Why didn't anyone go and see this movie? I was under the impression that 70's culture was making some sort of comeback with the success of movies like "Dazed And Confused", "Boogie Nights", and "The Ice Storm" and with "That 70's Show" getting good ratings, I thought people would be all over this one. I sure was and for good reason because this was a great flick complete with over the top performances, rockers vs. guidos, Shannon Tweed, over the top hero antics, a great soundtrack, Eddie Furlong, Ron Jeremy, a live performance by Kiss, the best use of a Runaways song that could ever be, the best use of a Cheap Trick song that could ever be (I had to buy "Live At Budokan" on CD), and, dare I say it, the best puke scene ever to be put on film. Our story concerns a group of four friends in 1978 who really want to go to see Kiss in Detroit. They have a problem though. One of their moms (played totally beautifully obnoxiously by Lin Shaye from "There's Something About Mary") decided to burn their tickets. The rest of the film centers on the four kids and their efforts to try and find a way to get into this concert. The lead cast members were all excellent and each brought their own bit of personality to their characters. Edward Furlong plays Hawk, the leader of the group whose adventures lead him into a male strip club with Ron Jeremy as the DJ. Giuseppe Andrews plays Lex, the more mellow member of the group who tries to sneak into the concert and makes friends with a pack of dogs. James De Bello plays Trip, the obvious stoner of the group who is involved in the weirdest robbery that I have ever seen on film. Finally, Sam Huntington plays Jam who has a pleasant coming of age experience during confession and whose mother makes him wear really bad clothes. Some of the co-stars include the aforementioned Shannon Tweed, Melanie Lynsky ("Heavenly Creatures"), Natasha Lyonne ("Slums Of Beverly Hills"), and Richard Hillman as a slimy scalper. In essence, "Detroit Rock City" has all the energy and drive that you would expect from a "Kiss movie" and all the right things about teen comedies. There is never a dull moment in this flick and I figured it would appeal to many people from teenagers of today to twentysomething people like myself who remember what a good R-rated teen flick should be like to older Kiss fans who can relate to being a teenager in 1978. I highly recommend this movie and I highly recommend the excellent DVD that New Line put out (it's just too bad they didn't include more deleted scenes). Check this one out!!
It is so nice to see someone doing something a little different with a tired old franchise. The filmmakers behind "Bride Of Chucky" have managed to make a sequel that is unpredictable, fun, and worth watching. In a world where most horror movies suck and when horror movie sequels tend to be some of the most unimaginative pieces of rotting papaya ever produced ("From Dusk Till Dawn 2"; "Halloween H20"), "Bride Of Chucky" manages to overcome the odds and be a cool little movie with great effects and a good little story. It doesn't try to hard to top the other pictures in the franchise because the filmmakers seem to understand that this rarely works and that the original is usually the best. They have just decided to take the character of Chucky and present him again in a fun little movie that doesn't really try to be any more than that. I think that these franchises get themselves in trouble when instead of simply trying to bring the characters that we know and love back to the screen, they try so hard to make a better movie than the original that they fail. "Bride Of Chucky" doesn't try and do this but it does manage to give us some death scenes that I have never seen before and a love scene that I have never seen before. Our plot is that Chucky is brought back by his girlfriend Tiffany who in turn is turned into a doll as well. The couple are soon on a road trip to find an amulet that will give them human form. They are driven to their destination by a young couple who are mistakenly identified as killers because everywhere they go, people die. This was directed by Hong Kong director Ronny Yu (who made the "Bride With White Hair" films) and has John Ritter and Alexis Arquette in small roles. Horror fans should be happy that someone out there is keeping some fun in a genre that seems to have forgotten that that is what it's there for.
I really wanted to review this one without even referencing "The Harder They Come" but for some reason this was an impossible task. Both films were shot in Jamaica with Jamaican actors, both films had lead characters playing musicians, and both films had a huge reggae influence. The difference is that although they seem very similar on the surface, they are in fact quite different. "Rockers" stars Leroy 'Horsemouth' Wallace, an excellent drummer who is trying to make a living. He goes around and peddles records on his motorcycle and drums when he is needed as he is one of the best drummers around. He soon finds that the rich people in the city can never seem to be rich enough and need to steal and exploit Horsemouth and his friends. They eventually come together with a plan to give the "capitalists" a return favour. That is the basic plot but the focus here is on the music and on Horsemouth and his friends. The film was very good and was not nearly as dark as "The Harder They Come". I suppose the main similarity between the two films was the amazing reggae music. For those of you whose knowledge of reggae does not go past Bob Marley, I highly recommend this film because it features some great reggae artists including Inner Circle and Burning Spear. If you are a fan of "The Harder They Come", I highly recommend this film also and if you just want to be cool, I recommend this film as well.
