Reaction & Review | Christine

 

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering a horror movie from 1983. That movie is "Christine".

Yes, guys, this is another one of those movies that I've never seen before. And I probably should have, considering that this movie was directed by John Carpenter. The only other time that I reviewed a movie of his for this series was "Escape From New York", which was quite a long time ago, probably about several years or so. And I think I'm well overdue, so I decided to cover another one of his movies tonight.

Now, I can tell you right off the bat that this movie, apart from it being directed by John Carpenter, is based off a novel written by Stephen King. Admittedly, I have never read any of his novels, but I have seen at least one of his stories that was made into a miniseries. And that was the 1990 version of "It". The one where Tim Curry's character was acting like an asshole in that thing. And before anyone might ask, no, I have never seen the 2017 film, nor it's sequel. I could possibly think about covering it for this series, but I can't really promise that.

So anyway, back onto tonight's subject. I'm really hoping for this thing to be good. After all, it is from John Carpenter, so there is a high probability that this thing is going to be at least reach the standards of it being good. However, considering that I've only seen about two movies from him, there is also that slight possibility that this movie could be a misfire from him. However, I'm still gonna hold hopes here on this thing being good. But the only way I'm gonna find out if this thing *is* any good at all, 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 "Christine".

3 minutes later

Well, guys, I know it's early, but I can at least say that the soundtrack is starting off on a good note. Why? Well, I know you can't hear it for obvious reasons, but it's the "Bad to the Bone" playing in the opening. I honestly haven't heard that song in quite a while, so hearing it again brings a nice touch to this movie already.

20 minutes later

Sorry, guys, if I'm not saying a whole lot right now, I'm sorta getting invested into the story here. It's really intriguing me so far and I'm hoping it stays that way.

16 minutes later

OK, I have a really dumb question here that I want to ask. So earlier, when Arnie bought Christine, the car's mileage was around 93,000 miles or so. And when Dennis went to check out the car himself, the car is now at around 88,000 miles. Now, I don't claim to be a car person, but is it even possible to lower the mileage of a car that's already been driven? I'm pretty sure that you can't, and considering the nature of the car itself, I imagine that Christine might've "magically" lowered the mileage herself. But I am sorta curious to know if that's even possible to do it for real?

8 minutes later

All right, guys, this outburst from Arnie's girlfriend about her claiming that he spends more time with his car rather than her seems kinda...off to me. I'm not quite sure what it is yet, but I am gonna try to explain it once the movie is over. Just thought I'd let you guys know.

11 minutes later

Well, I *was* gonna question why the hell Arnie's response to his car being destroyed seemed rather calm and subdued, and then when his girlfriend tries to console him, he gives out a loud outburst at her instead and tells her not to touch Christine. I *think* it's safe to say that Arnie's priorities seem rather distorted now at this point, in case they weren't already.

19 minutes later

Well, guys, I believe it's now time for Christine to get her sweet, sweet revenge against this prick of a bully by going on a taxidermy rampage on him. And I'm also gonna say that those shots of her on fire while driving looks awesome. Just thought I'd throw that out there. Oh, she also blew up a gas station, too. Still won't be as satisfying as when she kills that prick, but it was still really cool, nonetheless.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Christine". And we're closing out with the same song that was in the opening. As much as I'd like to continue listening to it, I have to review this thing. So, I'm just gonna shut the movie off here...OK. So, I guess I should probably start by saying that I really enjoyed this thing quite a bit. Now, is it as good as, say, "Escape From New York"? No. But then again, I am somewhat more biased towards that thing, so that's just more of a personal thing on my part. And I'd also include "They Live" as well, the other film from Carpenter that I've seen. That said, though, this movie is still really good on it's own standards, so I don't want you to think that I'm gonna be dumping on this movie entirely just because I prefer a couple of Carpenter's films over this one.

So, now that I'm done stalling, let's actually talk about why this movie is really good. And I'm gonna start with the writing. The writing here is really solid, and there's two things that really help it stand out. The first is it's pacing. This movie has some of the best pacing I've seen in a long time. Mind you, the film runs at almost two hours long. And you'd think that this movie would find some way to slow itself down somewhat, considering it's runtime and all. However, that's not the case here. It goes by quick, and you're never gonna notice how fast this movie goes by. And I believe what helps it the most is it's director. John Carpenter knows how to pace his movies properly, just based on the 3 films that I've seen from him. Granted, "They Live" might've had a slight pacing issue, though it's only on the first viewing that I kinda noticed it. The more times I watched it though, it never became an issue for me anymore after that. But anyway, Carpenter, like I said, knows how to pace his films properly, And I want more directors to take note on how he does it. Follow his example, and you might have a better paced movie. I'll just leave it that that.

Now the second thing that helps this movie stand out is it's characters. Specifically, I'm more referring to Arnie Cunningham. Because, when you first see him, he stands out as the stereotypical nerdy kid in high school who would get bullied a lot. And he does in this movie, at the beginning of it. But soon after he buys Christine from this strange old guy, his nerdiness starts to fade away, and he stops wearing his glasses. Which, in part, was mainly because one of the bullies broke them. And from there, he starts to develop into this no-nonsense guy with a serious obsession with Christine, his car. And at first, it's kinda off-putting. But it starts to become more noticeable when his mind becomes warped into insanity and there's almost no going back with his character. It's such a change that it makes Arnie stand out as the most memorable character of the entire movie. The other characters are fine, but Arnie easily steals the show as one of the best characters of the entire movie. Of course, Christine is an obvious second place.

If there is anything I could comment on, in terms of writing, that could be considered a negative, there is one thing that stood out to me. And I mentioned this earlier when I commented on it. So earlier, I mentioned something about the scene where Leigh's outburst on claiming that Arnie spent more time with his car than with her seemed a bit off to me, and I believe I may know why that is. See, Leigh says all this to him, but you *never* see it from her perspective from before that scene happened. The only other time you see both Arnie and Leigh together with Christine is when they're sorta making out at a high school football game, and you never saw that kind of issue between the two then. So, for her to make that sudden outburst at him now just comes right out of nowhere. And I know someone's probably gonna mention that it happened in the Stephen King novel, however, as I've mentioned before, I'm *not* reviewing the novel, nor am I making any comparisons between this and the novel. I always review movies by their own standards. So this scene kinda falters a bit because it just comes right of nowhere without any sort of context to it.

