Comic Review: Bob’s Burgers Free Comic Book Day preview

    I’m a newcomer to Bob’s Burgers, a surprisingly addictive animated sitcom. The antics of the Belcher clan have warmed my heart. Media tie-in comics are a messy, typically crappy thing. Usually nothing more than a heartless cash grab, they often miss everything that makes their associated property beloved. I’m glad that isn’t the case with Bob’s Burgers. Sure, without the voice actors, there is something missing. But throughout the comic there are little moments, odd beats and throwaway lines that feel so right.

    Similar to the Futurama comic (another surprisingly not bad media tie-in), this is an anthology of gags and bits. And it probably works more for it. Instead of trying to recreate the magic of a full episode, this takes one little joke or humorous scene and tells it in a few pages. I can’t imagine this would bring new people to the show, or be particularly exciting for folks who don’t watch it. However, if you are a fan of Bob’s Burgers, check it out. It’s fun and you’ll get a laugh or two.

-Matthew J. Constantine

Matt’s Week in Dork! (6/1/14-6/7/14)

    Not a lot of movies in this week.  I’ve been busy, though.  I’ve been listening to a bunch of music (really gotta do a write-up on some of that), reading, and out on the town.  Still trying to work my way through Preacher.  Man, I know people love it, but it’s a chore.

See you in your nightmares!

The Long Ships:  OK, so this movie isn’t very good.  It’s certainly not historically accurate.  And it’s got some weird, bordering on silly performances.  But, I enjoyed the heck out of it.  Richard Widmark as a Viking?  OK, sure.  Why not?

Godzilla, Mothra, and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack:  I enjoy some parts of this movie, but it’s really not very good.  And man, does it look cheap.  It’s also weird, because it makes Godzilla a straight-up villain, with other monsters (including Ghidorah) being defending monsters(?).  It just doesn’t work for me.

A Field in England:  This is a heck of a fun, strange movie.  It’s like the lowest brow characters from a Shakespeare play stumbled into a drug-fueled nightmare.  Magic, mayhem, madness, and mushrooms.  It’s hard to describe the film.  But for those with a taste for the weird, it’s a must.

Futurama Season Seven:  The show never hit the levels of its first three seasons again, but was still quite fun throughout.  This last season has several good episodes, and the final episode is a good exit for the show, assuming it never comes back.  I love the characters, the various running jokes, and all the fun they have with various clichés and tropes of science fiction.  Any buff should watch this show, for sure.

Tobacco Road:  When I fell head over heels for Gene Tierney after watching Leave Her to Heaven, I found many fantastic photos and movie stills of her on the internet (love the modern world).  Images that kept coming up were of her as a young woman, dirtied up in a hillbilly outfit, which I found was from Tobacco Road…By John Ford.  Readers may have picked up something of a negativity on my part toward Mr. Ford.  With the exception of The Grapes of Wrath, I’ve pretty much disliked everything I’ve seen from him.  Oh, The Quiet Man.  I f’in HATE The Quiet Man.  I was skeptical of this Depression era film.  But Tierney looked so good.  Having now seen the film, I can attest to Gene Tierney looking all kinds of amazing, and you can certainly see why people took note of her.  The rest of the movie?  It sucks.  A comedy about what trash, in which their ‘down home’ ways, which keep them impoverished, are lauded as being wonderfully rustic.  And it’s NOT funny.  Not at all.  Skip it.  Unless you’re the sort who finds The Quiet Man or Donovan’s Reef amusing.  Then you might like this.

In the Blood:  Gina Carano has a certain quality.  She’s not especially good at acting or especially beautiful (though, by no means terrible), but she’s sexy and cool in a way that makes her fun to watch.  Unfortunately, that’s not enough to base a film on, as this one clearly illustrates.  It’s boring, it’s poorly thought out, and it’s shot like an amateur vacation video.  The story is dumb, the action is uninspired, and Carano has little to do but make you wish you were watching her in a better film.

    On Saturday, Rebecca and I headed in to DC, where we ate at a swell restaurant called Founding Farmers.  From there, it was off to the National Archive to see the Making Their Mark exhibit.  Some very cool items in there.  Then it was off to the National Portrait Gallery to view the American Cool exhibit, and the Presidential Portraits.  Definitely better then the last time I went, to view that lame video game art exhibit.  And no weird smells, either.  After that, we were off to Politics & Prose, where we caught Sam Kean giving a talk on his new book about Neuroscience.  That was quite interesting, and I’m thinking I might have to read the book at some point.  I also found a couple cool hardcovers on the cheap.  Then it was on to eat at Paragon Thai Restaurant, one of the better Thai places around.  From there, home.  Man, I love DC.  A good day and a nice end to a Week in Dork.

