Reaction & Review | Catnapped!

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be covering an animated movie from 1995. That movie is "Catnapped!"

Now, I've wanted to see this movie for the better part of a couple of years. But, much like certain movies on my list to watch, finding a physical copy of it hasn't been possible. But thankfully, there is a copy of the movie on YouTube, so I'm gonna be watching the movie from there. I just kinda hope that I don't run into the same problems I had with "Black Magic M-66", where that movie was riddled with syncing issues. But I'll worry about that once I start watching it.

About the only thing I can tell you that I know about this movie is how I came across the trailer for it. You see, I'm someone who likes to buy movies on VHS. And during my VHS hunt, I came across all 3 of the Sailor Moon movies. And whenever I watched them, about two of the Sailor Moon movies had the exact same trailers for 2 certain movies. The first one was for a movie called "The Dog of Flanders", which looked really dull and boring. And the second trailer they showed was for "Catnapped!". And while I was watching it, I was really entranced by the song that they played. So much so, that I wanted to find a copy of this thing somewhere and give it a watch.

As for the trailer itself, barring the song that was playing throughout the trailer, I'm not totally sure what to think of it. The only thing that I could remember from watching that trailer was that it had something to do with cats and...that's about it. I know nothing about the movie itself, other than it has something to do with cats, and the song that played when I watched the trailer. But I am certainly hoping that my long wait of wanting to watch this movie will pay off. So the only thing for me to do at this point, is to shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Catnapped!".

10 minutes later

All right, guys, I know it's still early in the movie, but I think now might be a good time to say that Meeko's voice is irritating as shit. You guys can't hear it for obvious reasons, but if this is the kinda voice I have to get use to for the next hour or so, then I fear it may be torturous.

12 minutes later

Well, guys, I can say that while the story hasn't made a ton of sense so far, Meeko getting kidnapped was probably the best thing that could happen in this movie. So maybe I won't have to put up with her irritating voice for a while.

2 minutes later

So this cat princess has the power of inflation...OK. It's sorta different. Doesn't make me less comfortable after seeing her use this power as an example.

7 minutes later

You know, guys, I'm willing to give the movie this. The score in this movie is fantastic. The orchestral score that is being put to use in this scene really shows off the creativity of the animation. It's just kind of a pity that the movie is still kinda dull. But I'm certainly hoping for the rest of the movie to be better.

3 minutes later

So hold on a fucking second here. So, as a child, Buburina wanted to see the daughter of this wizard walk some tightrope on a very high spot of the castle. And after seeing her fall and possibly die, she says to herself that it wasn't her fault. Dude, you were the one who suggested, well, ordered her to do it in this case. I think it IS your fault. I'm sorry, guys, but that scene kinda rubbed me the wrong way, you know?

20 minutes later

You know, guys, it's kinda sad. Even though there is a lot of action going on here, I just can't bring myself to care about it very much. This movie has been really boring, and, honestly, I can't wait for the movie to end.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Catnapped!". And we're closing out with the song that was played in the trailer with some...odd stop-motion animation. You know what, I'm gonna shut the movie off now...OK. I'm trying to figure out where to even start. You know, when I saw the trailer for this movie, I was instantly hooked because of the song that played. And the visuals really sucked me in as to what was going on. The trailer really didn't explain a whole lot, but still, I was interested enough to check this movie out. And after watching this movie...well, I guess you could say curiosity killed the cat. Let me see if I can explain this further by talking about the writing.

Some of you may happen to recall a couple of episodes ago, I reviewed another animated film called "Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure". Well, "Catnapped!" sorta has the same problems as that movie did. Such as the story being really weak, and a ton of characters not having much character development. Now, I will say that, unlike "Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure", the character depth in "Catnapped!" blows Raggedy Ann out of the water. Granted, that's not saying a whole lot, but still, there is some character development to be found here. And also, the music is really good. Partially because, it's not riddled with god awful songs. The only song I can think of was the song that played throughout the trailer and during the end credits, but I will cover music later.

But I guess I should get into the writing proper. And the writing in this movie is really weak. Well, "really" is a bit of a stretch. It's sort of weak. Because we have this story about these two kids being dragged into this cat world, where their dog, Papadoll, was taken, and has been transformed into a monster. And so, along with a bunch of other cat people, they need to transform the dog back to it's original self before the next sunrise. Because, according to one of the cat people in this movie, when a foreigner, AKA a human, is exposed to the cat world's sun on their second day there, they are then permanently transformed into a cat. Mind you, when Toriyasu and Meeko, our two main child characters in this movie, are transformed into cats, it's when they first set foot on this cat world. And before we learn about the second sunrise, they think that it's only temporary until they leave the cat world. And, OK, that's fine. It's perfectly normal for a fantasy world to establish it's own rules. The problem here, though, is that you want to have a story that will make you want to keep watching and to stay interested. And for kids, they're going to enjoy this, because all of the problems that I had with the movie are not going to be noticed by children. But as for an adult watching this...well, I'll get more into that when I get to recommendations.

Now, you may have noticed that I keep referring to the cats as cat people. And that's mainly because I couldn't remember a majority of these characters's names, partially because, most of them were unmemorable. I can remember a few names that I can recall. And those names were Toriyasu, Meeko, Papadoll, and Buburina. Everyone else, I could say might've had names, but like I said, I couldn't remember any of them, because their characters were mostly shallow. The only two characters that had any level of development were Toriyasu and Buburina, the cat princess and our main villain of the movie. I want to touch upon Buburina, because most of my issues with the writing are going to mainly focus on her.

So, my issues with Buburina, mostly, has to do with her backstory. So, as a child, Buburina was a spoiled princess. In fact, she's still spoiled when she's an adult, but that's beside the point. And we get a flashback to where she, along with the King and Queen of the cat world, are watching a magic show performed by this wizard, along with his daughter Lily. And the whole time, Buburina gets more frustrated and angry, while everyone else is in awe of the magic performance. She then yells out to stop the performance, because she wants to see the child cat, Lily, perform her own magic, even though she was told by Lily's father that her magic was limited. And the only thing Lily does for magic is make a couple of birds appear from her hands. Still not impressed by it, Buburina wants to make Lily walk some tightrope at a very high spot of the castle. To which Lily does that, despite her father not wanting to go through with this dangerous act. Buburina insisted on it, because if Lily didn't do it, she and her father would not leave the castle. And it ends up with Lily falling and dying in the process. First of all, I wouldn't even call walking tightrope a magic trick, but's just me, personally. Secondly, I have a question. Why did the King or Queen not give out any order to stop Lily from doing this? They should know that it was dangerous, so why didn't they attempt to stop it? Is it because they didn't want to upset their daughter? If so, then that's a stupid fucking reason, because she was the one who ordered the child to perform it. I don't care if she's spoiled, there are certain things that, as royalty, you need to take a stand on. But no, they end up watching it, as the child falls to her death.

