Reviews
Vampires (1998)
James Wood's coolness can't save film.
When you hear John Carpenter's Vampires was based on an actual good book, you may be surprised. The only good thing about this film: James Wood. It's starts off with a great gory vampire killing scenes. This is followed by a party scene, which is followed by another killing scene, only the humans are dying. A calm scene follows this with people talking. With that I've identified all three different moods in this movie.
1. Gory killing 2. Plot explanation 3. Partying, sex, and alcohol
The killing scenes eventually get very monotonous and boring. The characters also become very boring, except James Wood. James Wood's character, Jack Crow was likable, despite the fact he enjoys entirely too much talking about other people's erections. His character was hardly consistent; he changes several times during the film, most notably, at the end of the film where he's everybody's friend, completely tolerant, a complete opposite from the middle of the film, when we've learned most about him.
This movie also stars Thomas Ian Griffith, who seems to be cast solely on his resemblance to Christopher Walken. I guess Christopher Walken must have turned down the part. He most likely would have had lots more frightening lines rather than Thomas Ian Griffith, who basically does lots of groaning and hard breathing. More unbearably, through most of the movie he has this ridiculously stupid look on his face. All the scenes with Crow's sidekick, Tony Montoya seemed like filler. Most information from those scenes could have been revealed more easily and efficiently, and you are disappointed at the end when he doesn't die. There were several more characters, but they were hardly interesting.
In the first scene, the master vampires are pinned as completely superior, but in the end, they are killed as easily as goons, James Wood, and the inexperienced wussy priest guy seem slack-jawed and carefree to kill them. The masters also seem as stupid as goons. Maybe this is based on the fact that they never explain how they become masters
`Let's go kill some vampires.'
`Yeah, whatever.'
And that's where the un-needed erection jokes are used again.
Teletubbies (1997)
This is the most frighteningly disturbing show on television.
The Teletubbies is a UK show about four stubby aliens who live on a giant miniature golf course. They walk around the course doing simpletonic tasks and eating alien toast. Their only means of communication is nonsensical jabbering and slight English-sounding words. Every once in a while a talking shower head rises out of the turf and gives them instructions to please the sun which is really a giant baby's head inside of a sun. Then a giant pinwheel beams messages directly into their cerebral cortexes and their abdominal area becomes a projector. Their stomachs usually show small films about children going on adventures, or less exciting things. One time it showed five kids jumping. Just jumping, for five minutes.
If none of this makes sense, watch the show, it probably won't make any more sense, but it might.
Flesh Gordon (1974)
A campy seventies sci-fi porn film at its best.
This is a hilarious bit of parody which is frighteningly unerotic. You may have to know just a little bit about Flash Gordon to understand some jokes in the movie, but at the same time, you had to have NOT ever watched Flash Gordon to understand the rest of the jokes. The characters were likable, all except Flesh Gordon himself, a character as indescript and boring as a gray wall, and the dyke queen was quite unneededly unpleasant.
Urban Legend (1998)
This was an utterly awful twist on a recent rash of slashers.
Urban Legend was a total failure on an otherwise good idea. This was a rare movie where I was tempted to leave the theatre near the end. The movie lured people in with an original plot and a promising TV cast, but managed to humiliate the young actors. The movie was improved only slightly by Alicia Witt and the comedic performance of the janitor. Rebecca Gayheart, who should stick to facial cream commercials suggested she doesn't speak, provided an embarrassing performance. The movie stuck to a mediocre level as the film progressed and left an essence of hope to the audience with clues that it could possibly improve, but no. As soon as the climax hinted its start you began to wonder how this production could get worse, that being your only incentive to stay.
The writers stood with the classic slasher rules, to the best of their knowledge. Making the killer whom you'd least suspect became a bit of a novelty. I can just imagine: "let's see who've made the least obvious through bad clues . . ." I'd be more satisfied with the killer being someone we've never even seen before, like a guest celebrity, or Red Herring.