C.H.U.D.II Bud the Chud

Watched September 1, 2015

1989
Starring: Brian Robbins, Bill Calvert, Tricia Leigh Fisher, Robert Vaughn

Having little to do with the first C.H.U.D. movie, this one tries the horror comedy approach to a sequel.

Colonel Masters (Robert Vaughn) is heading up a secret program to create C.H.U.D.'s as soldiers, but they can't seem to remove the cannibal part from their test subject, Bud. Bud (Gerrit Graham) tries to escape from the medical facility where they are testing on him. The soldiers and scientists freeze him with Nitroglycerin, essentially killing him. 

Meanwhile two teen friends, Steve (Brian Robbins) and Kevin (Bill Calvert) are in their high school biology class. After class ends they are in the back room of the lab putting frogs away when the corpse they are supposed to look out later is pushed out of the loading dock and rolls awat. They are worried they'll get in trouble for losing the body, so they go to the local disease control lab, which happens to be the same place that the military is testing C.H.U.D.s. They end up stealing Bud the C.H.U.D. They take him back to Steve's house and he ends up in the bathtub, then a hairdryer falls in the electrocutes him back to life. Steve and Kevin lock Bud in the basement to figure out what to do next. Bud easily escapes and bites Steve's miniature poodle. This turns the poodle into a C.H.U.D. too. I guess C.H.U.D.-ism is similar to how zombies become infected, in that everyone that is bit turns into a C.H.U.D. and can infect other people.

Steve and Kevin team up with their gal pal Katie (Tricia Leigh Fisher) to look for Bud. General Master is also looking for the C.H.U.D. Bud makes a bunch of friends and ends up on a farm, the government also finds Steve, Kevin and Katie there and try to arrest them. The C.H.U.D. group manages to escape.

 For some reason, the military know the C.H.U.D.s are attracted to large groups and there is a Halloween Dance at the high school that night. The C.H.U.D.s now have a whole posse and they all head down to the High school, synchronized dancing along the way. Steve and Kevin figure out that if you freeze then electrocute the C.H.U.D.'s you can cause them to explode, destroying them. Bud is attracted to Katie so she lures him and the the rest of the C.H.U.D.'s to the high school pool. They all fall/jump in, then Steven and Kevin throw nitroglycerin into the pool. Steve and Kevin rip and electrical line off the wall and throw it into the pool, causing all the C.H.U.D.'s explode, but not before Steve is bitten. All the C.H.U.D.'s are destroyed, Kevin finally tells Katie that he likes her romantically. Steve, now a C.H.U.D. tells his friends that he is off to explore the world. He hitches a ride with Colonal Masters, now a C.H.U.D. alond with a random woman played by Bianca Jagger.

The custom song Bud the C.H.U.D. is pretty great and plays often. I had some fun watching this movie, but that doesn't mean it's good. The makeup for all the C.H.U.D.'s is just some green face paint for the most part. The original C.H.U.D.'s were real mutants that looked pretty gross. Most of the laughs in this one fall pretty flat, but I did like all the great costumes at the high school Halloween Dance.

The Net

Watched August 25, 2015

1995
Starring: Sandra Bullock, Jeremy Northam, Dennis Miller

I've continued watching movies based around the internet that were made in the mid-1990's. The Net is another one on the list, it's less about virtual reality and more about the fear of all your information being accessible online.

Angela Bennett (Sandra Bullock) is a computer beta tester who loves the internet. She barely needs to leave the house because she can always order out from Pizza.net, her favorite online pizza delivery site. She lives in the larger Los Angeles area somewhere and works for Cathedral systems, an IT company based in San Francisco. Her mother has Alzheimer's and is in an assisted living facility. Angela visits her regularly, but it's hard watching her mother forget who she is. She doesn't have a lot of friends because she loves computer so much. A coworker from Cathedral Systems sends her a disk for a program they've been debugging called Mozart's Ghost. Once the program launches, there is a pi symbol in the bottom right corner, once pressed it opens a back door to top secret files. She talks to her coworker and they are both curious about what the pi symbol means. Her coworker wants to talk in person so her and he flies down in his personal plane down but a glitch in air traffic control computer makes him crash into some power plant towers. 