Now, after all that has happened, we see the wizard sneak into her room, later that night, after she falls asleep. He then puts a spell on her, which gives her the power to inflate people into a balloon. And that the spell would go on until she feels the sorrow of loss. I want to touch upon that point, because, and this is gonna be a bit of a spoiler, she never learns that lesson of loss. So ultimately, it makes her character development kinda pointless, as she ends up just being a bland, comedic, cartoon villain. Now, perhaps maybe, if this movie had gotten a television series, or even a sequel, then I think it would've made some sense. Because, right towards the end of the film, it does look as though that this movie was setting itself up for a sequel. The problem with that, though, is that neither of those possibilities end up happening. We never got a sequel to this movie, or even got a television show out of it. And that's kind of a shame, because I would've like to have seen where they could've gone with a TV show or another movie. But unfortunately, we got stuck with this standalone film.

Setting aside Buburina's backstory, her plan makes no sense either. So, one thing about the cat world that I didn't mention is that underneath it, there's a giant sleeping cat that holds the entire cat world together. If it were awake, then the entire cat world would plunge into chaos. OK, fine, I guess that makes some level of sense. But Buburina's plan is to inflate all of the cats she's captured, and use them to create a giant mouse that will cause the sleeping cat to awaken. And then she's gonna use Papadoll to scare the sleeping cat to go back to sleep, thus claim it as the protector of the cat world. On what basis does she think that any of this plan of hers will work? If the dog did end up scaring the cat, it probably would end up trying to run away instead of going back to sleep, thus causing more chaos in the cat world. Nothing about this plan of Buburina's makes any sense. If this is because of her selfishness or because she wants to make an example of the other cats if they get in her way, then...it still doesn't make any fucking sense. But hey, I guess this is what happens when you get a villain that's kinda written like shit. And I totally understand that she's a spoiled princess, so maybe her plan wasn't suppose to make any sense, but still, it was stupid as hell. And me even trying to make sense of it was pointless.

Now, aside from her. The only other character who has any kind of development is Toriyasu. Because during the latter portion of the movie, we get to see how Toriyasu's relationship with his dog, Papadoll, ended up breaking apart. And all of that is fine. The only problem, though, is that it takes almost an hour to get to that point, in a movie that's only around 76 minutes long. And you have to get through the rest of the movie in order to get to that point. But by the time that happens, you're, more than likely, going to end up getting bored by the movie. Because the movie tries way too hard to be interesting. And I personally stopped caring about the story a little before that plot point happens. So, I do have to warn you there, on the off chance you want to see this movie.

I can say, though, that beyond some of the nonsensical writing, the acting, for the most part, is really good. Except for one. And that would be whoever voiced Meeko. Now, I've made comments in a couple of my past reviews that, when you're voicing a child character, you're not expecting a lot of miracles. But, guys, I mentioned it at the start when I was watching the movie, that Meeko's voice was irritating as shit to listen to. Because for about 90% of her dialogue, Meeko's voice actress has to shout her lines, and it is grating to listen to. And it probably wouldn't be so bad, except, there were maybe about one or two lines of dialogue where she was speaking her lines all into one sentence. Now perhaps maybe that's how it was written in the Japanese version, or maybe it was because of a slightly poor translation where the voice actress didn't get enough breathing room to give out her lines properly. I don't know. Maybe I'm reading into that theory too much. But it was kind of an issue, enough for me to make mention of it. And if the intention was to make the child character annoying as hell, then congratulations, this movie certainly accomplished that. Beyond her, though, the acting was certainly really good.

Animation in this movie is great. I really like the attention to detail that went into the cat world, along with the designs to all of the cat characters. Including Papadoll, when he's transformed as a monster. My favorite moment is during the flashback when Buburina was a child. The detail of the animation during the portion of the magic show, along with the background music that went with it, looked beautiful. And I have to give the animators a ton of praise there. That said, I do feel as though the animation is a little...over-bloated. Now, when I say that, I don't mean any of the animation is bad. It's just, during the latter portion of the movie, say around the last 20 to 30 minutes, feels like it's trying way too hard to capture the viewers interest. Because there's all of this action that's going on, and it's suppose to be tense and exciting, but it ends up being rather tiresome. And I get that you want something to happen during the final climax of the movie, but as I said, the animators tried a little too hard to accomplish that by dragging it out to almost a half an hour. Now, mind you, what I just mentioned is very minor, in terms of flaws regarding animation. And I will say that I admire all of the creativity that went into the animation for this movie. I just thought it was a little too much, even for me.

The sound-mix is mixed well. There are, thankfully, no syncing issues when it comes to dialogue matching the mouth movements of all the characters. The score is great, but then again, it's mostly just orchestral music, which I don't mind. And, of course, the song that played from the trailer. Which, after looking it up, is called "Yume e No Tobira". I hope that's the right title of the song. But otherwise, the song is great. And I would highly recommend giving it a listen at some point, because it is that good.

So, with all that being said, can I recommend "Catnapped!"? For kids, yes. I can totally recommend it for children, because, as I said earlier, most children are not going to notice any of the flaws that I have mentioned. They are going to be sucked into this movie and they are, probably, going to end up loving it. As for adults...um...if you seriously have to watch this thing, then it's on YouTube right now. Go ahead and check it out. And who knows? You might find something more out of it then I did. But personally, I'm probably not gonna end up watching this movie again. Which is really disappointing to say, because I've wanted to watch this thing for several years, ever since I saw the trailer for it when I was watching one of the Sailor Moon movies. But like I said, curiosity killed the cat. And unfortunately, that cat ended up being this movie. Now, I kinda want to go and watch a better movie involving cats. And the first thing that comes to mind is "The Cat Returns". I'm gonna go watch that, because that movie is amazing.

