Good Afternoon Ladies & Gentlemen,

The struggle continues... yet against all odds, we're well on the way to getting MIL adjusted to Utah and finding her a place to live & finally become an adult. In the meantime, we also watched a few movies...

October 13 – Single White Female (1992)
 
I had never seen this movie before… but I basically have through cultural osmosis. Tale as old as time about the recently-single woman with a rent controlled apartment in NYC (Bridget Fonda) who now needs a roommate to help pay for her palatial accommodations (like 4000 square feet?!?) so she meets this shy applicant (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who slowly but surely starts to destroy her life… while also taking on the other girl’s look… and murderous hijinx ensue when she gets back with her ex-boyfriend (Steven Weber). This movie is… dark… and honestly infuriating with regards to how the main girl handles the situation in the most plot-convenient way possible. That being said… decent suspense… and plenty of full frontal nudity… and scenes that you’ll probably remember for a long, long time. What more can I say?
 
Rating – 9/10 – The ending epilogue almost destroys the rest of the movie… because honestly the “good girl” would probably have to defend herself in a court of law but… nope, just credits and a “I guess I understand it all…” BOO!!! Definitely watch this movie though…
 
October 15 – The Fog (1980)
 
I don’t recall if I’ve seen this movie since I started doing these… but it’s one of Izzy’s favorites. Director John Carpenter and his follow-up to the first two Halloween movies, small coastal town is terrorized by fog on the 100th anniversary of the founding of their town… and apparently pirate ghosts are going around killing people. Tom Atkins (without the moustache) & Academy Award winner Jamie Lee Curtis try to save the day with help from the voice of Adrienne Barbeau… and hijinx ensue. This is a good little 90 minute Halloween flick… as long as you don’t try to think too much about it… I think that’s why it’s good fun watch & one of Izzy’s favorite. It’s just ridiculous enough to be mildly scary but not too real.
 
Rating – 9/10 – I enjoy it too… but yeah, only an annual watch because of the wife. I prefer other Carpenter flicks.
 
October 17 – Duel (1971)
 
Spielberg’s first movie… well, I guess it was a TV movie that they added a few scenes to make feature length… but it’s about a traveling salesman (Dennis Weaver) going across California… when the driver of a trailer starts to terrorize him… and they both seem to lose their goddamn minds on the (completely isolated?) highways of California. For being such a simple premise, you see a lot of the Spielberg tropes in the filming with shots similar to movies like Jaws & Jurassic Park later… but yeah, definitely a decent flick. I recommend checking it out.
 
Rating – 8/10 – Only a few moments where I was checking the time… but you had to pad it out to feature length. The actual tense scenes are legit.
 
October 19 – Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988)
 
Killer alien clowns land in a small town and hijinx ensue. If you haven’t seen this movie, and you enjoy campy horror flicks, then you need to remedy this on Tubi RIGHT NOW!!! The special effects and hilarious kills are all you want in a horror flick without being really scared. The acting is… over the top in all the best ways… John Vernon plays his character (you know the one) and you even get a nerdy looking Christopher Titus saying “What the heck was that?!?” in his acting debut. Seriously, the Chiodo Brothers made a great flick!
 
Rating – 10+/10 - That’s right! Ten-PLUS!!! We showed it to Katie & Izzy’s Mom and they both loved it… and they soft… watch it with your kids!!!

Until next time!!!

​Steve

Good Afternoon Ladies & Gentlemen,

Another busy busy week... but the MIL is FINALLY moved in... and of course she's COMPLETELY ill prepared to be an adult and look for a place to live... and as expected I believe she's just looking to drop her burden of existence upon us but... that's not happening... as we've told her specifically for months while she was feigning listening... but yeah, the process is being done & my wife Izzy is a trooper trying to turn her mother into an actual adult for the first time in her 3/4 century of life so... it's a process. However, I don't think you all care about that... so here are the movies I could squeeze in...

October 6 – Carnivorous / Lockjaw: Rise of the Kulev Serpent (2008)
 
Obviously I watched this movie because it allegedly starred rap legend DMX… but it’s about a bunch of 30-something teenagers who go on a road trip & stumble upon some magic stick that releases a vengeful half-crocodile/half-serpent monster… and hijinx ensue. This movie has some serious “Pumpkinhead” vibes but… more like the 3rd or 4th sequel of Pumpkinhead where there’s a guy whose wife is killed by these douchey teens and he goes to kill them himself… but then there’s a monster already doing it for him… and yeah, it’s Asylum level CGI for the monster. Oh… and DMX is in like three minutes of this movie if that… and yeah…
 
Rating – 5/10 – This is blissfully short at least… but yeah, not the greatest
 
October 9 – The Haunting (1999)
 
Watched this one for our upcoming Halloween Special… along with the other 1999 horror remake about an All-Star cast of rich whites go to an old building with a seeded history to find out the meaning of Fear. This is the one with Liam Neeson, Catherine Zeta Jones, Owen Wilson & Lily Taylor and from the director of Speed & Twister. You can hear more about it in our episode but… there’s 1.5 deaths in this movie. I had completely forgotten that. For some reason I thought there was more… but this is PG-13 AF… and I still can’t really stand the Eleanor character. This feels like a Spielberg thing thrown in…
 
