things (Which in themselves don't make much sense anyway so who cares if one thing they do is a little off?) tear through whole buildings in a second when there is a whole swarm of them and take ages to get through glass when there are so few of them that you can't even see them. I thought personally it was obvious being that when one was happening you could see stuff and when the other was happening you couldn't. I think that was a tricky way the film-makers went about making it blatantly fucking obvious what was going on and not being "inconsistent" like the foagy assed reviewers who all got up in this film's face about flaws in logic and preachy dialogue seem to believe, probably because they drive hummers to work and get free hand-outs and hand-jobs from rival studios who want to see Keanu Reeves fail!
Fuck you reviewers who hated this film! Fuck you all!
Having said all that, the film was kind of shitty - but not for the reasons anyone else said.
In Short: Watch this film with Al Gore and see if he thinks it's too preachy.
Biggest Positive: The slight change in Klaatu's demeanour from the original into being a fairly well-informed alien who doesn't get overwhelmed with compassion towards the human race in the way the original teatered on doing.
Biggest Negative: A film with Jennifer Connolly and no David Bowie is no film at all.
Trivia: Keanu Reeves modelled his performance in this film after a maniquin he saw in a Gap store front.
To see my review of the original 1951 version: The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951)
And here's a pre-Review I did on my YouTube account before the film was released in cinemas:
Cast: Garret Dillahunt, Sara Paxton, Monica Potter, Tony Goldwyn
Synopsis: When the recently crumbled and bought-over movie studio New Line ended up cold and alone and without a hope for a future, Hollywood decided to ambush it in the woods! First they turned to something they owned but didn't create - Friday the 13th. They took Jason and they destroyed him utterly. Then they turned their sites on destroying one of New Line's shining stars, Wes Craven's babies - The Last House On The Left. They took The Last House On The Left and savagely raped it repeatadly in the woods and told it to fondle A Nightmare On Elm Street's breasts and piss it's pants. It promptly did so and once it was at it's lowest point, Hollywood remade Last House On The Left and turned it into a pile of excrement...
In it's dying breath, Last House On The Left fell to the ground, clawing at the dirt and croakily screamed to Nightmare On Elm Street - "Run! Don't... let... them... remake... you... too!".
And with that - The Last House On the Left was destroyed...
Review: I don't know why we feel compelled to go to the cinema to see movies like this when there were perfectly good movies like... well, I guess Watchmen is the best one out just now but hell, I bet Miss March would be in many ways a superior film to this.
It wasn't a bad film really but you have to remember that it's basically starting from a very low point given that it's a god-damned unnecessary remake (again!) so that automatically sets it at a negative score right now...
It wasn't nearly (even remotely close) as gritty and almost snuff-like as the original but that was to be expected... perhaps though it was expected too much by some members of the audience who seemed to be appalled when the rape sequence began. I mean, did they think it was just going to be left out altogether? Perhaps they were (more likely) too young to have even seen the original and have parents too dumb to realize they shouldn't even be seeing a watered down remake of Last House On the Left.
Anyway, the rape scene began and so many people left the theater that it made me want to spin round in circles and laugh! My wife pointed out all the "evacuees"; but I surmised eventually that they probably just had to pee or get snacks and chose the awkward scene to do it in.
But then out of the ten or thereabouts that left only a couple seemed to return to the theater...
I guess people generally don't want to sit and watch a girl get forcibly fucked in the ass. At least not in a room full of strangers anyway, that's awkward!
The film has promise but falls way short of being either as gritty as the original or able to be a mainstream "re-imagining" and popularized version of the it. Instead it is some sort of middle ground for lazy people who can't be bothered to locate a copy of the original.
There's too much cutting between "shaky-cam" and regular camera work too and the shaky-cam is extremely forced, you can tell someone's trying to make it seem cheap and nasty but failing, since you can tell they're trying.
In Short: A decent enough, watchable film but a few too many attempts at arty shots and close ups of girls panties - done in a way that makes you feel like the director thought that's all you had to do to make a film dirty and raw.
Biggest Positive: It stayed fairly true to the original film, a lot more than it could have and a lot more than many remakes do.