-Matthew J. Constantine

Matt’s Week in Dork! (4/7/13-4/13/13)

    I figured before Brad went into fits, I’d best start up Deadwood again.  I’d started watching it a couple years back, during an awesome Western month, but things happened and I didn’t continue.  After cranking through Rome while I was on vacation last week…well, I wanted more Rome truth be told.  But instead I decided to pop this back in the old DVD player.  They sure do talk pretty in Deadwood.  C&%$suckers, @$$f*&%ers, $#!tkickers, c#!%s, and lots of other words I typically use old-style comicbook style profanity for.  There’s enough swearing in this show to make salty sailors blush.

The Seventh Seal:  “My flesh is afraid, but I am not.”  Young Max Von Sydow is bloody terrifying, with his blond hair and his chiseled face.  He has a very sinister way about him.  This meditation on death and the fear of death is set against plague ravaged medieval Europe.  Von Sydow and his worldly squire have just returned from the Crusades, tired, bitter, and nearing death.  When the Grim Reaper arrives, they begin a chess game to decide fates.  As the story progresses, we meet a traveling circus with a goofy clown, and his comely wife, and their young boy.  Each step along the way, we meet various people trying to come to terms with life and its meaning.  There are some great discussions both funny and touching about love and living.  And some dark delvings into fear and horror.  It’s bawdy and thoughtful, and rather strange.  Even Death himself is rather funny, and sinister.  Interesting combinations in the movie.

Excalibur:  “Rest in the arms of the Dragon.”  Oh, John Boorman, you mad bastard.  Stylized and surreal, Excalibur is anything but naturalistic or realistic.  It is operatic fantasy, an epic poem on film.  He even opens it with my favorite piece of Wagner, Siegfried’s Funeral March.  Everyone is Shakespeare acting, bellowing dialog at the top of their lungs like devotees of the great god Brian Blessed.  You can imagine that John Q. Public circa 1350 might have imagined the story playing out much like this.  No connection to reality or history, but dwelling in the deepest and strangest of mythology.  What always kills me about this story is how kind of awful the ‘heroes’ are.  It takes all of two seconds for Lancelot to betray his ‘best friend.’  Of course, it took all of two seconds for them to become best friends in the first place, and just as little time for Arthur and Guinevere fall in love.  It’s not that I want the film to be longer, but it feels like it is supposed to be.  It feels like large chunks are missing.

L’Incoronazione di Poppea:  “Your breast deserves a sweeter name.”  Rome still on my mind, I lucked into having this one come in.  I didn’t actually know it was about Nero and his devil-wife Poppea.  It’s well produced.  I was surprised to see that it was from 1984; it felt more recent.  I’ll admit that I’m not more than a rank amateur at this whole opera thing, but I’m pretty sure I don’t care much for Italian opera.  So far, I’ve typically preferred the German stuff.  But again, I’m kind of new to it all, and still testing the waters.  Part of it is the music itself.  I want something a bit more epic and sweeping, where the Italian stuff I’ve heard so far sounds like little more than a harpsichord and a few violins (even when there’s a whole orchestra).  If you silence the singers and listen to Wagner, it’s still compelling music.  If you silenced the singers in this opera, I’d be wondering what I should order from the wine list, and hoping the cream sauce isn’t too rich.  Now, I realize what follows is an awfully shallow observation, but I’m an awfully shallow guy.  The lead actress Maria Ewing seems built for the stage.  From a distance, like from where you would see her if you were in the audience, she appears beautiful.  But up close, she looks kind of like a Muppet.  It’s distracting.  I don’t know if it’s bad plastic surgery, weird make-up, or she’s just an odd looking woman.  But it kept weirding me out whenever the camera would zoom in.  I wonder if she’s from a coastal town, ‘cause she has a touch of the Innsmouth Look about her.  But then, the guy playing Nero looks kind of like the Fat Kid from every 80s teen comedy, so what do I know?