Anyway, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Drive Angry

 

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be covering an action movie from 2011. That movie is "Drive Angry".

Now, I came across this movie not too long ago at one of my local video stores, when I was searching for a certain movie that had the word 'drive' in it. And you'll know what it is by the time I cover it. But anyway, as I was browsing, I came across this movie, and I can tell you a couple of things that I picked up from it.

The first thing is that it stars Nicolas Cage. And I have known that Nicolas Cage, for the most part, tends to be a very good actor. And in this movie, Nicolas Cage plays as an undead felon, who breaks out of hell to get revenge on the people that killed his daughter, and rescue her baby at the same time. So, in a nutshell, Nic Cage is playing Ghost Rider, except without all of the supernatural powers that Ghost Rider possesses.

So, setting aside from the obvious jokes I could make or have already made about Ghost Rider, that summary, to me, sounds fucking amazing. Because, for one, I do enjoy a good revenge movie. And the fact that it stars Nicolas Cage sounds like a fucking winner. However, thanks to this series, I have known that just because a concept sounds awesome, it does not mean that the movie is going to be any good. So there is a chance that this thing could be a massive turd.

However, I am certainly hoping for this movie to be amazing. But I will be ready to trash this thing, if it does end up sucking. And the only way I'm going to find out how good or bad this movie can be, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick, back, relax, and check out "Drive Angry".

14 minutes later

Well guys, I can tell you that the dialogue in this movie, at least so far, is kinda shit. And I am going to have to specify. Almost every character in this movie has used the word 'fuck' or some alliteration of that word in some context, and it's getting a little tiresome. And it's making it as though as nobody in this movie speaks like a human being. I kinda hope that the dialogue improves as the movie goes on, but right now, I kinda wish this movie would dial it back with it's over-usage of the word 'fuck', you know what I mean?

13 minutes later

You know, out of all the things I was expecting in this movie, Nic Cage fucking someone while fully clothed is not what I had in mind. He even has his sunglasses on, too. That is...kinda odd.

4 minutes later

OK guys, I have a tip for anybody who wants to do a shootout scene in an action movie. Doing it all in slow-motion doesn't make it look cooler. In fact, if anything, it's making this scene kinda dull. Plus also, some of the kills here are way over the top, and it's making this scene all the more stupid.

20 minutes later

You know, guys, it's rather sad. Even during a normal action scene, when things aren't in slow-motion, the shootouts are still boring as hell. How the fuck can you make a shootout in an action scene boring?! That is just really fucking depressing, guys.

3 minutes later

OK, you know what? As dull as that car chase was, the way that it ended was kinda funny. I gotta give them some credit there.

4 minutes later

So let me if I understand this. So Piper jumped out of the trailer van and onto Milton's car. Jonah just fired at least 9 shots from his revolver while Milton was trying to help Piper inside the car. And not a single bullet managed to hit any of them, other than the hood of the car? Oh...well, at least he blew out their motor. Well, whether he meant to shoot the motor or not, I think it's safe to say that Jonah's aiming really fucking sucks, guys.

18 minutes later

Why the hell isn't this fucking movie finished yet? Guys, I have been struggling to find something halfway interesting, and I haven't even gotten that yet. This movie is that fucking boring, and I can't wait for it to end.

The Review

Well guys, that was "Drive Angry". Let me shut that off...OK. If there is a word that I can summarize this movie, then that word is disappointing. Because, this story had a lot of promise going into it. When I read the back of the DVD case about how Nic Cage comes back from hell to get revenge, I was sold on it, because, as I said, I really like revenge movies. Unfortunately, unlike the ones I have seen, this movie doesn't really have the appeal factor that those movies had.

Let's start by talking about the writing, because this is where the movie slowly dies a painful death. I have mentioned this before in my review of "Samurai Princess" is that you want to have a reason to care about why someone is getting revenge and how it's affected them throughout their crusade, if you want to call it that. And we do have that here for our main character, Milton. Because Milton's motivation is that his daughter was killed by this religious cult that she was once a member of. And the only thing Milton has for a family is his daughter's baby, that they kidnapped. Why? Because they want to sacrifice the baby so that they can bring hell on Earth. And, according to Milton, they can do that. So he breaks out of hell, and this sets up the plot for our movie. I would like to know how escaping from a prison in hell, in a car, mind you, would lead you back into the real world, but I am not going to get into that.

Along the way he meets up with our female lead, Piper, who has very little personality to speak of. In fact, that's one of the big problems I have with this movie is that almost every character is dull and lifeless. The only other exception that isn't Milton, is our villain for this movie, Jonah King. And the only reason why I mention him is that he's basically a religious nutcase who thinks that sacrificing Milton's granddaughter is what will bring Hell to Earth. Granted, that's not saying much for Jonah, because religious lunatics don't have a ton of personality to speak of. But at least he does have that. As for Piper, she really has no reason to be in this movie, other than being caught up in Milton's revenge mission. The only things that happen to her is that she catches her boyfriend cheating on her, gets captured by Jonah's cult, and that's it. She really plays almost no factor into this movie. Hell, she doesn't even get to be a part of the final showdown with Jonah and his cult, as they are preparing to sacrifice the baby. No, she gets held back in that regard by the Accountant, whose only motivation is to track down Milton, after he escaped from hell, and to get a gun back that Milton, apparently, stole on his way out of hell. Why does the Accountant hold Piper back? I don't know. It wasn't properly explained all that well. If it was because the Accountant wanted Milton to finish the job by himself, then it still made no sense, because Piper volunteered to go with him in the latter half of the movie to rescue the baby. So why even hold her back at all?

As for Milton, he doesn't tell Piper about who he really is until when there's about over a half an hour left in the movie. We, the viewer, know who he is and what his motivation is long before that, because we get a flashback about how his nephew and daughter were killed by Jonah, and his baby was stolen after that. And admittedly, Piper picks up on the fact that his baby was kidnapped because she saw it on a news report on TV at a bar. But that's it. She doesn't get to know who he really is until long after one of his eyes gets shot at later in the movie. And until we get to that point, it's just too little, too late. Because most of this movie is boring as shit. Partially because, the pacing is rather slow, and the dialogue is mostly shit. And most of the dialogue has to do with characters saying the word 'fuck', quite a bit. About 65 to 70% of the dialogue has someone saying 'fuck' in some way, shape, or form. And mind you, this is coming from someone who swears a lot, but this shit is so forced that, as I mentioned earlier, nobody sounded like a normal person. Even Milton is written like shit, because his personality has all of the likability of dried paint. There's one scene I can remember where he was fucking somebody while fully clothed. And we see him shooting Jonah's followers, as they are coming in his hotel room to try and kill him. While Milton is doing all of this, he has a cigar in his mouth and sunglasses on him, while still holding onto the person in front of him who he's been fucking. If the scene was suppose to be an attempt at making Jonah funny and badass, then it failed miserably. And all it did was make that entire action scene boring as shit.