Biggest Negative: The original wasn't that good to begin with so they were pretty much fucked from the get-go.
Trivia: In order to fully experience this film in the best possible way pick up a pair of the super-special dark 3D glasses on the way in and put them on right away so no-one can tell you're taking a nap!
Cast: Jennifer Carpenter, Steve Harris, Jay Hernandez, That guy from Ally McBeal
Synopsis: What happens when you trap a group of people in an inner-city building without explanation and let wild zombie folks tear them to pieces? You get the intro to Dawn Of The Dead, I guess... but what if those folks aren't zombies and are actually rabid crazies? I guess that's 28 Days Later... yeah well, what if the rabies is fast acting and randomly makes people want to bite and eat each other? That's still 28 Days Later I guess... well okay, but what if there was a trendy "nightvision" shot where the viewer is the only one that knows what's going on? That's just 28 Weeks Later now, huh? Well fuck, what if the whole thing was shot on amazing(ly annoying) SHAKY-CAM-VISION! Now you've got Quarantine!
Review: Blah blah blah stuck in building, blah blah blah rabies, blah blah zombie film without the zombies. That's pretty much the gist of this film. That may sound like a derogatory review but believe me that leads to a pretty half-way decent flick! A lot of blood, a bunch of death (some particularly nasty falls and smashes actually) and some decent action sequences. The shaky-cam isn't too bad, since this film establishes the professionalism of the man behind the camera and thereby giving the film-maker a way to not make it suck to be "authentic" although it is wholly unnecessary and doesn't really achieve anything that couldn't have been achieved by just filming the movie like they weren't pretentious fuckers. Some slight problems with consistencies though in that the, for example, the virus spreads to it's victims in a matter of minutes. In minutes or less the victim is a foaming maniac, hell-bent on biting other people's faces suddenly... except for one character who is infected for hours before any symptoms kick in (Just at the right moment!) because it worked better for the "plot".
Another example, the victims seem to attack on site (Though not each other, go figure!) all through the movie until at one point it makes for a more "tense" moment if the victim waits until the person slo-o-o-o-o-owly turns around checking all their surroundings before finally facing them to attack... I guess these rabid brainless fucktards have a sense of dynamic tension! Must be part of the lesser prevalent side-effects...
Also a word of advice to anyone caught in the situation the characters find themselves in the end of the film (Stuck in a dark room with a rabid half-naked granny-looking thing chucking pots and pans everywhere while you are armed with a camera with night vision - happens all the time to me), don't just sit there and film the cowering girl next to you ignoring where the crazy rabid bitch is! Instead, maybe try using your advantage (seeing in the pitch black) to beat the un-living shit out of the foaming cunt! And instead of just hoping that for some reason while the bitch is tearing everything in the room apart without exception because she's a few olives short of a greek salad she'll somehow just coincidentally pass over the corner of the room where the two of you are shivering to yourselves if you "just keep quiet", why not try moving your stupid asses out of there? Hey, you know what else was "just keeping quiet"? THE WHOLE FUCKING ROOM FULL OF INANIMATE OBJECTS THAT SOME MENTAL PATIENT IS CURRENTLY TEARING APART WITH NO SENSE OF LOGIC OR THOUGHT! So maybe, just maybe, sitting quietly with your fucking camera on (I'm sure that thing has a little red light like every other one on the planet) you should get off your stupid asses and do something? Just a thought...
Besides annoyingly convenient plot devices, pointless shaky-cam-o-vision and the fact that it's a remake (Hiss!) this film is probably worth watching though. If you have an unlimited rental service like NetFlix (Or Shareaza, pow!). And if you don't have anything else in your queue you could be watching. And if nothing good's on TV. And if you don't mind unoriginal films. And if you suck.
Seriously, the film wasn't that bad. Here's a trailer for [REC] though (The film this was a remake of)
Biggest Positive: Well devised (I feel [rec] gets that credit though) and, towards the end starts to actually build up the tension you waited through the rest of the movie expecting to get in abundance.
Biggest Negative: The unnecessary Shaky Cam... it's been overused lately and unlike this, Cloverfield and Diary Of The Dead both had reasons to be using that effect...