Rating – 7/10 – It is what it is though… 90’s horror… but Casper’s CGI was MUCH better
 
October 11 – House on Haunted Hill (1999)
 
This is the other one… and is the R-rated version of The Haunting… Geoffrey Rush, Famke Janssen, Ali Larter, Bridgette Wilson, Taye Diggs, Peter Gallagher & Christ Kattan are stuck in an old sanitarium when a rich white’s birthday prank goes ridiculously wrong (and pretty dumb)… and hijinx ensue. Honestly, Chris Kattan’s character in this movie is… probably the highlight… though a bit out of place in the rest of the movie since he’s providing meta-commentary “Scream” style when everybody else is… basically a characiture.
 
Rating – 8/10 – Still enjoy it though… and 30 minutes shorter than The Haunting… though I have MANY questions about the ending

Yeah, so that's it... back to making sure my MIL can get her own place & she hasn't been lying to us about every single thing that she has said since we lived in San Francisco and were babysitting her there... but hey, I'll keep you vaguely posted... and luckily my wife isn't being driven insane by it either. :)

By the way, the new motto for Q4 is "It's going to be GREAT!!!"

​Steve

Good Afternoon Ladies & Gentlemen,

Things are moving along (dragged kicking & screaming it seems at times) but MIL is only a few days away from moving in... so in my precious free time from working overtime... here are a few movies that I saw...

October 1 – Race with the Devil (1975)
 
Two brothers & their wives go on an RV trip from San Antonio to Aspen… and apparently within an hour or so, they pull off the road for the night, witness a ritual sacrifice in the woods, and are running from a satanic cult with the powers of plot convenience!!! I really enjoyed this movie. It’s under 90 minutes, there are some decent Mad Max-esque car stunts, and some absolutely ridiculous plot conveniences that had me the whole time!
 
Rating – 9/10 – If it sounds like it’s up your alley, check it out!
 
October 2 – Casper (1995)
 
I legitimately hadn’t seen this movie since 1996 probably… but I remembered liking it when I was a teenager (and crushing on Christina Ricci). It’s the tale as old as time where a ghost psychiatrist (Bill Pullman) and his daughter are brought it to evacuate ghosts from a haunted house that may or may not have a treasure hidden within it for evil people who inherited it. The cameos are pretty good throughout, it’s a little darker than I remember now as an adult, but yeah… I still enjoy it.
 
Rating – 10/10 – Rated PG for your kids… they can deal with it… share the rewatch!
 
October 3 – Adventures in Dinosaur City (1991)
 
In the year 2 BJP, there were dinosaur movies… but they weren’t the greatest movie ever made quite yet… they were more like… what if I could be transported into a slightly pre-apocalyptic cartoon where there’s a battle between talking dinosaurs & cavemen… but once I’m transported into the TV, it’s live action using the leftovers from the TV show Dinosaurs?!? I don’t think I had seen this one before (I think it was released right around the time I was waiting for Jurassic Park to come out on video & I already had Baby: Secret of the Lost Legend) but this one was… almost exactly what you would expect. You can find it on YouTube and… I’m intrigued to see how this movie would have been in good quality instead of rotted VHS rip since the costumes seems like they might have been decent… but yeah, it’s ridiculous…
 
Rating – 8/10 – I think I’ll give any dinosaur movie at least an 8 out of 10!!!
 
October 4 – Death Race (2008)
 
I had seen this movie when it came out & remembered liking it… but has 15 years soured me on this “modern day” remake of Death Race 2000 starring Jason Statham, Ian McShane, Joan Allen, Tyrese & more?!? Let’s find out! Okay, so Joe Everyman (Jason Statham) is just a hard working guy who works at a mine… when somebody frames him for his wife’s murder… and in the future, prisoners race each other in highly televised events. Oh, did I mention that he used to be a racecar driver? Yeah, they kinda threw that into the 2nd act too… but yeah, he’s set up by the warden so that she can get the most viewers and… yeah, corporations evil & own everything including the penal system, blah blah blah… from the director of Mortal Kombat, the Resident Evil movies, and edits like he’s doing a Transformers movie… and I love it. It’s exactly the 2000’s action trash that you want it to be… and since it stars Statham, Tyrese & dollar store Michelle Rodriguez… you can basically release this movie as Fast & Furious 13 and it makes perfect sense.
 
Rating – 10/10 – Delivers what it promises & nothing else to make your brain tickle
 
October 5 – The Alien Factor (1978)
 
A spaceship crashes on Earth in the back woods of Wisconsin or something… and hijinx ensue when a cocky & omnipotent scientist man named Ben Zachary shows up & has the powers of knowing the script and apparently changing it to his whim like a 3rd grader claiming to have ALL the mutant powers during recess. Yeah, this was a Cinematic Titanic watch… but yeah, the movie was pretty crazy… and there were definitely time that I had no idea what was going on… but worth a laugh.
 
Rating – 6/10 – The “twists” and constant screaming only made me howl louder with how bad the script & plot elements were

Have a great week everybody!

​Steve