Now despite that one misstep, the writing here is still really solid. And even though the premise for it is kinda silly in concept, it's still executed really well in a somewhat serious matter. The acting here is also pretty good, too. The best actor, by far, would have to go to Keith Gordon as Arnie Cunningham. He plays this character up so well that it's almost frightening. And I'm mostly referring to when his character starts to lose his fucking mind in the latter half of the film. It's great stuff, and it easily makes him the best actor in the entire movie. The rest of the acting is pretty good, too. It's not exactly great, mind you. In fact, I would say the weakest actor in this thing would have to be Alexandra Paul as Leigh. She sounds a bit flakey at times with her performance. However, I will say that, when compared to the previous time that I covered a film starring a "Baywatch" actress, that being Nicole Eggert in "The Demolitionist", Alexandra Paul is definitely the better actress of the two. Granted, I understand that's not saying a whole lot, but it's at least better than nothing. So I can at least grant her that. Her acting isn't that great, but it could've been a hell of a lot worse, too. So, regardless of all that, the acting here is still pretty good from most of the cast, with Keith Gordon stealing the show as the best actor of the movie.

Special effects here are fantastic. Just about all of the effects are done practically, and a lot of them involve the Christine car. One effect in particular that is really fascinating is the way Christine fixes herself magically, I guess if you want to call it. From whenever she gets heavily damaged and destroyed to looking like she's brand new each time she fixes herself. It looks so impressive that I honestly could not tell whether or not it was done in CG. Now it's very well possible that it was also done practically, like just about every other film from Carpenter, but the illusion of it is done really well, if it indeed was done practically. So yeah, guys, the special effects here are really awesome.

Camerawork here is really good. The lighting here is lit really well. The sound-mix is mixed fine. The music here, both in score and the soundtrack, is fantastic. The score is the same kind of synth music that you would hear in something like "Escape From New York". But then again, the music was done by John Carpenter himself, so I guess it's to be expected to hear something similar like that again here. The soundtrack consists of a lot classic pop and rock songs. One of them I mentioned before is "Bad to the Bone" by George Thorogood and the Destroyers. There are a lot of songs that are played in the movie on Christine's radio that conveys what she's saying. One example I can think of is the song called "Little Bitty Pretty One" by Danny & The Juniors, where one of the bullies from earlier notices the Christine car from far away and the song will play, telling them to come and talk to her, as if to tempt the bully to come closer to her. It's subtle hints like that which make Christine that much more dangerous, and all for the better. So yeah, guys, the soundtrack, overall, is great, as is the entirety of the score as well.

In the end, guys, when all is said and done, am I able to recommend "Christine"? Most certainly yes. Like I said, while it's not exactly one of Carpenter's best films, in my opinion, it still holds up really well on it's own standards. If you were a fan of any of King's novels-turned into film adaptations and you haven't seen this thing yet, then I can most certainly recommend it. As for myself, well, I already said that I enjoyed it, so I'm definitely gonna be holding onto it for my DVD collection. And I'm kinda glad that I was able to check out another one of John Carpenter's films for this series, because it was way overdue for me, to a point that I almost neglected them entirely. I do have a couple of other films from him that I'm hoping to cover for this series, hopefully at some point. But for now though, I'm gonna go and watch another film from John Carpenter. I'd love to watch "Escape From New York" again. However, I've kinda seen that one a little too many times, so I'm gonna go watch the other film from him that I haven't seen in a good long while. I'm gonna go and watch my copy of "They Live" again, because I have to be reminded of how awesome that movie is. So that's what I'm gonna go do next once I get done writing up this review.

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 later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Hard Ticket To Hawaii

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering an action film from 1987. That movie is "Hard Ticket To Hawaii".

Now, in case you're new here reading this, a couple of weeks ago, I reviewed the first of many action films written and directed by Andy Sidaris, which was called "Malibu Express". And for the most part, I actually wound up enjoying it a lot more than I originally thought I would. Yeah, it was ultimately just a dumb action film with barely any plot to speak of, but it still wound up being very charming to where I could overlook a lot of the flaws that the movie may have had. 

So now, we come to the second movie from the "Triple-B" series of films that were made by Mr. Sidaris. Now, I don't really know much about this one, other than it being another action film that's probably gonna have a lot of women going near topless, or perhaps even *be* topless as was any indication from the previous film in this series. But considering that this was Andy Sidaris's bread and butter, it's probably to be expected here. So I'm not gonna complain about that, so long as it ends up being entertaining.

Now, one thing that I did find out, while doing a little bit of research for this movie was the fact that this film, in particular, is what most people think of when you bring up Sidaris's filmography. In fact, if I remember correctly, even Sidaris himself stated somewhere that this was his favorite movie to direct. Which is certainly something, but I also remember reading a quote somewhere online (I don't remember where, exactly), that stated that this was the best B movie of all time. Which raises a little bit of a red flag for me, because I have seen a lot of B movies, and I have enjoyed so many of them to a point where I could honestly rank them as some of my favorite movies of all time. And if this film doesn't live up to that standard, I'm probably going to have a bit of complaint with it because it may just be another one of those cases where a movie gets so over-hyped that it won't live up to the standards that some people have set for it.

So with that, I am still very interested to see how this movie is gonna turn out. I want it to be just as entertaining as the first movie was. Hell, I'm honestly hoping for it to be even better than "Malibu Express". I don't know if it will be, or if it will somehow live up to the standard of being the "best" B movie ever made, but the only way I'm gonna find out the answer to any of this 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 "Hard Ticket To Hawaii".

13 minutes later

Well, guys, so far, I can say this much. For starters, this opening song here kinda sucks. I know you guys can't hear it for obvious reasons, but this song here that's playing isn't really that good. And speaking of which, the sound-mixing in this movie a little bit questionable, too, what with some of the acting sounding kinda muffled. Now, I'm hoping that the film does get better, but so far, we're off to a little bit of a rocky start here.