Cast: Amanda Righetti, Jared Padalecki, Danielle Panabaker, Travis Van Winkle, Derek Mears
Synopsis: Watch Friday the 13th parts I - III, mix them together and sprinkle in some Texas Chainsaw Massacre part 2. Take away any logic behind the character Jason Voorhees (i.e. that he's a giant musclebound mass of non-thinking killing machine and not some elaborate trap-setting mechanical engineer who one minute is carefully setting up complex alarm systems, well laid traps and training himself to be a perfect archer but the next minute is retarded enough to believe some random chick is his dead mom that he saw beheaded as a child) and turn it into a choppily editted, poorly directed mash-up mess of a movie and you have the basic premise behind this "remake" of Friday the 13th
Review: What has been seen, cannot be unseen.
In Short: I know if you're reading this that, like me, you can't resist the urge to go see this film but please take my advice, when you go drink a lot of beer and/or bring with you a healthy "shout at screen" attitude (Kudos to the guy who, when told to "shut the fuck up" by a fellow movie-goer, promptly yelled "Ooooh sorry! We might not be able to follow the intricate plot! Oh Shhh! What's Jason going to say?"). If you;re not prepared to see a pile of trash you'll only be sickened to your core
Biggest Positive: Some of the kills, the ones that were done in one continuous shot (e.g. the one under the pier) or at least weren't cut all over the place in the edit were pretty cool
Biggest Negative: The fact that the film exists at all.
Not that many people read these reviews but just on the off-chance that someone out there is checking regularly with a plan to off themselves should my outlandishly pointless movie reviews ever ends I thought I should make it my duty to inform the world that for the next 2 weeks I most likely won't be making any reviews as I have family visiting from Scotland and frankly I'm not going to be bothered with logging in and typing random nonsense about films no-one gives a shit about.
I'm not sure the world-wide-internetwebs will survive my absence and when I return I will no doubt be returning to a blackened charred hollowed out shell where once my blog lay in all it's glory. I'll lift my head to the sky and scream for answers but none will come. I will turn to the dark side (Yahoo!) for answers but where the might Y! once stood so strong and proud, looming over the web with a bright red (or purple) tempting light, trying to draw the droves of people away from the Google empire, there will be nothing.
All "social networking" sites will have crumbled into obscurity and people will be doing weird things like letting people know what they're up to in person and leaving the house.
Yes sirree it will be a dark dark day for mankind...
But on my arrival back, in two weeks, surely a glimmer of hope will be awakened in the masses and gradually and painstakingly we'll all find a way to rebuild the web and make Google mighty again!
Oh yeah, Shutter was a mediocre American remake of a fairly decent Japanese horror film (I couldn't believe someone came up with the brilliant idea of remaking a film either! I mean, remake, brilliant!). It was fairly pointless and followed exactly the same plot as the Japanese one with very little added, changed or taken away except that it had some guy from Dawson's Creek in it and a weird man with an unusually large forehead. In it some people went "blah blah blah" while scary things apparently happened.
I used to firmly believe, and also have it proven time and time again, that all a movie had to do was involve zombies in one way or another and I'd at the very least be able to sit through it and enjoy it... Seriously, I've watched some drivel zombie flicks. From members of the "Return Of The Living Dead" series (Sorry fans, but they're really quite lame) to some old zombie films set in prisons that no-one's ever heard of, and no-one's ever wanted to hear of... but no matter how camp, dumb, retarded, mentally challenged, completely unrealistic looking, ridiculous, poorly acted or just plain shitty they were I was still able to take away from them the feeling of having watched a film with zombies in it. In itself, I thought, was something unmistakably unique and special and that no movie could possibly fail in, if they happened to contain zombies in any way, shape or form.
That was until I saw the "remake" of Day Of The Dead which made me want to gouge out my own eyeballs with a rusty spoon
Yeah so I've had a few beers, and yeah, I do prefer to review less... well... films that don't star Will Smith so much... yeah, so what?
You wanna make something of it, pal?
HUH?
Mothe...
Hey! I'm talking to you! You wanna hear this review or not? Ok, ok...