Addicted To Murder 2 : Tainted Blood (1998)
This is definitely a case of a sequel that is much better than the original. I liked this flick about the problems facing a group of vampires in New York. The main plot consists of a girl named Tricia (Sarah K. Lippmann) who is bitten by a vampire and has to deal with her new life as a vampire. She is partially guided by a bitchy vampire named Angie (Sasha Graham) and eventually by a bitter vampire named Jonathan (Ted Grayson). This is the part of the film that I enjoyed. Now, there are also a number of characters that I got confused with in that I did not really understand what their place was in the film. The main character that I didn't understand was the character of Joel (played by the returning star of the first films Mick McCleery). Maybe it's been too long since I've seen "Addicted To Murder" but I had no idea what this character was doing in this film. There were also some flashback sequences I didn't understand as well as a problem that the vampires seem to be having with serial killers. All in all this was a fine little flick but I found the story to be somewhat confusing and convoluted. Eventually, I just focused on the performances by Sarah Lippmann, Ted Grayson, and especially Sasha Graham because they were all excellent and the story of Tricia was quite entertaining. This was a well done shot on video production but I think that Kevin J. Lindenmuth (as talented as he is) got in a little over his head with the script for this one. Maybe it all gets explained in part three.
Sometimes I go into a video store and buy a pile of old movies and on occasion I get something like this. It totally sucked but I still can find something to say about it and therefore I have no problem reviewing it. This is another one of the old 80's "we are going to lose our business if we don't raise a lot of money in a few days so we had better turn to the sex industry for inspiration" films that I have seen before a number of times in such films a "Risky Business", "Bikini Car Wash", and "The Erotic House Of Wax". This film, however, had no b-movie starlets and the script was not very entertaining. Basically, the plot for this was a cover to show as much T&A (and more) in a short time in one location. Obviously there was absolutely no budget but a sucker like me was duped into buying it thinking it may be a fun sex comedy like the ones I grew up with. I don't want to totally slam this because it was innocent enough and at least one of the actors seemed like he was trying to act. There was a really dumb gag involving a girl being trapped in a plaster cast for the entire film and there is a female rock star character (whose band makes the Mini Pops look cool) whose main line is "Wanna fuck?" There is also lots of nudity and lots of nudity. In closing, only rent this if you want to see lots of nudity but believe me, you can do much, much better.
There's something about watching a Renny Harlin movie that reminds me of buying candy. You know what to expect and you get what you paid for. You are also really happy when you are eating it but if you have too much, you can do without it once in a while. Renny Harlin puts out a movie every couple of years and it is always a treat and always entertaining. This time around we have giant, smart, genetically enhanced sharks that are after the small crew of a seabound research facility. I didn't find this to be at all like "Jaws" other than the opening sequence and the fact that the monsters in the film happened to be sharks. As with "Cutthroat Island" and "Cliffhanger", this was a lot of fun while I was watching it and it was some big budget eye candy that spent it's money in the right places. I also want to add that it was nice that there were some mechanical shark effects in addition to come CGI shots that were are unfortunately becoming accustomed to. The cast was all very good and included Thomas Jane ("Boogie Nights") as an ex-con shark wrangler, Saffron Burrows ("Wing Commander") as the genius behind the mutant sharks, Michael Rapaport ("Beautiful Girls") as the resident structure expert, Jacqueline McKenzie ("Romper Stomper") as the blonde, Stellan Skarsgard ("Breaking The Waves") as the older scientist, Samuel L. Jackson as the millionaire suit, and LL Cool J as the cook named preacher. There were some great suspense and action sequences as well as some great effects. There were times I was reminded of "The Poseidon Adventure", "Alien Resurrection", and I must say that this was much better than the Treat Williams water movie from a few years ago entitled "Deep Rising". Check this one out for some nice harmless fun one night and if you are one of those people who are going to e-mail me and say something like "it was unrealistic; scientifically sharks can't..." or "it was dumb" or "the acting was crap", obviously you do not know how to kick back and just watch a fun and exciting action movie and you should rent "Shakespeare In Love" instead.
This movie was made the year before "Robocop" and features a similar idea of security robots. In this film, they are designed to patrol a shopping mall after hours and can disable intruders until police arrive. The robots are small robots that are a cross between Maximilian in "The Black Hole" and Power Droid from "Star Wars" designed like a tank. A group of teens decide to have a party in a bed store the same night as the robots first going online. A freak lightning storm does something to the robots which turns them into "Killbots". Then it is teens against robots in an abandoned mall which began to seem a little like a very b-movie "Dawn Of The Dead" with robots. The teens include Kelli Maroney ("Hard To Die"), Barbara Crampton ("Re-Animator"), and John Terlesky ("Deathstalker II"). There are also cameos from Mary Woronov, Paul Bartel, and Dick Miller. This flick has everything a decent b-movie should have including silly dialogue, cheesy music, scantily clad women, Dick Miller, an exploding head, and lots of screaming. It was directed by one of the 80's b-movie masters Jim Wynorski and the mall that was used was the same mall that was used in "Fast Times At Ridgemont High" as fans of that film will probably recognize it instantly. There is even a brief scene in front of the record store when Mike Damone explained the five-point plan to Ratner in that movie. All in all, "Chopping Mall" was a lot of fun and I recommend it if you can find it. You can see part of Roger Corman's "Attack Of The Crab Monsters" on a TV set at one point. You can also see Wynorski regular Toni Naples as the first of the bikini women that prance through the mall during the opening credits. Man, I am a geek.
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