8 minutes later

By the way, guys, I should mention right now that the acting in this thing, at least from our two leading ladies, is horrible. I'm hoping, maybe, that I'll be able to get use to their terrible acting throughout the rest of the film, but I'm not totally sure if I will or not.

6 minutes later

Wait, so let me if I understand this. There are posters of Andy Sidaris's other movies hanging around the area where our two leading ladies are at, including "Malibu Express". And one of them just commented that Cody Abilene, the main character from the first movie, left the agency he was a part of to become an actor. Um...I have a *bunch* of questions about this scene, but I fear that it will hurt my head if I try to ask them, so perhaps maybe I should just roll with it and see if this movie will get any interesting anytime soon.

3 minutes later

So this guy just freaked out upon seeing the snake that was unintentionally released during a struggle from earlier, and he attempts to shoot at it from probably about...10 feet or so, maybe slightly more than that. Like, dude, how the fuck you this afraid of something that isn't even close to being anywhere *near*you? I'm really curious about that, unless this guy is just afraid of snakes in general. Which would make sense, but again, I must stress it's, like, 10 feet away from him or so! That makes almost no sense at all.

15 minutes later

O....K....so, not only did they blow up that guy with a fucking *bazooka* of all things, but they also blew up the blow-up doll as an added safety measure. I could easily say that was fucking overkill, but what the fuck was up with that blow-up doll?! Was that, like, some sort of shield for that blond-haired guy to use? Cause if it was, then that was the shittiest fucking thing you could use as shield! Seriously, I want to know what kind of usage that blow-up doll was suppose to serve?! I'm *really* curious here.

6 minutes later

Wait, is that the same crossdresser that was in the first movie...? Holy shit, I think it is...why the fuck is he still doing the same shtick like he was in the first movie?! Is he just, like, a hired hand whose job is to cross-dress as women for some crime organization? I'm kinda curious about this now, and I don't think this movie is gonna answer that for me anytime soon.

19 minutes later

All right, guys, I know it's a bit late in the movie for me to be asking this, but is anything interesting gonna happen in this thing at all? OK sure, we had *some* interesting things happen, but those moments were very few and far between. This movie's starting to drag a bit, but I'm hoping that the last third of the movie is gonna be really interesting, considering our heroes are prepping up for one final showdown and all. So I'm hoping that it's gonna be worth it.

3 minutes later

All right, well, that was certainly sorta cool to see Rowdy throwing that razor-bladed frisbee that he made earlier to kill that guy. So, I can count that one up as another interesting moment.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Hard Ticket To Hawaii". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. So then...where to begin here? I'm gonna be honest, guys, this one's gonna be a bit tough for me to review. Because, the criticisms I'm about to level against this movie are gonna be seen by some people as being rather trivial. I say this, mostly for the type of movie I'm gonna be covering, which is, of course, an action film. A rather dumb one at that, but I'll get more into that as I actually talk about the movie itself.

I am gonna start by answering some questions that some people may be wondering. Is this movie good? Fuck no. This movie is in no way good. However, I don't think this movie was really aiming to win awards here, so I guess that's a moot point. Now, is this movie entertaining? I would say yes, as long as you're willing to view it through a certain set of lens. I'll get more into that later. Thirdly, does this movie deserve it's praise as being one of the best B movies of all time? Well...I can certainly see why some people would see it that way. Because this movie is filled to the brim with corny dialogue, bad acting, women with their boobs hanging out, action scenes that aren't really there until the last third of the movie. Again, I'll get more into that later. But ultimately, this movie has all of the ingredients of a great B movie. However, if I were making a list of some of my favorite B movies of all time, let's say...Top 5, for example, it would in no way ever make the top 5. Hell, I don't think it would ever make it in a top 10 for me. And that's partially because I've seen a lot of B movies that were far more enjoyable than this thing. Now let me be clear on something. On it's own standards, it most certainly is an entertaining movie. But to rate this thing as one of the best B movies ever made is definitely not worthy of that much praise. At least, for me it isn't.

So, with that out of the way, let's finally talk about the movie itself. I'm gonna start with writing, and the writing here is just not very good. Now, to be fair, the first movie didn't have great writing either, but at least it had a more coherent story that you could follow without too much problems, aside from the anti-climatic ending. Now, mind you, this film also has an anti-climatic ending, as well. Though in this case, they amp that up way more than the first movie did. However, I'm not really gonna speak about it, not that there's much to spoil here, anyway. Most people who watch action films are gonna care about the action scenes. And there are certainly moments where the action scenes do shine. However, I must stress that these are "moments", because one of the big problems that this movie suffers from is the pacing. The pacing in this film is really slow at times. It really takes it's time dragging it's own feet into getting to it's action scenes. I feel as if they were trying to go for a more story-focused action film, but the problem with it is that it really is not that interesting. And, like I mentioned a moment ago, the action scenes themselves don't really ramp themselves up until the third act of the movie. And by that point, the movie just seems to be a somewhat dull, and boring story about a diamond drug ring that is somewhat convoluted and doesn't make that much sense if you try to think about it for too long.

Speaking of which, there is something that I did want to mention, in regards to a scene that I talked about earlier, which was the segment involving Donna and Teryn interacting with the movie posters from Andy Sidaris's other movies. One of them I already mentioned was "Malibu Express", and about how Cody left his investigative position in order to become an actor. And while I still have plenty of questions about it, the one that sticks out at me the most is that if that posters exists, then aren't they inadvertently admitting that "Malibu Express" was *just* a movie, and not, like, a psuedo-sequel to this thing? And also, if I end up watching the next movie in this line-up of the "Triple-B" series, which is "Picasso Trigger", then am I gonna get a reference or something from "Hard Ticket To Hawaii" that it was all just a movie as well? I get the movie was trying to be clever with it's references, but it was honestly really poorly handled. If that was just left simply as a background piece for a nod to Sidaris's previous movies, then I probably wouldn't be questioning it like I am now. However, it stuck out at me the most, and it just left me really confused as to why they even had to bring it up at all to begin with.

