Pages

Friday, January 19, 2024

The Birds II: Land's End

 
Watched June 30, 2023
1994
Starring: Brad Johnson, Chelsea Field, Tippi Hedren, James Naughton
Director: Rick Rosenthal 

The VHS box makes it look real bad, but the production is actually pretty good.
 
 A fishing and game guy is out on the water collecting birds that have been affected by an oil spill. He does some tests then the birds attack him on the boat and poke his eyes out killing him.
 
Ted (Brad Johnson) and his family are on the ferry with their golden retriever going from the mainland to Gall's Ferry. Ted's wife May (Chelsea Field) got a job teaching how to use the desktop publishing computer to the photographer Frank (James Naughton) who runs the local newspaper. They have two daughters who are age 9 and 11. They've rented an old house right on the water. Ted is supposed to work on his thesis to finish his PhD so he can do more than teach high school biology.
 
They have one car, a Ford Explorer. The birds are acting peculiar, but their dog is good at sniffing it out. The kids are worried about staying on the island in the old house: no tv, no fun. First night in the new house, Ted has a nightmare revealing they had a son who was killed in a car flipping accident five years ago. 
 
Frank the photographer immediately hits on the May as she tries to do her new job. At home the girls explore and ride bikes while Ted gets writer's block. He tries to paint an exterior light fixture red. A seagull beak stabs him in the head, he falls off the ladder. His girl's see and laugh. The red paint spills. Frank gives the May a ride home just in time to see Ted cleaning up the paint.
 
Helen (Tippi Hedren) runs the local general store. She sees the band aid on Ted's head and recommends he see the town doc, even though the wound doesn't seem bad. The doc is also the mayor and he has his office at the local tavern. They discuss his cut, a bird eh? who cares.
 
May is trying to connect with Ted. They make out on the screen porch but the dog keeps barking at the birds and that disrupts their romance.

Ted tries to write again, the girls go and play on the beach but discover a corpse! It's the fish and game department guy. The town Mayor/ Doctor doesn't entertain that birds could be the culprit. An old fisherman picks up another dead bird. He unintentionally scares the girls. 
 
At work, Frank kisses May, she pulls away. She comes home mad, who is going to make dinner? they start to have a fight. But then the old fisherman knocks on the door and brings a big fish to them. He's the lighthouse keeper. He stays for dinner and they all have a nice time.
 
At some point, the girls rescued a bird the dog had grabbed and named him Eggbert. That bird leaves once he's recovered, but then that night he taps on the window to be let in. It's a trap! The girls let the bird in but that leaves the window open for a pigeon attack. May and Ted try to protect the girls and get them out of the bedroom where the birds are attacking.
 
In the morning, they decide to leave the island, but the birds attacked their car and it won't start. The previous night it was also shown that the birds attacked the lighthouse keeper. 
 
Ted goes to borrow the lighthouse keeper's car and find him dead. They take his car anyway and get to dock where the ferry to the mainland is waiting. They try to get on the ferry. The mayor and his friends start shooting at the birds, it's great! A boat pulling away still has a fuel pump attached, this leaks fuel all over the water. Then someone shoots a flare at bird, the bird is on fire, it falls in the water. Several parts of the dock explode. The family gets into a little boat, but they get too close to bird island. They flip the boat over and hide. The birds punch holes in the boat, but then leave. The family climbs back on top and it's assumed they are rescued.
 
No need for a sequel, duh. No explanation of the bird attacks. Good bird explosions though. The dead son doesn't add much, just tension within the family. The kids are fine. It's pretty whatever, they do mention the original movie with the Bodega Bay incident so I guess it's an official sequel.

Wednesday, November 1, 2023

Love on a Leash


 Watched March 17, 2023

2011

 Director: Fen Tian
Starring:  Jana Camp (Lisa), Aneese Khamo (Prince)

Start with a golden retriever dog running around a park with a large pond in the center, no sound. The dog's inner monologue says he's got to find some girls. People try to play with him. He's disappointed when a woman he sees starts kissing her boyfriend. He goes to an enclosed rock pond part that bubbles with magic and it tells him he must find his true love to break the curse.