While I'm on the subject of action, let's talk about the action scenes. Because, since this is advertised as an action movie, you would think that the action scenes would be something that would hold this movie together. Instead, all of the action scenes are bland and lifeless. I'm talking about stuff involving car chases that are slow, shoot-outs that are uninspiring and lifeless, and I mentioned one scene earlier where there was a shoot-out at a hotel where Milton and Piper are staying at. I already talked about how doing the entire scene in slow-motion doesn't enhance the movie in anyway, and where it made the whole scene boring to watch. I also mentioned some kills that are kinda over the top. One example I can think of is where Milton shoots one guy in the leg, and it causes him to do, I guess, some sort of front-flip into a window, crashing into it, and dying in the process. Now, I'm not asking for realism in an action movie, but I would like to see some sort of believability in how some of these people die. Now beyond that, I can say that was the only instance where an action scene was done in slow-motion. So, at the very least, I can give them some credit there. But beyond that, the action scenes are just dull, boring, and none of it is going to wow anybody, because the action scenes are boring to start with and they don't get any better from there. And as much crap as I gave "Lone Wolf McQuade" for it's plotless writing, at least there, the action scenes were kinda interesting, which didn't make me flat out hate the movie. But here, it's the exact opposite. We have a potentially amazing story, that's boggled down by a shallow script and action scenes that you make you want to fall asleep.

So, the writing here is a massive disappointment. What's also disappointing is the acting. Guys, this is quite possibly the weakest performance I have ever seen Nicolas Cage give out. A lot of people may not know this about Nicolas Cage, but he is known to be one of the most hammiest actors in the world of film. So when he's in stuff such as "Ghost Rider", or the two "National Treasure" movies , he can turn those performances into solid gold and make it his own movie. But in this movie, Nicolas Cage sounds like he's under-acting his performance. So much so, that he's not able to be himself. If he was playing more of a slightly goofy character, then I think it would make this movie all the more fun to watch. But instead, he remains mostly stone-faced serious throughout most of the movie. And the few attempts at humor in trying to show that he has some sort of personality is forced and unnecessary that it, ultimately, makes his character somewhat lifeless. As for everyone else, even though they didn't have much to work with, they at least turned in halfway decent showings. Except for William Fichtner as the Accountant. He was fucking horrible in this movie. Because it sounds like he doesn't know whether his character is trying to be funny or serious in this movie. And it makes his performance stand out, and not in a good way. So overall, the acting is OK, with the two exceptions being Nic Cage and Fichtner.

Now let's move on to special effects. One thing I didn't mention in this review until now is that this movie was also released in 3D. And I can tell you that this movie, in many shots, was really trying to aim for the 3D effects. And if I were watching the movie in 3D, I would say that the effects would be decent for that kind of viewing experience. However, seeing as how I'm not watching the movie in 3D, I can't really say that. I can tell you that most of those shots look rather average. We also have CG that is OK for the most part, except for one scene. So, we have our two heroes stopped by a police barricade. Now before I go on, I want to make mention that I am in no way a car expert, so if I don't know what kind of model car or truck it is, then I'm sorry, but I can only go by how I can describe it. So, behind the police barricade, we get to see the Accountant drive a truck that has a moving cylinder attached to it. And we see it bumping into the police cars, as some of them explode. All of that looks fine, except for the truck that the Accountant is driving. Because the truck, in about two or three shots, looks as though as if it were rendered out of a PlayStation 1 game. Mind you, this movie came out in 2011. Yet, the CG in that scene would've look terrible if it came out in 2001. That's how bad the CG was for that scene. Beyond that, though, everything else looked OK. From the muzzle flare of the guns, save for one shot where Milton was shooting 3 bullets from his car during the final showdown. But then again, that was scene was shot specifically for the 3D effects. Overall, the CG is average, but none of it is going to stand out at you, unless you were watching the movie in 3D.

Camerawork here is pretty good. The lighting is well lit. The sound-mix is competent enough. The music for both the soundtrack and score are nothing memorable, save for a couple of songs in the soundtrack. One of them I can sorta remember playing during the closing shot of the movie. I may have to look up the song at some point to see what it was called. But that was song was pretty good. But as I said, most of it is not really all that memorable.

So, when all is said and done, am I able to recommend "Drive Angry"? Unfortunately, no. I cannot recommend it, unless you find the movie cheap. Because I spent about $5 on this movie, and I kinda wish I got that $5 back. This movie is one of the most boring action movies I have seen in a long time, and it's by far, the worst Nicolas Cage movie I have ever seen. If you want a good action movie that has Nicolas Cage in it, go watch something like "Ghost Rider" or any of the two "National Treasure" movies. In fact, I kinda want to go watch the first "National Treasure" movie, because I want to watch a better movie starring Nic Cage. And I want to forget that this movie ever happened.

And with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to be covering an animated musical from 1977. That movie is "Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure". That title sounds far too fucking long for my tastes.

Now aside from the long title, I don't know a lot about this movie. In fact, I came across this movie sometime ago when I was watching a short animated film called "The Devil and Daniel Mouse", which I watch every now and again, because I really like that movie. And as I was scrolling down the YouTube recommendations, this movie was one of the things that appeared there. So, I decided to look up any kind of information on this movie that I could find, and to determine whether or not it would be worth covering for this series. And I came across a couple of things.

The first thing is that this movie was adapted for two different stage plays. The first in 1981, and then another version of it in 1984, which was, apparently, a darker version of the story. So much so, that it also got a Broadway release, which really flopped. I don't know how much of the latter is true or not. And the second thing I know about this movie is that it did not last very long in theaters. Why? Well, the movie's budget was about $4 million dollars. And during it's short run in theaters, the movie only got back $1.35 million of it's budget back. So, basically, this thing couldn't even get half of it's budget back. Which isn't very good.

