The Dependable Cliché-ables. Sylvester Stallone buys a book from amazon.com called 1001 Dependable Movie Clichés (and How To Utilize Them All In One Movie). Then he writes THE EXPENDABLES 3. DEPENDABLE CLICHÉ: Break an old team member out of jail. Barney Ross (Stallone), leader of the ragtag mercenary guerilla group The Expendables (Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture and Terry … Read More
MAD MAX
Arc of a Driver. Mel Gibson is mad. We know that now. But in 1979, he was madder. As MAD MAX. “A Few Years From Now” in a blasted ochre wasteland of cars and guns, lone highway cop Max Rockatansky (Gibson) goes Mad Mel on the bike gang that killed his wife and child. MAD MAX started it all. We … Read More
MACHETE KILLS
Cutting Coyote Comedy. I can’t tell whether MACHETE KILLS is stupider than EXPENDABLES 2 or smarter than JACK REACHER. Knowing that director/co-writer Robert Rodriguez intentionally crafts this movie with tongue planted firmly in Danny Trejo‘s ass cheek (sorry about the visual) affords it some leeway, however the hyper-reality clashes so discordantly with the ultra-stupidity that Wile E. Coyote called and … Read More
THE BEAVER
Puppetheart. A man suffering from depression bounces back to functionality when he adopts a beaver puppet to speak for him. Hmm… can’t tell whether THE BEAVER is a tragicomedy or a psychodramedy… it’s cute, it’s furry, it’s got a big mouth and it’s slightly insane – but enough about Mel Gibson. Jodie Foster (who last shared screentime with Gibson in … Read More
BRAVEHEART
Mel gets medieval on our asses… When the Legend becomes fact, print the Legend. — from THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE. War is Mel. Reprising his MAD MAX BEYOND THUNDERDOME hairdo, donning a slimming skort, pumping up the man-ceps and dropping an accent that is either Scottish or some form of Indonesian elvish, Mel Gibson brings the thunder as … Read More
EDGE OF DARKNESS
Edge of Dorkness. What a stupid name for a movie! Did they think Steven Seagal was the lead? Notwithstanding yawnful “sinister” attempt at kickstarting Mouthy Mel’s comeback tour, EDGE OF DARKNESS might have been a powerful film, raising questions about unethical corporations and their impunity when backed by government, had it not copped out with a simplistic denouement, using bullets … Read More
CHICKEN RUN
Eggs over easy. THE GREAT ESCAPE meets KFC. Creator Nick Park brings his WALLACE AND GROMIT stop-motion skills to the chicken coop, with CHICKEN RUN, a cutesy claymation adventure set in a British farmyard where a group of chickens are trying to escape Tweedy’s Farm, whose owner has just purchased a pie-making machine that makes… chicken pies! The chickens enlist … Read More
THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST
The Bashin’ of The Christ. Yeah, this is what all those other Jesus movies have been missing – the TORTURE. If you’re gonna bash Jesus, you might as well bash him right. Okay, send me your hate mail and get it over with. But Mel, not me, does more bashing of your effeminate savior than every other Jesus movie in … Read More
SIGNS
Cream of the Crop Circles. SIGNS is a storytelling masterpiece from writer-director, M. Night Shyamalan; a master moviemaker’s layered mosaic of fear, faith, family – and alien invasion. Don’t let the “alien” thing throw you – like every Night thriller, SIGNS is not of the Running and Screaming stripe, rather, a beautifully crafted lesson in film “making”; creative angles, smart … Read More
RANSOM
Blow me the money. Mel Gibson is billionaire airline owner Tom Mullen, whose son gets kidnapped in RANSOM. Rather than play to the kidnappers’ ransom demands, Mullen’s status allows him to go on national TV to offer the 2-million dollars ransom money as reward for any info on his son’s kidnappers – the ransom money becomes bounty money! Serpentine Gary … Read More
GALLIPOLI
Military Unintelligence. Peter Weir’s stirring anti-war epic, GALLIPOLI, has a heart as large as Western Australia, a sweep as wide as its blue-chiseled skies and – Mel Gibson’s naked 24-year-old bottom. GALLIPOLI is not about Gallipoli. The botched Australian and New Zealand Armed Corp (ANZAC) landing at that Turkish beach in 1915 is merely the backdrop to Weir’s wondrous character … Read More
APOCALYPTO
An Epic Fable in a Jugular Vein. MEL GIBSON’S APOCALYPTO is a bone axe to the cervical vertebrae at the base of the skull; jungle-wild beauty juxtaposed with bestial brutality, exceptionally well-executed. Emphasis on executed. Though an ominous quote by Will Durant opens the film (“A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within”), … Read More
Mel Gibson’s DUI
Losing His Religion. n his last day on Earth, Jesus mouthed off at the Jews sharing his table (Peter and Judas and the cast of extras), calling them ignorant and greedy and the cause of all ills. He was drunk. 1,973 years later, Mel Gibson did the same thing. Look what happened to Jesus. I’ve been following the Mel Gibson … Read More
WE WERE SOLDIERS
We Were Soldiers, In A Plotless Movie. Like the Viet Nam war, WE WERE SOLDIERS has no plot. And like the Viet Nam war, the movie drones on incessantly with half of America saluting it and the other half protesting that it should be ended. The number of isolated incidents Hollywood can potentially mine for movies about WWII or Viet … Read More