Category: 1992
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Well, the first installment of Alien Fire might have been good but this one is not. It’s apparently some sci-fi thing about a car and Native Americans and homophobes. Or something along those lines. It’s got a lot of quirky details, which Vincent draws well enough, but it’s useless. The Creep finishes (hopefully not for…
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I think I’ve seen Knight Moves at least twice before. The first time I saw it I stopped watching Night Moves and went back to the video store for this one. What can I say? I had no taste when I was fourteen. Starting it this time, though, I knew what I was getting into…
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I’m having a hard time reconciling the Robert Rodriguez who made El Mariachi with the Robert Rodriguez who made anything after it. Obviously, some of the filmmaking choices are due to the low budget, but the film’s frantic style–something owed far new to early Sam Raimi than John Woo–creates a hyper-reality. It, and some of…
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Yeah, it’s awful. Lewis doesn’t appear in the issue. Robocop doesn’t go to Detroit. The entire issue, for him, is set on an Aztec pyramid; something along those lines. Robocop spends most of the issue talking about what it means to be Robocop. What I find most amusing about the comic is how everything Furman…
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There’s some really awful art this issue. I’m pretty sure the last panel is the silliest panel so far in the series. It’s like a two dimensional … I don’t know what, but something atrocious. The issue really ramps up like it’s going to stop being stupid towards the end–though I do appreciate Arcudi not…
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This issue actually raises some interesting ideas. Well, no, it doesn’t. It made me think of some interesting stuff but it’s not in the issue itself, which is unfortunate. Namely, if Robocop does go bad, why doesn’t the police department have a way to turn him off? Secondly, why is Robocop’s sergeant in charge of…
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What a goofy series. Well, I guess it’s too soon to say the series is goofy, but the first issue is certainly goofy. Maybe it’s John Paul Leon’s artwork. I’ve only seen his more recent work. Prime Suspect looks like Dark Horse hired him to ape Kyle Baker’s most cartoonish style (I’m thinking the Disney…
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Wow, so good old Frank Miller coming through here with a happy ending and a dumb joke and just an awful comic book. There’s so little story in this issue, you’d think it was coming out today instead of back in the early nineties. Miller’s script reads like fan fiction, if I understand what fan…
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Let’s see if I can recap. The future lady doesn’t kill Robocop because he’s too human so Robocop goes off and kills himself. Wait, wait, I forgot the opening with the Terminators colonizing outer space (another thing Cameron wisely neglected wasting time on–what do the Terminators do once they take over the planet?). Ok, so…
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This issue is definitely better. There’s very little of the future warrior woman’s narration and a lot of Robocop versus Terminator action. Miller’s sense of humor even works a little–even if he overwrites–with the ED-209s being, basically, Robocop’s obedient lapdogs. His exposition here is still terrible, laughable really. But he comes up with some really…
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I’m not sure what level this one is most amusing on–Frank Miller doing licensed properties? Robocop vs. the Terminator being a sequel to the dismal Robocop 3 movie? The female soldier from the future knowing everything about the past even though she wouldn’t have been born yet? All the goofy expository dialogue or all the…
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Hellraiser III is one of the first “horror” movies I’ve seen where they seemed concerned with action figure tie-ins, with the Cenobites having gimmicks (they shoot CDs, blow fire and so on). It’s also one of those absurd movies set in New York but clearly filmed somewhere else, in this case North Carolina. It gets…
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Fifty/Fifty is the last film where crap-master screenwriters Dennis Shryack and Michael Butler worked together, though it appears they wrote the script in the mid-eighties. It’s one of their best films, which isn’t difficult, only because the film occasionally batters its viewer with man’s inhumanity to his fellow man (in this film’s case, it’s when…