So like, Will Smith is the last human alive, right? And like... he's some doctor, and he's working on something because... uh, oh wait no, because see... there are other people but they're just all like... crazed out on some cancer or something, right? Is that what happened?
Wait, can I start this review over? I get one do-over, right...
Man, look, I'll be honest... I started watching this film, had me a few beers and couldn't stop yelling at the T.V. and telling the Fresh Prince to get home to Bel Air before the shit got too real! He didn't listen... the dumb bastard. Then he hopped in his fancy airplane with Jeff Goldblum and blew up all the bad guys.
BOOM!
Shit got real.
Then my review started!
Ok, so Will Smith was just an ordinary New Yorker, not a care in the world when suddenly POW! a movie came along that was pretty cool about humanity being extinct. In this movie, stuff happened, but that's not important. What is important is that he had a pretty awesome dog. That dog was so sweet, man. It was all like, "woof!" And Will was all like "Shut the fuck up, this is meant to be a serious movie about wierdo people who live in shitty buildings" Then the dog was all like, "woof?" Which was doggie for "For real?" And Will was all like, "For real."
Then I'm pretty sure he made out with his creepy manican girlfriend. Dude, he totally made out with her and it was gross. Then he totally cried about it, because he was a bit of a wuss. Then, he said "Home, to Bel Air!" And all was good.
Until the ending.
Seriously!
The fucking ending to this movie can fuck off and suck someplace else because I was thoroughly enjoying this movie until the last 10 minutes or so!
Dude
fuck
off!
P.S. I'll give this as many tags as I want. This is my blog MOTHERFUCKERS!
Due to laziness on my part, and making it probably more convenient for anyone trying to view the archive posts, I decided I'll just name them after the film I'm reviewing instead of the Tagline. Isn't that a hoot?
I hope you're happy now, you bastards! You and your constant complaining and whining that I don't make any sense naming the posts after taglines...
Yes, I was fully aware that it made it trickier for people to view the archives and if anyone were to actually be using my site for the purpose of seeking out a review of a specific film that it would be near impossible. But frankly I didn't care, sir! Mine is not a site of "convention" and "following standards", and I say to thee that my site is not for the casual film observer, looking for a serious opinion on a film but rather someone who is interested in a perspective on a film that they haven't heard of, or is just interested in a fresh, or at least original, opinion on a film.
That is what this site is about, sir! Integrity, originality and freedom of expression!
But you come in here with your complaints about Taglines, and non-sensical reviews and thwarts my great ideas of making an interesting movie review blog!!! How dare you!!!
Nonetheless, from this day forth, the Title of my posts shall be that of the name of the movie which I review...
I hope you're satisfied, you son-of-a-bitch!
(Why did no-one like this film? Was the original that much better? Because I thought this was pretty cool...)
I don't think it's fair that I review this in any sort of "proper" manner as it appears to have been made on the low, just a group of people who were just having a laugh and trying to make a fun little "film".
It's only about 30 minutes long and yes, it involves the Ghostbusters we all know and love doing battle with Freddy Krueger.
Ummm... that's all. I think it's worth a viewing.
Speaking of which it's available to download at the Official Freddy Vs Ghostbusters Site! Here's a link: www.braxtanfilm.com/fvgb.html.
I'm pretty sure that'll be the only place it's available too.
Before anyone has been set to direct, star or film it.
All I know about it is it's a remake of Nightmare On Elm Street, not another sequel, not a prequel, a reeeeeemake.
It most likely will not have Robert Englund in it.
And...
It will be coming from the production companies of...
MICHAEL BAY!
Therefor.
Here is a quote from Bruce Willis when he was informed of some sort of vague interest in Michael Bay making a Die Hard film.
“I would rather eat a live baby in front of my grandma than have Michael Bay direct a DIE HARD movie. I would rather go hunting with Dick Cheney than let that car engine in a human skin leave his satanic fingerprints on John McClane. In fact, this new PG-13 thing is the only part of ruining modern action movies that Michael Bay is not personally responsible for. The rest of it is all him. Don’t even fucking say those words in the same sentence, you’re only gonna give them ideas for part 5. It’s like saying Candyman in front of a mirror, that motherfucker will show up and snort John McClane’s soul right in front of you and then piss it out on your shoes. He would have ruined DH4. Few people will work with him now, and I know I will never work with him again.”
