Kaos' way behind movie reviews

[wesfau2]

The Dirt

Always liked Motley Crue.  Well, let me amend that.  I didn't care much for Motley Corabi, but that was a short-lived experiment.  It's not that it wasn't "good" music, but  it was missing that semi out of control vocal chaos that Vince lent to the sound.  The Corabi album was too bland, too pasteurized, too tame. He's a better vocalist than Vince, but so is Pavarotti. I don't really want to hear Pava singing Kickstart My Heart either. 

As far as the band goes, I always felt they borrowed heavily from KISS even down to the scene where Nikki tells the rest of the band he "wants to create something people have never seen before"  Well, that's the KISS mantra and has been for decades, well before Crue arrived in '81.  And everything -- literally everything -- Crue did, KISS did it or did a version of it first.  (That even applies to the groupie humping, hotel destroying excess).

This movie?  Not really a fan.  At various points, starting from the very first scene, I felt it existed in some ways simply as a vehicle to display joyous debauchery with no real attached story.  And even at that it barely brushed the story that was the hedonistic rise and fall of Crue. 

It played more like a series of "can you believe we really probably did this shit" vignettes than it did as a cohesive story of the band.  The film was also extremely lacking in introspection. 

I wanted to know why Nikki was in so much emotional pain and see his addiction and recovery played out.  I wanted to get a deeper understanding of Vince's resentment of the band and how he dealt with the horrific tragedies (both self-inflicted and natural) that were part of his life. 

I didn't need to see Nikki snorting coke off a chick's ass to know that he did that.  Showing that (and numerous other scenes of over-the-top behavior) kept the film from reaching deep enough into who the members really were, what drove them, what fed their private demons (and how those demons guided the music).  Why not tell the story of Shout at the Devil being written because Nikki's drug-induced dabbling in Satanism took an allegedly bizarre turn (including levitating silverware) -- and how that spooked him out of continuing the satanic imagery. 

This movie only dealt with the consequences of their out-of-control behavior in a superficial manner.  It didn't give us the story behind the band, it just gave us snippets of glossed over stories from within the band.  The entire thing felt like it was just dabbing paint at various dots that had to be connected with no real sense of structure or cohesion. 

I didn't hate it.  The guys playing the band members -- with the exception of Ramsay Bolton as Mick Mars -- were decent enough.  I just didn't feel as if the film cut deep enough to give us the real story. It only gave us the broad brushstrokes of what those of us who know anything about the band already knew.  There were no revelations and no real reason to watch it unless you just like Crue music and want to see other people pretending to perform it.

If (when) there is a KISS movie I hope whoever does it will be willing to probe deeper into the real story behind the rise, fall, rise, fall and rise again of my painted heroes.  Or maybe I'd really rather not know.

While I agree that this wasn't a deep-dive into their respective psychoses, I enjoyed it quite a bit.

If you think they didn't beat us over the head with Nikki's underlying family issues (presumably the genesis of his addictions), then you really weren't paying attention.

I thought Ramsay Bolton was pretty great as Mick...his lines are perfectly timed codger-gold.  Figured you'd appreciate that about him.

I liked the narrative style, with each member getting some voice-over time and a chance to share their perspective.

It wasn't serious art, but it was a fun ride (with occasional solemnity) through the 80s with one of my favorite bands of that era.

[The Six]

While I agree that this wasn't a deep-dive into their respective psychoses, I enjoyed it quite a bit.

If you think they didn't beat us over the head with Nikki's underlying family issues (presumably the genesis of his addictions), then you really weren't paying attention.

I thought Ramsay Bolton was pretty great as Mick...his lines are perfectly timed codger-gold.  Figured you'd appreciate that about him.

I liked the narrative style, with each member getting some voice-over time and a chance to share their perspective.

It wasn't serious art, but it was a fun ride (with occasional solemnity) through the 80s with one of my favorite bands of that era.

Too bad 3/4 of it was fiction unlike the book which is incredibly raw and honest. 

[Saniflush]

Too bad 3/4 of it was fiction unlike the book which is incredibly raw and honest.

I tell you what wasn't fiction.  The boobs I got to see.  I give it two thumbs up.

[Snaggletiger]

I tell you what wasn't fiction.  The boobs I got to see.  I give it two thumbs up.

The man cuts through the superficial bullshit and gets right to the core of the matter.

[Saniflush]

The man cuts through the superficial bullshit and gets right to the core of the matter.

Oh and I have been with a chick like what was in the opening scene with Tommy Lee.  That is some fucking funny assed shit!

