This can't be real, can it? I think it is. It's just that good.
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Showing posts with label terrible movies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label terrible movies. Show all posts
8.30.2010
4.04.2009
The Wizard of Gore
Thank you, Diablo Cody.
As though I didn’t love Juno enough as it is, my roommate and I just finished watching The Wizard of Gore (the movie that’s briefly discussed by Ellen Page and Jason Bateman).
In a word, it was incredible.
Okay, incredible to my roommate and me is very different from what you might think is incredible. That’s understandable. To fully appreciate the mastery that is this movie, you have to love bad movies (and I definitely do). There are so many questions that are unanswered by this movie that many people would probably walk away angry.
I didn’t. I loved it!
The more important thing that this movie did, though, was bring a third fantastic film studio to the forefront of terrible movie culture. My friends and I all already loved Troma (home to Toxic Avenger, Poultrygiest, et al) and York Entertainment (Alien 51 and such), but now we have another: SOMETHING WEIRD VIDEOS.
To call their catalog extensive would be an understatement (You can view a list here.). There are so many movies on that list with such potential that it makes me weep in joy. I just queued up in my Netflix a Something Weird double feature: The Beast that Killed Women / The Monster of Camp Sunshine. Both deal with nudist camps (how are they not involved in more movies?) and crazy creatures that wreak havoc there. I don’t know which one will be better, but I think it’s a safe bet to say that I’m going to love both.
As though I didn’t love Juno enough as it is, my roommate and I just finished watching The Wizard of Gore (the movie that’s briefly discussed by Ellen Page and Jason Bateman).
In a word, it was incredible.
Okay, incredible to my roommate and me is very different from what you might think is incredible. That’s understandable. To fully appreciate the mastery that is this movie, you have to love bad movies (and I definitely do). There are so many questions that are unanswered by this movie that many people would probably walk away angry.
I didn’t. I loved it!
The more important thing that this movie did, though, was bring a third fantastic film studio to the forefront of terrible movie culture. My friends and I all already loved Troma (home to Toxic Avenger, Poultrygiest, et al) and York Entertainment (Alien 51 and such), but now we have another: SOMETHING WEIRD VIDEOS.
To call their catalog extensive would be an understatement (You can view a list here.). There are so many movies on that list with such potential that it makes me weep in joy. I just queued up in my Netflix a Something Weird double feature: The Beast that Killed Women / The Monster of Camp Sunshine. Both deal with nudist camps (how are they not involved in more movies?) and crazy creatures that wreak havoc there. I don’t know which one will be better, but I think it’s a safe bet to say that I’m going to love both.
2.12.2009
Where has the Buddy Cop Flick Gone?
The 1980s seem like they were a great time. Though I was technically born in the 80s, I don’t actually have memories of them so I must resort to looking at them through movies, music and popular culture.
As far as music goes, it’s my favorite decade. There are two HUGE realms of music that I love both of from that time – 80s pop and 80s metal – and it seems like there’s a never-ending supply of good music. Compare that to today where there’s only a handful of artists I’m really enthusiastic about and the case gets even stronger for the 80s. Nostalgia 1, Modernity 0.
Though that’s great and all, I think the real strength of the 80s was the cheesy-yet-incredible filmmaking. It was truly the peak of both high school screwball comedies and buddy cop movies and the world is a better place for it.
You may be wondering what prompted this sudden stint of nostalgia. This past summer, I think it all started after I watched the Back to the Future series on three consecutive nights. I realized how awesome like everything in that movie was and it made me wish I had been around for it to come out in theaters.
However, most recently, the movie that made me wish I grew up 20 years ago was Tango & Cash. Though not a “good” movie by any means, it is one of the best “good bad” movies I’ve ever seen (for more information, see the entry from Saturday, February 7th). I’m not sure how easy it would be to make another movie that is this corny, this over-the-top, and this awesome all at the same time. Aside from the writing and the action and all that, you have Kurt Russell and Sylvester Stallone IN THEIR PRIMES as a fantastic on-screen duo. Cinema doesn’t get better.
Watching it with friends, nearly every scene we came across we would say, “There’s no way this can get any better. (What just happened) was the coolest and most awesome thing ever!” Then, without failing, the next scene each time would blow the previous scene out of the water. It was incredible and it made me happy on the inside.
There will never be a movie like this made today. First of all, I don’t know if there are two super cool action stars that would be up for such a role. Second of all, and more importantly, the stuff that would come out today that would be written in a similar fashion would just be dumb. There’s a fine line between making something that’s enjoyably over-the-top / awesomely bad and something that just is painful to watch. I fear that if this happened today that one of the two actors would be Vin Diesel.
Enough said. That would be terrible.
As far as music goes, it’s my favorite decade. There are two HUGE realms of music that I love both of from that time – 80s pop and 80s metal – and it seems like there’s a never-ending supply of good music. Compare that to today where there’s only a handful of artists I’m really enthusiastic about and the case gets even stronger for the 80s. Nostalgia 1, Modernity 0.
Though that’s great and all, I think the real strength of the 80s was the cheesy-yet-incredible filmmaking. It was truly the peak of both high school screwball comedies and buddy cop movies and the world is a better place for it.
You may be wondering what prompted this sudden stint of nostalgia. This past summer, I think it all started after I watched the Back to the Future series on three consecutive nights. I realized how awesome like everything in that movie was and it made me wish I had been around for it to come out in theaters.
