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Bum Reviews (2008)
Bum Reviews Review
Oh My God! This is the greatest review show I had ever seen in my life!
It's about this bum, named Chester, and a bunch of unseen people force him to see movies before then sticking him in front of a camera to say how awesome all of the movies are! Only as he starts spoiling everything that happens, he tends to realize how much most of the plots tend not to make any sense... or that certain protagonists are idiots... or jerks... or more evil than the supposed bad guys. Okay, a lot of times the movies turn out to actually suck. But on the bright side at least these unseen people are exploiting a deranged homeless man into making a fool of himself in return for letting him sit inside of a nice warm theater for a few hours.
I made a fool of myself once! But it only happened when I was writing reviews on IMDb.
So if you like well thought out, spoiler-free movie reviews then... I... recommend finding some other reviewer who is much more professional, relaxed, and likely not shooting up on something while smelling like rotten cabbage and wet cardboard on his best day. (By the way, I'm pretty sure it wasn't wet with water.) But if you just want a laugh and don't mind being spoiled while watching a good riffing on many of the major cinematic releases, then you might possibly settle for this bum.
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2010)
A damn fun film.
To summarize where I'm coming from: (1) I've never played the 'Prince of Persia' games, (2) I had no idea what they were about, (3) I've never read any promotional side product of the video games, (4) I've never even read a summary of one of the game's plot off of Wikipedia. The most was maybe I read one back-of-the-box blurb in a Blockbuster 3 or 4 years ago, and I can't even remember what it said. So, other than seeing the trailers and the knowledge that this did come from a video game, and that this was coming from Disney. So, in the end – or at least when I was heading in to see the movie – I was hoping for an exciting PG-13ish popcorn flick.
My hopes were well met.
'Prince of Persia' was as good if not better than many other fun flicks I have seen. The characters were entertaining and neat. The quips and banter between Dastan and Tamina was good. The special effects were well done for a movie where you knew walking in that realism wasn't a major factor. Many details of plot were predictable, but enough was going on to have me hooked in so that I didn't care. The relation Dastan had with his father and brothers was very interesting and wasn't as cookie-cutter as I expected. In fact, it was better handled that in many "serious" movies I've come across.
The only other criticism I had was the overuse of bullet-time and ordinary slow-motion shots. The bullet-time was good a few times, since normal speed would had just been quarter-second and gone instead of adding a little bit of tension. But the slow-mo during some jump scenes or dramatic moments looked force. Plus the choppiness was took much (Dastan in front of the fire, for example). They should had planned that shot in advance and sped up the film during recording to get a smoother slow-mo image instead of dropping the frame rate in playback.
Eh. So it wasn't perfect. The humor, banter, and tension was well done, and the movie never felt like it was going on too long or too boring. Dastan's acrobatic tricks might had felt forced if it wasn't for the fact the talent was well established at the beginning, and if anything it made sense for him to use his talents throughout the film. And it 'was' entertaining to watch.
To repeat myself in summary, it was fun. This is the first time I've walked out of a movie not only feeling the possibility of a sequel looming but also very much looking forward to it. I also can't wait for the Blu-Ray release.
Sit back, grab the popcorn (or nachos or pretzel-bites), and enjoy.
Head Office (1985)
poor Reinhold in the complaints department...
I have read the other comments here and I do understand everyone has their point of view. I agree that if you have never worked for a huge corporation (where employees are numbers not faces)then this movie will probably seem like nothing more than a stooges flick with big name cameos. I as a rental when I was working for Raytheon as a secretary and I can officially say that this movie is hysterical. It starts out fast in the opening with DeVito and then later on with poor Reinhold in the complaints department... if you have ever worked for PR or Customer support this will hit home in extremes! I love it and have looked for the video for years when it seemed to disappear off the face of the Video world (unless you bought it from a used video store's antique collection). I still hope it will eventually be released to DVD but until then I will be content with my video and hope to not wear it out. :)
24 (2001)
DVDs back-to-back-to-back-to-etc.
I missed this show when it was initially on the air, and I have to say that I'm a bit glad I did. When Season One came out on DVD, my wife and I picked it up and started watching the episodes one after the other.
I think if I was forced to wait a week between each episode I would have shot myself. It was painful enough just having to stop the DVD player at midnight due to the fact I had work in the morning! It is that good.