Lisa (Jana Camp) and her friend Paula (Femi Emiola) are sunbathing at the park. Lisa is a virgin who is very particular about who she dates. The dog sees them in the park. The dog gets dirty and stops Lisa at the gas station, she lets the dog into her green VW new beetle. Lisa wears green and her apartment is green. She brings the dog in and gives him a bath. Luckily she was still wearing her bathing suit from the park. The dog's inner monologue is quippy. 

Lisa works at a retail store. A lady is trying on a dress that's too small for her and Lisa's boss tries to help. A guy, Kyle asks Lisa out. Lisa has a bad weave and looks pretty sick. Not that long after another guy pretends to be buying clothes for his wife but they're for Lisa. Lisa's mom lives far away but is worried about Lisa being single. The nosy neighbor friend who's color is Orange! brings the presents from the customer and says he's a friend/cousin/neighbor and that's why Lisa should go on a date with him.

 I think we see Lisa on a Kyle date. Then Lisa goes on a date with blue shirt and his overbearing mother. After eating dinner they go back to her house and she grills Lisa. The mother says her son, blue shirt, has a 10 year old son who is super smart and will be president. No more kids allowed in this relationship so Lisa needs to get her tubes tied. The mom is an OB/GYN so it's no big deal.

Lisa goes home and gets a call from Kyle to come over. She first has to clean up her house. He comes over, proposed but then admits he's gay and it would be a beard marriage. He just needs a son to appease his traditional family. None of Lisa's relationships are working.

By now Lisa has adopted the dog and named him Prince.

Lisa's boss then comes over and tries to sexually assault her. Prince saves her, the boss fires her and leaves. She is distraught, takes a sleeping pill and then takes too many. She passes out, Prince lies in the street, someone stops and follows Prince to call 911 for her. She goes to the hospital.

She says no more men, just me and prince. It's raining, she throws out her umbrella, it's supposed to get blown away. The rain is either digital or a sprinkler. She finds Prince and he brings her the umbrella. She says she loves him. He becomes a man! Lisa faints but Prince (Aneese Khamo) convinces her he is her dog. They make out and have weird foreplay back at her apartment. In the morning he's a dog again. 

Dog Prince goes to the pond who tells him he's just using Lisa and that's why he's not a man during the day, but she's having fun. They get pretend married at their house and take photos. Lisa doesn't tell her friend Paula about Prince being a man. Her mom comes to visit and forces a dinner with Prince, who at some point says his human name is Alvin Flang. It's a weird dinner because Prince doesn't have a job. Lisa's dad abandoned her pregnant mom when they went to get the marriage license. Mom and orange neighbor pressure Lisa and Prince to meet the next morning to get a marriage license, but Prince is still a dog during the day so...he doesn't show up.

Prince does gets a dog acting job so he's making money. There is also a part where the neighbor orange lady catches Prince in the early morning turning into a dog, but doesn't totally see the transformation so she doesn't have real proof. There is a new job lunch too where Prince can be human in the shadows on a cloudy day, but then turns into a dog in the pool.

At some point, Paula comes over because her car broke down right by Lisa's apartment. Lisa hides Prince, it's night so he's a man, but Paula finds him and is mad because Lisa was all high and mighty about her virginity. Friendship over. 

Lisa needs Prince to be human all the time. Prince hints he could kill himself and start over as a man. Prince runs away to figure it out but Lisa misses him. As she runs to meet him the dog is hit by a car and dies.

Sometime later. It's gotta be like 25-30 years. Lisa puts her apartment up for rent. Paula shows up with four school age kids. Lisa and Paula reconnect, those kids are Paula's grand kids! It seems unlikely because the age makeup is terrible. Lisa shows Paula the album of her "marriage" to Prince. Good set dog photos. Paula leaves and Prince in a wig shows up and they remember each other. Prince is young as he was reincarnated when the dog body died, but Lisa is now supposedly 65? Slowly Prince gets gray streaks in his hair. He's been a dog trainer this time. Lisa and Prince/Alvin Flang get married at night alone and they become young again together. The End.

 This movie is a total mess but just casually looking at imdb it looks like the director made it in her 70's, which is very inspiring. I've also heard since this is a student film there is a version with background music that helps stitch together some of the scenes.  I watched it for free on youtube, so you get what you get.

This has been making the rounds on bad movie sites/blogs/podcasts etc. so it was fun to see what everyone was talking about. 