However, most recently, the movie that made me wish I grew up 20 years ago was Tango & Cash. Though not a “good” movie by any means, it is one of the best “good bad” movies I’ve ever seen (for more information, see the entry from Saturday, February 7th). I’m not sure how easy it would be to make another movie that is this corny, this over-the-top, and this awesome all at the same time. Aside from the writing and the action and all that, you have Kurt Russell and Sylvester Stallone IN THEIR PRIMES as a fantastic on-screen duo. Cinema doesn’t get better.
Watching it with friends, nearly every scene we came across we would say, “There’s no way this can get any better. (What just happened) was the coolest and most awesome thing ever!” Then, without failing, the next scene each time would blow the previous scene out of the water. It was incredible and it made me happy on the inside.
There will never be a movie like this made today. First of all, I don’t know if there are two super cool action stars that would be up for such a role. Second of all, and more importantly, the stuff that would come out today that would be written in a similar fashion would just be dumb. There’s a fine line between making something that’s enjoyably over-the-top / awesomely bad and something that just is painful to watch. I fear that if this happened today that one of the two actors would be Vin Diesel.
Enough said. That would be terrible.
2.07.2009
Good Bad vs Bad Bad
There are two very distinct types of bad movies: the good bad movies and the bad bad movies. A lot of people, including myself, love good bad movies, but no one likes bad bad movies. Let me explain.
This was all prompted by two movies I watched last week – In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale and C.H.U.D. Neither of them are ever going to win an Academy Award, but one is far superior to the other.
We watched In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale because it looked big-budget bad and because behind The Love Guru, it was nominated for the most razzies (anti-Oscars) this year. Uwe Boll, the director, really knows how to make terrible movies, but not terrible in ways you want to see. Nothing about this movie was redeeming, which is why it’s only fitting that he’s winning the lifetime achievement award at the Razzies this year. This is the type of movie that if I was watching it alone, it wouldn’t have stayed on the television (and I hardly ever turn off movies); watching with friends allowed me to pick on anything and everything in the movie.
On the other hand, C.H.U.D. was bad in a phenomenally good way. This isn’t the best example for a good bad movie (because it wasn’t actually too bad hen the monsters weren’t on the screen) but it still serves the point. There are lots of movies and filmmakers out there who don’t necessarily set out to make a great movie… either that, or they fail so miserably at making a good movie that you think they were making a bad movie. I don’t think the people making C.H.U.D. had any expectations that people would take it seriously, which is why it worked so well. It’s a cult classic for a reason.
The growing trend in Hollywood these days is to remake classic horror movies from the 1980s. These are bad bad movies. There’s nothing good about them. There’s no substance, there’s no entertainment value, there’s nothing. I can only wish that people made good bad movies instead of these bad bad movies. Maybe that way I’d go see them.
I think a perfect example of a recent good bad movie (and by good I mean incredible) is Grindhouse. It’s currently my favorite movie of all time – it’s not by any means the best movie I’ve ever seen (personally I think that’s Pulp Fiction) but it’s the movie that I’d put on regardless of what else was on TV. Anyway, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino did a great job (in this case, Rodriguez more so) of making a movie where they took nothing seriously and put out a fantastically entertaining product. They weren’t trying to scare people (like new horror) and they weren’t going for awards – they were just having fun with it, and that’s why I love it.
This was all prompted by two movies I watched last week – In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale and C.H.U.D. Neither of them are ever going to win an Academy Award, but one is far superior to the other.
We watched In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale because it looked big-budget bad and because behind The Love Guru, it was nominated for the most razzies (anti-Oscars) this year. Uwe Boll, the director, really knows how to make terrible movies, but not terrible in ways you want to see. Nothing about this movie was redeeming, which is why it’s only fitting that he’s winning the lifetime achievement award at the Razzies this year. This is the type of movie that if I was watching it alone, it wouldn’t have stayed on the television (and I hardly ever turn off movies); watching with friends allowed me to pick on anything and everything in the movie.
On the other hand, C.H.U.D. was bad in a phenomenally good way. This isn’t the best example for a good bad movie (because it wasn’t actually too bad hen the monsters weren’t on the screen) but it still serves the point. There are lots of movies and filmmakers out there who don’t necessarily set out to make a great movie… either that, or they fail so miserably at making a good movie that you think they were making a bad movie. I don’t think the people making C.H.U.D. had any expectations that people would take it seriously, which is why it worked so well. It’s a cult classic for a reason.
The growing trend in Hollywood these days is to remake classic horror movies from the 1980s. These are bad bad movies. There’s nothing good about them. There’s no substance, there’s no entertainment value, there’s nothing. I can only wish that people made good bad movies instead of these bad bad movies. Maybe that way I’d go see them.
I think a perfect example of a recent good bad movie (and by good I mean incredible) is Grindhouse. It’s currently my favorite movie of all time – it’s not by any means the best movie I’ve ever seen (personally I think that’s Pulp Fiction) but it’s the movie that I’d put on regardless of what else was on TV. Anyway, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino did a great job (in this case, Rodriguez more so) of making a movie where they took nothing seriously and put out a fantastically entertaining product. They weren’t trying to scare people (like new horror) and they weren’t going for awards – they were just having fun with it, and that’s why I love it.
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