Hyperion

Bloodsport. Love it, have done since the first time I saw it 20 years or so ago! So its ropey as hell and JCVD's make up is well shoddy ( way too much blusher in places). Am sure that Jason from NR,NS is one of the fighters at the Kumite. but then Robin from Maid Marian (Wayne Morris) and Victor Wong from Big Trouble in Lil China are listed and I cant see any of them???? Also fairly realistic use of Karate Champ Arcade Machine, which is unusual for a movie. Least it sounds and looks right

Because they are not in it, just same name actors miscredited on IMDB, happens all the time on that site.

There was a nice Cube boxset around with all 3 films in at one point, its quite expensive on some sites but should turn up in places cheap if you buy second hand.

For a couple of years I've wanted to get a copy of Dark City Fight Club's entrance music to no avail, then today I casually downloaded Red Dwarf: Back To Earth since I've never bothered to watch it because everyone said it was wank, and there in the 2nd part is the DCFC theme, didn't take me long to track it down with this new info. This is it, pretty much

I liked The Hangover but never felt it was as good as some were claiming, I watched it and wondered if those people had ever watched any good comedies before.That said I've felt similar about other recent comedies like Date Night and Hot Tub Time Machine as well.

 

I missed the critical acclaim for Date Night, but I thought Hot Tub Time Machine was atrocious. The first Hangover is brilliant, though. I've only ever heard awful, awful things about Cop Out but haven't seen it. I might do, as well as Date Night, as I'm very fond of the 30 Rock cast now.

Hot Tub Time Machine is atrocious, I'd rather watch Scary Movie 2 than that. Best bit of Date Night is the car/taxi bit with Leon from Curb Your Enthusiasm, rest of the movie was just there, ok but nowt special.

Cop Out takes me back to the old days, to films like Stakeout. Check the trailer, you should know straight away if you'll like it just from that.

Comedy really is just personal taste though, one person's gold is another person's turd.

I liked The Hangover but never felt it was as good as some were claiming, I watched it and wondered if those people had ever watched any good comedies before.That said I've felt similar about other recent comedies like Date Night and Hot Tub Time Machine as well. If people think they are hilarious then fair do's cause I think 'Cop out' is funny and I bet people hate that.

I was re-watching Jackie Brown yesterday and joked to myself that Robert De Niro's character will be me when I'm old then I realised Louis Cara was probably the long lost dad of Julian from Trailer Park Boys and that's how I'll view him for the rest of my life.

The Thin Red Line. Worst war film ever. Nearly 3 hours long and only an hour of action. They could have cut this by about 45 minutes they didn't concentrate so much on random scenery and boring dialogue. I'm sure some people wanked over all that though.

I was reading the 'World Of Hurt' thread and it just vanished. Has it been deleted? I can understand with all the shite posted that was off topic but is it not possible to just clean the thread of these posts and reinstate it?

The Other Guys. Very hit and miss. The hits are very funny, the misses are very pointless. Not a bad film overall, although a bit long. Some funny quotes to come out of it, the best being "Did someone call 9 1 holy shit?".

I'd agree with that assessment. Though I think I preferred 'Cop Out' slightly more when I watched them at the same time.

Whats the consensus of 'Cop Out' round here anyway?

I felt like I'd watched an amusing movie that seemed like a tribute to 80's cop films and it took me back to those times whilst watching it but I see alot of people slating it especially cause Kevin Smith directed it.

I need to watch both these films again soon cause they were good fun.

Just knocked out two films I've not seen before.

Letters From Iwo Jima

While I saw the companion piece Flags Of Our Fathers a year ago, I put off seeing this version of the same battle but from the Japanese perspective until now, maybe cause it seems less interesting on the surface, its about "the enemy" and has no big names in it outside of Ken Watanabe. Upon recently re-watching The Pacific series and FOOF, I thought I better watch this finally. And I'm very impressed with it, its slightly better than the film of the American side of the story, Clint Eastwood has made a great film here. Despite its 140min running time and being subtitled, it seems to fly by. As I'm quite interested in WWII and can lose hours on Wiki reading about it, I was riveted by the story which is pretty much historically accurate. Usually in the battles of the Pacific on film the Japanese are portrayed one dimensionally or inaccurately but this one gives you great characters that you can feel for and respect without portraying the American Marines as the villains so to speak, there is good and evil on both sides.

