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Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016)
A Hot Mess
I really enjoyed the Alice in Wonderland film so I was looking forward to seeing this one.
Alice Kingsleigh (Mia Wasikowska) is captaining her father's ship, The Wonder, escaping Malay pirates and giving orders to port while her crew is going to starboard but they escape anyway. She's a year late returning to London only to find that her father has died and her jilted fiancé Hamish has taken over. Her mother has agreed to sell the family's shares in the shipping company and give up The Wonder to save her home. Absolem (Alan Rickman) turns up and Alice follows him through the Looking Glass. The Hatter (Johnny Depp) is all depressed. He is haunted by memories of his family killed by the Jabberwocky. Alice has to get the Chronosphere from Time (Sacha Baron Cohen) and return to the past to save Hatter's family. The White Queen (Anne Hathaway) is there making strange gestures with her hands but with well-groomed eyebrows this time and the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter) is back and apparently off her meds again. Then Alice wakes up and everything since she went through the looking glass was a dream while she was in the insane asylum. And the Hatter's family is fine, they have been living in an ant farm. The movie goes downhill from there.
Black to the Moon 3D (2013)
1 minute of entertainment in an 81 minute film
What is the intended audience for this film? At first glance it would appear to be for young children but the adult language, sex, racist stereotypes and genetically modified sheep make it inappropriate for children. There are no repercussions for bullying and name-calling.
But there is nothing here to hold the interest of adults either. The animation is horrible. There is less plot than is normally found in the average Saturday morning cartoon. There are references to ANIMAL FARM and 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY that I assume were intended to amuse adults but the humor of British cartoons is nowhere to be found. This is certainly not SHAUN THE SHEEP.
I wonder if the company that dubbed this cartoon in English played a horrible joke on the production company by rewriting the script? The one minute that I found entertaining was a scene where a room full of spiders did the Aboriginal Dreamtime War Dance.
Superstore (2015)
Watch it now, it won't be around next season
Stereotypes, clichés, and bad writing. The show has the retro look and feel of the 2007 premier episodes of Chuck. It's even going to air in the same time slot. It doesn't help that Ben Feldman looks and acts so much like Scott Baio did back in the day that it's giving me flashbacks. So how could anyone compare this show to The Office? It may have Justin Spitzer but it's missing something else. And I was shocked to see America Ferrera in this. Is she that hard up for work? NBC has already given it a vote of no confidence, cutting its order from the original 13 episodes down to 11. If you're enjoying shopping cart kayaking in the parking lot, watch it now because if it keeps depending on Jonah knocking down aisle displays for laughs, it won't be back next season.
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls (1995)
The monkey displayed more talent than Jim Carrey or Steve Oedekerk
I thought that Ace Ventura Pet Detective was pretty funny but this movie was so bad that I was embarrassed to be watching it. There were a couple of funny jokes repeated from the first movie. The new jokes were lame butt jokes. I probably would have thought they were funny when I was eight years old if my mother had allowed me to go to movies where men are sodomized by gorillas.
She didn't.
It is also very ironic that this movie was filmed at the 777 Ranch in Hondo, Texas. Celebrities and other rich people go there on vacation to shoot tame game animals, many of which actually appeared in the film. For $3,500 you too can personally shoot one of the scimitar horned oryx from the herd in the movie.
Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003)
I can't believe that someone I trusted recommended this film!
I can't believe that someone I trusted recommended this film!
If this film didn't have names like Quentin Tarantino directing and Uma Thurman starring, they wouldn't have even been able to find a distributor for a movie this bad. When they decided to cut it into two films they should have used The Bride's sword to cut the film instead of using their teeth. She gets beat up, then she kills the second person, then she kills the first person then you wait for Kill Bill Vol. II to see the part of the story between when she gets beat up and when she kills the first person? The trailer for Kill Bill must have been made before they cut the film into two parts because it had more scenes for Kill Bill Vol. II than for Kill Bill.
There was one good special effect during the fight scene at night in the snow when the characters looked like they were actually walking around in an Ukiyo-e woodblock print. The rest of the special effects were on par with Airplane 2.
Sonny Chiba played his role so straight. They must have lied and told him it was a serious film.
The Alternate (2000)
Punishing martial arts action overshadows the conventional weapons in "Agent of Death."
The video that I watched calls it "Agent of Death" but AKA "The Alternate" and "The Replacement."
Basic story: Election day is approaching and the President of the United States is not doing well in the popularity polls. Elizabeth, his Chief of Staff and organizer of his re-election campaign, decides to hire a gang to stage a fake kidnapping of the President thinking that this will give him lots of free TV coverage. When one of the members of the gang doesn't show up, a former CIA agent (Eric Roberts) is hired as the replacement. The kidnapping is staged as planned until the leader of the gang (Bryan Genesse) reveals that they have turned it into a real kidnapping and they have no intention of letting Eric and the President leave the building alive.
At first it was a little difficult not to compare this film to "Heaven's Fire" or "Die Hard" but it turns out to be a totally different film.
One happy difference -- the FBI agent outside the building, who was sort of annoying in "Heaven's Fire," is replaced by a much smarter and more entertaining Agent Briggs (played by Michael Madsen) in Agent of Death. His smirk is worth a thousand words.
Another plus is having Steven Lambert as stunt coordinator. While his work on the film "Titanic" probably reached a wider audience, true fans of mayhem will remember his work on films like "Total Recall," "Army of Darkness" and John Carpenter's "Vampires."
The second half of the film showcases a variety of weapons from handguns to blow guns to a flame thrower but they take a back seat to the martial arts. Eric Roberts looks in good shape and has shown off his martial arts skills in other films but with Bryan Genesse both choreographing the fights and playing his adversary, we have a situation where the good guy doesn't get in all the good moves. As Eric and his tux get the worst of the deal, Eric quips, "There goes the deposit."
Watch for the running gag as, behind the main action, the ditzy blond television reporter (played by Heidi Jo Markel) ducks and dodges but never lets go of her mike.
Fans will also recognize Larry Manetti (Rick on Magnum PI) playing Agent Harris and Eliza Roberts, real life wife of Eric Roberts, playing Chief of Staff Donaldson.
I don't want to give anything away but, please stay for the credits.