Now, one thing I accidentally neglected to talk about in my review for "Malibu Express" were the characters. And part of the reason why I left that out was because there really wasn't much there for character depth, outside of Cody Abilene being a man-whore. I could almost say the same thing about his cousin, Rowdy Abilene, who, I guess, is suppose to have the same mannerisms as Cody. However, with Cody, at least he was able to retain some level charisma that didn't make his character feel completely flat. I can't say the same about Rowdy here, since he is boring as fuck in this thing, and his dialogue really isn't that better, since he mostly just spews out cheesy one-liners that are definitely hit or miss. I don't remember a single thing about Donna, other than the fact that she has huge knockers. And as for her partner, Teryn, the only thing she really likes to do in this movie is basically just make James Bond references whenever she gets the chance. Like when she orders a martini, and she wants it shaken not stirred. And that stuff isn't really all that funny or clever since, well, references are kinda lazy and stupid anyway. Then again, the way they handled the references when it came to Sidaris's movies in this thing was also kinda stupid as well. So again, I guess that was a moot point.

But otherwise, guys, the writing in this thing isn't really that good. Which, for an action film of this magnitude, I wasn't really expecting that anyways. However, I don't think it's quite as interesting as "Malibu Express" was. OK sure, that movie was flawed as hell, but at least it was still entertaining enough to where I could overlook all of the flaws that the movie may have had. This thing though, like I said, while it's still entertaining, it's just not as entertaining, considering that the flaws here are a little bit more noticeable for me to not overlook. And while I'm on the subject of the movie's flaws, let's talk about the acting. I'm just gonna be straight up with you, guys, the acting in this thing is fucking terrible. Almost everybody in this movie ranges on sounding wooden or they're trying to ham it up as much as they can. There's only one exception to all this, and that goes to the actor playing one of the villains known as Mr. Chang. He goes by the name of Peter Bromilow. He's the only one here who's putting on a halfway decent showing, which is kinda sad, considering he's only in the movie for about...5 minutes tops, maybe? And what's even stranger than that is because of the fact that he was the only decent actor in this thing trying, it kinda makes him stand out in a bad way, because everyone else just sounds so terrible. However, it's the kind of terrible that makes the horrible acting stand out in a laughable way. So, as much as I want to rail against the acting even more, I'm not gonna be able to do that, given that most of these actors have probably never acted before this movie. And again, I could see the acting in this thing as just being laughably bad. So, it's something that you have to take for what it's worth, when it comes to the acting in this movie.

Special effects in this thing are kinda average at best. You have some of the standard pyrotechnics, squib work for the guns, and blood effects (what little there are). It's mostly the same kind of effects that were in "Malibu Express". The only thing that's new here is the snake. And the puppetry effects for it is kind of a joke. It's not really that good, though I will say the snake itself is designed really well. I'm pretty sure, at times, that they used an actual snake when it's not being used for the puppetry that's used way late in the film. Overall, guys, the special effects here are rather average, some of it leaning towards being less than stellar.

Camerawork here is decent, but the editing is kinda shit. There are two examples of this I can bring up. One of them is from way early on in the film where Donna and Teryn are loading the snake that was originally locked inside a wooden crate onto a metal stroller. However, when they went to the cargo area to get the snake out, there was no hint of a metal stroller behind them. Now admittedly, this one's harder to prove, since the camera was focusing on them getting the boxed crate out, and you never physically see the metal stroller until the very next shot. However, it is still somewhat noticeable enough for me to make mention of. Now, the other bit of terrible editing that I wanted to mention was later in the movie, where there's scene where Rowdy ends up jogging with a girl, just so he can meet up with another villain named Shades. And as they're jogging together, the girl was carrying a red frisbee in her hand. But on the very next cut, after they end up meeting Shades, Rowdy is *suddenly* carrying the frisbee in his hand. Like, when the fuck did that happen!? Were they just busy tossing it back and forth while they were walking? Seriously, when the hell did he get his hands on the frisbee? I would like to know this, and yet, I figured the movie didn't really care enough to answer it. So yeah, I can just chalk that up to the editor not doing their job properly.

But other than that, guys, the camerawork, like I already said, is decent, minus the terrible editing. The lighting here is OK, as most of it was filmed outdoors. But then again, considering it was all shot on location in Hawaii, and Hawaii is known for it's luxurious views, it would be kinda hard to mess up the lighting there. I mentioned earlier about the sound-mixing, when it came to our two leading actresses dialogue sounding very muffled. Well, the moment that I complained about that, the sound-mixing actually did get a little better. There were moments that it still kinda happened where the sound wasn't quite up to sync, but it's very minor, so I can at least give it some pass there. Really, it's only up until it gets to the title screen in which the sound-mix is a bit of an issue, and it mostly just involves our two leading actresses dialogue. Everything else in regards to the sound-mixing is fine for the most part. The music here totally sucks, though. Most of it is just oozing off that 80's synth music. And normally, I would dig that sort of thing, since I usually enjoy the campiness of 80's music. However, I just couldn't get into that here. And it also doesn't help that the opening title music sucks as well. I don't know if it was because of bad lyrics, or if the singer didn't really put enough effort into the song. But either way, it just sucked. So ultimately, the score and the soundtrack totally suck here.

So, when all is said and done, guys, am I able to recommend "Hard Ticket To Hawaii"? The only way I'm gonna be able to recommend this movie to you guys is if you're able to shut your brain off completely and just view it as a mindless popcorn flick. That's honestly the only way I'm gonna be able to recommend it. That, or maybe if you are someone who's into mindless action flicks, because this will definitely live up to that standard. However, if you are looking for more substance in your action films, then this movie is not for you. I should also mention, again, that the action scenes are rather spaced out. So don't expect a whole lot of them to happen if you're looking for that here. I know this movie has a reputation of being a cult classic, and I can certainly see why some people would think that. However, it's one of those cult classics that just didn't really do much for me. Now who knows? If end up watching this thing a second time through with my brain shut off, I might end up really enjoying this thing more than I originally did. However, I'm not sure if I will end up doing that. I would rather watch "Malibu Express" again over this thing, personally. So anyway...I mentioned the references Teryn made in regards to James Bond. I think I'm gonna go and watch another James Bond movie right now. I'm gonna see if I can my copy of  "Goldeneye" somewhere. I know I have it on VHS, but I don't know if I ever bought it on DVD or not. If I hadn't, then that's a definitely another movie I should re-add to my collection at some point. But for now, though, my VHS copy will have to do for now. So I'm gonna go and watch that next after I get done typing this review up.