Watanabe plays General Kuribayashi who is put in charge of the men at Iwo Jima, he spent several years in the US before the war and this leads some officers under his command to think he's an American sympathiser when he rubs them up the wrong way by totally changing the Islands fortifications before the Marines arrive. Unlike some of his officers, he doesn't believe in wasting men with honourable suicides instead of a tactical retreat or in needless Banzai attacks. The story follows him and the army under his command right down to the lowly Saigo who was forced to go fight and leave his wife. Without resupplies of food or ammo and no air support or help from the now decimated Japanese fleet, its up to Kuribayashi and his men to hold Iwo Jima as long as possible knowing its a hopeless situation.

Its a great film and I'm glad I took the time to finally watch it. You won't be rooting for the Japanese to kill Marines but you will see them in a more human light and gain a bit of sympathy and respect for some of them and the situation they were put in whether they liked it or not.

Rampage

Yes its a Uwe Boll movie, the first and probably last of his films I'll ever watch. I always think Brendan Fletcher has a Daniel Bryan look about him when he was in The Pacific, I looked him up on IMDB and this films DVD sleeve caught my eye, I had a closer look and despite it being a Uwe Boll movie it had a decent rating and people seemed to think it'd be given a fair shake if his name wasn't on it. It sounded intriguing so I instantly downloaded it to watch.

Fletcher plays Bill, a 23 year old loser who's disgruntled with every aspect of his life, so donning a full suit of body armour that he's slowly built in the basement, some bombs and a couple of Sub-machine guns, he goes on a massive killing spree through the local town but is there a method to his madness.

I think at worst its a violent columbine massacre type wank fantasy but at best a low budget film that's very watchable (albeit disturbing) and unpredictable. You don't know how to feel about Bill at first but as it goes on you'll quickly make your mind up. I did not like the editing of the film, it lost it some tension I felt, nor did I feel there was any message here other than the world's a violent place and shit like this does happen. While it seems to take ideas from the excellent 'Falling Down' with Michael Douglas and some real life events it has enough originality to not feel like a total rip off. I do worry that some mentals will watch this and think its a great idea. All said and done it was an okay 90 minute time passer that kept me interested. Oh and Max Headroom is his dad. Trailer to help you to make your own mind up if you want to see it or not.

What's the BSR stand for in Austin's Twitter name? I can't help but feel stupid for not being able to figure it out.

Edit: Broken Skull Ranch.

Answered my own question

I'm liking the Straw Dogs remake trailer.

Just got another film on my retro rewatch done.

 

3) Saturn 3

A 1980 Sci-fi film starring Kirk Douglas, Farrah Fawcett & Harvey Keitel. There isn't a great deal of plot but I like it and I'd quite enjoy a modern day re-imagining of the film if I'm honest. The film starts when the unstable Benson (Keitel) murders a fellow pilot and steals his spot as the captain of a one man ship heading to Titan, Saturn's 3rd moon hence the title. Upon landing at the moonbase he meets his hosts, scientists Adam (Douglas) and Alex (Fawcett). Adam and Alex have been there 3 years alone with their dog and despite an age gap have become a couple. Benson takes an immediate interest in Alex and the fact she has never been to earth, he also announces he has brought the components to build an Android that will replace one of them, hinting it will be Adam. Adam realises his paradise with Alex is under threat and talks about murdering Benson to Alex. Meanwhile Benson continues to try lure Alex into bed and constructing the big robot called Hector. Using a head jack he uses his own thoughts to educate Hector's A.I., unfortunately this means he absorbs his obsession with Alex and his murderous impulses as he becomes more and more independent.

So basically an old bloke, a younger bloke and a big Android all wanna bang the same chick in outer space and none are above considering murder.

The main interest of the film is how cool the above sounds and possibly to see Keitel in space. The bad points are probably the low budget, Lew Grade financed this and 'Raise The Titanic' at the same time, as the latter went over budget the former had to have its budget cut to compensate. The SFX in the space scenes are laughable compared to Empire Strikes Back, this must have been where the budget was cut.

The acting is nothing of note, Keitel looks menacing but his lines are dubbed over and Grade ordered two violent scenes to be cut, in fact there's meant to be 20 minutes cut but I don't know if they'd improve the film, if anything the 83 minute runtime is enough.

The Android is pretty cool and the scenes of them running from him under the grating of the endless corridors not knowing where he is, is reminiscent of Alien but less tense. Not a great film but an interesting piece that I had fun watching again.

 

I have sampled the shit out of that movie. Cool film, and as has been said, Fawcett's tits are specTACular.

