Three Movies. Three Minutes. Who The Hell Needs Hollywood Remakes?

Posted on November 30, 2013 by geelw

I’d heard of 1A4STUDIO and their hilarious 60-second remakes of classic genre films, but only got around to watching a couple today. Yes indeed, it’s ABSOLUTELY worth your minute or three to check these out before you waste the better part of your day watching and re-watching the rest of their output on YouTube. The other movie speedruns they’ve done are also priceless, but some require you know every bit inside and out, as you’ll laugh harder when you see how some scenes are handled.

I don’t have a “favorite” yet, but this trio made me crack up the most because I’ve seen all these way too many times to count. Still, I think the Aliens clip was the most amusing to watch, but T2 below? Yeah, they nail the big action scenes perfectly in record time. I can’t wait to see these guys handle some of the more recent blockbusters for sure, but given that many ONLY have about a minute of actual plot (ha ha, but I’m not kidding either), I’m wondering if we end up seeing thirty-second speedruns sooner than later.

Mr. Peabody & Sherman Turkey Day Poster Stuffed Full Of Self-Fulfilling Prophecy…

Posted on November 27, 2013 by geelw

Yeah, I’d be canning whomever thought up this poster like a bunch of cranberries, as my cartoon nostalgia sense tells me that this one will be dead on arrival after the first weekend at best. This turkey is planning to gobble up box office dollars while neglecting the fact that the original shorts worked perfectly because they clocked in at about five minutes and weren’t padded out with needless stuff that’s only going to appeal to folks who’ve never seen an episode of the Bullwinkle cartoons they came from. Ah well… I guess I should just shut the heck up and surrender, huh?

FINE. But not without a fight:

(thanks, bullwinklecanada!)

When I saw the trailer for the new CG flick the first time, I didn’t laugh at all, and seeing it again recently made me more annoyed than ever. But whatever, right? It’ll be “fun” for the kids that don’t care at all about history and nostalgia, that’s for sure. On the other hand… when the adults in the theater are groaning at the end like the ones behind me who hadn’t seen the trailer until then, I’m gathering Dreamworks will be wishing for their very own time machine so they can go back and erase this project from their books. Yuk.

That’s Right. Popeye Was A “Time Lord” Before The Good Doctor!

Posted on November 25, 2013 by geelw

(thanks, cartunes1000!)

And he had a kind of cooler and stranger time machine, too! Yeah, you learn something new every day, kids. Granted, that’s also what you call “VERY desperately running out of ideas” in Cartoonland speak, so although this episode is hilarious (you HAVE to love how that “time machine” works), it’s clear that Elzie Crisler Segar was spinning in his grave when this 1960 cartoon popped up on the tube wherever he ended up when he passed on in 1934. Anyway, enjoy and yeah… you KNOW you want that Picasso/Dali-esque clock thing in YOUR living room.

Jimmy Fallon vs. Xbox One: The “Who”, “What” or “Where” Show Returns…

Posted on November 21, 2013 by geelw

Yes, it’s usually pretty crazy on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon, but just what the heck was this confusing mess of a live demo? Yeah, the Xbox One has SO many things packed into that black box that it was hard to tell what was going on. I did note that Kinect wasn’t used for the menu navigation (as it seems to have issues with more than a few people in a room according to some early press), Forza 5 got a few seconds of play (not by Jimmy) that showed off some lovely visuals before things switched to the camera scanning Jimmy earlier (and making an awful likeness) and there was some playing of that new Kinect Sports game with Will Forte. Ugh. Meanwhile, that Microsoft rep was no Ron Popeil at all, trying to cram too much talk into a handful of minutes.

Look, if you’re trying to sell an all-in-one living room dominator/media center/juicer to the non gaming public and it indeed does WAY too much for a mere under five minute demo… you need a longer sales pitch. I don’t think that sloppy mess last night was selling any consoles to anyone who wasn’t already buying one because other than Jimmy drooling about the new controller too long, it really didn’t show off much other than pretty visuals and a lot of “wait, what was that?” before it ended. Eh, whatever – we’ll see what happens when the system rolls out later today. Or: yet another midnight launch I won’t be going to cover because it’s all hype and the REAL proof is a few months down the road plus when the post launch titles start dropping into stores…

Random Film of the Week: The Man in the White Suit

Posted on November 20, 2013 by geelw

(thanks, thecinelady!)

I recall seeing Alexander Mackendrick’s 1951 film The Man in the White Suit listed as both a comedy and a science fiction film in two separate movie books and as I hadn’t seen it at that time, I was a bit perplexed. Of course, I think I was also about twelve years old, so I was perplexed about a great many things. And in a constant state of perplexed about those great many things believe you me.

Thankfully, once I finally saw this classic a few years later, all my questions were answered – it’s a comedy AND a science fiction film (and a bit of social commentary, to boot). And of course, it’s an Ealing Studios film so it’s just about perfect in every aspect and yes indeed, comes very highly recommended…
Continue reading →

Random Film of the Week: Bad Santa

Posted on November 18, 2013 by geelw

So, did you hear the one about the people who want to do a sequel to “It’s A Wonderful Life” getting an internet sized hobnailed boot thrown at them for even deigning to think of such an outrage? Neither did I, as that could be disaster flick was only just announced. That’s one reason why Bad Santa and A Christmas Story have long since replaced that well-known and beloved classic as my favorite holiday movies.