Now you might be asking why would I even cover this movie to begin with? Well, when I eventually looked up the trailer for this movie, the animation caught my interest a bit. It was very...eye catching, to say the least. And I am, somewhat, of an animation buff. More so for hand drawn than CG, but I'm not going to dwell on that too much. I don't know how the music is going to turn out, considering that this is a musical, but I am about to find out right now. So, the only thing for me to do at this point, is to shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure."

3 minutes later

OK, I kinda like how this movie's opening credits tell you who animated what character. That is something I've never seen done before in any animated film ever. It certainly is different, and I gotta give whoever did the opening credits that way some props there.

10 minutes later

All right, so we're up to the second song in this movie, so far, and Andy's singing...kinda sucks. I totally understand that it's way early on in the movie, and there's plenty of time for Andy's singing to get better. But, right now, it's a little bit grating. Mind you, the music, so far, has been pretty good. I'm just hoping for his singing to get better.

7 minutes later

OK, I was totally not expecting that kind of singing voice for Babette. Also doesn't help that some of her singing words are kinda hard to make out. I get that she's suppose to be supporting a French accent, but still, I was totally not expecting that kind of singing voice for her.

13 minutes later

So, guys, do you wanna know what makes Andy's singing worse? It's when you pair him up with Raggedy Ann's singing. It sounds so disjointed, that it's making this song a little bit shit to listen to. Mind you, Raggedy Ann's singing sounds fine, by herself. But when you pair it with somebody who doesn't know how to sing, at least so far anyway, then it's bringing both of these performances down, slightly. Again, I'm certainly hoping for Andy's singing to get better, but, right now, my hopes are kinda low at this point.

12 minutes later

You know, out of all the characters I've run across in this entire movie so far, the Greedy is one of the most uniquely bizarre looking characters I've seen that comes across as both creepy-looking, and uniquely animated. And no, I'm not gonna tell you how, you're gonna have to watch this thing for yourself.

10 minutes later

You know, guys, I would really like to explain what the hell I'm seeing right now. But even I have no idea the fuck what is going in this entire sequence. It's incredibly...odd.

14 minutes later

OK, I know that this is suppose to be a musical, but do we really need a song about the pirate captain and his parrot being true friends? It's rather unnecessary. Then again, most of this movie has been dragging for quite a while now, and it's starting to make this movie kinda dull.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure". And that title still sounds far too long for my tastes. I'm gonna shut the movie off...OK. Wow...where do I even start? I'm gonna be honest, guys, this movie is going to be a very tough film for me to review. Because there is a lot here to like, but there's also a lot of big flaws here that stops this movie from being great.

Let's start with music. Because, after all, since this is a musical, I think it would be beneficial if I talked about the music and the songs first. And the music here ranges from pretty good to being really weak. I will start by saying that the music sounds great, if you take out all of the singing. By itself, the music sounds great. But then we get to the singing, and the singing is...a ridiculously mixed bag. In fact, I would say that out of all the songs in this movie, I can count, in one hand, the number of good songs that I really liked. Which were two or three of them. Everything else is either really short or complete crap. And a majority of these songs contribute almost nothing to the actual movie. Like I mentioned earlier, we didn't really need a song about the pirate captain and his parrot being close friends. Because, they are barely in the movie at all to begin with, so any character depth this movie tried to give them is completely non-existent. And while I'm on the subject of singing, the character of Raggedy Andy, or just Andy as I call him, has terrible singing for most of the movie. I was hoping that, when I was watching this thing, his singing would improve as the film went along, but unfortunately, it didn't get any better. And I mentioned that song earlier with both him and Raggedy Ann, as they are traveling through the Deep Deep Woods. It was fucking terrible. Because, as I said earlier, Raggedy Ann's singing voice is, actually, pretty good, when she's singing by herself. But when you pair it up with Andy's singing voice, it sounds so off-key and unnatural, that it makes them both sound terrible. To a point, that it was almost a chore to even get through that song without having to mute it entirely.

Now I talked about the pirate captain earlier, and how he and his parrot are both barely in the movie at all. And I'm gonna jump ship from music over into writing. Because the writing here is very weak. And when I say very weak, I mean it is a mess. So, we have this doll that came from Paris, France named Babette, that is a birthday present that was delivered to a little girl named Marcella. And Babette is lamenting the fact that she misses her home in France, but the rest of the dolls are trying to convince her that she's going to love her new home here. And as all of this is going on, the pirate captain sees her and attempts to kidnap her and take her as his prize. But he's trapped in a snow globe, because that's where he's lived throughout his 37 years, I think, and wants out. So he ends up tricking Raggedy Ann and the rest of the toys to let him out. And as soon as they get him out, he ends up claiming Babette as his prize and escapes out of a window with his pirate ship and crew. So it ends up with Raggedy Ann and her brother, Raggedy Andy, to find her, and bring her home.

Now all of that sounds fine for a children's film. I'm not expecting a deep, complex story. So, at least in terms of narrative, the concept is perfectly fine. The problem here, though, is that once our two heroes start looking for Babette, the entire story comes to a complete stop. Because, first of all, as I mentioned earlier, not only does the pirate captain disappear throughout most of the movie, but so does Babette. Which is mind-boggling, because she's suppose to be in some sort of peril as she was seen being kidnapped by these pirates. And you would maybe expect a scene or two where we get to see Babette, regretting the fact that she misses home and is hoping to be rescued. But that's not what happens. And this is going to be a bit of a spoiler, but the next time we see Raggedy Ann and Andy catching up to our pirates, Babette is suddenly a pirate captain. When the fuck did that happen? At no time, before then, did we ever get to see how Babette suddenly get the position of pirate captain or even get to see the actual pirate captain locked up below decks. It's really strange to me, because none of this was hinted at during the entire movie, and it really makes me question as to why we never get to see Babette or the pirates until the latter half of the movie?