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 later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Twilight Zone: The Movie

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering an anthology film from 1983. That movie is "Twilight Zone: The Movie".

I'd like to start off by saying that my first experience with "The Twilight Zone" didn't start with the 1959 series. My first exposure to this series was when I watched the 2002 series hosted by Forest Whitaker. And I remember the show being really fascinating for it's time. Of course, I would later re-discover this series again when MeTV was re-airing classic episodes of the 1959 series that was hosted and created by Rod Serling. And it was great. I really enjoyed the series, and on the off chance anyone might ask, my favorite "Twilight Zone" episode would have to be the Christmas episode involving an old guy dressed up as Santa Claus. I won't spoil that episode for anyone who hasn't seen it yet, but trust me, it's a great episode and I would highly recommend it.

But anyway, setting aside the awesomeness that is the 1959 series, I'm really curious to see what exactly someone can do with a movie adaptation of this particular series. Now I do know that this movie has 4 different stories in it, and each segment is directed by a variety of talented directors such as Steven Spielberg, John Landis, Joe Dante, and George Miller. So, in theory, this has all the makings of a great movie. But, I also know that just because your movie might have great casting in it, doesn't mean that the movie's gonna be any good. And this movie could certainly fall into that trap. But the only way I'm gonna know if this movie is any good at all 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 "Twilight Zone: The Movie".

7 minutes later

OK, so...upon talking about the actual "Twilight Zone" show, the guy in the driver's seat told his friend to pull over just so he can put on some sort of monster mask and, I guess, kill him...I think. Either way, that was a strange way to open the movie. Still though, I am rather curious to see if any of the stories are any good, so let's hope for the best here.

18 minutes later

You know, guys, I am gonna say that this story here involving this racist prick getting his ass handed to him by different races throughout history sounds really interesting, but so far, it's been a little bit underwhelming. Mind you, it is still kinda interesting to watch. I'm just hoping that there's gonna be some sort of payoff to all this, you know what I mean?

14 minutes later

So...this story involves these old people getting turned into kids again because this old guy had a "magic can" that would allow them to relieve their childhood again. All of a sudden, I kinda already miss that first story, because this one's kinda stupid so far. Just throwing that out there.

15 minutes later

You know, guys, I find it really weird how Helen, upon telling Anthony's family that she accidentally knocked him down from his bicycle, the family just seems to react in such a way that they act very happy-go-lucky about it. I don't know, I just find that really fucking creepy for some reason. But hey, so far, it's definitely the most interesting story of the bunch, and I'm hoping it continues this way.

10 minutes later

O...K...well, so, upon pulling out an actual rabbit out of the hat, he also ends up pulling a monster-looking rabbit as well. I am gonna say, that rabbit looks fucking awesome! I'm actually really digging this story, guys, it's kinda fun.

20 minutes later

You know, guys, I'm really intrigued by this fourth story, and what's helping it the most is the acting from John Lithgow. He's *really* selling me on it so far, and I'm curious to see where it's gonna go from here.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Twilight Zone: The Movie". Let me go ahead and shut the film off here...OK.

Before I get into the review, I do need to talk about something that I purposefully left out from the opening. And I wanted to wait until now to talk about it, because I wanted to see the full thing first before I get into what I'm about to discuss with you guys. You see, this movie, unfortunately, has a rather sad history to it. And all of it consists around the first segment, which is called "Time Out". I'll talk more about the actual segment when I cover the writing for this movie, but to give you guys a little bit of a history lesson, the story behind this segment is that the main actor, Vic Murrow, along with two foreign children ended up dying while the film was being made. Now I'm not gonna go into the legal issues in regards to the children not being able to work under California law or the circumstances into what happened after the film was made, but what I am gonna say is that that the two kids were suppose to be a part of the segment, in a different way. Because the segment had it where, originally, Murrow's racist character was suppose to save these two kids from a village that they were abandoned in until a U.S. Army comes in and shoots at them. However, that never happened because there was an accident involving the pilot not being able to navigate through some pyrotechnics, and thus, the helicopter crashed, which sadly ended up killing Murrow and the two children. Which then resulted in this part of the segment being cut out entirely.

Now I obviously can understand why this was changed. However, if I'm being honest here...had that awful tragedy never happened, I think it would've made the entire segment a *lot* better than what we actually got here. Because it would've helped a character redeem his qualities of being a mindless bigot. Unfortunately, what we ended up getting was rather bland. Now again, I do like the idea of the segment where Bill Connor, Murrow's character, gets his ass handed to him throughout history by other races and groups, such as the Nazi's, the KKK, blacks, asians, etc. It sounds really interesting, until you actually watch the whole thing, and it just feels kinda empty and lifeless. Now I am gonna say that the ending here was actually a bit chilling, considering the circumstances of what happens to Connor, but everything leading up to that ending just feels like it could've been handled much better. And again, if that accident had never happened, it probably would've been a great segment. But as is, the entire segment felt like one big ham-fisted moral lesson where we shouldn't be racist at all. Which probably would've been more powerful if we had gotten to see the segment with Connor and the two foreign kids. But instead, the whole message of the first segment was "please, don't be racist". Which, if you applied that to today's social media standards, it would totally backfire on this segment.

