Diving into a fiction of a fiction. In 1979, Captain America takes time out from saving Americans, to save Ethiopian Jewish refugees in Sudan, under the cover of THE RED SEA DIVING RESORT, a fake resort run by him and his superhero pals, to throw the Sudanese government off their taut-buttocked scent. Chris Evans is Ari Levinson, heading a team … Read More
ENDER’S GAME
The Thinking Man’s Alien Invasion. A boy-genius strategist is recruited by Earth’s military to repel extra-terrestrial alien invaders. And does the job TOO well. Adapted from Orson Scott Card’s 1985 novel of the same name, ENDER’S GAME is set in a dystopian future where children adept at video games – the currency of future war – are taken from their … Read More
THE JUNGLE BOOK 2016
Bare Man-cessitites. Am I evil? Yes I am! Am I evil? I am Man! — Diamond Head, “Am I Evil” THE JUNGLE BOOK is “Based on the books by Rudyard Kipling,” which means it is based on the 1967 Disney cartoon. That’s all this is – the Disney cartoon remade as a CGI-animated feature. No mention of Rikki-Tikki-Tavi and Nag, … Read More
SCHINDLER’S LIST
The Ones That Got Away (alternate title in Germany?) He was German, a Nazi, a profiteer of slave labor, a philanderer, an adulterer, a confidence man and a traitor to his country. He was Oskar Schindler, who saved over 1,100 Jews from concentration camps in World War II. Reminds me of that joke “…but screw just one sheep…” in reverse. … Read More
THE DICTATOR
For To Make Democratize in America. In the grand tradition of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visiting Columbia University in 2007 and denying the Holocaust, claiming Iran has no gays and lets women roam free with equal rights, so too is Wadiya’s dictator Hafez Aladeen, granted all courtesies when visiting the United Nations to extol the virtues of his oppressive Middle … Read More
IRON MAN 3
Phallus Metallus. Hmm, an IRON MAN movie without Iron Man… Kiddies will fidget, parents will cringe, marketers will hit the roof, executives will cower, and fans of good storytelling will rejoice. Is IRON MAN 3 the best of the series? Maybe. Probably. If you could call this an Iron Man movie. All I know is, Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) … Read More
SHUTTER ISLAND
Just dropped in – to see what condition my condition was in… The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven. –John Milton, Paradise Lost. What a beautiful, sophisticated, mind-leveling thriller! SHUTTER ISLAND is not “scary,” but creepy, disturbing and filled with enough tension and intrigue to drown a plush … Read More
A SOUND OF THUNDER
A Sound of Chunder. A Sound of Thunder. One of the greatest short stories ever written. By one of the grandest Grand Masters of Fantasy, Ray Bradbury. A SOUND OF THUNDER. Vomitous movie. In Bradbury’s science fiction short story, a company called Time Safari offers big game hunters the opportunity to go back in time and kill dinosaurs. Rule Number … Read More
SPECIES
Darwin never looked so good. It’s ALIEN with a spectacular pair of natural knockers. Designed by H.R. Giger – the alien species, not the knockers – a half-human, half-alien life form called Sil (Natasha Henstridge in her human form) escapes from a SETI facility and goes on a rampage fucking everyone. In the Biblical sense. And then fucking them in … Read More
WAR, INC.
Orwell’s 1984 meets W.’s 2004. War is the improvement of investment climates by other means. — Ben Kingsley, WAR, INC. WAR, INC. is political satire almost blacker than George W. Bush’s rectum heart, but wildly funnier than his misshapen weasel head. The opening text hits too close to the bone: “In the 21st Century, great corporations will bestride the Earth … Read More
THE LOVE GURU
Half-Spreading the Love. THE LOVE GURU: another excuse for Mike Myers to act unutterably stupid – and get paid for it. As the Guru Pitka, the usually brilliant Myers is in mediocre form, playing an Indian guru who is hired by Jane (talentless Jessica Alba) to help a recently-separated hockey player, Darren (Romany Malco, THE 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN), find … Read More
LUCKY NUMBER SLEVIN
Überhip Ünderworld. Embedded in the canon of hip street-thuggery, there is Scorcese’s GOODFELLAS, there is Tarantino’s PULP FICTION, there is Ritchie’s SNATCH – all periodically panned for their filmic stylings, yet garnering indirect accolades through their wealth of imitators – but if there is such a thing as “too hip,” Paul McGuigan‘s LUCKY NUMBER SLEVIN would be choking on its … Read More
DAVE
Electile Dysfunction. Rooted solidly in the “We Can Dream, Can’t We?” mold, DAVE follows the adventures of a stand-in for the American President who tries to rectify the administration’s shortcomings while “in office” – a grander fantasy than any cobbling from J.R.R. Tolkein. Despite the hypocrisy in trying to retain democracy’s visage by inserting a lookalike into the Presidential post without … Read More