While I'm on the subject of characters, almost every character in this movie has almost no depth to speak of. The only character that I can recall that had any kind depth was the Camel. Because, during the movie, our two heroes come across a blue camel literally called the Camel. I am not joking, he literally has no name. I guess it was too much of a challenge for the writers to come up with a name for our camel, but I digress. So, the camel once belong to an owner named Sam after he found him at a junk shop, and he felt loved since. And the noticeable features about the Camel is that his leg humps are flattened, and that the sticks in his legs don't function as well as they use to. Then, one day, he was thrown out by Sam's mother when he wasn't looking, and thus the Camel has been all by himself, as he's been busy looking for his caravan of camels. I'm not going to spoil that part, in case you really want to know what that is all about. Plus, also, one of the few songs that I liked in this movie comes from the Camel, which is another reason why I kinda liked him more. But, aside from him, nobody in this movie has any real character depth to speak of, including our two main heroes, who we spend the most time on in the movie. Now perhaps if this movie had focused less on songs, and more time in fleshing out our characters, then this would be a much better movie. But because this is a musical, and that we have a ton of songs in here, this is what we ended up getting.

And here, we come across my biggest problem with this movie. Which is the pacing. This movie has some of the worst pacing I have seen in a long time. Because I already talked about some songs being unnecessary to the story, and how I mentioned the main plot being put on the back burner after Babette gets kidnapped. The worse case of this comes from one scene where our three heroes, at this point, because the Camel ends up joining them, enter Looney Land. And, holy shit, does this scene drag on for far too long. Mind you, when I say that, I mean it lasts around 10 minutes. Now that may not sound very long, but if you ever decide to watch this movie, it really feels like 15 minutes, which still sounds too fucking long. You could almost cut this scene out of the movie, and you wouldn't miss a thing. The only reason as to why it exists is for a subplot involving King Koo Koo, that eventually leads our heroes to finding the pirate ship where Babette is being held at. But again, this film could've benefited had we not had that entire sequence involving Looney Land. Or at least spent as less time there as possible.

Now, I've gone over a lot for writing. And you would think that because of all these problems, I would say that the movie sucks. But I can't, because as I mentioned earlier, there is a lot to like in this movie. And this is where I'm gonna jump ship from negatives to positives. Let's start with the acting. The voice acting is fantastic. Every character, even though most of them don't have a ton of depth, has some spark of life brought into their performances. And it really shows here. Almost every actor in this movie is able give out some really solid performances to these characters. To which, even though the writing is heavily flawed, you are going to, mostly, enjoy what these characters are saying, because the voice acting is just that good. And even though I didn't care for Andy's singing, his acting is actually really good, so it's kind of a trade off. You'll like his acting, but you gotta get use to his terrible singing. There is one character, though, I do need to touch upon, which is Marcella, the little girl. I didn't mention this before, but this movie has a few moments where it'll transition from live action to hand drawn animation. And as I mentioned, every character who is voice acted sounds great. But during the scenes where it needs to be in live action, it focuses on one character named Marcella. And the actress who plays her does a terrible job at it. Now I totally understand that when you are dealing with child actors, you're not really expecting miracles from them, and that's kinda the case here, as well. But she was a terrible actress who really sounded stilted and robotic. But again, she was only a child actress. I don't know if she got any work since then or she's moved on to something else. Point is, she was the only actress who turned in a bad showing. But she's only in the movie for about, maybe, less than 10 minutes, so you won't have to deal with her acting for too long.

The animation is really good. Every character is designed beautifully, from color schemes, to the way that just about every character moves. All of this is some really smooth animation. And I have to give a special mention to the character of the Greedy. Because the Greedy, without giving away what he looks like, is always moving. At no time, will he ever stay the same way. He's always changing his shape and it's some really fascinating stuff here. In fact, the entire animation for this movie is incredibly eye catching. You're always going to be sucked into how these characters are moving. If there were any kind of negatives that I could pull from animation, there are two, and both are incredibly minor. The first one has to do with recycled animation. There are maybe, like, two shots where there are instances of recycled animation. One of them I can think of is towards the very end of the movie. Where we see the Camel looking into the window where all of the toys are together. And, for whatever reason, they use the exact same animation cycle where the Camel starts widening his eyes and his mouth drops slightly. I don't know why they had to use that same shot twice, but it is there, and it was kinda distracting. But that's, like, one of two instances where I could recall seeing recycled animation.

The second bit, and this isn't really a negative, but more so a gripe. I mentioned, a little while ago, that every character was designed beautifully. But some characters have this odd art-style to them that it could be seen as distracting. One example I can think of, is that there are two dolls that are twins. And the way that they are designed, kinda reminds me of something that you would see in a Disney cartoon short from the 40's. It's really odd, but I think that's more based off an artistic choice. Another character I can think of, and I'm not sure how to describe it, but she has a neck that looks like you would see something out of a jack-in-a-box. And her smile is really fucking creepy, too. But again, that's probably more of an artistic choice. In fact, that's something I will say is that the art-style is rather polarizing. And if you never watched stuff such as the older Disney cartoon shorts from the 40's, or any of the Rankin Bass television specials and movies, then there is a chance that you might not like the look of this movie. However, seeing as how I was able to get into the animation in this movie, because I have seen most of that stuff when I was a kid, it didn't bother me in the slightest. So, take it for what you will.

So, when all is said and done, am I able to recommend "Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure"? That...is a very difficult question for me to answer. If you have children, or knows somebody that has children, then they are going to adore this. Even though the story is almost non-existent, most children are not going to notice this. The same could be said for the songs. They are not going to care that there are a lot of songs in the movie, because they'll be busy looking at the fantastic animation. As for adults, I could, maybe, recommend watching it once. Because this is a movie that, if you are into hand drawn animation, and you've never seen this before, then I can definitely say it is worth watching once. I, personally, don't even know if I will wind up watching this movie a second time. But I can say that I am kinda happy that I got to watch this movie once, and if I hadn't discovered this movie by accident, then I probably would've never known that this movie even existed.

Anyway, with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Tourist Trap

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be taking a look at a horror movie from 1979. That movie is "Tourist Trap." I didn't think that I would be covering two horror movies in a row, but here we are.

Now, there's a couple of reasons why I wanted to watch this movie. The first reason being is that this movie was made by a studio known as Charles Band Productions. Which is the same studio that has put out stuff like the "Puppet Master" series, "Ghoulies", and many other horror films that are too many to count. Speaking of which, I also know that this movie was re-released on Blu-Ray in 2014 by Full Moon Features. And while it's not technically made by Full Moon, I'm still going to count it on a technicality that they did re-release the movie. Now, I have stated before that I wanted to see other films from Full Moon that wasn't a "Puppet Master" movie. So far, I haven't found one that I liked, but it's still early and, hopefully, "Tourist Trap" will change that.