But anyway, guys, the first segment of the movie was very underwhelming. And unfortunately, that's what most people, who are familiar with this movie's history, are gonna remember it for. Which is rather sad, because, I'm gonna tell you, guys, the movie is still halfway decent. It isn't great, by any stretch. But I can say that there is enjoyment to be found from this movie. And if you're someone who never had any knowledge about the behind-the-scenes stuff, then it's probably not gonna affect your enjoyment of this movie. Though having said that, if you're someone who's watching this movie for the first time, and you had prior knowledge about the film's history beforehand, then it's probably gonna end up being a rather difficult watch for you guys. Now yes, you can always just skip the first segment on the DVD version and just watch the other segments, but no one should be able to have to skip bad segments in order to enjoy a movie to it's fullest potential. Because once you do that, it'll ruin the film for you. Which is why I'm probably gonna have a more difficult time in trying to recommend this movie to anyone who might be interested in watching it. However, I am gonna be patient with the recommendations, because I still have the rest of the movie to talk about.

Speaking of which, let's actually talk about the rest of the movie, shall we? The writing here, as a whole, is a sort of a mixed bag. Now when I say it's a mixed bag, I'm mostly referring to the fact that, out of the 4 stories we got here, only 2 of them I'd say are worth watching, which would be the latter 2 segments. I've already talked about the first segment in great detail, so I'll go ahead and skip it. The second segment, which is called "Kick the Can", is quite possibly the worst segment of the entire film. Not only is it because it's boring as shit, but it also doesn't feel like it would fit in an episode of "The Twilight Zone". Most of the segment is being played up as a whimsical light-hearted comedy, but it just feels very out of place here. And to give you guys a comparison, the Christmas episode I mentioned earlier was also light-hearted in tone as well, but they didn't completely play up the happiness because most of that segment was a drama. And only by the end of it did it have a happy ending because the writing in that segment was so good, and the buildup to it was well worth the happy ending. This thing, though, felt like a movie Spielberg wanted to make at one point in his career, but ended up getting rejected by almost every film studio out in Hollywood because it had almost no real substance. And yes, I can reference Spielberg's name here, because he's the one who directed it! I don't know what he was thinking when he directed this segment, but again, it felt nothing like a "Twilight Zone" episode. It just felt like more of a lifeless passion project that he wanted to work on so badly, but it just had no real flare to it.

Now beyond Spielberg's shitty segment, the 3rd and 4th's segment are, again, really good. More so the third segment called "It's a Good Life", because it is, by far, the best thing about this movie. It was creepy, creative, and definitely felt more like an episode of "The Twilight Zone". But then again, this segment was directed by the same man who made "Gremlins" and "Gremlins 2". And you can definitely feel that kind of vibe from watching this segment, because everything about it was, again, very creative and I expected no less from Joe Dante. The fourth, and final segment, which was called "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" was also very good, too. Mind you, it does have a couple of flaws to it. Such as near the ending where our main character is being sent to the hospital for being "clinically insane" after seeing a monster he thought up of in his head. That part doesn't really bother me as much, but what exactly happened to the photo that he took with the camera he stole from this little girl in order to prove that the monster he was seeing destroying the plane's engine was for real? I don't recall anyone ever bringing that up. The only thing they did notice was that, again, near the end of the segment, they see that one of the planes engines was indeed ripped out and destroyed. So the thing about the photo leaves a little bit of a question mark there. But beyond that, the segment is rather enjoyable, so I can't really complain too much there.

But overall, guys, the writing here is most definitely a mixed bag. The first two segments aren't really that great, while the latter two segments are definitely really good. So, it's kind of a tricky situation with this movie in which would it really be worth it to go through the entire movie in order to get to those two good segments? Again, I'll hold off on giving a definitive answer to that when I get to recommendations. As for the acting itself, well, I am gonna say that most of the acting is really good from most of the entire cast. I'm even gonna mention the less than stellar segments that weren't really all that good, because the acting from everyone there was also really good, too. I'm even gonna include most of the child actors that they got for this movie. Their acting wasn't too bad for what they had to work with. Mind you, none of it is really that good, but it's still miles better than what I've heard from the past when it comes to child acting. So, at least there's that. The rest of the acting is great. Everyone turned in an awesome showing, regardless of the quality of the scripts that they were given for their respective segments. The best one, by far, would have to go to John Lithgow in the 4th segment. He's certainly hamming it up at times, but it's still a convincing performance to where I could overlook a lot of the goofiness that he kinda slips out. So yeah, guys, the acting here is really good from just about the entire cast.

Special effects in this movie are pretty good as well. And considering the fact that this movie was only made for about $10 million dollars, it does a really good job in handling it's effects. The best example would have to be the third segment again. The creature effects look amazing here. Not only do they look great, but also the animation here as well. There are a lot of cartoons playing, in which most of them are older Warner Bros. cartoons, but there's this one cartoon segment that they show, and without going too much into spoilers here, it involves one of the more creative deaths I haven't seen in a movie in a long, long time. That's how awesome it really is. There is very little usage of CG here. But then again, CG was hardly a thing back in the early 80's, so it's just something you have to roll with. The creature effects used in the final segment also look really good, too. So overall, guys, the special effects here are really good. In fact, I would say that they mostly hold up by today's standards. But that is just me, personally. Overall, the special effects here are really good.

Camerawork here is also really good. The sound-mix here is mixed fine. The lighting here is also lit really good. And the score here is great, mostly because, it was done by Jerry Goldsmith. And I've talked about him a few times in the past about how good his musical scores have always been, and this movie is no exception. Granted, it's not his best, but even on those standards, it's still really fucking good. So regardless, guys, the music here is fantastic.

So now, we come to the ultimate question regarding this movie. Essentially, guys, am I able to recommend "Twilight Zone: The Movie"? Oh man...um, how to answer this question? Well...if you can somehow overlook this film's tainted history, you might end up enjoying this thing. However, I can't guarantee that you'll like all of the segments that are featured here. Like I said, only two of the segments are worth watching, which would be the latter two segments. The first two, though...well, I can't promise anything with those. You could somehow end up enjoying them more than I did. And if you do, that's awesome. Rock on. But if you only care about half of the segments or, somehow, none of them at all, then there's no way I can really recommend this to you guys. If you are fans of "The Twilight Zone" show, well again, I can't really promise that you'll really enjoy this entire movie, since there's only half of a good movie here. I'm probably not gonna be watching this thing again, unfortunately. Which is a shame, because I wanted to really like this thing as an entire package. But as is, that's not the case here. So I'm probably not gonna be holding onto this thing for my DVD collection. Speaking of which, though, seeing as how I mentioned "Gremlins" when talking about that 3rd segment, I'm gonna go and watch the first "Gremlins" movie right now. And if I'm in the mood, maybe I'll watch the second film right after it, who knows? But anyway, I'm gonna go and do that next after I get done typing this review up.