[AUJarhead]

Oh and I have been with a chick like what was in the opening scene with Tommy Lee.  That is some fudgeing funny assed shoot!

Sweaty Betty in Barstow?

[Saniflush]

Sweaty Betty in Barstow?

Negative.  This was actually after the Corps if you can believe that.

[Kaos]

Us

Jordan Peele is being hailed as the great visionary in the horror genre.  He made a complex, layered film in Get Out that was much deeper than the usual chop-em-up, possessed-by-a-demon fare that qualifies as horror.  His new film, Us, follows a similar path in that it's got so many different levels and reflects a much deeper meaning. 

Problem is that neither Get Out or Us are truly exercises in horror.  They're both psychological puzzles designed not to scare necessarily, but to get the viewer thinking about societal issues in a different way.  Peele makes good movies, but I'm not entirely comfortable with the manipulation to promote his own personal/philosophical/political views.  

In Us a very white black family takes a vacation trip to a seaside town where the wife grew up.  The wife is hiding a horrible history in the town from her husband, and predictably the history comes back to haunt them. 

The problems begin when a mirror-image family appears in the driveway of the vacation home.  Doppelganger dad, mom, son and daughter then attempt to murder the originals in an effort to take their place.  

The movie then morphs into an extended series of hand-to-hand brawls.  As the whiteblack family fights back against their identical attackers, they discover that they are not alone in the fight.  Everyone in the world is battling their own duplicates. As the bloody, brutal fights rage on,  the story of where these duplicates come from is slowly unspooled.  

That part of the film is less than satisfying.  Where the duplicates were for years, how they were created, why they exist, how they live, and why they decided to emerge to confront the originals doesn't really make sense, is poorly portrayed and generates more questions than it answers.  It seems contrived and almost tacked on because Jordan decided at the last minute he needed to explain them somehow.  Might have been better if their origin had been left a complete mystery.  I think it made more sense in Jordan's head than it did on the screen. 

I also didn't understand or agree that the vengeance of one would be transformed into the vengeance of many.  The rationale for that massive undertaking by the duplicates was not given enough exposition.  

The movie was fairly well acted, had a good mix of drama and comedy, and almost kept the big twist from being obvious.  Granted, I suspected what was coming less than 15 minutes along, but I don't think everyone saw it coming.  

It still wasn't what I'd consider horror.  It felt more like an extended episode of the Twilight Zone.  

[CCTAU]

Peele won't hire white guys to lead. Peele can kiss my racist ass!

[Kaos]

Pet Semetary

The 1989 film adaptation of Stephen King's Pet Semetary was one of the worst versions of a King novel in a long history of shoddy efforts to capture his eerie writing on screen.  For whatever reason the deep, rich demonic flavor of King's words rarely translate well to film.  Maybe it's because his style is so familiar that the visions you had in your head as you read it can never be fully visualized by someone else.  Maybe it's because his stories are so layered and complex in their narrative that there's no way a movie can fit it all in there so things that matter end up getting left out.  

So there was a Pet Semetary in 1989.  It was bad.  The acting was bad (and this seems to be a consistent trait in all King adaptations), the story was choppy, the dialogue that felt so natural in print came out wooden and hackneyed on film.  And the special effects were laughable.  Just terrible. 

On the heels of the success of the "It" reboot, someone decided to bury the dead and decaying 1989 version of Pet Semetary in an ancient Indian burial ground and allow it to come back to life. 

While better acted than the 1989 effort, this attempt at bringing a King novel to screen fumbled in much the same manner as the first.  In fact, some of the 89 movie was probably better than this.  

My biggest problem?  

Pet Semetary is one of the few King novels that was satisfying in the way it ended.  So many of his other books I felt like he just ran out of things to say and rushed to the finish line.  Pet Semetary (the novel), on the other hand, offered a nearly perfect ending.  It was fully finished and provided a one-word cold knife of horror.  

This movie took extreme liberties with the end and crafted the most ridiculous possible closure.  It completely ruined it in my opinion.  It destroyed the entire premise of the story and everything that came before.  It was stupid. If I'd had any popcorn I would have hurled it at the screen.  

I love Stephen King's books. Nobody tells a better story.  His films are, unfortunately, mostly B-movie schlock.  This attempt doesn't ascend much higher than that. 

[Kaos]

Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins

I may have gone over this before.  I really don't know how this movie flopped.  I just think maybe it missed its time.  It came out in 1985 in the middle of the Rambo/Commando/Mad Max box office brawn-fest.  It was intended as the first in a series of action adventures featuring the reconditioned former street cop re-named after his hospital bedpan and trained by a quirky martial artist.  