And the second reason that I wanted to see this movie is because of one cast member. That one cast member is an actor that goes by the name of Chuck Connors. Some of you might not know who Chuck Connors is. And in case you don't, he was the star of an old Western TV show from the late 50's to early 60's known as "The Rifleman". Which I really enjoyed watching, and still do today. And I'm really curious to see how Chuck Connors will transition from a Western star to a horror movie like this.

I couldn't tell you much about the plot for this movie, other than it has got something to do with mannequins that have supernatural powers. That's pretty much it. I don't know anything else about the movie, other than what I picked up. I don't know if this movie will be any good, but I am certainly hoping for it to be decent. And the only way I'm going to find out if this movie will be any good or not, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Tourist Trap".

6 minutes later

So, hold on a second here. This guy is trapped inside a room of this bar. And rather than trying to go through the broken window that was shattered just moments ago, he instead is trying to break the doorknob off with a crowbar. Mind you, there are two windows. He could easily break the other one with the crowbar-oh, and now he dropped it. Sure, dude, that makes a ton of sense. Anyway, he could just break the other window and climb out of it while trying to defend himself at the same time. I know it's still early, guys, but, so far, I have yet to see any use of common sense being showcased here. I genuinely hope that the rest of the movie is going to be better, but right now, we're off to a bit of a bad start, guys.

11 minutes later

OK, I have a bit of a stupid question that I might regret asking. How does this chick know Mr. Slausen's name? As I recalled, Mr. Slausen never introduced himself to our female characters when he showed up a few minutes ago. I understand that I might be asking a trivial question here, but I am really curious, guys. How did she know who he was?

20 minutes later

That was quite possibly the worst jump scare I have seen in this entire movie. And I can tell you that it was the worst because the movie telegraphed it about 10 seconds beforehand. It's a really bad sign when a movie has to telegraph a jump scare of all things, and it's making this movie kinda shit.

8 minutes later

You know, guys, I'd be willing take this scene seriously if the acting wasn't complete shit. Because we have this weirdo covering wax all over this girl's face, except the girl doesn't know whether she's suppose to be crying or laughing, and it's taking all the suspense this movie had and making it kinda stupid.

19 minutes later

Well, guys, I can confirm one thing so far. Chuck Connors is the only actor in this movie who's putting in any kind of effort. Unfortunately, that's one of the very few positives that I've pulled from this movie so far. But hey, I'll have plenty of time to talk about all of that once this movie is done.

The Review

God, that ending sucked. Well, guys, that was "Tourist Trap". Thank god, it's over. Let me shut the movie off...OK. Where the hell to even start? Um...you know, I was kinda hoping for this movie to be decent and...it wasn't. Anyway, let's talk about this movie, shall we?

I want to start with something that I never thought I would talk about in these reviews, but I want to start with the rating that this movie got. Now, when you think of a horror movie, most of the time, you would expect them to have an R rating. Or sometimes, certain horror movies would get a PG-13 rating. But this movie has a PG rating. Which is rather unusual for a horror movie. Now that might be because the PG-13 rating didn't exist until somewhere in the mid 80's. And since this movie came out in 1979, it wouldn't be a thing for another few years until that rating became a part of the MPAA ratings system. But to be honest, if this movie came out today, there is no way in hell this movie would get a PG rating. At best, I would say this movie would get a PG-13 rating. And that's being generous, mind you.

Now beyond the questionable rating, let's talk about the writing, shall we? Writing in this movie is...incredibly weak. I will say that the story had some level of promise. And, in the hands of a good writer, we would've gotten an amazing story. But, you see, the story is brought down by our characters. Almost every character in this movie is shallow and lifeless. And I talked about this in my previous review of "Killer Klowns from Outer Space", where it's kind of a standard to have some shallow characters in horror movies. But the difference here is that "Killer Klowns from Outer Space" had some really sharp writing to where you didn't really need to worry about shallow characters having some sort of depth. "Tourist Trap" has almost nothing like that. The story here, as I said, could've been amazing, had we gotten someone who knew how to write interesting characters and a better script. But, unfortunately, we got saddled with this, ultimately, dull story. The only character who has any kind of depth is Mr. Slausen, who is Chuck Connors character in this movie. Because he first appears when our character's car breaks down and brings them over to his place to get his tools to help repair their car. And later on, you get to hear from him about how his wife died, how he and his wife wanted to build a resort, and how his brother built these mannequins so good, that they hired him away to the city at a wax museum. And you do kinda feel for him, for like, the first half of the movie. Now this is more attributed to acting, more so than writing. But I'll get to acting in a little bit. But anyway, Mr. Slausen is the only character in this movie who has any kind of saving grace. Granted, it's not much of a saving grace, but it's still there.

I want to touch upon telegraphing. Because this movie has some of the worst telegraphing I have seen in a movie in a long time. And it comes in two factors. The first one is jump scares. Now, I totally understand that a horror movie usually tends to have some sort of jump scares factored into their movies, but these jump scares are just lazily done. Because, first of all, all the jump scares in this movie are not scary in the slightest. The worst of it comes from what I mentioned earlier in the reaction portion of this review. So, we have Tanya Roberts character in this movie, Becky, as she goes to investigate the house of Mr. Slausen's brother to try and find Eileen, because, even though she was told to stay away from the house by Mr. Slausen, she goes to investigate it anyway. Which, I guess is sort of the norm when it comes to the horror movie trope, but it's still stupid as hell. So, we have Becky investigating the house. She goes into one room, and sees Eileen sitting on a chair. Mind you, she sees her from the back. And as she calls out her name as she approaches her, Eileen turns around to reveal that she's been turned into a mannequin, and starts raising her arms up and makes some sort of noise, which scares Becky, as she runs off. And that jump scare was so poorly done because the filmmakers telegraphed it about 10 seconds beforehand. And the worst part about all of this is that, when Becky does enter this room and calls out to Eileen, we actually get a front shot of Eileen turned into a mannequin before the jump scare could take place. And when you do something like that, it takes ALL of the suspension out of that entire scene and makes your jump scare completely worthless. Now granted, this movie doesn't rely on a ton of jump scares, but all of them are not scary and they come off as incredibly pointless, especially with how badly you telegraph those jump scares.