 

Wednesday, October 25, 2023

In Your Wildest Dreams

Watched February 3, 2023

1991
Director: Bruce Neibaur
Starring: Trevor Black, Lise Wilburn, Sarah Schaub

I had some Feature Films for Families as a kid, I think gifted by my religious aunt. I recall liking the Buttercream Gang but I couldn't tell you anything about it now. In Your Wildest Dreams is a FFF so I was a little concerned on it being too family friendly. The VHS cover I have is playing on Short Circuit but the robot isn't in it much, so no Johnny 5 energy.

Mark (Trevor Black) is a high school senior who's applied to Princeton but is waiting for his letter. His girlfriend Holly (Lise Wilburn) answers phones at her dad's company, Bank's Electronics. The very beginning is Holly's dad putting the AI robot in a car. Then Katey (Sarah Schaub), Mark's kid sister, is at the controls telling the robot what to do while driving the car. There is some funding needing, so some stock thing is mentioned, this will come into play later.

Mark, Holly and Katey go to lunch at a diner where all the business people eat. Katey asks Mark to check the change from their receipt. It's over so Mark takes it back, showing that he's a good kid. Justin (Brett Palmer) is a sleezy Wall St. (Gordon Gekko type) who it trying to make some insider trading deal with Banks stock and he's eating at the same diner. Mark has a scooter, Holly has a car and they babysit Katey a lot.

Mark's dad is an accountant who Justin owes money/taxes. At Mark's school, a woman from the SEC gives a presentation on insider trading. Then the class has to do a pretend stock investment assignment with $25k to see who can make the most with their stock pick. One computer is connected to the internet. Mark and his friends think they're pretend buying Bank's stock but it turns out to be real. Mark used his money market college savings account to buy the stock.

 Mark gets his Princeton acceptance letter and the family celebrates, it seems like a dream sequence, but it's real. Mark suddenly seems unsure because Holly's dad wants Mark to work for him and take night classes at the community college instead of going to Princeton. Mark's middle sister hints that Holly's making him change his mind about Princeton.

Meanwhile Justin gets mad at his accomplice because they discussed slowly buying Bank's stock and they don't know that it was Mark who bought the stocks. Mark buying that much stock puts a freeze on the stock. Mark and his friend talk to his stock savvy dad but there's nothing they can do, like try to un-buy the stock. The next day Banks announces the AI robot technology, the stock is for sale again and Mark makes a ton of money selling some of the stock.

Mark, Holly, Katey and middle sister go to pick up the middle sister's new boyfriend Enzo, he's a rollerblading punk and they're mildly shocked but they don't say anything. They go to a local amusement park.

When the money comes in from the stock sale, Mark buys a Ferrari and motorcycle for his dad, a faux fur coat for his mom, a stereo for his middle sister and a big play set for Katey. 

It turns out that Holly's dad needed the money from the IPO, this isn't how stocks work. But they keep putting it on Mark that it's his fault for buying the publicly traded stock. Holly wants Mark to give it back (that's not how stocks work...so?) Justin tries to trick Mark into trading the stock for Justin's abandoned warehouse he owns. Justin has two accomplices who try to muscle Mark but Katey stowed away and honks the horn, this distracts everyone. Mark steals Justin's phone, they have a chase around the empty building. Katey almost pushes a button letting a girder crush Justin's Ferrari. But the FEC lady stops Mark, the accomplice was an informant. They caught Justin, and Mark's a good kid. When he bought the stock Mark messed up their plan to catch Justin, but they got him after all.

Later, Mark listens to Katey and a friend fight about doing what's right. Mark gives the stock paper to Holly's dad. The End.

I've watched so many annoying kids in movies in was nice to see that Katey was not a super bratty kid even when she saves the day. Punk Enzo was the best secret rollerblading park of the moves and according to IMDB that dude is a Hollywood writer and show runner now. I didn't want Mark to get screwed over, I cared. Great ladies business power suits. Not enough robots. It wasn't clear on how why Holly's dad need the stock back, when the company was public and anyone could have bought the stock and sold it. I don't get it, publicly traded companies makes money when they do an IPO. It's not about robots, but it's family friendly fine.