Let's face it, no-one expected this to be any good at all.
I fully comprehended that he's a bit of a crappy director. I liked House Of 1000 Corpses, but Devil's Rejects was too trashy and there was no empathizing with good or bad guys on any level, and I fear it wasn't a deliberate ploy on Mr. Zombie's part, just poor writing/directing. Unfortunately the trash from Devil's Rejects seemed to sprawl itself out and infect Halloween. I don't think there was any need to show what a fucked up upbringing Michael Myers had at all, period. He was far spookier and scarier when it seemed like his upbringing (from the fleeting glimpse we see in the first original Halloween) was relatively normal and he just snapped, then years institutionalized made him even worse. That would have sufficed, Mr. Zombie, as the whole part where he's in the mental institution was fine, but his trashy family was not!
Anyway, that was expected. Like I say it was fully understood that he was crappy in this aspect. What I hadn't comprehended from the other films is how crappy a director he really is. So many unexpected and pointless cuts, close-ups of someone eating for no good reason, shots that aren't quite centered on the focus, shots with too much glare and, my own personal pet-peeve, epic fight scene type segments shot entirely in the fucking dark!!! I hate that shit... I know sometimes it;s creepier to not know what's going on, but for 20 minutes of film it'd be nice to have some idea!
At first you might think that edgy cutting, shaky cameras, glare etc. are all just part of Rob Zombie's style but I say fuck that shit?! Even if it his style, his style fucking sucks.
Let's see more crazy clowns and less white trash in yer films please Rob!
Most creepy 'what's going on?!?' type horror films (The Ring, The Others, The Grudge, The Waterboy) follow a basic pattern whereby the character development in the film is limited only to information that's relevant, such as finding out a character has a deep abandonment issue from their childhood which comes into play later in the movie when they're left alone in an empty cardboard box, leaving the bulk of the film to be used to develop a plot and to have all sorts of creepy things happen, such as photographs melting, Japanese girls gibbering to themselves about a curse, televisions mysteriously switching off and on when no-one is accidentally sitting on the remote or little boys who 'meow' when they open their mouths (It's amazing how tame that seems when it's typed...).
Dark Water is like the exact opposite of this idea... it was marketed, as far as I remember, as being part of this wave of creepy ghost story horror films that was at it's peak a few years ago and yet for the first hour of this film you'd think it had been written by Charlie Kaufman (before being swiftly censored and edited by some asshole from Fox, resulting in a long drawn out romantic drama with a few slightly odd characters who managed to slip through the net when the evil whore-hounds at Fox tried to turn Mr Kaufman's work into an all-encompassing feel good romance movie... this movie has nothing to do with Charlie Kaufman or Fox...) and it's not till far too late into the film that we are given even the slightest of slight creepy feelings. Alas it is too late... Had the entire film contained the spooky elements that were present in the last half hour this film would have been a moderate to poor horror film. Instead it was a poor to poor horror film. And the use of the term 'horror' is questionable. On the positive side, the characters in the film are quirky, realistically odd and well played. Down to characters who only play a really small part in the film (Such as the lawyer, the school teacher and the landlord). Unfortunately this is not a film in which I should be pondering over the complexities of such small parts, I should be wondering why there is a constant creepy drip coming from the floor above. Why there are endless demonic carol type singing of children's nursery rhymes eminating throughout the elevator shaft. Why the stains on the ceiling resemble a creepy little girl. WHY DOES THE CARETAKER REFUSE TO SPEAK TO THE LITTLE GIRL AND WHY DOES HE ALWAYS SHAKE WHEN SHE'S AROUND AS IF TO IMPLY THAT SOMETHING VAGUELY CREEPY IS GOING ON BUT WE JUST DON'T KNOW WHAT?! I should be concerned as to why the child has dissapeared and no-one seems to recall where she is, who she is, if she even had a daughter when she entered the building.