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 later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Malibu Express

 

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering a movie from 1985. That movie is "Malibu Express".

Now, for those of you who don't know, this movie was written, produced, and directed by a man named Andy Sidaris. And before I go even further, I should mention that, throughout the next couple of months, I'm gonna be covering quite a few movies from him. Now, to anyone who's not familiar with his work, he was mostly known for making trashy-looking action movies featuring girls in skimpy outfits and other such stuff. I'll get more into that in a second. Now I know I've stated in the past that I'm not really into plotless action films, but I've always had an interest in checking out Mr. Sidaris's work. And tonight, I'm finally gonna get a chance to see if any of them are good.

Now, to go into a little more detail into what I'm gonna be covering here, like I said, all of the movies I'm gonna be covering from him are action films. And in particular, the movies I'm gonna be covering from him are all part of a series known as the "Triple-B" series. And in case you're wondering, the Triple-B stands for Bullets, Bombs and Babes. Speaking of babes, that brings me to another point. All of the movies that he made under this series starred women that were either Playboy Playmates or came from Penthouse Pets. Now whether or not any of them can actually act decently is something I'll find out for myself, but it does leave me rather curious here.

As for what I know about tonight's movie, honestly, I don't really know much, outside of what I just described to you guys. The only thing I actually do know about is one of the leading actresses. Now admittedly, I don't really know if she was also a member of Playboy or Penthouse at one point, but what I can tell you about her is that she goes by the name of Sybil Danning. And for those of you who don't remember, she was the star of a god-awful movie I covered last year during my "Full Moon vs. Troma" marathon, which was called "Panther Squad". I hated "Panther Squad", so she isn't exactly winning me over here.

So, in case you couldn't tell, I'm kinda dreading about what she's gonna do here, but who knows? She could pleasantly surprise me and actually pull off something decent here in this movie. I'm also hoping for the movie itself to be very interesting. But the only way I'm gonna find out the answer to that 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 "Malibu Express".

5 minutes later

Wait, she was actually wearing her racing suit while being completely topless underneath it?! OK...admittedly, I'm not really an expert on how women dress up for racing, but was that actually common back in the 80's to just have women topless while wearing nothing but a racing suit? Mind you, I'm not judging what she wears, but it does leave me rather curious, you know what I mean?

6 minutes later

Well, guys, I am able to say this much. The music here has been pretty good so far. I know you guys can't hear it for obvious reasons, but this song here sounds like old school country music. I haven't listen to that in a long time, and hearing it now sounds pretty cool to me.

11 minutes later

Well, guys, it is official: Cody Abilene is a fucking man-whore to a tee. He has so many woman friends that he hangs out with, and the only thing I can ask is how many of them has he, or is about to potentially bang? So far, he's only done it once, which was with Contessa. But I'm kinda surprised he's able to hold in those urges while he's on the job. I guess that's dedication for you.

5 minutes later

You guys know how I mentioned a moment ago that Cody was a man-whore for having so many women friends that he hangs out with? Well...I'm think I'm gonna have to rescind that statement, because I found somebody else who's a fucking creepy scumbag that goes by the name of Shane. So far, this guy has taken pictures on a timed camera while having sex with a girl in the shower, and he's currently having sex with *another* girl while having a hidden camera that he's operating that watches them. I think it's safe to say that I'm beginning to despise Shane at this point.

19 minutes later

All right, guys, well, good news is that Shane's now dead. Bad news...well, I guess he can't pay off the $30,000 that he was suppose to pay off. Not that it matters much anymore, considering he's now dead. Still though, can't really feel sorry for the guy, so...good riddance, I say.

9 minutes later

So, instead of actually looking for any kind of evidence at the beach house that Lilian gave Cody, the first thing he does is to have sex with his lady cop friend from earlier. Gotta love to see Cody's priorities are in the right place, you know what I mean?

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Malibu Express". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. Wow, um...I'm trying to figure out where to start here...

I suppose the first thing I can say right off the bat is that this movie is dumb as shit. It hardly ever takes itself seriously, and what little seriousness they try to play up ultimately ends up being forgotten about as the rest the film ends up being about as dumb as it gets. There's very, very little plot here, which I kinda expected, being this is an action film and all. We have a *lot* of scenes and shots where women are either topless or are having sex with the good-looking guys. Well, mostly Cody Abilene, and a couple of times with Shane. Although the latter is done in a more creepy way. But yeah, this movie is not shy about showing any of that. Which, in part, is the part of the movie's charm. Because, even though this is only the first movie of his that  I've seen, the main selling point of Sidaris's movies were the beautiful women he casted. And like I said, this movie isn't shy about showing any of that. So yeah, if you like seeing tons of fanservice, this movie will definitely deliver on that aspect.

Our story here, like I said, is very thin and is only used as a framing device for this movie's main selling point. What little plot involves our main character, Cody Abilene, who's a Private Investigator that's being sent out to a home owned by a woman in a wheelchair named Lilian to investigate some sort of computer ring that Shane, which is Lilian's butler, gets involved in and has to pay up $30,000 to his boss. Though that kinda gets cut short, seeing as how he ends up getting killed later on, which then gets turned into a murder mystery of who killed Shane. And, of course, there's a bunch of action scenes, too. Really, guys, this story is very bare bones here. And what's really funny about all this is that they try to wrap it up in the most anti-climatic way possible. I'm not gonna spoil it for any of you, guys, on the off chance that you actually care about substance in your action movies. But I will say that the explanation of what happened *kinda* makes sense. I say "kinda", because, like I said, it comes almost out of nowhere. And if you're able to just roll with it, then it's gonna make your viewing of this thing a lot more enjoyable.