Prehistoric Women:  “Strangely enough, the swan dive was invented before the swan.”  You know what I like in a narrator?  I like a narrator to explain in detail exactly what’s happening on the screen.  That’s great.  It reminds me of the masterworks of Stan “The Man” Lee.  Due to a brief domestic dispute, a woman leads a bunch of her tribe away from the men (like five guys), to create a tribe of ladies who know how to do stuff (like fish unsuccessfully and get caught by giants).  Years later the children of this splinter faction return to get them some lovin’ from Not Russ Tamblyn and his buddy Not Sal Mineo.  The battle between the ladies and the men would later be echoed by the epic opening of Saving Private Ryan.  Truly harrowing.  I believe this is based on the same Shakespeare play that inspired Captain Caveman.  Certainly, the totally authentic prehistoric language, consisting of as many as 5 words, seem to encompass the range of human communication eloquently.  The film adheres to the great Raymond Chandler’s advice, “when in doubt, have two women wearing animal skins wrestle for a few minutes.”  As the narrator says, “it seems that women were women in those days, too.”  Boy, I’ll say.  I bet if you checked, you’d find that their legs went all the way up.  The erotic mating dance is pure interpretive genius.  The pteroducktyl may be the most terrifying use of stock footage of a waterfowl ever captured in cinema.  I hope the AFI will finally relent and name this one of the greatest films of all time.  It deserves the credit after all these years.  The discovery of tools, fire, misogyny, cooked meat, and how to drive off ducks all in one generation.  Amazing.  And the use of the grunting, hairy giant as a metaphor for our loss of humanity in an ever increasingly mechanistic society was thought provoking to say the least.

Spies-A-Go-Go:  “Ve noticed the sign und ve are rocking und rolling enthusiasts und ve are here for the dance.”  Everything is better when it’s A-Go-Go.  In case, like me, you find the comedy stylings of Benny Hill a bit too cerebral, there are options, like this fantastic spy adventure comedy staring Arch Hall Jr. and his amazing Giant Face.  See, you know it’s funny, because there’s zany music and ethnic stereotypes.  And of course, the funniest thing ever to happen in the history of funny things, a dwarf trying to rope a cow.  Pure.  Comic.  Gold.  Cowboy Jaws knows it.  Creepy, giant faced Arian monster Elvis, Arch Hall Jr. makes for a heck of a singing secret agent.  Forget Val Kilmer in Top Secret, it’s all about having a huge face and knowing how to mug the camera…mug for the camera.  Always remember to watch out for snakes.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture:  There’s not really much plot here.  It’s kind of a summation of all the various ‘find a supercomputer’ stories from the old show.  But it also lays the foundation for Trek to come, and ideas from this film echo on.  Ilia and Decker become Troi and Riker.  V’ger becomes the alien probe from The Voyage Home, and I think partially inspired the Borg, too.  The music is good.  The effects are nice.  And I like a lot of what makes it to the screen.  But there are some unnecessary scenes, and though I like a lot of the sequences of flying through space and around objects, there as room for trimming for sure.  But I don’t think this movie deserves the derision it typically receives.  I respect them for trying to keep Trek its own thing and not just follow Star Wars’ lead by making it action heavy, as they would do in Wrath of Khan.

The Vanguard:  This low budget sci-fi horror film has a deep running, very bent sense of humor.  There are hints of Evil Dead, Mad Max, Dog Soldiers and some other lower budget, fringe films.  It’s sort of what I was expecting from Bellflower (not the hipster snooze-fest I got).  Don’t get me wrong.  It has some serious narrative flaws, giving some character backgrounds that don’t exactly add up to motivation, losing the thread a few times, and it features a let-down ending.  Still, it has enough going for it that fans of low budget stuff should find something to enjoy.  The final blood explosion really doesn’t work, though, and it’s kind of a bad way to finish up, with a memorably ineffective special effects shot.  I did like the lead actor’s weird deadpan beard acting, though.

Beyond the Valley of the Doll:  “This is my happening and it freaks me out!”  Heavy weight philosophy, the dope, rock n’ role, an aggressive ambisexual, and more boobs than a Congressional subcommittee.  The wild world of Russ Meyer, the greatest dirty old man to ever point a movie camera at some bimbos in bellbottoms.  While it is obviously a ‘bad’ movie, it’s kind of great like only bad movies can be.  It’s so danged surreal, with scenes that don’t seem to have anything to do with the plot, characters acting in ways that don’t make any sense, and a tone that would be hard pressed to be less even.  Joke joke joke --Beheading!!!  Sing sing sing -- Attempted suicide!!!  Yet, for some reason (other than the enormous boobs), I was very entertained.