 

just been looking to buy that, ive been reading a Sci-Fi book about films that inspired by, and that were inspiration for Star Wars. That came free with Empire a couple of years back, its filled with old reviews, Saturn 3 was one of them.

 

The Last Starfighter is another movie i wanna get cause of the book.

Sounds interesting, films like Star Wars, Indiana Jones & Mad Max 2 definitely inspired lots of movies, good and bad.

The Last Starfighter is great fun, I went to see it at cinema as a kid, the alien assassins were pretty scary to my young eyes. And to this day me and my mate still regularly do impressions of the "We die" scene. Pretty much a movie landmark in CGI too. Might give that a Download one day as I only have it on VHS at the moment.

That's why European Horror stuff is so good, they rarely short change you or try to be overly clever, whereas Hollywood just phones it in most of the time.

Anyway I completed my current retro watch this afternoon with a 1984 Sci-fi film:

Runaway

Written & Directed by Michael Crichton and starring Tom Selleck as Jack Ramsey a cop who specialises in dealing with robots who have run amok (just like in Patlabor but on a smaller scale) and who has a fear of heights. He is teamed up with a new female partner, Karen, who he refreshingly likes, no cliched sexism or arguments, in fact they are both likable characters throughout the movie. They deal with a standard case which is then followed by a murder committed by a housekeeping robot which is an oddity. They soon end up discovering that chips are being added to robots that can turn them into killers. These chips are in the hands of Villain Dr Charles Luther (played by Gene Simmons in his cinematic debut), who has mini robot spiders (like Smythe's Spider Slayers in Spider-man) and a gun that fires personalised body heat seeking rockets. Ramsey and Co. try to take him down and recover the chips before he sells them to terrorists and the mob, meeting along the way Luther's girlfriend (played by Kirstie Alley when she was pretty fit).

Best thing about this film is that its dated well, its not said when its set and the futuristic stuff all looks pretty much like stuff we'd have today. None of the robots are humanoid, they are mainly Robot Wars style stuff with arms or Spiders about the size of a human foot. The Police have flat screen pads to use in the field just like iPads today, nothing seems too silly.

Of course it never became the Sci-fi hit of the year as intended because a B-movie took that honour, The Terminator, but its still a good watch all these years later.

Trailer

Watched two more retro movies tonight, both Roger Corman 'classics'

4) Battle Beyond The Stars

The seven Samurai/Magnificent Seven crossed with Star Wars with trashy results.

The Evil Sador (John Saxon) and his Malmori mutants hover their Warship over the planet of Akir (a homage to Akira Kurosawa like the whole plot). Sador tells the peace loving residents of the planet (or "bunch of fuckin' pussies" as Kenny Powers would call them) that they'll be back in a few days and when they are they better surrender to him or he'll destroy their planet. Why doesn't he demand immediate surrender, he's got all the weapons and an army, its not like the farmers can do much back but no, this procrastinating conqueror will get round to it next week sometime. So after he's gone, they decide they need help and off flies Shad on his own to search out help.

Shad is played by John Boy Walton actor Richard Thomas and is a bit of an annoying dipshit, think even the ship's computer thinks so. Anyway through a series of contrived meetings he has convinced a bird from an Android repair shop (his love interest), Space Cowboy (George Peppard, who has a ship full of weapons he was gonna deliver to a planet, Sador destroys at that very moment, now he's giving them away to Shad, how convenient), Nestor (who is 5 alien clones out to help for a laugh), Cayman (a lizard man and his crew), Gelt (Robert Vaughn pretty much reprising his Magnificent Seven part) and Saint-Exmin (a heaving chested Valkyrie who wants to fight, Shad tells her to sling her hook at first, one minute he's begging for help then next he's turning it down, the thick lump).

Anyway Sador comes back and they raise up to fight him and save the people of Akir.

The SFX are nothing to write home about, everything flashes on the screen in one second cuts to hide the cheapness (cause they blew the whole budget on Vaughn & Peppard). The models are pretty good, they were made by James Cameron (yes that one) who got noticed here and met Gale Anne Hurd on the set, who he married and made Terminator, Aliens and The Abyss with, so some good came out of this film. It also made a tidy profit.

Personally I have a lower opinion of this than I used to, its fun but a bit long and badly written so I found myself taking the piss out of it rather than reminiscing. It still must have its fans, its out on Blu-ray in 2 months.