Now, the other factor that I want to mention, and this is going to tie into writing, is that there is a plot twist that happens around a little after the halfway mark of the movie. And it involves our killer, who turns his victims into mannequins. And the most notable features about him is that he wears a doll mask, and has some dark, gravely voice. I'm not going to give away the twist, on the off chance you want to watch this movie, but the twist is so blatant and obvious, because he gives out some bit of dialogue that gives away who our mannequin killer is. And it's worse, because they telegraph this plot twist about 10 minutes before we learn the identity of the mannequin killer. And if you don't figure out who it is by the time they reveal his identity, then I'm sorry, but you're about as stupid as the person who wrote the script for this movie, and thought that this was a good way to build tension.

Now, as for our other characters, outside of them being shallow and lifeless, most of them are stupid as hell. One of them involves our very first victim, who gets killed at the very beginning of the movie. So, he brings his flat tire to this bar, because he was trying to find help. And as he goes into the back of the bar and discovers the mannequin in the bed, that's when almost everything in the room starts to shake, the windows are shut tight, and the victim is trapped, so you would assume he has nowhere to go. Except, there are two windows. One of them was broken by a mannequin, who's head falls off. And there's a crowbar on the ground. Instead of using the crowbar to break his way through the other shut tight window, he instead tries to use it to break the doorknob off the door, in hopes the door will be open by then. He bangs on it multiple times, but the doorknob is still intact. OK, so why didn't he just, as I mentioned, use the crowbar on the shut tight window to break it open and crawl out there? He could've gotten out within a few seconds. Or, he could've used it on the mannequin with the broken head that was in the way. He could;ve knock it down and crawl through the window there. But no. Instead, he drops the fucking crowbar and is holding on to the doorknob for dear life as he's screaming for help. And we see a ton of objects fly towards him while he's still holding onto the doorknob, screaming. And once all of the objects are thrown at him, the one that's left is the crowbar. And, what do you know, the crowbar ends up stabbing him in the back and he dies. Nothing he did in that scene made any sense, and I would've expected him to use some kind of common sense. But I guess that would be asking for too much.

The second instance of stupidity comes when two of our heroes are tied up, while another character, who only appears in this one scene, is strapped to a table. Now I hinted at this scene earlier, during the reaction portion of the review, where she's getting her face covered in wax. Now, I'm not talking about whether or not the victim was suppose to be crying or laughing. I'll get to that in a moment. No, the stupidity comes during when the mannequin killer is putting wax on the victim's face. We see one of our very few male characters in this movie, as his wrists are tied to a wooden pole. And we see him attempting to chew the rope from his wrists with his teeth. As the scene is going on, you would assume that he would get his wrists free and save the female victim from getting her face entirely covered in wax. But no, she dies, and he doesn't step in until AFTER our mannequin killer has finished off our victim. Why would you build any kind of tension, only for it to end up with the victim dying? Again, this is just another sign of the writer not understanding how to build proper tension if it was going to go nowhere.

So, as you can tell, the writing here is terrible. I said at the start of this review that the writing was incredibly weak. But after getting a chance to really talk about it, the writing here is incredibly stupid and kinda insults your intelligence, to be honest. Now, what about the acting? Well, as I mentioned before, the only actor in this movie that turns in any kind of showing is Chuck Connors. And I was curious to see how exactly would Chuck Connors transition from a Western star into a horror movie like this. And you know what? He does it really, really well. Now granted, even though he wasn't given much to work with, he was able to make his dialogue work. And it comes off as incredibly believable. As for everyone else, nobody here turned in a decent showing. The worst of this terrible acting comes from Tanya Roberts. So, I just talked about the scene involving the victim getting her face covered in wax, and how she didn't know whether she was suppose to be crying or laughing. As all of this is happening, we get a couple of shots of Tanya Roberts trying to look horrified as to what's happening to our victim. The problem here, though, is that at the end of both shots, Tanya Roberts look as though as she were smiling. What the fuck is she smiling for? She's witnessing someone about to be killed and she ends up smiling? That, guys, is what ruined the entire scene for me. I could maybe overlook the actress that didn't know whether to cry or laugh, but those shots of Tanya Roberts looking as though she were smiling killed any tension that scene might've had. So yeah, guys, acting here is mostly terrible save for Chuck Connors.

There really isn't a ton of special effects in this movie, outside of some practical effects. And the practical effects are...OK, at best. Because we have plenty of shots involving the mannequins mouths moving up and down, and that looked kinda average. I will say, though, that most of these mannequins are designed really well, and I do like the attention to detail on a few certain ones. The best example I can think of is during when Mr. Slausen brings our heroes to his home, and shows one off of these mannequins that his brother built. Such as one of them looking like a World War II soldier, one of them that looks like an Indian, and another one that was dressed like a cowboy. And the animatronics on them are really well done, especially with how they function. But everything else looks kinda cheap. And I totally understand that this movie was probably filmed with a low budget, but some of it could've been done better. Especially when you consider that the special effects were done by Charles Band himself.

Camerawork is pretty good. The lighting, in most shots, looks pretty good. Though there are some occasions where some scenes are filmed in the dark, but it's not enough to make it where you can't see what's going on. So, in that regard, I can say that the lighting is mostly well lit. Sound-mix and score are mostly good, except for some scenes that have music that sounds really loud. To a point where, I had to turn down the volume because the music was that loud. And it really could've been mixed better had the music not been so blaringly loud. But outside of the music being mixed a little poorly, the sound-mix was mostly mixed well. And the music is also pretty good, too. It's nothing amazing, but it's certainly used well enough, when needed to be properly used.

So, when all is said and done, can I recommend "Tourist Trap"? No. This movie could've been amazing had we gotten a better script and characters that weren't incredibly stupid. And I mean stupid, by the standards of horror movies. But instead, we got stuck with this. I could maybe recommend it if you want to invite friends over for a bad movie night and riff on it. Or if you're a fan of Full Moon and you like their movies, then there's a slim chance that you might like it. But, as for me, I'm probably not going to watch this movie again. And that's a shame, because I really want to find a good movie from Full Moon. Granted, I know that this film was only, technically, published by Full Moon, but still, until I find a good movie from them that doesn't have "Puppet Master" in it's title, I'm just gonna have to stick with those first 5 "Puppet Master" movies, along with "Retro Puppet Master", and "Puppet Master 9: Axis of Evil".

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.