Lost, Lonely, and Vicious:  “Yes, I know how it feels to be lonely…Wanna Coke?”  They may not be rebels, but they’re sure without causes…and clues.  Johnny Dennis and his vacuous jerk buddies don’t know what they want but they’re willing to sit around in a café and bitch to get it.  A young James Dean type guy is about to screw up his whole life because it’s going too well.  The glitz and glamour ain’t all it’s cracked up to be…I guess.  One day I do want a cute young lady to hold my bongos.  If it’s at a lake, all the better.  This is a heartfelt movie, if not a very good one.  It feels like the MST3K boys should take a go at it, but at the same time, it really does have a lot of heart.  The ending feels false, though.

    I watched a few old shorts on Friday night.  Crisis in Morality was a delightfully stupid Christian fluff piece about how everything fun or worth doing is evil.  Hell is a Place Called Hollywood is a nice sleazy short about the dangers of going to Hollywood, which almost certainly is the product of exactly what it’s about.  It features a bunch of cheeky nudity in the name of education.  We need to see the young starlet take her clothes off in the story of a young starlet who is exploited and made to take her clothes off.  It reminded me of that awesome Social Disease short from Amazon Women on the Moon.  Those pesky reform school girls are the subject of the third short, Little Miss Delinquent.  The lead girl in that one is surprisingly good.  I wonder if she went on to anything, or if her weird side-bite kept her from success.  And it’s Canadian, which makes it extra special.

Jacktown:  “All of a sudden you’re like…Gettin’ headaches.”  Whenever I review a uh…movie, I think I’m gonna dramatically uh…pause.  This is how you know I’m very uh…serious.  The two dimwit punks we meet seem to have a uh…inability to talk about what they’re talking about.  It’s like those villain conversations where the bad guy talks about ‘taking care of’ someone, or somebody ‘having an accident,’ but never actually says what he means outright.  When Blondie McDouche gives an underage waitress the business in his sweet convertible, he goes to the slammer for the statutory rape.  What follows is a kind of After School Special type prison experience, as the emotionless surfer-dude goes through the prison paces.  Then, through the ultra-kindly platitudes of the warden and the ministering of his bobbysoxer daughter, he gets the Jesus in him and becomes a good boy.

Doctor Who: Remembrance of the Daleks:  The beginning of the final stretch for classic Who, this is the episode I always think of when I remember Sylvester McCoy’s run.  The Doctor and Ace head back to 1963 and uncover some funny doings.  A annoyingly typical military dullard is in control of a unit of soldiers investigating, at odds of course, with the scientists who are trying to figure out weird energy sources.  Ace is especially cute in this one, letting her hair down a bit, and getting a chance to drop the hammer on some baddies.  She’s probably the closest companion the Doctor ever had to the great Leela.  The storyline makes interesting connections to William Hartnell, implying that he had some specific reasons for being on Earth at the beginning of An Unearthly Child that he was unable to accomplish.  I like when they build on the Doctor and his past, dealing with things he did even so far back as the first stories.  This is a pretty good Dalek story, and certainly feels more like traditional, pre-Trial of a Time Lord stuff.  One complaint I have is the voice of the Daleks; there’s something off about them here.  But I like their look, one group in white and gold, another in black or grey.  And the ‘special weapons’ Dalek is fab.

Monsters:  “The vibe just changed.”  Scoot McNairy does something I’ve rarely seen in film here.  At the beginning of the movie he makes you hate him so much; not because he’s bad, but because he’s just such a sniveling turd.  But as the movie goes on, he wins me over, growing as a character and maybe becoming more of a man.  And he does one of the only really effective drunk performances I’ve ever seen.  Beyond that, this low budget science fiction/horror film is surprisingly effective.  A photographer is tasked with getting his bosses daughter back home to the United States from Central America.  The problem is, most of Mexico is covered in what is known as the ‘infected zone,’ a region covered in invasive alien life.  I suppose there’s an element of social commentary, looking at how giant disasters effect those without the financial means to escape and the extreme methods people use to get to America (not to mention the advantage taken of those who try).  But overall, it’s a road trip adventure movie mixed with elements of classic Kaiju.