5)Space Raiders

Made in 1983, 3 years after the above, it saves money in its budget by re-using the James Horner soundtrack, Spaceships and SFX from Battle Beyond The Stars. It also uses pretty much unknown actors as well. It cracks off with a crappy gun battle between Space Pirates and Security Forces, a young lad stows away on the Pirates ship and gets whisked off on the run with them, after he helps repair their ship by getting into a small gap only he can fit in and replace a rod allowing them to escape the security force ships, they agree to take him home instead of ransoming him back, but they have to contend with a Alien gangster they owe money too, bounty hunters, stealing some ships and the Security forces huge robot ship tracking them first.

Its still quite enjoyable even if it is more 80's trash, the story is much more straight forward and the battle scenes are better than the above, not a patch on 'Return Of The Jedi' mind but I've seen worse. Couldn't help but think of Firefly/Serenity whilst watching it, I wonder if Joss Whedon took any influence from it.

They don't really make films like this anymore, fantasy space adventures are sorely lacking in number nowadays.

Just wondering, why is Tara "forced" to do what Madison Rayne says?

Ive just signed up with Wrestling Observer/F4W & I got the 1 month recurring membership, the questions Id like to ask people on here is any idea what day do they take out the money & I used paypal but my paypal account has 0 in it so will I end up getting in trouble with paypal & will I need to put money into my paypal account ?

Paypal should be linked to your bank account and draw it out of there. My paypal account always has zero in it unless I get credited for something and I've bought lots of stuff over the years.

How could I have left the tit shot out of the review.

Yeah Hector is a bit clunky at moving, looks pretty cool though in some shots especially the poster.

Just got another film on my retro rewatch done.

3) Saturn 3

A 1980 Sci-fi film starring Kirk Douglas, Farrah Fawcett & Harvey Keitel. There isn't a great deal of plot but I like it and I'd quite enjoy a modern day re-imagining of the film if I'm honest. The film starts when the unstable Benson (Keitel) murders a fellow pilot and steals his spot as the captain of a one man ship heading to Titan, Saturn's 3rd moon hence the title. Upon landing at the moonbase he meets his hosts, scientists Adam (Douglas) and Alex (Fawcett). Adam and Alex have been there 3 years alone with their dog and despite an age gap have become a couple. Benson takes an immediate interest in Alex and the fact she has never been to earth, he also announces he has brought the components to build an Android that will replace one of them, hinting it will be Adam. Adam realises his paradise with Alex is under threat and talks about murdering Benson to Alex. Meanwhile Benson continues to try lure Alex into bed and constructing the big robot called Hector. Using a head jack he uses his own thoughts to educate Hector's A.I., unfortunately this means he absorbs his obsession with Alex and his murderous impulses as he becomes more and more independent.

So basically an old bloke, a younger bloke and a big Android all wanna bang the same chick in outer space and none are above considering murder.

The main interest of the film is how cool the above sounds and possibly to see Keitel in space. The bad points are probably the low budget, Lew Grade financed this and 'Raise The Titanic' at the same time, as the latter went over budget the former had to have its budget cut to compensate. The SFX in the space scenes are laughable compared to Empire Strikes Back, this must have been where the budget was cut.

The acting is nothing of note, Keitel looks menacing but his lines are dubbed over and Grade ordered two violent scenes to be cut, in fact there's meant to be 20 minutes cut but I don't know if they'd improve the film, if anything the 83 minute runtime is enough.

The Android is pretty cool and the scenes of them running from him under the grating of the endless corridors not knowing where he is, is reminiscent of Alien but less tense. Not a great film but an interesting piece that I had fun watching again.

2) Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone

Also made in 1983 but ranked 44th highest grossing, it unfortunately got steamrolled over by coming out a week before Return Of The Jedi, least it got one week at #1 first. This film is like Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Mad Max 2 and the Borg from Star Trek in a blender but having enough originality to stand on its own. The film quality still looks great which has helped it age well and I was more impressed now than when I was younger by the amount of locations and big sets they employed throughout the film that made up for the fact there isn't much going on in the way of outer space stuff.

The movie starts with a galactic cruise ship getting hit by a meteor (Titanic in space anyone) only one escape pod makes out with 3 hot chicks inside they are taken prisoner by some Marauders. Our lead Peter Strauss hears of a reward for recovering those ladies and pilots his ship to the planet they are on with his female android at his side. On his adventures there he gets help from a 14 year old Molly Ringwald and has encounters with rival hunter Ernie Hudson & The Scavs, and battles the Zoners, maggot men, merwomen, mutated firebomb throwing midgets and the villainous cyborg Overdog (played to perfection by Michael Ironside). I can easily enjoy this as much as Star Wars and I appreciate the effort they put into it to make it look good and keep the story moving.