Speaking of which, let's talk about the film's humor next. Since the film doesn't really take itself seriously, you would naturally expect the movie to throw in some humor, and this movie's filled with that. There's a lot of sexual humor in it. I'm talking about jokes involving boobs, Cody's dick (yes, seriously), or how almost every woman seems to have the hots for our main character in wanting to have sex with him. All of that is here, along with this running joke where Cody is being stopped by this family, and their son wants to race him and prove that he can beat him. It's kinda stupid, and serves no real purpose to anything, but it still kinda works. The humor itself is a bit of a mixed bag. Some of it is really funny, other times, it falls kinda short. Now I do have to warn some people ahead of time that there are a couple of attempts at offensive humor, specifically, there will be about 2 or 3 moments where a character says the word "faggot". Now I obviously understand that some people will be turned off by this entirely now that I mention it, but like I said, it only happens about several times in the movie. And once it's out of the way, you don't have to worry about hearing it again. Myself personally, I'm not offended by any of this. But it is something that I still wanted to make mention of on the off chance someone gets easily offended by this.

Now even though there's not much of a story here, I actually do want to talk about the dumbest moment in this entire film. See, it happens right around the 3rd act of the film, as Cody and June are being chased down by these 3 bad guys by a helicopter, with Cody taking the wheel in June's racing car. And throughout the chase, June decides to try and have her way with Cody as she keeps coming onto him with her boobs hanging out. Cody keeps telling her no, but she keeps insisting it. And as the bad guys are chasing them from the copter, she notices them and actually asks them do they want her tits! Yes...seriously. She's kinda stupid. And it's when she finally decides to switch her stupid mode off upon realizing that they're carrying these ridiculously over-sized rifles, and tells Cody to step on the gas! Lady, I understand that you clearly want Cody to have his way with you, but there's a time and a place for that kind of shit, and doing so while during such a dangerous chase is clearly *not* one of those times! Good lord...

So yeah, guys, the writing here is stupid as shit. Which, for an action film, that's not really a hard thing to accomplish, but still, at least it knows what it wants to be. And that is being a stupid, cheese-ball action film with lots of women showing off their boobs or wanting to have sex with our main character. And while I'm someone that doesn't really care much about that, the film does have enough charm to where I can overlook a lot of that, because it felt mostly natural, outside of a couple of hiccups involving it's humor. Now that aside, the acting here isn't really that good either. Cody's actor actually provides narration throughout the movie, and it sounds incredibly wooden. Which, when compared to his on-screen performance in this thing, it's actually not that bad. Again, it's not really good, but it's certainly better than almost his entire narration. Most of the female cast members of this movie kinda sucked as well, mostly the two ladies who are always inside Cody's yacht, which he cleverly calls it "Malibu Express". I'm guessing they're the ones who are either at Playboy or the Penthouse Pets. Not totally sure which, don't really care. Point is, their acting sucked. Surprisingly though, the best actress in this movie has to go to Sybil Danning. She plays Contessa in this movie, and she's surprisingly rather decent here. Granted, that's not saying much, considering the only other time I saw her act was in "Panther Squad". But still, she does pull off a decent performance here, so I can at least say that much about her. Most of the other cast members seemed to be hamming up their performances, and judging from that, I don't think they were taking it that seriously. Which is a good thing, because I think that if they had tried to take it seriously, it probably would've destroyed the movie's charm. So, acting wise, it's not really that good, but it's certainly not the worst, either.

The only thing I can really comment on special effects are some blood effects, which there really isn't much of to begin with. Most of the effects boil down to the squib work on the guns, and that's about it. Then again, this movie was probably filmed on a low budget, so I wasn't really expecting anything special when it came to the special effects from 1985. I will say that the costuming here is OK. Most of that I could just say involves any woman wearing very little clothing, but then again, that was the film's intention, so it's kind of a moot point to bring up. I will say, though, that the wig this maid wears looks overly-ridiculous, because the wig is basically just big curly gray hair. The maid outfit she wears is also a little bit tacky, but honestly, I'll take that over the fake wig any day. That aside, the costuming here, like I said, is just OK.

Camerawork here is decent, at least, for the standard of low budget films. It's not great, but it's definitely not horrible either. Lighting here is pretty good. The sound-mix is mixed fine. The music is actually pretty good. Most of the songs in this movie consists of old-school country music. Now admittedly, it might have been made specifically for this movie, rather than using classic country songs in general, but it's still pretty good, and is certainly one of the better highlights of the movie. The score is also decent, what with the usage of banjo music and all. It's something I don't hear used a lot anymore, so to hear it in this movie is a rather nice touch. Otherwise, guys, the music here is pretty good.

So, guys, when everything is said and done, am I able to recommend "Malibu Express"? For the most part, yes, as long you know what you're getting yourself into. If you're someone who likes cheese-ball action films with hardly any plot and a bunch of fanservice to go along with it, then you're gonna adore this thing because it has all of that in spades. If you're looking for a more serious action film, then this thing is not gonna be for you. And as someone who also normally prefers a little more substance in their action films, I would normally disregard these kinds of action films. However, this is one of those cases where I'm not gonna be able to do that here. Because, while the film is dumb as shit, I actually found myself really enjoying this thing for the most part. And the fact that the movie knew what it wanted to be instead being something that it isn't makes this thing all the more charming to watch. So yeah, guys, again, I can most certainly recommend it, provided, of course, that you're into these sorts of movies to begin with. I'm hoping that the rest of the movies I'm gonna cover from Andy Sidaris are gonna live up to what this movie was able to offer. Or perhaps maybe even better than this thing. I have no idea at the moment, so for now, I'm gonna go and watch something else. I think I'm just gonna watch a James Bond movie. And I notice my VHS copy of "The World Is Not Enough" sitting on my VHS shelf there, so I'm gonna go and watch that next, because I haven't seen that thing in a long time. So that's gonna be a fun little nostalgia trip to relieve again.

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 later. Peace.