Yeah, yeah, there’s also been a sequel announced for the former (but nothing has appeared to date)while the latter has become a “must-see” holiday show for tourists coming here to New York City, but Terry Zwigoff’s mean-spirited, outrageously funny masterpiece grabs your Yuletide wishes by the short hairs, yanks hard and starts punching everywhere so hard that you may find yourself crawling around looking for your eyeballs under the table they rolled under after they pop out a few too many times… Continue reading →

Jimmy and Ice-T Put The PS4 On The Hot Spot…

Posted on November 14, 2013 by geelw

Alright, it’s a given: CUTE ROBOTS SELL CONSOLES. And SUPER-cute virtual robots you can play with and/or kick around the room? When the audience goes “D’aaaaaawwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!” more than five times a minute? Yeah, there’s Christmas in a box for Sony right there.

Okay, despite my occasional cranky side acting up from time to time, I’ll have to admit that Jimmy Fallon always gets me excited about gaming despite me having a longer history with them than he has. Granted, it’s his great enthusiasm for the medium and NOT his play style (that tends to lean towards the “Boy, do I suck at these games but I’m having FUN!” although he did beat Ice-T at that Pong variant) that’s hard to fake. And yep, game companies love him, Conan and anyone else they can get a console and controller to. Of course, none of them love ME, but that’s more my fault than theirs at the end of the day. Oh well, we’re workin’ on it… we’re workin’ on it. I’m thinking of writing a fake e-book (not really) called “How To Get The Respect You Deserve Without Being A Total Ass or Total Suck-Up” but we’ll say no more about that unless we want to be called a total ass. Or a total suck-up. Not too good at either of those, but I can swing both ways once I take some lessons. Is the Learning Annex still open here in NYC?

I Dream of Tee-Vee #1: Mothers, Russia Was The Bomb!

Posted on November 12, 2013 by geelw

(thanks, 2nicks!)

Yes, I have dreams about old TV shows every now and then and sometimes it’s a mash up of a bunch of old shows or dreams with music from some old shows. This particular dream I don’t recall much of other than it had the theme to the old NBC show “The Mothers-In-Law”, but it had some of the cast from “Ivan the Terrible”, a CBS show from 1976 that only ran five episodes and from my brief internet search, has NO footage or credits to be found. I actually watched every episode of that show as a kid and I was surprised when it was no longer on the air, but I guess a show about a bunch of Russians in a cramped Moscow apartment wasn’t exactly something America wanted to see back in that Bicentennial year. Whatever, I say – the opening credits were pretty funny from what I recall.

EDIT: Aha! I just checked and yes indeed, while the show was indeed very funny, your tax dollars at work back then (The State Department) colluding with the Russian government made sure it was taken away in a black car or something close. From IMDB:

Although the show got good ratings, the U.S. State Department, under pressure from the Soviet Government, gave instructions that it should not be renewed.

OK, maybe WE thought it was funny as hell (and I bet they were chuckling at the State Department until that red phone rang), but Russia sure hated the idea of us laughing too much (or at all) at their expense. As for The Mothers-In-Law? Hey, dig that funky title sequence and in those end credits, that bongo break will have you pounding the table like you mean it, I bet…

Mr. Peabody & Sherman Trailer: Wards of the State, Juvenile Delinquent Version…

Posted on October 25, 2013 by geelw

Urgh. OK, I think I asked this question before, but just WHO is this film targeted to? Us cranky ass oldsters who grew up watching Rocky & Bullwinkle, Fractured Fairy Tales and yes, these two characters are grinding our collective teeth about this CG travesty, the kids of today won’t have a C-L-U-E what the heck this is about other than the usual dumbed down predictable plot that lasts and hour and half and has pop songs packed in and the obligatory fake outtakes in the credits. Parents not in the know about Jay Ward and his creations (and style of humor) will of course, dutifully pack up the tots and trundle in to see this, buy the toys and other merchandise and thing all is peachy keen and as harmless as a stuffed poodle.

Me, I’ll be hitting my head with a hammer and hoping at least one or two critics point out that the Peabody segments were excellent because they worked best as unconnected shorts that were over and done with in a few minutes. Stretching things to feature length and adding needless stuff and worse modern jokes is only bleeding any chance for redemption from this one dry in record time. I didn’t even crack a smile during this trailer and that’s a bad sign because my sense of humor is pretty off the wall and expansive. Hey, I could be totally wrong, people… but it’s not a good sign in this day and age of movie trailers coughing up all the best parts of a movie in that two minutes or so. Hmmm… we shall see, I suppose…

Stuff I Sometimes Think About When Not Much Is Working Right…

Posted on October 21, 2013 by geelw

Not YOU, Arnold… we’re not related, thankfully. But I’d trade you a bag of brown rice for some of those muscles just so I could beat my head in on occasions such as this. I actually lost a chunk of a nice post earlier today thanks to making that silly issue of having a few in progress on WP and my laptop dying before I saved or the auto-save kicked in. It’s no trouble to rewrite stuff, but I hate having to redo posts because they always come out differently if I’m doing them on the fly and not working from notes. Anyway, between that and me generally being a wee bit too busy to keep up with my inbox today, I’m throwing this up as a diversion while I get my brain synched to do some rewriting. Ready? No? Oh well…