Bit of an early Ghostbusters thing going on with Reitman producing, Hudson starring plus an uncredited voice over by Harold Ramis. Adds to the fun.

 

I'll post again about the rest.

 

One of my favourite films growing up, total schlock but enjoyable and sinister as all hell in places (the mutants mostly), have not seen it in years, I seem to recall it was left nicely positioned for a sequal...

Didn't realise it lost out due to Jedi..life is harsh sometimes.

You should check it out again, its still great fun and I got more respect for it now than ever. If it had a less cheesy title and not been killed by bad timing of its release then it'd probably still be remembered better today.

I've been on a bit of a retro kick lately and torrented some of my childhood classics some of which aren't available to buy new anymore. Not only is it a trip down memory lane, its interesting to find out if they still stand up to my older eyes.

The first two I watched were:

1) High Road To China

The 27th highest grossing film of 1983, all I really remembered mostly from back in the day was Tom Selleck shooting a Lewis Gun. The plot involves a spoilt heiress Eve Tozer living it up in 1920's Istanbul, when her aide (played by Michael 'Admiral Ozzel/Mr Bronson/Hitler' Sheard) informs her that she will lose her inheritance to her father's villainous business partner if she doesn't find her father and present him to the London courts before he is officially declared dead. With the business partner sending numerous goons to stop her quest, she recruits O'Malley (Selleck), a drunken rough around the edges pilot and his two bi-planes to help her find her dad.

The relationship between Tozer and O'Malley is in a similar vein to Leia/Solo & Jones/Ravenwood, the film is sort of an Indiana Jones cash in. It features Brian Blessed & Wilford Brimley both seemingly having a blast helping the film roll from a slow start into an enjoyable adventure, Selleck is also fun to watch especially when rowing with the annoying Tozer. The Bi-planes get plenty of action, bombing, strafing and dogfighting against a German ace, the ending features a battle between a chinese fort (where our heroes are shacked up) against an invading Warlord.

The fact its set in the 1920's helps the film not look as dated as it might have done and while not a classic it was quite fun watching it again.

2) Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone

Also made in 1983 but ranked 44th highest grossing, it unfortunately got steamrolled over by coming out a week before Return Of The Jedi, least it got one week at #1 first. This film is like Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Mad Max 2 and the Borg from Star Trek in a blender but having enough originality to stand on its own. The film quality still looks great which has helped it age well and I was more impressed now than when I was younger by the amount of locations and big sets they employed throughout the film that made up for the fact there isn't much going on in the way of outer space stuff.

The movie starts with a galactic cruise ship getting hit by a meteor (Titanic in space anyone) only one escape pod makes out with 3 hot chicks inside they are taken prisoner by some Marauders. Our lead Peter Strauss hears of a reward for recovering those ladies and pilots his ship to the planet they are on with his female android at his side. On his adventures there he gets help from a 14 year old Molly Ringwald and has encounters with rival hunter Ernie Hudson & The Scavs, and battles the Zoners, maggot men, merwomen, mutated firebomb throwing midgets and the villainous cyborg Overdog (played to perfection by Michael Ironside). I can easily enjoy this as much as Star Wars and I appreciate the effort they put into it to make it look good and keep the story moving.

Bit of an early Ghostbusters thing going on with Reitman producing, Hudson starring plus an uncredited voice over by Harold Ramis. Adds to the fun.

I'll post again about the rest.

I know its on TV right now but after wanting to see it for about 6 years I bought the DVD set of Blade: The Series because its actually unrated/18 rated for UK rather than the tamer TV version. And you know it was well worth the

The Shitlist was amazing fun, it needs to be done again and if it gets shit wrestlers out of the business then all the better. Maybe do it separate as it did overshadow the good list.

Does Dan Fitch still post here? With all the bannings and name changes going about over last 6 months its hard to keep up. Not that I miss him I just noticed I hadn't seen him for awhile.

 

No. He was nominated for Dolt of the Year 2009, and had one of the biggest meltdowns this forum has ever seen over the following couple of days, resulting in a spectacular flounce.

Does Dan Fitch still post here? With all the bannings and name changes going about over last 6 months its hard to keep up. Not that I miss him I just noticed I hadn't seen him for awhile.