Why, if she had no daughter, is there a love-heart squeaked onto the glass of the window which Jodie Foster only finds when she breathes on the glass?
Why is it that only Jodie Foster can remember her child in one film and Julianne Moore in another? Thus furthering her career in which she will eventually become Jodie Foster??
None of this happens in Dark Water None of it. Something creepy should have happened But it didn't Something should have made me jump But it didn't Godamnit, you'd think this film had some sort of impact on my life the way I'm going on about it
It seems the world is full of remakes these days, everything from age old classic horror like the Hills Have Eyes to not-really-remake-so-much-as-a-new-version-of-a-character-that's- already-been-in-a-bunch-of-films-but-it'll-sell-better-as-a-new-film-than-a-remake like Spiderman. I even hear that Al Gore remade his entire home from reconstituted toiler paper he stole from people's septic tanks. Love them or hate them, remakes are here to stay and not only that, many of them are outshadowing their original versions! Some are going way out there and making sequels that didn't exist in the original series... while others merely totter along the same plot as the original version with a slightly altered script and leave the audience with a feeling not disimalar to diarreah of the mind. Fortunately this review is of one of the former...
The WICKER MAN
While Hollywood was busy wondering how to handle remaking the age-old classic Wicker Man, directed by Robin Hardy in 1973, without creating a major international incident with Great Britain for blaspheming and malicious degradation, Nicholas Cage stormed the offices of Millenium films and demanded they cast him in the lead role of whatever their next project was! Unable to resist his southern charm (And his nice sized AK-47 he was brandishing) they accepted and cast him in the leading role of The Wicker Man. This greatly dissapointed Edward Woodward who had been set to reprise his role as the bumbling virgin copper and bring his tally of acting roles to at least 2!
As you can see from this picture taken at the time, he was a bit miffed.
It is possibly because of this critical change in pace from the start that made The Wicker Man remake divulge so brilliantly from the original. For those of you unfamiliar with the happenings in the Wicker Man, the plot goes something like this: Bumbling British Bobby, Sergenat Howie, sets off to the island of Summerisle in search of a missing girl. He finds the island quite pleasant as it is filled with naked singing women having orgies all day and singing while girating vigourously against walls. Everything is peaceful and nice until the inevitable happens and he ends up burning to death along with a half a dozen chickens and a goat. In the remake, Nicholas Cage refused to play any sort of "virgin" or "bumbling copper" and also refused to allow his character to be seen "anywhere near a god-damned motherfucking bi-plane, you British piece of shit!", so instead his character dons a leather jacket, motorcycle and a cigar and spends the first ten minutes of the film boasting about how much slack he has between his legs.
Instead of going to Summerisle to look for a missing girl, he's going there to stop a band of international drug lords from creating a chemical weapons plant that could wipe out the entire west coast of America.
"If you can't tell me where the plant is, I swear to God, I'll rip all of your god-damned mother-fucking pagan son-of-a-whore heads off with my teeth!"
Although many of the scenes are greatly "Nicolas Cage-ized", much of the plot remains the same. Cage's character, for example, is still out to end the corrupt and vaguely pagan ways that happen on Summerisle and the character named summerisle still exists although in this version Summerisle is a woman, the idea being that there could be a bit more of a love-hate-love relationship between Cage's character and Summerisle. Unfortunately for the film makers (and Nicolas Cage) Christopher Lee refused to let anyone else play the role and so the whole movie has Christopher Lee prancing about in high heels, speaking in a high pitched voice and hitting on Nicolas Cage.
I think I prefer sacrificing virgins WHILE boosting cars!
The scenes following the dramatic and (far far far) too long love scene between Cage and Lee are confusing to say the least. Here is just one such scene...
The rest of the film from this moment on takes a strange turn and before the audience gets a chance to comprehend anything the gigantic mechanised Wicker Man is taking down Tokyo with Nicolas Cage screaming for mercy, caged up inside it's head as he tries to halt the onslaught of Japanese fighter pilots scrambling to take down the enromous monstrosity! Needless to say, it all works out in the end and a well placed poultry makes short work of the Wicker Man and leaves Cage free to return to Summerisle where he makes short work of all it's inhabitants...