The next day Angela heads to Mexico for a beach vacation. That's where she meets Jack (Jeremy Northam.) He's kind of charming and creepy, but he manages to trick her into a date on his boat. A weird dude keeps watching them, eventually he steals Angela's purse on a beach walk. It's all a trap because Jack just wanted the Mozart's Ghost disk. He takes Angela further out on the boat to kill her, but she just thinks it's a nice date and they have sex. While he is below deck, she puts on her clothes and his jacket where she finds his gun. She asks him about the gun and he takes it from her saying it's for shark fishing, with a silencer. Luckily she took clip out so he couldn't shoot her.  She hits him with a bottle of wine, and escapes in the little motor boat only to crash into some nearby rocks. 

Several days later she wakes up in a Mexican hospital without any personal identification. At the US embassy they grant her a temporary visa with the name Ruth Marx, she reluctantly signs it even though the name is wrong. At the airport she goes to where she had left her car and it's gone. When  she gets to her house, it's for sale and open house is going on. Angela goes in and starts freaking out at the realtor.  The cops are called and Angela tries to explain her situation.  The cops run Ruth Marx's name, since that who they think Angela is and she has a bunch of warrants that Jack just added to get her into trouble. Angela escapes out the back door and steals the realtor's phone. She doesn't have any real life friends, but she has an ex-boyfriend Alan (Dennis Miller), who also used to be her therapist. Alan doesn't believe Angela's story at first, that her identity has been switched. They do get Angela checked into a hotel. 

Jack is still tracking Angela since he botched up killing her.  Jack and his group of bad guys mess with Alan's medication and give him penicillin which he is allergic to and he ends up in the hospital. He starts to recover but is then killed. He was the last person who could verify her identity, since her mom has Alzheimer's.

Angela is arrested and tells her story to her court appointed attorney, who doesn't believe her anyway. She is released from jail by a supposed FBI agent who turns out to being working for Jack. She manages to escape the clutches of the fake FBI guy and hitchhikes to San Francisco to the Cathedral offices to figure out who is behind the Pi symbol. She gets into the office and forces everyone out with a fire alarm. She finds out that Jeff Gregg Microsystems guy who created the whole Gateway security system included the Pi back door to manipulate information and people. She copies the info and runs to the Pan Pacific Computer Convention that just happens to be going on down the street. She finds a computer and emails the info to the FBI. Jack finds her chases her onto a cat walk where she hits him with a fire extinguisher and he falls, presumably to his death. The movie ends with her and her still Alzheimer's afflicted mom back at her house. She got her identity back, she is Angela Bennett again.

One of the funniest parts to me is when Jack is flirting with Angela at the Mexican resort. He traces her accent to Southeastern Colorado, which to my knowledge is not a region specific accent at all. Jack also call Angela a clever girl just like in Jurassic Park.

While Jack is still trying to seduce Angela and they are walking on the beach at night she gets cold. She is only wearing a crop top and Jack has a casual suit jacket on. Instead of offering her his jacket, her pulls a large napkin out of his pocket and ties it around her waist. 

It was alright, but overall too long. The pace could have been sped up. The hacking and internet stuff was pretty realistic. She ordered pizza on the net, which is something you can do today. It could easily be remade, the same security issues exist, but that doesn't necessarily make it a compelling movie.

Hard to Kill

Watched August 16, 2015

1990
Starring: Steven Seagal, Kelly LeBrock, William Sadler, Frederick Coffin

Mason Storm (Steven Seagal) is a tough cop who is on a stake out one night. He videotapes a mob/Senator conspiracy to kill the Senator's competitor. He calls in to the station with the incriminating information to his officer friend, but a corrupt cop who is also working for Senator Vernon Trent (William Sadler) overhears their conversation. 