    I finished Scatter Adapt and Remember, a pretty darned good book about how we might survive an oncoming mass extinction.

    “The greatest Bruce in rock is Bruce Kulick, guitar player for Kiss 1984-1996, from Brooklyn.  Case closed.”  I read issues 7, 8, and 9 of Hawkeye.  It’s a fine comic, but I still don’t get what the big deal is; why people are going so apenuts for it.  There are some funny bits, and I like that they’re keeping a lot of the more outlandish superheroes and villains out of it.  But I still hate the art, and I still don’t see what makes people so gushy about it.  I guess it’s like E.R., or Seinfeld and Friends, or Richard Geer.  I know they’re popular, so they must have something that makes people watch.  But whatever it is is totally lost on me.

    “Gods are such beautiful creatures, I’ve never been more sure of that.  Because I’ve seen what they look like on the inside.”  I then read issues 2, 3, and 4 of Thor: God of Thunder.  Only one more issue to go in the God Butcher story arc.  The first issue was great, with a lot of ‘holy cats!’ kind of potential.  Once the story really gets going, though, it’s only pretty good.  I don’t know if maybe, like Godzilla The Half Century War, it should have been a bit longer, like say 10 issues, or if the idea wasn’t quite as good as it seemed like it might be.  I’ll have to read the final chapter in the story to find out for sure.  Still, I love the art and there are a lot of intriguing ideas.  I want more of Thor doing intergalactic P.I. work.  Even the appearance of Iron Man, which initially bothered me (the first panel, with the two of them flying together, gave me that heart sinking feeling when you’re hoping for a new pony but get a pair of socks), is handled pretty well.

    “Get the boys to load her into the car--Then you can dump her like a gentleman.”  On a roll, I figured I’d read the first two issues of the new Rocketeer miniseries, Hollywood Horror.  Now, I love the Rocketeer and I love Lovecraftian horror.  And I even see ways they might work together.  This ain’t it.  I dislike the narrator intensely and I absolutely hate the art.  It’s like a super-crappy kids comic, the sort of thing only kids would be so lacking in sophistication as to accept as passable.  It looks like the worst stuff Cartoon Network dishes out.  Anyway, in spite of my Rocketeer love and immense gladness that the property is being developed, I can only hope that this isn’t a sign of things to come, simply a speed-bump along the way.

    “I really hope that brown river has something to do with chocolate…”  Yeah, they’re not that great, but Futurama comics give me a nice bite sized chuckle.  The writing is about on par with later seasons of the show, not the classic amazingness of the first few.  The art is fine.  It’s not something anyone needs to rush right out and buy, but if you’re looking for something quick that gives you a laugh, it’s a pretty good choice.

    And to round out my comic reading for the week, I ended up finally sitting down to the two Morbus Gravis trades I picked up years ago.  Man, I like the art.  I don’t think much of the content, though.

-Matt

Matt’s Week in Dork! (10/14/12-10/20/12)

    Not much in the way of Dork life for most of the week.  But on Friday night, there was another meeting of the Justice League of Extraordinary Book Club.  This month, for Halloween, we read the Hellboy anthology The Chained Coffin.  I was surprised (and very happy) that folks seemed to really like it.  Much more than I was expecting.  And several people expressed interest in reading more (Jill’s already started).  Hellboy is so rooted in the things I love.  The weird tales of H.P. Lovecraft, Arthur Machen, William Hope Hodgson, and others; the fairytales of the Brothers Grimm and others; Judeo-Christian mythology; medieval history and legend; the pulps like The Shadow, Doc Savage, and The Spider; and so many more.


Lust for a Vampire:  There are elements of this film that I really like, but it is a total mess.  Pretty young women dancing about in Greek-type robes, Ralph Bates’ mousy freak, and the wacky pseudo-Christopher Lee jabbering on in Latin.  Oh, yeah.  But the production looks…well, it looks like a TV episode or something.  Even the nudity is awkward.  As usual, there’s plenty of bodice-ripping opportunity, but much of the nudity that is in the film seems tacked on or wedged in where it doesn’t belong.  It also doesn’t help that Yutte Stensgaard looks so much like Shelly Long.  Not one of the better Hammer Gothics.