Wednesday, October 18, 2023

Critters 4

Watched January 27, 2023
 
1991
Director: Rupert Harvey
Starring: Brad Dourif, Angela Bassett, Don Keith Opper, Terrence Mann

Somewhere in Kansas: A space bounty hunter,  Charlie (Don Keith Opper) has found two Krite eggs. He's about to destroy them when he gets a holo-message that he can't destroy them because they're the last two of their species. A space tube is sent, Charlie puts the eggs in the tube, but he gets stuck and frozen in the tube and sent to space.

Somewhere in space is a crew of salvagers. Al (Brad Dourif), Rick the angry captain (Anders Hove), Bernie (Erik DaRe from Twin Peaks), Fran (Angela Bassett ) and Ethan the intern (Paul Whitthorne) round out the crew. They see the tube, scan it but they don't know what's in it. The Captain is smoking in their ship, wouldn't the oxygen mix be combustible? They decide to pick up the capsule. They are able to decipher a logo from Terra Corp. and send a message to them. Perhaps the original bounty hunter plays the Terra Corp. guy? The company gives them a space station location to drop the capsule off at for payment. They arrive, it's a cube with a propeller. Once onboard they discover the station is empty.

The computer, Angela is only running at 50% so she's a malfunctioning computer. No one is at the facility, it's large including a science lab and pharmacy. Al gets the computer to show him several levels are blocked off, no other people are on board so he wants to leave. The nuclear core of the ship is also unstable. 

Fran takes a shower, the pervy captain hands her a towel while she's still in the shower and she punches him. The Captain gets space madness and goes to open the capsule without anyone knowing. After laser blasting it a couple times it sends a computer warning that Al sees. Al sends Ethan to check it out. Ethan gets stuck in the elevator because of the crazy computer. You have to say the opposite of what you want to get the computer to work for you. Angry captain knocks Ethan out and hangs him by a hook. Captain gets the capsule open and Charlie, now unfrozen, rushes out. Captain pokes around, the eggs have hatched. Two critters attack the Captain, one on the leg the other on his mouth. Charlie gets Ethan down from the hook. The rest of the crew finds the Captain. Ethan and Charlie are chasing/running away from the critters when they discover the lab. Charlie goes into a duct. Ethan follows but then it dumps them in the trash compactor. The computer is doing to jettison them into space but they the find another duct and escape.

They find Bernie and get cleaned up. They all meet in the astroturf lounge room. Charlie discovers he's been in the tube for 50 years and everyone he knows is dead. Charlie explains the critters.

They also unlock a video from the lab, showing that they were doing experiments to make critters clear out life forms on planets they wanted to colonize?

They find a key card. Leo goes to the pharmacy grabs tons of pills but then is critter attacked. The team gets back to their docked spaceship. Al loads Charlie's old gun with six bullets. Charlie shoots at the two critters, killing one but damaging the ship in the process. The critters have laid more eggs. Fran  smashes some. The Terra Corp. guys and stormtroopers arrive. Charlies recognizes the head guy who just wants the eggs. They've hatched! Ethan outruns the stormtroopers by using the computers reverse psychology to close doors. Ethan finds the eggs, juggles them, and threatens to smash them. Ethan shows Fran that he has the gun. Ethan tosses the last egg, the bad guy tries to grab it but Fran punches him with the gun. Al was already shot, Ethan is sad and Al was his surrogate dad. Charlie, Fran and Ethan get in the Terra Corp. ship. The Terra Corp. guy tries to attack Ethan but is eaten by a critter and then frozen and smashes to pieces. The station starts nuclear meltdown/self destruct mode. Fran, Charlie and Ethan get away. The space station blows up with all the critters. Charlies bushes a button after being told not to and the ship goes crazy.

 I had incredibly low expectations for this movie so it was pretty fun. Little bit of humor, but everyone is taking the story seriously. Fran doesn't die, so that's something. I liked it. The music is all over the place with weird western riffs and space music. Creature effects by the Chiodo Bros!

Wednesday, October 11, 2023

Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2

 


Watched December 23, 2022

1987
Director: Lee Harry
Starring: Eric Freeman (Ricky), Elizabeth Kaitan (Jennifer),  Darrel Guilbeau


It's awful! Garbage day indeed.