The acting in the show was great (*NOT REALLY A SPOILER*) although I thought Dennis Hopper's accent was a little painful to listen to, but the role was otherwise carried out wonderfully. The storyline was fantastic and kept me interested all the way through.
I don't mean to critique other posters... well okay I am, (*SPOILERS*) but just to clarify one detail on the claim of another IMDB poster that Bauer was a terrorist while conducting his actions in Europe. Technically, he was an assassin. Not a terrorist. A terrorist acts to spread fear and disrupt the lives of a populous (like bin Laden or the Sons of Liberty). An assassin is out to kill a specific target or targets (like Lee Harvey Oswald or Brutus), and in this case Bauer was guilty of causing some collateral damage. That's not an excuse, condemnation, or approval (although my opinion does fall into one of those three categories). I'm just clarifying the difference.
But getting back to my review of the show, there is one detail that I did want to quasi-humorously point out about the show. Is it just me, or were the married women on this show required to be people you wanted to slap repeatively. Yes, there were only two people who really fit the bill on this one; but both of them REALLY got on my nerves. (This is not a criticism of the actresses. It was obvious to me that they were written this way.) Oh well, (* MAJOR MAJOR SPOILER HINTINGS*) at least considering what happened to both of them, I look at 24 as having a happy ending. 'insert evil grin here';
SpongeBob SquarePants (1999)
Sick, twisted, perverse, piece of great entertainment
It's a good thing to be able to watch something that short circuits the mind long enough to not take anything seriously. The show is hysterical and disturbing. And nowadays I need both.
My 2 cents on the sexual 'debate': the nudity jokes are completely based on the fact that there is NOTHING to show. It's as if Donald Duck took his shirt and hat off and people started worrying about him being naked. A lot of times cartoons will put stuff in that the youngest of the innocents will not catch but the older viewers will. And if someone young does pick up on it, then they obviously already are intelligent enough to understand the joke. Personally I'm more disturbed by the live-action cuts that they occasionally do, but that's what makes the show funny.
Now if only Gary will get his own spin-off. :-)
Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002)
Bashing aside... well, mostly.
I just saw Episode II last night, and although it will be another 3 years before I can truly comment on the first trilogy (Episodes I-III) to the original trilogy (Episodes IV-VI), I'll have a go at it since the first trilogy is almost 67% complete.
First off, it is now official in my mind that the first trilogy has the better and more complex storyline. In fact, I believe that it is far far better than the original. [And believe it or not I did not intend the pun reference to the opening line of the films.]
*SPOILER ALERT*
Watching the manipulation of Palpatine over the entire Empire is extraordinarily impressive. Evil guy we're supposed to be rooting against or not, I really admire him now and have realized that for good or bad, at this point he deserves the Republic. After Episode I, I was just impressed with him, now I believe the man to be a total genius.
The other reason I love the first trilogy is because (and of course it is needed for the set up to the original trilogy) the 'good guys' have lost big time in both movies (and you know they will have to completely crash and burn in Ep. III). However, in parts I and II, it is easily mistaken by those not paying attention (like Obi) that the good guys did save the day both times (albeit at some cost, but that's always the case). At least in Ep. II, Yoda is intelligent enough to verbally backslap Obi when he makes the comment claiming that things did come to the happy ending.
Did I hate Jar Jar in Ep. I? Heck yeah. However I did like the fact that his antics were toned down in Ep. II (he had character development over 10 years) and that he himself became completely used as a pawn in the short air time he had. Frighteningly, that means the character actually had a point to being in the movie. I still hope his purpose in Ep. III is to help increase the body count by one, but we will see.
----
Senator Jar-Jar: Why-sa you in black suit, Ani?
Darth Vader raises his hand at Jar-Jar.
Jar-Jar's head explodes.
*splut*
*thud*
Vader commences his only tap-dance number in the series on top of the body.
----
I can dream.
Flaws with Ep. II? First off, I didn't buy the love story, at least not as it was presented. I bought it a little bit more after Anakin went off to 'rescue' Shmi, because that lead to a pity reaction from Padme that I thought could blossom the romance. But the stuff before it was trite and seemed written in purely for the reason that sooner or later the two will have to conceive the characters for the original series. The dialog was poorly done, more so than the other Star Wars films (which at least still had some real personality clashes; like Leia and Han, where the one liner zings that they kept nailing each other with).