Fright Night:  This surprisingly charming update to the minor vampire classic does a pretty good job of bringing things to the modern day, while still capturing a bit of an 80s vibe.  Collin Farrell turns in one of his best performances, and everyone seems to be having a good time.  It is frustrating that in spite of the blood, the film feels very PG-13, and I was surprised to find out it was R.  I guess they drop the F bomb too many times.  As always, a little less obvious CG would have been nice.

The Brood:  Oliver Reed, man.  Somehow, I don’t think he’d have been a good psychologist.  Every move he makes, every expression on his face lets you know he is filled with raging contempt and barely checked violence.  His outer calmness is clearly hiding an seething inner chaos of hate.  Not conducive to mental health.  Winter bleached Canada is once again the depressing home of horror as David Cronenberg explores our violent impulses and what happens when we don’t want to deal with them.  There’s some cool stuff in this movie.  However, I don’t know if it’s the hero or what, but I don’t find it especially interesting.  Not one of Cronenberg’s better films.

Spontaneous Combustion:  This movie is crazy.  A seemingly forgotten Tobe Hooper film that is well worth rediscovering.  In the same semi-genre as Scanners, Firestarter, The Dead Zone, and other psi-power awakening films.  I think, in the aftermath of the 50s and 60s, when a lot of secrets about experiments the government had been getting up to came out, there was a brand of anxiety this film cashes in on.  The late 70s and 80s were full of movies and TV shows about the results of science run amok, always awakening nasty bits of human potential.  Poor Brad Dourif.  He’s a nice guy, but everybody’s dumping on him, and his inner fire is about to get out of hand.  This movie doesn’t always work, but there’s enough cool in it to make it worth watching.  This is one I’d love to see get a good remake.

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom:  “Nothing shocks me.  I’m a scientist.”  Often dismissed, I think this is a good entry in the series, with plenty to love.  I grant you, Kate Capshaw is quite aggravating.  And the effects don’t always play.  But there’s some excellent action.  I think my major complaint about this movie is its limited setting.  After a brief stop in Hong Kong, the rest of the film takes place in India.  But Indiana Jones is kind of like James Bond.  He’s a world hopper, and having him stuck in one location feels wrong (like that Bond film where he spends all his time in Japan).

House of Whipcord:  Ugh.  They’re called lights.  They’ve been using them on film sets for a century.  Half the time, you can’t see anything that’s happening because it seems the filmmakers didn’t pay the lighting bill.  But worry not, the annoying, sniveling voice of Penny Irving never stops.  And while you can’t always tell what she’s saying, you can always tell it’s stupid.  I guess this is S&M porn (it’s not actually porn), but it’s all pretty silly.  I suppose if anyone ever turned a light on, there would be a lot of nudity.  But they don’t.  A right wing group of sexually repressed weirdoes kidnap young women to abuse them for imagined crimes.  And plenty of bad lighting and editing later, I still don’t care.  Is that prison matron John Noble in drag?

King Kong:  “I’m just an actor with a gun.”  Peter Jackson’s remake of the original 1933 King Kong, one of the best adventure films of all time, is clearly made with a great deal of love.  And generally speaking, it’s very good.  An epic of weird retro-adventure.  But on a few occasions it does fail.  The most obvious and glaring problem is the canyon stampede scene, which is super clunky, totally unneeded, and looks bloody terrible (seriously, it looks horrendous…how did this make the final cut?).  Some sequences run too long, especially the big Kong VS ‘V-Rex’ scene, which feels like it will never end.  And some of that time could have been better spent exploring the island and its mysteries.  But, problems aside, there are great characters, fantastic visual feasts, grand adventure in the spirit of the original, and some very emotional and beautiful scenes.  Kong is rendered with supreme skill and technical finesse.  Naomi Watts is a beautiful woman, and can sell youthful innocence with a tinge of world weary resignation (she really doesn’t look her age…it’s kind of creepy).  This was Jackson’s dream project, the movie he’s wanted to do since getting into the movies (and before, I’m sure).  And I get that.  It would be one of mine, too (along with Creature from the Black Lagoon and Conan).  It’s not a perfect film.  But it’s a grand adventure film like they rarely make these days.

The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad:  This is actually two separate stories in one movie.  First up is a story taken from The Wind in the Willows.  It’s a pretty good short film.  But I think that UK stop motion version from 15 or 20 years ago is much, much better.  The second is the adaptation of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.  It’s a pretty good, pretty freaky telling of the tale.  Some good funny bits, and some good creepy bits.

