Category: Movies

Two Movies That Hold Up @Schwarzenegger @STARZ #Predator #TheFly

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Some random channel surfing on Tuesday night led me to Arnold Schwarzenegger Predator. I picked up about halfway through and was struck with how well this movie held up. People will always find a way to complain, but I don’t think Predator would offend anyone. The acting and story remain interesting, and even the special effects hold up well. The most complicated thing to deal with is the Predator himself, but he’s invisible for most of the movie. His cloak is a bit odd, but that’s exactly what you’d expect from a cloaking device. It’s not going to be perfect.

Wednesday’s random channel surfing led me to one of my favorite movies during my teenage years: Jeff Goldblum’s The Fly. The computer technology that supposedly manages teleportation is also remarkably (but expectedly) primitive for such a feat, and the prosthetics are a little dated, but much like Predator, they’re irrelevant until the very end. Nevertheless, they made a great effort showing the slow transformation into “Brundlefly,” and Goldblum’s head tics were a nice touch. The end was emotionally powerful enough to help you ignore any special effects shortcomings.

As an elementary school student, I was terrified of the 1958 version of the film because of the final scene with the small human getting eaten by a spider (a cheesy scene I’m glad they didn’t duplicate in this version). I’ve had an irrational hatred of bugs ever since. Note well I said hatred. I don’t fear bugs; I want to punch them in their faces. And yes, lobsters are bugs, so I won’t eat them. The Incredible Shrinking Man made matters only worse.

Okay, you didn’t really need that journey into my twisted mind. Be grateful I’m stopping there. The point is that both of these movies are easily watchable today. If you have Starz, give them a(nother) shot.

Unless you’re entomophobic. As always, YMMV.

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Classic Movies: Top Secret @valkilmer @CBSAllAccess #TopSecret #movie #CBSAllAccess #ClassicMovie #GoodWatch

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The other day, I was thinking, “I’d really like to see Top Secret again.” This weekend, I watched the latest episode of the Stand, and afterwards went browsing through the movie list on CBS All Access and found — you guessed it — Top Secret.

This category, Classic Watch, is reserved for classic movies like Casablanca and Citizen Kane. Perhaps it was inappropriate to include the Nightmare Before Christmas, but I make no apologies for including this one. This movie is a classic as far as I’m concerned. It’s stupid fun. Some of the gags were dated, in part because younger people won’t get the references (e.g., the exploding Ford Pinto), and in other part because people today are far more sensitive than they were in the 80s. I must admit that the latter makes me snicker a little bit.

As always, YMMV.

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4th Edition D&D Has Poisoned Star Trek #DnD #RPG #StarTrek

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Way back when, 4th edition Dungeons & Dragons created a meaningless dust up. It presented female dragonborn (anthropomorphic reptiles) with mammary glands. That is, they had boobs. This makes no sense, and now, after all these years, this thinking has infested Star Trek.

The Andorion gets my vote.

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My Latest eBay Purchase @StarTrek @eBay #StarTrek #eBay

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Sundays are now lazy days for me. Going forward, I’m just going to re-post other people’s work or just do something silly. Today it’s my latest eBay purchase.

Not all of us are smart.

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I Refuse to Drop Either of These @StarTrek @StarWars #StarTrek #StarWars

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Sundays are now lazy days for me. Going forward, I’m just going to re-post other people’s work or just do something silly. Today it’s … well, let’s just say I refuse to let this go, both the meme and the underlying issue.

Star Trek >> Star Wars.

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Time to Move on from #Christmas #MCU #Thanos

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I hope you all enjoyed your Christmas, even if you don’t celebrate it, but it’s time to move on. We need to focus on getting rid of this horrible, COVID-19-infested year. That can be tough to do, so we’ll need some help. Fortunately, he’s already here, and he’s inevitable.

I know that moving past Christmas can be hard for some, but take down those Christmas lights, or you’ll be next. Now is no time for Christmas. In fact, now is no time at all.

Strange bedfellows, and all that.

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Jar Jar Abrams Should Leave Us Alone #StarWars #Mandalorian #ThisIsTheWay

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Sundays are now lazy days for me. Going forward, I’m just going to re-post other people’s work or just do something silly. Today it’s a meme shared on Facebook, and it isn’t silly. It’s a serious commentary as far as I’m concerned.

Image may contain: 3 people, text that says 'We can't satisfy the original trilogy fans while appealing to a new, younger audience. HOLD MY BLUE MILK.'

I’m not alone in my view.

Then there’s this:

Abrams Discussing Star Trek With Jon Stewart : startrek
How could you hand the reins of Star Trek to a guy who hates Star Trek?

I could go on forever.

Jar Jar Abrams should stay away from anything nerdy. He clearly doesn’t get it.

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Uncertain Watch: Replicas @replicas_movie @hbomax #GoodWatch #replica

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Replica is yet another movie addressing the nature of the human mind, and whether we could transplant human consciousness from one mind to another. There are a lot of problems with this movie. Disconnected writing, terrible special effects, and cheesy dialogue plague it. To make matters worse, the story needs to cover far more ground than it can in 1 hour and 45 minutes. As a result, characters accept without question revelations that should be mind-shattering. There’s no time for them to come to terms with this information.

All that said, I’ve learned to focus on the ideas that these movies raise rather than how they address them. Who cares if the movie doesn’t handle an issue thoroughly (or even correctly)? My brain does a pretty good job of considering those issues, at least to the extent of my own knowledge base. That works for me.

So, I guess that means I liked it. Replicas is streaming on HBO Max. As always, YMMV.

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Great Watch: Richard Jewell @hbomax #GoodWatch #RichardJewell

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I have a lot of streaming services. This week, I shifted back to HBO Max to watch a couple of movies. First up was Richard Jewell.

First off, this was a great movie about how the FBI railroaded a hero, Richard Jewell. Clint Eastwood knows how to tell a story, and the fact that this was true (more or less) makes it all the more impactful.

I don’t ever want to get political on this blog, but every so often it’s unavoidable. Being a cop is hard work, and being a good cop cuts against human nature. Only those people capable of living up to a heightened standard should become cops, and that occurs only with training. If you’re not capable of putting the public’s interest in catching the bad guys ahead of your own career goals, you aren’t living up to that standard. It’s frustrating knowing cops like that are out there, but it’s important to acknowledge and address it. It also makes for good storytelling.

But cops aren’t the only ones under the microscope in this movie. So are the rest of us.

Richard Jewell is streaming on HBO Max. As always, YMMV.

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Father of the Year @quiethandfilms #StarWars #Mandalorian #ThisIsTheWay

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Sundays are now lazy days for me. Going forward, I’m just going to re-post other people’s work or just do something silly. Today it’s a completely unverified quote from an anonymous source with respect to the Mandalorian. Maybe Giancarlo will see my mention and verify it. Doubt it.

Enjoy.

Father of the year. Seriously.

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