Ricky (Eric Freeman) is a dead eyed dude in a white room where a psychiatrist comes to interview him and record it on a reel to reel. Ricky tells the story of Silent Night, Deadly Night the movie. Billy is Ricky's older brother who witnessed Santa kill his parents. Ricky was a baby at the time but he seems to have all of Billy's memories. We re-watch Santa killing the family when they stop their car to help him. When Billy acts out about Santa fear he is punished by Mother Superior, the nun at the orphanage where both boys ended up after the murders of their parents. Billy sees two adults, who are supposed to be teen orphans according to the credits, having sex. Mother Superior belts them and Billy too. The younger, nicer nun had told Billy to go outside to play. Mother Superior gives a speech about what the older orphans did was naughty so they must be punished.
 
 It keeps cutting back to Ricky in the white room, it's awful. Then Ricky tells that Billy got hired at the toy store. Around Christmas time, they made young Billy be Santa. At the Christmas Eve party at the toy store, Billy sees a co-worker sexually assaulting another co-worker. He rescues the woman, strangles the man but then kills the woman too. Billy kills the husband and wife toy store owners too. He's on full naughty Santa kill rampage. We get a 'best of' of all the kills from the first movie. Billy kills a couple that were about the have sex, he hangs the woman on a rack of antlers, then kills the dude. He kills some bullies who were night sledding. The cops are now on Billy's tail, but since he's dressed as Santa they keep running into other people dressed as Santa. They think Billy is headed for the orphanage, it's Christmas morning now. At first a deaf Santa shows up and is killed by a cop, but it's not Billy. Then Billy does show up and kills that cop in the basement. Billy makes it into the building but is shot by the detective before he can kill Mother Superior in front of all the kids. 
 
Now that's we've watched the best of the first movie, we get back to Ricky. After Billy died, Ricky was adopted and it was mostly good. He freaked out at some nuns, but his adoptive parents were trying to make it work.Then his adopted dad died, he's supposed to be 15 at this point but he is played by Darrel Guilbeau who was 25 at the time. 
 
While wandering the woods, Ricky sees a picnicking couple. The get romantic, but the woman stops it stating that the guy is getting too aggressive. The guy gets the point, stops and goes over to his jeep, he turns around to suddenly see Ricky in the driver's seat. Ricky drives over the guy about 6 times. 
 
Later Ricky gets a job cleaning up at a restaurant, while taking out the trash he notices a guy beating up another guy, loan shark style. Ricky takes the extorter and stabs him with a closed umbrella, which he then opens. The rain starts to wash the blood away.
 
The doctor interviewer shows Ricky a photo/headshot of a woman and asks "What about her?" "Jennifer was my love" Ricky replies. It shows how Ricky met Jennifer (Elizabeth Kaitan), she ran her car into his motorcycle. They said nothing to each other but she got on the back of his motorcycle and they were dating. They have sex, holding each other and not moving at all. At a movie date, some heckler is making Ricky nuts. He leaves Jennifer seated, but the she is accosted by her ex-boyfriend, Chip who wants to get back together with her. She's not interested. Ricky kills the popcorn heckler and his embarrassed friend. 
 
Taking a suburban neighborhood walk, Jennifer and Ricky run into Chip, who's car has broken down. Ricky gets mad and electrocutes Chip with a car something. Jennifer tries to stop him, but he strangles her with a car antenna. Ricky is on a tear now. He grabs a gun from Chip? He walks the neighborhood in broad daylight, and the infamous garbage day scene happens here. No real context, I guess it could be that Ricky is taking out the garbage but he shoots someone taking out their garbage for now apparent reason. The cops do try to stop him, but he gets away? He steals a Santa suit from a Salvation army bell ringer. Goes to the 666 address that is Mother Superior's house. The younger nun is back in the mix. Mother Superior is wheelchair bound now and apparently had a stroke, but also has bunch of facial boils. Ricky attacks her, she falls down the stairs. The cops shoot Ricky and he falls out a window. The End.  

No fun.

Ricky is a bad actor there's no arc to his character. Ricky is bad, he does bad things and dies. He's killed a lot of people but doesn't care or get punished himself. The Santa trauma is still hard to explain especially for Ricky over Billy. There isn't a naughty/nice determination to killing. I do not recommend, this movie bummed me out a lot. The garbage day clip is it's own thing because even within the context of the movie it's nuts. I have seen the first one, and I knew this one had a lot of clips from the first movie, or most of the the footage from the first movie. It takes a lot of what is fun in a horror movie and cuts it out, it thinks you just want to see the kills but you need to have context to have the kills be interesting. It doesn't work and is a chore.