Massacre in Dinosaur Valley:  “Want a banana?”  Ah, Brazil.  Land of cockfighting and plastic surgery disasters.  Amazing ADR.  Better music.  Spectacular acting.  Tip-top editing and cinematography.  And that ‘humorous’ sexual assault scene.  Didn’t it get nominated as one of the all time greats by the AFI?  This movie is really, really dumb.  It’s only mildly entertaining.  By the way, you don’t get to call your film Massacre in Dinosaur Valley if there are in fact, no dinosaurs.  Now, some attractive women take their clothes off, and that makes up for a lot.  But I’m darn well owed some dinosaurs.  The disk has a bunch of special features.  Probably my favorite are star Michael Sopkiw’s personal photos from his time in Brazil.  The interview is kind of interesting; hearing the story of a guy who had a strange kind of success, but a temporary kind.

You want dinosaurs?  Try a different movie, buddy.

Terror of Mechagodzilla: “Your heart is frozen and dry.  Who’d love a cyborg?”  One of the better late Godzilla films, it’s got some pretty good storytelling and cool creature effects.  I love these movies.  And I’m not normally a fan of Japanese film.  Aliens, cyborgs, peaceful monsters, electrocutions.  Oh, yeah.  It’s interesting that Godzilla doesn’t show up for 50ish minutes in this movie (and it’s a great entrance).  There’s other stuff going on, and the giant sea monster Titanosaurus blows some stuff up (or over, anyway).

Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Beginning of the End:  “Women on the verge of an atomic breakdown.”  This dreadful bit of 50s Atomic Horror is full of Burt I. Gordon awfulness.  But with Mike and the Bots along for the ride, it’s a fun bit of wackiness.  They’re pretty on with this movie, cutting it up pretty hard.  And the grim views into the private life of Dr. Forrester and TV’s Frank will strike terror into the stoutest heart.

Sound of Horror:  “She’s only an amateur.  And a woman.”  This movie teaches a few lessons.  Don’t go to Greece and blow up Neanderthal burial mountains.  Especially if those Neanderthals date all the way back to the Siege of Troy!  If you like seeing old sweaty dudes dig holes in a cave, this is the movie for you.  There is actually some potential here, but it’s sabotaged by profound technical failures.  It’s shot poorly, and the audio and dubbed voices make it feel extra crappy.  There’s a taste of the weird tale and the classic monster movie.  But sadly, this is no classic.  Check out young Ingrid Pitt as the go-go dancing hanger-on.

Tosca:  “My love nest has been defiled!”  Puccini’s opera gets a cinematic adaptation in this 1976 version.  Placido Domingo with his Riker beard is pretty awesome.  But I was quickly reminded of something I’ve said many times.  I just don’t dig Italian opera.  German?  Sure.  Italian…Meh.  As far as the story goes, I think the lesson learned here is don’t hook up with a crazy, jealous bitch.  Tosca is a paranoid harpy who continually suspects poor Mario of every kind of infidelity with little or no cause beyond her own self-obsessed insecurity.  I’m a loyal guy, but two hours of this woman’s flip-flopping emotions, accusations, and suspicions would probably drive me into the arms of another woman…Or a monastery.  Though she eventually becomes less awful as their situation grows more terrible.  And the end is pretty badass.

P.J. Harvey on Tour -Please Leave Quietly:  P.J. Harvey is probably my favorite currently active musical act.  She’s frequently on my computer’s rotation, her CDs often near the top of the pile.  Hers was also the first real concert I ever attended (what can I say, I lived in Maine for 31 years and 38 Special didn’t do anything for me).  So when she put out a live DVD, of course I picked it up.  Sadly, it’s just not what I wanted at all.  It’s super disjointed and looks thrown together.  The music sounds good, but it’s not shot at a single event.  Even within a single song there is footage from several different performances.  It just feels weird and fake.  Parts of various performances are really good, but I really, really don’t like the format.  Also, her guitarist who keeps twitching and falling about is annoying as hell.

Master of the Flying Guillotine:  Jimmy Wang Yu is the One Armed Boxer, and he’s got old man assassin problems.  A blind old dude, with a long white beard has a wacky head chopping weapon, is looking to trim some martial artists… a bit off the top.  A fighting contest, a bunch of foreign fighters, and some fantastically weird music all crank up the kung fu chop-socky.  Some pretty good fights and some unintentionally hysterical dubbing.  Great stuff.