With the conspiracy on both video and audiotape Mason goes home to his hot wife and young son. But the bad cop has sent some henchmen to take out Mason. The evil guys break into Mason's house, kill his wife, shoot him and try to shoot his son who escapes out the window. Mason is taken to the hospital and initially declared dead. It turns out that Mason is just barely alive but in a coma, his partner Kevin (Frederick Coffin) asks them to not reveal that he's alive to the press. Now identified as John Doe,  Mason is taken to the L.A. Coma Center. 

Seven years later, Mason is still in a coma. His nurse, Andy (Kelly LeBrock) brings a kitten to try to get him out of his coma. It's either the kitten or Andy admiring his dick that wakes him up from his coma. Once he is awake, Andy calls the police because she was given a code number to call in if her ever awoke. Unfortunately the same corrupt police guys hear the call and head to the hospital to kill Mason. Even though Mason has little muscle strength with Andy's help they escape the coma center. 

Andy drives them to Ojai, she has been house sitting for a friend but no one knows she is there so it'll make a good safe house. Mason begins to build up his strength with acupuncture and martial arts training. Andy helps him find out some information about what happened the night he was shot. It turns out his old partner Kevin has been raising Masons son, who survived and his son is safe from the bad guys at a boarding school. Andy and Mason begin a romantic relationship.  The bad guys are still after Mason, they manage to find Andy and track her back to the house. Where there is a crazy shoot out, but Mason and Andy escape. Mason's old house has been sold but it's being remodeled. He sneaks in and breaks open a secret panel to get the evidence of the Senator's conspiracy with the mob. 

Even though his son was safe at the boarding school, Kevin brings him to meet his dad. Mason has a fight with some more of the bad guys and saves his son from them. Due to the Senator always saying the same phrase, Mason recognizes his voice from the audiotape and puts it all together. Mason now has his target. He goes to the Senator's house and surprises the Senator's evil henchmen. Mason kills the corrupt cop who has been trying to kill him this whole time. He finds the Senator but doesn't kill him, instead he is arrested. Mason is reunited with Andy and his son, the new family will live happily ever after.


Steven Seagal in his prime, pretty fun action stuff. The kitten at the coma center is very cute, the fact that there is a dedicated coma center is great. Steven wears these tight light blue jeans that leave little to the imagination and it's too much. There are multiple camera shots where all you see are the crotch of those jeans. Both Steven Seagal and Kelly LeBrock had some crazy outfits and it was fun to find out in the credits that they're outfits were by Armani.

Conquest

Watched July 27, 2015

1983
Starring: Andrea Occhipinti, Jorge Rivero, Sabrina Siani

I had never heard of this movie before, it's pretty crazy but it fits into the early '80s Beastmaster type fantasy model. Lots of tiny loin clothes and crazy cave man adventures.
 
A young man, Ilias (Andrea Occhinpinti) is given a bow by his people with the task of going to a foreign land. Once he becomes a man he will be able to make the bow shoot laser arrows that go wherever he needs them.

The other land is ruled by Ocron (Sabrina Siani) a lady who wears a golden full head helmet and a tiny thong. She had something to do with making the sun rise. She rules a gang of weasel faced wookiees that kill people and bring the heads for her to eat the brains. Ocron has a vision of Ilias killing her, so she sends her minions to kill him first. She summons a demon god to bring more bad things to attack Ilias and Mace.