That is really my only complaint against Ep. II. So, my only suggestion George is to keep doing what you are doing, except when you get to the part in the script where you need to use these " " summarize what needs to be said and let someone else write in the actual dialog based on your notes.
Other than that, Ep. II was incredible. I especially loved the scenes involving the Fetts. It took a loved character from the original trilogy and severely expanded out everything about him.
Excellent storytelling.
Krull (1983)
Get with the times (the early 80's in this case)
This movie will most likely in the long term be one of the forgotten classics (if you can't call it one now). It is definitely one of my old-time faves (along with the Atari video game).
Now to put my two cents in on the argument-fest going on between the different camps of reviewers I've been reading.
Could the special effects been better in the film? Of course. But in order to do so the film would have to had been made much much later. There is a big difference in having great special effects in a fantasy film vs. a science fiction space opera. Doing it for a fantasy film is much harder. The effect need to be more melded into the live-action unless you have obvious cuts, which itself can be annoying and distracting. But all in all, for what they had at the time, Krull's special effects worked! Heck, some scenes still give me the creeps.
And as for the reviewer who said that the Glaive was just tossed and it was doing all of the work while the hero just posed, you don't understand how the weapon worked. The Glaive was a psionic weapon. The hero was guiding it with his mind. Yes, it was a little like the Force, but who gives a crap? The Star Wars concept of the Force was far from original too, but it's still a nifty concept to the pictures. Now let's go on.
Now for the 'sexist' storyline argument. WHO CARES!?! I'm personally tired of the feminist crap that is constantly out there, but it didn't stop me from enjoying 'Ever After' or 'Fellowship of the Ring' (during the sixty seconds of revisionism that Peter Jackson put in to get the feminists to shut up and more so to also build Arwen's screentime). The old time story of 'girl kidnaped by baddie; guy goes save her' is one of the oldest staples in storytelling. Hell, why don't we go back and re-edit Snow White while we're at it!
*HUFF* *HUFF* ... *pant*
Okay, I've vented. Sorry 'bout that....
Anyway, damn good movie. Remember the time it was made for FXs. Would love to get it on DVD. Blah blah blah, etc. etc.
South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999)
Offended? Disturbed? Good.
This is the first time I had ever seen a movie completely go overboard in all attempts to offend every single person on the planet. When I saw it there were too many times that I just crawled into my seat embarrassed that I was in a room filled with other people watching this. However I was also laughing my a** off so hard I couldn't breathe.
In all honesty, I would have loved this movie much much less if I wasn't offended. If nothing in this picture disturbs you, then you truly can't appreciate it... and you should probably also be locked up. But that's another issue.
Starting off with a nice standard musical number with several 'what-a-minute' lines thrown in to see if the audience is paying attention (for example, Stan's Mother's comment about Jesus), the second number was a complete turn around in-your-face use of the U.S. first amendment. And considering we're in an age where the application of the constitution is optional and often disregarded by many, (how many times do people role their eyes in real life when someone says "It's my first/fifth/second/fourteenth/nineteenth amendment right!") this is one of the most important films to come out in a while.
Yes, I'm serious.
Many times we have movies attempt to defend a viewpoint of American rights (and the importance of freedom of speech for everyone in general). The great thing with this satire is that it uses the rights it is trying to defend to the fullest. And by using the ridiculous (for example using Canada as the scapegoat when the real-life scapegoat is Hollywood) it attracts a larger audience and entertains while trying to get the message across.
Parker and Stone have proven to me to be the greatest satirists in a long while. I might not agree with all of their opinions on issues, but they are extraordinarily skilled in delivering the ideas forward with the grace and elegance of a 2x4 to the back of a head.
It is unfortunate that this movie had to be tortured by one of the greatest anti-free speech organizations in America (the MPAA). Maybe they were able to turn this into a better picture due to attempts to trick them and show how moronic the MPAA is, but many other movies have been more hurt or destroyed by the interference from the organization this movie criticizes so heavily. I hope another South Park movie is made, or at least another Stone+Parker film with this level of satire. Because when these people can say what they want to, then I know that all of my own thoughts and ideas are safe for expression without government reprisal.
*SPOILER-ISH WARNING* By the way, I would like to thank the two of them for the scene with Bill Gates. I just want to know if what happened in the end undid Bill's earlier exit. We can all hope not.