Lost Horizon:  I like this quiet and thoughtful, almost wistful movie about a man’s hope for a better world.  After fleeing violent conflict, a diplomat and a ragtag group of refugees crash in the mountains of central Asia.  From there, a dangerous journey through the snow takes the group to a hidden land of peace and tranquility.  But not everyone wants peace.  Not everyone is ready or willing to be happy.  Not everyone can cast off the trappings of their former life.  The movie is like a dream, a meditation on paradise, and a contemplation of life and desire.  It’s a fascinating classic, which was not well received in its day, and there’s no wonder.  Not an action movie, but a grand spiritual journey.

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade:  “Goose-stepping morons like yourself should try reading books instead of burning them.”  I know this is an unpopular opinion, but this is probably my least favorite of all the Indiana Jones films.  Don’t get me wrong, that still puts it up there.  It’s pretty great.  But it has some major problems.  The entire opening, featuring young Indiana, is bloody awful.  It’s too humorous and goofy (what‘s with that fat kid?).  Even the credits kind of suck (and that’s not something I usually notice).  Why is Marcus a bumbling idiot?  And as a friend recently pointed out, it’s lame that all of his trademark quirks (hat, whip, chin scar, snake fear, etc.) all come out of one single event.  Plus there is too much of an attempt to remake the first film.  Another Judeo-Christian artifact, more Nazis, a very similar plot progression.  The differences are what make it work, in spite of the problems.  The relationship with his father and the more fatale femme.  And the world hopping is back, which is something I want in this kind of film.

The Mummy:  I have such mixed feelings about this movie.  I was pretty jazzed to see it when it first came out, but was seriously disappointed upon watching.  It still feels like they were trying to do too many things, go in too many directions, and thus failed at all.  It’s not funny enough to be a comedy, not scary enough to be a horror movie, and not exciting enough to be an action movie.  But over the years, I’ve come to enjoy it as a light bit of pulpy fun (not good, but fun).  Of course, the Egyptian history nerd in me screams out at how much they bungle things.  But that happens every time ancient Egypt is used (10 Commandments, I’m looking at you!).  This movie did finally give me a name for a character archetype.  The Beni Character is that guy who shows up in a story only because the writer needs someone to create conflict.  Pay attention to Beni (Kevin J. O’Connor) in this.  He is directly responsible for every single bad thing that happens.  And, if someone just put a bullet in him the first time he did something that clearly warranted immediate execution (At the ten minute mark, by the way.  Though an argument could be made for eight minutes, I would vote for a severe beating, not death, for that act.) then everything would have turned out fine.  The Beni character is all too common these days, especially in the realm of horror, where nearly every horror movie (and most science fiction) relies purely on at least one character being as stupid as humanly possible in order to move the plot along (see: any ghost movie, Drag Me to Hell, Prometheus, Sunshine, etc.).  It also serves as a reminder that while CGI can do amazing things, it shouldn’t be a star unto itself.  Anyhow, I think this was the movie where I first really noticed Rachel Weisz.  And for that, it deserves a certain place in my movie lover’s heart.

    I read B.P.R.D. volume 3.  That continues to be an excellent series, and I can’t wait to read the next volume, which should be out in a little over a month.  And first volume of the New 52 Aquaman, which was a heck of a lot of fun.

    And in the wake of the Hellboy reading of last week, I finally sat down to the Library Edition volume 5, as well as the finishing part of that story, the trade paperback The Storm and the Fury.  Kept chugging along and read the short story anthology The Bride of Hell.

    After the extremely fun Aquaman: The Trench, I figured what the heck, and read that series’ issue 0.  It’s pretty much just a glossed over origin story.  Not much actual depth, but at least it gives you a few facts of his beginnings.

    Issue 63 of Futurama was pretty funny.  It got a couple good chuckles out of me, actually.  They do a good job of capturing the characters from the show.  You can almost hear the voice actors as you read.  There’s certainly nothing of consequence going on.  But it’s perfectly enjoyable silliness.

    Issue 0 of Batman The Dark Knight is a reminder of how familiar Bruce Wayne’s origins are at this point, and how it might be time to stop revisiting it.  Everything here is stuff you’ve seen before, from a slightly different angle.  Not really an interesting one.

-Matt