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Someone with a lot of time–and a low propensity for retching–could probably do a fine comparison between television cop movies of the late twentieth century and b-movies of the decades immediately prior. In the Arms of a Killer is absurdist in its portrayal of police investigation, between John Spencer’s disgruntled detective smoking cigars first thing…
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I forgot MGM still made movies in the 1990s. The aura of bankruptcy and failure has surrounded Leo for so long… it’s distracting. I remember my Diggstown laserdisc sleeve. It’s been at least ten years since I’ve seen the movie. It’s still a great time and I’m left, as I always was when finishing it,…
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Universal Soldier is nowhere near as bad as I thought it was going to be. The beginning is exceptionally painful, as Roland Emmerich does a Platoon impression. As bad as Charlie Sheen was in that film, however, nothing compares to Jean-Claude Van Damme as a farm boy from Louisiana or Dolph Lundgren’s attempts at conveying…
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Director of not one, not two, but three 1980s John Hughes movies, Howard Deutch applies those hard-earned skills to remaking M*A*S*H and, shockingly, doesn’t do too bad of a job. Sure, Article 99 is absurd and Lea Thompson as a doctor is a hoot, but its well-intentioned and sensitive to its characters. I’d heard of…
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As far as I know, Year of the Comet completes the Louis Jordan as a mad scientist in search of eternal youth (continuing from his two Swamp Thing movies). There’s something so perfect about Jordan pursuing eternal youth, it’s not even questioned. William Goldman uses the device to complicate things in Year of the Comet,…
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According to IMDb, it took Howard Franklin ten years to get his script produced. In that time, I wonder if he worked on it, because the finished product does not appear to have been considered. The Public Eye is beyond tedious. The combination of Franklin’s plotless script and Mark Isham’s nap-inducing score make the whole…
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Rutger Hauer plays a rogue cop who needs big guns, smokes cigars, and has his Zippo lighter fixed for a three-inch flame. Amusingly, the character being some kind of poster child for overcompensation isn’t recognized, neither by Hauer or by the filmmakers. Hauer’s performance is something extraordinary. I mean, sure, the lines are awful, but…
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Whoever–studio executive, director, producer, whatever–gave Lorraine Bracco another job after Medicine Man is a couple things. One of the bravest persons in Hollywood and, additionally, a film criminal. Bracco’s performance is astoundingly bad. I mean, the character is terribly written too–a scientist smart enough to run a foundation, but she doesn’t know a thing about,…
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I suppose, if there were a quiz or something and I thought about it real hard, I’d remember Under Siege brought Tommy Lee Jones… well, not back exactly, so I guess just brought Tommy Lee Jones. Looking at his filmography and the dates, someone could wrongly argue Oliver Stone tried championing him–but it didn’t work…
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I’m not sure when Lorenzo’s Oil lost me. The opening credits are set in East Africa, the focus is on Lorenzo–for those who don’t know, who don’t remember the previews if not the film, Lorenzo is a kid who gets a rare disease–and the film takes a lyric quality. George Miller was a good, straightforward…
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Outstanding, emotive, melancholic biopic of Chaplin, with a transfixing Robert Downey Jr. playing the lead role. The film covers Chaplin’s whole life, from a childhood in poverty to the silent successes to the eventual sound failures. Fantastic all-star supporting cast–especially the various Chaplin flings (Marisa Tomei is a standout)–but Downey’s the whole show. Downey, John…
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Delightful comedic thriller has Robert Redford leading a group of high tech security experts who run afoul of Redford’s old hippie pal/nemesis Ben Kingsley. Great performances throughout (from an awesome, varied supporting cast), wonderful direction from Robinson, and a lovely, playful James Horner score. 126 minutes of expertly executed fun. DVD, Blu-ray, Streaming.Continue reading →
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So, I guess David Fincher wasn’t that upset about the “Assembly Cut” Fox did of Alien³ for their moronically-titled “Alien Quadrilogy” DVD set a few years ago, because he left his name on it. Fincher’s always badmouthing Alien³ but hasn’t got the balls needed to Alan Smithee a film (like Michael Mann has). Now, was…
The Stop Button 