On his journey, Ilias meets up with Mace (Jorge Rivero) when Mace saves him from being attacked by Ocron's henchmen creatures. Mace is a random warrior who has no problem killing a man to take the boar that he has killed, even though he explains that he didn't kill the boar, he's on the side of the animals. Right before Mace saved Ilias, Ilias saved a mud haired girl from a snake.  Mace knows the girl's family, they share a sheep that they stole from some guy with the family. The girl and Ilias make eyes at each other as they eat the meat. They all go to the sleep but the girl wakes Ilias to go make out, but then the girl is killed by the Ocron's creatures. Ilias is kidnapped and Mace is knocked out. Mace comes to and finds Ilias tied up, but they manage to escape the creatures anyway. They are then attacked by a mysterious poisonous arrow plant. While running away, Ilias is hit and gets a really bad infection, that could kill him. Mace leaves him to find a special plant that could heal him, but he is attacked again. He does makes it back to save Ilias from the poison. Ilias decides that he'll never become a man and heads home in a handmade boat. Mace is then captured by Ocron's creatures, but Ilias comes back and by doing that becomes a man that can shoot laser arrows.

Back together, Ilias and Mace decide to find Ocron, but that night Ilias is sucked into a black light cave. Mace goes after him but can't see what's happening, once he finds Ilias he is already dead and decapitated. Elias's head is taken to Ocron, but she knows that Ilias still has his soul even though he is head. Mace burns Ilias's body and rubs the ashes on his face giving him the laser arrow power. Mace finds Ocron, who takes off her mask to reveal a monkey skull face. Then Mace kills her and she turns into a wolf. Mace leaves to fight another day.

Lots of crazy things happen in this movie. At the beginning a young girl is ripped in half, then decapitated. Ilias has a crazy leather crop top and loin skirt combo outfit. If you like lots of fighting, oozing wounds, and exclusively topless women this movie is for you. It gets a little slow in the middle but the action scenes make up for it. There is also a part where Mace is saves from drowning by some dolphins.

Mirror Mirror 2: Raven Dance

Watched July 13, 2015

1994
Starring: Tracy Wells, Roddy McDowall, Mark Ruffalo, Sally Kellerman

I was blown away to find the not that great movie Mirror Mirror has a sequel, but it was a surprise VHS find. 

Marlee (Tracy Wells) and her younger brother Jeffrey (Carlton Beener) are recouperating at a nunnery after the death of their parents. Marlee's much older step-sister Roslyn (Sally Kellerman) wants to get the money that was left by Marlee's parents. Roslyn has been working with Dr. Lasky (Roddy McDowall) to keep Marlee sedated until a certain date, I'm not completely sure. 

Marlee is not sedated the whole time, she invites a grunge band to come play in the nunnery's dance space but the mirror doesn't like them and they are all burnt to a crisp but Marlee and Jeffrey survive.  This only adds to Marlee and Jeffrey's state of shock.

Roslyn hires a crazy groundskeeper to torture Marlee so that she seems unfit to inherit the money. The haunted mirror is in Marlee's room. After the band was burned she lost partial sight, but when she looks at the mirror it's perfectly clear. She begins to dance again, her passion,  for the mirror and she falls in love with the mirror. This makes them mirror demon do her bidding. Jeffrey seems autistic a first, playing his violin, but he's fine and it turns out he's the only pure one the mirror demon can't touch. 

A young man, Christian (Mark Ruffalo) shows up randomly and starts hanging out with Marlee. The nuns explain that he's a former orphan. It seems that there are only there are only two nuns in the whole place. After a ton of dancing around by Marlee, the mirror demon goes berserk. It takes Dr. Lasky into the mirror zone, kills the groundskeeper with acid and makes Roslyn look old, her worst fear. The mirror then tries to kill the blind nun, but Jeffrey stabs it. This makes the demon come out to attack, but Christian takes one for the team and stabs the demon with a special knife. Marlee then wishes none of this happens and it takes her back in time to the trade places the very first woman who interacted with the mirror.

I found Mirror Mirror 2 to be long and boring. The plot of the older step sister trying to get money from Marlee didn't make a lot of sense. It makes the first Mirror Mirror look fantastic. There is too much dancing from Marlee, but it's kind of fun to see Mark Ruffalo in an early role. Overall it's really slow and dull with a very strange soundtrack.