Good Afternoon Ladies & Gentlemen,
Back is feeling much better now... ready to get back into the show season... but Izzy was a damn champ making that money without me!!! This also gave me time to watch some movies... June 22 – Commando (1985) John Matrix (Schwarzenegger) is a former mercenary or something… but he’s retired now & living in the woods with his daughter (Alyssa Milano) but then some South American general (Dan Hedaya?) sends a hit squad to kill him, kidnaps his daughter & blackmails him into killing the president so the general can take power? Now John has to figure out how to get his daughter back… and it’s by teaming with a stewardess (Rae Dawn Chong) and destroying hundreds of bad guys. Guys, this movie is amazing & 1,000% action and one-liners… and Vernon Wells as the final baddy is chef’s kiss… Rating – 10+/10 – Love this movie even though the story is ridiculous… June 23 – Champions (2023) Woody Harrelson is a semi-pro assistant coach who gets fired after a DUI (and pushing his boss coach Ernie Hudson) & as part of his community service is “forced” to coach a local Special Olympics basketball team… knowing that it’s also directed by one of the Farrelly brothers & the trailer you can see how the movie could go a VERY questionable way. Ladies & gentlemen, I’ll tell you what… this movie was legitimately great! Now, basketball movies I’m usually pretty skeptical of because of playing it for a LONG time in my younger days… but the way everything is handled, this movie was deep, thoughtful, hilarious, and even Kaitlyn “Sweet Dee” Olsen was able to show off her acting chops a little bit. I highly recommend checking it out! Rating – 10/10 – Seeing Woody shooting a jump shot just reminded me that there’s a “White Men Can’t Jump” remake out there that I’ll probably watch one day… June 24 – Puss in Boots: The Last Wish (2022) Of course I’ve seen some Shrek movies (at least the first two) & I’m familiar with Antonio Banderas as the titular character Puss in Boots… but in this one, Puss is faced with his own mortality as he’s down to his last of nine lives, and is on a mission to find the last wishing star to get his lives back… meanwhile he’s paired with an ex love (voiced by Salma Hayek) & a Chihuahua (Harvey Guillen) but being pursued by DEATH (a big bad wolf), kingpin Jack Horner, Goldi & the three bears!!! Hijinx ensue… and I really liked it. It’s fun for kids & adults… and that’s a delicate balance… Rating – 10/10 – Again, highly recommend & would gladly enjoy watching it with a child in need of distraction June 25 – Rollerball (2002) I remember watching this when it first came out and… not enjoying it… like everybody else based on its RT rating. However, I thought it might be worth another shot since I had time on my hands & it was featured on Tubi. Basically in the year 2005 (remember?) there’s a new sport in Russia where it’s a mix of extreme sports & death… but the ratings are great & violence is high… and there’s a kid (Chris Klein from American Pie) who’s the new wunderkind… but things aren’t what they seem as there’s corruption (gasp!). Okay, the movie… is not great obviously. The thing is that there are decent ideas there. LL Cool J is great as charismatic friend. Corruption in sports & power struggles are fraught with ideas for effective storytelling. Some of the actions scenes are okay. Unfortunately, this had the perfect storm of a few things happening like director John McTiernan becoming completely disenchanted with Hollywood, Hollywood chopping up his vision into PG-13 BS, and… Chris Klein may not be the greatest actor by any means… but I feel like he had the worst possible choices of movies to try to kickstart his career with this, “Say It Ain’t So”, “Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li” and so on. However, this movie can best be summed up in the infamous 12-minute night vision action scene that’s bad even by straight-to-VHS standards. Rating – 6/10 – Made me want to watch the original… but there’s possibilities in it June 26 – Planet Terror (2007) Yes, the other half of the Grindhouse duo, directed by Robert Rodriguez (apparently he has a new movie out called Hynpotic that I need to watch soon) and a campy over-the-top zombie kind of flick where a chemical has been released on the populous turning them into a violent horde of melty monsters… and hijinx ensue. I love this movie as an ode to the Grindhouse movies that I’ve learned to absolutely love over the past decade or so… from the ridiculous moments of dialogue repeating, the coarse special effects to “age the film” or whatever, the long shots at the “superstar that’s fallen on hard times to have a small part in this movie” (Bruce Willis) and the violence is just cranked up to 11 with exploding blood & limbs & well, explosions!!! Absolutely top notch… Rating – 10+/10 – Why am I not seeing more Robert Rodriguez?!? June 27 – Easy Rider 2: The Ride Home (2012) This is… sort of a sequel of the legendary 1969 “Easy Rider” but… it’s really about the rest of Peter Fonda’s character Wyatt’s family and just a family drama… but it’s also about 40% motorcycle riding on the open highway to pad out the 90 minutes. Wyatt’s brother Morgan is asked to come back to the States to see his father before he dies… and then along the way we get a bunch of flashbacks as to why he’s in Mexico, what happened to other siblings, the father’s past, the sister’s, his buddy Wes Coast (played by Jeff Fahey) and… yeah, it just kinda happens. I didn’t hate this movie as much as I did when I first saw it… but find out specifically why on an upcoming Patreon Exclusive episode in July for BIKER MONTH!!! Rating – 6/10 – This one is rough at spots… and I’m not a fan of drama… but there’s some positives too June 28 – Rollerball (1975) After watching the remake the other day, I had to watch the original starring James Caan. Basically in the year 2018 (40+ years in the future as opposed to 2-3 like the remake), there’s no war… only the corporates… and Rollerball!!! Want some more background on how this came to be or what the global ramifications are of this society? TOO BAD!!! Theatre of the mind!!! Fill in your own blanks, you get bare bones in this one… but apparently there’s a book that I’m not going to read. James Caan is the aged star of Rollerball… and they want him to retire… but he doesn’t want to… so then “They” start taking away the rules to kill him because… well, that’s another thing they don’t really explain well. Look, I really enjoyed the movie… and if you combine this with some world building elements of the remake… you could totally make a decent version of this. Other franchises have tried like Hunger Games and… coming next week… but yeah, 70’s fun. Rating – 8/10 – Not great but good… Happy Independence Day to those who celebrate... until next time!!! Steve
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Steve and Izzy
Steve and Izzy are the hosts behind the EILFM podcast, are BJCP beer judges and have terrible to questionable taste in movies. Along with the PodCats Pickles, Cameron and Poe they will justify why these movies are amazing Archives
May 2024
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