It floundered at the box office.  I just don't get that.  It's a fun piece of modern-day Indiana Jonesish action/adventure film.  It moves along at a good clip, the performances are good (including a youngish and still hot Kate Mulgrew).  Maybe it was that star Fred Ward lacked the muscle-rippling bulk of Stallone or Schwartzenegger.  Maybe it was that a PG-13 action romp couldn't find traction in a world that had turned to R-rated versions. 

It's one of those movies that I've always liked and feel is truly under appreciated.  Fred Ward learns Shinjuto (or something) and battles wits with a shady government-backed organization.  The bad guys are cartoonish, the action outlandish. But it's still an easy, no-thought-required sprawl. 

Couldn't be made today, though.  Joel Grey's Korean Shinjuto master would trigger the entire cultural appropriation warrior class. 

[Godfather]

Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins

I may have gone over this before.  I really don't know how this movie flopped.  I just think maybe it missed its time.  It came out in 1985 in the middle of the Rambo/Commando/Mad Max box office brawn-fest.  It was intended as the first in a series of action adventures featuring the reconditioned former street cop re-named after his hospital bedpan and trained by a quirky martial artist. 

It floundered at the box office.  I just don't get that.  It's a fun piece of modern-day Indiana Jonesish action/adventure film.  It moves along at a good clip, the performances are good (including a youngish and still hot Kate Mulgrew).  Maybe it was that star Fred Ward lacked the muscle-rippling bulk of Stallone or Schwartzenegger.  Maybe it was that a PG-13 action romp couldn't find traction in a world that had turned to R-rated versions.

It's one of those movies that I've always liked and feel is truly under appreciated.  Fred Ward learns Shinjuto (or something) and battles wits with a shady government-backed organization.  The bad guys are cartoonish, the action outlandish. But it's still an easy, no-thought-required sprawl.

Couldn't be made today, though.  Joel Grey's Korean Shinjuto master would trigger the entire cultural appropriation warrior class.

What the hell happened?   Did we go back in time?

I can't wait till you review The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension.  It looks so great I can't wait to see it in theatres.

[AUJarhead]

What the hell happened?  Did we go back in time?

I can't wait till you review The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension.  It looks so great I can't wait to see it in theatres.

Granted, that movie is better than Captain Marvel or Last Jedi.

[Saniflush]

What the hell happened?  Did we go back in time?

I can't wait till you review The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension.  It looks so great I can't wait to see it in theatres.

You shut your dirty whorish mouth.  This movie was good and the books are even better.

You move like a pregnant yak.

[Godfather]

You shut your dirty whorish mouth.  This movie was good and the books are even better.

You move like a pregnant yak.

I love that movie.  Why you giving me grief?

[Saniflush]

I love that movie.  Why you giving me grief?

You never said you liked it.  You didn't call.  I was hurt.

[Kaos]

What the hell happened?  Did we go back in time?

I can't wait till you review The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension.  It looks so great I can't wait to see it in theatres.

What part of "way behind" is lost on you?

[Godfather]

What part of "way behind" is lost on you?

all of it

[Kaos]

all of it

perhaps I should have added another "way"

[The Six]

Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins

I may have gone over this before.  I really don't know how this movie flopped.  I just think maybe it missed its time.  It came out in 1985 in the middle of the Rambo/Commando/Mad Max box office brawn-fest.  It was intended as the first in a series of action adventures featuring the reconditioned former street cop re-named after his hospital bedpan and trained by a quirky martial artist. 

It floundered at the box office.  I just don't get that.  It's a fun piece of modern-day Indiana Jonesish action/adventure film.  It moves along at a good clip, the performances are good (including a youngish and still hot Kate Mulgrew).  Maybe it was that star Fred Ward lacked the muscle-rippling bulk of Stallone or Schwartzenegger.  Maybe it was that a PG-13 action romp couldn't find traction in a world that had turned to R-rated versions.

It's one of those movies that I've always liked and feel is truly under appreciated.  Fred Ward learns Shinjuto (or something) and battles wits with a shady government-backed organization.  The bad guys are cartoonish, the action outlandish. But it's still an easy, no-thought-required sprawl.

Couldn't be made today, though.  Joel Grey's Korean Shinjuto master would trigger the entire cultural appropriation warrior class.

Fun story. I've never made it through this movie without falling asleep. Not as a kid, not as a teenager, not in college, not as an adult. I liked it, but something about it always zonks me out.